Upon Vestia: Chapter Thirty-Three

"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?"

Shane would help Matt into the chair so they could go find a room at least for the night.

Starr smiled at Armin as he fussed over her and Luna "Thank you for everything Armin." She said genlty before shifting and circling around her baby.She was soon asleep in her little nest.

The drgaons would go back tot heir rooms or sleep on the medical beds if they hadn't been cleared yet.

"There's no way the regular janitor can do this." Esk pointed out. "He'll just puke everywhere." Not to mention Matt couldn't actually bend that easily at the moment.
"Someone has to clean up the mess." He spoke without any emotion, this was simply a fact, he was so accustomed to cleaning up messes like this, it just felt natural to be doing it. Besides, it was his team who'd made this particular one.

---

Matt let Shane help him, smiling tiredly at him as they headed for a room.

---

Armin watched Starr sleep for a while which totally wasn't creepy honest. "Sleep well my friend." He murmured, and left her to rest.

---

Kay discharged any patients who were able to walk and walked around making notes and keeping track of everything. He barely paused when James talked to him. He just shook his head.

Ellie decided that if Hewitt needed her, Vestia would call. She'd head with Shane and Matt to First Class, and they'd find a room.

The beds in First Class were wonderfully huge and comfortable, plenty of room for three exhausted friends to curl up together.

Ellie would pause to get her armor off and rinse her mouth and face first though, she felt really gross after the day's events.

~~
Ethan nodded. Esk was right, no way could Matt handle this, and James was busy being a medic right now.
Ethan eyed the mess on the floor, some sort of internal debate playing out in his mind. "Want help?" he said finally. He didn't know why he was offering. Maybe he just didn't want to look any further at the destruction in the library right now. Or maybe the thought of Esk cleaning up all this death alone reminded him too much of his days with Kaylr. He wasn't sure, and he didn't really want to be introspective about this.

~~
James sighed. Judging by his understanding of his coworker's mind, Kay was probably trying to keep himself from freaking out right now. Which yeah, maybe James was doing that a little too, but he'd always been a little less emotionally repressed than Kay. So maybe James should just leave him alone, so that freakout didn't happen?
He gave up on trying to talk to the guy. Probably wouldn't go anywhere positive for either of them.

Matt was somewhat to tired to do much other than just crawl into bed and lay there, he couldn't even get his damn shoes off.
Still, at least he had no armor to get off right?

---

Esk paused, people generally didn't offer to help. He nodded. "yeah... once we get this done, you want help with the library?" It mattered to Ethan, he knew that, even if he didn't really understand WHY. Maybe they could salvage some books, who knew.

--

Kay looked faintly grateful when James didn't press for elaboration and went back to his business. He would literally do this till his legs gave out, because he was an unhealthy workaholic who'd never figured out appropriate outlets for his problems.

"Sounds good," Ethan said, he was willing to turn this into some sort of trade if Esk was. He didn't know what else to say, so he'd just pull on some gloves and get to work. This was going to take a while, he knew. But he had plenty of experience, so that helped.
Maybe that wasn't a good thing, but it was useful this time.

~~
James left Kay to it.

He'd finish checking on the patients, then plug in somewhere and start scrolling through the news and old messages on his tablet. He wanted to see what he'd missed, even if it hurt.

Periodically Kay came over to see what James had found, much as it sucked, he kinda wanted to know as well.
But then he'd go back to work.

---

Esk worked efficiently but it was fairly clear he was very very tired and he wasn't using one arm nearly as much as normal. His shoulder still hurt despite the painkillers.

Still, this HAD to be done and it wasn't like Esk wasn't accustomed to working through exhaustion. His life the past few years hadn't exactly been peaceful or calm until he'd met the Silver Devil, he'd had to fight and struggle his way along, kill or be killed, that coupled with years of military training made him pretty resiliant.

He tried to ignore the stench.

James would show Kay whatever he'd discovered. He didn't just look up political stuff, although he did start with that. He also looked up his favorite movie franchises and TV shows. The good news? There was a TON of new stuff to binge watch that sounded awesome.
Yeah, he was trying to distract himself. He had no idea what to say to Asher and Lark, and he was trying to put off thinking about it.

His poor siblings, wondering what had happened to him for ten whole years. He wondered if they were going to be angry. He knew he would have been.

~~
Ethan mostly focused on the work, but looked at Esk occasionally. It was pretty obvious the guy needed rest.

He didn't bother him about it though. He had a feeling Esk would just get pissed off if he did. And Ethan wasn't really in the mood to be snapped at.

Eventually Kay's energy gave out and his legs buckled. He caught his weight on a desk, blinking a few times. Yeah, he should sleep. Definitely. His vision was starting to tunnel and his body was giving up.

---

It took a while, but eventually they got the bodies and body parts cleared. Now they just had to wash the floors but the bots might be able to do that now, now that there was no rubble and corpses in the way.
Esk stood up, stretching tired limbs.
Blood had soaked through his clothing, most of it had dried though thankfully. Still, he looked a mess.
Maybe Ethan wouldn't want him near his books like this.

James saw Kay almost collapse, and unplugged himself from the wall to go see if he needed help.

~~
"We can leave this to the bots I think," Ethan told Esk. Yeah, he had no desire to spend the rest of the night mopping blood if the nonsentient bot army could do it instead.
He probably looked every bit as gross as Esk did, and he really, really wanted a long, hot shower right now. The books could wait.

Kay gestured for James to leave him, stubborn even when barely concious.
He straightened up, took a few breaths and found his tablet to write [i'm going to bed.] it took him far longer than it should have to type that.

He staggered toward the door, swaying a little and trailing one hand along the wall for balance.

---

Esk nodded. "at least the worst of it's sorted." He stretched, wincing as he moved his shoulder and jarred the burned skin. "We... should probably get cleaned up." Yeah, if Ethan looked this bad, he knew he had to look awful. Great.
Hot showers, yes, good hot showers. Then maybe collapsing into a bed to sleep.

James eyed Kay uncertainly. He did not look well right now, but that was kind of to be expected, wasn't it? "See you in the morning then," he said after a few moments.

If Kay collapsed, he was sure Vestia would tell someone at least.

~~
"That sounds like a good plan," Ethan agreed. "See you tomorrow I guess." He'd head off toward the nearest teleporter. His room on floor 3 wasn't going to be usable, so he'd head for first class. Hey, he deserved a luxury rich people shower after doing his part to clean up that mess.

Kay made it to at least somewhere with a bed, probably not first class though. That wasn't overly close was it?

He just sort of collapsed face down, asleep almost before he'd even touched the mattress. He slept fully closed, he was too tired to do anything else.

---

Esk nodded. "Vestia, keep people outta here till it's cleared up okay?" Last thing they needed was more people traumatised and upset by blood soaked halls.

He headed back to well, anywhere that was closest. His own room was inaccessable so first class would have to do if he could walk that far.
He really didn't much care, he'd sleep in a chair if he had to.

"Will do," Vestia said. Yeah, she'd seen how Ellie reacted to that sight. She didn't need her crew any more shell-shocked than they already were.

First Class wasn't too far by teleporter, so Esk might made it there, maybe.

~~
Ethan made it to First Class and took a loooong shower, since he didn't need sleep. Thankfully Prime Vestia's water heaters were way more capable than those on Mirror Vestia, and her water filtration systems could clean the water for reuse relatively rapidly, so there was no danger of him stealing all the hot water this time.

Esk intended to have a shower, honest, but when it came down to it, he was just too tired. He collapsed into a bed in a bloody, disgusting mess. Oops?

(so, next day when everyone's rested and able to think clearly?)

(Sounds good to me!)

(Sounds good to me too)

---- August.. ish 2800 ----

Everyone would probably sleep very heavily till some time in the mid morning.

Jarral had returned to the large command ship to talk with Eva and would return later, when he figured they'd have thought up more questions to interrogate him with.

Right now this war zone was quiet, eerily so. Workers and fighters buzzed about to and fro, some sort of construction was slowly ongoing around the rift but beyond that, in the eerie glow of that tear, everything was tensely peaceful.

---

Matt spent the night heavily asleep, curled up with one arm around either Ellie or Shane, whoever was closer.

---

Kay slept in, everything ached.

---

Esk rose early with a groan and peeled himself off the sticky bloodied sheets. Ew. Shower, definititely shower. He went to do that.

---

Mourn dozed fairly peacefully in a lovely painkiller haze.

----

Silence and Ivor slept curled up, Ivor resting his head on Silence's tail.

----

Luka hopefully had gotten back to a bed. Whether that was alone or with Rigel however...

----

Armin had spent the evening catching up on news, pondering over it, worrying and wondering how to handle this. Eventually he'd gone to bed.

Now he rose early and went to find something to eat, which uh.. might be interesting as wasn't the main kitchen and dining area on the 3rd floor?

---

Hewitt slept heavily, his body recovering... slowly. It could be weeks before he was up and concious and back to his bitchy self again.

---

Some engineers arrived to help shore up Vestia's hull.

Vestia felt somewhat better with the workers there to fix up her hull. She was going to need a ton of repairs to be 100% functional again, but hey, this was progress. Maybe in a day or two she'd be able to start the trip to Unity Station.

She'd had her bots finish cleaning up most of the blood. Likely she was still going to be finding bloodstains for a while though. What a mess.

~~
James and Tori had stuck around the med bay, staying with the patients. They'd been catching up on the news, so now they were moderately well updated on current universal events!

~~
The other androids had all found a room to hide in together, they were still freaked out. And probably going to stay in there most of the morning.

~~
Ellie had planted herself between Matt and Shane for the night, not being alone had made her feel somewhat better. She woke up blearily, still feeling kinda awful. Oh god, her parents. She needed to tell them she was okay.

~~
Ethan had finally finished his shower and headed off on a wander around First Class. he really wasn't sure what he was doing, just... wandering.

Vestia hadn't told him about Hewitt yet. She knew he was going to freak out when he heard the news.

~~
Tala slept a long time, but finally woke up to find a sheet on her. Huh. She eyed the sheet uncertainly, then pulled it off and dropped it down a laundry chute. She headed for wherever Vestia told her the nearest shower was, her fur was crusted with blood and she could still smell some of the gas's chemical stink as well.

Rigel woke the next morning with Luka at his side. He certainly hadn't wanted to be alone and they were kind of platonic as they had laid there. He smiled softly and got up, trying not to wake her as he went for a shower and to change.

~~~
Starr woke up to her daughter's pushing against her and calling for food. Luna was hungry and let her know it. She chuckled as she got up, setting the child on her back to find something to eat together.

~~~
Dawn woke, confused as to where she was, she had simply found a room near the med bay to sleep in for the night. She went to see if she could still get to her room for clothes and a good shower.
~~~
Shane didn't mind sleeping beside Ellie through the night, though her movement woke him in the morning. He yawned and turned his head to look at her. "Morning, how are you feeling?" He asked, he knew she had been so out of it the night before.

Now that things were calmed, Vestia might notice that Sawna was not there.

Luka slept heavily, still wearing her heavy combat boots even.

---

Matt opened one eye as Ellie stirred but didn't move his arm. "Wha?" He asked groggily.

---

The workers would talk to Vestia for a bit about what needed to be done and would soon set to work. it was gonna be a big job, especially with the damage from that ship crash having torn such a hole.
Hmm.

---

Vestia would help the workers figure out what needed to be done, and then gratefully let them get to work.

She realized her crew probably needed something to eat, so she'd helpfully inform people when they got up that there was food in the first class dining room. The food was a little less fancy than usual because many of the cooking bots were gone, but it was perfectly tolerable food.

If Dawn had lived on the floor where most of the crew lived, she couldn't get to her room. Vestia hadn't pressurized the floor yet, sorry.

~~
"Better," Ellie told Shane tiredly. She kept her voice down for Matt's sake. "Kinda better, anyway. You?"

~~
Vestia wouldn't notice immediately that Sawna was missing, but she started to have the feeling someone was. She did a head count and came up short. She started scanning her memories to find when she'd last seen Sawna.

Shane nodded then shrugged "Alright, considering." He said then smiled softly. "We won though, even with all this wierdness after."

~~~
Dawn sighed and headed to the room she had slept in to shower anyway. She would go check on their patients before going for food for herself.

~~~
Starr found the food, giving Luna cooked meat and water since she was too young for anything else, though she had her own breakfast too.

~~~
If she had the video files she would see that Sawna had fainted at the start of the anti-magic attack then had vanished when they had gone through time. Perhaps she had gone back to her universe somehow, who knew?

Matt opened his other eye, letting go of Ellie and rolling onto his back. "Hey..."

---

Esk eventually managed to clean all the long dried blood off himself. Gross.
He considered clothing options. Hmm, there weren't many were there? "vestia?" He asked. "I don't suppose you have a change of clothing right?" His own clothes were dirty with blood and grime and yeah, he needed clean clothing damnit.

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