Upon Vestia: Chapter Twelve

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"Yep, all alone on a desert planet with a weird bird." Ellie scowled, "False gods. So gross. I hope all immortals die soon." She paused, "Umm, well, I hope the immortals I like stick around for a while longer though."

Esk shrugged noncommittally. "Esk." He told her.

flying_purple_monkfish wrote:[What he says isn't cruel though, that's what makes it so hard. It's agonizingly true. We weren't kind to him growing up, we were scared of him. We had every reason to be but that didn't make it right. He has absolutely every right to hate me, I deserve it. I screwed things up for everyone. I won't lie and claim our lives before were great because they weren't, but after our mother died... everything just got a lot worse. ] He cuddled into Asher, grateful for the arm around him.

Asher sighed softly. "You guys made some terrible mistakes, and they must weigh on you heavily. Whether his words are cruel or not, they'll be unpleasant to hear. But maybe if you attempt to talk to him, you'll at least start being able to come to terms with your guilt."

Kay exhaled deeply. [I don't think there's much either of us can say or do that'll absolve me. ] He closed his eyes, even if right now he didn't feel like he deserved Asher, he was so so grateful he was here.

"No, maybe not." Asher sighed, "Sometimes all we can do is admit our flaws, try to do what's right, and then choose to move on. Maybe talking to him won't change a thing, but you need to try, and then you need to not let your guilt weigh you down, because you were a dumb kid then, and kids make terrible choices."

Kay shifted his head to smile weakly at Asher. [Thank you. ] Not that he felt that much better. Still the fact Asher wasn't about to let him wallow in self pity was something Kay was grateful for. [I hope i'm older and marginally wiser now, but sometimes I doubt it.]

Starr smiled and nodded then glanced around the shuttle. "There is not much I can do here until we reach the guild at least."

"Except not get yourself infected." Esk told her. "Wonder if it'd kill you... " He mused to himself.

"You regret what you did. That means you're showing some improvement," Asher said gently.

[I never meant to hurt anyone. ] He looked glum, pulling away to look at him earnestly [If I were a better person, i'd tell you to run. To get as far away from me as possible because I know it's only a matter of time before you suffer because of me. Everyone i've ever cared about has. I'm cursed, but i'm also far too selfish to let you go. I love you so much, and everyone I love gets hurt.]

flying_purple_monkfish wrote:"Except not get yourself infected." Esk told her. "Wonder if it'd kill you... " He mused to himself.

"I am a shapeshifter, so likely it wouldn't kill me." Starr said "I have it as safe as I can make it and still work on it."

Esk shrugged. "If you survived the fever." He glanced warily at the blood. He didn't really like being in the room with it. "I'll leave you to your mad scientist thing."

flying_purple_monkfish wrote:Esk shrugged. "If you survived the fever." He glanced warily at the blood. He didn't really like being in the room with it. "I'll leave you to your mad scientist thing."

"See you around" Starr said and smiled

Asher looked apologetic. "I know you never meant to hurt anyone. I meant that you recognize the mistakes you made, and are trying to be a better person, and that's a good thing."
"Kay," Asher looked back at him steadily, "You are a good person. You've had some incredibly bad luck, but that's no reason for me to hide from you, or for you to try and chase me away. Like I said when we decided to try dating, I'm probably going to end up suffering no matter what we do, because of the choices I've made for myself. And we've already established that I'm a hazards to you as well, which you decided wasn't a deal breaker. Us being together doesn't make you a bad person."

Esk nodded and did so, rather relieved to be off that shuttle.
He headed back to his room, fingers brushing the pendant around his neck. He frowned. Could this really work? Not breaking a bubble for a while was one thing, but could this actually stop his touch killing things? He wasn't totally convinced.

---

Kay nodded slowly. He didn't much look like he believed Asher, but he'd spent so many years blaming himself for everything, it wasn't a habit he was about to snap out of. He'd convinced himself everything was his fault, to the point nothing anyone said was really going to tell him otherwise.
Still, here they were, together, alone, and knowing so much of Kay's history Asher still hadn't fled. That counted for a lot.
He said nothing, he simply pulled Asher into a tight hug.

Starr looked around and cleaned up a little before locking her shuttle up again and going to her viewing deck again.

Asher wished he could get Kay to stop blaming himself for everything, but that wasn't going to happen. He hugged Kay tightly, and hoped that everything would work out well for him, because he really didn't deserve the amount of misery he kept having to deal with.

The medics would totally sit and snuggle and watch the stars till they were needed, or till Kay needed to eat. Whichever came first really.

---

---TIME SKIP---- About a week ---


Vestia approached Vavare to drop off the spiderkin and paint the ship.

It was a richly green world of giant creatures, huge prehistoric looking plants and great bodies of water.
Oxygen levels were high and the temperature was cold, not cold enough for snow, but certainly cold enough for frost to form overnight.

The crew would be warned to avoid lighting any flames and wearing anything that might create static.
They'd also be advised to wear rebreathers if they wanted to leave the ship.

Vestia landed at the spaceport the vavare passengers had suggested, dwarfing the buildings and smaller ships, and taking up a lot of the pavement with her bulk.
She had her bots getting together the equipment to paint her hull, and would be enlisting the help of any passenger who didn't hastily think up an excuse to not help.

Matt had quite happily distracted himself from just about everything by hanging out with his new friends. That was, when Thalia hadn't dragged him off to go pick out wedding favors or something else tedious and unnecessary. He was starting to understand why so many cultures just didn't DO weddings, man they were a lot of work.

He volunteered to help paint, just as an excuse to get away from wedding stuff for a few hours.

---

Kay would head to the observation deck to check out this new planet, curious about such a truly alien world.

--

Mourn helped the bots gather stuff together, he was starting to get anxious about his upcoming surgery even though he kept telling himself it was stupid to be nervous and he was being dumb. His anxiety annoyed him a great deal, but paintcans and tools were an excellent distraction.
Also, as one of the engineers he sort of felt like this fell under part of his job description. And he was looking forward to looking down on this alien world from the massive height of Vestia's hull.

---

Swarm argued with themselves about whether to leave the ship. They were small, everything on this world was large and the high oxygen levels were likely not going to be good for them. Unlike the humanoids, they couldn't wear a mask, so in the end it was decided they'd just have to sit this one out and get the others to learn everything they could.
The inability to gather new knowledge left them sulky and ill tempered, they lingered by the windows looking out ruefully.

---

Luka was absolutely terrified of this strange new world. She'd help paint the ship sure, but if they were attacked by giant bugs, she was going to lose it.

---

Esk had spent a lot of time AWAY from everyone else. He liked to let them assume he was just sulking or something, when really he'd been practicing with that bubble and trying to pilfer any plant, flower or otherwise living thing nobody would miss to experiment on.
It wasn't going so great. He really didn't have the focus for this and his own subconcious seemed unwilling to accept he COULD do it. He kept sabotaging his own attempts and every time he did he felt a stab of validation. This was hard, GOOD. He wanted it to be hard. If it was easy it made all these years a complete waste. It meant he'd suffered unnecessarily and that made him angry.

When he got bored of killing plants and screwing around with the bubble, he found a quiet sparring room to smack a few punching bags around and get that anger channeled into something else. It stopped him punching the ship.

He was struggling, because he really didn't know how to deal with all these emotions he was enduring. So he did what he always did when he was overwhelmed, shut down and hit things.

---

Armin and his family were excited. They chattered quietly away to one another as the ship landed, watching the familiar sight of their homeworld with eager anticipation.

First chance they got, Berit and Trygve made for the ramp, eager to tear their masks off and breathe the sweet air of their native lands once more.

Armin however lingered behind nervously. 6 years was a long time, and while he was eager to see his family and breathe the air and see his home once more, he was also scared by how much may have changed since he was gone.

He waited for the rest of the crew to gather. He had decided he would help paint the ship too, because he felt indebted to these people and to Vestia herself.

James would go looking for Swarm, because he had a feeling they wouldn't be able to survive in that environment, and of course he knew that they loved to learn things. Maybe he could record information for them, and play it back for them later! They had always been nice to him, he should totally return the favor.
He hadn't been able to think of a good enough excuse to get out of painting duty, so he was gonna be helping out. High up on a giant ship. With a huge sky waiting to suck him away, and a sickening drop below. He was so not looking forward to this.

~~
Tala was glad that the temperature, although chilly for many species, was no colder than the winters on her home world. She would be fine without a shirt, as usual.
She was going to help with painting duty, too.

~~
Asher had been nervously preparing part of the med bay for Mourn's upgrade all week. He kept telling himself that this wasn't all that different from the times when he had repaired himself or his siblings, but it really was different, and that scared him a bit.
Sure, he wasn't going to be messing with Mourn's organic parts in any way, only changing the mechanical components, which he had read up on carefully and understood well. But he was still by no means an expert, and would be making changes to a completely unique cyborg. Of course he was nervous!
He went to help Mourn and Vestia's bots prepare the paint supplies.

~~
Ellie was lazy and didn't help with preparations, but she was gonna help too because it sounded AWESOME.

Swarm was just looking out one of the windows on the observation deck. Some of them turned to see James. -hello- -James- they spelled out for him.

Kay smiled softly at James. Like Swarm he was just staring out the window at the strange forest beyond the port.

---

"Hello robot" Mourn declared, slightly less cheerfully than usual. "You lucky no have breathe, no have to wear mask over face. " He frowned. "Make hard to understand people." He shook his head. "No see lips."

Matt caught up with them, carrying a few things. "You know, I could move all this for you." He told them.

Mourn tilted his head at him. "Tall one make good point."

Matt chuckled. "Thanks, I do sometimes have good ideas."

---

James smiled at the Swarm and Kay. "Hello!" He said cheerfully, "How are you guys doing?"

~~
"That's an extremely good idea," Asher said to Matt. "If you're willing to do it, we're very grateful."
He looked at Mourn thoughtfully. "Maybe James or I should work near you, so we can tell you what everyone is saying." There had to be a better solution, but it would probably take a long time to wire up. He'd have to think on that.

Kay shrugged [This is going to be novel. I've never been to a world quite this alien before.]

Swarm buzzed to themselves. --We-- --lament-- --we-- --may-- --not-- --explore--

---

Mourn shrugged. "Spider people be happy. Masks uncomfortable to wear."

Matt chuckled and picked up some of the stuff, disappearing it. "Yeah, I have to admit, i'm crazy curious what they look like under those masks."

Mourn stared at Matt. "Why?"

"I dunno, just am. You know, the mystery of the unknown and all that." Matt grinned.

"Mmm. I get masks. We set up harnesses. You teleport, you help."

Shane helped get things ready, but kept going to the windows to look out at the world they approached.  He was excited about this planet even thoughthey couldn't go out as humans.

~~~
Starr was at the ramp, watching quietly. She had a rebreather ready for the ramp to open since she didn't want to revert to her natural form

~~~
Skye and Moone were in their room. Moone would stay with the chicks while the others painted.

~~
Dawn and Rigel would help with the painting,  they would keep the numbers from wandering and being straight. They didn't want anything to go wrong with this.

"Oh man, I know the feeling. This is my second planet, and the last one was a generic tourist resort." James nodded enthusiastically. He looked at Swarm sympathetically, "How about I look at things for you, and when I came back, I can play back the video? It'll be better than nothing, at least."

~~
Asher nodded, "It will be interesting to see them without their masks. And a lot of fun to see their planet." He added, "We'd better test the masks to make sure they're working. Don't want to get anyone sick accidentally."

John had gotten over his illness by then, the man volunteering to help paint the ship. He passed by Sonata putting masks on each child, explaining that they could watch the paint and wander within sight of the ship, and Lilian would be there to make sure they obeyed those rules and didn't do anything dangerous as each kid had their back legs flared out, Rey in particular bouncing excitedly while Cassi sat on a nearby chair between Kaleb and Jay, swinging her legs to and fro as they all waited to go. The two dark-haired older Terran glimpsed at each other before looking away quickly after both realized neither one of them could produce words.

Saraphine trembled involuntarily as she had an exceedingly tiny mask made from Merith's own creation ("Consider Keepers like, demi-Creators.") She peeked out from between the shadow-black vulpine legs of Quinn, who looked down at the tiny woman, "What's the matter? I thought you liked exploring."

"The matter? The matter?!" Saraphine squeaked, before stepping out in front of the fox and opening her hands wide, staring out the window. "Look at this! I've seen big, but the things on this planet are huge! How do you think that makes me feel?!" She stared back at Quinn, who seemed to hesitate before busting out in laughter at the thought, the two continuing to gaze in awe at the place.

Vanessa and Merith had also volunteered to help, the two of them stepping towards the ramp to join the gathering crowd. Vanessa watched Merith boredly as he gazed out the windows nearest to the ramp. Suddenly, his face seem to split open and bones popped and muscle twisted as he morphed, endo-skeleton replacing itself with an outer shell. Two arms developed into four, each hand, and even foot, becoming a four clawed appendage with opposable digits. Over his mouth became a mantis-like mouth as tube-like organs braided themselves around his chest and mouth, a pair of tarsus protruding from his back. The black-boned bug-like creature stared around, one eye a vivid yellow green and the other a scarred milky white. Vanessa scoffed, "Now that's an old form. How long have those been extinct?"

"About three magaannus." Merith clapped his top hands together with a loud clicking noise. "Too bad, too, they were quite inquisitive. A bit of a hive mind, as well."

"What is it with insect species and their hive minds?" Vanessa muttered, but soon joined Merith in a similar form.

Berit and Trygve greeted Starr happily when she arrived, as soon as the ramp was open they'd both pull their masks off, clipping them to their belts and taking deep breaths.

Berit grinned broadly. "Home sweet home!" She declared.

"Our mothers will be expecting us." Trygve told her.

"They can wait. Our gracious hosts must first be paid."

Trygve bowed his head. "Of course." He looked to Starr. "We will assist you in this task."

The pair smiled broadly to everyone as they came down the ramp.

"Welcome!" Trygve declared loudly "To Vavaren!" He spread both arms wide.

--

Swarm bobbed up and down eagerly. --we-- --would-- --like-- --that--

[You can do that?] Kay asked.

--

Mourn nodded. "Yes, test. " He handed one to Asher to test, fiddling with the other. "No like masks."

Matt watched Mourn for a moment, then seemed to catch up and realize what he was on about. "I do know a little galactic sign you know... "

Mourn tilted his head. "You do?"

Matt nodded. "Yeah, of course Kay can't actually sign properly. " He held up his hand and wriggled his fingers. "Missing a digit, makes it a bit awkward but its close. Might work."

Mourn frowned. "Maybe. We see. If not, robots translate."

Matt laughed. "yeah, it can be your job for once Asher." Ahh he remembered well the first few days they'd been on Vestia and Kay hadn't been totally confident enough to write much, so Matt had ended up having to translate everything he telepathically projected to those he didn't want to barge into the brains of. Good times.

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