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?"

Eva nodded "Yes... I mean... probably." She was not an expert on alien magic after all. "what was that about plants?"

"Your guess is better than mine anyway," Ellie said with a smile. "I have plant magic," she explained, "I can make them grown and heal and do what I want. So we're all kinda magicky here, which is neat, right?"

"which is why we're badass." Matt nodded.

Eva laughed. "I'm sure you are."

Ellie nodded. "We're like, the scariest." She was about to brag about how all the slavers were dead because of them, but then the image of that hallway flashed into her mind, and she hastily tried to think of something else, anything else. "Can you guys make pretty ice sculptures of something?" she asked, trying not to think of blood and death.

"I can totally make ice sculptures!" Matt declared.

Eva hesitated. "not... pretty... "

"no?"

"Art is... not my strong point." She admitted.

"hey me neither." Matt grinned and pulled himself to the edge of the pool, freezing a small portion of the water and coaxing it into an abstract shape.

Eva shook her head. "With me it's more... if it can go catastrophically wrong it will. I can burn water!" She wasn't actually kidding, somehow she could. Scary.

"Yeah... I actually sorta want to see that," Ellie said. "Hey Shane, can you make ice sculptures too?"

Eva shook her head. "trust me.. you don't. My... ancestry seems to have tainted all creative pursuits, it always ends up.... hellish.. nightmarish.. just... not pleasant."

Matt looked curious, distracted from the ice which started to rapidly melt back into the warm pool. "Esk's always drawing... oh shit, what if that's why he never lets anyone see it? maybe it's too horrifying!" He liked that idea.

Shane nodded and smiled, though he got out of the pool to go over to the frozen side and focus on making a sculpture out of ice for them.

Ellie frowned. "How can you be genetically bad at art? That doesn't make sense." She snorted at the idea of Esk drawing horrifying things, "Yeah, maybe he is drawing awful stuff. But he likes to freak us out, so why would he hide it from us?"
She got out of the pool to watch Shane work. "My money's on Shane making the best art," she decided.

Shane made a dragon out of the ice, it was a form e knew well after all. He sat back and looked at it in the light when he was finished.

Matt clapped his hands at the dragon. "Yep, definitely the artist" He nodded. "That's awesome Shane."

Eva shrugged. "I don't get it either, but the things I create? they're wrong and they drive people mad, or worse. It's not worth it." She smiled at the dragon sculpture. "you're good at this."

"I think Shane wins," Ellie said, smiling. Her BF was so talented and adorable omg. She looked at Eva, "Wait, your art literally drives people crazy? Or are you being metaphorical? Cause whoa."

"you ever read any Lovecraft? It's like that." Eva nodded.

"That's cool, dangerous but cool" Sane said to Eve, giving Ellie a smile for saying he won.

Ellie shook her head. "Haven't read any Lovecraft," she said. Her eyes brightened, "Oh waitttt, he's that Terran dude who started an alien-worshiping cult! I remember my parents were so mad when they heard what he was doing!" She was probably thinking of another Lovecraft then, oops.
"Yeah, I mean I don't want to look at your art, no offense, but Shane's right, that is pretty cool. Wait, does your art drive you crazy too?"

Eva shook her head. "no, maybe i'm just immune to my own psche." She chuckled.

Matt shook his head. "that is fucked up."

"That's awesome, you mean," Ellie said with a grin. Maybe it was just because she hadn't ever experienced Eva's art, but she thought it sounded badass.

(Do we want to timeskip soon? Give people a little time to process their angst? lol)

(yusssssss)

They'd go back to splashing around in the water. At some point Matt got his pilfered bottle of...what he assumed was actually vodka or something, and took to swigging that too. Until Eva confiscated it, took a long swig and handed it to Shane for safe keeping.

Matt was pretty drunk, though she didn't really understand why. She assumed it was the angst of this whole thing though, she'd probably get plastered in a similar situation too.

(All right, how long sounds good to you guys? A couple days? Skip to Unity Station? I'm cool with either option personally.

Tell me what sounds good, and I can write something up. )

(next day maybe? so they can grab a little more exposition if required, message people who need to be contacted, chat about how they're getting to unity and make plans?
I want to tie up a couple of loose ends briefly which shouldn't take long and then they can be underway? Outta this creepy place? lol)

(Okay, that makes sense to me! Sound good to you, Starr?)

(Sounds good to me)

AUGUST 8, 2800
(Assigning arbitrary date since I don't think we had one yet, yep.)

Vestia continued to supervise her repairs, and be as helpful to her crew as she could. She probably delivered poor Amity to Mourn at some point, hoping Mourn would be able to fix the drone. Although she reflected that maybe it wasn't wise to give the drone to Mourn while he was in his current wounded state, hmm.

~~
Ellie and Shane and Matt had fun with Eva, well, sort of fun. There was a limit to how much fun you could have if you were just trying to repress your grief and pain, after all. But still, it was... okay, and Ellie managed to avoid getting super drunk for once. Afterward Ellie had checked in on Hewitt and given him another dose of her healing magic. She couldn’t do much, but she figured it was probably helping… a little.

She had probably gotten Matt and Shane to share her room again that night. She didn’t want to sleep alone, not when she kept imagining horrible explosions and endless corpses.

She woke up late the next morning not really feeling rested, and went to get some coffee, hoping that it would help. Today she NEEDED to talk to her parents, she decided.

~~
Tala was feeling better today. Her body was starting to recover from the effects of the gas, and although the pain from the gunshots was still intense, she was able to go for a short jog at least. She really didn’t feel up for much more than that though, so she decided not to push herself too hard.

She wasn't one for dwelling on sorrows, but her thoughts did go to Nadira a lot. 22 years was a long time to be separated, and she wondered what sort of a person Nadira had become.

~~
James contacted Asher again eventually, apologizing for hanging up on him earlier. They chatted for a while about everything that had happened while Vestia was gone, and James enjoyed hearing Asher’s anecdotes about life on the space station. Ten years hadn’t changed this at least, they were still family, and it was easy enough to return to their old friendship as well.

He’d return to work, actually almost feeling happy. Hey, he might have missed a lot, but at least things were okay between him and his siblings again.

~~
Ethan had helped Starr for a while, then went to see Hewitt, which turned out to be a mistake. Seeing the man unconscious and wounded and knowing there was nothing he could do to help, well, it really hammered home just how powerless he was right now. He’d left hastily, but the feeling clung to him anyway.

He went to the new library to work, to try to exert some amount of control over a situation where he felt completely helpless, but it didn’t feel like enough now. His old coping mechanisms from his time with Kaylr, his sadism and cruelty, were starting to creep into his thoughts again. For the first time in a long time, he felt a genuine desire to hurt someone, to bring them down with him.

Unable to shake the intrusive thoughts, he left the library, took his gun out of pocket space to give to one of Vestia's bots, then fled to some distant level, telling Vestia not to let anyone near him. He needed time and quiet to get his brain in order, and in the mean time, he didn’t want to do anything he was going to regret.

Matt was doing an excellent job of pretending to be fine, mostly. He had moments where his smile would falter, or it wouldn't quite reach his eyes, but he was coping the only way he knew how, by running away from it all.

He didn't join Ellie and Shane that evening, bidding them goodnight and telling them he just wanted to get his thoughts together.

He escorted Eva back to her ship and that was the last anyone saw of him that night.

Matt was being Matt.

----

Esk eventually went to bed, sprawling out quite comfortably on the large first class beds.Yes, he could get used to this. He'd never had such luxury in his life! He still couldn't quite shake the feeling he didn't belong here though.

But he was aching and exhausted and he slept well into the mid morning.

----

Mourn examined the drone and made a face. Stupid slavers, why they have to shoot the drone?! It was no threat!
Maybe he should give it guns or a taser, yes!
but it was too small to really do that with. Drat.

He worked on straightening out the fans and figuring out if there was any major internal damage while he waited for his data recovery program to get anything it could off the fried laptop hard drive. Having something to do was actually pretty good for him, it distracted him from the pain.
He didn't much care they'd been lost for 10 years right now, but he did care that nobody had freed all the androids. That bugged the shit out of him more than anything else.
Wierd little guy.

----

Ivor went to find Moriah in the morning, he wasn't sure why, but she was kinda nice and having someone other than his sister to talk to was... refreshing.

----

Luka was trying to work up the nerve to ask Rigel a few questions in wake of her conversation with Dawn.
Finally come morning she'd ask "Rigel? Can your people bond to non Pandorians?" He had claimed he could have a relationship with her hadn't he? but how much of that was actually real? Eugh, aliens... maybe the Imperium had a point about alien relationships, they might not cause your brain to melt out your ears but they were pretty complicated and confusing.

----

Kay slept heavily, having put his meagre belongings safely away in a drawer in his new room. He was still hurting but at least talking to Asher had helped a little.
Come morning he rose, showered and went to get his morning coffee. Hed continue his stock check later.

---

Armin tidied and went to see the floor Sawna and he had shared and retrieve what he could from his own workshop. Thankfully this floor hadn't been spaced, just a little blown up right?
He'd politely request some bots to help him move heavy bolts of fabric and tools to first class where he'd seek out a new place to work.

He hesitated when he stood outside the cafe, bowing his head. Sawna... he already missed her. He hoped she was safe and that she was happy. He prayed she was with her family again.

Shane stayed with Ellie, she seemed to need him to. It was a little awkward without Matt there but he managed. She needed a friend more than anything else right now.

~~~
Starr didn't work too long, though she managed to help clean up a few rooms before she went to collect her thoughts and deal with talking to the dragons left behind for a while. She would collect Luna before night to continue bonding with her.
~~~
Skye and Jewel ended up sharing one of the suites, helping one another put up what they salvaged from the other rooms. Jewel turned an empty hanging pot into a bed.
~~~
Rigel looked to Luka at her question in the morning and nodded. "Yes, we can. It's not 'normal' and the kids from such pairings don't have as much natural magic, but it can be done." He said, wondering why she was asking.
~~~
Dawn for her part worked until she got tired, then found her bed. She had yet to pick one in first class since she wanted to stay near the patients. She went back to work in the morning, checking on patients and seeing if any could be discharged yet. Dragons could heal pretty fast when they were taken care of.

"You mean it doesn't happen often?" not normal? sounded a lot like how the Imperium referred to aliens. "or that it's... wrong?" Luka asked, fidgeting a little.

---

Armin went to get breakfast.

---

Kay went to work, he had a terrible habit of forgetting to eat. He nodded to Dawn as he entered the medical room with his coffee.

---

Moriah was sweeping the hallway in First Class when Ivor found her. With so many bots out of service, Matt still needing crutches, and James busy with medical stuff, Vestia had been hiring the androids to handle a lot of her chores.
She saw Ivor, and smiled. "Good morning."

~~
Ellie worried about Matt, she didn't think it was a good sign that he wanted to be alone. But hey, it was Matt's call, so she didn't pressure him.
She hadn't seemed at all weirded out to just cuddle with Shane, although she sort of noticed that he did find it weird.
Sorry Shane.
In the morning she drank her coffee and sent her parents a simple message. [Mom, Dad, I'm ALIVE! Sorry for disappearing! Love you guys! Call me!]

~~
James had figured two medics on duty was plenty, so he wandered off to look for Skye. She had a sibling on Unity Station too, funny that.