Upon Vestia: Chapter Twenty-Four

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Dawn chuckled and shook her head a little "I don't need a party." She said softly, chuckling.

~~~
Skye looked to the door then came over to open it "Mourn? What's up?"

"Should I ask for any special flowers to be grown in Hydroponics?" Vestia suggested. "You don't have to have a job to be here, but if you have any useful skills, I'd be happy to hire you."

Esk frowned, well that wasn't the reaction he'd expected. "I don't think any of the rest of them want to leave either." He told her. "I mean, getting crammed back into that tin can that's barely holding together as it is? Why do that if you've got a far more comfortable cruise ship? Now the family aren't chasing them, well, until they make more enemies it should be relatively okay. Then again these guys are really fucking good at making enemies." He shrugged. "When they do, we get on the Devil and leave them to it."

--

Matt frowned. "Cyborg... you mean they're people who decided to become ships? How.. what?" Nope, he was confused.

Asher nodded. "Some of them opt in, if they've been very badly injured and are likely to be crippled for life. Obviously it's a difficult transition to make for an adult though, and so not many people actually qualify for the program. It's much more common for children with severe disabilities to be entered in the program by their parents, if the doctors believe the child would otherwise have extremely poor quality of life." He shook his head, "There's still a lot of debate about the ethics of turning a child into a spaceship, for reasons that should be apparent. I must admit though, most of the smartships I've met seem to be perfectly happy with their bodies."

Matt frowned, that was pretty horrifying. "Well I.. er.. guess if they're happy being spaceships?" Hmm, maybe flying around wasn't such a bad ol' deal. "So.. Terra doesn't just have like... cyber prosthetics or something? How.. how do they turn people into spaceships?" Sooo many questions omg.

"Yeah, apparently it works for them. My smartship partner said he loved being able to sense everything around himself, and he couldn't imagine how limiting it must be for me, when I could only look in one direction at once," Asher looked amused. Ah, different species and their different perspectives. "There are a lot of cybernetic prosthetics in use as well, only the most seriously crippled are even considered for life as a smartship, so everyone else gets more standard options to improve their lives."
"The operation to install a Terran into a smartship body is pretty major. They get wired into a brain-computer interface, and are put in a life-support pod, which can then be installed in a ship after the adjustment period is over. It's not a very pretty procedure."

Matt shook his head. "I dunno man, it'd be a hard call to make right? Oblivion... or that... " He had no idea what he'd chose. "Do they still get to see their families and stuff?"

"It's certainly not a choice that's taken lightly," Asher agreed. "It's not exactly a reversible procedure." He'd had to do checkups on his smartship's human body a couple times, and there was no way he could imagine the guy's body ever being functional again. "Some of them have good relationships with their families, but a lot of them don't get along well. Parents don't always have an easy time seeing their child as a spaceship."

"Yeah that's gotta be pretty damn weird." Matt agreed. "Make going to family events super akward too."

Asher laughed. "At least they already know where the party venue will be, I suppose."

"Well, we like a lot of different flowers like bee balms, columbines, daylilies, and lupines, foxgloves and hollyhocks, cleomes, impatiens, and petunias. If you have any of those already, that will be fine, if not, I can just use the plants I brought and hang them in my room" Jewel said with a grin. "They gave me a bag that has practically no end, even if I can't use the part where it brings what you want to the top, I can still use the holding part."

~~~
Dawn looked to Esk again and gave him a half smile. "I'm not sure if uncle Rigel even wants to leave Vestia unless he has to."

"I know we have some of those. You should talk to our botanist-farmer Ellie sometime, she'll make sure you have plenty of flowers available to you," Vestia said. "Come on in, I'll bring a bot over to show you around."

Jewel grinned and came in the ship again, glancing around "Thank you, I would like to see Ellie again." The Terran seemed fun, even if they had met under tense circumstances before.

A bot scuttled over to Jewel and led her down the hall. "What sort of a room would you like?" Vestia asked. "We can modify the door on a room for you if you want, I imagine large doors aren't something you're super fond of."

(How tall is Jewel again? She's small, IIRC, but I don't remember how small)

(1 foot tall )
Jewel chuckled and nodded "Yeah, big doors are a problem if they don't open to movement. You can make a smaller door in the big door for me?" She asked curiously.

"Sure, someone can cut a hole in the door for you. There are lots of people who would volunteer to help." Vestia led Jewel through the living level, "How many of my crew have you met so far?"

Jewel tilted her head then shrugged "I'm not sure, I met so many people when we were all training together. I may even have met them all and just didn't notice."

"Ah, true," Vestia chuckled. "Well, I'm sure they'll all introduce themselves to you in time. We'll probably be having a celebration of some sort soon, so you'll probably meet most of them then if you attend."

"That sounds awesome" Jewel said, still following the bot to her room. "I can't wait to meet everyone without the stress of the fight."

"Oh good, it'll be fun to have you there." Vestia's bot led Jewel to her room and opened the door, parking itself against the door so it wouldn't swing shut. "Make yourself at home. It's a bit big, but I'm sure you can fix it up to your liking."

Jewel grinned and flew into the room, looking around then setting her bag down and going to the bot to pat it's casing "Thank you" She said then flew around, looking at everything "This is perfect, plenty of room for all my stuff and plenty of flying room for me." She was kind of used to a big room even though her people tended to live in colonies, one colony to a room. "Who do I ask about getting the door fixed so I don't get stuck?"

"I'm glad you like it. Hmm, the felid Mourn would be able to help you, but he tends to lose his manners around smaller people," Vestia said, "So you'd want to get someone else to go with you to see him. Asher, one of the medics, might be a safer bet."

"Oh, the android man, yeah, I saw him at the trial. Where's he at?" Jewel asked curiously. She wouldn't mind a better introduction to that hero

"He's up on one of the observation decks. I can guide you there if you want," Vestia said. She considered, "I suppose we'd need to contact someone else to help him, I don't think he can get the door down by himself." Darned passengers getting hurt.

"Lead the way" Jewel said excitedly, going to the door and into the hallway. She was glad the bot hadn't left yet. "We can figure out who needs to help together, who's here that's able to help?"

"We can make James do it, he's a robot so he's pretty strong, although one of his arms keeps dislocating, so that's inconvenient," Vestia said, letting her bot lead Jewel down the hall. "Skye is a bit small to be lifting doors, but maybe she'd work. Esk is still recuperating so he's not an option. Maybe Kay? He's in one piece, but not super athletic or anything. Or maybe Dawn, she has magic that could help." So many bad options! It was terrible.

Esk nodded. "He won't leave if you don't want to either." He reasoned, then shrugged. "I don't think it really matters much though,  if we have to leave we have a means, otherwise, well... the food's better here." He snickered.

---

Matt nodded. "Man, I thought the terran empire was kinda boring but turns out it's super screwed up and weird." He smiled softly. "It's gonna be interesting."

Jewel stopped and hovered in place "If we get this done before you leave the guild, we can get one of the eagles to help, they are strong and would be willing." She said, looking to the camera.

~~~
Dawn chuckled and nodded at that "It is" She agreed cheerfully.