Upon Vestia: Chapter Twenty-Three

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"You have a tablet at least, right?" Asher asked Dawn.

Skye looked up then smiled at him "Yeah, Dawn helped make it so we wouldn't have to stop so often." She said, coming over to him "She had a lot pf plans to make it even better."

"She did a great job." Orel smiled as Skye came over. "What sort of plans was she thinking of next, do you know?"

Matt grinned at James. "Not that I know of." He pointed to the puzzle. "We think this is secretly perverse, but it just looks like a deer and a rabbit being cute." He wrinkled his nose. "Vestia might just be screwing with us."

"Good, I don't wanna have to resuscitate one of you," James said. "That wouldn't be fun." He looked at the puzzle too, looking for anything inappropriate in the picture. "Chances are she's just screwing with you. The giant spaceship's gotta get a laugh somehow."

"Yeah, still.. don't you think it's weird?" Matt shook his head. "Can you resuscitate people? Okay this is probably like, super rude but do you guys have like... breath?" Hey he was curious.

James eyed the puzzle. "Very weird. No kid is gonna want to do such a complicated puzzle, and no adult would want to solve such an adorable puzzle, right?"

"Are you saying we aren't adults?" Ellie said, a bit indignantly.

"Maybe," James teased. He grinned at Matt, "We can store a small amount of air in our bodies for expulsion through the mouth or nose, for realism and first aid. It's not super effective for saving lives though, honestly, you'd probably die of suffocation anyway."

"Man, does that mean you can't play flute?" Matt tried not to snicker at the image of James trying to play a wind instrument. "Clearly someone needs to point out this massive musical oversight to the design team. "

"Yeah, pretty sure that wouldn't work at all. Not enough lung capacity." James looked amused. "Even blowing out candles on a cake would probably not work so well, is have to keep pausing to get more air."

Ellie giggled. "Well I can't do that either because I always start laughing too much, so you're not alone."

"Still man! No android orchestra! Huge oversight there." Matt patted James on the arm sympathetically. "Cake I guess isn't so bad if you can't even eat the cake anyway right? I know that feeling, you can't really ram candles into a steak." He laughed at the thought.

"Well at least we're usually good singers," James said, "I take comfort in that. Besides, we can't steal all the jobs from the organics!" He smiled at the idea of candles in a steak, "With the right attitude and a little ingenuity, I'm sure you could make a lovely birthday steak."

"Chickens and other animals, and the feed for them as crops in here." Skye answered with a smile.

"Wow, big plans. I don't know how she finds the time," Orel said.

"I think she is wanting to stay with Vestia" Skye said with a shrug.

"Who wouldn't? There are a lot of good reasons to be on this ship." Orel blushed suddenly, and ducked his head.

Skye flushed too and looked away, smiling at that though. "Well, she is technically a part of SD's crew still."

"Oh yeah, I guess there is that." Orel looked hesitant suddenly, "Skye, I've been thinking about when you guys leave the Guild."

Matt snorted. "Nah I think i'm good. We never really did the whole birthday thing anyway. And out here it's really awkward to figure out what date it IS."

"Omigosh, we need to cure your lack of birthday parties! Download an Imperium calendar on your tablet, and you'll know when it is. It'll be great!" said Ellie excitedly.

James smiled a bit. "Birthday parties are fun, if you're a party person."

Skye looked at Orel again, tilting her head a little "Yeah?"

Orel looked awkward. "When you go," he started, "at first I was thinking I should ask you to stay here. You could live in the artuvian apartment, there are plenty of room there. But then I reminded myself that you have to go get Moone, so you can't stay..." He paused, still awkward. "So then I started thinking, I've been at the Guild five years. I don't want to be here forever, it's nice, but it's not that nice. And there's a big ship that's going to have plenty of room for one more artuvian. But of course, if we break up or something, which we might, that might be pretty awkward..." He frowned.

Skye smiled at that and moved closer to take his hand "You want to come with me?" That was exciting to her, the chance to have him close, "It can be dangerous, I have to warn you."

"I'm thinking about it," Orel said, smiling a little. "It's okay if it's dangerous, we've already fought in a war, you know." He took her hand and looked at her. It was so tempting to leave with Vestia to be with Skye.

Skye smiled at him then frowned a little "What about your parents?"

"They're happy enough here. They'd be sad to have me leave, but I'm an adult and they know I can do what I want now," Orel said.

Skye smiled again at that and nodded "So, they will stay here now?" Well, at least it was 'safe' here, or safer than going anywhere. She looked up at Vestia "What do you think, do we have room for Orel to join us?"

Matt grinned. "Hey that's actually a good idea! I can annoy the shit outta Kay and Esk by insisting they celebrate too." Ooo Esk would get so mad, and Kay was definitely not a party person. He shrugged, wincing a little, moving too much still hurt. "Growing up I guess it was just too hectic, we got like, a brief 'horah' at dinner and that was about it. I mean not that i'm complaining, but you know... any excuse for a party right?" He laughed. "And I don't have to share any more either. HAH."

"They like the Guild. Now the Family is defeated, they won't be going anywhere," Orel said with a smile. "This is their home, they have friends here."

"Hmm, I think we might have room for one more on this ship..." Vestia teased.

~~
"Oh good, annoy the two grouchiest people on this ship by throwing parties for them. Sounds fun," James said with a laugh.

"We can get them cool presents to make them feel better," Ellie decided. "They'll forgive us."