There is a notable shift in her demeanor, that much is certain. Evelyn is no longer the mysterious traveler we picked up a week ago. We’ve all been living together for over a week now, and in that time, Evelyn has been generous and thoughtful, as well as playful and intelligent. But now, after defending us from a company called Rossum, she is more assertive and confident. Where she had been supplying useful nuggets of information that we attributed to her travels, she now regularly introduces new information that she deems relevant. Sometimes it is helpful, and sometimes it comes off as combative. She has a vast wealth of knowledge, and where anyone else might take a moment to research a topic they are unfamiliar with, she seems to already know everything already. I understand that her perspective must now be that the cat is out of the bag, but it is jarring to interact with another person who seems to just know everything. What’s even more unnerving is knowing that she is always listening to everything we do on the net, which we all use so frequently it might as well be second nature.
Since she cleared out the crews of the war ships and detained Jack, Cicero has left her alone, interacting with her as little as possible. Liam talked to me about how she dealt with the crews, as I decided not to join them after I saw how upset Juno was. Nothing he said surprised me after what I saw her do myself, but he commented about how quickly she cleared entire rooms of people. He described it as one fluid motion, she would blow someone’s head off across the room in the same stroke that she was cutting someone else from shoulder to hip. He compared it to a short uninterrupted dance.
Juno, who Evelyn got along so well with the last few days, was inconsolable for several hours after the attack, but after sleeping, she apologized for blaming her for what happened. I was surprised by how much Juno’s opinion mattered to Evelyn; she was in a much better mood after making up with Juno. Thomas, out of all of us, has no reason to be upset with Evelyn, and if anything, he is slightly resentful of me for bringing the relic that Rossum was after.
Evelyn, in a show of generosity, offered up her room to us for extra living space. Star Fury has five beds, which is enough for the six of us as Thomas and Juno share a bed, but it is a tad crowded when everyone is in the common area, so we have been using her room’s larger living spaces. We took an access point from Thomas’s house and installed it in Star Fury’s lower floor so that her room is conjoined with the rest of the ship. Jack is also being kept in her room.
From talking with Jack, we determined that it was as I suspected; they were after the relic. He also told us about Valerie, how she runs her company, and he mentioned that this would most likely not be the last that we saw of her. He did not mention any specific plans to attack us or anything else, but he made it very clear in his description of Valerie that she was not the type to abandon an interest.
My first thought after hearing of Valerie’s persistence was to get up and leave as soon as possible, however, Evelyn assured me that she sent a clear message to Valerie, and that we were completely safe here for the moment. So, with her advice in mind, we’ve stayed for another local day, but now after we’ve installed her room in Star Fury, and interrogated Jack, there’s not much left for us here, as Thomas’s estate is in shambles. Since Juno managed to get herself together, she has been trying to convince Thomas to come with us, wherever that may be. He at first had plans to rebuild the mansion, but after inspecting and rummaging around, we found that the explosives had some kind of corrosive agent in them. The agent seeped into the metal holding the house together and the integrity of the house as a whole is compromised, if he were to rebuild, he would have to start from scratch. After he realized that the whole house was slowly crumbling, about an hour ago, he agreed to accompany us.
Now the only question is where we’re going next, and that is what I plan on discussing with Juno in just a moment.
“So Juno, the last time we had to pick a place to go, we decided to stay with a friend, and that didn’t go so well. We do eventually need to leave here; it would be irresponsible for us to stay for much longer. Do you have a preference for where we end up?” I ask. Juno and Thomas are sitting in chairs in the corner of the upper echelon of Evelyn’s library. Thomas has been enamored with Evelyn’s collection since she first showed it to him, and since the destruction of his home, he has spent most of his time here.
“I actually have a request,” says Thomas. “I would like to go see the structures left behind by the Preludes, Evelyn has been there before, and I have been reading about them. They’re what’s in that picture down there,” he says, pointing down at a photograph on the lower level. I follow his direction, leaning over the railing to look at the picture. I know of the Preludes. A few people have pointed out to me over the years that it’s lucky they don’t have a similar profession to my own, clearing out animals and less advanced species from planets. As we humans, are just as primitive to them as the cave dwelling species we clear are to us.
“I’ll discuss it with Evelyn, see what she thinks about going back somewhere she’s already been. What’s the name of the planet you’re referring to?” I ask. At this point I really am at a loss for direction. All my life I have always had direction, in the military I had orders, as a contractor, I had terms to follow, and before all that, my parents were strict, and they pushed their agenda hard. I have had very few points in my life where I decided my own direction, short as it may be compared to some others at only a mere 37 waking years. Gosh, to think of my parents, I haven’t done that in quite some time, lost to me as they are; my centuries in stasis due to my military years are to thank for that.
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“Eiso, I believe is the planet that picture was taken on, ask her for Eiso,” he says.
I climb back down the ladder to the lower floor, and I walk over to the picture to get a better look. To call what’s pictured a structure would be underexplaining, it looks to me to be a completely disorganized conglomerate of impossible shapes. In the foreground of the picture, you can see the material has a glassy sheen and is mostly a mirky white color, the white color looks like it was swirling inside a liquid before freezing to a solid state. There is no sense to the design and most of it looks to defy physics. Huge platforms and arcs hang at precarious angles supported sometimes by nothing but the thinnest of threads. The best way I can describe it would be to relate it to a pool of water, wrapped around an empty sphere. Now imagine someone splashing fiercely all around in the water and each wave, splash and droplet freezing at its apex. Now take all the water inside the once empty sphere, and you have an idea of what the structure looks like.
I don’t see the usefulness in going to Eiso, but I also don’t have any other ideas. It seems that all the money each of us has accumulated is worth almost nothing, chased as we are; as there’s no way any of us could buy property or anything of real substance.
Evelyn is outside, laying out in the grass on the other side of the hill, away from the burnt fields, looking up at the stars.
‘I wish we could stay here,’ she comms as I walk down the hill towards her.
When I get closer to her, I respond, “yes, it is beautiful, but it’s simple. I don't know about you, but we wouldn't last here long before we started craving something more.”
“I’ve had my fair share of life in the fast lane Gabriel, it would be nice to take a break. I’ve been playing the game you all are just beginning for longer than you can imagine. How old are you, Gabriel?” She asks.
“Don’t you know?” I say. She’s had no trouble finding anything else she wants to know.
“Yes, I do. I know where and when you were born, and I know that you enlisted and that military personnel spend lots of time in stasis. By only examining your genetic makeup and telemeter length I can tell you are a very young man. But Gabriel, relationships are not one sided, you need to answer questions about yourself to me, just as much as I to you, for the sake of interaction and perspective. I know the information, but I do not know your thoughts on it or your perspective on life. I know that you’re bothered by some of the things I can do, but that doesn't change that I can do them. I do hope to stay with you all for a while, but for that to work we must have a healthy relationship,” she says.
I must admit, I am taken aback at first, she is so forward, she stabs directly at the heart of the problem.
“Okay, I understand your point. I’ve had 37 waking years. I’m sure that I must seem like a child to you,” I say.
“I've found that age is not always the best indicator of maturity. And regardless, differing perspectives are rarely a detriment,” she replies. An interesting thought, in my mind, age almost directly corelates to maturity, and differing perspectives are the cause of most conflicts. I guess this boils down to the perspective and context she’s talking about.
“If you say so. Thomas wants to go to Eiso. He’s interested in the Prelude structures. Do you have any problems with going back to somewhere you’ve been before?” I ask.
“I don’t think just this once will be a problem. Something to consider though, and this won’t be a problem on Eiso, but we need to modify Star Fury’s clearance codes and registration information before we dock at any official port. That will require some finagling. The Government makes a point to keep the registration database for spaceships as tamperproof as possible. We will have to go to a shipyard to have an entry added. We are also going to have to bribe a few people to make it happen,” she says. I hadn’t thought about having to rebrand Star Fury. She’s right though, too many people know us by our ship.
“Do you know what shipyard would work best for this kind of thing?” I ask.
“I’ve looked into this before, when I was considering buying my own ship. A friend of a friend apparently bought an entry to the database at one of the smaller shipyards. I decided at the time that it was too much of a risk, and I didn’t have a way to get there anyway. Travel isn’t a problem now, but we still have to find out how he bought the entry. At the very least, we can go there and act as if we’re in the market to buy,” she says.
I’ve never heard of someone buying an entry to the spaceship database, I’ve always heard that you might as well buy a whole new ship before trying to falsify an entry to the database. It makes sense, the regulation of interstellar travel is one of the few chokeholds that The Government has to control its vast dominion.
“That’s where we need to go then. Sightseeing can wait,” I say.
‘We have to take care of some business before we go anywhere for leisure. We’re leaving for a shipyard to change Star Fury’s registration, before we go to Eiso. We leave in fifteen minutes,’ I comm out to everyone.
“Fifteen minutes is all I get?” she says with a sigh.
“We’ve stayed here longer than I’m comfortable with already. We can come back here eventually if you really want to,” I say.
“I suppose you’re right,” she says.
‘Liam, will you do me a favor and put Jack outside the hanger, Valorie will come pick him up here eventually, and I don’t want to bring him with us, if that’s okay with Gabriel,’ she comms to the group.
‘It’s fine with me,’ I add.
‘Sure, I’m ready to go already anyway,’ Liam responds.