video;

[circumspector]

Hi again - better news, kind of. At least more useful news.

[ she gives a quick little wave hello. ]

So first of all, quick update on the Reindire. I think I got them addicted to tequila by mistake? In my defence I didn't know that's not normal food for animals like this. I am trying to limit their habit of drinking it with water, but also a robot dedicated to make tequila sunrises just for them in case they get agitated, but dividing it with water or other liquids to ween them off.

Apart from that, they seem to really like Mercenary Day food. Which I've been told you guys call 'Christmas'. But Mercenary Day cake, eggnog, little brightly wrapped candies, something I'm informed is 'pine tree' leaves and 'holly'. That sort of thing. I'm not sure who to tell that to, so if someone could pass that along to the appropriate administration.

Secondly, I made a book, to help people that might be new to space travel. Since not everyone comes from a time and place where they are used to this. [ she lifts up the ring binder of pages, glossily laminated. ] There is no technical speak in here, it's just a no nonsense description of how to put in suits, what to do in the case of chemical fires, what to do if you find yourself in a zero gravity situation. It has pictures too just in case someone can't read or finds the terms hard to grasp. I am leaving a copy for anyone that wants it in the library. I'm more than happy to digitise it as well if anyone would prefer that.

Lastly, in case there is any confusion, I am the big white deer thing with stars and bones that hangs around with the other animals. Please don't try to have me for dinner at any point. I'll give you a warning bite.

Comments

[nockturnal]

[ He sounds disgusted for a moment. ]

They allowed giant bugs in your school? Ridiculous.

[ Yes, Hanzo. That's the ridiculous part of what she just said. ]

What came of these markings you speak of?

[circumspector]

[ she frowns a second, allowed - ? Oh, right, Earth. ] Oh, no, they can burrow through concrete. The turrets outside usually kept them out, but sometimes it happened if the came through the sewers underneath or something.

[ Perfectly normal. ]

Power. I became a siren. [ She lifts her left arm and shows him them. He's definitely already seen how extensive they are. Covering her arms, her chest, her stomach, hips, legs, down to one hoof, or foot as it had been. Curling as intimately as a lover, around and under her breast, hugging the inside of her thighs in swirling rivers of light on her sickly pale skin. ]

There are six sirens in the universe at any one time. Six women, who are granted impossible abilities, and a hunger that drives us out into the universe. I could do things with my mind that defined explanation. For me, it was technology. I could slide my mind into machines with just a thought, could control them like other people breath. But it wasn't just that, it was more like holding this whole, other, secret reality I bent with just my mind.

That was the hunger. To find ourselves out in the universe. I never got to talk to other sirens, myself, but I heard them speak. It was like this... empty place lives inside of us. We can rip stars out of the sky, and you just want to drag them inside of your body, to hold that power, but it will never be enough.

[nockturnal]

[ So when he supposed her divine, at first, he hadn't been far off the mark. Perhaps closer to a demi-god...or a demon. Either way, she does not speak as one bragging about their abilities.

This is simply how it is. Remarkable and terrifying as that might be. ]

How are these...siren chosen?

[circumspector]

[ that is the old pain, the deep sigh with her voice sticking in the back of her throat with the old ache. ]

I wish I knew. But I've never know. We wake up one day, and there is a little blue dot that begins to grow, this knowledge begins to grow in us. No one explains it to us, we aren't given a purpose.

And we usually learn the hard way, that the power we are given isn't a toy.

[nockturnal]

Power never is. It is as much a burden as a blessing, always.

[ That much, he knows. The echo of those consequences rests within him even now, rattling around in quieter moments of contemplation. ]

[circumspector]

When you get kidnapped and sold to the highest bidder at twelve years old, it's hard to see it any other way than that.

[nockturnal]

Unfortunate. But unsurprising.

You seem capable of defending yourself from such fools now, however.

[circumspector]

I always was.

They ended up not being the problem, when it came to it. I think there is a saying, about the people you love hurting you the most? I killed my mother after they took me. I just wanted everything to stop. I screamed until it did. Then she stopped too. There was blood, just so much blood and - my father...

He wasn't a good man, then again, no one is where we come from. But he became a very bad man. For years and years I was alone and he was everything to me. What he did... because of me and... with my power? Every little girl loves their father. I just wanted to make him happy. He was everything to me and...

[ Connor, Charles, they would tell her, because they gave her more than she ever thought she could come to know, let alone accept, over and over again, to not be so hard on herself. She didn't have a choice. She barely had her own thoughts after Jack was done with her. What else could she do?

But that didn't give back those lives. Good or bad. ]

I did awful, awful things.

[nockturnal]

[ It is not simply little girls who love their fathers. Who wish for them to be proud. Who strive to become what they wish. In following in his father's footsteps, he had likely caused harm to many...

Yet he did not feel a fraction of the guilt that she professes. What does that make him, in comparison?

A question for another time. ]

And now you would rather not risk harming those you intend no harm to again.

That is reasonable enough. I think I would ask for the same, were I so uncertain.

[circumspector]

[ She nods. That's all there is to it, in the end. ]

You end up with so much suffering on your hands, and you have to decide what you are going to do about it... and for me? Mankind does bad things, a lot, I know that. Hurting others isn't new, especially not where I come from. People eat their own children there.

I have to take responsibility for that. I will take responsibility for that. Anything else isn't good enough.

[nockturnal]

I, too, have caused suffering. For those closest to me...and those I know nothing of.

Every day, I seek to find a path to walk that I might find peace in. I do not know if that day will ever come.

But I must try.

[circumspector]

[ It warms her, to find, that despite it all - she's not alone. Happiness that filters through all her features as she regards him across the video stream. A smile that is wide but contented. ]

Then we have each other to try with.

[nockturnal]

[ Is this what friendship feels like? How odd, to find it with such a person. ]

Hm.

Just so.

[circumspector]

[ It always came in the strangest places. But Angel accepts, in the far too naive way that she has for someone who has done the things she has, that this is how it should be and can be and takes it with both hands. ]

Well, I need to go again, the Reindire need to be moved on again, they're getting restless because I cut off their tequila supply.

[nockturnal]

I will not keep you.

I know how such creatures can be.