un: mori | text

[setpoint]

Hello everyone.

Recently I found something in my room. It seems to be some sort of diagnostic tool that can connect to the consoles. Most of them are missing a lot of data, and some are malfunctioning, but I did learn a few useful things.

First, the consoles and life support systems were reactivated the same day we woke up. A significant amount of data is corrupted, so the tool didn't give me a current date, only the number of days since then. It seems like the station was shut down completely before we arrived.

Second, the last time those systems were fully functioning was 2654. It didn't give me a month, and I don't know how long ago that was, but it is a baseline.

[Not a very pleasant one for her, but it's something.]

The good news is, the life support systems seem to be running properly. It hasn't picked up any issues.

Comments

[tekimetexeng]

[ Good on Alex! She's about to be much less subtle, though, so brace for it friendo. ]

I don't know. You're probably right, but you know I grew up on ships. It wasn't much worse than the slums for gravity, and better for just about everything else. And with the state of things...

[ Deep breath, Naomi, you can do it. ]

If I could have, I would have taken him with me. For better or worse.

[donkeyballs]

[ There's a long pause, where Alex just watches her, and wrestles with several different, overlapping feelings at the same time.

Shock, first - because he's known Naomi for years, and has never heard about her ever having a son. Confusion, for the same reason.

And then a deep deep empathy and sorrow, as his heart reached out to her.

But he had absolutely no idea what to say. So he only got out a single word, voice laden with the depth of emotion he was feeling: ]

... Naomi...

[tekimetexeng]

[ All of those emotions make perfect sense, and she watches them flicker through Alex's eyes as this new information settles. ]

The Martians weren't completely wrong, back on the Donnager... I had ties to the OPA. His father. I thought I didn't have to be involved, and then something happened that I couldn't live with. And he took Filip away from me, and I had to run.

I didn't want to leave my son, either. I thought maybe you'd understand that best.

[donkeyballs]

God, Naomi... I'm so sorry...

[ He is, for multiple reasons. Sorry for her loss. For not having known. For thinking he was alone in his pain - or at least alone with Prax - and for any time he accidentally rubbed his own issues in her face, while being completely oblivious to hers. It broke his heart. ]

Christ, I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

[tekimetexeng]

[ Hey now, he didn't know because she never told him. She's private like that. There were plenty of times it could have come up, but she'd kept quiet. And there's more to it, but no point in dredging it up. The important part is that she had a son, she'd had to leave him, and now she knows he's gone. Same as Alex. ]

Neither would I. But I hope he grew up well even without me. Melas too.

[ She raises her glass again. ]

Yam seng.

[donkeyballs]

[ His chin wobbles, just for a second, before he swallows and grits his teeth and finds his backbone. Then he carefully raises his glass, tipping it towards hers but not touching. ]

Yam seng.

[ And Amen. ]

[tekimetexeng]

[ They have to be strong. She'll probably break down and cry for awhile back in her quarters once it settles, but right now the sadness is only in her eyes. ]

I'd say we should invite Prax, but if he hasn't seen Mako's post yet...

[ Well, she doesn't want to be the one to break that news. ]

[donkeyballs]

[ He considered it for a minute, and then carefully, solemnly said: ]

He's gotta know, boss. Better it come from us.

[tekimetexeng]

[ Naomi sighs softly. He's right, of course, and she owes him one already. Best to break it to him themselves if he hasn't seen. ]

Right once again. I guess I'll be brave for a change.

[ She taps her communicator, calling Prax to ask him to come meet them at the bar. ]

[contorta]

( prax's been in the garden, not checking the network. he has a tendency to lose himself in plants and it helps, here and now. it's a good distraction. but the call comes and he makes his way over to the bar. he doesn't know what he'd expected, but the picture of alex and naomi drinking alone isn't it. )

Hello.

[tekimetexeng]

[ In the time it took Prax to get to the bar, Naomi has fetched another glass, and it sits before an empty seat at their table. Nothing in it yet, She doesn't actually even know if Prax drinks, but in this scenario the option seemed like a good idea.

She nudges the chair out with her foot and gives a little nod towards it. ]

Wa koming gut, Prax. Join us?

[ Welcome, she says, but neither of them look happy. In fact, they're both visibly upset, though Naomi has a much better poker face. ]

[contorta]

( the lang belta is not that familiar to prax's ears. even though he's a belter, ganymede stands out from other stations. something about the mix of inners and belters, the relative wealth of it, the safety -- though of course, that turned out to be an illusion.

he nods, starting forward where he's stopped, moving toward the seat and settling into it.

they look too serious for this to be good news. ) What's wrong?

[donkeyballs]

[ Alex glances at Naomi, and for a brief second thinks about letting her tell Prax - but then decides that he would start. When he speaks, his drawl is low and even, almost apologetic. ]

Doc, there's been some - well, news ain't the word. But we've learned something about the station.

We don't know what year it is now, but we know what year it was, when the old crew was here.

2654.

[contorta]

( at first, prax just nods. so they have a date. that's good, right? it's something, at any rate. it's information.

and then it sinks in.

2654.

he's suddenly glad he's sitting down. )

How —

[tekimetexeng]

[ The moment the date sinks in is obvious, and Naomi nods quietly. She hadn't expected Alex to take over the announcement, but it does save her the trouble of how to word it. Now she can just explain. ]

The command deck is still mostly locked down, but Mako Mori found a diagnostic tool and was able to access a full analysis of the life support systems. Before things turned back on when we started arriving fifty days ago, they were last active in 2654.

I questioned for a moment whether that was really measured in Earth years or some other metric, but all the recordings so far indicate the crew was human, and Alex says people have found classic Earth books in the quarters. It's probably Earth years. We'd suspected from the unfamiliar starscape that to get this far out we would have had to be in stasis for a time, but... I didn't think that long.

[contorta]

( there's a horrible lump in prax's throat, a heavy weight on his chest. it reminds him of the time when the gravity was down, when he was paralysed, unable to move. barely able to breathe. he feels that way again now.

he'd started coming to terms with mei being lost. he'd started hoping again. he'd started fearing she might be something worse than dead. he'd regained hope. clung to it.

and now —

if what naomi says is true, mei is long gone whether she was even still human or not. he turns his head away, the breath he drags in sounding suspiciously wet, and just pushes his glass toward the bottle in front of naomi.

drowning sorrows is a terrible plan, but he doesn't care right now. )

[tekimetexeng]

[ It might be that they don't have to worry about any of this. That whatever method by which they were brought here could traverse time and space in the opposite direction once they figure it out. No one had been able to thoroughly explain the alternate histories, after all, or the gaps between people from the same worlds, but Naomi is a practical person. A realist, and one who always braces for the worst case scenario. When someone can provide an explanation, she may dare to hope. Until then... she's going to process it like she would anything else, and let herself grieve. Her belief right now is that their children are gone.

Prax nudges his glass over and Naomi lifts the bottle to pour for him, starting a mental tally of how much they've all had so far. They'll have to keep an eye on each other to make sure no one goes overboard. ]

There's still a lot we don't understand involved here... nothing's entirely certain. We just thought you should hear the whole thing from us rather than come across the report on your own.

[donkeyballs]

[ Alex isn't drinking, at the moment, just sitting with his glass between his hands. ]

Now here's the thing. That's the date - or at least was the date - for where we are. And if we got here by stasis, that's - well. That's it.

But I don't think we did. Or at least - if we did, it was in tandem with somethin' else.

This station is full of people who are from Earth - but they ain't from our Earth. The histories don't line up. So something - that's gotta mean something, right? It can't just be that we're... That we're really out here, three hundred years later, and everyone else happens to be from somewhere else...?

[contorta]

( alex might not be drinking, but prax takes a big gulp from his glass the moment naomi's finished pouring. it burns all the way down and he almost has to cough a little, but it's a sensation he welcomes. it distracts him, at least momentarily, from the ache in his chest and the pressure in his head. )

What does that mean?

( he presses his lips together. he's a scientist, he should be able to analyse this, but right now, he can't think beyond mei has been dead for three hundred years. )

[donkeyballs]

[ He leans forward on the bar a little, turned so that he's facing both of them, and uses a hand to illustrate with gestures, the other still gripping his drink. ]

Alright. Hear me out.

We know when we're from. Right? That makes sense. But we also know when a lot of the other people are from. And some of them are way out. Vanessa, right, hell, she's from the 19th century. There's no way someone shoved her into cryo, right? They didn't have any of that shit, back then. So unless some alien just - snuck down onto Earth and just - randomly froze people, they had to have grabbed her from her time.

[ Alright. Breath. Continue. ]

Take Mako and Raleigh, now. They're from the 21st century - but they were fightin' aliens. That sure as hell didn't happen on our Earth, right? The protoshit was our first contact - I don't think history would somehow erase giant freakin' monsters and the robots they needed to fight 'em.

So, we ain't all from the same spot. We can't be. We ain't from the same universe, or from the same time. Right?

So I figure - I figure - here, this is another universe altogether. However they pulled us from one universe to this one, it's gotta be here somewhere. Maybe it's two-thousand and six fuckin' hundred here, but that don't mean it is at home.

[contorta]

( prax lifts his drink to his face but doesn't take another sip quite yet, hoping against hope that alex has something to offer that will make the enormity of all of this less oppressive, that will mean he still has a chance to find mei. to make things right somehow.

what kind of father can't help his own daughter? what kind of father lets her be turned into a monster by the man supposed to treat her? )

Different universes. ( he echoes.

but that only means mei might not be gone yet, but that he's nowhere near her. that he isn't even in the same universe as she is anymore. )