Upon Vestia: Chapter Thirty-Three

First topic message reminder :

"Hey man," James said to Kay, after waiting for a few seconds for the guy to pause his work, and realizing he wasn't going to. "How you holding up?"

~~
"It's my job to care about the books," Ethan said. He tried to look like he had no emotional investment in the state of the library, with moderate success. "Vestia pays me to keep them nice and safe and organized, which they aren't." He watched Esk curiously, "Who put you on janitor duty?"

Rigel nodded "Yeah, we will, for now, let's worry about what we are going to eat." He said, getting a plate so they could get food.

Ellie nodded. "Heck yeah, dead slavers." Her expression flickered though, she felt a little queasy remembering the aftermath of the explosion.

Luka got something to eat. "do you think we have enough food?" She asked, worried suddenly.

---

"Are you okay?" Eva asked, noticing.

Matt put a hand on Ellie's shoulder. He had no idea what was up but she looked a bit pale suddenly.

"I'm good, it's good," Ellie said. She didn't really want to explain the horror of seeing the people who'd died, or even worse, the people who'd survived the blast. Her stomach churned at the thought. "Let's... let's go look at stuff. Or stay here and drink tea. I don't know."

"We should, I think" Rigel said, suddenly more worried "Hey, Vestia, was the cafeteria or food storage affected?"
~~~
Shane looked to Ellie as well, worried about her. It wasn't like her to just go pale like that.

Matt was gonna worry about Ellie, no matter what she said. "yeah... how about a tour?" He suggested. That was kinda distracting right? "we can show off first class"

"Some of the refrigeration rooms got destroyed, but not all of them. We can make it to Unity Station on our reserves, I think," Vestia told Rigel. "Hydroponics is all right too, so our long term food production is still okay."

~~
Ellie nodded. "First Class. Yeah. Gotta impress Eva." She got up, setting down that cake she'd grabbed earlier.

Luka nodded. "I hope they can help us resupply..."

---

Eva beamed.

"Yeah, come on then. We can tell you about our awesome adventures as we go!" Matt suggested.

"Yeah, me too." Rigel agreeed with Luka as he got his food and found a table to sit at.
~~~Shane got up andreached for Ellie's hand to walk with her.

Luka sat down. "The rooms here aren't rooms really are they, they're more like.. small apartments" the suites of first class weren't just a bedroom, heck, there was even a bathtub in that bathroom! fancy!
"it'll be quite a change." She wasn't really used to having so much space to be honest.

Ellie took Shane's hand. Yeah, she was glad he was here. "We can tell her about..." she tried to think of a memory that didn't relate to Thalia or death in some way. "The time we got super drunk on Heny's whiskey or something." That had been, well, not death and not Thalia anyway. Yay?

"Was that the same time we built a pillow fort?" Matt asked, man, the drunk nights blurred into one.

"Heny's whiskey? Pillow forts?" Eva would follow along and listen to any silly story they wanted to tell, smiling softly. it was nice to have company.

"Yeah... I think so..." Ellie squinted a little, trying to remember. It wasn't exactly a clear memory. "Heny didn't think we could handle her whiskey, but we totally did. I mean, we didn't like, do anything stupid or anything. I think." She looked to Shane, he probably remembered a little more than she did anyway. "the pillow fort was great, I remember that at least."

"The pillow fort was amazing!" Matt agreed enthusiastically. Now that was a pleasant memory.
"and the glittery hats! remember we made glittery hats one time! I totally sent one to Web."

"i bet he appreciated that." Eva looked amused.

"oh i'm sure he did." Matt cackled. This massive distraction was working a treat. Of course he'd get depressed as soon as he stopped talking to other people but he didn't plan on doing that right now. HAH.

(okay so... once we wrap up whatever, wanna skip a few hours ahead to the finding out how much of their shit they've lost?
<_<

Also Matt has to watch that video from Thalia... ahem. Dum de dum)

Shane chuckled "I remember finding you in the closet with all the pillows, making that fort. Of course we ended up in the rec room watching movies later on.

Ellie giggled. "Oh maaan, good times. I'd forgotten the movie." She smiled, "Yeah, the hats were awesome. I'm sure Web loooved the glitter."

(I'm up for jumping forward whenever! Ohh, the angst of lost stuff and Thalia, hahaha)

(whooo!)

---time skip---

Eva would be given a tour and regaled with stories of drunken exploits, wheelchair races and glitter.

A few hours later however, hopefully floor 3 would be repressurised for exploration.

Eva returned to her post, but not before Matt invited her to come share a drink with them all later on.

---

Esk had managed to salvage a pile of parts and had them taken somewhere to be stored. Mourn or Shane or even Rigel could probably build a couple of new bots out of these bits, but Esk sure as heck couldn't. He could fix things, he couldn't make them. Still, the quiet time had been pleasant.

---

Ivor and Moriah would chat most likely about all manner of random things. He was slowly, oh so slowly starting to trust she wasn't about to hurt him.

---

Kay had been bustling around tending to the injured. Except Hewitt, Kay had absolutely no idea what to do about Hewitt. He needed a botonist, not a medic. Maybe Ellie would have to play nurse for a bit longer. He decided to go find her and talk to her about this. He was concerned for the old man after all, he was old and who the hell knew how much damage an Aketi could recover from. Hewitt talked a lot of shit after all, half his claims could have been nonsense.
Ellie knew about plants, so he'd ask Ellie.

---

Luka would head down to the hangar to work on the Devil, poor old girl had taken a beating.

---

Armin remained with Starr till she needed to rest or told him to go away. He was trying to be helpful.

Rigel would go down to work on the Devil too. He wanted her up and running again himself.

~~~
Starr wouldn't make Armin leave until he was ready to. She tried contacting the dragons in this time to find out more about the last ten years as well as visiting the injured on Vestia.

Vestia would finally announce that Floor 3 was safe to be visited. Everything had been successfully repressurized, and oxygen had been restored to normal levels.

~~
Ellie had ended up having fun showing Eva around, once the last of the queasiness had worn off. She did enjoy talking about her and her friends dumb antics, and Eva had been a pretty good listener.
Ellie decided that Esk must be the black sheep of the family, because Eva and Hytar were both super nice.

She'd probably be hanging out in some lounge, not super sure if she actually wanted to investigate the wreckage of Floor 3, when Kay went looking for her.

~~
Ethan had spent some time with his new library project, before deciding that he really should get himself fixed up. He'd gone off to the android med bay to get supplies, and had stalked off to his room to repair himself, snarling at one android who made the mistake of asking if he wanted any help.
Once Ethan was in a better mental state he might realize he should apologize, but right now all his pent up rage was closer to the surface than it had been in months, and the best thing he could do was avoid everyone or work on the library.
Which he was going to do.

~~
Moriah spent a good amount of time with Ivor. She cared about the guy, and wanted so much to earn his trust. Eventually she'd probably leave him, but she definitely wanted to hang out with him again soon.

~~
Tala was exhausted, she'd probably take a nap. Maybe the ten years had affected her somehow, or maybe it was all the gas she'd inhaled. Either way she needed time to recover.

~~
James eventually felt better about his family issues, sort of. He'd go investigate Floor 3.

Kay found Ellie without too much trouble, nodding to her as he came in.
[I think I may need your help.] Straight to the point.

----

Esk asked Vestia to gather up anyone who wanted to head to floor 3 to investigate. He'd head down there himself.

----

Matt noticed he had a message from Asher and played it. It was a video... from Thalia.
fuck.

He watched that in silence, expression blank as he listened to her excuses.

"I have to accept you're just not coming back." she ended with. "i'm sorry."

Matt closed his eyes, his chest hurt.

He put the tablet down and went to see if the first class bar had any booze in it. Right now, he needed several stiff drinks.

---

Mourn wanted to go to floor 3 to see what of his stuff he could salvage but he wasn't in much of a state to do so. "Ship!" He demanded. "Tell people, find laptop, see if still work.. " it was unlikely of course, even if it hadn't been spaced, the rapid freezing temperature of depressurisation had probably fried the damn thing.
Bah.

---

Ellie blinked, looking from the writing to Kay. "You do?" She'd kinda forgotten about Hewitt in the morning's chaos, oops?

~~
First Class did indeed have booze. Lots of nice, expensive options in classy bottles.

Vestia watched quietly for the moment, not sure if she should try to talk to Matt or not. She wasn't going to intervene in his drinking, probably, she knew he was miserable right now.

~~
---Right, I'll tell James to look--- Vestia told Mourn. ---Let's hope it survived---

Kay nodded. [My medical training only really extends to humanoids. I can just about fathom out Star Dragon anatomy but Aketi are well beyond my knowledge. I need a botonist and as you're the only one on board, I was hoping you could assist me]

---

Matt grabbed a few bottles from the lower shelves, grabbed a glass and filled it up, taking a swig, yep... this would work. Numb the pain or whatever.

---

Luka sort of wanted to see what a mess her room on the 3rd floor was, and if she could salvage anything. "Captain?" She asked Rigel. "Do you mind if I help with the salvage?" she felt a bit bad abandoning the work on the devil but... yeah...

Ellie blinked. "Oh man! Hewitt! I gotta check on him!" She stood up hastily. "Wait, do you want me to tell you about plant dudes, or do you want me to take care of him myself?" She wasn't totally sure what Kay wanted.

Kay looked hesitant. [Do you think he'll be alright?] He had no idea, those injuries looked pretty catastrophic but how'd you tell if a plant was alive or dead or dying? [I don't think I can help him, but maybe you can.]

Ellie frowned, looking uncertain. "I don't think he's going to die. Plants are like, stupidly tough. If they don't get killed instantly, then you can usually help them grow back if you give them the right water and nutrients and care. And I used my magic to help stabilize him, so that should help."
She hesitated, "But... I can't tell you if he's going to be able to wake up or walk again or anything like that. Aketi are pretty different from the plants I hang out with, they're a lot more complex, and that means I have no idea how to predict how well he'll recover." She shook her head. Plant people were confusing.

Kay nodded. [Which is the problem, we have no reference for what we're dealing with here. ] He looked thoughtful. [You magic can heal him? Maybe Amity knows more. ] He looked to Vestia's cameras. [Vestia, where's Amity?] the drone was the only other Aketi on board, and even if he wasn't actually Aketi, he knew more about them than anyone else did.