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?"

Armin nodded. "And I shall continue to do all I can for you Miss Starr, for as long as I am able and you will tolerate it."

---


"that's how most people are." Esk reminded James. "Just wanting to live their lives."

James nodded. "Turns out we aren't so different after all. Too bad it took so long for them to realize it." He stood back from the game with a sigh. "I give up. Wanna give this level a try? It's super hard."

Shane nodded then smiled "Yeah, even if that 'battle' lasted ten years somehow. That is still such an odd thought, even if I didn't have anyone left behind besides the kids."

~~~
"I won't stop tolerating it, I enjoy having you around." Starr replied softly. "I will do all I can for you as well." She wanted him to be happy not just surviving.

Esk hesitated, then shrugged. "sure, if I fail then we blame the game okay?" He was joking of course, but he had such a weird way of delivering jokes. He didn't smile and his tone was so flat and lifeless sometimes it was hard to tell it WAS a joke.

---

"I am truely most fortunate and blessed to have you as a friend." Armin told Starr.

"Yeah, it's so weird," Ellie agreed. "Just... all those years of history happening out there, and then we just skip through all of it. It's kind of like flipping to the end of the book and reading all the spoilers, isn't it?"

~~
James attempted to match Esk's flat tone, but kind of failed. He just had too much energy to do it. "You got it. We'll blame the game, and nobody will ever know you failed." He watched Esk curiously, wanting to see how well he would do.

Esk snorted at James' tone, idiot. He took his place in front of the machine, picked up the gun and had a go at this level. He did a lot better than James at least, but the difficulty curve on this thing was ridiculous and by the end he found he was just shooting randomly trying to hit anything. This was a pretty brutally difficult game. He focused, and though far from perfect, managed to JUST scrape through into the next stage. "well fuck, they really screwed the curve on this didn't they?" the next level was impossible, probably intentionally so. These old games were designed to suck money from the pockets of kids weren't they? and the best way to do that was to make them extra hard so they'd keep trying over and over and over again.

"It's not just me then, good," James said with a grin. "I was kinda afraid you were going to have no problem with it, and then I'd be all embarrassed by my failure." He shook his head, "Oh well, the first few levels were fun at least."

"As am I" Starr replied gently.

~~~
Shane nodded "Yeah, I hadn't thought of it like that, but it is in a way." He agreed.

Esk shrugged and gave up. "I still beat it in one." He reminded James. Of course he had a lot of military training with shit like reflexes so might have had a slight advantage.

---

Armin patted Starr's shoulder. "What now?" He asked. "Is there anything you need doing? " (omg someone has to tell Armin about Thalia! lol. I forgot)

"In a way that's kind of cool. I mean we got to skip all the boring stuff," Ellie said. She was getting philosophical over here, yep. "Stinks for my parents and the kiddos, but oh well."

~~
"Show-off," James grumbled good naturedly. "Those Satare sure do know how to train up arcade gaming legends."

"yeah, the make us play simulations and ball games fucking constantly. NO fun on the holodecks, simulations only, training only." He rolled his eyes. "and then they wonder why the cadets spend all their time gambling or fucking."

"I'm not sure. I guess we check on Matt and make sure he's alright with the whole Thalia vanishing thing." Starr said and frowned a little. She didn't like that.

~~~~
Shane smiled and shook his head "Too bad we skipped all the cool stuff too."

"Sounds awful," James said. "Clearly they need to re-prioritize, I mean who doesn't use holodecks for fun?" He looked amused. "Oh well, at least you're good at shooting things thanks to all the not-fun training?"

~~
Ellie nodded. "I missed so many Human Days. So many presents I'll never get to open. And you missed... ummm..." she tried to imagine which cool things Shane was sad about missing out on. "What do you wish you'd seen?"

"Thalia has vanished?" Armin asked, sounding aghast. He hadn't been told! "Oh dear, what happened?" He nodded "yes, yes, let us see how our friend is. " Matt must be frantic, surely? He would be.

---

Esk shrugged. "You know how fucking annoying it is trying to sleep when three of your bunk mates are screwing? " He made a face. "I suppose to their credit, they kept it casual and didn't get attached so no relationship drama." He stepped away from the machines. "I was good at killing things before I went to military school." He reminded James.

"I don't know, we will have to look up and see what was missed. I have heard about a lot of movies and such." Shane replied.

~~~
Starr nodded "Apparently she left a note and their kid and just left seven years ago or so. She doesn't want to be found now." She explained then shrugged "I don't understand leaving like that, but she did." She would turn to the camera to ask Vestia where and how Matt was.

"Aww gross, that's not something you ever want to overhear," James said. "I mean compared to that, endless training must have not sounded so bad." He paused, "Wait, when you say three, do you mean three people in one bed, or three separate couples?" Hey, it was an important distinction to make, okay?

~~
"Oh good point. I bet there are sooo many good movies to see. We could try to get as many as possible, and then have a marathon to catch up!" Ellie grinned.

~~
Vestia would probably ask Matt if he minded company, and then give Armin and Starr directions if Matt was okay with it.

Armin looked troubled. "then... she left? of her own accord?" that was sad. He bowed his head.

Matt was about, he'd probably gone back to drinking.


---

"two guys, one girl." Esk replied flatly. Apparently in the Imperium three ways were AOK but homosexuality wasn't. Go figure.
"I invested in ear plugs." and sketched an awful lot to keep his mind off it, yeesh.

James snorted. "Wait... but I thought two dudes was like... not okay in the Imperium." He looked amused. "I bet they sell so many earplugs out there, oh my gosh."

Starr nodded and frowned at the news that Matt was drinking so much and so early. "Yes, she chose to leave." She replied and headed to find Matt.

~~~
Shane chuckled and nodded "Yeah, a marathon of movies to see what was made in the last ten years."

"We should find a computer and start getting movies. We'll need a nice, huge collection for this," Ellie said. "Then we can watch them with some of our friends, or just by ourselves maybe." She kinda liked the second idea, actually. Hmm.

Shane nodded and smiled again. "Yeah, a catch-up marathon." He agreed happily.

Ellie reached out to pet one of the goats again. "Wanna do that now, or stay here a while longer?" she asked. Both options sounded pretty good to her.