lostandfoundlrp | (no subject)

Winters 2

There is grass beneath my feet. Thick sturdy stuff, some g-modded variant of the hardy Florida grass we would sit on to watch the Falcon super-heavy launches at Cape Canaveral take the final equipment loads up to orbit and the waiting UNSS Harmony, a year ago… a century ago depending on your perspective. And now, I was back on Mars and there was grass growing. Green Mars, Eden called it, and he was right.

Outside the dome wall just visible form where I stand in Gateway park, some variety of moss covers the land, drinking in the wan midday light and breathing out the burgeoning atmosphere of this resurrected world. Life has returned to Mars, not confined to the domes but free and wild and growing everywhere it can.

I cross the park, grinning like an idiot at the joggers, playing children, a dog walker (there are dogs on Mars!) I pick up a cap from a street vendor and find a signpost and make my way to the Museum. I slip among the people going about their day with ease, nobody is paying me any attention and the indifference is nice, as is the lack of zombies, tentacle monsters or other such oddness.

I approach the museum, a beautiful curved building constructed from Martian basalt, steel and glass. As I climb the steps to the entrance foyer I feel a tinge of embarrassment at even being here, at the self-indulgent nature of the whole trip. But… Summer was gone – safe, and with no memory of me and ‘Nowhere’, but gone. Kara and Max are gone, I still struggle to separate the Max I thought I knew from the ‘prisoner’ that was described… and either of them from the truth, what ever that was. Someday, perhaps there would be a Max who had lived in love and freedom and all that creative power would be a Good Thing in the Universe.

I told Eden at the time, I was choosing to Hope. I guess he had finally made a believer out of me, though I doubt this was quite what he was expecting. T’lis has gone back to her own time and I can’t deny it sounds pretty good. There are still the guardians and a couple of others in the house, Danu has been preventing my slide into some self-indulgent moping, but I can’t keep imposing on her – even if she is ‘the giver’ now.

So here I am, convincing myself it was worth it. I follow the line on the floor that leads to the colonisation exhibit. Its dark inside, and the subdued chatter of a school group up ahead can be heard over the subtle music. Turning the corner I feel like I have walked into a wall, the breath driven from me like a punch. I flop onto the padded bench in the centre of the space and just stare.

A holoscreen takes up the wall opposite the entrance, the horizon of Mars as seen from orbit forms the backdrop and there, lit by banks of lights, with habitat rings gently rolling in the night is the UNSS Harmony, my beautiful ship. As I watch the cargo landers detach and begin their decent to the surface, followed by the lander – the lander I piloted. I jump as I hear my own voice from the speakers, cockpit chatter with Ramerez and Prasad. the voice fades out, not following the lander but staying in orbit.

I only notice the date in the bottom corner when it changes, numbers rolling round in a blur until more than a year has passed, then suddenly, out of the night comes the UNSS Ambition, Ion and Fusion drive plume burning across the night. It slides into orbit, dwarfing its older sister and releasing landers like a dandelion shedding seed. What is left of the core of the ship inches closer to the Harmony until the two connect into one single structure.

The clock spins again, sunlight wrapping around and around the spindly construction as it rotates in the dark, until in a blaze of glory that drowns out the stars, the four drive plumes of the UNSS Destiny scream triumphant in the dark. She takes her position and brings the first true colonists to Mars. Dozens of Shuttles plummet into the atmosphere and the core joins the orbital station to keep watch over the fledgling colony.

I take my feet and slip out as the display starts its cycle again. Walk unsteadily down a short corridor with illuminated pictures showing different stages of the colony’s construction. Above the door to the next room picked out in lights are the words “the second step”.

It’s a large room, roughly divided into three sections, one for each of the ships. I want to look at them all, see all the things I missed, that I should have been here for. But I don’t. Instead I feel myself taking slow footsteps through the Harmony display to where life size holograms of the crew smile frozen in time.

I’m sat on the floor; I don’t know how I got here. These were my friends. We lived together, laughed and hoped and grieved our lost home and dreamed of the one we would build together. Now they were all long dead. I feel like there is a weight on my chest and I can barely draw breath.

“Commander?”

The voice draws me up as if out of a well. I blink moist eyes and look around for who is speaking. “Commander?” it repeats, a feminine voice that seems almost familiar. “Hello?” I say, looking around, but the room, large as it is, is empty. “I’m talking to you through the intercom commander, I can see you on the security cameras. Hello.”

“Who are you? I ask, climbing to my feet, looking for cameras that are probably too small to see.

“I am the governing intelligence of Eveningstar station. A visitor to the museum reported a man in distress, the security system ran a facial recognition. The cap was not a sufficient disguise, I am sorry to report. After the Elysium incident any report of you being on the planet is automatically reported to myself. I have to ask you, are we in danger? Has the Crystal plague returned?”

I shake my head, “No, no… I just came to see. To say goodbye to them, I suppose. I… I’m sorry, I didn’t mean too…” I feel my voice trail off, unsure of what to say. “Who are you again?”.

“There have been a number of upgrades and expansions, but my core physical strata and programming is essentially the same. Eveningstar station is the geosynchronous orbital dock work and communication Hub formed from the original colony star ships. My neural architecture is built on the Virtual Intelligence that ran the Harmony.”

It takes a moment to sink in. “Harmony? My Harmony? Is that you?”

“Hello Commander. Its so very nice to see you again.”