Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

This was it.

There was only one thing left that had to be done, but all they wanted to do looking out the window of the Vessel was the one thing they didn’t think they could bear; Watch as that small, dark orange ball floating in space shrunk down and quickly expanded in a flare of plasmic blue.

Wants.

All Laz ever had was wants, but the universe hadn’t fulfilled a single one lately.

They wanted to be an astronaut. The universe ended.
They wanted to stop it. They couldn’t stop a supernova, let alone however many were happening here at the end of it all.
They wanted to explain. No one would remember.
They wanted help. No one would believe them.
They heard about a lead in the Sun Station. It was completely useless.
They wanted to say goodbye.

They had, of course. Spending the past couple of loops going around to everyone, spending time and saying their farewells. Of course no one meant goodbye in the way that they had, but it still felt nice. No, that wasn’t a good word, it was the worst thing they had to experience yet, but it gave them a sense of closure, they had done right by everyone, the best they could.

They’d gone to Gabbro last, mainly a tactical choice, seeing as how uncontrollably they were shaking when they landed. They weren’t going to be able to play that off to anybody else. They’d expected Gabbro to have a word or two of wisdom, but after Laz broke down explaining to Gabbro that this was the only thing left to do, they had failed, there was no way to fix it, Gabbro spent the entire loop in near silence comforting them. “You did the best you could,” “It’s okay, Laz,” “I’m proud of you time buddy.” It felt fitting that their last goodbye was the only one that was “real.”

They held it together that final loop. Rushed by before Slate could say a thing as usual. As soon as they broke through the final node in Dark Bramble did it all start flooding back again. Tears flooded their eyes. They didn’t see the Vessel in time. Their ship impacted and became lodged in the opening, but they were fine. They squeezed by, threw the warp core in, and shot off to the Eye.

Grave relief.

They wouldn’t die, but their universe sure would.

“…” 

They couldn’t muster a word, but their face drew together in what might have been the ugliest, most painfully sorrowful expression yet seen. The final dregs of what used to be their Sun, their home, their family, their friends, lost their bright blue hue and fell invisible against the now empty backdrop of space.

They dried and rubbed their eyes until they were purple, then finally looked up to see it.

The Quantum Moon.

They blinked. They blinked again. Again. Again. Again. Again and it never disappeared.

The supernova must have destroyed the versions of the quantum moon that were orbiting the planets in the system. The Moon’s uncertainties should still have it collapse down to a field of debris or ionized gas back where the solar system used to be. So, why was it staying here?

The shards. The shards came from the moon, but did not act as extensions of it, they all behaved as their own quantum object. Any version of the Quantum Moon in the solar system would have been destroyed. Any left over matter would no longer associate with the Quantum Moon, forcing this to be its only possible state. Why is this significant? Why is this big? Laz couldn’t understand.

Solanum. She also now only has one possible state of existence, the version of her on the Quantum Moon.

Laz ripped the warp core out, forcing the doors to open on failsafe, they shot through the corridors to the hull breach. They’d fly out there on their jetpack if they had to, they’d-

The ship was still lodged in the breach. The faithful Mk6, of course it wouldn’t give up on Laz now. Oh, the days they’d spent helping Slate with every ship since the start of the “Mark” naming scheme with Feldspar. Gossan had their own before they decided parts should be standardized, everyone still remembers how that went. At least, everyone did remember. They would never be able to come to terms with the fact that they’re gone, but there was still at least someone they could save.

Chapter Text

Something happened. Something happened and she wasn’t exactly sure how she knew, but she could feel it. As much as that seemed to go against everything the Nomai in Solanum is. She really had been here for too long. Wait, didn’t she just get here? How could it be too long?

Question: How much time has passed since landing on the Quantum Moon?

Observation: The dyes on her suit have considerably desaturated and she has a “feeling.”

Hypothesis: A monumental amount of time has passed.

Hold on, no. if as much time has passed as she feels has passed, then she would surely be dead. Still, how much time does she feel has passed, hypothetically. It is exceedingly hard to place a timeframe. She simply does not have a way to conceptualize a length of time as long as this, or she may not be able to conceptualize it because it never passed in the first place.

She began tapping her fingers against her staff. Very puzzling, two mutually exclusive theories, with only a “feeling” to support or discredit one or the other. Her tapping was getting loud. She should be dead if this much time has passed. She must have strong fingers. The dyes in her suit have weathered considerably. She should stop tapping, it’s becoming difficult to concentrate. It could be an effect of the Quantum Moon. She stopped tapping a while ago, why can she still hear it? Nobody else returned with faded garments…

Her train of thought came to a halt as she noticed the tapping was coming from one direction. As the tapping drew closer it grew louder and sounded more like footfalls, very rushed footfalls, until a figure emerged over the horizon. Someone had joined her on her pilgrimage? No, that’s not a Nomai.

That is not a Nomai.

An alien species! How exciting! However, it seems to be moving with purpose, towards her, how terrifying. Solanum gripped her staff, she may have to fight. She didn’t know how to fight!

The creature stopped some five steps away from her, gesturing wildly while repeatedly looking back. It was speaking at such a speed that had Solanum known its language, she may not know what it was saying anyway.

This was not going to get them anywhere, she would have to find a way to communicate. It obviously was intelligent enough to understand. It even had its own atmospheric suit, complete with a rather… perilous looking device strapped to its back. She moved to produce a set of language stones with some topics that may be of interest, paired with the Nomai tenets of philosophy before she was interrupted by the creature producing a hinged rectangular block, inside of which were many thin and flexible sheets, and a thin stick with a pointed, dark tip.

The creature then used the stick to produce pictures on the sheets inside of the rectangular block. Ah, yes! It is a book! The clan elders spoke about how they used to use books before being stranded here. Now, what was this stranger drawing? The first drawing depicts the sun in Solanum’s home system growing in size before exploding in a supernova. The next, the stars in the sky follow suit. Finally, this creature and Solanum leaving the quantum moon for the Eye.

The pictures seem to suggest that the heat death of the universe has begun.

Conclusion: A monumental amount of time has passed.

But that would mean that everyone, her family, her home…

No…

Chapter Text

Laz watched as Solanum slowly took in what their drawings had shown her. Did she understand? Her legs suddenly gave out and they caught her before she hit the ground, but her weight continued to push down on their arms so they slowly helped her sit down. They really didn’t have time for this, the Sun was going to…

No, no it wasn’t. They had all the time they needed. They sat as well.

Laz watched as Solanum used her staff to produce a sentence on the ground.

[ Am I correct in understanding that the heat death of the universe has started? ]

After Laz had read from their translator, Solanum’s head slowly bobbed to the side and she produced two smaller sentences with a good deal of distance from the first.

[ Yes ]                    [ No ]

Laz said “Yes” and pointed to it while nodding, Solanum went slack before she moved to produce another sentence. They hoped that Solanum would be able to pick up on the correlation between nodding their head and their answer.

[ Are we the last of our kind from our system? ]

Hesitation… 

“Yes.” 

Solanum starts to tremble.

[ You want us to leave the Quantum Moon to go to the Eye of the Universe, but wouldn’t that just bring us back to another reflection of the moon? ]

Laz says and points to “No” while shaking their head, then produces another picture showing the destruction of each of the other versions of the Quantum Moon.

[ I see, this version of the Moon is the only possible quantum possibility, so we must end up at the Eye of the Universe. ]

Laz nods yes energetically. Solanum tilts her head before the gesture seems to click for her. Her body still shakes.

[ My clan is long dead, but it was their dream to eventually make it to the Eye, I will go. You have my gratitude for understanding my language, I only wish that someone else wer1^489#&%&%5#1^198/0& ]

Laz deactivates the translator before finishing and lunges forward, wrapping both hands around Solanum, prompting a surprised yelp from her before she returns the gesture. Then the crying. The uncontrollable, inconsolable sobbing that Laz is all too familiar with. It’s too much.

They both fully break down. Laz hasn’t experienced this before, Gabbro had always been there to help them through when they really needed it, they stopped them from getting to this point, but now, it just felt good to open up to someone who seemed to be just as fragile as they were. Misery loves company. No, that’s a bad use of the phrase. Sometimes it’s just good to cry.

They stay like that for a while before getting up. Solanum produces more writing.

[ Thank you for that, I had tried to keep up a show of professionalism as I was making first contact with an alien species, but it is nice to know that there is someone who will offer their support. ]

Laz shrugs and holds their hands to the side, as if to convey “I’m just doing what I can,” hoping that Hearthian and Nomaian mannerisms are fairly similar. Thankfully, the meaning is not lost on Solanum and they hug once more. Laz breaks a smile, the first genuine one since over a thousand loops ago. And they make for the north pole.

They are welcomed by the sight of the Mk6 standing proud and defiant in the face of the end of it all. It was strange, seeing as how they landed on the north pole, but they couldn’t exactly have punched through the vortex, so… Who knows? Nomaian curiosity still was going strong, and, upon seeing the ship, Solanum started fawning over every little detail. Mixtures of admiration, concern, and, of course, the sadness from before.

Stars, Nomaian and Hearthian mannerisms really are similar.

They both clamber into the ship, Solanum placing special attention onto the pieces of Nomaian tech integrated into the ship and the map plastered onto the wall next to the computer. Laz is about ready to take off when she writes again.

[ I should have asked this first but, this ship is by no means interstellar, are you from another star system? ]

Laz shakes their head.

[ Then, which planet are you from? ]

Solanum produces a list of the planets Laz had spent so much time exploring, pointing towards Timber Hearth.

[ I must have been gone a long time for your kind to evolve to the point you are now. I must know, what exactly happened to my clan? ]

Laz’s whole body droops. They move over to the ship computer, gesturing for Solanum to sit down. They navigate to the thousands of photos showcasing ghost matter stored from the scout. Most importantly Arkose throwing an apple over the fence, and the resulting timelapse of the apple withering away. A tear rolls down Laz’s face, they can mourn for the hatchlings later, this has to be handled with tact. Solanum places a hand upon their back. Laz displays a picture of the Interloper and its core, Pye in full view. Solanum visibly sinks, but it doesn’t seem that she understands, so Laz resorts back to the drawings. They depict a Nomai entering her shuttle to head for the Quantum Moon shortly before a comet enters the Solar System, the comet ruptures after its orbit brings it to close to the sun and its ice partially melts. Solanum shifts.

[ This comet entered our system shortly after I had landed on the Quantum Moon, and it brought a substance that spread throughout the system, killing my clan. Is this correct? ]

Laz nods.

Solanum produces more writing that quickly recedes back to the staff, trying multiple times to gather her thoughts.

[ I see, I suppose that it is somewhat more consoling that their deaths were nearly instantaneous and they did not have to suffer, but I am still saddened that we, as a clan, never completed our mission to reach the Eye. ]

Not on Laz’s watch. Solanum would reach the Eye, the souls of her clan would be able to be laid to rest proper. They still weren’t really sure this would work. The ship broke one of the rules of the Quantum Moon to land on the north pole, but would they still end up at the eye when they left? They would just have to find out. Laz snapped a picture, just in case, and gingerly piloted the Mk6 to the south pole to the whirlpool in the sky. Strange circumstances of arrival? Strange circumstances for departure. They sent the photo to the ship computer screen, turned around, and stared at Solanum and the picture. Laz hit the throttle.

They weren’t sure when to look back out the front window, they had half expected Solanum to disappear and they would take that as their signal. But no. Solanum still sat there, then slowly got up to look outside.

The Eye.

They watched as the Stranger’s signal blocker drifted lazily by the canopy. Laz thought back to how excited the stranger made them, they had set themselves on going to the Eye, but here! A whole new thing to explore! And with it the possibility of a solution! It didn’t lead anywhere, of course, just a whole new source of sorrow. Solanum just stared at it blankly, and bobbed her head to the side, the same way she had always done when Laz crested the horizon on the Quantum Moon. They’d have to find a way to explain later, pictures would not be good enough.

They flew over to the Vessel, she deserved some kind of closure.

Chapter Text

These last few minutes had been nothing short of… revealing. Despite having just started her pilgrimage to the Quantum Moon, Solanum found herself here, at the Eye of the Universe, with a strange creature claiming to have come from Timber Hearth. How long had she been gone? She stopped that line of thought as the form of the Vessel came into view, wrapped in vines and bearing the scars of its unfortunate warp to Dark Bramble. Had there been some sort of miscommunication? Were there Nomai on board to run the craft? No, her clan would never let their Vessel remain in such a condition.

She waited with bated breath as the strange, not at all dangerous, chemical-powered craft loaded with enough fuel to break a hole through the roof of the Sunless City. Drifted to a stop just in front of a large hole in the hull. They drifted down the corridors, past the decaying bodies, and into the control room. The strange creature inserted an advanced warp core and weight returned to her body. The creature led her up to the communications boards above the bridge. Modern Nomai clan leaders were discussing the state of the universe. Canna, Bromi, Hyssop, Clem, Neem, all names she did not recognize in the slightest.

“...It is clear the universe is dying.”

“...the old myth my grandfather used to tell, the Disappearance of Escall.”

How long had she been on that moon, that her clan had passed into myth? She decided to send a message out.

“SOLANUM: I am sending this message from Escall’s vessel. It seems that I am the last of Escall’s clan. I will not be able to join you, nor do I recommend you come out here. I can see no stars, but we have finally found what my clan went off searching for those years ago.”

Many minutes passed before more text appeared on the wall, she wasn’t fully alone.

“CANNA: Greetings, Solanum. Though the existence of Escall’s clan is no doubt a revelation, we would not recommend you coming out here either. The Blackrock Suns have also started to become unstable, we will be searching for more soon. My deepest apologies for your clan. If you wouldn’t mind, could you explain how your clan went missing? And why you still refer to your clan as belonging to Escall?”

“SOLANUM: Of course, my clan had detected a momentary signal that was older than the universe. The decision was made to warp quickly before the signal could disappear.”

“SOLANUM: Unfortunately, our vessel became entrapped and our warp core damaged. My clan spent the rest of its existence searching for what we called the Eye of the Universe.

“SOLANUM: Then, by grim circumstance, a comet carrying lethal matter entered our system and ruptured, killing all life here instantaneously.

It hurt to write. She knew it. She knew it well, but it drilled into her very heart to admit it out loud.

“SOLANUM: I was on a trip to the Quantum Moon at the time, and I only survived because I became entangled to the Moon which had one of its possible orbits around the Eye of the Universe, far away from the effects of the matter. I hypothesize that since there were no other conscious observers on the Moon, it was unable to collapse into one possibility. Effectively separating me from the normal flow of time. I am only four generations off from Escall.”

“CANNA: Quantum entanglement on this scale was previously thought to be only theoretical… What is the Eye of the Universe, and how did you and a whole moon become quantum entangled?”

“SOLANUM: We believe the Eye of the Universe to be the source of all quantum uncertainty in the universe. As you approach it, that uncertainty grows enormously, to a macroscopic scale. The Moon became entangled to the Eye due to its proximity to it, as for me… I believe my unique situation made it impossible for me to be considered a true outside observer.”

“SOLANUM: It was our goal to find the Eye of the Universe, and now I am here, I have to see my clan’s goal through.”

“CANNA: You have our best wishes. If only there were more time. Farewell.”

No new messages appear, but Solanum knows that there are Nomai somewhere out there, and she will not be forgotten.

Chapter Text

Laz removes their helmet and flicks through the images stored on the scout, tears welling up. They almost jump at the contact when Solanum lays a hand upon their shoulder. She has removed her helmet as well.

[ Thank you for bringing me off the Quantum Moon and here to the Eye of the Universe. I suppose I should introduce myself, I am Solanum. ]

She looked just like the statue, three eyes with rectangular pupils, but she was not as gaunt and infinitely less imposing. She had four horns, and every part of her head except for her face was covered in strange lightly colored fiber accented with dark patches. The "fur," as Laz remembered from Hal, that grew from her head was longer and hung down below her shoulders. She was undoubtedly smiling, but there were unmistakable undertones of sadness and grief.

Laz points towards their chest, “Laz,” then gestures to Solanum, “Solanum.”

She bobs her head to the side to process before straightening and speaking “Паслен.”

Then, “Лаз.”

[ It is interesting to hear my name in an alien language! Was my pronunciation of yours correct? ]

Close enough. “Yes.”

Solanum started mumbling to herself, “Ec, No, Ec, Да, No, Нет."

It didn’t sound as alien as Laz expected, her voice somewhat sounded like that of a Hearthian, just softer and more refined.

[ I had initially been skeptical of your claim that you were from Timber Hearth, but I now see a definite relation between you and a species my clan found in the waters there. The stages of evolution necessary for your kind to be able to live on land are nothing short of amazing. I particularly admire your four eyes. ]

Well ain't that familiar? Laz smiled at the message.

[ You have my thanks for allowing me to see the Eye of the Universe. I am ready for whatever is next as long as you are. ]

Laz gestures back through the corridor and gave her a softly expectant look.

“Д- Ec, umm… Yes.”

It was oddly endearing for Laz to watch Solanum trip over the word “Yes,” but they didn’t think they would be able to cleanly transition to “Da” easily either.

Solanum was dragged up into the gravity beam of the Mk6 and Laz followed, feeling the familiar embrace of a faithful friend as the beam brought them up. Solanum had already found her seat at the computer, and Laz strapped into the pilot’s seat. They slowly brought the ship over to the north pole and carefully slipped it underneath the clouds. It was pitch black, save for the ship’s overkill spotlight and the exceedingly frequent lightning strikes.

Then they saw it, the maelstrom, exactly like how it had been in the Quantum Moon’s reflection of the Eye. Except, now they could hear the quantum fluctuations, without the signalscope, through the hull of the ship. It felt like it was reverberating through their body. They froze right there. Solanum came up from the computer and put her hands on their shoulders. It snapped them out of it. They didn’t know if they would have been able to do this alone, it surprised them just how much having someone else there with them, even if they couldn’t speak the same language, could make all the difference. Still, it didn’t matter how much they looked around, it seemed the only way forward was up. Laz turned to look at Solanum and pointed at the vortex.

After a moment of deliberation, “Yes.”

Laz slowly brought the throttle up. Solanum’s grip tensed. They entered the eye of the storm.

Chapter Text

The ship disappeared, she was falling, falling, falling, Laz turned around to check on Solanum. They looked terrified

Impact, but no pain, no fractures, there was barely even a sound. Solanum thought they were going to die. She had shot through the very fabric of quantum space. Oh stars, she was going to fall apart. Laz started struggling with something before a light on their chest ignited. They turned to look at her. She was shaking, trembling, she couldn’t hold still. Had she died and just not realized? It was becoming hard to breathe. Where were they now? What were they going to do? Solanum just wanted to go home. Laz took Solanum and squeezed her tight. They patted her back repeatedly with one hand and rubbed with the other, it felt oddly reassuring. She hadn’t realized she was hyperventilating until now. Laz hugged tighter. She wasn’t alone, she wasn’t hurt, she was fine. She was fine.

“Thank You.”

Laz read the message and pointed their thumb upwards.

Was something up there? Solanum couldn’t see through the pitch black.

Laz chuckled, “No,” and pointed their thumb up while smiling, then down while frowning, and alternated between these two. Ah, it must be a positive affirmation of some kind. She would be so excited to be learning so much, if it weren’t for the circumstances.

Laz shone their light around, cold blue rock and ice, like that of Brittle Hollow, and a vision orb switch. She moved the switch, and the room lit up. The Eye Shrine, just as she left it before leaving for the quantum moon.

She steps down to read.

“Be welcomed in this place. This shrine is a space to reflect on what brought us to this star system: the signal from the Eye.”
“We observed the Eye’s signal in our travels, and followed it here to find its source.”
“What we know is this: The source of the signal (which we have chosen to call the Eye of the universe) is older than this universe itself. The rest, we were unable to learn.”
“Enter, and visualize every one of its possibilities.”

Solanum continues.

“Suppose the Eye wishes to communicate.”
“The signal is a call. Were we the intended audience?”
“The signal is the Eye’s voice. It speaks a language we won’t ever know.”
“Or maybe the signal is the Eye’s attempt at expressing itself.”
“Of note: From the signal, we were able to determine the Eye’s approximate age (or perhaps its lack of age?).”

The next one… Why were they slightly different?

“How can the Eye be older than the universe itself?”
“Suppose it is a relic from a previous universe.”
“The early universe was unimaginably hot and dense. If anything existed before, it would have been destroyed.”
“Suppose the universe is older than previously assumed.”
“Suppose the universe is not as young as previously assumed.”

A whole new proposition.

“What is the Eye of the universe?”
“The Eye is the source of the signal that brought us here.”
“Suppose the Eye is a more advanced being.”
“The Eye is older than this universe, so imagine how much it could have taught us.”
“Perhaps it is a cosmic library!”

And now a whole new entry Solanum had never seen.

“Who were the Nomai?”
“The Nomai were the species that came here to find the Eye.”
“How could all of the Nomai have been destroyed simultaneously?”
“Suppose outside intervention.”
“What could have happened if the Nomai were able to find the Eye?”
“Suppose infinite possibilities.”

Why was it showing her this? This wasn’t what was in the Eye Shrine! It’s like the Eye was mocking her, mocking her for being the last member of a failed clan. 

No, that can’t be right, the eye is not conscious, it simply can’t be. It requires an outside conscious observer. These were reflections of her thoughts, her grief. She just wished she wouldn’t have to face them. At least she wasn’t in this alone. Despite how strange Laz was, it was nice to have another curious spirit with her. It was comforting to feel their hand on her shoulder as they translated and read what she had read.

The lights went out, so too did Laz’s flashlight, and they were plunged into darkness once again.

This time, Solanum was met with the sight of a wooden hallway housing a Nomaian statue she recognized from a project Pye had been working on. She doubted that they ever finished.

She paused, realizing Laz was no longer next to her. She turned around to find them with their hand braced against the wall and their head bowed down to the floor. What were they looking at?

Oh. The Eye Shrine on Brittle Hollow was a place important to her journey, this place must have been important to theirs. This was a picture showing more creatures similar to Laz. Short, unreadable writing with noticeably different styles were scrawled upon the lower left of the picture. Maybe signatures of some kind. Solanum made an inquisitive sound.

Laz looked up at the picture and pointed to each of the figures.

“Xорнфельс, Госсан, Cлатe, Фельдспар.”

The alien names sounded strange to her, barely fitting into the phonemes she had grown used to. These people must have been important to Laz, their composure betrayed by the look on their face. 

They pushed on, pausing briefly before the statue as their face tightened. Then continued before Solanum could probe for any sort of explanation. They moved from exhibit to exhibit in what Solanum was quickly recognizing as a museum. They drifted by each almost lifelessly, save for a diorama of the stages of a star going supernova and a model of a satellite. As for Solanum’s part, she was stuck trying to work out the age of a wall that was on display before a container caught her eye. Inside was a skeleton unceremoniously piled on the ground.

A child’s skeleton.

It hadn’t yet occurred to her that when the event that wiped out her clan happened, there would be countless children caught in the wake of it all. She could feel herself shaking again.

It took a tug from Laz to snap her out of it. There was hurt in her, and in Laz’s eyes there was empathy, understanding, and sorrow. She didn’t understand. They had watched their home system erupt in flame, how were they able to help Solanum bear her sorrow? She hadn’t even seen it happen.

They guided her away from the skeleton and towards another container holding the carcass of a juvenile specimen of one of the anglerfish native to Dark Bramble. They read the placard and momentarily cracked a small smile. She wondered what could have been written on it. They made their way up the stairs into a room with a tarped roof and an extremely large telescope. This wasn’t just a museum, this was an observatory.

Solanum could have spent hours fawning over every little detail of the purely optical device, but both her and Laz’s attention was drawn to what hover in the middle of the room; a miniature galaxy.

Was it real? Was this just some trick of the eye? They both reached out and touched it. The world dropped out from under them, shrinking away.

Chapter Text

Laz watched as a whole galaxy filled their view, their galaxy. Then, weakened as they watched it flare up and fade away. It took them a while to realize they were floating weightlessly, and Solanum was clutching at their shoulders. The night sky filled the view in front of them and only in front of them. So, they brought them forward towards the stars. They moved faster than should have been possible until they realized that this wasn’t space, these weren’t stars. This was a forest, and what they thought to be stars were whole galaxies.

Laz and Solanum silently wandered around for some time, it was serene, peaceful, beautiful. Then they saw that flare of blue from the corner of their eye.

No.

A piece of them deep down had hoped that if all else failed, then whatever was happening was confined to their galaxy, and other civilizations may still have the chance to live. More blue.

No no NO.

This really was the end of everything.

This wasn’t supposed to happen! They were supposed to fix everything! They were gonna save everyone! They wanted to save everyone!

They collapsed to the ground. They hadn’t realized they were shouting. They hadn’t felt that they were crying

“I just wanted- I wanted to…”

Solanum came rushing over and crouched down next to them.

“Hey, hey, hey, I’m sure you tried your best, you did all you could.”

“That’s the thing! That’s what Gabbro and anyone else who believed me said! I did all I possibly could and it still-”

Solanum’s eyes went wide, then it clicked for Laz. The tears stopped.

“When did you learn Hearthian?”
“When did you learn Nomaian?”

Solanum stared in shock for a moment, “... Amazing! The Eye’s quantum properties must be allowing our respective languages to collapse into a universal-”

Laz gave Solanum the most suffocatingly emotional bear hug ever.

“Oh my stars, I can finally talk to you! I thought we were going to be stuck with having to use the translator and your staff and my amazing artistry to talk! My full name is Lazurite, but that’s a bit of a mouthful, do you have a nickname? How are you feeling? I’m sorry for breaking down just now. ohmystarsohmystarsohmystarsohmystars.”

“This is definitely a favorable… oh who am I kidding? This is great! The base implications of this alone are logic-shattering! But, what do we do now?”

That's a good point... What do they do now? They looked around, the forest was now completely dark, and the trees either disappeared or became petrified in quantum stone when they looked away.

Beep Beep Beep

“What was that?”

“My uh... signalscope, it makes that sound whenever it detects an unknown... signal source… It’s coming from that way.”

“... That sounds like… breathing.”

Laz grabbed Solanum’s hand.

“It’s the only thing to walk towards, so…”

“Of course, the only remaining course of action.” She said with a thick air of mock confidence.

“At least we can talk to each other to calm our nerves now.”

As amazing as that was, it barely helped to ease either of them.

They tread towards the signal.

75 Meters
56 Meters
39 Meters
28 Meters
20 Meters

It was them. Bit for bit. Verbatim. A Copy. A mirror. They paused for a moment before both Solanums stepped forward to close the distance. The flashlight flickered, and a tree appeared. Solanum yelped and retreated.

“What happened?”

“I’m not sure, my flashlight stopped working and now there’s a tree!”

They turned back to the tree, it was smaller now.

“Hold on.”

Ca-Clack
Ca-Click

A Stump.

Ca-Clack
Ca-Click

A campfire.

“Would you look at that?”

They knelt down to the firepit.

Ting
Chik
Clack

It roared to life.

Laz sat down and motioned for Solanum to do the same.

“... Ever had a marshmallow?”

“A what?”

“You know, campfire pastime number one? Just above spooky stories and hand puppets?”

“I can’t say I’m familiar.”

“Well that just won’t do. Here, take these.”

They hand her a stick and some marshmallows.

“That there is one of the finest marshmallow roasting sticks, hand-picked by yours truly. All you have to do is skewer the marshmallow and hold it over the fire, not close enough that it burns, but in that sweet spot where it turns golden brown. I found that it’s best to give it a harsh turn every few seconds to see if it jiggles in place, that tells you if the inside has gone all melty.”

Solanum mirrors their every move like a student, “This seems somewhat unsanitary, like this?”

“Yeah just like that, and don’t worry, the heat kills off all the nasty stuff. Plus, it’s the end of the world, so… who cares? Just make sure not to let it catch fire,” Laz sighs, “Gabbro was the only one of us mutant enough to actually like them like that.” Laz unmannerfully bites down on yet another one of their works of perfection.

“If you wouldn’t mind, could you tell me about them, your friends?”

Laz swallows, “Oh, yeah. I suppose I should tell you the whole story now that we can talk proper, but not right now. Roasting takes precedence, and speaking of, that one’s looking good.”

“It is? So do I just… eat it?”

Laz takes another bite, that’s why they always packed jumbos; one roast, two bites, or one bite if they was feeling it, “Yermph, jush muuk ak mut Ine ooin.”

“...What?”

“Look at what I’m doing, and don’t do, like a small bite, dive right in.”

Laz watches in anticipation as she takes her first bite. Her eyes widen, her brows shoot up, and a smile splits across her puffed out cheeks.

“Mmmmpph,” she waits to swallow before attempting to speak, Laz would have to teach her proper marshmallow etiquette, “This is great! I’ve never ever had anything like it in my life! What’s in it?” She finishes off the rest.

“To be honest, I’m not exactly sure. Basically, it’s sugar, water, and some kind of gelatin. Oh, and air, don’t forget the air. We used to have issues with them getting stuck inside of our cans, so Porphy had the great idea to coat them in corn starch so they weren’t so sticky on the outside.”

“Whipped, sweetened, gelatin. Sometimes it’s the simplest things…”

Laz looks around their post-apocalyptic campsite as Solanum starts coaxing another marshmallow to perfection.

“Those trees weren’t there before, were they?”

Solanum also looks around, “They absolutely were not.”

“Ooooooh, spooky.”

As if in response to what Laz said, they hear creaking behind them. They whip their head around only to see a rocking chair, only without anyone to rock it. Laz looks at Solanum, who only blinks in confusion, before her head snaps back to the chair. Laz follows her gaze.

“Esker?” Laz shoots up and stares in dumbstruck confusion, “Esker,\! how are you here?”

“Do you hear music?”

“What? What are you talking ab- Oh. Sudden lack of emotion... Spontaneous appearance... you're not real, are you?

“Unfortunately, that’s the case. Only you and your new pal can do what has to be done. Now, I swear I can hear music.”

For something that supposedly had no consciousness, the Eye sure had a masterclass in emotional manipulation.

Laz was too disappointed to feel sad about it at this point, it just felt empty.

Solanum looked incredibly confused.

“Solanum, this is Esker, jack of all trades handyman for our space program and a nearly endless well of wisdom.”

“Is that some sort of roundabout way of saying I’m old? Hi there, Solanum.”

“Hello.”

They pulled out their signalscope and sure enough, music. Instruments they thought they would never hear again, and some that they had never heard before.

“I’m picking up some music signals on my scope here. I’m gonna check them out.”

Solanum was already looking at their staff, a pale blue indicator light shone on the top. “I’m seeing the same thing, but some of these signals… I have to find them.” She looked like something had struck her in the stomach. She started off into the woods. “Meet back here okay?”

“Oh, uh, okay!”

Laz started off towards Reibeck’s banjo first, they were met with a sealed Nomaian structure. They looked for a way to get in, but there were no doors. Maybe it was like Ember Twin, there was probably a tunnel somewhere. They looked around the forest and then back to the structure. I was damaged now.

“Oh, sure.”

Ca-Clack
Ca-Click
Ca-Clack
Ca-Click
Ca-Clack
Ca-Click

They clambered over and reached for the banjo, but just as they were about to touch it, their lights flickered and it disappeared. They looked around, but it was nowhere. Then, in the distance, they spotted a familiar figure at the campfire, along with Solanum. So that’s how this was going to work.

They followed Chert’s drum next. They found their signalscope pointed at a cluster of red stars. Laz used their own to see Chert’s drum orbiting the centermost star and walked towards it, only for the stars to disappear, they reappeared when they drew near to the signalscope. They looked through their scope towards it once again, it felt like they could almost touch it. The lights flickered, Chert’s scope was gone. That did the trick.

Gabbro’s flute was next. Laz drew closer.

“The quiet shade” was written on a sign pointing to the side, they followed.

“Across old bark” Another sign.

“In the ancient glade”

“It’s always dark” This one was pointing straight up, so Laz ignited their jetpack and flew up to a hammock. Gabbro would definitely set up in a spot like this. They reached for the flute, lights out again. Feldspar next.

They walked over towards the source of the harmonica. They were met with an anglerfish bearing down upon them.

Laz dropped their flashlight in panic. The beast was gone.

“Ha. Haha. Ha. Ffffffffffuck you.”

They found the harmonica sitting on a stump, small jellyfish gently floated up beside them. At least this was pretty. Still...

“Apology not accepted.”

Reach out. Touch. Flicker.

Laz looked around with their scope and found one more signal was still there. They figured it was one of the signals Solanum was after, might as well check up on her.

Wait, they’d heard that instrument before, on the Stranger. Did the Eye really make a reflection of him here too? They headed towards the signal and found Solanum already waiting there.

“Oh, hey! I found all of my signals, so I figured I’d meet with you for this one. I take it this is one of yours?”

“No, well… yeah. Sort of? I’ll explain it when I tell the whole story later.”

They both approached the grave.

Ca-Clack
Ca-Click

Nothing.

“I was expecting that to at least do something.” Laz backed away to get a better look at everything.

Thump

They had backed into a structure of some kind, “Hey, look at this.”

Solanum immediately bent down to inspect the roofed platform, “Woah... Highly refined construction, but made of wood... What is this?”

“It’s a bandstand, these people were highly social with each other and music was probably their favorite pastime.”

Laz advanced the reel. The grave was dug up.

“... I guess we’re supposed to... go down there.”

“I… suppose, but this feels incredibly wrong.”

They dropped inside.

Candles, a door, and paintings. Paintings with each of this system's inhabitants.

“Here, look at this, this is what they looked like, they came here on a huge spacecraft, larger than the Vessel, even before your clan had arrived.”

“Before?! Another species, under our noses that whole time…”

“And over here is… Hal, Gneiss, and Tephra.” Laz stirred for a moment, “Hal never got to translate this peoples’ language, Gneiss never got to finish fixing my guitar, and I… never came back to play with Tephra again.”

“I’m sure they’d be proud of you for making it this far.”

“Yeah, but it still hurts. Tephra was just a hatchling, there was so much potential in them, I could see it.”

Solanum was staring at the painting of the Nomai, “I know, there were dozens of children studying in the same school I had gone to in Brittle Hollow, it pains me to think of them.”

“At least we’re here together, I’d have broken down in the forest back there if it weren’t for you.”

“I couldn’t just let you go through that alone. Now, what do we do next?”

“Not a clue… uh, nearly every piece of these people’s technology needed light or darkness to do anything, maybe try blowing out the candles?”

The Hearthians and the Nomai disappeared from their paintings.

“How… poetic.”

“Yeah…” Laz blew out the last candle.

Creak

“Told you, light activated everything.”

They walked down the corridor to a standup mirror.

Solanum walked up to the candles, “My turn.”

A corpse of one of the inhabitants appeared in the reflection behind them.

“whAT THE FUCK”
“oh SHIT”

They both snapped around, but were only met by the sight of one of the instruments used by the Stranger’s inhabitants.

“‘Oh shit?’ I didn’t take you for the swearing type.”

“What? That scared the daylights out of me, professionalism be damned!”

“Professionalism’s overrated anyway. If you have to be taught to act a certain way, then that isn’t the real you.”

Laz reached for the instrument, they were both brought back to the foot of the grave. Flowers, he deserved a proper burial.

“I suppose there is some merit to that way of thinking.”

Laz takes out their signalscope, “I’m not seeing any more signals, we should return to the camp.”

As they approached the camp, they were able to make out four new Hearthian figures, and four new Nomaian figures. Laz’s heart started racing. Solanum similarly tensed.

“I know they are just quantum reflections, but it is still nice to see them.”

Laz felt that introductions were in order.

“That over there is Gabbro. Most level headed dude to ever exist.”

“Hiya, Laz. Nice to meet you, Sol.”

“That’s Chert. They can do calcunometry in their head faster than anyone could on paper.”

“It’s calculus and trigonometry. Hello, Solanum.”

“That daredevil over there is Feldspar. The most legendary pilot in the history of the Outer Wilds Ventures.”

“How’s it going?”

“That ball of restrained enthusiasm over there is Riebeck, our resident archeologist.”

“Oh, uh, hey, hello, Ms. Solanum. I never thought I would get to meet a Nomai! Even if I’m... not actually... meeting her…”

“Hello everybody, it is nice to meet Laz’s friends…”

“Now who are these fellas over here?”

“Oh? Oh, of course. This is Bells, she helped me along my pilgrimage to the Quantum Moon.”

“Hello Laz. A Nomai finally made it to the Eye of the Universe, with a member of an alien species no less! How exciting!”

“This is Pye, she was like family to me in my childhood years. She inspired my renewed interest in the Eye of the Universe.”

“Greetings, Laz. I am incredibly happy to see that our project worked! You made it.”

Oh, right, Laz still had a story to tell.

“And this is Filix, she was my teacher while I was in school on Brittle Hollow.”

“I hope today finds you well, Laz. You have my thanks for helping Solanum learn so much.”

There was still one more Nomai left, Solanum was staring at them, somewhat confused if Laz could trust their understanding of Nomaian expressions.

“So, Solanum, who’s that?” Laz and Solanum were looking at a Nomai wearing a suit of dark blues and blacks. The main body of their helmet was more organic and smooth than what Laz had grown used to, and the outer ring around the helmet was more of a diamond shape than the usual circle.

“I do not know.”

“Greetings, I am Solanum and this is Laz, what is your name?”

“I am Canna, I led a clan of Nomai and helped maintain the survival of the Nomai conglomerate. It is amazing to see a member of Escall’s long lost clan make it to something of such importance.”

“Of course! Well, it is a pleasure to meet you.”

This was great, all of these familiar faces and some they had never seen before here for support at the end of it all. Laz felt that warm feeling inside of them that they hadn’t felt since their first first launch, but something was missing. No, someone was missing. Where was the Prisoner?

Laz left Solanum to converse with everyone and searched for him.

It didn’t take long for Laz to find him slouching against a tree.

“Hey there, what are you doing out here?”

The towering creature drew in a breath and sighed. Even after all this time, the movement struck a pang of fear into Laz’s heart. “When my kind found the Eye and realized what it was capable of, they were terrified. It was too difficult a truth. Like a light too bright to look upon directly, it burned them.”

“What they could not unlearn was hidden away in darkness… obfuscated, then lost. They did not want to see their story end.”

“My kind weren’t always like this. We weren’t always so afraid. I did what I could to set things right, yet I am still of my kind, and you know now what they did. I cannot promise our fear won’t stain your mind.”

“And so, a choice: Are you certain you want to remember me?”

“Well, yeah. Fear is a natural thing, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t scared out of my mind right now. Come join us by the fire, let’s see what this is all about.”

“I don’t want to repeat my kind’s mistakes. But if you’re willing to take the risk, then so am I.”

“That’s the spirit. By the way, I was never able to learn your name, what is it?”

“I can hardly remember, it has been so long… Acher, I believe.”

Laz pointed over towards the camp, “Go and find yourself a spot, I’m sure the others would like to speak with-”

Acher had disappeared by the time Laz turned around, they looked back towards the camp and saw him already standing there.

Right, quantum riff-raff.

Laz walked back to the camp and sat down next to Solanum.

“It’s been a while since everyone’s been all together like this, there’s even some new faces here. Should we start?”

Laz was tempted, but remembered they still owed something...

“Not yet, I promised Solanum the whole story, and I think you all should hear it too.”

Solanum had her eyes focused on Laz.

“Alright, it started… who knows how many years ago, a species of bird-like creatures detected an impossible signal…”

Laz detailed everything, all the history they learned. The Inhabitants of the stranger. The blocking of the Eye signal. The lone rebel. The Nomai. The Interloper. And then it was less history and more memories. The founding of the Outer Wilds Ventures. Laz’s inspiration. The launch. The time loop.

“... the Quantum Moon drifted into view, and I knew that I had to save at least someone.”

Solanum tumbled over her words.

“Oh my stars, Laz. I didn’t- how could- are you… That must have been agonizing, how long were you… how long were you linked to the Ash Twin Project?”

“It has to be over a thousand loops.”

“I’m… I’m so sorry.”

The post-apocalyptic campfire erupted into words of comfort, apologies, and support. Laz hadn’t realized just how much they had needed it until now. They had spent what felt like just just under two weeks alone. Facing the end of everything down by themselves. It felt good for them to have someone understand and comfort them. They started crying again. Not tears of sadness, not quite tears of joy. It didn’t matter. They felt relieved for the first time in a while. They were afraid of the end, but now, sitting here among friends, they felt good. They had reached the end. There was nothing to perpetually worry about anymore. It was simply over.

“Thanks guys, I uh… thank you.”

Laz didn’t have anything else to say. They were all here, they could say goodbye.

“Solanum, how about we get whatever this is moving, are you ready?”

“Yes, I’m ready.”

“So, uh what exactly are we doing?”

“We have everybody here around a campfire, just like old times. How about some music?”

“I’ll set the beat!”

Chert began playing. Then Riebeck, Gabbro, Feldspar, and finally Esker. It was the song Gneiss had taught all of them, the same one that each of the travellers played to pass the time between tasks. Then Acher started, every drawn out note oozing with sorrow. Canna started to play, their staff generating the sounds of a soft, nearly ethereal, plucked string instrument. The other Nomai began to play shortly after, seemingly following their lead. Bells’ sounded no less elegant than Canna’s, but it was much more full, with an almost waxy sound. It didn’t sound plucked, but it certainly sounded like a string instrument. The notes could sustain almost indefinitely and seemed to just appear when a note was played. Filix’s instrument sounded very similar to Gabbro’s flute, but it was much deeper and metallic. It sounded as if it generated one pure tone and complemented Gabbro’s melody perfectly. Pye’s instrument sounded similar but was much higher and could slide between notes. She used it to play a meandering yet steadily rising melody.

Laz looked over to Solanum.

“I do not know this song, but I am happy to be part of it.”

Solanum started to play, her instrument sounded like the string-filled cabinet Gneiss was working on for Porphy’s home. It sounded much more smooth and had more weight to it. She played a floating countermelody that felt so different from everything else, yet fit in perfectly with the rest of the music.

The perfect jam session. Laz wished they had their guitar.

Thunk

Laz turned around to see what had fallen over. It was their guitar, just the way it was before it broke in two after walking into a tree in the quantum grove.

Laz immediately picked it up and thought hard about what to play. Inspiration came to them. They struck chords that complement Riebeck’s banjo while falling in with the syncopation that Solanum was making heavy use of.

It was perfect. They didn’t want it to end, but the fire eventually died out and the music faded away.

Before them was a ball of smoke, flashing from the inside revealed shadows of unknown figures.

“What’s… what is it?”

“I do not know. Maybe it’s a- Oh.”

“What?”

“It’s everything. Every possibility. The Eye is the source of all quantum uncertainty, and we are seeing that here in front of us.”

“But, wouldn’t that mean…”

“I have a theory, given that the Eye of the Universe is older than the universe, then it must have existed before the start of everything. All of the universe’s quantum uncertainty in one object, existing before existence, effectively a blank slate. All it would take is a conscious observer to collapse the possibilities, and the emptiness fills.”

“We’re looking at a new universe.”

“We’re looking at every possible new universe. There was always one big question for my clan, ‘What happens when a conscious observer enters the Eye?’ Well, how about two? And there’s no one I’d rather step into the unknown with, then a friend.”

“That’s… scary, but I’ll gladly face it with you, pal.”

“Are you ready?”

Laz mulled over it for a moment. A brand new universe. They always wanted to be an astronaut to explore, they hoped that there would be more to explore in this new universe.

Laz took one last look at their friends, they all looked proud, satisfied, happy.

“You did good, time buddy, see you later.”

Finally, they took Solanum’s hand, “I’m ready.”

They stepped up and observed the innumerable possibilities.

Everything suddenly moved away from them, spreading out until the firepit, trees, and everyone at the camp was too far to see.

Flash.

An impossible amount of light met their eyes as their ears took in the sound of infinite thunderclaps. They were still safe here for the moment, outside of the rapidly expanding bubble of spacetime. The laws of physics simply did not apply to them yet, but the shockwave would catch up soon enough.

They held Solanum against their side tighter. They were beginning to be pushed by the shockwave. Wait, no, that felt more like pulling, dragging, falling.

They looked at each other one more time.

Nothing.

Then pure, blinding red.

Chapter Text

Oh look at that, it’s snowing.

He really had been in here for a while. If it was snowing, then it was probably around mid September at this point.

Cooper had always loved driving and seeing this country. That’s why he took up that job as a long distance courier over summer break. An excuse to drive across the whole United States and get paid? Of course he would jump at that.

He knew the paycheck for that package was too good to be true. One more package before heading back towards the east coast and taking some deliveries there, then spend the rest of Summer break at home in Boston.

“Deliver by July 18th.”

“Stick to the roads.”

“Keep an eye out and stay away from anything strange.”

“Do not leave the roads”

“Do not look inside the package.”

“Never drive off the roads.”

He thought they thought he was a newbie. Of course he wouldn’t look in the package, he’s got more integrity than that! Plus it was a really short trip, too short to do any recreational trailblazing. 140 miles from Portland, a short jaunt on a ferry, then 20 or so miles west to… what was it again? Oh, right “8253 West Brookstone, make sure the door says exactly 8253.” All while on a slow drive through gently curving sideroads over the Olympics, however much of it was still open to drive through anyway. Eastern block media got a real kick out of the continued expansion of the Zone, then they went and got one of their reactors blown up. They shut up quick after that.

“You are delivering to an A.R.D.A. watchpoint. You are to knock and hand-deliver the package, they will not accept drop offs.”

All that yammering about protocol amounted to squat. They said nothing about the partially intangible boulders. He thought he wasn’t actually seeing them, because what he was seeing was physically impossible. “Keep an eye out and stay away from anything strange.” That was beyond strange, that was “I’m exhausted and seeing things and I need to keep driving to the next rest stop.” He knew he had gotten enough sleep, but cannonballing across time zones on 12 hour drives was nuclear on any sleep schedule or perception of time.

His van shut off. It wouldn’t turn back on. He just replaced this starter. Red lights. His van left the ground.

Zap.

A lot had happened since then: he was being driven insane by a car, he verified several urban legends, drove to places that should have been impossible, solved the mystery of the Mass Hallucination, solved the mystery of the Remnants, found out they were actually the same thing, cured his car-catalyzed insanity, and now his best and only friend was that same car that may or may not be alive.

Maybe he wasn’t fully cured.

Remnants were supposed to have weird properties, but his car never seemed all too strange. Aside from several mannerisms that basically said, “Hey! Look at me! I’m alive!” Well, if a lump of car parts, headlights, and spare wheels could float twenty feet off the ground, seemingly be intelligent enough to chase him and his car, and lift him several feet into the air, it didn’t seem so strange that his car may be alive. Maybe he just watched Herbie too much as a kid.

At least he had the garage set up in a livable way, jukebox playing that slow mix he saves for these off days he holds for himself.

“ ...And I slip away, down by the wa-ter. ”
“And I slip away, down by the wa-ter.”

Something wasn’t right. He could feel a pressure pushing on the inside of his head. Oh god, his head was really starting to hurt now.

The pain stopped just before it rose to his breaking point. He opened his eyes.

Black. Pitch black in every direction. Then the largest explosion he had ever seen. It was expanding towards him. Oh shit, he had to move, had to do something, but there was nothing to push off, nothing to hide behind, nothing to-

BEEP BEEEEEEEEEEEEEP

Back in the Garage.

He didn’t park his car that way, why was it angled towards him?

“Driver! Dr- uh, Cooper, come in! We got an emergency here.” The F.A.X. machine wailed to life, poking at his mental bruises from whatever just happened.

“Jesus, Francis, could you speak a little quieter? I’m battling the mother of all headaches right now.”

“That can wait! Something big just- wait, what came before the headache?”

He sounded serious, not good.

“Felt like my head was exploding, then I guess I passed out. I saw stuff that wasn’t really happening, like I was hallucinating. Why?”

“That happened to me too.”

Oh shit.

“... You don’t think-”

“Mass Hallucination Event, another one. But there have been no strange readings from the Well. It’s all coming from Cappy! You gotta get over there yesterday.”

“Alright, on it, keep me posted. Anything else strange going on with Cappy?”

He tore the fuel filler from the pump and drove it down into the filler neck.

“Gamma radiation levels have still not fallen to normal levels, and they… yeah they’re climbing again!”

He set the route into the planner, Perpetual Stability, good. Brand new panels, doors, wheels, engine, this is the best time this could have happened.

“Alright I’m about to leave, how fast are we looking at exactly?”

He throws the door open, using the handle to pull himself into his seat.

“All projections show a second gamma burst in five hours, give or take a couple minutes.”

He’d cut it close with that, that trip would usually take six hours when there was no reason to hammer the accelerator on the access roads. He’d have to drive hard the whole way up to Sierram.

He turned the key. The car got running almost immediately.

C-Thunk

He glued the pedal to the floor.

“I’m on the way.”

“I’ll leave the channels open, keep your radio nearby.”

Going down E4 made the trip slightly shorter, and the roads closer to the outer wall tended to be in better condition.

So much for an off day.

Chapter Text

He’d shot through E4 like it wasn’t even there, just another part of the road. He hadn’t driven out to specifically go to Sierram since the experiment nearly two months ago, but it was always a good stop, given that it always had two gas stations. The instability never shuffled those around. He was certainly going to need those gas stations, going full throttle for as long as he had was chewing through fuel.

A question mark appeared on the LCD screen he had transplanted from a Gameboy and wired into the ground loop of the car. An early experiment of his; If the car was alive and could control parts of itself, it may be able to influence the electronic signals leaking into the chassis ground. Most of the time it stayed blank, sometimes it would produce a picture, and sometimes, sometimes it would make sense. There was no other way to interpret it this time though; “What’s going on?”

Should he answer? If he does, he’d basically be submitting to the possibility that he actually had gone crazy and he thought his car was alive. This was almost certainly no coincidence, maybe it really was alive. Ah hell.

“Francis picked up an extreme gamma ray burst coming from Cappy, it triggered another Mass Hallucination Event, which is already bad enough. What’s worse is that it’s not sourced at the Well at all, it’s all coming from Cappy. It may be rearing up to cook off and do what it did to Sierram again.”

A new picture. A station wagon with speed lines behind it.

“Glad to see we’re on the same page.”

He was coming up on Sierram, it had been four hours and fifty-two minutes. It was 4:47am, should be dark, but the sky was glowing an angry shade of red. And it was pure red, what was the word Oppy would have used? Spectral.

“Hey, Francis, come in.”

“What have you got?”

“I’m almost at Sierram, but the sky is glowing red. Hold on, scratch that, it’s the clouds. The clouds are giving off a spectral red. Anything without red coloring is just jet black.”

“I- I have no idea what that could mean, but it’s obviously not good.”

“I just passed the junction gate, I’m inside the city limits. I’ll get a better look from the overlook up ahead.”

“Tell me what you see.”

The trees were making it hard to see much of anything before they got to the clearing. Cooper made it to the overlook and parked the car in the road, he’d need to get moving again quickly when he was done. He walked to the railing, pure fear shot through his mind as he set his eyes on Colossal Cappy.

“Holy shit, Francis. The clouds weren’t glowing, they were reflecting the light from Cappy! The core is easily ten times larger, it’s glowing incredibly bright, I can’t even look at it from here!”

“What?! This is really, really bad. Okay, there should still be some measurement equipment near it. You’re going to need to go over to Cappy and tell me what the readings are.”

“Alright, just let me put on my sunglasses. How much time-”

“Uh- Radiation Spike! RAD-AT--N SP---! G-T BE---D ---ETHI-G -OW! I--- A---- T-------------”

Cooper barely had enough time to dive to the ground before the sky exploded.

Pure, blinding red.

Then nothing.

Chapter Text

His head hurt again, it was bad, he couldn’t even get up from his bed. Why did he set his alarm this early? He was uncomfortable. Was his alarm always this loud? His bed felt harder than cement.

Cement.

He was on cement.

BEEP BEEP BEEEEEEEEEEP BEEP BEEEEEEEEEEEP

“Ah, Jesus, I feel like fuckin jelly.”

He struggled to his feet.

BE-BEEP

He looked around, the sky was clear blue, not a cloud in sight. Everything around him was charred black. Cappy looked… normal. He turned around, there was his car facing him, a perfect side profile silhouette of it was projected onto the treeline behind it, outlined in black char. 

He didn’t park his car there, he left it on the road, by the entrance to the overlook. He looked back towards Cappy, the ground was also charred, but starting near the overlook fence and tracing all the way back towards the silhouette, everything was untouched. He walked around to the left side of the car. It was coated in ugly black, the windows were warped, the tires had burst, the sheet metal had started to melt. There was no way.

“Did you move there?” The words left his mouth slowly.

BEEP BEEP

The front wheels swivelled a bit.

His car really was alive. It moved itself to shield him from… whatever happened. Eat your heart out K.I.T.T.

“Wuh, uh… Thanks.”

BEEP

“We… we got lucky that this junction was in perpetual stability, the sun’s up, I must have been out for a while.” Cooper glances at his watch. “Oh shit, it’s like fucking 10 in the morning, Francis probably thinks I’m dead.”

He got his radio out and tried to tune in. Interference. Static. Must be some residual radiation left over, nothing ionizing though, his geiger counter would have been clicking faster than a playing card stuck into the spokes of a bicycle. If only this thing had a larger antenna, it was already difficult enough trying to get wireless communication working here.

BEEP

His car was shaking its antenna side to side.

Right, the car still had the older system that sent signals back to the big transmitter at the garage through the ARC Device connection. He hoped that the radio in the car would be able to brute force the connection issues.

“Francis. Francis, come in”

Might as well get the putty out.

“Francis, do you read?”

Good thing it was only the tires on the left side. He used to only pack one spare before he came across his first spike puddle. Now he never leaves the garage without two.

“... Cooper! You’re alive! What the hell happened out there. I read an incredibly intense gamma ray burst and the frequency went dead, no hallucinations this time around.”

The putty was working its way through the burnt panels as Cooped worked to remove the liquified wheels. The glass smoothed out and the metal became sturdy. It would never quite be straight again, but he goes through these panels every two days, it was no big deal.

“Yeah, back from the dead, there’s a ridiculous amount of residual radio interference out here. As for what happened, not a clue. Everything around here is scorched and charred, not a shred of green anywhere, but get this; I was outside of my car when it happened, I left it on the road, but it moved itself over to shield me from the burst. The car drove by itself to protect me.”

He fitted the new wheels on, brand new kicks, good as new. He'd need to get to work with the paint when he got back though.

“Seriously?! That’s amazing, it must be one of its properties as a Remnant… Wait, you’re still in Sierram?! It’s gotta be completely inhospitable over there!”

“If that was the case, I’d already be dead.”

“I suppose, just be careful. Since you are still there, can you check the observation site for any surviving equipment? I’d still like to see what the nearby sensors caught. Don’t do anything stupid though, keep your geiger counter handy.”

“Can do, it definitely looks to be a lot safer out here now, Cappy’s back to its regularly terrifying size. You don’t have to worry about a thing. Cooper, Out.”

“Good to hear, Francis, Out,”

He made his way down from the overlook to the gas station and filled up as much as he could. The car must have been idling this whole time since he went out, they were running on fumes.

He pulled up to the remains of the railroad bridge that now leads to Cappy. The windows of the control building were blown out and the roof had partially collapsed. From up here he could see the damage to the site, every nearby research trailer had been either blown away or crushed like a soda can. The switch for the crash barrier still seemed to be intact. He gave it a turn and one half of the barrier fell away without an issue, the other half got hung up and screeched the whole way back down to the ground.

Every computer in the area had either been blown away or was trashed or partially melted. He was going to have to drive up and take the measurements himself.

He inched up towards Cappy. Now this was strange, everything close to Cappy was completely unscathed. It was like there was never any explosion in the first place. There was one computer inside this radius and Cooper went to extract the data from it. He had no idea what the numbers meant, but they were big. 1.45 yottajoules every quarter-second during the event, and that was just what the sensors were able to pick up. Francis was really gonna like this.

BEEP BEEEEEEP

“I’m almost done, gimme a second.”

How was he this used to his car being alive already? Maybe he had always known. Just didn’t want to admit it. It had been extremely active on the drive from the overlook to Cappy. If it had acted this way from the start, he would have believed a lot sooner.

BEEEEEEEEEEEEP BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP

“Alright, alright, I’m done. You really shouldn’t rush this, Francis is gonna want this data in as good condition as possible.”

Cooper was walking over to his car, but the honking kept becoming more frantic, and it was flicking its headlights on and off.

“Is something wrong?”

He looked over to where the headlights were pointing.

There were two bodies on the ground, clad in protective suits.

He ran over as fast as he could.

“Holy shit are you two okay?”

No response.

“Hey! Can you hear me?!”

He pulled them out of the range of Cappy’s radiation, their chests rose and fell slow. He needed to get them somewhere safe.

“Hey, open the rear doors if you can.”

BE-BEEP

The doors shot open.

He unbolted the backseat tanks and strapped them down to the roof rack.

He took the one with the more artsy helmet and sat them in the back. He rested their walking stick next to them. He dragged the one with the more conventional radsuit over, unclipped their backpack, and set them down in the other seat. He took the backpack and shoved it into the trunk. Why was it so heavy?

“Is that a fucking rocket engine?”

That didn’t matter, he had to call Francis to let him know.

“Francis! Come in.”

“What is it? Did you find any data?”

“Yeah I did, but I also found two unconscious breachers just on the ground right next to Cappy. Dumbasses must have seen the fireworks and made their way over. I guess that they decided that hanging out next to the giant glowing ball of energy was a good idea. They’re alive, but the radiation must have caused them to black out. I’m bringing them back to the garage.”

“How are you so sure they’re breachers?”

“They’ve got really good kit, and nobody from the Zone would think that getting close to Cappy is a good idea. I’ll call you when I get back to the garage, I gotta drive.”

“Alright, I’ll be keeping an eye on you. Francis, out.”

Cooper looked back one more time to make sure they were strapped in tight. Something was off about them, but he couldn’t quite place it. He had to do a double take.

Three fingers?

Chapter Text

“Sev-en-ty-three men sailed up, from the San Fran-sisco bay.”

Laz didn’t think that no longer existing would feel like this. It kinda hurt, something had happened, but they were too exhausted to open their eyes. They felt like they were drifting in and out. There was music, singing too, though, not the angelic kind they had expected from Gabbro’s wild speculations of the afterlife.

“Ride, Captain, ride upon your mystery ship,”

It was in Hearthian, were they back home? No, that’s not possible.

“Be amazed at the friends you have here on your trip.”

Their body wouldn’t stay still, it was like the ground below them was constantly shifting and bouncing. Something didn’t quite add up, why did this feel so wrong? Maybe this is just part of the experience. The experience of not existing.

How could they be experiencing things if they didn’t exist?

Their eyes shot open just in time to see the strange spacecraft they were in plunge into the sun.

They screamed. It felt like they were being taken apart, but then they were put back together again.

“Woah, woah, woah, woah, hey, chillax, my first jump was a little disorienting too, but the feeling goes away quick, just take deep breaths.” They brought their ship into some kind of large building. “You really shouldn’t be awake right now, you and your pal were right next to the most energetic open-air phenomenon in existence. Who knows how long you were out there.”

They were faced with the view of a figure draped in protective cloth and wearing a full face rebreather that covered their whole... Well, face. It had two circular glass inserts for the eyes. What happened here that warranted protection heavy enough that they needed to cover their bottom set of eyes?

“What’s going on? Where are we? Who are you?”

“Man, you wake up quick. Uh, you just took a trip through a gateway in my car. We’re in the Pine Tree Auto Shop, right in the middle of the only stable pocket for a couple miles around. I’m Cooper. Now you really oughta get some rest, I mean what the hell were you thinking?! Getting up all close and personal with Cappy like that, especially after that light show.”

“Wha- Cappy? I don’t even know how I got here. Who’s Cappy?”

“Oh, well… maybe it’ll come back to you, must be a bit loopy still. Actually, seeing as you’re awake, could you help me bring your friend here into the main room? I’ll set up a row of chairs and we can lie ‘em down. Then you seriously need to get some rest.”

Friend? Who was here with-

Solanum lay motionless next to Laz.

“Solanum! What happened to her?”

“Same thing that happened to you I’d guess. Grab her arms, I’ll carry her legs. Cappy spits out ridiculous levels of radiation, you two are lucky I found you when I did.”

“Radiation?! How much?”

“Hey, relax. Radiation doesn’t act the same way here in the zone. You still can get burns, but nothing happens on the molecular level, you’re not gonna get cancer or anything.”

They lifted Solanum out of the “car.” This was all way too strange. Why was this person staying in a building this big by themselves? What is a car? What happened? 

There was light spilling in through the windows from outside. Natural Light. Laz’s heart fluttered.

“Hey, dude, what’s your name?”

“Laz.”

“Nice to meet you.”

They had to know, “... Do you see stars at night?”

They walked her through what was probably this person’s workshop, past a strange machine that was making music. And through a door.

“Uh, well yeah when the sky is clear, but it rarely ever is around here. You can make out the galaxy belt. Sometimes I shut down all the lights when the sky is empty, just so my eyes can adjust to the darkness. You can see plenty more that way. Set her down right here, let me grab some chairs.”

“Have you seen any supernova?”

“Whoo, I wish, I feel like they’d be cool to see, there’s probably hundreds of stars cooking off in our galaxy everyday, none visible to the naked eye, but there’s so much gas left in the galaxy that new stars are probably still forming faster than they blow up. Everyone’s waiting on Betelgeuse to cook off one of these days. All the astronomers keep saying ‘soon.’ It probably already went supernova, we’re just waiting for the light to reach us.”

They were no longer in a dying universe, but how? How had they spontaneously ended up here? Was this even real? Were they just dreaming?

“Where you from?”

“Uh, Timber Hearth?”

“... Never heard of it. I’m from Worcester, but I live in Boston these days. Or lived at least.”

Cooper lined up some chairs into a makeshift bed. “Here, lift her on top of these, it’s better than that tiled floor.” They laid Solanum down on the chairs. “Lemme get this helmet off, let’s hope the radiation didn’t start chewing at her skin. I’ve got some ointments and wrapping, but it’ll still- Woah.”

“What is it? Oh, right, she’s an alien. A Nomai.”

“An alien. A goat-like alien. How did you even meet her? Y’know this is like, number one on the list of things you should have told me. Francis is gonna flip.”

“Hey, I wasn’t really thinking about that at the time. There’s a lot on my mind right now.”

“Yeah I’d bet, I don’t think I’m seeing any burns. She’s probably just not used to shooting awake like you did back there. An alien, that explains why she only has three fingers.”

Laz looked at Cooper’s hands, they had five fingers. Riebeck hatched with four, but five?

“‘Only?’ Three is normal. You’re the one with five fingers.”

“Three is nor-? There are six billion people on this planet, and I could probably count how many of them have three fingers on my hands, because I have five fingers. Did you get close to any other anomalies besides Cappy?”

“Anomalies?”

“Yes! Anomalies… Okay, you know what? I’m hungry. Are you hungry? Thirsty? I feel like I’m gonna go insane if we continue having this conversation on an empty stomach and I gotta get out of this suit.”

They hadn’t felt hungry in two weeks, but now? “Yeah, I could eat. As long as it's no trouble.”

“If it were any trouble, there’s nothing we can do about it; We’re kinda stuck here.”

“Oh.”

“I’ll go ahead and get your stuff from the car.”

Cooper left the room and started rummaging around. Five fingers. The only people Laz ever saw with five fingers were the Stranger’s inhabitants. But Cooper spoke perfect Hearthian, there was no way that six billion people could all hatch with five fingers.

…

Six billion. Six billion. There were six billion people on this planet?! There was no way a planet could hold six billion people. Was this even Timber Hearth?

Laz looked outside. Snow piled up against the door. Trees, as far as the eye could see, and they could see far. The gargantuan hills and mountains seemed to disappear into the haze of snow. They couldn’t even make out any curvature. They wouldn’t have been surprised if this planet was completely flat. Maybe it could hold six billion people. There were trees out there. Plenty of trees, plenty of oxygen. Laz removed their helmet.

The first thing they were met with was the smell. It wasn’t necessarily bad, it just smelled exactly like Slates’ workshop, minus the rocket fuel. Slate… 

Them and everyone else were gone for good. It was just Laz, Solanum, and now Cooper in whatever this place is.

Speaking of Cooper…

“Alright, I took some time to dig for the good stuff. Found some cured meats and some fresh bread. I got some sauces too. Even found a bag of marshmallows. There’s some water and soda in the fridge over there and I even found some smelling salts in a military kit if we need to wake, your… you… you’re…”

Laz finally got to see what Cooper looked like. Their skin was the shade of cut timber with a tinge of red. And they had the same stuff Solanum had on her head, only it was a solid, light brown and seemed to only stick to the top of their head. And they only had two eyes. Right, new universe, of course Cooper wouldn’t be a Hearthian.

“... You’re not human either. Right. Sure. Fine. Yeah you know what? That makes perfect sense. I could believe one alien, but two different aliens? Here? Hahaha, You’re not from ‘Timber Hearth,’ you’re anomalies.”

“Hey, I’m pretty sure I’d know where I came from.”

“Yeah? Well, to me it looks like Cappy just spit you two out. Still, you haven’t actively been trying to kill me so I suppose we’re on good terms.”

“I know what I’ve been through.”

“Manufactured memories.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Prove it.”

“I had to watch my universe die!”

Laz felt like they were going to break down again.

Cooper opened their mouth to speak, but no sound came out for a long time.

“...Well shit, now I feel like crap, do you… wanna talk about it?”

“Not particularly.”

“Hey, that’s fine by me, just, if you- you can-”

“Hey, it’s… fine. Just leave it.” 

“...”

“What was that you were saying about waking Solanum up?”

“Right, uh, I found some smelling salts.”

“‘Smelling salts?’”

“Ammonia inhalant, they’re little packets filled with this really strong stuff, tricks the lungs and the heart into working faster, irritates the nervous system, and forces the brain to wake up. It smells by the way . It’s made specifically for this, but I’m not sure if it’ll work on her.”

Cooper knelt down and held the capsule firmly with both hands.

Snap

Solanum shot up from the chairs.

“Что происходит?! Где я?”

Her eyes were wide, she held both hands to her nose in a grimace.

“Woah, hey Solanum relax! It’s me, Laz. You’re okay.”

“Лаз?”

Apparently, the “quantum universal language” thing probably only existed in the Eye. She seemed to understand though, and she quickly calmed down.

“A russki, alien, space goat. Great.”

“‘Russki?’ ‘Goat?’”

“Oh, yeah that’s probably not nice, picked up ‘russki’ from my dad.”

“Why is she a ‘russki?’ And what’s a goat?”

“A goat is an animal that she kinda looks like, minus one eye, and she’s speaking Russian, you know, privyet and whatnot.”

“Привет!” Solanum perked up.

“See?”

“You know her language?!”

“No, can’t speak a lick of it, just what I picked up from movies.”

“Еще один инопланетный вид! Ты меня понимаешь?”

“... Yeah, I don’t know what she’s saying.”

“Oh, неважно…” She visibly sinks.

“Well, uh, this is Solanum. Cooper, Solanum. Solanum, Cooper.

“Купер?”

“Yup, that’s me. Hmm, we could probably find a library with some Russian-English books. I bet that egghead Francis would know where to look. Shit, I was supposed to call Francis! I’ll be right back, he’ll get a kick out of you guys.”

Cooper rushed out of the room.

Laz held out a thumb and alternated between up and down with a questioning look.

“Yes, я в порядке.” She held out a thumbs up.

Cooper walks back into the room. “-never gonna believe this; They aren’t breachers, they’re aliens.”

“What?! Are you serious? Where did they come from? How did they get to the Zone?”

The voice responded from the small box Cooper held. It must be a radio of some kind, and they must be speaking with Francis.

“They don’t know, and it seems to be a… difficult subject. Look, do you know if there’s any libraries left in the zone? One of them speaks Russian, and we need to figure out how to translate it.”

Cooper set the radio down on the counter in front of them.

“What, Russian? Okay, uh… alright, here, there’s a decently sized library and international visitor’s center in Port Angeles. That’d be a good place to look, it’s right on the edge of the Zone, so there should be less scrambling from instability. But, hold on, seriously? Aliens? And they speak languages from here. On Earth.”

It was a strange concept. It obviously wasn’t a coincidence that the people in this new universe spoke the same languages of the two conscious observers to enter the Eye…

“Well from my point of view you two are speaking my language.”

“Такое интересное устройство. Интересно, как это работает…”

“Wow, I have so many questions…”

“Not right now, Francis, this was supposed to be an off day, remember? Plus, they were both unconscious ten minutes ago, give them some time.”

“What? You can’t- Alright, that’s fair, I do need some time to get my thoughts together. Did you manage to get any data from Cappy?”

“There was a working computer and sensor array nearby, sent over a copy through the F.A.X. machine, and the hard drive is making its way through the pneumatubes right now.”

“Great! I’ll see you around. Oh yeah, you two make sure you stick with Cooper, he knows the Zone better than anybody.”

Cooper deadpans, “Aw, Francis, don’t make me blush, it makes my back hurt. Pine Tree Auto, out.”

Click

“‘They’re aliens…’ What was the whole thing about us being anomalies?”

Cooper hesitated for a moment, “... Manufactured or not, those were still your memories, and they looked like they hurt, bad. I don’t want to discount something you obviously feel strongly about. Plus, this is probably more exciting for Francis.”

The wind buffeted against the windows.

“We’re not going anywhere in this weather. The snow’s already well over a foot deep. The car’s gonna need a full refurbishment and retrofit to be able to drive through that. I’m gonna see If I have some clothes that fit you two. Is there anything else you two need?”

There was one thing on Laz’s mind.

“You said something about marshmallows earlier.”

“Mаршмеллоу?”

There was no way they were the same thing as what they were familiar with.

“Yeah, the bag’s right here.”

Yup, those were genuine, honest-to-goodness jumbo marshmallows, just in a strange clear bag.

“Look at that. I didn’t think they would be the same as what we had. Do you have anything to roast it over?”

“You had marshmallows where you came from? Huh, strange world. I’ll grab the burner.”

Cooper brought over a portable burner and a tray with some crackers and brown tiles. He lit the fire, producing a ring of stable, blue flame. He took a minute to fiddle with a knob on it until it produced the wild orange Laz was more accustomed to.

“You two work on those, I’ll be right back.”

Solanum had the same look on her face that she had when Laz had her roast her first marshmallow. Cooper came through the door with a basket full of clothes and a tray with three steaming mugs. Laz took a bite.

“Woah, you’re just eating them right off the cuff? I mean well, you do you.”

“Yeah, how else are we supposed to do it? Also, what do you got there?”

Solanum happily ate her marshmallow.

“Hot chocolate.”

“‘Hot chocolate?’”

“You’re kidding me, you don’t know what hot chocolate is? It’s like the second biggest use for marshmallows behind S’mores.”

“... ’S’mores?’”

“... You people make jetpacks and you don’t know what s’mores or hot chocolate are?”

“... No?”

He made an exasperated laugh, “Ok, grab a change of clothes and cozy up, looks like it’s gonna get cold. When you get back, you’re both in for a lesson.”

Laz looked through the basket and found a pair of tough, blue pants that should fit. They searched for a warm shirt and found a brown jacket with some patches on the shoulder and cotton lining the inside. An undershirt near the bottom of the basket grabbed their attention, it had a picture of a metal machine with two wheels, probably four if it was symmetrical, stamped onto it, lettering was stamped above.

“What’s ‘chev-ruhlette?’”

“Uh-buh-bup! Say it with me…” Cooper pointed at each syllable in the word, ‘Shev-row-lay,’ but most people just say ‘Shevy.’”

“Shev-row-lay. Shevy.”

Solanum perked up, “Шевролей. Шеви!”

Laz gave her a thumbs up. “That’s awfully stupid.”

“How do you pronounce ricochet?”

“... Touché.”

“Exactly. Restroom’s through that door behind me. Shower’s in the big metal trailer out back if you need it.”

Laz grabbed a pair of rather warm looking socks from the basket and spare undergarments from their backpack and retreated to the restroom. The clothes fit well, it was a good thing this species was built in such a similar way. They left the room and Solanum filtered in after them.

“How do I look?”

“Like you belong here, except for the general… alien…ness.”

“What’s this jacket made of?”

“Leather, it’s treated hide from an animal called a cow, real good windbreak. That is a flight jacket you’re wearing after all, that’s why you got all those patches on your shoulder.”

Laz craned over to see the patches.

“What are they?”

“The American flag, a 38 team number, and a VP Racing patch.”

Laz had an idea. They ruffled through their bag and grabbed their own patch and a sewing kit and started to work on the other shoulder.

“Adding some personal flair? Whatcha got?”

“It’s the patch for our space program, the Outer Wilds Ventures. Somebody’s gotta remember them.”

Solanum came through the door wearing a red knit sweater and the same type of blue pants Laz had grabbed, just darker, it seemed to be the only kind of pants Cooper had. A long, dark green coat also lined with cotton hung from her arms. There must have been a Nomai custom about clothes and clan colors.

“Yep, a trenchcoat will definitely keep you dry,” Cooper gave her a thumbs up, “but the cold will soak through those metal boots faster than you can say ‘I can’t feel my feet.’ I’ll see about stitching together some proper boots.” Cooper waved her over, “Alright sit down, it’s time you learn about proper winter culinary arts.”

He gestured to get Solanum’s attention, she must have understood he was about to demonstrate something, because she had all her attention forward. He took a marshmallow, cut it into small pieces, and distributed them between the three mugs. Cooper brought a mug up to his mouth and took a sip.

Laz and Solanum both took their own mugs. Solanum didn’t hesitate. Cooper had to stop her.

“Hey! It’s called ‘hot’ chocolate for a reason, drink it slow. Or you’ll burn all of the taste buds off your tongue.” Cooper took another sip, even slower this time, while eyeing Solanum down. Solanum mirrored his movements. She had that look on her face again.

She turned to Laz and nodded with a smile on her face. “Mmm-hmm!”

Alright, there were marshmallows in it, how bad could it be? Laz took a sip. It was hot, but manageable if they drank it slow, and it was smooth and creamy. There was also something else… Oh right, it was good. Really, really good. Laz felt a smile split across their face

“Where has this been all my life?”

This would have been perfect hiking up the geyser mountains back on Timber Hearth. It was just too bad that… no, no not now. Now’s not the time.

“I know right? Nothing beats cozying up with hot chocolate when the snow starts piling up outside.” Cooper started roasting his own marshmallow.

“What about s’mores?” Laz took another sip.

“I’m doing that right now, you should start roasting your own marshmallows by the way.”

Laz set the mug down, and started roasting. Solanum must have sensed that another lesson was starting and she followed suit. The Nomai were always so curious.

Cooper took the tray he had brought out earlier and snapped the crackers and brown tiles. Solanum leaned in. “This is chocolate, and these are graham crackers.” He set one tile on one half of each cracker and left the other half empty.

“When you’re done roasting your marshmallows, and this part has to be done quick by the way, you take the cracker with the chocolate on it and put the marshmallow on top. You don’t want it to cool down, you want the chocolate to be a little soft and melty. Then, you squeeze the other half of the cracker down on top and remove the stick. Bam, s’mores.”

Laz and Solanum both finished making theirs by the time Cooper had finished eating his. They both started on their ad hoc sandwiches.

If the hot chocolate was a river of warming goodness, then this was a whole lake! It was sweet and messy, but it was good. It added a whole new level to this whole marshmallow thing. Solanum was nodding enthusiastically again.

A group of friends sat around a fire just having a moment. It could never replace what Laz lost, but… it was nice.

“Ooooh, ever put a marshmallow in a microwave before?”

Chapter Text

Solanum was prepared for change when she started her pilgrimage to the Quantum Moon, but this was unprecedented! Aside from… Everything else she had experienced, two new alien species met in one day! Her clan would have been so proud of her. Maybe somewhere out there, they were. 

After some time, Laz got up and retired to a row of chairs to sleep, after all they went through, stars knew they needed it.

The new alien, Купер, if she had to guess, also got up and went back into the main room of the building. The room had devices of unknown purpose littered everywhere and there were worktables at the center of it all. She had no idea what any of them were for and was afraid of any damage she may cause by inspecting them so she just followed the alien around. He? It looked like a he, acted like one too, she had thought the same of Laz, before they explained that their species didn’t have a concept of gender. He approached what was obviously a map before charting a navigational route towards an area to the north, bordered by what she assumed to be water, if the blued coloration was anything to go by. This planet must have been massive just based on what little sense of scale the map afforded. No, bigger, not more massive. The gravity alone from a planet of this size with conventional mass would have been ridiculously high.

Купер moved over towards a large machine at the far end of the room. He finally noticed her and opened a door, gesturing inside. Ooooh, another demonstration! She sat down inside and he fastened a strap across her waist before closing the door after her. He walked away and pushed a button on the wall, causing a sizable door to lift out of the way. He walked around to the other side of the machine before entering another door. In front of him were a multitude of informational displays and objects to grip that she assumed controlled the machine.

Of course, this was this being’s vessel! A relatively small one, but still a vessel nonetheless. Perhaps a shuttle then? She didn’t know how it managed to fly though, perhaps that mechanism was hidden underneath. He turned a switch and the vessel made a grinding noise, before settling into a low rumble. He moved a control lever backwards and released another. Then, he turned around and the vessel started slowly moving. He rotated a control wheel with his left hand and brought the vessel to face the forest.

He threw the control lever further back and stomped down on something where his feet were. A high screech came from the rear of the vessel and Solanum was forced into her seat. They plunged through the forest at high speed, but never flew. Why would a vessel be designed with such focus on moving over the ground? Of course! On a planet as big as she assumed it to be, any inhabitant species would be bound to develop a means of terrestrial transportation! This was very- She had never seen anything- This machine was- Oh stars this was fun! The vessel flew through the trees and around tight turns. She was being thrown around, but she didn’t care, this was exhilarating!

Her excitement got the better of her, “Whooooooooo!”

Купер started as well, “Whoooooooooohoooooooooo!”

They went round and round the small patch of trees at speeds that were really quite dangerous, but who cares? The vessel had started sliding sideways at one point and Купер had to divert all of his attention to the control wheel, making small adjustments and keeping the machine moving in the right direction despite what should have been a complete loss of control. Eventually, the time came to bring the vessel back into the large building. He brought the control lever into the forward most position and turned the small switch again. The machine fell silent.

“That was amazing! You just use these to get around all the time?”

Купер just walked over after closing the large door and patted her on the shoulder with a smile. Right, yes, different languages. This was going to be difficult.

He put a hand on the roof of the vessel, “Кар.”

Chapter Text

He’d bash himself for taking that risk later, one wayward breeze and all the snow caught up in the branches would have fallen and interrupted their ride. It would have taken him the rest of the day to shovel them out, but demonstration was the only language they could speak right now. The goat-like alien, Solanum, seemed to be too excited to sleep and she walked over to the tardigrade farm and stared in fascination. Her hanging around would give him more of an excuse to voice his thoughts, even if she couldn’t understand. He really needed to figure out how they were going to get around at all.

“This snows gonna become more and more of a problem as time goes on, we should look into getting you set up to drive through this. And no honking right now, Laz is sleeping.”

bzzzzzzzz bzzzzzz

The warning chime, he’d mostly disconnected it since nearly everything he did to the car set of one warning or another. It was accompanied by a “mute” symbol on the LCD screen.

“That’ll work.”

Solanum walked over, thinking he was addressing her.

He pointed at the car and mimicked a talking mouth with his hands while shaking his head. “I was talking to the car, it can’t talk at all, so we’ve had to use… unconventional forms of communication. Oh yeah, by the way, this is Solanum.”

The car waved through the LCD screen.

Solanum immediately took much more interest in the car, she walked to the front and leaned underneath both sides of the car, it must have been to see what made it work. Heh, good luck, Cooper still couldn’t figure it out himself.

The car started rocking on its suspension to mirror her movements. He’d never seen it move like that before… What was causing this all of the sudden? Solanum laughed and the car kept up their little game. It was trying to make friends.

Cooper kept rocking his head over what he could do to make the car snow-ready. They were going to have to contend with low traction and nearly impassable mounds of snow. Eh, just brute force it.

“Alright, alright, alright, we got work to do,” he said with a smile. “How about this; We’ll give you a lift, eight or so inches. We’ll get more clearance and the extra space should be enough to fit a transfer case and front diff. How does that sound?”

beep boop beep

Cooper looked at the LCD. It showed a station wagon pushing through traffic. It amazed Solanum just as much as it did the first time.

“And a snowplow, good call.”

Now there was a smiley face.

Cooper went outside and Solanum watched intently as he started pulling parts from the old K10 out back. Once upon a time, Cooper found some old equipment order forms addressed to General Motors while going through midzone. Turns out that Radius Motors was formed as a subsidiary of GM to build ruggedized cars specifically for the Zone. It was under a contract from the U.S. Government. Ford formed O’Hanlon as a means to compete. After Cooper found that order form, it made it easier to find parts for the creature comforts he couldn’t be bothered to build himself. Like the air compressor from that work truck and that A/C compressor from that Monte Carlo he happened across. It certainly made drives through the scorch much more bearable. And don’t even get him started on the working alternator he finally found.

He returned to the garage with a pushcart loaded with springs, shocks, and the wheel hubs from a Humvee. He considered the leaf springs from the big Airstream for a moment, but decided against it. Solanum followed closely with the K10’s oil sump in her hands. He went back, loaded the drivetrain components up, and brought those in too. It was cold out there, much colder than it should be at this time of year, he might have to get a bit more drastic with the modifications…

The car was put up on jacks and the old drivetrain was mostly knocked out, but one of the brake calipers in the back would not budge. Bigger wrench? Nothing. Rust penetrator? Nothing. Blowtorch? Nothing. Solanum must have seen he was frustrated, so that look turned to confusion when a smile slowly spread across his face.

“Percussive maintenance.”

The car quickly drew the axle up towards its body, like it had accidentally driven on hot coals.

bzz bzz BZZZZZ

“Hey, come on, we’re stuck here, and you’re not gonna be able to move until we’re un stuck.”

… bzz

The axle slowly dropped back down.

“We’ll try to make this as quick as possible.”

He handed a sledgehammer to Solanum, she had that confused look again. He mimed hitting two places on the rotor, “You hit here, and I hit… here.” 

BANG

The whole frame rang with the impact. Solanum looked concerned, but quickly got the idea and hit the other side. Her swing was hesitant and off center. It looked like she had never swung a sledgehammer before, but it would still work.

“What are you two doing over here?”

Oh right. ‘Laz is sleeping.’ Solanum and Cooper suddenly looked incredibly guilty. She left for the other room.

“We’re getting the car ready for the drive tomorrow, sorry for waking you.”

“It’s fine, I napped long enough. Need any help?”

“If four hours is enough for you… We’re gonna be lifting that whole assembly into the bottom of the car.” Cooper motioned to the parts spread over and around the pushcart. “Another set of hands would certainly make it faster.”

Solanum returned with that staff of hers in hand, did something to the device on its end, and tapped it against the ground. A blue line spiralled out of it.

“Woah, what’s she doing there?”

“That’s her writing, I have a tool to translate that.” Laz hurried back to the other room and returned with a strange scanning device with a large screen attached.

“She says ‘Apologies for waking you.’”

“That would have been useful, does it-”

“It doesn’t work both ways.”

“Ah, bummer. Does it have any connector ports?”

“Yeah, why?”

“If I can send a copy of its data to Francis, he might be able to work out a way to get it going in both directions. Either way, he’d definitely be excited to play with alien programming.”

“That’d be great! It would be so much more convenient if we could speak outside of ‘yes’ and ‘no’ questions.”

Cooper sat down at the F.A.X. machine. “Alright, how do we connect to this thing?”

“There’s a four pin plug on the underside here, but the maintenance ports next to it lead to those pins, just in case. From left to right it goes power, ground, data in, data out.”

Cooper fished two pins from his diagnostic pack into the data ports and hooked it into the computer, setting it into data retrieval mode. “All set, what now?”

“We set it into copy mode like… this.”

Ones and Zeroes started flooding the computer screen.

“Alright, very cool stuff! Now, we’re trying to get a very stubborn part off the car. Can you take the parts we have taken off and just move them under the workbench behind me?”

“Sure.”

As they took turns assaulting the brakes, Solanum’s form and force significantly improved, and Cooper could see the rotor rocking in place. He stopped and sat down, both hands on the rotor. He gave it a good tug and landed on his back with a liberated rotor.

“Woooo…”

“Whoohoo…” Solanum seemed just as done as he was.

Cooper had them help with mounted the new springs and shocks and mounted the transfer case to the transmission. He measured the new driveshaft against the current one, too long. The driveshaft wouldn’t telescope enough to fit in, he’d have to cut it. Which meant he’d have to cut the front driveshaft too. He set up some stands and lifted the driveshaft on top. He motioned for Solanum to come over and hold it down.

“Hey, Laz, hold this side down. I gotta make sure this is as straight as possible.”

With some downwards force, the reciprocating saw chewed through the driveshaft and came around again a couple inches down, making another cut. Solanum let go and backed away laughing, she wrote another message.

“She says, ‘My hands went numb.’ Heh, yeah that’s normal, it’ll come back soon.”

Cooper brings over the front driveshaft and they repeat the process. The pieces are laid into a jig to keep them straight and centered. He hands over three sets of sunglasses. 

“I’ve only got one pair of welding goggles, so these’ll have to do. If you do want to look, try not to look directly at it.” He mimed putting the glasses on and covering his forehead to Solanum, who was looking at the sunglasses confused. She looked weird wearing glasses meant for two eyes, Laz looked funny with two sets stacked on top of each other.

Solanum must have recognized what he was about to do because she covered all of her eyes with her arms.

Chik

Chi-FWOOoomphfffffssssshhhhhhhh.

Solanum barely peeked under her arms, even still, Cooper could tell she was surprised. He got to work joining metal to metal. He didn’t know a thing about welding before getting stuck here, but replacing every part of his car almost every day made him learn quick. He ran a steady bead through the whole seam, lifting only to rotate the axles in the jig. He stopped when both axles were in one piece again.

“Alright, I’ll need to do some rough balancing, but that’ll definitely hold.”

Solanum put more writing on the ground.

“She says, ‘I had assumed that was going to be harmfully bright. Chemical combustion based welding! Amazing!’ We usually stuck with gas welding too. It was usually Oxy-... something.”

“Acetylene.”

“Yeah that, what is this for anyway?

“The car moves by containing little explosions in cylinders and using the expanding gas to push down pistons in these cylinders, these pistons are attached off center to a crankshaft to convert the linear motion into rotational motion. These driveshafts send the rotational motion to the wheels.”

“Sounds a bit complicated, why not use a turbine?”

“Seriously? you’re familiar with jet propulsion, but have no idea about internal combustion engines? Those spin way too fast and burn way too hot. They also don’t have the instantaneous torque this has.”

“... What next?”

beep beep beep

“Op, data extraction’s done.” Cooper unclipped his radio, “Francis, come in.”

“Hey, what’s going on?”

“Laz, the alien that speaks English, had a translator that works on Solanum, the alien that speaks Russian. It only does writing and it’s definitely not Russian writing. We pulled the code and data from the translator and were wondering if you’d like to take a crack at getting it to work both ways.”

“Oh, sure! Not much else to do here right now, residual radiation from Cappy is still blowing out my sensors. Speaking of, I ran the data you brought back; Cappy released a ridiculous amount of energy, like a zillion nuclear bombs, all in the gamma spectrum, you’re lucky to be alive. The first burst was relatively small and had the same waveform as the radiation from the Mass Hallucinations, but the second burst… Completely different. I haven’t seen its waveform anywhere else.”

“Another mystery to chase down, eh? Data’s on its way, backup drive’s heading through the tubes now.”

“Okay, I’m starting to get the data. About the aliens, Laz and Solanum. How alien are we talking?”

“They both have three fingers on each hand, Laz has four eyes, long, pointy ears, blue skin, and patches of scales. Solanum looks like a goat with three eyes and four horns. Other than that they’re pretty similar to us. Just as tall, and the same general body layout, but Solanum has got like, two knees? What’s the word… ”

“Digitigrade.”

“Yeah, sorta? It’s not like her second knee is our heel, I mean it's literally a second knee. She’s still flat-footed.”

“Huh, but other than that they’re pretty similar?”

“Yeah, they even fit into some clothes I had.”

“You gotta send pictures.”

“I gotta find film that works.”

“Yeah, well I’ll get to work on this translator stuff, catch you around. Francis, out.”

“Pine Tree Auto, out.”

“Scientist?”

Cooper raised an eyebrow, “How could you tell?” He said flatly.

“What’s left to do?”

“Hang the new springs and shocks and bolt in the new drivetrain.”

“Let’s get to it.”

Work went quick now that he had two whole other sets of hands, even if they had less fingers. Everything was tied up and turned it over, the familiar throb of eight cylinders filled their ears. He had Laz sit in the driver’s seat.

“Alright, when I tell you to put it in drive, you need to move this lever back until a ‘D’ pops up, if I ask you to stop, you need to step on that big pedal down there and move the lever forward until a ‘P’ pops up. If I ask for gas, push down on the other pedal.”

“How is this thing more complicated to pilot than a rocketship? I think I got it…”

Cooper slipped underneath the car and taped some wheelweights to the driveshafts at random, removing and repositioning weights until there was only one on each axle, and marked where the weights had been. He broke the welder out and added material in line with the mark until the vibrations disappeared again. Solanum watched the whole process with awe.

“Alright, give it the beans.”

“What?”

“Hit the gas as hard as you can.”

“Oh, okay.”

Cooper didn’t see any vibration, but there could still be some.

“Feel any shaking, outside of the engine idling?”

“No, it was really smooth.”

Solanum started to write again.

“Op, Sol’s writing again.”

“Hold on, ‘What a simple, yet effective solution. Ingenious!’” Laz was putting on quite the show of make an impression of a stereotypical scientist.

“Thanks. There’s one more thing to do before we wrap this part up.” Cooper opened the doors and gestured for them to get inside. Solanum beamed with excitement.

They took it for a test drive. Too hard in the rear. Again. Too hard in the front. Again. Clunk in the front. Again. Just right. The car was clawing through the turns and sat just above most of the snow, the banks they did hit sent a puff of white over the windshield, prompting excited cries from his passengers. They pulled back in and shut out the cold.

“Hoo, I flew a rocket, so I thought being stuck on the ground would be boring, but wow! Complicated or not, that was fun!”

“Such are the wonders of driving, but we can make it better.”

Having somebody else in the garage that could talk back was something Cooper was sorely missing. He cut the treads out of a set of off-road tires and bound them to some airless cores he made then shut them into the matter regenerator to force them to fully bond. Solanum and Laz looked at the setup in confusion.

“It’s really weird tech, atoms naturally want to bond together, but they also naturally push themselves apart. If you can get them vibrating at the right frequency, they shoot right past that repulsive force and can form bonds again.”

He let those cook while they cut, welded, and ribbed a sheet of quarter inch steel into a v-plow with polycarbonate sheets on the outboard edges so the headlights could peek through. There were wires run from the LIM Shield power supply to another set of Shield emitters and heating coils in the plow. He hung the whole assembly on a hoist and bolted a set of hydraulic pistons from a tow truck to the frame behind the bumper. He mounted the hydraulic pump to the right rear side of the roof rack and hung the new plow onto the pistons so it could be raised and lowered.

The matter regenerator stopped whirring. He took the wheels out, tested the bonds, and drilled holes through the tread to the wheel itself. Bolted pneumatic spikes poked through each hole and their supply lines were hooked up to the compressed air feed from the Hummer wheel hubs. He bolted the air reservoir down in front of the hydraulic pump, strapped a weatherproof roof trunk and bolted four high beam lamps to the front rack. Then, bolted a fuel reservoir to the rear rack. The wheels were mounted and he replaced all of the old body panels with brand new steel and insulated panels.

It was 10 pm now, nearly ten hours of hard work and labor. To create his Magnum Opus, his Venus de Milo, his Breakfast Club.

“I think we really outdid ourselves here, how do you feel?”

A heart and a smiley face appeared on the LCD.

“We still gotta get some paint on you, what are you feeling like?”

The screen shows a small dot going around an oval track.

“... Something sporty… White stripes on ice blue?”

Thumbs up.

“Coop, you’re talking to the car.”

“...”

“...”

“... Oh, uh right. The car’s alive.”

Laz shot him a skeptical look.

“Yeah, yeah, I know, that’s crazy. And I can assure you that it is not normal, but we’re in the Zone; nothing makes conventional sense here. Ab normal is normal.”

The car started flexing its new suspension and plow.

“See?”

“Woah, wha- How does it work?”

“Not a clue, by all means, it shouldn’t be possible, but…”

The car wiggled its wheels.

“You guys got to play dress-up, now it’s this dude’s turn.”

Cooper broke out A.R.D.A.’s specialized quick-dry spray cans and decal rollers. The car was soon adorned with a light blue paint job with white stripes running down the centerline. Cooper plastered a decal “11” on the front doors and rear fenders and bolted the insulation grid back onto the doors.

“I think it’s looking good, but we’re gonna have to see how it drives tomorrow. I don’t know about you guys, but I am pooped. You should sleep too. We’ll hit the road around 7. See you guys in the morning.”

“Yeah, good night.”

“Ты собираешься спать?”

Laz yawned, “Wuh?”

“Уже довольно поздно…”

“Yeah, I’m going to sleep.”

bzzzz bzzzz

Chapter Text

It was really, really strange. This past day was full of excitement, but now that it was actually able to easily move, it just felt bored.

It had never felt more fear than it did during that moment in Sierram. Cooper was outside and it could see that something bad was about to happen, but there was nothing it could do! It never had been able to do anything before, but in that moment, as that light in the sky flared up, it felt more energy than it ever had. Like its battery was recharged a billion times over. It could actually move, and it had to protect Cooper.

It had expected the feeling to go away with the pain from the blast, but no. It stayed, it lingered for a moment more, then longer, then longer. It was in shock, it didn’t know what to do now that it could do anything. It just watched over Cooper, waiting for him to get up. He had to get up. When he did, it had felt relief, like a weight had been lifted from its springs. Cooper finally recognized that it was truly alive. It had never felt happier, but it still didn’t know what to do. Cooper always had a plan though; They drove down to Cappy and got up close enough for Cooper to safely do something with a computer, but what were those? They looked like Cooper. And they were motionless, on the ground, like Cooper had been when he didn’t get up for hours on end.

Cooper didn’t notice.

It was reminded of the time it spent in that old shed, waiting for the next piece to fall off or rust away. It couldn’t remember when it started thinking, but it felt like it was there for a long time. When it heard Cooper shuffling through the forest, desperation struck, this wasn’t just another animal, this thing was intelligent. So, it did what it could to get his attention. When he saw it, his face bore nothing but relief. It didn’t know why it could recognize that, but it did. Cooper had saved it and it had saved Cooper. It saw a similar situation in those two figures lying on the ground there. It had to get Cooper’s attention, Cooper would save them, like he had saved it. 

Now they were here in the garage with them. Oooooh, it wanted to talk with them sooo bad. It had tried before, but those sounds they made were so complicated! It could understand them just fine, but making them? Nope. They all seemed to be enjoying their time and they had worked to get it seriously kitted out. Its new suspension felt stronger, and there was a new sensation in its front wheels; It could move those too now! It really wanted to try this new stuff out, but they all started looking tired. It could wait.

It could wait.

Oh, this was boring, there was nothing to do to pass the time. What were they doing? Oh, right, sleeping. Shutting their eyes and letting their brains think slower through the night. It wondered if it could do something similar…

Maybe all it had to do was sit idle, stop thinking, and, drift… away…

Woah! What?! It’s 12 o’clock now! What happened? Was that sleep? Wow, it felt great! Its mind felt like its transmission after a good flush. That was like time travel! It didn’t have to wait for 7 o’clock to come! 7 o’clock could come to it instead. Oh, watch out, time, you’re about to get sleeped on, sooooooo… hard…

Chapter Text

be-beep, be-beep, be-beep, be-beep

Cooper fumbled with his watch, “Alright, alright, I’m up.”

The timer on the jukebox clicked. Cooper started the Mr. Coffee in the corner.

“-came up from the country with a smile for everyone. She left her blue horizon just to find another home..”

That was the weirdest dream Cooper ever had, aliens? Seriously? He really had been in here too long. Well, time to make some breakfast.

“... A lonely girl who traveled many days, a lonely heart that could not find no way…”

Grilled spam and hardtack had started to get old. So, Cooper thought he’d try his hand at bacon and pancakes.

“... And she said, ‘Mama, it’s a hard life, now you’re gone, Mama, it’s so hard to carry on…”

He broke open a package of bacon and set a couple strips on the griddle. He set it down on the burner. It sizzled, lifting a haze and the smell of an easy-going diner into the air.

“Huh, wuh- Morning already? What’re you up to?”

Oh. Uh-huh. Not a dream. That’s cool.

“Uh… breakfast. Want some pancakes?”

“I’ll have whatever you make.”

Cooper nursed his coffee down and started to work on the batter, he mixed in the usual ingredients and a little butter. It just seemed a little utilitarian, though. What did his mother always do? Right, vanilla. Maybe there was some in the… Yup, he had a glass of extract tucked under the counter. Solanum slowly roused herself with a yawn and rubbed her eyes.

“Доброе утро.”

“Oh, hey, good morning.”

“Morning, Solanum, you hungry?” Cooper mimed bringing a spoon to his mouth.

“Oh, да… yes.”

Cooper removed the bacon from the griddle and the griddle from the burner. A pan replaced it and batter was poured in. He put a few strips on one plate, and the rest on another. The plate was laid onto a tray alongside cups of coffee.

“Here’s some bacon and coffee, I’m gonna call Francis while the pancakes are cooking.”

Laz and Solanum both selected a strip of bacon and inspected it.

“You just eat it. And the coffee is like wake up juice.” Cooper fiddled with the F.A.X. machine, “Hey, Francis, you up? Come in.”

“... Morning, Cooper. I was hoping you’d call soon. I wasn’t able to make much sense of the translator data, but I think I found the code responsible for conversion. It’s a linear algorithmic process, so I copied the data and reworked it to reverse the process. It should automatically detect the language and work automatically from there. There’s also some new code that should let the screen display the alien language.”

Laz lifted his attention, “Oh, sweet!”

Cooper gnawed on his bacon. “Geez, you finished already? Well, thanks, but did you get any sleep?” Cooper flipped the pancake.

“Technically, no. No, I didn’t sleep at all. This was just so exciting.”

Cooper could hear him yawning through the tiny, tinny speaker.

“Alright, well send it over. And get some sleep, you sound like you’re about to fall outta your chair.”

“Tell Francis we say hi.”

“Laz and Sol say hi.”

“Oh, hey. Data’s on the way now, hard drive’s also… moving. Connection’s been slow so the hard drive might get there before the data finishes sending. Good night.”

“Yeah, Good night, Francis.”

Laz and Solanum had emptied their plate. A whole day on s’mores, hot chocolate, and granola bars must not have been very filling. He slipped the pancake onto their plate and handed them a set of forks and knives.

“Here you go, don’t dig in just yet, lemme get you some syrup.” Cooper poured more batter into the pan and rustled through the cabinets for a bottle of maple syrup. He returned to the duo, bottle in hand.

“This is the good stuff, from up north.” Cooper poured a gratuitous amount on the large pancake.

“Thanks.”

“Спасибо вам.”

ssssssssSSSSSSHHHHH-THNK… ding!

“Special delivery! and  yeah…” Cooper looked at the ones and zeroes filling the F.A.X. machine’s screen, “... wireless data is really slow right now. Pneumatube got the drive here before it was even halfway finished. Let’s see if this works, we still have a backup copy if we need it.”

Laz excitedly hurried over to the terminal and Cooper pinned the connectors back into the translator as Laz set it into maintenance mode. Data started flowing in. Cooper barely had enough time for another pancake before the transfer finished. It was only a patch after all.

Cooper retrieved the translator and handed it to Laz. They expectantly looked at Solanum. She eyed them, confused, before writing.

“She says, ‘Am I eating this wrong too?’”

“Ha! No you guys are fine.”

“Alright, let’s see if this works…”

[ He says you’re fine, we’re just trying to see if the translator works both ways now. ]

At the press of a button, the translator took the English writing and turned it into crude rows of lines, dashes, and rings. Just without the spiralling shape that Solanum’s writing had shown. Laz turned the screen to face Solanum. She looked surprised before squinting and taking a moment to mouth out the words. Solanum started excitedly bouncing in place.

More writing.

[ This is amazing! We now have a means of two-way communication! I apologize for taking a moment to read, ends of lines are typically to denote the end of an idea or phrase in my language. I see now that it is a rather simple matter of left-to-right and top-to-bottom. ]

“Curves would be the only way to get one big line to fit on anything…”

“This is amazing! Tell Francis he’s a genius!”

“From what I heard from him all the hard work was already done in there, you must have put a lot into this thing.”

Laz started looking sad all of the sudden, he sat down. “Yeah, I mean I built it but… Hal did all the hard work deciphering the language.”

“Who’s Hal? was he… Oh.”

Solanum set a hand over Laz’s shoulders. “They were my best friend back there, I miss them. I miss everyone, but I’ll never see them again. They’re gone.”

“... I’m not really in a good position to say this, but I may never make it out of here, ever. Everyone I know has probably given up on looking for me, but I push myself. I get out there nearly every day and keep going. Even if I’m not doing it for me, I keep going, because if I stop… I guess I wouldn’t be doing right by them. You gotta keep moving, it doesn’t matter what direction, it doesn’t matter if you don’t know where to go, so long as you keep moving.”

Laz quietly reflected on Cooper’s words, Solanum seemed concerned.

“... Yeah that was awfully sappy, but it’s true… How’s about some more pancakes?”

They spent the rest of the half hour just talking. Trading stories and experiences. Turns out that Solanum was ancient, two-hundred and eighty-something thousand years, but no older than Laz, some quantum weirdness or something. When the time came, Cooper got up and made for the car.

“It’s nearly seven and I want as much daylight driving as possible, I should head out soon.”

“What should we bring?” Laz started relaying the conversation to Solanum.

“You’re not- It’s waaaaay too dangerous out there. You can’t come with me.”

Laz stared him down and crossed their arms, “Trust me, I’ve dealt with danger before, we can handle ourselves.”

Solanum read and nodded in affirmation.

“I don’t think you understand, ‘abnormal is normal’ remember? Out there, the laws of physics hold just about as much weight as paper mache in a rainstorm. It’s not safe.”

“Not safe? We stared down the big bang! I’m an astronaut for crying out loud and you don’t know the half of what I’ve been through.”

“I can’t keep tabs on two other people!” Cooper held his hands out in front of him, exasperated.

“You don’t have to. Astronauts remember? We both flew through space on the regular.”

[ And I, for one, am very interested in the differences found on this planet. ]

He put his fingers on the bridge of his nose, “...Alright, fine. We’ll have to make more fuel stops to make up for not having tanks in the back, but it’ll be fine. Come on, load up, get your jackets on, we got places to be. Oh, and Solanum, you’re gonna need these.”

He held up a pair of oddly shaped boots.

“I hope you don’t mind, but I took some measurements and cobbled together some proper winter boots before I went to bed, these’ll keep you warm.”

Solanum took the boots and gave them an appraising look before fitting them on.

“And Laz, you’re probably gonna wanna wear this, you got long ears, lots of surface area. You’d do well to cover them up. Frostbite’s a bitch.” Cooper handed them a hat lined on the inside with, you guessed it, cotton. It had two flaps to cover the ears and an exposed area of cotton was folded up over the forehead area.

[ Thank you, Cooper, but if you did not want us to join you, why did you make these? ]

“Maybe I just wanted to see how much you really wanted to get out there. Come on, we’re burning daylight.”

He really didn't, those were just supposed to be gifts. What are you gonna do?

Cooper locked in the destination and the front garage door lifted open. The snow had stopped, but it had easily packed to two feet in height.

“Whoo, nothing like a trial by fire, or ice in this case.”

The car glided over and through the snow. The plow forced it to the sides, it’s like it wasn’t even there. These two had done a great job. They’d have made great mechanics.

[ Question: What are we doing? ]

Chapter Text

Laz and Solanum settled in and watched the trees march past. This planet really was massive, with the amount of distance they had to cover, they could circumnavigate Timber Hearth 50 times over, and that wasn’t even counting all the meandering turns they had to take to scale the mountains.

The thing that seemed to interest Solanum the most were the tunnels and, what Cooper called, “freeways.” Long, flat, straight stretches of paved road that seemed to punch through the forest and landscape without a care that something had once been there in the first place.

It didn't matter how many times they drove past a distance superstructure in the hills, it captivated her each time. She was a beaming source of unbridled curiosity and wonder.

“... The engineers would drill holes in the rock and blow a small canyon right out of the hill with dynamite. The road would be paved right through it, that’s why you can see those vertical channels in the hillside there.”

Laz had been translating for Solanum. “Dynamite?”

“Oh, uh what’s it… tri… trinitrotoluene, T.N.T., dynamite. It’s a mass-producible explosive that’s mainly used for demolition. Now when it came to these tunnels, explosives were used, but only when it was absolutely safe, you wouldn’t want the whole mountain falling on you. Around here, where durability was most important, it was much more common to see a boring machine. Big old thing, as big as the tunnel and chewed through the rock. As it passed by, it would automatically put concrete lining in place so the tunnel would hold up behind it.”

[ All this to create a convenient, high-capacity roadway. I am in awe. ]

Laz seemed to share the same thoughts as Solanum; people had built this. A large group of people had come together for the express purpose of carving a path through the mountains. Six billion was suddenly starting to make more sense.

The three of them passed away the time with stories, fictional and true. In trading those stories, Laz had learned one thing; Cooper had been through a lot. It seemed that for every story that Laz had, Cooper had another that paired it. And he was never in a time loop.

“I tell ya, if it weren’t for this car… I’d have died right there in that ditch.”

A small screen showed a car drive up and release a heart symbol into the center of the screen.

It was still a strange concept, this machine was alive. No explanation. No verifiable reason. It just was. Laz had thought Cooper was just crazy, but after hearing all of his stories… at least some of them had to be true, right?

“-damned thing latched onto the car and- Op, access road barricade, looks like we’re here.”

Laz started translating. “Where is ‘here?’”

“Now that’s the million dollar question. This is junction E4, but that’s really the only constant thing about it. Every time you drive through here, the entire place just… changes.”

[ What does he mean? ]

Cooper looked like he was having some trouble finding the right words. “The access roads, like the ones we’re coming off of, are clean, nondescript stretches of pavement. There’s not much else to reinterpret, so they rarely ever change. I wouldn’t really matter if they did anyway, it’s just a straight road. Now, the junctions..." Cooper raised a finger out of his fist and was shaking it next to his head, "Those are a whole different thing altogether. If you have two roads that carry hundreds of people every day meet at one point, there’s bound to be more stuff happening at that one point. People build houses, gas stations, and businesses. It becomes muddled, there’s a lot more room for interpretation, so every time the Instability rolls through, it’s more likely to be scrambled into something different.”

[ How is that possible? And what is ‘instability?’” ]

“Make sure that's Instability with a capital ‘I.’ That’s a hard question. I’m no scientist, but I have one theory; It’s obviously one of the side effects of ‘LIM Technology’, as in un lim ited frequency. The higher the frequency of an electromagnetic wave, the higher its energy. So, if you had a wave with unlimited frequency, you had unlimited energy. The field of LIM tech focused on the creation and manipulation of these ‘LIM waves’ and this place, the Olympic Peninsula, was its testing grounds. The technology was very promising, infinite, clean energy and conveniences that were only dreamed of beforehand.”

“Of course, you could imagine that containing a wave of infinite energy was going to be difficult. Some of it leaked out of the testing labs. As it turns out, unlimited energy can create more unlimited energy. The amplitude of these waves then increases by constructive interference, but they cant keep increasing. At some point, the waveform collapses, causing a cascade of energy to sweep across the landscape, the Instability.”

Cooper pauses again, like he’s verifying his theory as he speaks, “There is a fundamental law of the universe, any given amount of matter can be turned into a proportional amount of energy, and vice-versa. The equation is E=mc 2 , energy is equal to mass times the speed of light squared. Francis will say there’s more to it than that, but it’s good enough for this explanation. Either way, you can imagine that converting from energy to mass gives extremely low yield. You would need a ridiculous amount of energy to create any meaningful amount of mass…”

Laz felt like they knew where Cooper was going and they weren’t sure they liked it.

“So what if you had unlimited energy? Well, then you have the potential for unlimited mass. The waveform just needs to collapse, but there’s one important detail; Every object gives off a waveform that is specific to it and this wave can mix with a LIM wave. When the instability passes through and a mixed LIM wave collapses, it has a chance to collapse into matter, generating a copy of this object. This happens all over an affected area, causing it to get scrambled, but it gets weirder. Sometimes the collapse can generate spacetime, so a distance that used to be barely a mile long, is suddenly more than ten.”

Solanum was glued to the translator, soaking up every word she could.

“That’s strange enough, but this process also could explain the existence of the anomalies; If the waveform of an object can mix with a LIM wave, then can the waveforms of two or more objects mix together? The answer is yes. The waves from multiple objects can mix, creating a new spectral footprint that is a combined identity of the component objects, like a crash test dummy and a military grade explosive device for example.”

Cooper gestured out the window, the car creeped through a field of glowing plastic statues.

“If this combined wave mixes with a LIM wave, and this wave is to collapse, and the collapse produces an object, this object will be a mixture of the two objects. These strange objects then exist until the next wave of instability, where there is a chance that their waveforms can mix with a LIM wave again, creating more copies of the object.”

“We’ve been able to forecast what the conditions in a junction are, but it’s all probabilistic. You only ever know what exactly is in a junction and how much of it you’ll find when you actually get there and see for yourself.”

The words entered Laz’s mind just as they read them from the translator.

“It’s quantum.”
[ It’s quantum. ]

“What?”

“It sounds exactly like quantum mechanics, like when an object appears to change state or react when under the observation of a conscious observer.”

Cooper brough his hand to his chin and thought for a moment, “... Y’know that kinda makes sense, I’ll have to ask Francis about it when he wakes up. He probably has some experience in the field.”

Laz helped Solanum trade theories with Cooper before the conversation died down. Cooper brought the car next to a strange machine with a semicircular arm surrounding a cage containing a floating, glowing, liquid-like substance. Cooper removed the cage, it seemed like the whole world groaned in protest. Solanum looked terrified. Cooper nonchalantly walked back to the car and slotted the cage into the device in the front seat. It… disappeared in front of them.

“The hell was that?”

“... Uh yeah. I forgot about how scary that was the first time I pulled one. That is a Stability Anchor and the thing I was carrying was a container of anchor energy. It was an early attempt to stem the Instability fronts by absorbing excess LIM wave energy. Nowadays, with no one to empty them, they just fill up and sit there doing nothing. Luckily for me, they provide the perfect power source to power the ARC Device here.”

“What does it do?”

“That’s a surprise for later.”

Laz could recognize a mischievous grin anywhere. They'd seen it a million times from Slate or Mica in the past.

“Whatever you say.”

The world outside was covered in pure white, Laz couldn’t make out where the capped trees ended and the sky began. The snow was perfectly flat, like an undisturbed pond, but it looked like something was carving out a path next to the car. Laz barely had enough time to flinch before the glowing ball of metal lept from under the snow and latched to the door they were leaning on. Another jumped at Solanum’s door, eliciting a shocked yelp.

“whOOOOAHLY SHIT!”

“What happ- Hey, we got bunnies! I was wondering when they’d show up! Man, I can barely see ‘em in the snow!” Cooper pressed a button taped to the steering wheel and a warm glow surrounded the car, the bunnies fell away. He shut the device off, but more bunnies swarmed the car and Cooper swerved to avoid their attacks. The car felt like it was losing purchase on the ground. Cooper pressed another button on the steering wheel.

Tck-TSHH

The soothing sound of white noise as the car pushed through the snow was suddenly replaced by a harsh rumble from each of the wheels. A low hum was heard from the front of the car. The engine surged.

The car suddenly felt like it was literally clawing through the snow. Laz strained against the seatbelts, making a fool of themself! Solanum looked like she was keeping her composure, unerringly composed during the situation. She even looked like she was having fun!

 “WHOOOOO Yeah!”

Eventually, Laz found themselves a good handhold and could keep still. This was kinda fun! It was just like the feeling they had when they were passing time away one loop flying through every obstacle they could find on Timber Hearth. They’d clipped the side of the arch then, but they managed to land. It was the first time they felt happy since the start of the loops.

“Hahahaha YEAH! Get outta here! We’re UNTOUCHABLE!”

“Oh look who’s getting enthusiastic all of the sudden!”

Solanum joined in with a “Whoooohooooo!”

One by one, the bunnies made their carefully calculated leaps before Cooper swerved out of the way at the last moment. The wheels clawed away from underneath the car and cabin was dragged along on top of them. The entire frame would harshly tilt to the side.

BEEP BEEEEEP

“Yeah you tell ‘em! How about those retractable spikes, eh? I’d say they did a good job.” Cooper literally brushes his shoulders and presses a button.

PSSssshhhh…

The rumbling died down and the soothing white noise returned.

“... You gotta teach me how to drive one of these one day.”

“Coming from the guy who flew a rocket ship?”

“Do you see any rockets around here?”

“I actually did once. I’m telling you the Zone’s weird.”

After that whole show, Laz could actually believe the prospect of a spontaneously appearing rocketship. The excitement gradually died down. And they settled into watching the world fly by again. This place was dangerous, but it was also… beautiful. If they had to end up anywhere after the end of the universe, they were happy it was here.

They passed another access road barricade and traded stories again while the music played through the whole cabin. There sure was a lot of music, in a world full of six billion people, there were probably millions of musicians, all making their own form of art for the rest of the world. Some of it was fast and used instruments Laz had never heard before and some was mellow and more familiar to Laz, it was cozy. And talk about cozy, the snow was still powdery, it hadn’t even considered melting, but the inside of the car was warm, like sitting in front of the fireplace in Gneiss’s cabin during the rare thunderstorm.

The sky had started to clear by the time they made it to the next junction.

“Where are we now?”

“... Junction E1, what used to be the town of Sierram.”

“‘Used to be?’ what… happened…”

As they rounded a turn, they were met with the sight of a floating red ball of energy. Laz and Solanum both stared in awe.

“Remember when I told you two about Cappy and how I found you unconscious next to it?”

“Yeah?”

“Say hello to Colossal Cappy.”

Laz felt a pang of fear shoot through them again.

“What happened to the town?”

Cooper paused for some time before starting. It was like when Laz was preparing to tell about what happened to the Nomai...

“... February 13, 1973, a little more than twenty-six years ago, the town of Sierram was holding the first annual ‘LIM Fair.’ You see, the town had gotten lucky and were chosen to be the first place in the world where civilian families would have access to the wonders of LIM tech. 83 families, 83 homes, 83 pieces of LIM tech to be carted in by train and handed out. LIM tech had always been a wild beast, but they had been toiling over it for nearly three decades now, all the issues were ironed out, they were ready for commercial release.”

Given what Cooper had already shared about LIM tech, Laz wasn’t feeling good about this. Solanum looked genuinely afraid.

“The festivities opened early in the morning in the town fair. A.R.D.A. had brought over some examples of LIM tech to be displayed in the town square and were, among other things, trying to sell people on the idea of having their own home power source. There was playing, music, cookouts… People were socializing, having a good time. Then came the time for the resident families to choose their piece of LIM tech to bring home. The train carrying the LIM tech rolled in, and there is where concrete documentation ends.”

“The best witness accounts were from the closest group of people to Sierram; children of the families in Sierram who were at a wilderness camp. Around dinnertime, sirens went off and a shockwave rolled through the camp. Sierram was radio silent. Eventually, a team was sent in, and they were faced with much the same thing we see here; 83 homes, 83 families, and all the other people in attendance were gone, replaced by an irradiated crater and Colossal Cappy. They set up research posts, sensors, and interferometers in a desperate attempt to understand what had gone wrong. They got nothing. Small scale tests and simulations were set up. Nothing. They ran a full size test with the exact same conditions as the Sierram Disaster; A train was loaded with the same tech, in the same cars, across an exact replica of Sierram. Nothing. It was a fluke. By all understandings, what happened here had no reason to happen and yet, it did. Anyone close enough to explain was gone. No bodies were found, no debris. Nobody knows what happened during the first annual LIM Fair.”

Laz sat in silence. Solanum blankly stared out the window. They couldn't understand. That number just didn't make sense. 83 families. If this species is similar to Solanum’s in that respect, that is at least two parents with any number of children in each household, then… around 400 people. Not counting the people who weren’t residents of Sierram. Four-hundred people. There were only twenty-two Hearthians... and maybe, maybe one-hundred Nomai. But four-hundred people? Just gone?

“... Why are we here?”

“This is one of the only places on this side of the zone that’s guaranteed to have gas stations. It’s a common stop for me, but I still hate driving through here as much as I did the first time I came.”

Laz looked around. The landscape was desolate and dark, not a shred of color anywhere. It was just black.

“... The trees aren’t covered in snow, they’re all branches, they should have grown back by now.”

“Before I found you, I was rushing over here because Cappy was throwing out strange readings. I got here just in time to see it paint the sky red and explode. Maybe that’s what it did all those years ago. I think it may have had something to do with your arrival here, but who knows? We’re gonna spend a little time here, so if you need to use the bathroom, go now, as soon as I’m done filling up, I’m doing some checks and we’re back on the road. Grab a set of breathing masks and slip them on.”

Cooper squeezed the car through the gap in the fence and drove it next to the pump. Cappy was right there, in the middle of the carter, in front of them. Laz took out his signalscope, it sounded deep and warbly. It sounded like it was growling. Laz turned it off, they couldn’t listen to it any longer. Laz went inside and found Solanum looking for actionable supplies and alien artifacts. They diverted to the side door and relieved themself. Solanum filtered in after them and she returned to the car with a collection of objects from the gas station. Cooper finished checking the car and took his turn in the restroom. He returned and they motored off.

“We’re gonna go a bit out of the way here on an unmarked access road I found. There’s  something you need to see when we get there.”

The rest of the drive was silent, none of them felt like talking. If it wasn’t one source of overbearing existential dread, it was another.

The sun had slipped below the horizon and the clouds had disappeared completely. The sky was a dark, cool cobalt that still casted however little light it was reflecting. Cooper started guiding their car up the curves of a tall mountain. With every curve they cleared, Laz could see more of the surrounding area, the mountains stretched on almost endlessly into the white. And the gargantuan containment wall loomed in the distance. Even from here it still looked massive.

“Wow.”

[ It is quite pretty. ]

“Yeah, these are the outskirts just outside junction E3. This mountain wasn’t here before the Zone. Instability rolled through one day and, pop! New mountain. It’s stayed ever since.”

“Why are we driving to the top of it?”

“You’ll see when we get there.”

Laz waited through the sensation of popping ears as they rose and rose and rose. Eventually, they made it to a clear, flat area looking out to the East. Were those… lights down there? Cooper shut the car off and they all got out. He put a set of binoculars up to his eyes.

“See those lights down there?”

“Yeah… what am I looking at?”

“You got your telescope thing, don’t you?”

Laz put his eye up to the signalscope and set the magnification as high as it would go. It was a city. No, not a city, that word just sounds too small for what they were looking at.

“That’s the city of Seattle and just past it over the water, is the city of Bellevue. And there, near the middle of the city, see the weird looking tower?”

There was a tall, white structure with a circular section at the top. It sat on three legs.

“With the legs?”

“Yep, that’s the space needle. Observation tower built for the 1962 World’s Fair. Overlooks the whole city.”

Cooper held the binoculars in front of Solanum’s eyes and she grabbed them as he was pointing down towards the city. She gasped and her mouth hung in an open smile.

“... How many people live down there?”

“In the whole Seattle metro area? About 2,600,000.”

Two million?! Right, six billion. There are six billion people living here.

“There’s a bunch of lights moving around.”

“Cars.”

“Those are cars?! Those buildings must be massive!”

Laz could hear a dull roaring in their ears, they looked towards where it seemed to be coming from. A large object was cutting across the sky.

“What is that? Up there.”

“What’re you… oh, yeah. That’s a jumbo jet. Probably coming in from overseas and skirting around the Aerial Exclusion Zone. Looks like a seven-four… it's got the hump behind the cockpit.”

“Cockpit? Someone’s flying that?”

“Yup, international mass transport, it’s probably got just under three hundred people inside, but they can hold nearly four hundred fully loaded.”

Solanum had caught view of the spacecraft, no, it’s obviously meant for air travel. Aircraft? Sure. Laz translated what Cooper had said to Solanum.

[ Just as big as a Vessel, but capable of holding many more people. It seems to keep in the air by means of speed and lifting surfaces only. Ingenuity truly knows no bounds. ]

She had stars in her eyes, mouth agape in wonder. It was infectious.

Laz and Solanum both peered through the binoculars and signalscope for a while, pointing out interesting things and there seemed to be no shortage of those. Laz flipped the switch on the scope. Sounds. Lots of sounds. Music, then talking.

“Woah.”

“What is it?”

“I just picked up a signal from down there.”

“Oh, let me hear.”

Laz passed the headset to Cooper, it didn’t really fit on his head.

“Oh, yeah. That’s the radio. People broadcast music and talk shows over the airwaves. Most cars have a means of picking up those signals. It keeps people entertained on their drives home.”

“We had radio, I just wasn’t expecting so much. It’s just… Wow.”

“How are you able to pick that up with this?”

“You’d have to ask Chert for the specifics, but it scans over the whole radio spectrum and makes a guess on the type of modulation it uses. Still, it can pick up on raw signals and vibrations.”

“Vibrations, like sound?”

“Yeah.”

“From here?”

“Yeah, the scope figures out what it's looking for and filters out everything else.”

“But it shouldn’t be possible to pick up sound from this range.”

“Again, you’d have to ask… Chert.”

The realization hit Laz like meteor for what felt like the umpteenth time since they got here. 

“... One of your friends?”

“Yeah.”

Cooper gave Laz a good pat on the shoulder and they all stared down at the lights in silence until the sky turned dark and they had to leave “before the Instability kicks up.” Laz did not want to see what that was like.

It was silent the whole way down the mountain before Cooper spoke up again.

“In here things are strange and dangerous, but out there, people are going about normal lives. Six billion of them, all with their own story.”

It was a nice sentiment, one that both Laz and Solanum desperately needed after going through Sierram. Laz was starting to feel really comfortable with the company he kept now. They definitely considered them friends at this point, closely tuned to each other’s thoughts. It was a cozy feeling that Laz had only really felt with Gabbro. Calm. The rumble of the engine soon lulled both Solanum and him to sleep.

Chapter Text

The dashboard light shot up underneath Cooper’s face, lighting it up like a flashlight during a spooky story. Fuel was good, car was… relatively undamaged. The road disappeared into the dark, yellow stripes and white lines being the only hint it was even there. High beams shot ahead, cutting out an observable section of the universe.

Those two were slouched over in their seats. Laz looked considerably more exhausted, Cooper still couldn’t figure out why. They were supposedly in a brand universe, meeting an alien, and discovering previously unknown technologies. But they only asked questions, rarely any small talk outside of their stories. And about those stories; sometimes they didn’t line up. Take Brittle Hollow for example, every story had the planet falling apart and getting sucked into a black hole, but Laz told each one like it was a pressing issue each time he arrived. And how did a planet like that only start to fall apart on his launch day? 

There was something Laz wasn’t telling him. Solanum probably knew, she always had a… compassionate? Empathetic? Look on her face when Laz told their stories. Still, they didn’t have to tell Cooper so long as they could confide in Solanum. Cooper knew what isolation looked like and if Laz was keeping it to themself, it’d eat them alive. Cooper had almost fallen to that point himself. Maybe Laz was simply just exhausted, alien physiology may be weird. Cooper wouldn’t press for now, but if things got bad? He’d be damned if he let someone trudge through pain like that alone.

They cruised through F3, not much of a choice in the matter, Swift Storm was in play. Music low, heater to “DEF,” transfer case in part time. Just a simple cruise through the hills. Cooper cursed at the world every time he pulled an anchor, why did that have to be so loud? People are sleeping! They would stir, but wouldn’t wake up. They’d gotten used to this road tripping business quick, either that or they really were exhausted, but they had a full night's rest, what could have possibly got them like this?

More driving, the snow was fairly constant outside of Sierram. The Zone had been awfully calm, he didn’t usually skirt down these junctions though. So, it was probably just calmer over here. Or the anomalies didn’t take well to the snow. It was easy to pick up on the Wrigglies, they shook all their snow off and stuck out like a sore thumb.

They pulled into junction F5 to fuel up. It was just after twelve, Perpetual Stability, no heavy anomalous activity. Cooper was used to locking eyes down the road and hanging his arms on the wheel for hours on end, but being in a car with two other people who were out cold? His mind was getting the wrong idea. Nothing was more important on the road than staying alert, but now? He was slower than 95 during rush hour.

“We’re gonna go a little out of the usual procedure… Having trouble staying awake here, I’m liable to get us wrapped around a tree at this rate.”

Cooper eased the car towards a garage and shut them in.

“I’m gonna take a quick nap, then we’ll get back on the road.”

beep boop beep

Smiley face.

“... Wake me if anything happens. Good Night.”

Sleep came easy. Cooper dreamt of floating in a black void, like in the hallucination. It exploded again, but it was quiet. The blast caught up to him and he was surrounded in white light.

A picturesque green field stretched before him, the ground seemed to curve away from the horizon.

“Hey there, stranger.”

Cooper turned around to see someone lying on a hammock, they looked like Laz.

“Didn’t expect to see anybody else out here, what brings you around here?”

“... I think I’m sleeping?”

“Yeah... This does seem like a dream, doesn’t it?”

“Huh, lucid dream, I’ve never had one, that’s… transcendental.”

“ Transcendental… I like that.”

A breeze meandered through the grass.

“... What are we doing out here?

“Not much to do out here, so I’m just relaxing, not like I’d do much else if there was a choice.”

Who the hell is this guy?

“... Is this real? Are you real?”

“Real is subjective… or something. Either way, does it really matter?”

No, he supposed it didn’t. Cooper laid down. They both just sat there in silence. The red sun hung unmoving in the sky. Cooper stayed there for a while, he didn’t know for how long.

“Well, this was just supposed to be a quick nap… I should get back up to drive soon. How do I…”

“You’re relaxed right now, so, I dunno… unrelax? I usually just try to open my eyes, only more.”

“... More…?” Cooper drawled out flatly.

“Yeah, more.”

“... Uh… I uh, I guess I’ll see you around then.”

“See you around, dream-buddy.”

Cooper walked off, geysers shot water into the sky, some of it never fell back down. “Open his eyes, but more?”

“How does that work?”

Cooper was back in the car. The trees shuffled past the windows, his hands were firmly not on the wheel.

beep boop beep

The car waved at him.

“Uh, good morning… have you been driving this whole time?”

Smiley face.

Cooper looked at the map, 3:21, they were three-quarters of the way to Port Angeles.

“Huh, thanks, you really kept it tied up here. Mind if I take over?”

Thumbs up.

This would have been incredibly nice during his more frequent long hauls to the deep Zone in the past, but what are you gonna do?

The group pushed on towards Port Angeles. Despite all his travelling, Cooper had never seen what the zone would have done to a city, given that it was all mostly forest and sparse settlements. Might as well rouse the group now, work off the grogginess before getting into the city.

“Hey c’mon wake up, we’re almost there.”

“Wuh, oh, good morning.”

“... Гуд… морнинг?”

“... Yeah, good morning to you too!” Laz gave Solanum a thumbs up. She smiled.

“We’re driving through the suburbs right now. We’ll be in the city proper in about a half hour. There should be a bag with some snacks and MRE’s for breakfast.”

Houses marched by outside their windows. There were no civilian cars, only military jeeps and the like. Branches rested on power lines, a couple telephone poles had fallen over completely, the roads were pitch black. Other than that? It looked like a normal neighborhood, frozen in time. Flags, tattered and faded, hung outside front doors. They passed row after row of copy-pasted houses. Still-life.

Eventually the houses became larger, taller, less frequent, replaced by parking lots and restaurants. There was no snow on the roads, in fact, they were completely clear. Laz and Sol were enraptured with the outside.

“We’re in the city now, welcome to Port Angeles. Largest settled area on the Olympic Peninsula, before everything happened at least. Visitor center will be down by the water at the pier. We’ll see what we can find there, then we’ll look for a library.”

They crawled down the road, slow. Cooper didn’t like the feeling. Sure, everywhere in the Zone was empty and desolate, but that really hit hard here. This was a city, it should be full of people and cars, but like everywhere else in the Zone, nothing. Dead quiet. Not a hint of life. They rolled past the restaurants and hotels, built to capitalize on the tourism that would never return, until they arrived at a building, proudly labeled with “PORT ANGELES INFORMATION CENTER.” They filtered out and the three of them took a moment to stretch.

“Not gonna see a whole lot of radiation or particulates around here, should be fine to be without breathing equipment. Keep it on you though. Wanna walk out to the pier?”

“The pier?”

“Long strip of wood that juts out into the water?”

“So… a dock.”

“No, longer and taller, sometimes with buildings on it.”

“... Why not?”

The three of them wandered down the pier until they reached the very end, they stared out across the water.

“That’s uh, that’s a lot of water.”

“This is really only a small part of it, three quarters of the planet is covered in water. And out over there is the Great North. And those lights? The city of Victoria, Canada.”

“Canada?”

“Another country.”

“... Country?”

“Geez, how small was stuff back where you came from? This world is big, really big. So big, that groups of people start to develop their own distinct identities and customs. People like to stick with people who act like them, and countries are formed. We’re in the United States of America, and that is Canada. The two of us are allies, but still two different, distinct entities.”

[ Like the clans of the Nomai. ]

“Sure. Let’s try not to waste more time out here, this is uncharted territory. And I’ve heard rumors of… things in the water.”

Laz and Sol both hesitantly walked away from the end of the pier, Cooper could feel his own feet dragging too. Freedom, outside the Zone, just across the water. Of course, he would never make it, and A.R.D.A.’s probably waiting there to scoop anyone up. And he’d be leaving his friend behind…

They stopped at the door to the information center, “Let’s see what we can find in here.”

They walked up to the door, past the empty hanging planters. Cooper had to pry the door open. Inside, it was dark and dead. Everything exactly how it was left, save for some papers on the floor. As Laz and Sol looked around, Cooper made his way to the back to find a breaker panel. He set his eyes on one and flipped the main breaker.

CHUNK
click click
tink
cl-clink

To his surprise, there was power. Contactors and relays in the breaker opened and closed, fluorescent lights clicked and buzzed in protest as they struggled to strike an arc in the cold. Cooper returned to the group.

“We got some power going here, there must be a solar or wind farm nearby. Power could shut off soon when the cells dry up, we should look quick.”

“I found a couple of books that say ‘Russian’ on the front, but I can’t read anything else besides that.”

Laz had found a travel brochure and booklet for tourists from Russia. They were old and faded and still had the soviet flag, but they would work.

“Oooh this is really good, usually travel brochures are all the exact same words, but translated into different languages for all manner of tourists who come through. Let’s see… ‘Dob- Dobpo noxa-’ No, that can’t be right. We may need to find a book for basic English to Russian translation, I have no idea how to pronounce this. Still, hold on to those, they’ll definitely help for cross-referencing.”

They searched and searched and searched, grabbing everything they could find in Cyrillic, but nothing dedicated to translation. As the group was beginning to leave, Cooper spotted a selection of cameras and colorful boxes sitting on a shelf next to the main desk.

“Huh, tourists would be coming through here, gotta make business somehow.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Cameras. Instant cameras. Polaroids. The company specialized in making cameras that would spit out the photo right after you took it; Instant camera.”

“What? How does that work?”

“The cameras used practically regular film, just layered into a frame that packed the whole darkroom process into a closed sheet.”

“It prints it? This thing’s tiny! Where’s the circuitry? The memory? The printer?”

“It doesn’t print photos and it’s not digital, it uses film.”

“Film?”

“You have digital cameras, but no concept of film? Seems like you missed a step there.”

“Of course we made digital cameras, look here,” Laz took out his little scout, “Autonomous lander that gets launched from this cradle, we used it to probe into areas that may be dangerous. It’s got a couple cameras built into it. Slate was proud of each one he handed out”

“Looks a bit… bulky, but I guess that makes sense for something like that.”

Cooper browsed through the cameras available. Solanum wandered over and curiously inspected them herself. There were some boxy ones with any combination of features, but sitting proudly on top of the shelf was a display of compact folding models. Autofocus, auto-exposure, flash, these are nice. He put a cartridge into it, it spit out a slide like a tongue.

“Surprised these cartridges still have juice. These cameras are top-of-the line, so it’ll set focus and all that other stuff automatically. They got a set of plates behind the lens, when you hit the shutter release, they shoot open, then close just as quick. Light shines through the lens and reflects off a mirror, landing on a sheet of film. The film is coated in chemicals that react to specific colors of light and then show that color when they develop.” Cooper raised the camera to his eye and framed them up. “Ideally it’d work like this…”

Snap
vrrrrrrr

Laz and Sol squinted.

“Ow, that’s bright. Little warning next time?”

“Come on, film needs a lot of light to expose, and they’ll expose just fine, but there’s nothing to develop the picture and lock the color in, so when you pull them out, you won’t see a thing. It’ll just be brown, since that’s the color the film usually is.”

Cooper took two other cameras from the display and handed them to Laz and Sol. He removed the picture and gave it a glance. Cooper was wrapping up translating to Solanum.

[ Photography by chemical reaction? How interesting. And the camera itself must have required a lot of thought to fold into such a small size. ]

“How is this chemical reaction stuff easier than making a digital picture? You said it would be in color? I’d like to see that.”

Cooper stared at the picture, it was light blue, “You just might, looks like the chemicals are still fresh in this one, must have been cold enough to hold them over. Or it’s just anomalous; Stuff doesn’t really seem to expire here in the Zone.”

Cooper started shoveling the other cameras and film into a bag.

“.... Spare parts?”

“Yeah, these are like clockwork on the inside.”

 Laz and Sol headed back to the car while Cooper gathered up the books into his backpack and cameras into a duffel bag. A smell of ozone and a crackling floated through the open door..

“What the hell is that!?”

BEEP BEEP

Cooper hurried outside and leveled a flare gun.

POP

The noise startled the two of them, but the ball of electricity slowly turned away to follow the light, minutemen sticking up where it travelled.

“... Crawlers, they’re attracted to light and vibrations, sound. The flare will distract it for a bit, but we should get moving, several thousand volts is not a pleasant experience.”

“You say that like you’d know.”

Cooper raised an eyebrow at them. “That’s cause I do, now get in the car.”

They rush to the car and slam the doors after them.

“Is it really several thousand volts?”

“Yeah, that much should kill you, but the Zone is weird. Radiation doesn’t give you cancer, it just hurts. Electricity doesn’t stop your heart, it just hurts. Of course, you can still get hurt enough that you die, so you shouldn’t stick around. Plus, it still feels the same way it would either way.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah, not fun.”

[ What now? ]

“We’re gonna look for a library, we should have more luck there.”

They set off and around the city, going up and down each street and block. The sun had started to rise by the time they happened across a sign that said “Public Library.” Cooper brought the car around to look for a main entrance, guiding it down a street marked by a sign that read, “Library Parking.” He parked the car in the drop-off loop in front of the main door.

“Hey, how long do those photos take to develop?”

“I almost forgot, it should be done by now.”

Cooper fished the picture from his suit. It showed Cooper and Solanum both looking straight at the camera with thoughtful looks on their faces.

“Ha! You guys look funny, but it came out great! Definitely a keeper.”

Cooper handed the picture over. They both stared at it for a moment before Solanum pointed at something and chuckled. Laz pointed at the picture and laughed back. A counteroffensive. They both started laughing.

“This did come out great! Ooooh, how about a photo in front of the building here?”

“Sounds good.”

They emerged from the car and Cooper herded them away. He corralled them into a tight group and tried to get the car and the library in frame behind them. He’d just have to see when the picture develops.

“Say cheese.”

“‘Say cheese?’”

“It’s to trick you into smiling.”

“Cheeeeeeee-”
“Cheeeeee-”
“... Чееee-”

Snap
vrrrrrrr

A neon rectangle imprinted into Cooper’s vision.

“Yep, still plenty bright. Let’s check this place out.”

Laz leaned into the peeling decal on the glass door. “North Olympic Library System, looks to be the place?”

The door creaked open. The stale smell of leather bindings, paper, and gaudy carpet filled the air.

“Seems like it, look for any isles marked as ‘International’ or something.”

It really was quite eerie. This whole place had been abandoned because of what he knew to be the most dangerous conditions on the planet, but it was orderly, this was the outer Zone after all, not a single book on the ground. The place was just locked up by some custodian, hoping to return when all this was over. Now, it was empty, illuminated only by the dim, deep orange shooting over the mountains. Maybe this place also was hooked to the same grid… Cooper forced both hands against the main breaker lever.

EEEeeerr-CLUNK
click
click
click

No fluorescent lights, just good old reliable warm filament bulbs. Made the whole place really cozy.

“International section’s over here!”

Cooper wandered over, “Anything useful?” Sol was bounding from isle to isle.

“Nothing yet, but I found some science and engineering books in Russian that Sol might like if we can get her to read this.”

Cooper had a look, dual language.

“These are good either way! They’re translated on the inside, more cross-referenceable stuff.”

“... Hey, how many people lived here?”

“Not sure, it was a while ago, maybe 17,000, give or take?”

“... I don’t like it, it’s…”

“Empty? Eerie? Desolate? Spooky? Yeah, I get where you’re coming from.”

Cooper spied a spine out of the corner of his eye.

“Oh, look at this! ‘English-Russian Bilingual Dictionary.’” Cooper peeled the book from the shelf and opened it, “Index… Common Phrases... Dictionary... Sentence Structure... Aha! ‘Phonemes and Pronunciation!’ This is exactly what we need.”

“You serious? This will work?”

“Yeah. Hey Solanum!”

She turned the corner with a library duffel bag filled with cultural, geographical, and scientific books.

“... Well, she’s got initiative, I guess we should grab some too. Good way to pass the time?”

“Yeah why not. Alright let’s see…” Cooper took out the travel brochure and a notebook and transcribed over a rough pronunciation of the phrase on the front, “Dobro- Dobra? Dobro poze- pozhalovat' na Olimpiyskiy pol- uos- trov?”

Solanum beamed, a slight tinge of confusion, but was still very excited, [ Am I correct in understanding that as ‘Welcome to the Olympic…’ Something? Apologies, but I am not familiar with the final word. ]

Cooper silently pumped his fists. Laz looked similarly excited. Still though…

“That was the word for peninsula, ‘poluostrov.’”

Solanum still shook her head.

“Hmm, oh, right, if the worlds back in your universe were too small for you to ever build a pier, I doubt either of you would have a word for peninsula.”

“Yeah I had no idea what you were talking about when you said that.”

“Well, it’s basically a sizable chunk of land that juts off into a body of water, but hey! Look at this! Spoken translation.” Cooper shook the book in his hands.

[ Yes. Such geographical features were much too small for us to name them anything. I share your excitement for this discovery! I am still going to need help grasping at your spoken language though. ]

Laz typed on the translator, “Don’t worry, we’ll help you with that.”

“Well there you go. I’m gonna radio Francis, see if he wants anything. You too look around for anything you’d like.”

The two strangest Zone inhabitants to ever live scurried off into the shelves. Cooper brought the radio to his mouth.

“Radio check, radio check. Francis, come in. Have the airwaves cleared up?”

“I copy, little fuzzy, but otherwise okay, how’s it going?”

“You sound better, when’d you wake up?”

“About three hours ago.”

“Oof, gonna be hard to swing back into your circadian rhythm.”

“What rhythm? I swear sometimes the nights out here go on for days.”

“That’s fair… anyways, we made it to Port Angeles. Found a bilingual dictionary and it works, the language she speaks is literally just Russian. Are there any books you want? Theoretical physics or something?”

“I’m all set, I got all the writing I’d need in here, plus, I practically worked with the greatest authors. Wait, could you actually get some adventure books? None of my stuff is exactly recreational.”

“I’ll dig around. Any updates?”

“Yeah, the surge from Cappy must have oversaturated some sensors. I'm still picking up concentrated energy sources all out in the middle of nowhere, but they always disappear by the time the next sweep comes. On the whole, it’s fading though and the background radiation seems to be falling to normal levels.”

“Alright cool, also, the two of them seem to believe that the uncertainty in the Zone has something to do with quantum dynamics, any ideas?”

“That’s a big field, they’d have to be more specific. Plus, even here in the Zone, quantum behavior on that scale is highly unlikely, but I’ll poke around.”

“Alright, see ya around. Cooper, out.”

“Francis, out.”

Cooper set about grabbing any and all “recreational” books he could fit in his backpack. They loaded up with more Russian books and some personal choices. The sun's rays had started to peek over the mountains by the time they had finished.

“All set?”

“Yep.”

[ Will we be returning these? ]

“What? Come on, I’m sure the librarian would be much happier if these were actually being-” 

Solanum wore a mischievous look on her face.

“Oh, haha, very funny. Come on, let's get back to the car.”

The door creaked open. Cooper knelt down in front of the car.

“Hey buddy. I got you the first two seasons of Knight Rider, some auto parts catalogs, “Basics of the Driving Line and Other Racing Tips,” and a hot rod calendar.

bweeeeee-weoooooo

“Of course it’d like that one.”

“Heh, little rascal.”

Cooper had loaded their haul into the overslung trunk. The sun was new and the air was crisp. There was a whirring coming from the car. Wait, no, that’s not from the car… A shaking now too. Laz and Sol obviously noticed, but before they could move, a large glowing ball of I-beams, light posts, and sharpened axles shot up the road. It paused at the entrance to the parking lot.

It had seen them.

It quickly barreled towards them. Get to the car, no, wait, it’s targeting them. This thing will tear the car apart. Get inside. GET INSIDE.

“THE LIBRARY! GET INSIDE!”

The three of them crammed into the mudroom and Cooper trapped his crowbar in the door handles. The… thing kept crashing at the door. Cooper scanned it, 

// WARNING                   
NO RECORDS AVAILABLE

“WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!”

“I DON’T FUCKIN’ KNOW! BIG BUNNY? HUGE HARE? URBAN USAGI? GIANT JACK?! I’VE NEVER SEEN SOMETHING LIKE THIS BEFORE!”

“GET AWAY FROM THE DOORS AT LEAST!”

The grinding was becoming deafening, the oversized Broken Bunny was spinning in place, it looked like it was rearing to chew right through the door. Solanum was pushed into the corner, terrified, arms on the walls supporting herself. Laz was in a stance ready to fight or run. What could they do here? Maybe-

BEEP BEEEEEEEEEEEEEP

The car roared to life and activated the LIM Shield and Plow. It rammed into the Bunny, rebound from the shield sending the hulking mass of metal flying several blocks down the street. It screeched as it hit the ground.

More screeches, many more.

“Get to the car we need to GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE NOW!”

They threw themselves into the car.

C-Thunk
Tck-TSHH

Cooper floored it, if felt like he was going to stomp right through the floorboards.

“Laz, get up here and use the ARC Device. Bring the cursor over a yellow marker and hold the selector down.”

“O- Okay how’s this one?”

Right turn. Straight road.

“Perfect, hit it.”

Every warning signal the car had ever been equipped with momentarily screamed as the power surge forced a gateway open. The sky went red. He imagined the A.R.D.A. Watchtower employees across the water were getting quite the show right now. Solanum must have been looking out the window, because she let out a worried yelp. Laz took her hand and comforted her.

All was quiet save for Cooper’s grunts as he threw the steering wheel from one side to the other. Cooper took a turn hard, getting up on two wheels, the right wheels returned to the ground with a slam.

The snowbanks he’d thought to be cars buried under the frost shook and cleared the powder from their tops. More Giants, they shot up and down the roads. That’s why they were empty. He slammed on the brakes as a Giant careened through an intersection just ahead of them. There had to be at least twenty on his tail, and they were catching up. The gateway was just ahead, keep driving, floor it.

A Giant crashed through a building next to them, reducing it to rubble and turning pipes and piles into penetrating projectiles. It clipped the rear bumper and the car spun out, facing them in the wrong direction. The sight of several hundred tons of scrap metal racing towards them filled the windshield. A couple hundred feet away and closing faster than a commuter from Connecticut.

“Ho-lee SHIT!”

Cooper slammed the shifter into reverse and got the car up to a dangerous speed, Giants practically biting at his bumper, harassing his headlights. He palmed the steering wheel hard over to the left and the tires cried as they sacrificed rubber to the asphalt. The shifter fell into drive as storefronts shot by in front of the windshield. Cooper kept the wheel pinned to the left and caught the rotation on the front wheels. Momentum pointed the car slightly to the right, but it eventually straightened out and the engine sent all it could to the wheels.

The car erupted out of the dense city streets to the suburban forests. The Giants lagged behind and retreated back to the city. They don’t want to leave their cover.

“Ha… haha, hahahaha hoooooooooo.” The strained laugh escaped Cooper’s mouth, each of them slowly let out an exasperated chuckle. They were bearing down on the gateway, almost out. Solanum gasped and screamed.

Oh, right. She was asleep the first time. What a pleasant first jump.

Flash

Her screams slowly subsided as she finally realized they were back at the garage. They coasted numbly onto the diagnostic rack.

“... Yeah, that’s what the ARC Device does. It opens a gateway back to the garage. Only way to return. Junctions become too unstable after you pass through them.” Was he out of breath? Yeah, yeah he was.

[ I see. Apologies, I thought it was- ]

[ How does it work? Does it house a black hole/white hole pair? ]

“I don’t think so? You’d have to ask Oppy, but she left a while back.”

“Never thought I’d be happier to see an oversized workshop.”

“Hey, this is my oversized workshop.”

“I wasn’t bashing it.”

“... I’m gonna send over Francis’ books. Then, yeah, I’m gonna rest. I’ll see ya.”

“What? It’s morning.”

“I have been driving for twenty-four hours, good night. Maybe try working on Solanum’s English?”

“Uh, right. Good night.”

Cooper placed Francis’ books in a bundle and sent them down the pnuematube.

Shhhhhhhthoooooooooooom…

“Carrier 62, reporting package in transit.” Cooper mockingly mumbled in sing-song.

Cooper retired to the main room and dug the picture out of his radsuit. Definitely a keeper. He stuck it to the fridge with a magnet. The radsuit came off and he entered the restroom to change from “work” clothes and into something more comfortable. He collapsed onto the chairs. He’d need to find or make some mattresses, how did he sleep on these?

Chapter Text

That was particularly, not… ideal. Cooper had said it was dangerous out there, but wow, yeah. Dangerous. Laz could still feel their heart racing. Solanum looked similarly numb to the situation.

[ That was a particularly stressful encounter. Cooper was right, the ‘Zone’ can be dangerous. Still, unexplained phenomena, abandoned remnants of a civilization, and the promise of a healthy one just over the wall? I am excited to return. ]

That chase out of the city was familiar to Laz; It was like all the times they’d try going through Dark Bramble before reading the writing Solanum had left behind in the anglerfish cave when she was a kid. Ugh, maybe not a good memory…

Laz spoke over the clickity-clack of the translator keyboard, “Yeah, it was nice to get out and see the world. And what a world, right?”

[ Yes! It is incredibly interesting! This planet must be incredibly large, but no more massive than the planets back home… ]

Home…

[ … Either that, or mass effects spacetime to a significantly smaller degree in this universe. ]

“... I miss home, but I haven’t really been thinking much about it, this place is just so… new. I dunno, I think it’s making me feel… guilty? Like I should be thinking about it more, everyone I knew is gone and I don’t think that’s fully clicked for me yet.”

Solanum gave a thoughtful look before responding. That beam disappeared from her face and was replaced by a deeply contemplative look. How could she care so much?

[ … I don’t think that is something you should be guilty about. It is true, we both have to bear the pain of our loss, but it doesn’t have to consume every moment of every day. You don’t have to feel guilt because you survived, it is simply the circumstance we both fell into. The best we can do is hold onto their memory and carry on in their stead. ]

[ At least we have each other, and I want you to know you can always talk to me. ]

Solanum wore a warm smile.

“Thanks, Sol. Now, how’s about understanding each other’s speech? How would you like to go about this?”

[ I would like to learn your language, both you and Cooper speak it, as well as the person over long range communication. It also seems to be the native language around here, so I believe that to be the best course of action. ]

“Okay, let’s start with a foundation. We have a direct line of translation already, so let’s take this in steps.”

[ What do you propose? ]

“Russian spoken language is the same as yours, so we should get you to understand Russian writing, and from there, Hearthi-” Wait, no, it’s called English here… backspace. “English writing, and then English speaking.”

[ This sounds like a good plan to me, what comes first? ]

“Well, I remember Hal talking about how Nomian writing is structured with an alphabet, it wasn’t symbolic like he initially thought. So, are each of your letters tied to a specific sound?”

[ Yes, would you like me to produce a list so we may draw connections? ]

“Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking.”

Solanum produced a list of singular Nomaian letters, they looked strange when not connected together, and sounded out each one. Laz did their best to connect each one to its Russian counterpart, sounding out what the book showed to be the pronunciation. Solanum had to correct them more than once. Eventually there were only two letters left, Solanum looked troubled.

[ These are not pronounced exactly, they modify the sound of the preceding letter, but I’m finding it difficult to explain… This one, smooths? Out the sound and this one, makes it more harsh? It is a difficult concept to explain. ]

“Well there’s a ‘hard sign’ and a ‘soft sign’ so I’m pretty sure we can make an educated guess here. Anyway, here we are; A full, Nomai-to-Russian alphabet. Which means we can translate from Nomai to English by hand. Having all of the needed information in a book for you sure makes the process easier. Now, can you read this line?” Laz pointed to a line on the front of the travel brochure that they had rehearsed in their head. All of the information needed to translate between two languages, in a book. Riebeck would be going crazy right now.

“Полное… руководство?”

“Hey, yeah that’s good! You barely even needed to look at the alphabet sheet!”

[ My mind recognizes this as important information, it is unlikely to let it slip so easily. ]

“Tch, wish I could do that, but yeah, that makes sense. Your kind is Nomadic, you’d need to be able to pick up on different languages quickly.”

They started work on word-to-word translations and basic sentence structure. Eventually, they got to the point where Solanum had insisted on trying to form her own sentence. Despite the whole “important information” thing, she still needed to look at her notes. It had only barely been more than an hour.

“I have… warm… shirt!”

Laz applauded and typed on the translator, “Very good! Only one thing; you need to have an article before ‘warm shirt.’”

[ Right, I had a feeling I was forgetting something, they are so easy to miss! Let me try again… ]

“I have… a warm shirt?”

“Yup, right on the money. We’ll get this done in no time.”

be-beep, be-beep, be-beep, be-beep

“Wuh- Oh sunnova- I forgot to turn the alarm off.”

“Hey sleepyhead. What’s that?”

Solanum fumbled through her notes, “Cooper! Gu- good… morning!”

Cooper walked over, “Oh hey! Look at that, good work, Solanum. Quick learner. What’s what?”

“The beeping.”

“Oh, that’s the alarm on my watch, I left it set from yesterday.”

“You got an alarm… on your watch.”

Cooper unclipped it and handed it to Laz, it displayed the time as numbers, no hands. It must have a tiny computer inside.

“Yeah, and a calculator. I got it from my dad, it’s the same as the one Marty McFly wore in Back to the Future. Remind me to put that movie on for you guys sometime, it’s good.”

Laz was playing with the buttons on the watch. They handed it to Solanum after she took interest.

“Staying up?”

“No, just getting a snack and then back to bed.”

[ This is a remarkably practical piece of engineering! I assume it comes in handy? ]

Cooper dug through the fridge, “Yeah it’s kinda nerdy, but I like it and use it a lot. Can’t complain.”

Cooper looked troubled.

“Something on your mind?”

“... Nothing, just a weird dream.”

Solanum handed back the watch.

“I’m gonna try and go back to sleep and set a reasonable alarm this time, let’s say 2 pm. I’ll see ya.”

“Good Night.”
“Good Night.”

“Very good, you’re really getting the pronunciation down!”

Solanum beamed again. Laz couldn't help but smile.

Laz typed out on the translator again, pretty soon they may not even need this, “Let’s get back to sentence structure, you’re gonna need that memorized most over everything else…”

They spent the whole day chipping at this language barrier, but they eventually slowed down on word structure and pronunciation. It was really the first time Laz reflected on how weird their language was. Like, “night.” “Night?” Whose idea was that? Why wasn’t it just “nite” or something? Sol chuckled when she realized that Laz was just as confused as they were on the subject. She was making great progress, but memorizing a whole new alphabet and its grammatical laws in one day? That was not going to be possible, even for a species that evolved to be as curious as possible. Still, they sat and worked away, Laz would be damned if he wasn’t going to try his hardest. He’d survived the end of the universe. What was one little Hearthian lesson? Either way Solanum was starting to look burned out, they imagined they did as well.

be-beep, be-beep, be-beep, be-beep

Cooper roused himself with a yawn, “Good afternoon, fellas.”

“Hey, Coop.”

He visibly had more of a spring in his step as he walked over. The “F.A.X. Machine” crackled to life.

“Come in, Cooper.”

“I copy, Francis. What’s up?”

“Have you noticed anything weird with the car just now?”

They all suspiciously looked over towards the car, sitting innocently in front of the garage door. “Besides the whole definitely being alive thing? No.”

“Huh, It’s probably nothing, the signal was really weak. After the residual radiation cleared up I detected another waveform coming from the car, it just disappeared, right now. I haven’t seen anything like it before. I’m analyzing the waveform’s spectrum to see if it’s showing up anywhere else. How’s it going?”

“Good, I just woke up. More mysteries, huh?”

“Maybe, maybe not.”

Cooper wore a troubled look on his face.

“Alright, I’ll see ya. Pine Tree Auto, out.”

“Francis, out.”

The troubled look morphed to be more puzzled, it disappeared when he looked at them. “Geez, you guys are still at it? It’s been like, eight hours. ‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.’”

“... What?”

“Oh yeah, also from a movie.”

“Yeah, you keep saying that, what are those?”

“Y’know, moving pictures, movies.”

Laz remembered the little stories Tephra would scrawl out on paper, Rutile would have the whole village come over to watch them on the projector.

“Oh, yeah we had those.”

Cooper paused in place, “Y’know, it is a bit late to start on another trip and you guys have been at it for a while, Why don’t we watch one? Oooh, I can show you Back to the Future! I found a copy in a Zone Receiver not too long ago.”

“Sure.”

“Coop’s gonna put on a ‘movie’ for us to watch.”

Solanum read the words of the translator before her attention was drawn to the cart Cooper was pushing.

He wheeled in a large tube screen with a small box wired into it. He ran one of the wires into a connector in the wall. It flicked on and settled into a barely noticeable whine. He dug in a basket kept on the same cart and grabbed a black plastic book.

“I thought we were watching a ‘movie,’ what’s the book for?”

Cooper gave Laz a confused look, “Book? What do you… Oh! This isn’t a book, this is a VHS tape, two hours of video on magnetic tape.”

“Two hours? There’s no way there’s two hours of video on that, you can’t fit that much on tape.”

“Well yeah, if you moved it straight across, but if you moved the heads at the same time, you’d be able to use more of the tape. It barely moves more than one inch per second, but since the heads are moving too, it’s like you’re actually running tape two hundred times faster, more data can be stored.”

Laz could almost hear Slate go “Of course, that’s so obvious!” In the background.

Cooper slotted the tape into the smaller box and the screen flashed blue before returning to black, “I’m gonna make some popcorn, the movie will start soon.” He killed the lights.

The black faded into stars and showed a blue planet rotating in place. The words “UNIVERSAL” and “AN MCA COMPANY” were superimposed on top of it. This was nothing like what Laz had seen before; These weren’t moving pictures, they were moving pictures, not the sequential still frames shown during festivals. The title of the movie slid onto the screen and shined in faux light. The screen then showed an actual, real scene that was somehow recorded and played back in full motion, with real sound, in color! And this was all on tape! Both Laz and Solanum stared slackjawed at the screen until the popping from the other room subsided and Cooper returned with a large bucket full of popcorn.

“So, this is a science fiction movie about time travel, everybody I know’s watched it.”

Laz typed out a message to Sol, “He says that this is a fictional science movie about time travel.”

[ Time travel? Your people have also successfully invented time travel? ]

“Hey, emphasis on ‘fictional.’ Wait… what does she mean ‘also?’”

Oh Shit.

“She meant it like, on top of everything else. Like, I know I said I’ve seen a moving picture, but this is amazing! Back home it was just pictures that we would advance one by one.”

“... Like a slideshow.”

“Sure.”

Whew, nice save. Cooper dropped the confused look as it was replaced by obvious realization.

“Whoah… rock ‘n’ roll…”

That kind of looks... familiar...

“That thing he was holding kinda looks like a guitar.”

“That’s cause it is. Do you play? I have one hung up on the wall, if you’d like to play it at some point.”

“That’d be nice.”

That was close. That was almost really bad… Why though? Why would that have been bad? Well, they would have to explain the time loop to Cooper. Nobody ever believed Laz before, and when they did they just went into a panic attack, he couldn’t do that to… Wait, no more supernova, and Cooper already has been dealing with supernatural science, so maybe he would believe them? Maybe he could tell him at some point, but not now. This “movie” thing is cool.

Wow, is that what life is like on the outside? It looks like Port Angeles, but there’s cars and people walking around everywhere! Maybe this whole new universe thing wasn't all bad.

“...Check out that four by four!”

bweeeeoooo!

They sat and watched the "movie," rarely speaking up to discuss plot points or translate something Solanum couldn’t catch. Solanum, as it turns out, is a chronic nervous eater and made most of the progress into the popcorn bucket. Eventually, the movie was over and the credits rolled. Those must be names... Again, so many people...

Laz hadn't realized that she still had her arms wrapped around their own. They were glad the lights were still dark, they could feel the blood rushing to their face.

“That was awesome! The DeLorean looked so cool! That was just… wow.”

[ I do not believe temporal displacement would affect time in the way it did in the movie, and 1.21 gigawatts would likely be much too little for any practical time travel, but as you said, it is a fiction movie and I very much enjoyed it. ]

Solanum’s walking on a thin line here. Why did the movie have to be about time travel?

“Everybody I know likes that movie, it’s basically a classic. You’d be hard pressed to find someone who didn’t.”

Come on, Laz, steer the conversation away… “What I would do with a time machine… maybe I’d go back if I could. Play some music with everybody one more time.”

“Missing them?”

“Like you wouldn’t know. I always wanted to go to space, I looked up to every one of the other travellers, except Gabbro, they were always kinda lazy, but I feel like they understood me the most. Feldspar was the coolest, but they went out into space one day and never came back… Now, being here, without all of them… I wonder if I should have ever left.”

Cooper suddenly looked very concerned.

“Hey, I’m fine, and don’t worry about Feldspar, remember? I did end up finding them in Dark Bramble.”

“... Did you say Gabbro?”

“... Yeah?”

Cooper stood up and lifted a hand to about his height, “About yay high? Lays down on a hammock? Plays a weird clarinet flute looking thing? Calls me dream-buddy? General hippie energy? Looks. Like. You?”

How the hell does he know Gabbro?!

“How do you know…”

Chapter Text

This place was weird, it definitely wasn’t real, that’s for sure, but it felt real, like they were really here. Laz went off to do the thing, then as soon as they were supposed to be incinerated in a supernova? Bam, they’re on not Timber Hearth. Gabbro decided to do what they do best; Relax. But this place was completely different from what Gabbro had experienced before, eh, they were probably just meditating super hard. What if they could meditate, while meditating? That would be cool. Maybe they could start with just sleeping first…

“Uh, hey again.”

That’s a familiar voice, “Oh what? A repeat visitor? But, that implies other visitors, which I haven’t gotten. So, hey?”

This dude again? No complaints, but why was Gabbro seeing them again, they’d never seen anything like them before, maybe he was just turbo-creative.

“Yeah, hey. Were you doing something just now?”

“Yeah, I was sleeping.”

“You were sleeping, inside a dream.”

“Yeah, I’m trying to step up my game. Gotta pass the time somehow.”

The stranger shifted on their feet, obviously confused. This was gonna be a cakewalk.

“... Why are you still here? Aren’t dreams supposed to be, I dunno, constantly changing?”

Oooh, a riddle.

“How about another question: Why do you keep ending up here?”

Deflect all questions from dream manifestations by asking another, classic.

“I don’t know, I thought dreams had something to do with what happened the previous day, but I just ran away from a giant ball of metal at a hundred miles per hour with Laz and Solanum in the back of my car, so I don’t really see any correlation.”

Woah, dream buddy’s really dropping the ball here, must be a newbie, where’s the subtlety?

“Wait, you know Laz? That’s cool, but I guess it makes sense, my dreams are influenced by my thoughts. I wonder where weird, two-eyed dudes come in?”

“Wha- your thoughts? I’m the one dreaming here.”

Oh it was a trap. Clever play.

“Pretty sure I’d know, dream buddy.”

“How could we prove it?”

Oh, check, they got them, Gabbro had never been beaten before, maybe they could still salvage this.

“... How could we prove it? That’s like… a philosophical conundrum.”

“... Alright, let’s just not focus on that. Whatever’s happening is happening, right?”

Ooooh yeah, a draw. Gabbro still reigns as the undefeated dream-master!

“I can subscribe to that.”

“... Got a name?”

“Gabbro, got one of your own?”

“Cooper.”

“Coop-er, Coop-er. Well met.”

“... You say you knew Laz?”

No way, they’re not breaking their promise, not even to dream dude.

“And I’m not saying any more, they’d have to tell you the rest, it’s their story.”

“Or you’re not saying because I don’t know.”

Ooooh, that’s a good one.

“Does it matter?”

“... No… Are we supposed to… do anything out here?”

“I’m gonna play some music, do you play anything?”

“I uh, got a Rhodes in my garage, but that’s kind of where I’m awake, and I don’t really play it that much anymore.”

There was a weird piano behind them. Gabbro deadpanned, “Oh what a bummer, hey what’s that behind you?”

“What do you- what? How did- Why is my piano here?”

“How do you think I got my flute? You thought about it. I’ve never seen a piano like that before though, so maybe you are the one dreaming.”

That would actually be pretty cool.

“So, what do we play?”

“Little bit of improv.”

“Sure.”

They started to play. Cooper missed keys and fell behind some, but eventually tied it up. They started making up a melody, but kept collapsing back down into patterns they knew. It took a while for them to be confident in their own phrases, but when they were, they were a pretty good music buddy. Wow, that sounded ugly, was that coming from the piano?

“Hey, dude you okay over there?”

They were gone. Undefeated dream-master and first successful dream-exorcism in one day? They were almost being too productive. Now they could go back to dream-sleeping.

It really was starting to feel lonely out here.

“Oh wow, still here. Sorry for dropping out like that, my alarm went off and woke me up. This is just getting weird.”

You’re not convincing anybody…

“You’re telling me.”

“Maybe I should tell Laz about this, but that would be crazy, like, ‘Hey there’s this guy that I keep seeing in my dreams that kinda looks like you, ever heard of them?’”

“Looks like you really got yourself a conundrum here.”

“You’re telling me. I mean, they’re hurting, bad, I can tell, but I don’t wanna press the question. If they don’t wanna talk about it, that's fine by me, they seem comfortable talking to Solanum.”

Solanum? The Nomai Laz told them about? It doesn’t matter, dream buddy needs some of that Gabbro-special-guidence.

“I think you’re doing it right, you should just wait until they’re ready to talk themselves. And they got Solanum, so it’s not like they’re completely alone.”

“Yeah, but Laz’s talking about how their universe ended, which means everyone they knew is dead. That can’t be an easy thing to bear, even with someone to talk to. Maybe that is the whole story, but I can feel there’s more to it.”

Oh don’t they know it.

“Hey, they’ll tell you when they’re ready, I know they did when it came to me. Look, how about you meditate with me, it seriously helps to calm the nerves.”

“I- y’know what? Yeah.”

“You just sit back, relax, clear the mind, and take deep breaths.”

This place was nice, a bit lonely, but dream-buddy fixed that sometimes. It was nice to just take a breather. No voices telling Gabbro “wake up,” “get the statues,” and “help us get these things off the wall.”

Oh wait, that last one is a bit more pressing. Hey Hornfels.

“Wake up! Gabbro, we need your help, more of those things are here. They’re chewing at the walls!”

“Relax, Hornfels. What if this is just what they do? They could be chill.”

“There is nothing “chill” about trying to tackle the hatchlings. Tephra could get themselves hurt!”

Ohhhh yeah, that is pretty bad.

“Where are they?”

“Over by the weird glowing tree! And don’t shake hands with the glowing statues!”

Come on, that was only once!

Chapter Text

They were almost screaming at this point, not in anger, just in shock.

“What do you mean ‘in your dreams?!’”

“I mean that ever since the drive up to Port Angeles, I would talk to them in my dreams!”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because it was a durrream! Fabrications. Of. The. Mind!”

Solanum interrupted, “Please, no… fight.”

Laz calmed down a bit and grabbed the translator, “We’re not fighting, this is just big news, apparently, Cooper has been talking to Gabbro in his dreams.”

“Gabbro…? Gabbro! How?”

“You’d have as good of an idea as we do.”

This doesn't make any sense! This doesn't make any sense whatsoever! They died. They died back with everybody else when the sun decided to clock out. And Laz had made a very good effort on not including him in his stories. Apparently, it's really hard to lie around time travel! Was this really Gabbro? Did Laz just happen to accidently let their name and a whole fucking description of them slip?

Was Gabbro... Alive?

Cooper spoke up again, also having calmed down, “You’re sure, you’re absolutely sure that this is someone you know?”

“Of course! It’s Gabbro, it’s textbook Gabbro. We were the only ones to understand each other since they were the only other one who was in the-”

“... In the…?”

Oh, nice one Laz. Stressing over Solanum, but they ended up dropping the ball…

What the hell? Why not?

“... The loops. The time loops.”

Cooper had his hands on his hips, eyebrow raised up, head turned slightly to the side. The same. Damn. Look Laz had gotten from everybody else.

“... Say what now?”

Here we go, “I got caught in a time loop before my universe ended. It was the only reason I was able to find the thing that ended up… jumpstarting the new universe.”

Cooper turned to face Laz directly, more in contemplation than anything.

“... what.”

“Twenty-two minutes. The Nomai built a machine that could send information back in time twenty-two minutes for the explicit purpose of firing the same probe over and over again in random directions to basically brute force finding the Eye of the Universe. The only thing that could provide enough energy to send the information back in time that far was a supernova. So they built another device to prompt the Sun into exploding.”

Cooper's face morphed to restrained fear. If it wasn't derision, it was terror... Like Chert. Maybe Laz was wrong about Cooper having an open mind.

“They would let the machine run until it found the Eye, then turn it off so it would be like the sun never exploded in the first place. Only issue was that the Sun Station didn’t end up working, the Nomai went extinct, and their machines were left on standby. When our Sun reached the natural end of its lifespan, it went supernova and triggered the loops. It took more than nine million loops for it to find the Eye, and when it did, The Ash Twin Project bound to whoever was standing near to one of its terminals. Wrapping them into the loop too to shut down the Sun Station and prevent it from firing. That happened to me on the day I was supposed to launch for the first time.”

They'd run through this story thousands of times in their head. Rehearsing it for Hornfels, Gossan, hell, even Porphy, all on the off chance that one of them, one of them, would believe them.

It hurt.

“But, the Sun Station wasn’t working. So, I was stuck, in the loops, for what felt like more than two weeks. Rushing around the Solar System to find out how to stop this before getting incinerated every twenty-two minutes if I hadn’t gotten myself killed some other way before that. Every twenty-two minutes, everyone I knew died. Every twenty-two minutes, the heat death of the universe started and every star in the sky went supernova. Gabbro was the only other one in the loops, they were the only one I could go to. Eventually, I found out how to get to the Eye and rescued Solanum there. The Eye of the Universe is the source of all quantum uncertainty and probabilities in the universe, so when we stepped in and observed it…”

Laz took a deep breath, “We ended up here, alone.”

Laz hadn't noticed the sudden shift in Cooper's face. His hands fell down my his side. He looked mortified. Completely mortified.

“Jesus Christ, Laz, why didn’t you tell me?”

Laz was on the verge of tears, “Everybody else I went to wouldn’t believe me and when I explained it, and if they did they’d just break down and I didn-”

Cooper took Laz in a hug, “Christ a-fuckin-live. You’ve been sleeping, but I got the feeling you haven’t rested in a long time.”

He was right.

“... It hurt. It hurt so much.”

Cooper had that tight look on his face like when Hornfels was holding back tears for a week after losing Feldspar. Solanum didn’t understand what they were saying, but still understood what was going on, she hugged them too.

Laz cried again, not the desolate, hopeless sobbing they'd had on the Sun Station. More like the sobbing with Solanum in the Eye. These were people they could trust, it was comforting. Relieving. Every time they thought they were done, thought they were strong enough, they just broke down into more sobs again. Cooper just gripped the leather jacket over their shoulder blade tighter and patted their back, Solanum weighed her head harder against their shoulder.

It took a while, but Laz got it back together soon enough.

Cooper stepped back and held Laz’s shoulders, a deeply empathetic look covering his face, “Feeling better?”

“Yeah, thanks.”

Cooper left and brought over the burner, some chocolate, graham crackers, and marshmallows.

He wore a troubled look, “... Were you able to… Did you feel it each time you, y’know.”

“Yeah…” Laz half-chuckled, “You’d be surprised, supernova is not the most painful way to die.”

“And everybody else… Was Gabbro the only other one?”

“Yeah, nobody else knew what was going on, our village would always be on the dark side of Timber Hearth when the sun went, but Tekite was investigating a crater in full view. I’m not sure how they felt… But Chert… they were on the north pole of the planet closest to the sun, making star charts. They always figured it out, every loop, and every time I had to watch them hopelessly break down.”

“... Fuuuuck... What if you didn’t die at the end of a loop?”

“It was a lot less difficult that way, but the Ash Twin Project would still pull my memories back anyway.”

“... Starting the loop with new conditions, erasing that future like it never happened...”

“Yeah, but I still had the memories. Memories of everyone I knew dying.”

“You don’t have to… talk about that if you don’t want to.”

“It’s fine, well, no, it isn’t, but... now I feel like I need to get this off my chest.”

“... Soul food? How about some Mac ‘n’ cheese?”

No idea what that is, “Sure.”

Cooper poured water into a large pot, and some milk, butter, and cheese into another. He set the pots on the stove.

Laz and Sol sat wordlessly on the floor while he cooked. They leaned into her. She leaned back. The... car inched up too. Alive and empathetic. It was nice to have support, even if some of it was coming from a metal machine. Maybe they should have said something earlier. They sat for a while and made some s’mores, eventually Cooper returned with three steaming bowls and a can.

“Here, mac ‘n’ cheese. And for you, a fresh can o’ Berryman’s own all-purpose fuel system cleaner.”

bzzzzz bzzzz!

Cooper poured the can into the car’s fuel filler. Laz tried the “mac ‘n’ cheese.” It was… homey, soothing. It filled them with a warmth they couldn’t describe. Probably because it was actually warm, but it was very good. “Soul food” is an accurate moniker. Solanum definitely agreed.

Cooper sat down, “So, your friend…?”

“Yeah, It’s gotta be Gabbro, but how could you know?”

“... The Zone is weird. Some think the Mass Hallucination was less hallucination and more… out of body experience. If my dreams were anything like that, then who knows? They may be out there, somewhere.”

Oh, please don’t go there… “You don’t mean that.”

“I do! Maybe…? On the drive that freed me from the negative effects of the car, I went to the Well. In there I heard the voice of a friend who… died. Died helping us get through this place. Sure, it was just his voice, but he was definitely talking to us, taking back to us, from wherever he is. Weird, weird stuff, but... Well, I guess that was always his thing.”

That is probably the most philosophically complicating prospect they had ever heard. And it wasn't even from Gabbro.

“... The car has negative effects?”

“Not anymore! And definitely not through its own will.”

“... I didn’t tell you a lick about Gabbro. And still you saw them exactly how they were. Maybe they are still out there.”

“Yeah, may-”

The F.A.X. Machine screamed to life again, “Cooper, come in!”

“Op, hold on.”

Cooper walked over and grabbed the radio.

“I read you, Francis, what is it?”

“I took the spectral deconstruction of the rogue waveform from the car and looked for any matches. It showed up a total of three times in the past: Once from 1 to 3 this morning, then twice from 5 to 6 and 6 to 2 earlier today. Do you have any records or remember anything at all from then?”

Francis sounded exasperated, and a little afraid.

“Uh… No, I was asleep through all of those, what’s this about? What’s going on?”

“The source of the waveform is centered at the Well.”

Cooper seemed a bit frightened, “You don’t think it’s-”

“It’s not a Remnant signal, but anything happening with the Well is cause for worry enough. You may have to go back there soon.”

A grimace shot across his face like he'd just had a sample from one of Porphy's "good" batches.

“Ah crap, you know how hard it was to get out of there the last time, what are we gonna do?”

“I know, I know, I’m working on it, just keep an eye on the car for anything strange.”

They both sat on the line for a moment, mulling on the new information.

“... Any more news?”

“Yeah, the car’s waveform has been much more energetic since the explosion in Sierram. I think the energy from the blast may have amplified its properties as an anomaly, which would explain its recent activity.”

“... I’m afraid that’s not the only anomaly it amplified, when we were in Port Angeles, we came across giant Broken Bunnies. The size of an Astro van.”

“The size of what?”

“Uh… a Vandura.”

“Oh, wow, that’s… terrifying. Also, y’know those pings I was getting from my blown-out scanners?”

“Yeah?”

“Well they’ve all fully disappeared, except for one. It’s sticking around junction D2, maybe check it out while I figure out what we can do about the Well.”

“Is that everything?”

“Yeah, just when things were starting to slow down around here…”

“Oh, don’t I know it. Pine Tree Auto, out.”

“Francis, out.”

Cooper turned back to Laz and Sol, he looked steeled and serious.

“Laz, and you too, Sol, if either of you ever feel that way again, ever, you can always talk to me. That stuff is on a level that… Well, I don’t think anyone is equipped to handle. I’m not gonna say I understand how you’re feeling because let's be honest here... but I know how trying to deal with heavy stuff alone goes. It’s not… pretty.”

Laz was drying their tears, “Okay, thanks, Coop.”

He shrugged, “Just what we have to do. Now, from the sounds of it, there’s a new mystery to track down, down for another drive tomorrow?”

A smile finally returned to Laz’s face, “What kinda question is that? You know I’m game.”

“Yes! Enjoy… trip.”

“... We’ll leave same time in the morning. Now, look at me here, you sure you’re feeling okay?”

“... Yeah… do you… have any more of those movies?”

Cooper started listing off on his fingers, “Yeah, I got Footloose, Top Gun, F.M., Cannonball Run, Smokey and the Bandit… Y’know what? You choose.”

Laz got up and shuffled through the basket, basically picking one at random.

“... Top Gun, not a bad choice…”

They settled back in and watched the movie. They didn’t really talk as much this time, they were just soaking in the company. It was an action-packed story of heroics, loss, and coming to terms with that loss to do what you had to do. Laz could relate. The movie centered around a hotshot pilot who flew a “fighter jet,” Laz could almost see Feldspar doing what “Maverick” was doing.

[ What is the purpose behind the construction of those machines? ]

Cooper took a moment, “... How many people were there, back where you lived?”

“Twenty-two.”

[ There were many clans and each Nomai clan was typically around one-hundred people, but those clans would rarely ever act as more than discrete entities. ]

“Wow, things really were small where you came from. Here, on Earth, where there’s as many people as there are here, there’s bound to be fights. Since there are so many people, those fights can get… pretty big. At the base of it, that jet is an evolution of the stick you’d pick up off the ground to give yourself a fighting advantage.”

“People built machines… for killing other people?”

[ It wasn’t common, but there were times when a disagreement between clans would escalate to conflict, but on a scale such as this? ]

“... There will always be assholes out there. Greedy men who claw their way into seats of power. They get stupid and brash, and they pick fights. Still, as violent as we can be, humanity is good. In every instance of some great evil emerging to threaten the good things in life, there have always been good men who rose up, willing to give their lives to protect the things they believe in. Still, bad people will twist that cause. It's hard to find a pure reason to fight anymore. Things are... simpler in here in that respect.”

“I’m not leaving my wingman.”

“... Good guys win, and the bad guys lose.”

“Ideally.”

“Good tone. I’m taking the shot!”

“You don’t have to worry about that as much anymore. Soviet Union collapsed a while back. No one’s really found a good reason to keep up the aggression.”

It really put everything here in perspective. This place was bigger, astronomically so, of course things would be more… complicated. But Cooper was good people. Right? Besides the whole alien thing, he would have been right at home on Timber Hearth. Laz wondered if it would have been this way for the Hearthians if there were more of them…

“So, what did you think? Of the movie.”

“It was… good. Revealing, but good.”

[ There was a good deal of violence, but I would be lying if I said it wasn’t exciting. It was enjoyable in a macabre sort of way. ]

“That’s just action movies for you; Violence, daring, high stakes! Action…” Cooper glanced at his watch, “We still have more free time, got any secret Timber Hearth… ian-”

“Just Hearthian.”

“... Hearthian activities to pass the time?”

“We would usually just play music, but I was planning on getting back helping Sol speak English again.”

She tapped their shoulder, [ Actually, I think it would be best to take a break for the time being. I feel as if I may go insane if I have to learn any more today. ]

“What? Am I that bad of a teacher?”

[ Stars, no! You have been very- ]

She withdrew the text and produced another spiral.

[ You were joking, weren’t you? ]

“Maaaaybe.”

[ I may still be driven insane yet. ]

Laz turned back to Cooper, “You said you had a guitar?”

“Oh yeah, lemme take it down.”

Cooper walked over to the wall next to the orange tanks that had the… things floating inside of it and pulled an instrument off a mount on the wall. It certainly looked like a guitar. It had six strings, a neck, but the body had no soundhole. Instead it was flat, made of blue stained wood, and had a very strange shape. There was a plastic panel taking up the majority of one side of the body with a set of knobs and a slider. A metallic insert was sunk in just below the panel and the bridge had a long rod attached to one end.

“This is the creme de la creme, the best of the best. Found it in a recording studio in Midzone. Behold, the Fender Stratocaster.”

Cooper strummed a few chords, they sounded… weak and metallic. He walked his hands up and down the neck as he played singular notes. Laz was starting to feel very jealous about the whole five fingers thing.

“I don’t mean to sound dismissive or anything, but that’s the best of the best? It doesn’t really sound very… full.”

“Well that’s because it’s not plugged in, dummy.”

“Plugged in?”

Cooper walked over to the “Matter Regenerator.” It really just looked like nothing more than a haphazard collection of speakers and tape recorders, but it did what he said it did, somehow. He lugged a particularly robust looking speaker over and plugged it into the wall.

“It’s an electric guitar. It picks up the magnetic fields from the strings as they vibrate, you just need an amplifier to hear it.”

Recognition struck in Laz's mind. Uh-oh.

“Like the one from Back to the Future?” Laz slowly backed away.

“Yeah, but this one is nowhere near as… explosive.”

Cooper ran a cable from the guitar to the amp, it hummed ever so slightly before he struck his hand across the strings, producing a loud, but, thankfully, not destructive, chord.

Solanum, apparently, was not ready for that and jumped a step back.

“I take it you played acoustic, so I’m gonna set this up to sound as clean as possible…”

Laz took a hold of the guitar and drew the strap around their shoulders, it was weighty, but it felt at home in their hands.

“Ha! You look like Chuck Berry… Oh! Francis wanted pictures of you two, and I can do that now. Have Sol pose up next to you, I’ll be right back.”

Cooper left to retrieve his camera and Laz gestured for Sol to stand next to them.

“Cheese?”

“Yeah, Coop’s grabbing the camera.”

He returned and held the camera to his eye, “Alright, watch the birdie… Say cheese!”

“Cheeeese.”
“Cheeese!”

snap
vrrrr

Cooper took a couple more shots and bundled them up in the pnuematube.

“So, let's see what you got.”

It was definitely a new experience. Sure, it played the same as a guitar, but it sounded very different. Regardless, the first thing Laz could think to play was the same thing he and the other Travelers grew up learning. Like at that campfire at the end of the world… Sol and Coop started playing too and they just spent the time jamming out. A song for the end of the old world, a song for the beginning of the new. 

Chapter Text

Chert’s Research Notes - Property of Chert!

“I am going to have to orate this log, it seems that whenever I think about this topic, I am unable to prevent my hands from shaking.”

“It is currently… oh I don’t even know anymore! There are no more stars in the sky to gauge a rough date. We are both literally and figuratively, in the dark.”

“Either way, the events of the past few days have been nothing short of… preposterous!”

“I was well underway with updating our star charts when I noticed a cluster of supernova. How novel! However, as the minutes ticked by, the amount of stars growing redder and eventually exploding seemed to increase exponentially.”

“It took more time than it should have, frankly, for me to notice the same thing was happening to our sun!”

“It was not my… best moment, I fell into a dark place, but eventually I reserved myself to the end… The shockwave overtook me and I found myself... here. Eventually, everyone else at the village appeared, then Gabbro, then Riebeck, and, most surprisingly, Feldspar.”

“Apparently, they’d been trapped inside Dark Bramble all this time, but now, we were all here! Us, and various nearby personal effects, were transported instantaneously at the point of contact with the supernova to wherever we find ourselves now.”

“Does this make any sense whatsoever? No! This place we find ourselves in doesn’t seem to follow the conventional bounds of spacetime and is, quite frankly, gargantuan. I am unable to gauge the diameter of the no doubt new planet we find ourselves on, my signalscope became damaged by the supernova before being brought here with me, but I imagine that the amount of gravity experienced here should be many magnitudes more than what we are seeing.”

“Fortunately, there were some buildings in rather… precarious condition nearby to where we found ourselves. They were sat on wheels and we had to anchor them down. We have taken shelter here, but there are… things out here that seek to do us harm. Mangled balls of scrap metal and high energy electricity that crawls through the very ground itself make attempts to assail us. We have constructed a wall and it seems to keep them at bay.”

“Riebeck, Hal, and I have taken to examining the technologies and artefacts left behind by whatever resident species used to be here. Amazingly, they also seem to have spoken, or at least written, in Hearthian! Riebeck even found a large illustration of this theoretical species holding strange instruments, some with an almost uncanny resemblance to a guitar. Who are these 'Beatles?’ Are they some kind of deity?”

“... As amazing as these circumstances are, I fear that one of us was not as lucky as the rest. Lazurite has not appeared with the rest of the villagers. I know that day was their inaugural launch day, but where are they? Is it possible that the conditions for ending up here included being caught in the supernova? Perhaps they noticed early and fled. But wouldn’t they have told us? Oh, stars, where are they?”

“I must end this log now, we have to find a means of food and water. There were some preserved cans found in some refrigerators, but I fear our supply is quickly starting to dwindle.”

Chert set the tape recorder down and steeled themselves, the shaking gradually subsided.

Food, they need food and they need it soon, there is barely enough left for a single day. Gabbro started running over. Oh, great, the layabout. Credit where credit is due, though, they have certainly been carrying their weight, but how could they be so calm? These are not calming circumstances!

“Gabbro! What seems to be the rush?”

They slowed down near Chert, but started walking back in the direction they came, “I couldn’t find Hornfels or Slate, and you’re like the only other smart guy, so I came over to you.”

“I’m flattered. Did you find something?”

“Sure did, you should come over and see this.”

Gabbro led Chert over to the building that Porphy helped Gneiss set up as a medical center. Stars knew they needed it with these… things roaming around. They gestured to the large metal container.

They leaned against the wall with a smug look, “I have solved our little food problem, no need to thank me.”

Chert looked at them incredulously, “Gabbro, this is what these people used to DISPOSE OF THEIR WASTE! And this one looks particularly unsanitary! What is leaking out of it?”

“Woah there, let me explain; I was searching for food, but couldn’t find a thing. Bummer right? So, I came over here to meditate and think on it.”

Chert was unimpressed, “You were sleeping.”

“Meditating. Either way, I rested my back on this box over here, and it spat this out.”

Gabbro held a fresh can of “SPAM” up for Chert to appraise.

“I tapped on its side again, and it spat another out. I got to talking to it, seems like a pretty cool dude, at least I think it does, it never really talked back.”

Are they being serious right now? “It. Is. A. Large. Scale. Wastebin.”

“Well, why don’t you try it.”

Calm, calm, calm, how were they so calm all the time? Chert sighed and walked over.

knock knock

The remaining lid of the container shot open and it began to forcefully eject canned food, packaged meals, and canned water from the… stuff. It glowed blue with every ejection.

Chert could hardly collect their words, “... What. The hell.”

“I know! Pretty cool right? Poor guy seems to get tired after a while though, but it’ll be fine soon enough.”

Food, new food, but it came from… a garbage… thing… “I’m… not eating that.”

Gabbro grabbed a bag labeled M.R.E. off the ground, peeled it open, and started eating, “What? It’s completely fine. Plus, do we have any other choice right now?”

“... No. No we don’t. Good find… Gabbro. Has anyone seen Lazurite yet?”

Gabbro sunk, they seemed very distant, more than they usually did, “No, not a peep.”

Chert reluctantly grabbed a can of water and mercilessly cleaned it before cracking it open. It tasted… fine. They left and began to walk through the “village.” It never got dark, but it also never got light. They seemed to be stuck in an endless, hazy limbo. Cool blue light pervaded everything. Slate was over by the strange glowing tree.

“Slate, what’re you… What’s going on?”

They seemed very excited for some reason, “You’ll never believe this; I was over in the workshop, playing with some of the technology here and I found this big reel-to-reel tape player. It’s obviously supposed to play sound, but the speakers were blown out so I went over here to grab one off this tree before I started trying to fix it.”

They heaved up a black and silver box with two large spools and the word “SONY” stamped into the front. It looked… pristine.

“It doesn’t look very broken to me.”

Slate inspected it while talking, “That’s the thing, it isn’t, at least, not anymore. Where’s your signalscope?”

“Over by the regular looking tree.”

“Alright, I’ll be right back”

Slate retrieved their signalscope from Chert’s observation post. It wasn’t like there was anything to observe here anyway. They paused a few feet away from the tree.

“Alright, what do you need to show me?”

“Watch this.”

Slate stepped towards the tree and it started glowing brighter. It rang with a gentle hum. Chert looked back at Slate to see a wide grin and their signalscope slowly straightening out. The scuffs on the mirrors disappeared. The glass that had warped from the heat smoothed out. The chips on the wood healed over. Heck, the paint became shinier than it ever was before.

“What the-” They looked through the eyepiece; it was smudgeless, exactly zeroed, unerringly straight, perfectly clear, and clearly perfect.

“I know right? I don’t know how it works, but this tree fixes stuff.”

It was just like the day Chert had built it… “Remarkable, I may actually be able to make good measurements now! What about that tape player?”

“Oh yeah, the tree also fixed the speakers, seems like the majority of the tape I found for it is music. Barely any personal logs or anything, and the quality of the audio from it? It’s like you’re actually listening to it in person!”

Slate had experimented with recording music before, but the recorders used would sound terrible. They were only good for voice logs.

“That thing able to reproduce listenable music? How advanced was this species? You said there were some personal logs right? What is their speech like?”

“Well, that’s the crazy thing-”

“What?”

“It was in Hearthian, all of it.”

“... That doesn’t make any sense! I’ll have to tell Hal. I suppose you should see if anybody else needs their stuff fixed.”

“Will do.”

This place was becoming exceedingly strange. Strange objects that actively hunted down other things? Sure, that makes sense. Predatory instincts would be bound to… Evolve? Develop? In a place like this, but objects that by any and all accounts were not just passive, but directly beneficial? It was all so… anomalous.

Chert was closing in on the shack they had been sharing with Riebeck and Hal. It had been some kind of cartographer's workshop previously. Chert opened the door to find Riebeck in the more structurally sound looking corner studying some of these aliens’ writing, probably too terrified to peek outside.. Hal was inspecting a globe on a table. 

“What are you looking at here?”

Hal looked up to see Chert, then quickly got back to staring at the globe, “Oh, hey Chert, model of a planet, maybe this planet?”

“Terrible model, it’s smoother than a marble, where are the mountains?”

“That’s the thing, if you take a close look at it, the level of detail is amazing, and there are lumps and ridges everywhere. I think those are the mountains.”

They were tiny, barely noticeable from where Chert was standing, but yes, there were definitely intentionally placed surface details.

“... This model is to scale?”

“Ha! No, based on what I’m looking at, the height of the mountains is actually exaggerated. Like, a lot.”

Riebeck speaks up, “Yeah, I’m reading a journal here, it was written by someone who was climbing a ‘Mount Olympus.’ They say multiple times that it’s nearly two and a half kilometers tall. Which is… really high.”

Hal continued, “The globe also has a set of scale bars, and apparently, this planet has a circumference of forty thousand kilometers.”

Forty thousand. Forty thousand?! “It must be a different unit, It’s impossible for a planet to be that large.”

“Well, we found a meter stick, and yeah, it was a meter long.”

“But that doesn’t- The planet must be less dense! No, no, the soil seems perfectly normal… Then, the gravitational constant is… different? But, what could cause such a fundamental change in the laws of physics?!”

“There’s gotta be something we’re not seeing, some ‘dark variable’ we aren’t taking into account.”

“You’re making fun of me aren’t you? I’m telling you, there was no other way to explain why galaxies rotate faster than we think they should.”

“Yeah, but this is just weird.”

They were right, this is weird.

“Slate was over by the strange tree, somehow, any objects that are brought within range of it spontaneously repair themselves. They used it to get a tape player working and, I’m being entirely serious here, these people spoke Hearthian on top of writing it.”

“... Seriously? But that’s like, well it’s impossible! All of the cultural events, customs, experiences… all of it would need to fall into place in the exact way to independently develop Hearthian exactly. Maybe convergent evolution applies to language too?”

That was a headache-inducing theory if Chert ever heard one.

“Even though all of their stuff is in Hearthian, it’s still really hard to get a good idea of what’s happening here. This place is just so empty. And dangerous…”

“... Have you heard anything about Laz?”

Hal was gonna ask sooner or later.

“No.”

“Do you think they’re okay? Do you think maybe they’re lost out there… alone… in the dark…?”

“I- I don’t know. I’m gonna look for Hornfels and see if they figured out a water solution. Gabbro found a garbage container that spits out food and some water, so we should have good supply there, but we still need more water.”

Hal looked sick. “... Food… from a garbage container.”

“Yes, it is disgusting hearing it out loud, but it seems… sanitary enough, and the cans and packages are sealed anyway.”

Riebeck butted in, “... at least we won’t starve?”

Chert walked out and started walking over towards Hornfels’ platform? Cart? There has to be a better name for these things. Tephra and Galena interrupted them midway through the walk.

“Chert! Chert!” Tephra was practically jumping towards them.

“What? Tephra? Galena? What are you doing out?”

“We were playing with Mica and Arkose, but uhhh… we…”

“We were using Moraine’s signalscope…”

Tephra whipped around, looking very betrayed, “Galena! Uh, yeah, we were using Moraine’s signalscope and we picked up something! You have the big one, so we thought that maybe you would get a clearer signal?”

These little rascals, Chert could remember a time when they were like that too. Wait, a signal?

“Wait, you picked up a signal? Here? What did it sound like?”

“I’m not sure, we lined it up exactly where it was coming from, over there,” they pointed, “but it was really weak and staticy. Still, we’re sure there’s something there… You’re not gonna tell Moraine, right?”

No need to cause more trouble than there already is, “Just… ask them before using their signalscope.”

Tephra pouted, “Awwwww, but they never let us use it!”

Chert smiled at them, “I’m sure one of these days, Slate will make you your own.”

Tephra looked away, suddenly taking interest in the ground by their feet “... Is Laz back yet?”

“I… I’m sure they’ll be here soon.”

Hornfels could wait. There’s a signal out there. Which means that something is making the signal. Which means some one could be making the signal. Oh, stars, why did everything have to be so difficult around here?

Chert brought their signalscope back out to their observation point. They pointed it in the rough direction that Tephra was pointing in. South… a little east too, if the compass could be trusted in a place where gravity was suddenly significantly less forceful. Wait, wait there is definitely something there… Is that music?

“You get up every morning from your alarm clock’s warning, take the eight fifteen into the city.”

Music. Somebody is out there. We need to send a signal out. Maybe they’d be able to hear us. Maybe they’re a member of the species that abandoned this place. Maybe it’s Laz…

“There’s a whistle up above and people pushin’ people shovin’ and the girls who try to look pretty.”

They need to get Slate to build some kind of transmitter. And soon.

“And if your train’s on time you can- Francis, come in.”

… What?

“I read you, Cooper, what’s up?”

Are these-

“We’re heading out to D2 right now, just made our way through the expansion wall, anything new?”

These are live transmissions!

“Nope, signal’s stabilized since we spoke last, no change. How’s it holding up?”

These people are talking! To each other! Right now!

“Just passed through G3, battery’s looking good though. Solanum’s making good progress learning English, we’re helping her along. You get the pictures I sent?

“Heello, Francis!”

“It's Hello, Hell-o.”

If only there was a working… something they could use to put a signal out.

“Hey guys, doing good over here, no downpours forecasted and the Sun actually decided to show up today. And I did get those pictures! You were right, you guys are pretty similar to us. Convergent evolution, I suppose. I’m gonna check on the battery farms. Francis, out.”

… Sun?

“Cooper, out. -easy as fishin’ you could be a musician, if you could make sounds loud or mellow.”

“The sun actually decided to come out?” But, the sun went- There are no- What the hell is going on?

Chapter Text

It thought their issues here in the Zone were bad. It and Cooper were both stuck here. Well, there were times when Cooper could leave, but he wouldn’t leave it behind. Now, there was something else that the Well was making it do, and it hadn’t even noticed! It hoped that it wasn’t going to end up hurting Cooper again, or Laz and Sol for that matter. Laz and Sol…

They had been through it. It only really had Cooper up to this point and it didn’t know what it would do if Cooper ended up dying. But Laz and Sol, they already went through that, but not with one person, everyone they knew. And Laz had to live through that multiple times. How could anything even be able to bear that? It had to let them know that it would be there for them too.

When Laz and Sol went to sleep (amazing thing by the way), Cooper stayed awake for a time and outfitted it with a set of anticorrosive panels. It didn’t like the look of them, but it didn’t like how acid felt more. He then made a set of anticorrosive clothes, for Laz and Sol it assumed, before he went to bed. Cooper was good at taking care of things. Who knows where the two of them would be if he wasn’t the way he was. 

Laz and Sol’s situation told it one thing though, as bad as things are in here, they could be much, much worse. In reality, it was incredibly lucky. It didn’t have to become a Remnant, it could have just remained a normal, regular car, in which case it wouldn’t have woken up one day to see this world. Fate is a weird thing.

This place was weird, it knew that despite it being all it’s ever known. It wondered what it was like outside these walls, what a normal life was. Whatever “normal” was, it didn’t know of a group of people that deserved it more than those that helped it. Good natured people and a good natured car, surrounded by what can only be described as bad nature. What a world.

It might be time for that sleep thing again, it was getting awful dark…

Chapter Text

click

“psst- hey c’mon man, wake up.”

“Road trip! Road trip!”

Cooper had been caught up on sleep, so he’d spent a good deal of last night taking measurements of Laz and Sol’s suits and making some chemically resistant coverings. Then he went and got some sleep, no Gabbro this time…

He'd almost expected the alien hippie's presence when he went to sleep, but there was no red sun, no strangely small planet, no geysers, no hammock... Just the indecipherable riff-raff that usually made up his dreams. And just when he found out that his encounters were much stranger than he thought. What was keeping his dream-buddy?

“uuuugh… Come on, Coop.”

“Доброе утро- uh… Good morning, Laz, Cooper.”

“Mornin’”

“Morning! We’ve got places to be, I already got your stuff loaded up.”

Laz rolled off the chairs and to the floor with a thud, voice muffled by the floor, “Where we headed today?”

“Dream another dream, this dream is over.”

“Midzone, junction D2. I made some anticorrosive ponchos for you two, trust me, you’re gonna need them.”

The scanner didn't show any Corrosive Squalls, but the readout was packed full of other anomalies so... Better to be prepared if one sneaks up on them.

Laz grabbed the poncho that was sized to fit them, “Anticorrosive… ponchos? The hell kinda place is this?”

They have no idea... “Not a fun one. There’s hashbrowns, sausage, and coffee on the workbench over there.”

“Thanks, Coop.”

“Thank You, Cooper.”

Was Laz doing alright? That was some seriously heavy stuff yesterday… “So… you all set about yesterday? Anything else you wanna talk about?”

“No, not right now.”

Alright, shit, deflect… “... Found a mini amp that I was using for the first generation Matter Regenerator, I put it with your backpack in case you wanna play at some point on the road.”

“With the ‘creme de la creme’ guitar?”

“Yeah, just don’t lose it.”

"Well... thanks."

It was the crack of dawn outside, still a little orange, but the sun was still very much up. The snow was also very much still there. This is gonna be a tough couple of months.

A couple more refills of coffee and the group set off. More music, singing, and stories. This time, Laz’s made sense, now that Cooper knew why they were so strange. They did their best to help Solanum learn the intricacies of English. He hadn’t realized how complicated it was until now, but she was a remarkably fast learner.

They were driving down the highway to G1, probably as good a time as any to show them the ropes. He brought the car to a stop.

“See something out there?”

“Nope, the highways are usually completely dead, we’re gonna take a moment so you two can learn how things work around here.”

Cooper got out of the car and the two of them followed suit, he trudged through the snow to a wreck on the side of the road.

“That car is the only functioning set of wheels in the Zone, and it takes a lot of effort to keep it that way. There are about a zillion of these wrecked cars on the sides of the roads out here and they’re a great source of spare parts.”

Cooper handed a scrapper over to Laz and grabbed a second one from the back of the car for Sol. She struggled to get a good grip on the controls, but eventually managed.

“What do I do with this?”

Solanum was inspecting the scrapper, “What does… machine do?”

“You use it to cut up parts for raw metal,” Cooper pointed at a relatively nice part of a door on the wreck, “You’re gonna wanna target surfaces like these first, cut them out to save as much raw material as possible, then work at the rest of the part.”

Laz squeezed the trigger, the saw spun up.

“Now, this is really important. Keep a tight grip. That thing’s gonna wanna tear out of your hand. And a large spinning disc capable of tearing through metal just flopping around is not, particularly, safe.”

Laz and Sol both adopted a wide stance and worked at their panels, Cooper gathered the fragments with a Hand-Vac.

Solanum set the scrapper down when they were done, “How I do?”

Cooper was loading the material into the trunk, “You guys did good, lots of salvageable material, let’s get moving again.”

Sol filtered back into the car and Cooper sat next to her. She looked very confused, Laz even more so.

“Shouldn’t you be sitting in that seat?”

“Didn’t you say you wanted to learn how to drive one of these?”

They looked surprised, “What? Seriously? Right now? I have no idea how to drive this thing!”

“Coming from the astronaut? Come on, there’s nothing to hit out here.”

Laz sat down in the driver’s seat, the car waved to him through the screen.

“All right, but if I do hit something, it’s on you. So, how do I…”

“Remember when I was balancing the driveshaft? Same idea, you just gotta turn the steering wheel to guide the car in a certain direction. And there is actually weight on the wheels now, so you’re gonna need to give the gas more oomph.”

“You do good, Laz.”

Laz slipped it into drive and got the car moving.

...

They sucked. Like, really bad. The ride was jerkier than when Cooper was trying to learn manual for the first time, and Laz was learning on automatic!

“Okay there, cowboy. You got a foot on each pedal?”

“Uh, yeah?”

There’s your problem, “Yeah, don’t do that. Your left foot has one job; Absolutely nothing. There’s a dead pedal in the footwell that you’re supposed to rest it on. The right foot does everything. There’s really no reason to hit the gas and brakes at the same time… unless you’re having fun.”

Laz took a moment to reposition their legs, “Okay, is that better?”

Cooper leaned over the seat, “Yeah, you’re moving a lot smoother now. You already got good grip on the wheel so we’ll go over steering; When you’re going through tight turns, you’re going to need to slow down, otherwise you’ll sail clean off the road.”

Laz spoke to themselves, “Just like the Sun Station…”

The Sun Station? Isn’t that where they… oh no.

“Hey don’t say that kind of stuff when you’re driving.”

“What? I only fell into the sun a couple times.”

They gripped the wheel and got the car up to a good deal of speed, they sailed through the turns and kept to just the right speed to hug the driving line.

“Jesus Christ, Laz.”

“It’s actually really similar to orbital mechanics.”

“Figures.”

Laz eventually had their fill and it was Solanum’s turn up to bat. She had to play with the seat to be able to fit in the footwell, but she got there eventually. She eased the car forward and kept it to gentle curves under steady acceleration.

“You certainly took to this quick.”

“I watched Laz, payed attention good. Not as reckless.”

“Heh.”

“You could say that again. Now, I’ll admit that was good driving, but keeping right to the edge of the envelope is not a good idea in here. You could be driving along at night, and a boulder the size of a house could be blocking the road. You need to allow yourself room to improvise.”

Laz looked as if a lightbulb had gone off in their head, then they looked a bit guilty, “Oh, yeah. That makes sense. I sorta lost my sense for that… after going through the loops.”

“... Ah, yeah… That would do it.”

It really wasn't a pretty picture. Laz was young, as astronaut of course so they weren't a kid, but they might as well have been Cooper's age. Being that young and already having such an intimate first hand experience with death? That just didn't seem fair.

Solanum was easy on the car, Laz was hard, and Cooper was in that golden middleground that Zone had made sure he stuck to. Eventually, the ARC Device showed an Instability front peeking through on a corner of the map and Cooper reassumed his role as “The Driver.” They continued on to G1.

“The Driver…” He wondered if the stuff he had done while here in the Zone had earned him a sort of urban legend status. That’d be kinda cool, when the dust settles he may very well be on the same level as bigfoot.

Junction G3 was a bitch like always. Perfectly built to sap all electricity from your car. It was evil. Laz and Sol were looking out the windows, squinting through the darkness.

“Why dark? Sun should be out, no?”

“That’s just the way it is out here. We haven’t exactly been able to probe into why there’s no light in this junction, there’s no haze, but whatever reason there is, I’m sure it’ll probably raise more questions than the ones it answers.”

“It’s… not right. You can’t even see any stars, it’s like the sky is just… not there.”

There was a hint of recognition in the way Laz stared through the glass. Eyes glazed over in restrained fear.

“It’s definitely a solid nine on the creep scale, but it’s just another condition a junction can have here in the Zone. This is the only one where it stays permanently.”

There was always something else… off about this part of the Zone. Sure, it was pitch black, but there was significantly less sound. Like all the animals had left because even they knew that this wasn’t right. He never liked exploring in this junction. Just drive around, grab the anchors, and leave.

Solanum spoke up, “If there is no Sun, then… why do trees still have leaves?”

That was a good question, maybe the Instability would generate healthy trees here whenever it swept through. Dooming them to rot away as they had nothing to eat. Or maybe they were getting sunlight, and the conditions in this junction made it so that they couldn’t see it?

“No idea, put another tally up for ‘weird Zone stuff.’”

If there was one good thing about the snow, it was that it effectively neutralized the crawlers. They couldn’t focus enough electricity into a small enough area, because the electricity would just jump to the snow. This didn’t stop the anomalies that worked off of chaining electricity though. Minutemen and Wriggling Wrecks seemed to have a significantly larger range through the snow.

Eventually, they made it to the access road and sunlight slowly started to shine through again. Soon enough, the expansion wall loomed in the sky in front of them.

“Woah.”

“Yep, first expansion wall, slightly shorter than the outer wall, but it’s actually fully completed.”

“Why does Zone- the Zone need many walls?”

“It’s to keep the worst of the Zone contained. The innermost wall was built first as conditions worsened. Then, an event at the Well caused the first Mass Hallucination, which caused a significant increase in anomaly encounters, and, we believe at least, created the first non-laboratory Remnants. Conditions continued to plummet and this expansion wall was built, then the outer wall to encircle the entire Exclusion Zone.”

“And we’re about to cross through one of these walls? Built to stop the worse stuff from getting out.”

“Yep, corrosive ponchos remember?”

“... Shit.”

The car plunged into the depths of the wall, it never ceases to amaze Cooper just how big it was on the inside. Laz and Sol looked up towards the ceiling with open mouths.

“What, exactly, did they build this wall for again?”

“Nothing, it was built for nothing exactly. You can’t predict what the Zone will spit out, so they just built a wall as large as they could to keep in whatever showed up.”

They inched further through the interior of the wall, avoiding Tourists and Spark Towers along the way. The pavement disappeared underneath dirt and debris and they followed the train tracks up to a tunnel, emerging out through the other side.

“Welcome to Midzone. Francis isn’t too far away, but It’s not really possible to get to his area from here; This place is pockmarked with corrosive lakes.”

“Unfortunate, I may enjoy meeting him.”

“How about we give him a call, see if he got those pictures you sent?”

“Oh yeah, let’s see if he got his sleep schedule back to normal yet.”

Chapter Text

“-Taking care of business.”
“-Taking care of business.”
“-Taking care of business.”

“It’s all mine!”
“It’s all mine! I been-”

“Taking care of business.”
“Taking care of business.”
“Taking care of business.”

“And working overtime. Whoo!”
“And working overtime. Whoo!”

Laz hadn’t been able to memorize a single song yet, but this one had an easy chorus, so they were able to keep up, Solanum too. These trips were fun. Laz wondered how they’d ever gone out into the solar system as many times as they had without a buddy to mess around with.

Midzone looked… different. The snow receded and the green grass slowly disappeared as they drove deeper into this part of the Zone, replaced by strange reds and fluorescent blues. It was also generally swampier. It reminded them of the simulated world in the Stranger. Just significantly more alien... Somehow.

“Is this normal? The red and the glowing plants.”

“Hoooo, absolutely not. Nearly every plant on the planet is green. The stuff in here’s been messed with in one way or another by the Zone.”

“Red is… strange color for plants. Green is most useful color for… sun-food-process?”

“Photosynthesis?”

“Yes, thank you.”

Cooper raised his free hand in the air, “Who knows? Maybe these photosynthesize radiation, or they’re red because of the acid.”

“I agree! I will take sample when we stop.”

They pressed on towards junction D2. Driving past floating, glowing boulders that made the headlights flicker whenever they got close and large… bubbles that bounced and spat out acid when they hit the ground.

“Not a very hospitable place, you’d be hard pressed to find a good place to hunker down here. Francis got lucky.”

Laz could certainly see why, “Yeah, he ever tried leaving?”

“It’s difficult to move around anywhere in the Zone without protection. And very few people have protection they can wear that’s actually good enough for this place. We’re lucky that we’re packed into this shiny metal box here.”

“You think we’re gonna see any more of those ‘Giant Jacks?’”

Cooper froze in contemplation for a moment, but quickly eased back into his seat.

“... No, I think Cappy’s explosion was limited to the outer Zone, if that’s what even caused those things to appear, they could just be specific to urban areas. I barely ever see bunnies period, here in Midzone.”

That’s good at least. Still, if there was one thing that Laz was lucky to not have to experience in the loops, it was acid, most of the time, but here they were driving into a place that apparently necessitated wearing an anticorrosive poncho.

“... What are the ponchos for anyway?”

Cooper shrugged, “Acid, specifically the rain.”

“Rain is acid?!”

Solanum lurched forwards from her seat, it was the first time Laz had heard her yell unprompted.

“Only in discrete, singular storm cells. They’ll blow in, harass an area, and quickly shuffle out again. Most of it is still, relatively, normal rain. Still, it’s better to be prepared.”

The car rolled through an access road barricade, the lights switched to red. Red usually means "don't," so why was... oh.

“... The roads become unstable when we drive through?”

“Huh?”

“The lights on the barricades, they turn red.”

“Oh, yeah. The access roads are like a house of cards. There’s not much to get it to topple, except for us. You usually can’t go back the same way you came.”

Solanum started staring out the window, endlessly curious about the outside world. It was something Laz could anchor to, if all else failed.

“Is this ‘junction D2?’”

It was hard to tell, outside of the barricade, Laz wouldn't have really noticed, “Looks like it.”

"Yep, whatever’s giving the signal is coming from here. Lemme get Francis on the horn.”

Cooper started playing with the knobs on the radio.

“How do you get music out here? I don’t see you pack any of the tapes you put in the jukebox.”

Cooper kept at the knobs, trying to ease the static away, “That’s cause they’re still in the jukebox, except for one, but that's more of a good luck charm. Lots can go wrong out here in the Zone, and I’d rather not lose my music. So I have a couple players hooked up to different frequency transmitters. Takes a lot of power to get radio to work in here, if the Zone wasn’t here, you’d probably be able to hear my radio from anywhere on the planet.”

“All that for music?”

Cooper looked like he was getting frustrated, “Psssh, of course not. I needed to build a powerful scanner to be able to see into the Deep Zone, it came with the territory. Still, it wouldn’t make sense to brute force everything. Which is why it is currently eight different types of impossible to tune into the Midzone frequencies right now.”

He gave the radio a whack, the static disappeared.

“Figures. You’d be surprised how often that happens. Breaker one-nine, breaker one-nine, Francis, come on back.”

“Oh, how’s it going, ‘Bandit.’”

“We’re in D2, any ideas on what we’re looking out for?”

“No idea, keep an eye out for anything strange. Well, everything’s strange so… Keep an eye out for anything normal? I’ve got no profiles on this waveform, but I’ll try to run a high-resolution scan and get an idea of where it is.”

“Any theories? Maybe it’s the Loch Ness Monster, or one of the boats from the Great Pileup! No! Something more elusive! A good car from 80’s Mopar…”

“It’s probably just a rogue signal relay caught in a recursive loop… Alright, scan’s complete, not particularly revealing, but I guess you’d have the best chances looking around the northeast corner. That’s all I got. Also, can Laz actually play the guitar or did you just pose them like that?”

Seriously? Can they play? “Come on. I grew up playing guitar.”

“... What are the chances two different species with two different cultures ended up developing the same instruments? Well I’ll leave you to it. Tell me what you find.”

“Alright. Cooper, out.”

“Francis, out.”

Cooper brought the car around to each of the stability anchors. It was still a bit frightening; Doing something that caused the very atmosphere to groan was probably not a good idea, but what did they know. He parked at a gas station, underneath some kind of roof to shield it from the rain while he was filling up. They made their way over to the northeast corner of the junction and started looking around. No such luck.

“Man, never really thought about how difficult it would be to find something you’re not even sure is there."

Yeah, don't even start with that.

"All we got to work off is a signal, which still may just be coming from a damaged detector by the way.”

Solanum quickly turned to look at Laz, “Mmm! Laz! Umm, signal… signal-scope device! Will that work?”

“Oh! Yeah! That just might work.”

Solanum had really been making great progress learning… English. She knew enough words to get a basic thought across, more complex ideas took more interpolation, but they had gone a full three hours without having to use the translator. That’s a new record! Laz couldn't help but feel a little warm inside every time they made a breakthrough.

Laz brought their signalscope out and turned it on. Sure enough, there was a signal behind them at a distance of 173 meters.

“Look at that! Signal’s right behind us! Good call, Sol.”

“Oh, great. Right on top of that hill. Hold on, let me turn us around.”

As Cooper brought the car about-face with a couple of reversed turns, Laz was able to line up the signal and actually hear it. It sounded like a- like a…

“Holy shit.”

“What? What is it?”

“The signal! It sounds exactly like the distress signals we’d use back home! There might actually be someone up there!”

Someone from home? That wasn't just unexpected... It was completely impossible! But... Laz and Sol were here... So... Could it really be possible?

“No shit? Seriously? All right, hold on, it’s gonna take some negotiation to claw up this hill.”

Laz crossed their fingers as the engine growled and every component of the car seemed to groan in protest. They slowly inched up the hill. Once they crested it, they looked out the window. Laz and Sol stared wordlessly. Cooper stared, confused. Laz would have recognized that shape anywhere; the white paint, the thruster banks, the large dish, the golden canopy, the haphazard bundle of tanks and electronics strapped to the back…

Laz snapped out of it, “That’s my ship!”

The Mk6 was just there, in front of them. There was a nasty gash in the earth leading to where it rested and one of its landing legs had given up. It sat on its side. It must have skidded to a stop, but-

“What? How? How did it get here?”

“I don’t know, I don’t have a single clue. When we flew it into the Eye it just sorta… disappeared from under us.”

The car crawled up to the beaten lander and they all got out. It was sparking, red lights flashed on the outside.

Laz struggled to find a thought of any kind with which to start. It wasn't very difficult for Solanum to beat them to it.

“How much time since universe-start?”

“There’s a bit of debate on that, but most astronomers would say about 13.7 billion years.”

There was no way it had been here for that long. Maybe it was because of the stuff here in the Zone? Maybe it was something to do with Cappy? Who knows! This place made absolutely no sense sometimes.

Laz cracked the hatch open, purple rings floated down from the inside.

“Well, uh... After you.”

Solanum went up first, then Cooper. He somehow managed to trip over himself while in mid air, while not touching the ground. He landed inside with an unceremonious thud. Laz went up after him.

“Little warning about the gravity stuff next- Woah, that’s… disorienting.”

The world outside hung at an angle compared to the floor of the ship, but gravity was still pulling them towards the floor.

“Nomaian gravity crystal, they generate a localized bubble of gravity and somewhat counteract regular gravity.”

Solanum turned back from inspecting each part of the ship, “Exciting! Laz, you must be very happy.”

They turned to the pilot’s seat, hull integrity readout was completely red, “Well yeah, but it’s in a bad way." Laz set themself on one thing, "We gotta fix it.”

Cooper whipped around from where he was in the cramped space, “Fix a whole rocket ship? We’ve been out here for a while, we don’t know when the Instability’s gonna roll through. And I’m not even sure the gateway can handle two crossings.”

“We have to at least try.”

“... Okay, lemme get to the car and hitch it to the side, I’ll tug it up on two legs so we can fix the broken one. We should be able to do the rest with some putty.”

Cooper tumbled back out of the hatch and hurried back to the car. He got to work running a cable from the car, to a tree, and to the ship. He handed Laz and Sol a couple cans of putty and ran the cable back to the tree.

Solanum coaxed the putty onto the problem areas, “Is nice to see something from… past here.”

She was speaking with a wistful, nostalgic tone. It was soft. Laz couldn't help but share her feelings.

“Yeah. At any rate, it’s good to have something to remember them.” Laz hurled a clump of putty onto the port hull, its crumples straightened out.

“Laz, I want to thank you… For saving me from… ummm… wandering moon. It has been nice spending this time with-”

A crackling spread over the hills in the distance.

WAA
WAA
WAA

Cooper rolled down a window and shouted from the car, “Ah shit we really gotta get going here!”

The sound sent shills down Laz's spine, “What was that?”

“Instability alarm, we’ve got five minutes. Tops.”

"Instability? Shit, we got it mostly patched up over here, how’s it going for you?”

“Hitches are hooked up, but it’s a fighter.”

The car’s wheels were kicking up soil, Cooper activated the spikes. The engine dropped to a low growl before shooting back up to an angry roar. The ship slowly started to lift off the broken leg.

“Hey that’s good! Keep going, keep going… Stop it there!”

The ship balanced precariously on the two remaining legs. The broken one hung uselessly from the left side.

Cooper got out of the car and leaned back in through the driver's side window, “Think you can keep tension in the line?”

BEEP BEEP

“Alright, good, we’ll be done soon.”

Cooper hurried over with an unimpressed look on his face.

“Really? Wood? For landing legs?”

“We used much metal for Ash Twin Project, not much left. Using metal for whole ship might be… bad idea.”

Cooper shrugged with a look that screamed "Alright, I'm done," and rushed back to the trunk of the car. He dragged a large piece of metal back over.

“Structural I-beam. I used to hang these off the front of the car when it was difficult to get enough material for a proper bumper. It should work fine for this.”

Coop and Sol held the beam in place while Laz strapped and clamped it down. They gave it a good kick and shove. It didn’t move an inch.

“That’s as good as you’re gonna get it. Especially out here.”

Laz gave it an appraising look, it looked like shit, “Yeah, it should hold.”

Cooper shouted back to the car “Alright, let it down slow.”

BEEP BEEP

The ship slowly tilted back over and the leg rested on the ground. It creaked and flexed, but it held up.

“We got a minute before the yellow’s on us. Does that thing have a radio transceiver?”

“Yeah, what frequency?”

“Tune it to 27.185 megahertz. I’m gonna pick a gateway in my car and you’re gonna fly towards it. Wait for me to get to the gateway. You’ve gotta come in low, the gateway doesn’t work at higher altitudes. I’ll drive in right after you.”

“And what if it doesn’t stay open?”

“That’s why Sol will be with you. I’ll hurry over to another access road and open a gateway in another junction if that’s the case. Now get moving.”

Cooper undid the cabling and rushed into his car. Laz and Sol packed into the ship.

Now, what the hell is a hertz?

Laz took a wild guess, maybe it was like a cycle? They tuned their radio to 27.185 anyway.

“--ea-k-r--ne-nine, Breaker one-nine, come on back, Starman.”

Oh, great. It works!

“I read you up here, just gotta get the engines started.”

Yellow wisps were licking at the canopy, the radiometer started wailing.

Please work…

Wrrrrrrrrrr-FWOOOOoooshh

The turbines spun up and the engines ignited with a roar. The ship shot off the ground. Good-old Mk6.

“Alright, we’re up! We’re ready!”

“Okay, I’m gonna go for a gateway to the west. You know what to look for. Opening… now.”

The car let off a burst of energy and a column of bright yellow appeared in front of them. The horizon glowed red.

“Good link… Alright, get moving!”

Laz brought the ship in just behind and above the car, just in case something went wrong. Solanum clutched the handholds next to the computer. The car looked so much smaller from up here, but seeing what Cooper had to do from an outside perspective? It was a wonder they didn’t have more bruises.

They were eventually overtaken by the Instability as they beared down on the gateway. Solanum seemed afraid.

“Alright we’re almost there, we’ll be fine in the low amplitude Instability for a time, but you don’t wanna stick around for the high amplitude front. Get in there!”

Laz brought the ship down into the gateway. Their vision went white and they burst through to the garage. They set the ship down by the side entrance. Cooper should have been right behind them…

“Cooper? Cooper, are you there?”

The car materialized in front of them and rolled into the garage.

Solanum eased up, “Phew.”

Chapter Text

That could have gone bad.

Cooper watched Laz’s hodge-podge ship barrel down into the gateway. It flickered. The ARC Device threw up every warning it could. He had to pour more anchor energy into it to keep it stable, but he made it. They made it. Now there was a rocket ship parked next to the garage. Laz and Sol walked in through the side door as the salvaged repair station worked away at the car.

“Hey, you made it! What kept you?”

“Gateway almost shut me out, I had to restabilize it, but hey! More than one object can go through the same gateway! That’s good!”

“I would enjoy learning how ‘ARC Device’ works!”

“Yeah? Well, we’ll get you a seat on Frequency File when we get out of here. I heard that’s where Oppy went as soon as she got out of here.”

“... Speaking of getting out of here, can’t we just use the ship to hop over the wall now?”

They could, couldn’t they? Yeah, if they wanted to get shot out of the sky. Who knows what A.R.D.A.’s got out there.

“Ideally, yes, but they didn’t set up the no-fly zone around here for no reason. Plus, I’d be leaving the car behind. And the people outside may not be as… receptive to you guys as I am.”

Laz had an innocently confused look on their face. Oh boy, this is going to be difficult.

“What do you mean?”

“Many stories of Nomai clans finding planets with only one… in-tell-i-gent species. Best idea was to… limit contact.”

“Yeah, people are afraid of the strange and possibly dangerous. That’s why this place is walled off. We do look for aliens; we train our telescopes out to space, we’ve chartered nearly every visible part of the night sky, but we haven’t heard a peep or seen any indication that there’s other life out there. You guys just… showing up might be taken as an indication of, ‘AHHH! They’ve been hiding among us! Alien spies sent to take over our minds!!!’”

They both stared at him like he was crazy.

"What? That's how I would have reacted before all this."

The car’s radio erupted into static.

“Cooper, come in.”

“I read you. What do you got?”

“Well, you seem fine… So, not much. I picked up some strange readings from your last jump back to the garage.”

“Oh, yeah. We found Laz’s ship and got it working. Did a double jump through the gateway, but I needed to feed it more anchor energy.”

“... That was incredibly reckless. What if the gateway fully collapsed?”

“Don’t worry, we planned for that. I was gonna drive along to the next junction and jump from there.”

“I… guess that works… Now,” Cooper could hear Francis take a deep breath through the speaker, “What is the construction of their ship like? How big is it? How small is it? Is it fast? How does it fly? How does it land? How much more advanced is it? What is it made of? How was it built?”

“... Is that everything?”

“Actually, from what I’ve seen, your technology is more advanced than ours. Slate would have a field day with this car. Heck, it’s completely made out of metal.”

“Completely made out of- As opposed to what?!”

“Wood.”

“... Your ship is made out of wood.”

Cooper could hear that Francis's expectations had been thoroughly shattered, even through the radio.

“Only the parts that don’t need to be sealed or heat-proof.”

“Heat proo- What about re-entry?”

“What’s so hot about re-entry?”

“Okay, Cooper? You’re going to have to send pictures again.”

“Alright. Any progress on getting through the Well again?”

“Yes, actually! Last time, the biggest trouble came from keeping the whole place from scrambling around with you in it. So, I’m working on something that should automatically be able to calculate and align LIM phases… It’s still very early in development though, I’ve only been able to stabilize five minutes in lab conditions.”

“Hey, take your time. You already did plenty with the translator.”

“Yeah, thanks for that by the way, Francis.”

“Thank you, Francis.”

“You’re welcome, also was that you, Solanum? You picked up English quick.”

“Not possible without Laz and Cooper.”

“How’s the battery farm?”

“Very stable… Concerned calls from Zone inhabitants at an all-time low.”

“Well, radio me when you’ve finished. Pine Tree Auto, out.”

“Francis, out.”

Ok, cool. Now...

"'What's so hot about re-entry?' What isn't hot about re-entry?"

"What? You're just flying back into the atmosphere."

"Yeah, but you're- Oh, right. Yeah. You came from tiny planet world."

"What difference does that make?"

"Look at how big this planet is. You'd need to be going ridiculously fast to get into orbit. When you get into re-entry, you bleed off that speed by friction with the air. Ever rub your hands together?"

"Yeah, but that would only really be a problem if you're going like... twenty times the speed of sound.

Cooper just stared and crossed his arms.

"... Seriously?!"

"Yeah. I don't think you're gonna be doing much spaceflight with that."

Laz looked disappointed. Cooper felt bad for breaking the news to them.

"Hey, there's plenty of stuff to explore. Sure, you may not be able to just waltz over these walls, but there's still plenty just in the Zone."

That seemed to brighten them up.

"... Yeah, I guess that's okay."

"Astronauts are few and far between I'm afraid, but that doesn't mean you can't be one... Just gotta get people to see past the... alien thing. We're back home so, let's relax."

Laz and Sol wandered around the garage. Laz grabbed something to eat and Sol looked over the technology like she always had. Cooper grabbed a soda and walked over to her.

“Taking in the tech?”

“Oh, yes, what does this do? Why does it float?”

“This is the Junction Bypass. It floats because it needs to be kept in as controlled conditions as possible. Remember how I was talking about how the Zone can sometimes modify spacetime? This device forces the Instability to collapse into a road that connects any highway junction to any other highway junction. The kicker is that this road is much shorter than it should be. You can imagine that it is very sensitive, again, the reason why it needs to float. Any physical contact could throw off its delicate signals”

Sol suddenly looked at the device with much more reverence. “Nomai used black hole and white hole to move long distance. We never thought to… stitch spacetime together.”

“Only really works in here, one of the few ways we’ve been able to take advantage of the zone.”

The car’s radio spat out ugly static and the green indicator light flared up. Great, one of these again.

“---re!--t s---ld b---orking now.”

“-----tle--ore-----he ri--t…”

Laz walks back into the workshop, “Who’s on the radio?”

Cooper looked over towards the car, “Nobody, sometimes it picks up old broadcasts that should have fizzled out years ago.”

“----no----e--ther--ay, the other w---”

“... Kinda creepy.”

The signal starts to clear up, “-es!--ig-t th-re, righ- there. Exactly 142.5 degrees.”

“I’ve heard spookier ones before. Not exactly sure where they come from, but based on context, most of them are from around the 70's.”

“Listen! Do you hear the music?”

“Woah, yeah… weird.”

“They fizzle out eventually, sometimes they’re annoying when they interrupt my music.”

“Yeah, I could see that.”

“This is like what I heard last time! Is the transmitter working?”

“Should be, but this place plays hell with the radio.”

“One time, I heard a recording of a group of people slowly getting picked off in the woods, then one said that they had some shampoo… Sometimes I wonder if these were even from real people, or just another trick of the Zone.”

“Signal’s dr-pping. -e’re lo-i-g---.”

“--at? O-----m--on!”

“---------------------”

More static, the orange indicator light switched back on.

“-e all give a little, it can really mean a lot. It's a small, small world, but it's the only one we got.”

“And just like that, they go away.”

“What, is this place haunted?”

He asks himself that question nearly every day.

Cooper shrugs, “Might as well be. I’m gonna test fit some loadouts for when we have to drive to the Well. Now, I’m gonna stress this here; I appreciate your company, both of you, but the Deep Zone is a whole different ball game. Like, turbo dangerous. Are you sure you’re gonna wanna tag along?”

“So long as we stick to the car we’ll be fine right? I didn’t come this far just to sit around in a garage.”

“Yes, I feel the same.”

Cooper grinned and shook his head, “You two are crazy.”

“Coming from the guy who does this daily.”

“Valid point, you amphibious asshole.”

“Many thanks, two-eyed twat.”

“Do I get rude nick-name?”

Cooper thought for a moment, but couldn’t come up with anything, “... It’s not polite to insult a lady. And I’ve already allocated all my alliteration.”

Laz didn’t quite get the memo. They spoke faster than a Kentucky auctioneer, “... shaggy-shithead.”

Solanum held her hand to her mouth and giggled.

“Really? To her face? You should be ashamed…”

“My heart pangs with the deepest of guilt.”

This little shit…

“You got the slick tongue of a Boston native, you know that? You’d be right at home there.”

“You can blame Gossan for that.”

“... Who were they?”

“... Test pilot for our space program. Quick witted, but even quicker to words. That didn’t always work out for them… They convinced me to drink sap wine for the first time. Never really forgave them for that. Porphy’s stock was an... acquired taste, even for them. They said I spent the rest of the night walking around like Tekite after he had just got his prosthetic leg. I didn’t remember of course, ‘Yeah, that’s 'cuz you drank Porphy’s wine!’”

It was the first time Cooper had seen Laz smile when talking about their past.

“... What about you, Sol? Any fond memories? If you don’t mind me pressing, of course.”

Sol wore a contemplative face before starting, “No, trouble. I just… Ah! When I was young, I lived on Ember Twin. Ilex, Taget, Lami, Laevi, my friends, we played game- a game in the caves around large fish skeleton. We would sneak across cave and one would wear a… blind cloth? Blindfold and have to listen for the rest of us. After, Pye would make, ummm… baked pan dough filled with fruit, covered with dough.”

Baked pan dough? What? Like, “... Pie?”

“Pye made pie? That’s funny.”

“.... Yes? That was her name.”

“No. Pie. Like the dish? You take a short pan and line it with dough, fill it with fruit or something else, and then you layer more dough on top and bake it.”

“... English name for пирог is pie? And Pye made it? That is funny! So, yes, Pye would make pie and we would sit and talk. She was like second mother to me.”

“What about you, Coop?”

What about him? He’s gotta have one good story… Oh, yeah this one.

“My dad has this slick car, electric blue ‘71 Challenger, with a Hemi. My mom said it was the first thing he got when he got back from Vietnam. He was always tinkering with it in one way or another. I was helping him out with it one day. We had the car up on ramps. He had me in the driver's seat, pumping the brakes so he could change the brake lines.”

“The car popped out of gear and rolled right over the chock. Of course, he’d disconnected the brakes so I couldn’t stop it. He was lying under the front of the car when it happened, so I’m basically in the middle of the street, looking at him with the wrench in his mouth scrambling to get up. ‘The e-brake! The e-brake!’ He was shouting.”

“We eventually winched the car back up into the driveway. Decided to take a break for the day. Sat on the porch eating popsicles. I thought he was pissed, but he started laughing. Said he hadn’t seen something that ridiculous since he worked in an auto shop.”

“That was earlier this summer, last time I saw him before getting stuck here.”

“... Last time I saw Gossan, I fixed up a piece of mining equipment for them. Then, I said goodbye and… you know the rest.”

“... I last saw my friends and Pye on the launch pad as they waved me off for pilgrimage to Quantum Moon.”

Wow, way to kill the mood.

“... Well, that’s what counts right? Our most cherished memories are always of people we know and love. There’s nothing wrong with that. We miss them, which means they were important to us. That’s only natural.”

“Yeah, that’s… you’re right…” Let’s try and change the subject here, “How about pictures of your ship? I’m sure Francis would be very happy.”

Chapter Text

“-eaking News, covered live in-studio by our specialists.”

“Thank you for tuning into Channel 7. I am Carol Martinez, It is currently four o’clock and we have a very interesting segment in store today;”

“Late this morning, we received an anonymous package here at the studio. Inside was an unmarked tape dated to earlier this morning.”

“After reviewing the tape, studio staff initially discarded it on the belief that it was doctored footage.”

“Shortly thereafter, we began receiving reports of strange, visible phenomena in the Zone; ‘Northern lights colored deep red’ appearing only in a small area over the Exclusion Zone wall.”

“Description of the event bears a definite correlation to what we found on the tape. Except, the tape was recorded via telephoto lens from Canada, providing an unobstructed view of the event.”

“With me, today, is our head meteorologist, Samuel Davis. Samuel, you have some expertise in the field of high altitude phenomena, such as aurora borealis, is that correct?”

“Yes, Carol, that’s correct.”

“Now, for what may well be a Channel 7 exclusive, we will be showing the footage from the tape. Would you mind walking us through it, Samuel?”

“Of course. The tape here shows a time of recording of 4:52 am. The conditions pictured match the conditions from this morning.”

“Then, at 4:56, the ‘aurora’ in question occurs.”

“Around the same time that we started receiving reports on the event.”

“Yes, that’s correct. Now, it is important to mention that this event came with no prior large-scale solar activity and, even more confusing, is that aurora do not occur this low to the ground.”

“And if they did, they would excite the air in a way that would produce light blue light, think lightning.”

“The event is quick, lasting only about a minute, but in that time, the observed size of the excitation quickly shrinks before a flash of yellow light is observed.”

“Now, if you’ll zoom in on the source of that flash…”

“There. A well defined column of yellow light.”

“Rewinding to the start of the event, you’ll see that the formation of this column precedes the formation of the red glow by several seconds. On top of that, this column seems to be the point that the red glow is shrinking down to.”

“In all my experience as a meteorologist, I can confidently say that there exists no natural phenomena capable of producing such an event.”

“Thank you, Samuel. We go now to Jim Ward in Victoria. Jim?”

“... Yes, Carol, we have just arrived here and there is still a definite tension in the air among the people of Victoria.”

“Zooming in behind me, across the water, is the site of the event earlier this morning.”

“Witnesses say the event was centered on what was previously the city of Port Angeles.”

“All around us are of course, more people looking across the water, but also clusters of scientists from A.R.D.A. trying to do the same thing as we are I’d imagine; Staring at the horizon to try and figure out what happened.”

“Oh! Hello there, Jim Ward, Channel 7 Seattle. May we have a word, mister…?”

“Mason Hunt.”

“Did you see what happened across the water earlier this morning, Mister Hunt?”

“Yes, I did. I had woken up for an early morning walk now that the snow’s cleared. I took my usual route by the water when the sky turned red. Even from here I could hear a buzzing in the air.”

“Some believe that that was aurora borealis, what do you have to say to that?”

“You hear that from those A.R.D.A. shrinks? Absolutely not. I’ve seen aurora borealis around here before, that was definitely not the northern lights. I don’t even think it was natural.”

“About the A.R.D.A. scientists, when did they show up?”

“About a half hour after it happened, but they won’t tell us anything. Something’s wrong. The greener ones look excited, but the older guys? They look scared.”

“‘Scared?’”

“Yeah, not terrified, but they’re definitely on edge. Everyone is. That delivery driver that went missing and now this? The Zone is bad news. Real estate’s gonna get cheaper around here, I’ll say that much.”

“Thank you for your time, Mister Hunt.”

“Scientists aren’t gonna say anything, so somebody’s gotta speak up.”

“We’ve approached the A.R.D.A. scientists for comment on the situation, but have heard nothing back. In Victoria, Jim Ward, Channel 7. Back to you, Carol.”

“Thank you, Jim. Such a shame about the recent lack of information from A.R.D.A. Yesterday marked two months since the disappearance of courier Cooper Patterson, leaving no trace behind and prompting no response from the Government organization.”

“The search continues, but authorities still urge members of the public to stay away from the Zone’s walls. If you have any information regarding Mister Patterson’s whereabouts, please contact your nearest law enforcement officer or department.”

“Now, in other news, General Motors announces plans to shutter Oldsmobile following a decline in sales, marking the end of America’s oldest automobile company.”

“...With Radius, Pontiac, Chevrolet, Buick, and Cadillac, we are struggling to strengthen the brand ident-”

Chapter Text

"We've been together since way back when."

Articles were such a new concept.

Solanum had been practicing “English” for the past couple of days, but “definite articles” had still been a source of confusion for her. They made sense, further contextualizing otherwise ambiguous nouns, but their use cases were strange and fickle. Sometimes, the articles weren’t even used!

“...Think about it like this; If I say, ‘I’m going to school,’ that suggests a little ambiguity. Like I’m saying that I’m going to school, as in the building, and school, as in the process. Or, you’re saying it as a good way to use as little information as possible.”

Laz had been helping her, always so patient and considerate. Using every slip up as an opportunity to teach her something new.

“Now, if I say, ‘I’m going to the school,’ that implies that you’re physically, and only physically, going to the actual building. It’s exclusive to the other meanings of the word. You wouldn’t say, ‘I’m going to school’ on a day when school’s out, but you could use, “I’m going to the school” on any day, but usually only when you mean that you are just physically going there.”

Solanum had started to draw connections, it was time to posit a hypothesis.

“Assume there are many schools, would one then use, ‘I’m going to the school’ to suggest specific- a specific school?”

Laz smiled in that warm way that Solanum always enjoyed seeing.

“Yes! Also, in that case, you’d basically be saying that you’re open to questions like ‘which school?’”

“So if I said, ‘I’m going to eat the food…’”

“I would understand that you are implying a specific, a definite, and might ask, ‘What food?’”

“But, if I said, ‘I’m going to eat food…’”

“I would ask, ‘Mind if I join you?’”

They were just like Filix in a way, slowly helping Solanum through the difficult topics and guiding her to the correct answer.

“What about ‘a?’”

“A bit more tricky, a bit more simple. You can get a hint for it by seeing where else ‘a’ is used, Like when I say ‘a person,’ I could also have said ‘one person.’”

They were always genuinely enthusiastic when given the chance to either learn or teach with her. It was somewhat infectious.

“‘A’ basically… Singularizes? Yeah, that’s a good word. Singularizes a noun that you can count. So, you would say ‘I am walking down a path.’”

“So, ‘I am making a breakfast.’”

“Ah, you just said a nice edge case there. You could say, ‘a breakfast,’ if you were making a really special one, like, ‘a seriously awesome breakfast,’ but, since ‘breakfast’ is not usually countable, you’d say, “I am making breakfast.”

“I see, and what is the difference between ‘a’ and ‘an?’”

“There you go! ‘A’ and ‘an’ are the same, but you replace ‘a’ with ‘an’ when the next word starts with a vowel sound. So, try purposefully not following that rule.”

“... This is an garage, I am eating a apple.”

“Feels wrong doesn’t it?”

“Yes! ‘A garage’ and ‘an apple’ definitely flows off the tongue much easier.”

“See? You’re basically a master already.”

“But what about my voice? My accent?”

“You ever hear Cooper? Compared to every other voice I’ve heard, he sounds like an alien.”

Cooper speaks up from under the car, “Hey, I’m from Bahston.” It sounded more exaggerated than usual.

“And, uh… I think your accent sounds kinda… cute.”

"..."

"We're still having fun, and you're still the one."

Well, that certainly gave her pause. Her accent was decidedly not cute! It was impractical and getting in the way of general comprehension of spoken language! However, right now it seemed to be causing another issue; a large amount of bloodflow was coursing up into her face.

It would have been completely quiet if it wasn't for that "juke-box."

“Excuse me?”

Laz suddenly threw their hands up and leaned away, their face became similarly discolored.

“I’m sorry! Uh... pretty! Pretty's a better word, right?”

“No, it’s just… I wasn’t expecting that…”

CLANG

Cooper rolled out from under the car and sat up, “Oh ho ho ho! Mwah, mwah, mwah, mwah. Looks like we got a couple of cosmic crushes over here.”

bweeeeee bweeeoooo

Oh, please.

“Coop? Car dude? Shut up.”

“Yes, shut up, Cooper.”

He sat up and turned around, wrapping both arms around his side in a faux hug. Is this how all people from “Boston” acted? If so, the prospects of leaving this Zone were certainly losing their luster.

Laz threw a pencil at his head. Cooper slumped over on the car door.

“Ahhhh. Ohhhhh. Owwww. I’ve taken a grievous wound. Aaaaaah, we’re just messin’ around with ya! Isn’t that right, car… dude. Huh.”

Cooper stilled.

“What?”

“How have I not come up with a name for the car?!”

The car excitedly jumped on its front wheels, like when Solanum told Laevi that she would be going to the Quantum Moon after her.

BEEP BEEEP

“Oh, we gotta come up with something! Any ideas?”

Solanum started, a good deal of ire in her voice, “Well, if I may, Nomai clans would usually name vessels after the place they were built.”

Cooper frowned, “... Michigan?”

bzzzzzzz

Apparently a negative answer. Solanum didn’t quite like the sound of ‘Michigan’ either.

“Well, Nomai are named after plants, and we get our names from minerals…”

“Ah! So how about a metal? Titanium? No, that has terrible nickname potential…”

“Steel?”

bzzzzz

“Cobalt.”

bzzzzz

“... Silver?”

bzzzzz

The car was being very picky. It was just a name! Still, Solanum wondered if she would have been as indecisive if she were old enough. What would the Vessel have chosen as its name? It was such a strange concept, a living machine.

“Hmmm… Oooh! I know! Memory metal, Nitinol.”

… BEEP BEEP

“Does that work?”

The car rocked on its wheels. It was strangely endearing.

BEEP BEEEEEP

“Alright, say hello to Nitinol.”

“Hey.”

“Hello, Nitinol.”

BEEP

Cooper crawled back underneath "Nitinol," Apparently satisfied with his teasing for the moment.

“Alright, hold still. Don’t go crushing me while I’m working on you.”

Solanum turned back to Laz, one question on her mind.

“Did you mean that? About my voice being pretty?”

“Wha- Of course! You’re amazing. Your unrestrained curiosity is infectious. Every time I saw you, back then, in the uh... loops, you were always so enthusiastic. Like a shining beam of happiness and wonder, but you were trapped, in one way or another, like I was. It was easy to identify with you.”

“Well, I admire your bravery and that you took the risk just to save me. I admit that I feel a sense of connection with you.”

She really ought to control herself, this is an alien species! But, did that matter? Laz is just a person. A person who supported her when she was at her lowest and trusted her enough to allow her to support them...

She did not experience the passage of time on the Quantum Moon, for her it had felt like only a handful of hours, but when Laz told her of her clan? It was as if the desolation of those false years caught up with her in an instant. And Laz... they were empathetic enough to share her deepest pains regarding the whole... event.

She had barely even been in this new reality for a couple of days, but she already knew she could trust the two... three of them. Laz is understanding, Cooper is... rambunctious, Nitinol is... well, it's a machine, but most importantly they were all good people. She could trust them.

She had lost her family, but had found a new one. Given the circumstances, she could not have asked for more.

Chapter Text

“-then we must build a stronger one!”

Gabbro had sauntered over to where Slate and Chert were… energetically discussing something. Relax, dude.

“I probably could, the bigger buildings have what looks like powerful radio arrays, but I have no idea how to work them.”

“Is that our best option?”

Time to jump into the rapids, “Hey, what’s going on over here?”

“Hey, Gabbro, how’s the hammock holding up?”

“Great. This tree thing is my new friend.”

“Hello, Gabbro. We’re trying to transmit towards a radio signal we picked up a good distance away. But this… this damnable place wreaks havoc with any transmission equipment!”

Chert seemed like they were going to explode, poor dude had a lot riding on them, there were bags under their eyes. They were the only smart one that didn’t have a role back at the village, so everybody went to them.

Sounds like torture.

What usually calmed them down? Oh, right.

“Hey, why don’t you explain to me what’s going on. Walk me through it, Alright?”

“You. Interested in things that I’m doing. This place really is strange.”

Gabbro stared at Chert expectantly.

“... Alright. We found a signal coming from… somewhere. It’s music, in Hearthian.”

That’s weeeeeeeeeird.

“Partway through a song, I heard voices, speaking to each other over the radio.”

“So there’s people out there? Cool.”

“Yeah, but everyone’s here. Except for, except for… Laz. Chert thinks they’re the same species as whoever used to be here.”

“Yes, and they were talking about how the Sun came up, but the Sun went- Well uh... It’s gone. We- uh… We need to get in contact to figure out what’s going on.”

Chert was starting to shake. Their voice wavered with every word. Gabbro hadn’t seen someone act like that since Laz after the first loop. What had Chert so wound up? They never knew about the loops, Laz said they were on Ember Twin the whole time, well away from any statues.

Oh, right. Ember Twin.

“Hey, Chert. You doing okay? You were on Ember Twin, righ-”

“It’s fine. I’m fine. We’re alive, there’s nothing to worry about.”

Whatever you say, buddy, “... How’s the sitch with the food and water?”

“I helped Tuff drill down a well. Gneiss and Porphy both say the water’s drinkable, but I’m still gonna set up a still, just in case.”

“Yes, and your… ‘garbage buddy’ continues to deliver a steady supply of food and raw materials. We are in a dangerous, yet otherwise stable position here. I still wonder why these buildings were put on wheels… Maybe they are meant to move… Perhaps we should be moving.”

“Hey, we’re fine here right? No need to overcomplicate things… You doing okay? I think maybe you should take a break.”

Uh oh, wrong words, they look pissed.

“‘Take a break?’ ‘Take a break?!’ Gabbro, all you have been doing is taking breaks! Some of us are actually doing stuff right now!”

“Hey, Chert, maybe they’re right, you should really catch-”

“Shut up! SHUT UP! You don’t know what it was like! While you were lazing on Giant’s Deep and you were doing... whatever you do for the launches, I was out there doing work! I watched as one by one, stars in the sky fizzled out and then stared down our own sun as it collapsed and incinerated me! Now Laz is missing and we find ourselves hanging on by a thread! And you!"

Chert pressed a finger solely into Gabbro's chest. Fire in their eyes.

"You- you… You’re completely fine. How do you do it? You found what may well be our most important lifeline while you spend most of your time knocked back on that hammock of yours. Whereas I… I haven’t completed much of substance here…”

That's a look Gabbro knew. They’d seen it in Laz a thousand and a half times. Laz had gone straight to Gabbro after that first loop they actually saw the supernova. They desperately needed somebody to talk to, but Chert? They had been keeping it in. That could not be healthy. There was really only one thing Gabbro knew could fix this.

“... Chert, get some rest. You look like you haven’t slept since we got here.”

“I haven’t. Every time I close my eyes, I see it. The blue light, the burn…”

“... I’ll help you. I think I may have come to peace with the whole situation earlier than most.”

Gabbro guided Chert back to the largest building. The one with six wheels and the humpback glass roof. It had been set up as the de facto village center. It was full of seats and it was generally the quietest inside. Gabbro had become numb to the loud sounds of high winds, they forgot how silence was usually a prerequisite for sleep for most people.

They guided chert to the full length seat at the very back, plenty of space to lie down.

“The trick is deep breaths, but don’t think happy thoughts, just don’t think of anything. For once in your life, try not to think.”

“... I could do without the snarky remarks.”

“You need to think to speak! No thinking.”

Gabbro sat there for a while, watching over Chert, bouncing back and forth with the same arguments. They both settled into silence. Chert would periodically break into restrained sobs.

It was too familiar.

Gabbro kept by Chert until they stilled and fell silent, it took hours. Their breaths were shaky and shallow, but they were, importantly, asleep.

Gabbro slid the curtain from the door. Gneiss was waiting just outside.

“Keep an eye on them, they’ve had it rough.”

“How bad is it?”

Gabbro's face felt weird, like every muscle in it was tensed up. Brows furrowed and mouth hanging in a distinct arch. Being alone on Giant's Deep was just simple, but life isn't simple. They owe it to everybody else to at least be there.

“They haven't slept since we got here, saw what happened firsthand. I’m gonna tell Hal and Riebeck that they’re gonna be out of commission for a while.”

It was sobering. It really was. Gabbro didn’t know what to expect after Laz shot off that final loop, but it wasn’t this. Everyone was here, everyone was getting by, but it was quiet. Everyone was distant. They'd barely even held a proper return party for Feldspar. Gossan and Hornfels and Esker seemed to be the only purely happy people there. Speaking of…

“Hey, Esker. Hey, Feldspar, holding up?”

“Yeah, I didn’t expect to end up here after getting out of Dark Bramble, but hey! Anything’s better than that place. Even if it’s… basically the same… At least I can talk to people again, right?”

“So much for Hornfels eating your ear off about those statues.”

Didn’t need to remind them of that, “Oh yeah, I don’t have to carry a giant statue back to my ship, what a shame.”

“... What brings you off that hammock of yours?”

“Chert’s… They haven’t been doing well since we got here. They haven't slept at all. Finally managed to get them to call it.”

“They haven’t slept? That little workaholic…”

“It’s not like that, they haven’t been able to sleep. They were on Ember Twin, had a front row seat back there.”

They didn't need more explanation than that, Esker already knew what Gabbro meant.

“Oh.”

“... And we’re sure the Sun blew up? That’s something we’re sure about? I mean, I couldn’t see it at all, but the glow coming through the fog? And the burn? I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“I barely saw it. My cabin casted a shadow from it, so I got up and looked around the side just in time to get a facefull of plasma.”

“Couldn’t see much through the cloud cover on Giant’s Deep, but I had a feeling.”

“...”

“...”

“No Laz yet, right?”

There’s the question, the same one them and everybody else here was silently asking themselves.

“No. Nothing.”

“... It’s like the world traded them for me…”

“Hey, dude, don’t think like that. It’s not your fault.”

“... What are we even doing here?”

“Chert found a signal from who knows where, sometimes there’s people talking on it. Slate’s working on building a transmitter to get in touch, but until then? It’s too dangerous to move anywhere around here.”

“What, like those glowing statues?”

“Never living that down, huh?”

“Not as long as you’re wearing those bandages.”

“... What are we gonna do?”

“... I’ll get back to you when I figure that out. See ya, Esker. See ya, Feldspar.”

“See you around.”

“Catch you later.”

Gabbro continued on towards Hal and Riebeck’s building. Esker and Feldspar wandered off. Esker had volunteered to stick around Feldspar while Hornfels was busy with whatever needed to be done around here. So, effectively, all the time. Feldspar would fall down, then get back up chuckling. Eight years of muscle fatigue and malnutrition would do that to you.

Gabbro paused at the door. Hal asked. Hal always asked. And it always hurt a little more when Gabbro would say “No.” Everyone else seemed too afraid to question sometimes, especially Riebeck.

knock knock

“Come in!”

“Hey.”

“Hey, Gabbro.”

“How’s it going, Gabbro… Where’s Chert?”

“Sleeping in the ‘hound. They haven’t slept since we got here, y’know; Too… messed up to get any shuteye.”

“I thought something was wrong, they’ve been so… quiet lately.”

“... Do you think we’ll find Laz?”

There it is, right on schedule, Hal. Question was phrased differently this time, they’re giving up hope.

“N- I… don’t know, but I do know it’s not like them to give up. If they’re out there? They’ll be here.”

“It just- It’s unfair. They wanted to be an astronaut all their life, but they only got a whole half hour before the Sun blew up. Now we can’t even find them.”

“It could have been worse. I mean, it was a supernova! At least the hatchlings are safe, and we get to learn about a whole other alien species! I wonder what their villages were like…”

Riebeck… The only thing that could outweigh their fear of danger and near certain death was a level of curiosity uncommon for even Hearthians. They’d probably like discussing that.

“Villages? Isn’t this a village?”

There it was, that certainly lifted their spirits. Riebeck slowly unfurled from their little ball in the corner.

“No! No, not at all. The medical cabin is the only permanent building. From what I can tell, the rest of these were built to move, and I mean move. Meant for covering long distances on the ground! Which makes sense, given the size of the… empty… barren… field we’re… stuck in… Uhm… and the construction is all metal! For each one!”

“They move? Why aren’t they right now? Are they sleeping? Ooooh, do you think they’d be my friends?”

“They’re machines, Gabbro.”

“Doesn’t mean they can’t still be friends! What’re you up to Hal?”

“Trying to figure out where exactly we are… Found a route map, but I don’t know where exactly they stopped. If they abandoned machines that could move on their own and carry them from place to place… Something must have gone really bad. I wonder if we should be staying around here.”

That’s really foreboding, it was the second time they'd heard that. Unfortunately, it one of the few things that made sense lately… Bad news…

“Hey, look. We’re fine, right? No need to worry about that right now.”

Gabbro wasn’t sure of that themself to be honest. They weren’t going full panic mode, but there was a definite tension, even for them. They couldn’t crack… not now. If Gabbro cracks… that’s because things are really bad. But it wasn’t bad. There really was no reason to worry.

“I’ll see you around.”

“Yep.”

“Later, Gabbro.”

Everyone was affected by this, even the hatchlings. If there was one thing that stood out to Gabbro, it was that everyone seemed too afraid to say “Goodbye.” Like, if they did, that person would end up disappearing… like Laz. Come on, time buddy. They just have to be out there.

Chapter Text

be-beep be-beep be-beep be-beep

click

“In my mind, I can see reminders of a past decay.”

be-beep be-beep be-beep be-beep

“So far behind, like the shadows linger at the close of day.”

“Hey, come on, Coop, wake up.”

be-beep be-beep be-

“G’Morning.”

Another day, another… wait, he didn’t have any plans for today. Just waiting on Francis to finish the Well Stabilizer. Wooooo, another off day. Hmmm, that smelled good.

“Sol insisted that we make you breakfast for a change.”

“Yes! Working with alien fruits was an interesting challenge, but we made a ‘pie!’ Just like Pye taught me.”

“How’d it go? Making a setup for the car yesterday.”

“Went good, I still have a set of Olympium panels from the first time I went, we’ll use those.”

Cooper crawled out of bed and dragged his way over to the workbench, paper and tools had been pushed to the side to make enough room for a dining table. Three slices of pie were sat on plates.

“Looks good… What’d you put in it?”

“Apple, blue-berry, and cimm- cinn-a-mon. Very interesting spice!”

Sol stared at him with expectant eyes.

Cooper sat down and dug in. She leaned in closer.

“What’s the plan for today, Coop?”

“Nothing, just waiting on Francis. Y’know this is really really good.”

She beamed.

“I told you you’d do well!”

Cooper couldn’t help but crack a smile.

“How did you make this?”

“Large, round, wheeled building had an oven!”

“Wha- Oh, the Airstream! Why didn’t I ever think to use the kitchen in there?”

"Yeah, what's that thing for anyway?"

"Big ol' house on the road. Take the comforts of home with you while you're out exploring this place."

“... What was this place like? Before the Zone?”

“... Mountains, trees, pure untamed wilderness. 'Perfect for the outdoorsy types.' Nobody knew LIM Tech would turn out as bad as it did. If anybody had any good idea, they probably woulda done all this in Los Alamos or something. What was it like on Timber Hearth?”

“Kinda like it is here. Tall trees, but the whole planet was tiny compared to this place.”

“I guessed as much… How about you? Where did you live, Sol?”

“I grew up in Ember Twin. In the Sunless City, built into a cave. I then spent much time on Brittle Hollow, learning in the Hanging City. There was a black hole at the center of the planet that the scientists would experiment with.”

Say whu- Huh? What? Huh? “A black hole? Isn’t that, like, really dangerous? And impossible? The whole planet should have been eaten.”

“Oh, no. Brittle Hollow’s black hole was linked to a white hole. If you fell in you would end up near it. Paired black holes act different than regular black holes.”

“Yeah, that’s how my scout works.”

Wormholes. Cool. Oppy would have loved to get her hands on that tech.

The three of them sat and worked away at the pie. It was nice, just like Thanksgiving. Cooper finished his plate first.

“Mmm! I should get to work on your spacesuits!”

“What for?”

“Deep Zone is heavily irradiated and contaminated, best thing for it is hermetically sealed suits. Which you two, conveniently, have. I’m gonna need to beef them up. Anti-puncture lining and explosive resistant vests.”

Solanum spoke through a full mouth, “Exprosirph?!”

“Told you it was dangerous in there.”

Laz suddenly looked a bit concerned. Hey, buddy, you already signed up.

“What did we get ourselves into?”

“It’ll be fiiiiiine. Just stay away from anything glowing red. Or pink. Or- y’know just stay away from anything glowing. And don’t shake hands with the crash test dummies.”

“... Would you mind if we got more practice driving?”

Cooper thought about it for a moment. It couldn’t hurt.

“... Why not? What do you say Nitinol, let ‘em have a couple rounds on the test track?”

BEE-BEEP

“If it’s okay with it, that’s fine by me.”

Laz quickly finished their pie and rushed over to the car, Solanum excitedly followed close behind.

“Sweet! I’ll try to bring it back in one piece!”

“You’ll do more than try.”

They shut themselves into the car and started the engine. They sat still for a while.

“Hey, uh… How do I-”

“Move the shifter to ‘R.’”

“Oh. Right.”

The wagon slowly backed out of the garage.

“Ey, Nite! Make sure they don’t crash.”

BEEP-BEEEeeeeeeep…..

The car left the garage entirely, outside were the sounds of eight cylinders and slipping dirt.

Just like old days. It was just Cooper and the garage.

Really kinda miserable when he thought about it. No matter. He’s got some spacesuits to mess with.

Cooper brought the two spacesuits to the Outfitting Station. He carefully took the base components apart and left the helmets to the side. No reason to mess with those. They could always wear their ponchos over their suits, so they were covered on the acid front. They were also spacesuits so radiation was already a given. It was just punctures and explosives that were really important.

He got to work on Laz’s suit first. Their anatomy was pretty similar, so it would be easier. The suit was lined with carbon fiber sheet and plate, and a healthy complement of Red Balloons. There was a good deal of excess material on the outside of the suit, so he hung some Olympium plates from a harness and slipped it underneath. Nice and low profile, similar protection to his own kit. What time is it? 9 am. He was making good time.

The roar of the engine outside fell to a low rumble, the sliding stopped. Solanum must be driving now.

It would probably be better for Sol to keep her metal space boots for this. It didn’t seem all too cold in Midzone. Plus, metal was better than canvas in the event of a Blacksmith sending a stray Titan’s Bone up from underneath her. 

More carbon fiber, more Red Balloons… More coffee. This time he took extra care to account for any anatomical differences. Seams were closed up and sealed. Solanum’s suit also had a sort of exterior layer, so Cooper stitched together another vest with several thousand adjustment points, just in case. The vest slipped underneath. It was good work, he could barely tell he had done anything with them.

And, time. 12:49. He hooked up the air supply of the two suits and ran some pressure into them. No hissing, no leaks. No problem. 

…

Now what? Not much else to do… Geez, how did he ever fight away the boredom? Maybe he could… No, already did that.

…

12:50

…

beep beep
--------fsssssssshhhhh

Oh, thank God.

The F.A.X. Machine shot out static, “Cooper, come in.”

“Hey, Francis. How’s it going?” He greeted, trying not to sound desperate.

“Finished work on the Well Stabilizer. The profile you scanned from Cappy was a treasure trove of information on high-amplitude hyperoscillodynamics! I don’t think I could have done this without it.”

“Cool. Well, send over the blueprints. I’ll get to work over here.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea… This thing is specialized, one-of-a-kind, boutique. I’m going to need some hands-on time with the ARC Device to properly integrate and calibrate it.”

“You trust my skills as a mechanic that little?”

“... What happened to the first Nitro Booster you built?”

That's a low blow.

“... That’s fair. So how does it work?”

“It keeps your LIM phases aligned while you’re in the Well. Just entering the Well causes an energy spike that effectively de-synchronizes any and all waveforms in there. This will chew on a steady supply of anchor energy to force the LIM phases to align. It’s not pretty, but it’s the only way to do this from a mobile platform.”

“Alright, so stock up on anchor energy, stop at your place, then cannonball to the Well. Seen that signal show up again?”

“No, not a trace, but it was there, and any activity with the Well-

“Is bad activity. Yeah, I’m aware.”

“I get to meet real aliens! Tobias would be going crazy right now… And, uh… It’ll be a pleasure to finally meet you in person too.”

“Thanks… I’ll round them up, we’ll be moving soon. Pine Tree Auto, out.”

“Francis, out.”

Cooper walked outside and waved the trio in. The car eased onto the scanner. Nice and straight. Nice and slow. Must be Sol.

“Get your stuff together people! We are moving!”

“...What?”

“Francis finished the Well Stabilizer, we’re gonna hang the Olympium panels on Nite here and we’re gearjamming straight over to Francis’s. And then, the Well.”

Cooper swung his hand out in front of his face, as if the word was appearing in front of him. Though it wasn’t some place he particularly wanted to go back to.

“We get to meet Francis? He is a scientist, correct? I would enjoy speaking to him.”

“Yep, prepare for a long drive though, we’re not using any bypasses; We’re gonna need as much anchor energy as possible.”

Laz hopped down from the passenger seat. Sol clambered around the steering wheel and out of the driver’s seat.

“Your suits are both ready, in the utility room next to the F.A.X. Machine. Tell me how they fit, I’m gonna hang the panels.”

The two of them rushed over to the room and emerged with their suits. They raced each other to the bathroom. Sol got there first.

“Aw come on! You shoved me!”

The only response was a muffled “Ha-ha” through the door.

Cooper shoveled a path outside to the parts lockers and loaded the Olympium panels onto the pushcart. It slid more than it rolled over the ice. The cart found its place next to the car. Next to Nitinol. Laz and Sol were wrapped in their spacesuits, minus the helmets. Cooper got to work unbolting the anticorrosive panels.

“So? How do they feel?”

“A bit heavier, but otherwise? No real difference.”

“I agree! You did very good work, Cooper.”

“... Need any help?”

“That’d be great. There’s a couple of spare impact guns on the shelf next to the garage door. Grab a 10 and a 13.”

After a bit more explanation and pointers, the group got to disassembling the outer shell of the car and, eventually, mounting the extremely heavy Olympium panels. The car looked like it was ready to drive through hell.

“... I’m not an expert on these things, but… If we’re driving to a place with a real risk of explosion, isn’t wood… not a good idea? Especially coming from the guy that complained about wood landing legs?”

“What? Oh, that’s not wood, it’s a decal, vinyl covering.”

“... Why wood?”

“Older station wagons actually used wood, think of this as-”

“Tradition!” Solanum suddenly looked very bashful, “Apologies, I did not mean to interrupt. Nomai had a similar practice. It is the reason my helmet is shaped like the helmets of my ancestors.”

“Yep, basically the same thing. Alright, are we ready? Got some snacks? Blankets?”

“Yep, yep, yep.”

“... Three yeses.”

“No reason to dilly-dally, let’s hit the road.”

They strapped into the car. Nitinol set off with a rumble and they were on their way. It was going to be a simple drive; access road, anchors, access road, anchors, access road, Francis, anchors… Then repeat the process all the way up to the Well. More than a day on the road. Hoooo boy.

Cooper radioed Francis and they settled in on the access road. Cooper swooped around E7 and they were off again. Laz was experimenting with the wondrous magic of the electric guitar, Solanum joined them with that stick thing of hers. It was one of the few times Cooper shut his radio off and just sat and listened. Company was good.

Chapter Text

Axes, as it turns out, are not the quietest thing in the world.

Wood was always their lifeline. Need a fire? Wood. Need a new building? Wood. Unfortunately, it seemed to be a bit of a hot commodity right now. They had plenty of shelter, but that wall needed constant upkeep and fire was still an absolute necessity.

Marl had trudged out with Tuff and Gossan, they had a large cart from the village in tow. Tekite had wanted to come, but with that leg? What if they needed to run?

It didn’t really matter anyway right now. They had finally made it to a grouping of trees, but one of those things was crawling through the ground right next to them. Strangely enough, this one was pink, not the electric blue of the other ones, and everywhere it went, it spit out boxes that rolled around and exploded.

They hid, best they could behind the trees, sharing concerned looks between themselves. Gossan was tense, looking around with a discerning eye. Tuff was similarly steeled, clutching their axe to their chest.

For Marl’s part, they were silent as could be. Those things scared them proper the first time they went out, but after the seventeenth run-in with them, it lost its novelty quick.

The crackling and blasts receded. The pink light faded into the haze.

Marl peeked around the tree, “I… Think we’re good.”

“Yeah, I don’t hear ‘em at all. How are you holding up, Tuff?

“Fine, this still definitely beats that cave.”

“Well, let’s not dawdle.”

They got to work splitting wood and parting fibers. One by one, trees fell to the ground and were sized up for the cart.

The big tree back home got what was coming to it. It was almost lucky it was the Sun that did it in, given how quick the three of them were working through these.

The logs were layered on and Gossan tossed some rope over the whole stack.

“That’s as much as we’re fitting on this, let’s tie ‘em down and make for the village.”

“Yeah, I’m starting to not like it out here.”

“What? Nerves getting to you on your first run?”

“I won’t lie to you there, but I still got solid ground under my feet. I’ll be fine.”

Gossan hefted the cart straps over their shoulder with a grin, “Well, make sure you stay away from the blue stuff; You walk through that and you start floating!”

Some of the color drained from Tuff’s face, “You’re kidding.”

“Alright, come on. Let’s not make them lose their lunch.”

They hauled their well-gotten-gains back towards the village.

Tuff leaned in to whisper, “Were they lying? About the blue stuff?”

“Nope, but we only ever saw it once. There’s nothing to worry about.”

They had seen it more than once, but it was already difficult hauling this load, they didn’t want to haul an unconscious Hearthian on top of it.

“‘Radiation levels are rising! It looks like a full scale constructive runaway!’”

They all froze in place. The voice seemed to be coming from everywhere.

“Who’s there?!”

“‘I- I can’t arrest it! The inhibitors are getting drowned out!’”

“Hello?!”

“‘Lock down all entrances and ventilation! Level 10 Shielding!’”

“Guys? What the hell is going on?”

They both stared at Tuff, then at each other. Completely at a loss for words. There was only barren dirt and haze in every direction, nowhere where these voices could be coming from.

“‘That’s not going to work! We have to use the main emitters! Inverted polarity!’”

“‘The field is too saturated! We can’t get a connection to- Turner! Turner! Get back here! You’re going to get yourself killed!’”

“‘It’s the only way! This whole place is going to blow!’”

“‘Turner! Don’t be stupid! Get ba- Turner! Gamma levels are rising! … Holy shit… ALLEN! GET OUT OF THERE! NOW!’”

They all waited with bated breath as the desperate shouting faded into the haze. They didn’t hear anything else. Gossan was snapping their head around. Tuff looked like they were afraid to move. Marl felt their heart in their throat.

“We all… We all heard that… Right? ‘Cuz I had some of the wine Porphy made from this place earlier…”

“Yeah, I heard that. Let’s get the hell outta here.”

They pulled as hard as they could all the way back to the village. Soon enough, the wall loomed through the haze just as the straps were starting to imprint ugly purple marks into their shoulders.

“Tekite! We’re back! Let us in!”

It wasn’t the voice Marl usually used. They felt their voice waver and hitch. They were desperate… and a little scared.

The gates unceremoniously swung open. Tekite was on the other side, a worried look on their face.

“Thank the stars you’re back! We thought something bad happened out there.”

Gossan dropped the straps from their shoulders, “The voices?”

“I take it you heard them too then. Everyone’s spooked, especially the hatchlings. Rutile wants these walls strengthened up. It’s a good thing you came back with so much.”

“Yeah, Tuff did a good job.”

“It was only a difference between hitting rock and hitting wood.”

“We’re just a little winded right now is all.”

“Of course! You three look like you ran the whole way back.”

“We did.”

“Oooh, yeah. You three need to rest… Marl, you think you can still-”

“Yeah, I can keep watch. It’s just sitting around after all.”

“Thanks, I’ll see if Gneiss can get you some hot food.”

Marl made their way over to their little section of the wall and clambered up to the overlook. Their sore muscles threatened to have them fall to the ground.

“Hey Marl, glad to see you’re back.”

Hey, here comes Moraine.

“Hey, there, tree-guardian. Looks like your pal finally got its just-deserts.”

“Yeah, but it wasn’t you now, was it?”

Come on, just let them have this.

“Tomato, Tomahto. Looking for more signals? Need a boost?”

“Yeah, can you help me up?”

Marl strained their arm as they lifted Moraine up to their lookout.

“I’m gonna try to find those voices.”

“Ooooh yeah, those were spooky. Gave Tuff, quite the scare. Gossan too.”

“And you.”

“Maybe. Oooh, you know I saw another one of those electricity things, except this one was pink!”

“Really? Cooooool, I wonder what it sounds like?”

Their arch-nemesis was good company while out on these watches. Helped to ease away the boredom of it all.

“Think you could cover for me today? The sprint back here left us all pretty tuckered out.”

“Oh, yeah sure. I’ve got plenty of rest.”

No need to rub it in.

Chapter Text

Did his hair look good? He hoped it looked good. Francis made sure to grab the cleanest lab coat he had left and his mostly intact tie. First Contact! With two alien species! Well, second contact, counting Cooper.

Doesn’t matter! They would be here soon. It may be one in the morning, but he could hardly sleep. The excitement pervaded his whole being. It was the only reason he had enough energy to sextuple check the Well Stabilizer. It should work. It will work. It has to. There’s no reason it shouldn’t. He had been exact in every calculation. Would’ve given Oppy a run for her money.

…

Maybe the garden could use some work? Yeah, yeah… He’d been so caught up in the battery farm that he forgot about his actual farm. Francis had never been much of a green thumb, that was more Tobias’s thing… He’d be happy seeing how much Francis had learned.

The greenhouse stood tall and strong. The potatoes and tomatoes were nice and healthy and the apple and orange trees stood as the centerpiece of the whole place. Herbs and vines and flowers crawled along the dirt of the planters. It was the only place of untainted nature left this deep into the Zone. They were always so proud of it.

The impact-resistant, anticorrosive glass walls started rattling. It made Francis freeze in place. Another Seismic Squall? Oh, right. It had been a while since Francis heard that sound, well over a decade. It was an engine. They were almost here…

They were almost here!

He scrambled outside just in time to see a shelf of yellow light cut through the fog over a hill before two circular lights crested over the road to replace it.

BEEP-BEEP

It wasn’t what Francis had been picturing all this time. When Cooper said “wagon” he’d assumed that it was a Jimmy or an Eagle, heck, even a Jeep; Those were popular around here. He certainly wasn’t expecting a… that, especially with how Cooper drove it. He could scarcely believe that that “National Lampoon’s Vacation” car was what Cooper had been relying on all this time. Probably shouldn’t say that out loud, given that it was proven that the car is alive. Wouldn’t want to get on the nerves of a two-ton, 500 horsepower machine… Plus, it must have been capable, since Cooper was still alive.

The car eased to a stop just next to Francis, Cooper got out first.

Cooper shot his hands up, “Francerooski!-”

“Don’t call me that.”

“-How’s it going?” Cooper stuck his hand out. Francis took it, but Cooper pulled him into a weird half-hug-half-handshake thing. How much had Francis missed?

“It’s been good over here! All this time, we actually meet in person!” He patted Cooper on the back.

Laz and Solanum hopped out of the car. The pictures really didn’t do them justice.

“Hey, Francis.”

“Hello, Francis.”

Genuine, real aliens, “Uh- buh- uhp- duh… Hey! Laz, Solanum, It’s nice to finally be meeting you guys in person!” He stuck his hand out, Laz took it and shook it. It felt like a regular person’s grip, just… three-fingered-y. Solanum was obviously studying the motion. It took her a moment to get a proper grip, but she shook his hand as well.

“You are a scientist of this place, correct? I would like to discuss some of the phenomena of this ‘Zone’ with you.”

Scientific, empirical discussion with an alien? “Well, of course! I’d love to bounce ideas off of someone with such a different viewpoint.”

Their facial structures were strange, both of them, but Francis could still clearly tell that she was smiling.

“Gonna say hi to Nite?”

“... Nite?”

BEEP-BEEP

“You named it? Well, hello Nite. I hope these three haven’t been too rough on you.”

The screen on the dashboard showed a station wagon roll up and produce a waving hand from its roof.

“Yeah, we couldn’t just keep calling it ‘the car’ or ‘the Remnant,’ so we went with Nitinol.”

“Ah, like memory metal, because it’s alive. I thought only Tobias could come up with cheeky names. Can I make you guys anything before we get started? You’re going to be here for a while. I have a garden and one of those ‘Friendly Dumpsters’ nearby.”

“I would appreciate that very much, thank you.”

“Any fish?”

“Sure. Let’s see what more than a decade of Zone life can do for the culinary arts.”

“I can do charcuterie, but my options are pretty limited, no fish… Oooh! How about some of Francis’s own twice-baked potatoes?”

Was he being too much? Yeah... maybe... but, well, aliens! It didn’t matter! So long as he gets to talk with them.

“Don’t really have any preference. I lost my ability to get disgusted a while ago.”

“My cooking’s not that bad.”

“I wasn’t saying it was.”

How did he ever put up with people from the East Coast?

He got to work on the food and had Cooper pull the car- Nite up to the side of his little cabin. Laz waited patiently as Solanum used the shower. He shut the potatoes into the oven and brought his hi-fi out under the awning so he could listen to music while he worked. He put on his favorite record.

“No shit, you like Boston?” Cooper had stopped dead in front of the door and was inspecting his setup.

Francis turned around from the ARC Device, “Yeah, why wouldn’t I?”

“Didn’t take you for the hard rock type, I was thinking more like America or the Doobies.”

“They were always one of Tobias's favorites. I grabbed this album as soon as it was available around here. It was the last one I picked up before the closure.”

“... Mind if I put something on?”

“Go ahead.”

Cooper fished around inside the car and produced a tape from the glovebox. He put it into the hi-fi. Didn’t he know it’s rude to interrupt someone’s music? It’s fine, they’re guests. Huh, that sounds… familiar.

“That kind of sounds like Boston.”

“Because it is. Walk On, 1994.”

Francis shot up from his work mat, “What? Are you serious? Oh, man, you gotta let me copy this.”

“Go ahead. It was a gift from my dad. It’s the only tape I keep in my glovebox, little keepsake. One of the few things I was able to salvage from my delivery van.”

“... Do you miss them? Your family?”

“Of course, but stuff is still happening in this place. One way or another, the Zone still needs me.”

“Unfortunately.”

“... Well, I’ll leave you to it. It’s my turn for the shower soon, then a nap. Thanks for having us by the way.”

“No problem.”

Cooper filtered back in through the back door. It really hadn’t dawned on Francis just how bad Cooper’s situation was. Sure, they were all stuck here, but Francis, the breachers, and everybody else? They made that choice. Cooper just held the unfortunate title of being the first and only unwilling breacher. They wanted to stay, he wanted to leave. He did have a commendable sense of duty, though Francis wondered if he was doing alright. Now, Laz and Solanum… That was a strange situation. Sure, they were trapped here, but maybe that’s for the better. Who knows what A.R.D.A. would do to a couple of aliens that came from the Zone. Who knows what Francis would have done back then.

Solanum eventually came out, curious to see what he was up to. The hair? Fur? Same thing, on the top of her head was wrapped in a towel, too much to dry in a reasonable amount of time.

“Oh! Hello, Solanum.”

“Hello, Francis. If it would be no trouble, may I watch what you are doing?

“Be my guest.”

“... I already am your guest?”

“Uh… it’s a saying. Like, ‘make yourself at home.’ I am conveying to you that I am comfortable with you doing whatever you wish, in this case, watching me.”

“Ah! That makes sense! There are many… symbolic semi-truths in your language.”

“Metaphors?”

“Yes, that is the word.”

She sat on the nearby stool, attentively watching each thing that Francis did.

“What is the goal of this change? How does it work?”

“I’m hooking up this device, the Well Stabilizer, to the gateway emitters. It’ll use anchor energy to force the waveforms of whatever entered with it to remain in phase with the Well. It’s a difficult, finicky process from a distance, but if you’re in the Well, it can effectively brute force the synchronization of the LIM waves. You had swing sets right? Little things you could sit on that hung from an iverhead support?"

She had a contemplative look on her face before answering, "Ah! Yes. There were some on Brittle Hollow, on the surface near the school."

"Well, think of it as pushing someone on a swing; You can get away with tiny nudges if you push them at the right time, but, as long as you're giving them a good shove, you don't have to be exact with your pushes. It's not exactly pretty, it won’t do anything exact, but it’ll get close enough that it won’t matter anyway.”

Solanum took a moment, obviously digesting the information, “... What happens if the phases misalign?”

“The interference from the foreign object will cause a destructive collapse of the waveforms in the Well and, by extension, that region of the Well itself. But that won’t happen unless you run out of anchor energy, which Cooper should have collected a good amount of.”

That reminds him… “Cooper! How much anchor energy have you gotten so far?”

Cooper’s voice reverberated out the door, “Just over 12 kLIM.”

“That’s pretty good.”

“I aim to please.”

“... How long will the anchor energy last?”

“Well, he has twelve, and there are more junctions up ahead… I’m not entirely sure, but a couple of hours at minimum, you don’t need to worry about a-”

Ding!

“Hey! First bake’s done. Wanna see why they’re called twice baked?”

“I am very interested.”

Francis guided her back inside. Cooper was already knocked out on the couch. Laz was in the shower. He removed the pan from the oven and cut each of the potatoes open.

“Why must they be ‘twice-baked?’”

“Because this step needs them to be cooked at least a little bit.”

He scooped the insides of the potatoes out and mixed them together with some onions, butter, salt, and whatever cheese he had that he thought would work, a bit of garlic for some punch too. He filled the potato skins back up and gave them a second coating of olive oil. This was always Tobias’s favorite.

“Now we put them back in so the new ingredients can cook.”

“It looks wonderful… We would do something similar with some specific flowers that would grow on the cactuses where I lived.”

“That sounds good. Exotic, but good.”

Francis went back outside and knelt down to work again. Solanum followed close behind like a newbie lab assistant.

“So, how did your people get around? Through space.”

“Excellent question! For short distance planet-hopping, we constructed cannons capable of altering the force of gravity, bending it to produce a net acceleration.”

“What? I didn’t even think gravitational amplification was possible… Uh, continue.”

“For our long distance travel, we employed the use of warp cores. They would generate a white hole at a destination and a paired black hole for our vessels to enter through.”

Uh-huh Uh-huh… What? What?! “As in a wormhole? Those are only theoretical! And if you wanted to actually travel through one, you’d need to move faster than the speed of light!”

“I do not fully understand our warp technology, but writings from Annona described it as such; A black hole has the potential to accelerate objects that fall into it past the speed of light, but, in the sense of a usual black hole, the bending of spacetime effectively renders this acceleration as null and void. In the case of a black hole white hole pair, however, this bending of spacetime is significantly less prominent. Allowing any object that falls through to accelerate faster than the speed of light.”

“Faster than the- time effectively stops working at lightspeed, so couldn’t travelling faster, theoretically, cause a displacement backwards in time?”

It was one of the more crackpot theories Francis had heard tossed around back when there were still more researchers here.

Solanum faltered for a moment, but quickly composed herself, excitedly looking at Francis.

“Yes! It took our observation of the phenomena in real world conditions, but we found there to be a negative time interval when using our regional warp system, which could be amplified by the addition of large amounts of energy. This is what Pye taught me. Yet, you figured it out by hypothesis alone! You would have been ‘right at home’ in the High Energy Lab.”

This is… unprecedented! Groundbreaking! This may very well shatter any and all preconceptions of spacetime! Maybe this was the answer to the Unified Field Theory!

“Now, if you wouldn’t mind a question of mine. Where are the rest of your species? Of Laz’s species?”

Solanum slumped. Alien facial structure was still weird, but it was clear that she was sad. Incredibly so.

“I’m afraid that both Laz and I are the last members of our respective species. The consequences of our arrival were… unfortunate.”

“I- I’m so sorry. I didn-”

“It is okay. We have dealt with this already. ‘Keep on keeping on,’ as Cooper always says.”

The look remained on Solanum’s face. Last of their species… How would Francis- How would anyone be able to deal with that? Cooper was probably right, the only thing anyone could do at that point is to carry on. Getting caught up in grief like that would tear someone apart. They'd have to face it a little at a time. Francis was certainly experienced in that.

It took a while for Solanum to speak back up again, “What is this ‘Well?’”

“It’s uh… It’s a source of infinite gamma radiation, a well if you will, and, apparently, portal to… somewhere else. We haven’t figured that out yet. The Zone is full of energy, but we can’t use most of it. Now, gamma radiation is still on the usable spectrum, we could use it to generate heat. So experimentation was done on the Well to try and get it to release this radiation as a means of clean, renewable energy. None of the experiments really worked, and they probably made the conditions in the Zone worse.”

“‘Portal?’”

“No idea where it goes, just that people who are dead can somehow speak from that place.”

“Ah, yes, I remember. Cooper explained this somewhat. Told about a friend who had given his life.”

“... Yeah… Tobias. It’s nice to know he’s still out there, but I still miss him.”

“Was Tobias important to you?”

“... Immeasurably.”

Solanum looked to the side and pursed her lips together, obviously trying to think of what to say next.

“... We all must deal with loss. What matters is what you gain after it. I learned this from Bells, guide for my pilgrimage to the Quantum Moon.”

Wait what? That couldn’t be hyperbole or a fancy name… She doesn’t seem like the kind of person to exaggerate…

“Quantum… Moon?”

“Yes. It was a moon that orbited the Eye of the Universe, which we believed to be the source of all quantum uncertainty. Its proximity caused it to become quantum entangled, thus causing it to orbit every planet in its parent system simultaneously. Until being observed, of course.”

“What- That's- Oh! That reminds me; I probed into your 'quantum dynamics' idea, turns out there is a definite degree of superposition waveform collapse that only seems to happen whenever Cooper moves around. There may be some merit to that. Still, I can’t exactly say I have any experience with something like this… What’s the Eye of the Universe?”

There’s that look again. She just seemed so… broken. Everything about the way she acted reminded Francis of himself in the early days; Young and fresh out of college, teeming with excitement and emotion, but having to keep a professional face about himself. It was suffocating at times, but maybe it was a cultural thing for her.

“I would rather… not discuss that at this time.”

“That’s okay. You don’t have to tell me anything."

They both just sat there, silence punctuated by the silent clicking of the ratchet wrench.

"The potatoes are probably almost done, and I think a windstorm’s kicking up. How about you go inside and rest on the couch?”

“I would like that.”

Francis made his way back inside. Cooper was in the shower now, Laz was plucking at a guitar. Despite being in such an alien place, even by regular Earth standards, they all seemed relatively calm. Cooper must have made sure they were comfortable if they weren’t losing their minds.

Solanum sat down on the couch next to Laz, they leaned into each other. It was funny; despite being aliens, they were both so… human. It was one of Francis’s theories; If humanity could develop empathy… Why couldn’t other species do the same?

Ding!

The potatoes were done. Tobias would have loved this batch.

Cooper left the shower and joined them at the table. They ate and talked. Solanum and Laz shared as much of their story as they were comfortable with. Even still, it was heavy. Francis couldn’t really tell, but, if he had to guess, he’d have placed them at about the same age as Cooper. For someone that young to have to experience something like that? It was tragic, but what wasn’t in here?

Chapter Text

Drop-ceiling tiles cast miniature shadows across the almost alien looking landscape of fiber-based structuring, illuminated by the dull, warm glow of a slide projector in a dark room.

A sharp wail punctured its way through the speakers recessed next to the lighting fixtures.

“Alright, we’ll be starting soon. Just waiting on the last few stragglers. Coffee and donuts are on the table at the back of the hall if you’re feeling drowsy.”

The river of white coats died to a slow trickle before stopping completely. Two figures at the front of the room exchanged words.

“Is that everyone? Yeah? Okay. Ahem, thank you all for being here today, I understand it’s not the most practical time for this. Now, everybody take your seat. Make sure you find the seat with your name, they’re organized by surname. If you can’t find your name, stop looking at your coworker’s computer, this memo wasn’t for you. The door’s over there.”

Light chuckles and dreary sighs washed through the room. Each coat found its seat.

“Well then, let’s get started. This one’s coming straight from management; Effective immediately, all current research projects, initiatives, etcetera are to be placed on hold.”

Low murmurs wash through the crowd, discrete chunks of laboratory white sway to the side, voicing concerns.

“As you all may have noticed, things have been a bit more hectic around the head staff- Yes?”

“Yeah, what about the Fall-Winter meteorological survey? We can’t exactly ‘put a hold’ on the seasons.”

“I’m afraid they mean it. All initiatives, all projects, all surveys, all activity of any kind is to be placed on hold, no exceptions.”

cl-click

“Now, recently, there has been an unprecedented uptick in activity in the Zone. I’m sure if you keep up with the news around here, you know what I’m talking about.”

cl-click

“At approximately 11:54 PM, September 14th, geosynchronous satellites detected an incredibly energetic radiation surge in the gamma spectrum.

More leaning. The white wavering back and forth starts to look uncannily like the froth on the waves of a stormy ocean.

cl-click

“Then, at 4:51 AM, September 15th, a significantly more energetic surge in the gamma spectrum and… uhm… beyond.”

The wavering in the crowd freezes. The coats straighten up and some lean forward, propping their heads on arms supported by knees.

cl-click

Restrained gasps and exclamations of shock roll through the crowd.

“Both events were near-instantaneous; lasting only a few seconds, but were both located here. Sierram.”

cl-click

“Immediately after, satellite observation picked up the signature of a radiation source bearing the same spectral footprint as the ‘Second Emission’ at the source of said emission.”

cl-click

“Shortly thereafter, the source disappeared.”

cl-click

“Pictured, is a spectral deconstruction of the ‘Second Emission’ footprint. Management wants identification on the source and cause of the event.”

“Now, if you’ll look under your seats, you may find an envelope. Keep it sealed.”

The sound of rustling and creaking foldable chairs spreads its way through the room.

“Those of you without an envelope may now return to their positions and get to work. A full description of your task will be sent out to each of you via electronic mail. You may not discuss this meeting with anyone outside of your immediate team. Any discussion in your team must be kept as succinct as possible. Those of you without envelopes may now be dismissed.”

A large number of coats rise from their chairs and shuffle past towards the doorway, remaining quiet except for the usual “excuse me” or “pardon me.” The last of the coats leave the room, leaving a significantly smaller grouping behind.

“Those of you who remain may now open your envelopes. It is an NDA. Should you choose to sign it, you will be grouped up to work with the rest of the researchers currently in attendance. Please give a show of hands once you have signed the paper. If you choose not to sign, you may leave and will be given a similar task to those who left earlier.”

The clicking of pens and hesitant scrawling from the hands of the remaining scientists melds into each other as ink meets paper. All in attendance eventually raise their hands.

“Alright, good.”

cl-click

“You have all been selected not just for your clearance level, some of you actually have clearance that would typically be considered too low. We have also considered your seniority in the company. Some of you are among the very few who still remember the events of September 14, 1961. Those of you who don't will be briefed after this meeting.”

Shudders and quiet exhales escape from the few researchers still remaining.

“The other teams will be working on the Second Emission, you all will be working on the First Emission.”

cl-click

“This is the spectral deconstruction.”

“... Oh shit.”

“Yeah… Aside from the obviously high amplitude of this particular example. You may recognize this as the same footprint as the emission that triggered the… ahem… hallucinations.”

cl-click

“On top of this, the source that remained after the Second Emission did not just disappear. In reality, it slowly faded away.”

cl-click

“Instead of disappearing, it was instantaneously transported here, it remained at this location until it faded away completely. Yes?”

“Are we sure this isn’t some sensor malfunction?”

“Yes, they’re absolutely certain. Now, as if this wasn’t enough, satellites also detected three more similar sources in relatively close proximity to each other before they too, faded.”

cl-click

If dead quiet was the word to describe the state of the large conference room before, then there exists no other term to describe it now.

“Yeah, that’s exactly where you think it is. Your task is much the same as the other teams. Except, you will be focusing more on these three sources and the mechanism behind the first’s spontaneous displacement. This meeting is over. You will be relocated onsite to the west wing laboratories, any equipment requisitions will be fulfilled without question. I trust you all understand the severity of the situation.”

clack

The room falls dark before the harsh glow of the fluorescent tubes fills the space once more.

“A copy of these slides and any pertaining information will be sent out to each of you. The originals are to be burnt, you are expected to dispose of your copies once work is finished. Which, admittedly, may not be for a while. After moving your equipment, you are free to do whatever you wish for the rest of the day, work starts tomorrow. Dismissed.”

White coats, receding hairlines, and glasses pour out through the door after some make a quick detour for the tables at the rear of the room. The last figure descends from the podium and selects the largest cup available, filling it with coffee.

"Hoo, boy."

Chapter Text

Francis is a very nice man. Solanum wished they could have stayed to speak some more, but this “Well” certainly is not something to leave out of supervision. He waved at them as they pulled away, confident that his modifications were as perfect as they could be. His eye for detail rivaled only by Phlox’s endless double checks of the most imperceptible details on his statues.

Nitinol was carrying them past those familiar reds and blues they had seen from the first time they were here, Cooper stowing anchors along the way. Solanum was tempted to get out and collect some more samples when they stopped for those anchors, but decided against it. She had realized last time that she really had no idea what to do with them.

“Got a gas station up ahead. We’re gonna top off… About a sixth past half a tank here, better safe than sorry.”

As often and somewhat tiresome these repeated stops were, Solanum certainly could see how necessary they were. Being trapped in a dangerous place without a working means to move was something she was very familiar with.

Laz stirred from their nap, “... Are all of these ‘Big Dan’s?’”

“Pssshh, no. Well… Yes. In here at least; They were the only ones insane enough to run a business that required running a chain of buildings set down right on top of several underground tanks full of highly flammable fluids in a place where things just happen spontaneously. Fire included.”

Chemical based technology seemed to be the most common among all forms of transportation for Cooper’s species. Solanum had read about how in the case of most civilizations, the last form of transportation to rely on chemical reactions was typically spaceflight. Still, the people of this planet, “Earth,” were using not just chemical but combustion processes for nearly all transportation infrastructure. A fact that was juxtaposed by the miniaturized teleportation device attached to the front seat that in many ways was more advanced than even what the Nomai had built.

She supposed it made sense; A planet this large was sure to have many large deposits of oils and other flammable resources. Still, having tanks full of this “gasoline” in major population centers was sure to be… perilous.

“Is it not dangerous? For there to be such large, confined tanks of this fuel?”

“Well, that’s why they’re underground and very, very tightly sealed. When one does set fire, it’ll typically burn through one of the pumps or the fill hole, since there’s no oxygen for it to use in the tank. It’d need to burn for a while for those to get damaged enough to get enough vapor in the air to cause an explosion. Still, fires do happen, so every populated area will have a fire department which will run one or more fire stations; Buildings full of all the gear and machinery and firefighters you’d need to get anywhere in a city with enough water and pumps and manpower before a building burns down.”

“You have people whose sole job it is to fight fires? That was usually Slate’s job, since they ended up making most of them in the first place.”

Cooper eased Nitinol next to the purely mechanical counter based fuel pumps.

“Well, yeah. Most of them are volunteers too. Cities are huge. Everything that could possibly happen is thought of ahead of time and prepared for, ideally. ‘Course, you can’t think of everything. The worst fires mostly had the small capacity of early firetrucks to blame, so we built access points to a city’s water system every couple-hundred feet, fire hydrants. Functionally endless water nearly everywhere you are.”

They stepped out of the car and Solanum had a quick look around, but she didn’t find anything that matched that description.

“I do not see anything that could be a ‘fire hydrant.’”

“We’re out in the middle of nowhere. No reason to spend money of piping through the middle of a forest. And, you’d be surprised: gas stations are pretty low on the list of things that spontaneously catch fire.”

“Oh! Yeah… I remember we used to be so afraid of our launchpad setting fire that fireproofed the whole thing. Turns out the exhaust from our rockets were more of an issue to the Observatory.”

“When, something’s obvious, you can plan ahead for it. It’s the stuff you have to learn through experience that’s the kicker.”

Solanum and her clan knew that very well.

Cooper was filling Nitinol with gasoline. The subtle clicking and whirring of the pump hinting at the no-doubt complex mechanism inside. The bucking of the engine eased out into a smooth rumble, she imagined that was a sign of content on Nite's part.

There was a slight metallic screeching. Then, the howl of distant winds.

Solanum turned around to see a loose and dissasociated collection of wispy black and red clouds. Apparently, the source of those screeching noises. She did not have any guess as to how a loose collection of clouds could produce such noises.

The train of thought brought her back to the Quantum Moon, she quickly banished the feeling from her mind.

These formations had usually brought high winds before, but now it was starting to rain. Solanum held her hand out on habit and a drop landed on it. It burned.

She breathed in through clenched teeth, “Ah!”

Laz rushed over, “What?! What is it? Are you hurt?”

“Yeah, you okay?”

In the moment of unexpected pain, her grasp on English momentarily slipped, speaking only on reflex.

“Нет- I am okay, thank you. Umm… hot- burn water… the rain burned.”

Cooper looked to the sky, “Ah shit… Ponchos up! Let’s get back in the car before the sky opens up on us.”

No sooner than they closed the doors on Nitinol did the fog around them turn a shade of sickly green. Water mercilessly fell on every square meter of the surrounding forest, the native flora retracted into its protective layers.

Cooper looked at the ARC Device, “Corrosive squall, except this is less of a squall and more of a storm, its covering the whole junction. Usually I’d sit under a roof like this and wait, but that doesn’t seem to be an option.”

He had Nitinol move up to a considerable speed and they raced away. Laz was looking at her palm, there was a small red mark in the center.

“It doesn’t look too bad… do you still feel it?”

“No, I am fine now, thanks, Laz.”

That warm smile Laz always wore when speaking to her finally returned. It made her feel more secure. The worries surrounding the concept of acidic rain slipped away.

Solanum realized something.

“The rain hurt! Is Nitinol okay?”

“Nite’s fine; all the paint A.R.D.A. carted in here has respectable anticorrosive properties.”

Nitinol produced a thumbs up on that small screen next to the steering wheel, Solanum sighed in relief.

“-but it doesn’t work against the fucKING JELL-O!”

Cooper swerved Nitinol hard, barely clipping the edge of a glowing, green, gelatinous mass that had fallen out of the sky right in front of them. It popped, coating the windows with a thick, green film and causing some sections of the status readout to shift to a more muted blue.

It hurt Nite.

bzzzzz bzzZZZzzz!

“Yeah, shit, sorry. I’ll break out the putty once we get outta this.”

They were serving from side to side. Cooper had to quickly turn to avoid another one of those “jell-os.” The car got up on two wheels and continued to tilt over. Solanum was pressed into the door and Laz fell onto her. Cooper had to loosen his grip on the wheel to stop Nitinol from rolling over completely. The sudden widening of their turn sent them on the opposite side of a guard fence, flanked on one side by structural steel and by highly resilient trees on the other. They marched past the windows at such a speed that Solanum couldn’t even tell they were separate objects. She watched as the acid chewed the guardrail metal and collapsed nearby buildings.

Cooper took a glance backwards, worry barely visible through the eyepieces on his facemask.

“How you doing back there?”

SPLAT

“COOPER! LOOK OUT OF WINDOW!”

“Wha- oh, SUNNOVA-”

Another clump of slime had hit the ground in front of them. They plunged further into the forest to avoid it, bouncing on stray rocks and mounds of dirt.

This is fun! However, there is still the very real risk of them becoming an unsightly accessory for an unlucky tree so… All Solanum could muster at the moment were various expletives and a couple excited shouts. Everything that happened in this place seemed to only work to confuse her emotions!

Nitinol was keeping up a good deal of speed and Cooper was doing a good job keeping them from becoming debris scattered around the forest.

"Alright! Forget the roads, we're carving our way through the forest to the access road."

The ground fell out from underneath them.

“... heh-heh, Uh-oh.” Was all Solanum heard from Cooper as he floated up from his seat.

“Ohhh that’s uncomfortably familiar.”

As the nose of Nitinol's frame dipped down, Solanum was met with the sight of ground, one-hundred meters away and closing rapidly. Her eyes went wide.

As they fell, a stray outcropping of ground came up to meet their wheels and the car lightly made contact with the ground. They were pinned into their seats and the suspension compressed as they rounded the ninety degree arc at the base of the hill. They exited with a great deal of speed and barreled through more forest before sailing right over a berm and landing square on a road, right to the next access road barricade. They lost control and the tires screamed in protest as the car slid and rocked to a stop. The left pair of wheels landed back on the ground.

Cooper straightened Nitinol out and they silently drove through. The green slowly eased away into the familiar dark fog of the night.

“I uh… I couldn’t see the uh… the topography on the map through the… through the green.”

“....... fffffuuuuuuuck.”

“Holy. Shit.”

bzzzzzzzzz…

“Yeah, yeah. Those are all valid feelings right now. You all get a round of punchies next time we stop, okay?”

“Are you being serious? Cooper! That was… awesome!”

“Yeah, I’ll agree on that, but you’re still getting punchies from me, dude.”

“Can we actually wait on that? I’d rather not have sore shoulders if I have to do more steering.”

“Fine, but I get Sol’s punchie.”

It took some time for Solanum to realize she was still holding onto Laz’s hand. She pulled them in closer, they didn’t complain.

Chapter Text

It was a fairly light day for them, all things considered; Spinel was on the bench, coaxing away the the dull pain from the cuts and scrapes they imagined they must be feeling, Tephra was sitting on the smaller chair as Porphy patted the antiseptic they had found onto their scrapes.

“One of these days, I’ll be faster than Mica. Just wait ‘till my legs are all long and grown! They don’t stand a ch-”

They breathe in sharp through their teeth.

“Sorry pal, shoulda warned you.”

“It’s fine. I don’t wanna end up like Tekite!”

Gneiss had just returned to the medical cabin after making sure that Chert had actually fallen asleep this time. They had been tempted to bring Gabbro over, but Chert eventually relaxed into slumber.

Gneiss finished wrapping the bandages around Spinel’s arm.

“There we go. Now don’t you go off and get these dirty. We may have plenty, but it won’t last forever. What are you even doing to get like this in the first place?”

“Slate needed help removing… something from one of the buildings here. Turns out their smooth walls aren’t really reflected on the inside.”

“Oh, that little tinkerer’s always up to something. Now you make sure that they apologize for that.”

“Trust me, they did. Thanks, Gneiss. I should get back out there. Have a good rest of your day.”

“Stay safe out there.”

The now occupationless angler left through the wooden door, revealing the blue haze just outside.

It didn’t sit right with them. It was wholly unnatural and almost sickly compared to the crater back home.

The medical cabin used to be more crowded when they’d first arrived here, but after the wall was put up, the constant inflow of injuries gradually subsided. Much to their relief.

None of them were serious, except for Gabbro that first day… But, thank the stars, they were doing well now, always appearing every so often with an armful of medical supplies just when they seemed to be starting to run out.

Speaking of, here comes the little philosopher now.

“Hello, hatchling, what do you have for us today?”

“Hey, Gabbro, how’s it going?”

“Ooooh! Gabbro! You gotta teach me to kick like you! You sent that hopper flying last time!”

“Hey, Gneiss, Porpher, Teph, just wait ‘till you get your running legs in, you’d probably have a better foot than me!”

It was difficult to get a read on them, they were Gabbro after all, but Gneiss could tell that there was something, subtly, off.

“Got some painkillers, distilled water, good-ol’ H2O2, and some gaowze.”

Porphy turned around to face them, “It’s gauze.”

“‘Gaowze’ makes me feel warm inside.”

“Gaowze! Gaowze! Haha!”

“Come on, now you got Teph going.”

Talking with the hatchlings always made that slightly wrong feeling around Gabbro disappear. They always knew when to be sincere, even if most didn’t realize.

“Thank you, Gabbro. Now what brings my favorite little dreamer in so early?”

“You said I should come back every so often to change out bandages.”

Porphy snickered from the corner, “So you actually decided to show up on time for once?”

They set the supplies down on the counter and made their way to the bench.

“I was only ever a couple hours late.”

“Is your arm starting to hurt again?”

“No, I’m fiiiiine. I just wanted to swing into the rhythm y’know? It’s all hands out here.”

There were slight undertones of uncertainty in their voice. Extremely subtle, but there. Gneiss hadn’t heard it from Gabbro since Feldspar went missing.

“Took you long enough.”

“Now, now, Porphy, let’s not be rude. Now, let’s take a look here.”

Gneiss gently undid the wrappings on Gabbro’s arm. They had started to fray and discolor, but not too bad. The patches where the burns and shrapnel scars had settled in had fallen to a light blue. The skin was still raw and weak and plasma still flowed from the seams. Serous drainage, but normal amounts for this stage of the healing process. It hadn’t gotten infected.

Gneiss started cleaning off the area.

When they all arrived here, no one was really scared. Just confused. The danger hadn’t really registered for anybody at that point. Gabbro, ever the easy going soul, found the first thing that looked like a person and shook its hand. It was an innocent, joking move meant to ease off the concern that everyone was feeling.

Then it started glowing.

The statue exploded in what would be the first of many underhanded tricks this place would play on them. It was the first time that anyone, really, had ever heard Gabbro truly scream.

It broke their heart.

Fissures on their hand and arm opened up and the whole thing became red as they fell to their knees, trying to find a good place to grip their other hand to stop the pain.

Everyone immediately rushed over while Gossan tried to keep people away from the rest of the statues. Gneiss grabbed some cloth and a nearby stick, fashioning a figure-8 loop that they slipped over Gabbro’s arm and twisted tighter until the bleeding stopped.

The numbing of the pain from the cut off bloodflow eventually allowed them to stop screaming. They spoke through gritted teeth.

“What’s going on?”

Gneiss couldn’t forget those words. Especially from Gabbro. No hidden undertones, no double meaning, no self-reflective riddle. Just genuine confusion and shock.

Gneiss hadn’t realized they’d gone ahead and finished rewrapping their arm until they felt their mouth blurt out-

“Done!”

It took a second or two for them to fully come back to their thoughts.

“You’re coming along very well, pretty soon we won’t need to bandage this. Your fingers have healed up well enough, so we’re only covering your hand and arm this time.”

“So I can play my flute again? Sweet.”

They couldn’t help but smile. There was the little hatchling they knew.

“Yes, but be careful; the skin on your fingers is still a little raw.”

“Ooooh! When will I get my instrument, Gneiss?”

“I’m afraid I can’t focus on instrument making right now, but as soon as this is all figured out, I’ll put something together for you.”

Tephra smiled lightly before wincing.

“Porphy!”

“Sorry.”

Gabbro sat up and flexed their fingers, “Alright, well, I’m gonna see if anybody needs any general bugging. Thanks, Gneiss. See you all tomorrow.”

They went off through the door with that loose walk they always had since they were young. Gneiss hadn’t realized how much they enjoyed seeing it until that explosion rocked this new world they found themselves in.

“You be good now, dear.”

“See ya, Gabbro.”

“See ya!”

Nobody else was injured, so Gneiss decided to bring the new supplies back into the other room. Walls were lined with medical supplies and medicines they could not recognize or pronounce. They filed the supplies away to their respective shelves before, like each time they had walked in here, their gaze fell onto the object resting on the chair in the corner.

A broken guitar, neck separated from the body. They know they said they couldn't focus on instrument making right now, but...

Today. Today they would fix it.

Chapter Text

The days on this planet were slower. Much slower. Back on Timber Hearth, a day was just the cycle from when someone woke up to the next time they woke up, unaffected by the natural "day" cycle. It was nice that this planet just happened to rotate at the same rate.

This new place they were in was more alien then even Brittle Hollow. As they got close to that third wall, all of the color just seemed to die out. Gargantuan stone columns wrapped in large, glowing, red vines seemed to grow out of the ground itself. Laz couldn’t even see the tops of most of them through the haze.

Cooper saw them craning their head up, “Yup, welcome to deep Zone, junction A7. No real clue where those columns come from, but they don’t fall over… Not usually. Nothing to worry about.”

There was only one thing on Laz's mind, “They’re huge.”

“Not the biggest hunk of stone I’ve seen. I gotta take you to New York at some point.”

“Is that a city?” Solanum asked, stars in her eyes.

“Yeah, most densely populated on the planet, but there’s not a whole lotta space to build, so they build up. Place has a rich history of what were previously the world’s tallest buildings. Tallest one’s fourteen hundred feet tall.”

That’s a strange way to measure something. Feet didn’t seem all too exact.

“... Feet?”

“Unit of measurement, what do you use?”

“We use meters.”

“Oh, we got that around here too. A meter is about three and a quarter feet so… four-hundred and… thirty-something meters? Close enough.”

That’s a big foot. Even for Cooper, but 430 meters? That was tall. That was ridiculously tall. Like, what did they even have to gauge that off of? Timber Hearth was one kilometer across, but it always looked so small when Laz saw it from space.

Sol chirped up from next to Laz, “Construction of such heights in this gravity is nothing short of breathtaking! How tall was the legged building you showed us? The… uh… Space… Needle?”

“Let’s see… six-hundred feet so… one-hundred and eighty… something meters. Yeah.”

That gave Laz the gauge they needed. Three times the height of that? Yeah, these columns were relatively small then. Woah.

Cooper brought them around the junction, using a vacuum to collect some red balloons and pulling the anchors like usual. Each time he did here, though, he rushed back much faster than before. Apparently this place had its own explosive breed of bunnies. A group of them almost got them caught between a couple of those columns with the statues stuck inside of them. The explosion they felt as they drove away shook each of them to their core. What used to be a stability anchor sat useless and mangled in the center of it all.

“That was loud! Stars, this place sucks!”

“You don’t go anywhere in the Zone without protection, especially here. That’s why you got those vests.”

“How about I stay in the driver's seat while you grab those next time? So we can get out faster.”

“I would have to agree with Laz here; Having that encounter repeatedly will undoubtedly lead to… complications.”

Cooper mulled over it for a minute, “Yeah, you’re probably right. That hasn’t always gone to plan in the past… When we stop for anchors in the next junction, you get in the driver’s seat. Okay, Laz?”

“You got it!”

This was great! Laz was actually going to get to drive in actual conditions! They were so excited when they finally finished training for the Outer Wilds Ventures, it meant they were finally ready to fly their own ship. Laz felt a similar feeling, here, now. Sol looked at them with a smile, sharing their excitement.

“Ooooh! Look! Olympium! Can never have too much of that, I’m gonna go and grab it.”

c-thuk
chunk

“She loves to limbo, that much is clear. She’s got the right dynamic for the new frontier.”

Cooper left the car and they were left alone in the backseat. Sol quietly hummed along to the music on the radio.

“How have you been holding up Sol? I thought you’d be a bit more… well, afraid of all this.”

“It has been wonderful, Laz. And yes, I am afraid, but more so astonished! I spent most of my life in the caves in Ember Twin and our shuttles were only ever launched on pre-calculated routes. Finally being able to experience manual-control transportation, and in a place such as this! It leaves me in awe. And I am infinitely glad to be experiencing it with you.”

“Yeah, it is great. Isn’t it?”

“Now what do we have here…?”

Laz heard Cooper through the door of the car, recognizing the intonation of a new discovery in his voice. Laz had heard it a thousand times when they were mumbling to themself, but it was strange hearing it from someone as seasoned as Cooper was in this place. What was he looking at?

They felt a bolt of fear shoot through their spine as they watched Cooper lean down to touch a small crystal. They forced all of their effort against the door handle

c-thuk

“COOPER! DON’T TOUCH THAT!”

Solanum stared out of the open doors, confused and a little shocked.

Cooper freezed in place a “foot” away from the blue crystal Laz was all too familiar with.

“What? What’s wrong?”

They rushed over and practically forced Cooper away from the small patch of hexagonal prisms he was about to reach into. Laz felt the panic in their mind slowly fall away.

“I’ve seen this before. It’s ghost matter.”

Laz barely registered a gasp from the open door behind them.

Cooper just stared at them with a very hard to read look. Especially through his visor. Wait, no. That’s a very easy to read look. He was confused. Laz wasn’t expecting to see that look on his face, but Cooper had no idea what he was just about to stick his arm into; Laz hadn’t told him about ghost matter yet.

“This is baaaaaad stuff. The gas these give off is highly lethal.”

“Like radon?”

Ray-what? “What?”

“Radioactive gas.”

“No! Well, yeah… sorta. This stuff is like ‘turbo -radioactive,’ Gabbro always liked using that term. If you step into it, it doesn’t really give you burns or anything. You literally burn, and then you sorta just melt.”

Laz saw his eyes widen through his mask before they became more worried, “I take it you have experience with it then.”

Laz remembered all the times they’d accidentally slid down the wrong path in the interloper.

Ouch.

“Yeah, trust me it’s not pleasant and you were about to stick your arm in there.”

Laz watched as Cooper’s head recoiled back and looked to the side.

“Lemme show you.”

They rushed back to Nite and grabbed the Little Scout. Laz caught a glance at Sol’s face, it was distressed and shocked. Not in a particularly bad way, just in a “Yeah, that was waaaay too close” way.

They took a picture of the space just above the crystals and sure enough, the characteristic blue-green glow was there. Laz shot the Scout down on the ground and took pictures at different angles. Thankfully, that seemed to be the only patch. Cooper leaned into the screen.

“Hooo yeah, bad. Let’s get back to Nite, I’m gonna punch this into the log.”

They walked back to the car and collapsed with relief on the inside. He sat in the driver’s seat, but didn’t get moving immediately.

“What did you call it again?”

“Ghost matter.”

Cooper pulled out a small device with an even smaller keyboard and connected it to the ARC Device. He started typing, with his thumbs only. Words flowed onto its small, but detailed, screen.

“Ghost… Matt-er… Red… Spires… and probably Smokestacks too. We’ll put a full profile together when we get back.”

He slid the small device into his pocket. Laz and Sol both had their eyes locked on it the whole time.

Solanum had a look of wonder in her face, “What was that device?”

Cooper dug the small… thing out of his jacket again, “What, this?”

“Yes!”

“It’s a PDA… Uh, a ‘Personal Digital Assistant.’ I use it to manually put in logs for things I find with no prior records, which is very rare. It was stupid hard to put this thing together in here; all the tech you find is more than a decade old.”

“Wait, so it’s like a… tiny notebook, but it’s a computer?”

“Made with technology from more than ten years ago?!”

She was right. Ten years ago. That technology was more than ten years old! What Laz wouldn’t have done to be able to lug their ship computer with them everywhere they went.

“Yeah… Wow, I never really thought about how cool that is. But we still got something more pressing here; This isn’t just you guys, this is something else from your… old universe. How is it here?”

Now he was right. Laz had no explanation. Apparently Sol didn’t either, based on her silence. Something else had come from the old universe to this one. And it had to be fucking… Ghost matter. Maybe it was because it held a significant space in their mind? It was one of the few things that would simply never leave it; It had influenced so much…

“I got no idea.”

“Well, based on what you said about it… Let’s hope it’s only here in deep Zone.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m gonna grab the rest of the Olympium… And I’m definitely staying away from those crystals.”

c-thuk
chunk

“Thank you, Laz, for not speaking about-”

“I know, you can tell him when you’re ready.”

They leaned into each other. Laz was able to spy the ARC Device from around the seat. There was a circle of green on it, much like what came before the windstorms and acid rain. Great, what kind of storm was specific to this place?

Explosions in the distance, this place really was that dangerous.

Cooper returned to the car and threw an armsfull of, thankfully, pink and purple glowing rocks into the trunk from his backpack. He walked over to sit in the driver’s seat.

“Hey Coop, what is that stuff anyway?”

“Olympium. Started popping up around here after the first Mass Hallucination. It’s twice as heavy as steel, but four times as strong. Mix it into an alloy with aluminum or titanium? You get the strongest thing on the planet with barely any extra weight.”

“Cooper, there is another green area on the ARC Device. Is there going to be more burn- acid… rain?”

Even more explosions, somewhat closer this time.

Laz joked, “Heh, yeah… Or is it gonna start raining rocks?”

Cooper looked at the ARC Device, concerned. He flipped to the section labeled “Zone Conditions.”

“Ah, shit! I didn’t check! I’m always supposed to check!”

Uh-oh.

He threw the car into reverse with an urgency that Laz hadn’t seen from him yet and floored it, sending their faces into the back of the front seats as the little arrow that represented the car just barely stayed outside of the green area. They were running out of road though, it curved back in the direction they were going behind them. They stopped just ahead of the curve.

Was that really necessary?

Laz and Sol peeled their faces from the seats, “Dammit, Coop! What the hell’s going on?”

Cooper looked less concerned and more reluctant. Still, there was a pain in the way he moved.

He slammed it into drive. Almost exasperated, he said, “Why’d you have to say ‘raining rocks?’”

Oh, Laz did not like the sound of that, “What?”

The speakers in the front-left side of the car screamed to life.

be-be-be-be-be-be-beep
FWOOOO-CRASH

A large rectangular rock had fallen from the sky, right next to them. A sickly green glow spread from where it landed.

Okay, maybe that was necessary.

“Time to fuCKING MOVE! PUT YOUR SEATBELTS ON!”

He floored it, the car shot away and back down the road they had reversed on. Another rock fell where they had just been.

“Oh my stars… MOVE MOVE MOVE!”

They could barely hear Cooper over the cacophony of high velocity impacts just outside the relatively flimsy metal door they were hiding behind.

“Okay, this is fine! Don’t worry! It’s fine! You’ll never have one drop on you as long as you’re moving.”

Laz could tell that he wasn’t very sure of himself.

be-be-be-be-be-be-beep
SHWUUUOOO- CRASH

A monstrous chunk of stone, about the size of the pillars around here, cut off the road in front of them. Cooper barely swerved around it, nearly clipping the corner in the progress. The radiometer went red and angry, Laz had never seen it like that before.

“-EXCEPT IF THey fall right. In. FRONT. OF. YOU.”

Cooper was almost angrily shouting at the sky. Combinations of swears that would have given Gossan an epiphany. His accent deepened too. Laz clutched Sol tight. She clutched back. They turned around to see the million-ton block of stone slowly sink into the ground. Laz half expected to see a bright purple flash erupt from the ground after it, since it was certainly falling into a black hole because WHAT THE HELL ELSE COULD THIS BE??

be-be-be-be-be-be-beep
FWOOOO-CRASH

be-be-be-be-be-be-beep
FWOOOO-CRASH

be-be-be-be-be-be-beep
FWOOOO-CRASH

More stones… They were falling faster, more frequently. Closing the distance on them, like they were zeroing in with a Little Scout.

Nitinol hit the small lump of metal where the access barricade meets the road, leaving the ground with a small hop. The front wheels met the ground before the rear pair. The sounds of pulverized hearth… earth and deafening impacts retreated behind them.

Huh. Hearth. Earth. Who’da guessed?

Cooper settled into his seat, like all that didn’t just happen.

Sol found her words before Laz could even think, “Cooper? What just happened?”

“Oh, uh… Meteorite Squall. Uh, they’ll just happen around here.”

Just happen? They just… happen!?

“You mean that was normal??”

“Around here. In Deep Zone.”

Like that made it any better. That was a storm. That created meteorites. Must be where all these columns came from.

“Hey uh… How about you cover these next two access roads? I think I need to sleep, especially after our little, accidental… takeoff in C5.”

“Yeah. Yeah, sure. I don’t think I’m gonna be able to sleep for a while after that.”

“Oh don’t be a baby.”

Chapter Text

Lots of stuff going on lately. This would probably be the first time Hornfels would say that one of their breaks was earned.

Meditation came to Gabbro with some difficulty this time, but they quickly eased back as the calming lull of tall grass fluttering in the wind filled their ears. Usually, every time they meditated they would end up somewhere else, or nowhere at all. But each time they’ve meditated since the end of the loops? It’s always been here.

Seriously weird stuff.

“Huh, Ch, Uh, Ha…”

Someone was mumbling from the grass.

“Well, we’re waiting here in Allentown…”

Gabbro inched closer.

“... For the Pennsylvania we never found.”

Gabbro stopped right at the source of the sound, no one was there. They really needed to get their ears checked.

“Hey, don’t mean to interrupt, but is someone here?”

Someone shot up from the grass a couple meters away from them. Sound must be weird in here. The person turned around. Oh, hey, Cooper.

“Ey! Gabbro! You weren’t the past couple of times. How’s it been?”

They had their hands out in an almost welcoming gesture. Dude, this is basically their home.

“Hey, dream buddy. Long time no see. Same old same old where I am. Haven’t been able to relax in a while. It’s been a lot of effort. Two days without meditating? That’s like, a thousand years.”

Hyperbole, but... it almost did feel like that. It was better now that they had their flute.

Hyperbole... Hyperbowl... Another weapon to use against Porphy!

“... That’s… Two days. Anyway, Laz says you’re real and not just a figment of my imagination, so that’s cool.”

Ha! Dream-buddy surrenders.

“Ah, so I am the one who’s dreaming.”

Gabbro couldn't help but sound smug. Coming from them though... It felt wrong and forced. Smugness was never their thing.

“Well, yeah, but… Not really? See… I’m dreaming too, so something else is going on here.”

Oh come on, dude. You can’t win against the Gabbster.

“Any ideas?”

“Not a clue…”

Lazy offensive there, Cooper.

“... Laz told me about what happened. The important parts anyway; You were in the time loop too, that must have… sucked.”

Oh, alright. Looks like their going to be moving onto "personal reflection." It's a bit early for that... That's usually step 7...

“... It wasn’t all bad. Like, it’s nice to be able to just sit around and relax, but after two weeks of doing nothing? It got… boring. Even for me."

Cooper had a strange, skeptical look on their face, "Boring? Repeatedly being incinerated got boring."

"I barely ever got time to register the pain; Supernova are quick apparently. So, for most of it, it was just me, my hammock, and my flute. Oh, and the swirly-dos, but that's neither here nor there... anymore at least."

Gabbro felt a rush of air leave their mouth. It was weeeeeeird. Apparently, they just sighed. Not for theatrics or to clear the mind, it was a genuine sigh.

"I never got to tell Laz, but I wanted to get out there and help them. I just couldn’t. It would have been too much of a hassle.”

Cooper's weird fuzzy brow furrowed and their mouth pulled to the side, "'Too much of a hassle?' Why?"

"For starters, my ship was off enjoying a nice swim, playing hard-to-get too. I tried to get to it. Took a page out of Laz's book and used the pattern of the loops to be able to get to it as soon as possible, but by the time I figured out how to consistently get to it, Laz had already come so far. Well past any of the Travelers before them. Swimming out to my ship got old. So I just stopped, I knew I'd slow them down."

Sighing felt wrong.

“Hey, dude, look; Laz only speaks of you with good words. I’m sure if they felt sour about you, they’d speak up about it.”

“Maybe, maybe not. How have they been doing by the way?”

Gabbro's worry around Laz had been chewing at them for a while. What did good-ol' subconcious think?

“Laz is doing good, both of them are. We're helping each other stay safe.”

That certainly made them feel better, even though it was just what their mind thought, or probably hoped. That would make more sense.

“‘Both of them?’”

“Y’know, Solanum?”

There’s that name again, Laz’s Quantum Moon buddy… What do they have to do with this?

“... All this started to happen after Cappy cooked off… It’s gotta be related in some way…”

Ooooh! Ooooh! The detective look!

“Doing some sleuthing?”

“You’d be surprised how much driving and ‘sleuthing’ goes hand-in-hand around here.”

Gabbro knew that look, the same one Laz always wore while bouncing ideas of them on those visits to their island.

Those thoughts were nice. An island of good in a sea of desolation.

“Similarities. Connections. Unknowns.”

They looked back towards Gabbro, “What?”

“Laz’s workflow; Find similarities, draw connections, probe unknowns. Worked wonders for them back there.”

They brought their hand up to their chin, rubbing it against tiny, weird fur. 

“Well… Cappy is the similarity, no real connections, but we’re probing an unknown right now.”

What's a Cappy?

“Looks like you got yourselves well on the way to unravelling this mystery. Pretty soon you can draw some connections.”

“I suppose we are… I should go now. I’m gonna need to be at the wheel when we drive into the Well so, See ya.”

“Later, dream-buddy.”

Personal reflection. At step 3?! Things are getting strange.

What’s the “Well?” And what does “at the wheel” mean? An overactive mind causes an overactive imagination. They need to just chill out for a while.

The red sun hang in the sky above them.

Just need to chill for a little while.

Chapter Text

Cooper roused himself from the backseat.

Yeouch.

He’d been sleeping in a bad position, nearly sideways. The back of his shoulder felt like rubber and flared up in sore pain when he moved it.

Laz was at the wheel.

“Mornin’”

They both looked over and Laz returned their attention to the road. It looked... gravely familiar.

“Morning, Cooper.”

“Good afternoon, Cooper.”

“Oh, looks like we got a wiseguy here.” Cooper ruffled Sol’s hair.

“Just using the correct term.” She had that little mischievous grin again.

“How far out are we, Laz?”

“About two… miles.”

Oh, great. They're here.

“Alright, let’s switch out.”

Laz theatrically slumped over and let out a mock sigh.

“Awwww… Alright, fine.”

They eased on the brakes and they rotated out of their seats. Cooper hung his hands on the familiar wheel and they set off.

The contactors in the gateway barricade slammed shut and its light went red. He was back. Here. In R2. The Well.

Gargantuan circular red lights and scaffolding like structures jutted into the sky. Just like how he left it.

“Woah…”

“What… What are we seeing, Cooper?”

“That’s the Well. I don’t think it’s the roof of it or anything, those lights are solid the whole way through. Plus, when you go through, the ARC Device can't produce a topography scan... And the ARC Device is foolproof... mostly. I don't think the outside is representative of the inside.”

"... We go somewhere else."

Yeah, yeah they do.

Cooper pulled Nitel to the side of the road at the overlook and pointed to a collection of red lights streaming up into the sky, “There, that’s where we’re going.”

That feeling shot through Cooper. That feeling. The one he hadn't felt in nearly a month now. Uncertainty. Trepidation.

“Are you sure that’s safe?”

“I drove through that last time. It was... fine. Lemme get a hold of Francis.”

He reached for the knobs on the radio. Laz and Sol continued to press their faces against the glass.

“Those lights… they kinda look like giant versions of the lights on the Bunnies.”

“Perhaps the Well is a bunny.”

“I hope it doesn’t wake up.”

That is a terrifying concept. He already had his fill of oversized Bunnies, let alone Metrodome sized ones.

“When it comes to the bunnies, if the lights are on, it’s typically active. So, if it is a bunny, it’s already up. Francis, do you read?”

The radio ground out static for some time before a voice pierced through.

“I read you, Cooper. How’s it going?”

“We’re here.”

That was the heaviest two-worded statement he'd ever had to say. The Well. It's fine. Francis is a great scientist. The Well Stabilizer has every reason to work and no reason not to.

“Oh, shoot. Already? Okay, I’ll see what I can do to stabilize from here, buy you a couple extra kLIMs. How’s that looking by the way?”

Cooper glanced at the ARC Device, “Sitting at 32 kLIM, how’s that?”

“Good! Very good, you’ll have plenty of time. Keep a buffer of five for the gateway, ten for safety.”

Might as well make it 12. There was a pressure coursing up his neck. Elevated bloodflow.

“Absolutely. Alright, we’re heading in.”

“Got it.”

Cooper brought Nite down the hill and around the bend, slowly inching towards the entrance to the Well.

The Well.

The place he’d barely made it out of within an inch of his life last time. The place that exists outside of conventional space, where no one would be able to find him if he got stuck. And he was going there with two other people, technically three. What if he messes up? They’re all depending on him, he can’t mess up.

His hands became white-knuckled on the steering wheel. The Zone was completely spontaneous. He's gotten into the routine of not thinking about things beforehand. Here, at the sight of the Well? It hit him like a freight train.

“Coop, are you alright?”

His breathing was shaky and deep. He hadn’t realized before now. Nite was stopped on the side of the road.

beep boop beep

A worried face appeared on the screen.

“Yeah, I'm okay… It’s just… Well, I didn’t think I’d ever be coming back here.”

“Whaaaat? Really? From Cooper? The Driver? The Driver? You outwitted giant death machine… things, you hurled yourself off a cliff for fun, you threw yourself into Cappy for science! What’s a silly little Well got on you?”

“What Laz is attempting to say is: We trust you, Cooper.”

The Well.

He was going there with three other people. People who trusted him.

“Alright, let’s get this over with.”

The rolled alongside an abandoned fuel truck and topped off the tank.

“You guys ready?”

“Yep.”

“Absolutley.”

beep boop beep

Thumbs up.

“Francis? We’re heading in right now.”

“I’ll keep everything tied down over here. Godspeed.”

"Reach out and take it. Reach out and t-t-t-take it."

Breathe in. Breathe out. Like Gabbro had showed him. He felt his shoulders fall back into a relaxed position.

They drove into the Well. Cooper’s vision went white.

It came back in the form of a steep hill. Trees and columns and rocks and wreckage stuck out of the ground at odd angles. They were careening down the side at a frightening pace. How fast? The speedometer was pinned to the very right side of the dial. 120 seems a bit reserved for what they were seeing, all things considered. His hands painfully squeezed down onto the steering wheel.

Breathe in.

“We’re really in it now! Got a clear line to the bottom… I think. I can’t even see the bottom!”

Pillars and poles and plants and pikes shot by the windows on both sides of the car, but there was a relatively navigable path stretching out in front of them.

“Don’t you think maybe we should slow down?!”

Yeah, they should, but it's not exactly like they could.

“Not on this slope! Any brakes would lock up the wheels here and we’d lose control completely! Put your hands up! Enjoy the ride!”

“Whoooooooooooooooo!”

“... Whoooooooooooooooooo!”

The headlights finally landed on something other than fog. Flat, level ground filled the windshield ahead of them. Here we go.

The car leveled off and the sudden impulse of weight on the front suspension caused them to spin out. Backwards and sideways and wrongways at two-hundred and ten.

What a way to live!

The car ground to a halt over the loose, unincorporated sediment. They all eased back into their seats and Nite eased back onto its springs.

“...”

Breathe out.

“... Welcome to the Well.”

“Whoooooo…”

They made it back. In here. Or out here. Or... Well, they were here. And with the benefit of absolutely no entropic reconstitution!

Breathe In.

“Now, where the hell are we? Francis! Any read on that signal?”

“--o--N-----No. No, not yet. Looks like you’re gonna have to look around. Currently showing 3.2 kLIM per hour on the Well Stabilizer.”

“Hey! That’s pretty good! I… think, no real metric for this but, good job, Francis!”

That gives them a good deal of time, but the readout Cooper had on the ARC Device showed a wild fluctuation in Anchor energy consumption. apparently that was just the average. It could get better. It could get worse.

“Thanks! Call me if you see anything strange, but not Zone strange. Stranger, like- You know what I mean. I’m leaving the channels open.”

They eased away from the foot of the mountain they just slalomed down and set off into the cool, hazy, blue of the interior of the Well.

Breathe out.

Chapter Text

“Hey, Marl.”

“Oh, hey, Hal, how’s it going?”

Hal climbed up to the lookout on top of the wall, careful not to drop the tray of food for Marl.

“Doing pretty good, Porphy made you some food.”

As soon as the word “Porphy” left their mouth, Marl’s eyes locked onto the tray with a dreary expression.

“Aw, I hope it's not cornmeal again.”

“Don’t worry, they said they got creative with it this time.”

That might not have been the best choice of words for that, but Marl took the tray anyway. At least it was hot.

“That’s what I’m afraid of, what brings you out of your cabin?”

Hal sat down on the seat next to Marl’s lookout stool and stared out into the haze.

“I needed some air, why do they got you on lookout anyway?”

“I have a good eye, needed to make sure I knew which tree was the tallest.”

“Bet you’re glad it’s gone, huh?”

They rocked on the rear legs of their stool and kicked a pebble off of the ledge of the lookout, lips pursed with a contemplative look on the rest of their face.

“Yeah, just wish I was the one to do it, stupid Sun.”

Yeah… stupid Sun.

“Marl! Marl! Oh, hey, Hal. Can I come up to use my signalscope?”

Moraine was down on the ground reaching up for the ladder, signalscope slung over their back.

Marl gave a warm, playful smile to the amateur stargazer. It was weird that they were outside though, who knows what could happen out here?

“Oh, hey Moraine. Shouldn’t you be inside?”

“What? Come on! I’m not a hatchling anymore!”

“C’mon, Hal, it’s okay. We do this all the time. Here, take my hand”

“What? I wasn’t gonna tell anybody, just wondering.”

Marl let their arm down and hoisted Moraine up to the lookout post. They slid over another stool for them. Moraine immediately got to looking out through their signalscope.

Marl and Moraine always had a playful contest going centered on that tree back in the village, but they really seemed to be getting along much better. Especially given the circumstances. At this point, Hal thought that the Nomai concept of “siblings” fit pretty well.

Moraine squinted through the lens of their scope, “Seen anything lately?”

“Just more of those glowing pink things crawling through the ground…” Marl wiggled with their fingers to accentuate what they were saying, “... a couple of those hoppers too. They keep their distance though.”

“I like the hoppers, they sound cool through the ‘scope.”

Things were slowly lulling back down to a normal. It seemed like forever since Hal was able to just go for a walk. They managed to keep Riebeck off their nerves with a box of tools they found by the tank building. They could almost still hear the squeals coming from their cabin.

Still, walking through the “village” still felt wrong. There was a face missing, another person absent from the crowd. Laz still hasn’t shown up. It's been nearly a week, probably. Gabbro said they would be here if they were out there, but it’s been so long. What chance did they have?

Moraine had started fiddling with the knobs on their scope, “Ooooooh, that’s weeeeeeiiiiiiiird.”

Marl leaned in, like an elder listening to one of the hatchlings’ stories, “Whatcha got there Moraine?”

“It sounds like a growling, but it’s kinda… metallic? I definitely haven’t heard this before.”

“Really? Let me hear.”

Moraine handed the signalscope to Marl. They pointed the scope in the same direction Moraine had. The entertained smile on their face quickly dropped to a concerned scowl as their eyes set on the display screen.

“It’s coming right this way.”

“What?!”
“What?”

Oh, this better be another false alarm, “What do you mean right this way?”

Marl started pacing back and forth, but the scope still pointed in the same direction, “Exactly towards us, it’s not going to the side or anything. Two-thousand meters and closing, quick. Do you see anything?”

Hal squinted out over the horizon; It was blue in every direction. The haze stopped them from seeing anything more than a couple hundred meters away.

Wait, hold on. There’s something there. A dim glow was becoming visible in the direction they were pointing.

Uh-oh.

“Marl! Look! Over there!”

“What? What is- Oh. Oh, yeah. What is that?”

More tense seconds passed, Hal felt like they were going to explode. Something that sounded like it was growling? And it had closed that distance in such a short time? Definitely not good.

Maybe Marl had seen this before? “Any ideas what this is?”

“No idea.”

The glow in the haze condensed down into two distinct spots.

Eyes.

Those are eyes.

“Are those eyes?!”

“Shit. Moraine! Get down and get inside. EVERYONE! SOMETHING BIG’S COMING AND IT’S COMING FAST! GET INSIDE!”

Commotion and chaos through their makeshift “village.” Everyone rushed back to their cabins. So much for settling into a normal.

Hal squinted at the eyes sprinting towards them through the haze. They could hear the growling themselves now. Four more eyes, somewhat above the first set, shot through the fog.

They really shouldn’t stay up here much longer.

“Marl! Come on we gotta get inside!”

“Yeah, yeah. Come on, let's go.”

They jumped down from the overlook and hid inside the Travelers’ cabin. Gabbro and Chert were already inside.

The little egg in the corner spoke up, “What is happening?”

“Something big is coming for the village.”

Gabbros seemed aloof as usual, but they were clutching their flute, tight, “Do you think it's big elder hopper?”

“Gabbro, I do NOT wanna think about that right now.”

“SSHHHHHHH”

The growling was right outside. Pretty soon Hal could make out another sound, grinding soil just on the other side of the wall. The grinding fell in volume and the growling lulled to a low rumble.

c-thuk

“-ver really got to drive through this part of the Well before, so I wouldn’t know, but this is weird.”

“Do you recognize it at all?”

" We know you, they know me. Ex-trasen-sor-y, Syn-chroni-ci-ty."

“... Never seen anything like it before.”

Voices? And strange music? They were muffled heavily, not just by the walls of their cabin, but by something else too. Still, there were voices out there! Which means people! Or… maybe it’s another trick. Riebeck flinched when they heard the voices. Hal felt themself jolt too. Those voices came from nowhere last time. Everyone sat still in the cabin, deathly silent. They must have thought the same.

“I’m gonna look for an opening. This could be the source of the signal!”

“You said that about the last three weird things.”

“... Fourth time’s the charm. Stay safe in here.”

chunk

“Alright… entrance.”

crunch
crunch
crunch

“Entrance…”

crunch
crunch

“En-ter-ance-suh.”

It was looking for an entrance. Looking for a way to get inside.

vrrrrrrr-thnk

“Hey, why don’t I jetpack over and look for an entrance?”

“Excellent idea. May I also get out? I would like to investigate this structure.”

“This is absolutely the worst place for that.”

One of the voices sounded normal, but the other two sounded… wrong. Hal didn’t like this one bit.

“Yeah, you say that, but aside from those pink things? We haven’t seen anything since we got in here.”

“... Alright fine, it has been pretty… quiet. You can both come out.”

“Sweet!”

“Uh… Sw- Sweet!”

c-thuk
vrrrrrrrrr
c-thuk
chunk
chunk

“Alright, quick little hop. You see anything weird, get out of there.”

“Yup.”

fwOOOOSH…sh…fwOOOSH-thud

That sounded… familiar. Oh shit. It’s inside.

“All good?”

“Yup!”

crunch
crunch
crun-
crunchcrunchcrunchcrunch

“Over here! Got a little hole, might be able to stick a prybar in here.”

“Oooh yeah, good find. Alright, hrrrng… hnnnng… huuuOH-”

thud

“Hahaha… HA HAhahahahah… Oh that was funny, do it again!”

"Asshole."

“Are you okay, Cooper?”

Hal registered some movement from the corner of their eye, or, rather, a lack thereof; Gabbro had stopped fidgeting and they looked slightly less terrified.

Oh shit. Did Gabbro just break?

“Yeah, yeah. Just busted my ass.”

“Here.”

“Thanks. Now, let’s see how this fares against a little impact action.”

wrrrrrr
cli-cli-cli-click
CRASH

It just broke the wall. It just broke the fucking wall. Marl flinched at the sound, slight disbelief melded with their fear.

“Open sesame. Mi casa… es su casa.”

“... What?”

“Nevermind.”

“Hey. watch your helmet.”

“Wuhoah! Look at this! Must be some old research convoy…”

crunchcrunchcrunchcrunchcrunchcrunch

“They even got their hands on a Greyhound!”

“Uh… Coop? Come over here, look at this firepit.”

“Oh yeah… It’s still… smouldering.”

“Peculiar… Oh! Cooper! Look at these logs!”

“Uh… yeah…?”

“The cuts still exhibit fresh coloring… When was the last time people were here?”

“Wall was put up in ‘63… 35 years ago… It should have faded by now.”

“HEY! IS ANYBODY HERE?!”

“Laz! What are you doing?! There could be more dredges out there!”

Laz? Laz?! There was no way, there was absolutely no way. Hal looked back to the group, they were all sharing glances between each other. Gabbro looked incredibly confused.

There is no possible way, not after they had given up hope. It’s gotta be another trick.

“There could be people here! We need to find them!”

“... Okay, okay. Yeah, you’re right.”

“IS ANYBODY ALIVE IN HERE?!”

“Okay, Miss Gradenko. Let’s try not to scare any possible survivors. Ahem, IF ANYBODY CAN HEAR THIS, WE CAN GET YOU OUT OF HERE!”

“OVER HERrrmmphhphp! Mmmmph!”

Gabbro shouted out from inside their cabin. Chert had their hand over their mouth. They were all staring, terrified, at Gabbro.

“Over there.”

“Yeah, I heard it. Holy shit someone’s alive out here.”

crunch
crunch

It’s getting closer.

crunch
crunch

They were right. They should have been moving.

crunch

Whatever was outside slowly walked up to the door. Hal’s heart was beating out of their chest. These things spoke! How dangerous could something that spoke be? They’d be fine, right? Right?

The metal door creaked open, revealing a tall figure behind it. Draped in garments and hidden behind a heavy respirator.

A person.

Ha… hahaha… It’s a person!

Their head slumped from their shoulders upon looking around the room.

“... Gabbro?”

“GABBRO?!”

Another figure emerged and shouldered the first from the doorway. It landed on the ground with a heavy thud.

“Oooph. Ohohoowww, what the hell, Laz?!”

The new figure stood in the doorway, covered in the EVA gear of a certain missing astronaut.

“Laz?!”
“Laz?!”
“Laz?!”
“LAZ?!”

“Whu- Chert? Marl? Gabbro?! Hal?!”

They stood in the doorway for a moment, slouched over.

Well, that just won’t do.

The four of them rushed towards Laz and practically tackled them out of the doorway, wrapping them in a tight group hug.

“Wha- I don’t understand! How are you guys here?!”

“We have absolutely no idea! But you’re here now!”

“EVERYBODY! IT’S SAFE TO COME OUT! COAST IS CLEAR! AND FRIGGIN’ LAZ IS HERE!”

“Everybody…?”

Slowly, each member of the village came over to see them. Laz ripped off their helmet and rubbed their eyes.

“Oh my stars! Everyone is here! You’re all okay! And Feldspar! You made it out of Dark Bramble!”

“Hey! Hatchling, nice to see- Wait, how did you…?”

This is happening. This really is happening right now. This isn’t a dream. It wasn’t a trick. Laz is here. Laz is here right now! Hal rushed in and hugged Laz tighter than they ever had before. Tears welling up in all four of their eyes.

Gossan and Riebeck were helping the other figure up from the ground.

“Yeah, thanks… fellas. Uh… thanks.”

The rest of the Outer Wilds Ventures members crowded around Laz in a big group hug. Hal had their breath squeezed out of them by the sudden addition of Riebeck, but it didn’t matter. Laz was back. Their best friend was back!

It didn’t take long until Hal clocked a sharp double take from Riebeck and then what was probably the deepest gasp they had heard from them. Which is really saying something.

“Whu-bah-duh? Usa-duh--fuh-gug-NO-MA-NAH-MA?!?!?”

Stars, they hadn’t hear Riebeck lose control of their speech that bad since they got their hands on one of those staffs that the- Nomai… had…

There’s a Nomai standing right there.

There is a Nomai… STAND ing… right there.

Laz apparently noticed that the crowd had suddenly gone quiet because they also turned to face… them? He? She? Only, for some reason, Laz didn’t look all too surprised.

“Oh! That’s Solanum, she’s a, well, yknow… A Nomai.”

“Whu-buh-yuh- You know her name?!” Riebeck rushed over, dropping everything they had in their kit except for a pencil and notebook. They started writing, “Hell-o… Miss… Sol-an-um… You… Are… A… Miss… Corr-ect?”

She smiled. She smiled and it looked like a Hearthian smile! Maybe it’s not a smile then? Because… Why would she be smiling?

“Yes, I am a ‘Miss.’ You certainly hit the nail on the head there!”

…

Did she just…?

Riebeck dropped their pencil and notebook, “Oh my stars, she speaks Hearthian.”

Did she just… make a bad pun?

The entire village went quiet, it took Gneiss and Porphy coming over with what was probably the biggest medkit Hal had ever seen to snap them out of it.

“Oh my stars! Laz! Hatchling! Space-cadet! You’re back! Are you hurt?”

Gneiss started looking over Laz and Porphy had already begun to dig some bandage rolls from the kit.

“Don’t worry! I’m fine! Cooper took good care of us. He’s been here for a while.”

They gestured over towards the taller figure, they raised their hand. Their five-fingered hand.

Wait. “He?” As in… Nomai? There were two?!

“Yo.”

Laz looked over towards “Cooper” and wore a disappointed look on their face.

“Wha- hey, dude, take your mask off, the air’s fine!”

“Cooper” shrugged and removed the respirator from his face.

What. The. Fuck. 

Ha! Hal was right! A whole new alien species! And here was one right in front of them!

“I’m a uh… human. Hey there.”

That bomb of information would have annihilated this crowd at any other moment; another alien, that also speaks Hearthian, but they were still wrestling with the emotions surrounding the undeniable fact that Laz was, in fact, back. And safe!

Laz returned to Hal. They were still wearing that shocked face.

“I really don’t understand; The sun goes supernova, you up and disappear, and you show up with not only a living Nomai, but also a completely different alien species that also speaks Hearthian? You got a story and a half to tell buddy.”

They sunk a bit.

“Yeah, I uh… I guess I do… just not right now.””

Hal knew that look. It was the oh so elusive “serious Laz” face. That was okay. They didn’t need the story right now. Laz was here. Laz was here! Everything was okay now.

“I just wish you actually got some use out of that translator.”

“I actually did get a good deal of use from it.”

Chapter Text

"Don't mess with that!"

"Well, what can I mess with?"

Chapter Text

Everybody was happy that Laz was back… Wherever they were. Slate, of course wanted to ask how their newest and most advanced ship performed, but there wasn’t much either of them would be able to glean from a half an hour's worth of flight time.

The hatchlings were all fawning over the two new aliens. One of them was a Nomai, Solanum . Slate had always thought that if they could just speak to one, they could figure out every little secret in their tech. They probably were still going to try at some point.

Now the other one, Cooper. They… He was a member of the species from this place and they seemed to have technology similar to what they had on Timber Hearth, just waaaaaay more advanced.

Highly advanced and nearly impossible to understand tech, or highly advanced, but familiar tech?

Solanum was keeping Mica, Tephra, and Arkose entertained. Apparently Riebeck too. Looks like she’s got her hands full. What about Cooper?

He was kneeling down next to Galena, handing them a strange multicolored cube. It turned, and then it turned another way… Without falling apart. Galena immediately took more interest in the object.

Slate was interested too. Looks like we’re going with “highly advanced, but familiar tech.”

“Hey, you’re Cooper right? I’m Slate.”

“Oh, hey there!” He stood up and shook Slate’s hand.

“What did you just give to Galena there?”

Galena kept their focus on the cube while turning it, “It’s a Rubicube.”

“Rubik’s cube. It’s a toy, a puzzle. You turn the sides until the squares on each side match.”

That… That’s a toy? “If that’s a toy, then I’d like to see what your actual tech’s like!”

“Ooh yeah… You got like a gate or something? A big one.”

“Yeah, we used it to cart wood in here, Hornfels and Tekite have the keys to it.”

“Alright, Now who’s…”

What did he need a big gate for?

Cooper and Slate started looking around, it didn’t take long until Slate spotted the museum curator next to Solanum, keeping the hatchlings, and Riebeck apparently, from getting too rowdy.

“There, black sweater and overcoat. That’s Hornfels.”

“Alright, cool. Hey, Galena! That thing’s a bit tricky, but I’m sure you’ll get it eventually.”

As they walked over to Hornfels, Slate noticed all the tools and other things hanging off Cooper’s belt and backpack. They didn’t even recognize most of them.

“Hey, you look like an authority figure. I’m Cooper.”

Hornfels turned around and excitedly shook his hand.

“I’m Hornfels. If you don’t mind, I just… Wow, another alien species! This has got to be exciting for you too!”

“Well, yeah. General belief at the moment is that aliens don’t exist so…”

“I remember how excited I was when Feldspar brought back the first ruins. I can only imagine how you feel right now.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty wild.”

Alright let’s move this along… What does Cooper have that needs a whole gate to fit in here? Slate could barely contain their curiosity.

“Cooper here needs the gate opened.”

“Of course! What? Can’t use that hole you punched out?”

Cooper held his hands out with a shrug, “Yeah, sorry about that. We’ll help you patch that up.”

“Don’t worry about it, we have plenty of spare material.”

Hornfels pointed in the direction of the gate and they walked over. They shared glances with Slate and the kit the Cooper was less carrying and more wearing.

“Bet you’re glad Laz is back, huh?”

“Absolutely! I’m somewhat glad they managed to guess the launch codes, I doubt they would have had any time in space before- uh…”

“Yeah, yeah, ‘before the Sun exploded,’ I heard it before, you’re not gonna sound crazy.”

Yeah… That is weird… How did they guess those codes? There were 17576 possible combinations. Slate made sure to use a large number of combinations to make sure the hatchlings wouldn’t do something dangerous. Maybe they got them before going to sleep? But that’s completely out of protocol. Hornfels wouldn’t have done that…

“Oh, good… Here’s the gate. Slate, help us pull this open.”

“You got it.”

The tugged the gate open, revealing the desolate wastes outside.

He probably had his own cart or something, “So… looking for something out here?”

Cooper leaned outside and whistled. Slate heard a grinding then a low rumble from around the corner.

“Hey, Nite! Over here!”

A large, metal machine with wheels like the ones their cabins were on lumbered on through the gate. Hornfels looked on in shock. Slate looked on in… Well, also in shock

A machine. On wheels. Built completely out of metal! The rumbling coming from the front and rear of the machine seemed to grow in intensity whenever it lurched forwards.

Oh stars, they need to figure out how this thing works. It was moving by itself!

“Hey, Nite! Nice of you to join us. Wanna say ‘hi?’”

BEEP BEEEEEP

All of the sudden, the entire village went silent and stared at the wagon. Laz and Sol called over from the crowd.

“Oh, hey, Nite!”

“Hello, Nite!”

BE-BEEP

“Nite” slowly rolled over to the crowd, the hatchlings let out a simultaneous “cooooooool” and rushed over.

Hornfels just looked on, mouth wide open. Backing the gate shut.

It looked really solid. Aside from the twelve or so things Cooper had probably strapped to it. The welding seams looked great, the shaping of the metal was smooth… It was obvious that a good deal of thought was put into it.

“Did you build this?”

Cooper laughed, “Only most of it, but the heart comes from Nite itself. Isn’t that right?”

Wait, wait, wait, the heart? “Woah woah woah… ‘Nite’s’ alive?!”

Pssshh, no. Jumping to conclusions there… Still… It’s moving around. By itself. With nobody controlling it. 

Well, shit. It is alive, isn’t it?

bzzzzz bzzzzzz

“Yup. Only car on the planet that is. The rest of them are just machines.”

Nite continued on, probably feeling very good about itself.

“I knew it! Ha! These machines were meant to move around! But… These 'cars' are machines, right? How is Nite alive”

“... I’ll get back to you on that; I've got no idea. You a mechanic?”

“Engineer. I built all of the rockets.”

Slate couldn’t help but feel a little proud of that statement.

“Ah, man after my own tastes. Wish we could stick around to talk, but-”

Suddenly, the lax attitude that Cooper had been wearing since he got here dropped to the ground harder than Mica’s rocket after running out of fuel.

“Oh, shit.”

“What?”

Cooper rushed over to what was probably the right side of Nite, since those were probably headlights. He leaned in through the window and looked at a large screen.

“28 kLIM…”

“What? What does that mean?”

He rushed over towards Laz. Ignoring the questions that Slate was asking. It didn’t really sit well with Slate, last time they were running after someone like this, it was after they had accidentally set fire to the wheelhouse.

“Laz! Laz! The Stabilizer’s not gonna last forever, we gotta get everyone out of here.”

Apparently, Laz made the realization too. A grave look fell over their face.

Slate was really starting to not like this.

“But there isn’t enou-”

“Enough space in Nite, I know. There’s gotta be something we can do…”

Cooper paced back and forth, looking over the village at the cabins they were living out of. He stopped when his gaze landed on the building that made up the village center.

“That’s it!”

“What?! What is it?”

“The Greyhound! The bus! The GM-Marmon-Herrington Super Scenicruiser! Forty seats of cross country coach comfort! We had three of them in the scrapyard back home, I know… enough about them. We can get it working and get everyone on it!”

“Bus?” “Cruiser?” “Working?” That’s a car too?

Laz wore an uncertain look on their face, “How long will that take?”

“... A while. It’s diesel, so it should be simpler though. And if it comes down to the wire, we could always tow it… probably.”

Slate weighed their options in their mind, steeling themself on the duty ahead, “I’ll help. Can’t be much more difficult than rocketry can it?”

“I’ll help too.”

Slate didn’t expect to hear that voice volunteer for something, since it was Gabbro’s.

“Glad to have you two onboard.”

“Happy to help.”
“Don’t mention it.”

They rushed over to Nite, the kids were climbing on top of it. Nite was bouncing and rocking on its springs, keeping them entertained. Cooper grabbed his toolbox from the back of Nite and dropped it near the rear of the bus. He started picking out some tools. Some of them were familiar, others… Not so much.

Slate gave the whole thing a nice look… Okay, what the hell are they looking at?

This was probably the first time in Slate’s life that they had no idea where to start with fixing a machine.

“Alright, what do we need to do?”

Cooper threw a panel near to the rear of the “bus” open.

“Any motor sitting for this long is gonna be seized up worse than my dad after a bad Thanksgiving dinner. Ideally, you’d pull the whole thing apart and clean it out, but we don’t have that time. We’re gonna pull the glow plugs, get this thing rolling, then dump the clutch. Shock going through the drivetrain should break any rust in the engine.”

Great, that didn’t make sense at all, “I think I understand… What do I need to do?”

Cooper handed them a set of tools and leaned into the engine bay.

“Take this breaker bar and unscrew these plugs. Here, here, here, and here. Lefty loosey. There’ll be four more on the other side, same spots.”

He dug through his pile of tools and produced a set of weird looking… blowtorch things?

“Now, Gabbro, I’m gonna need you to take these and inflate any of these tires that are flat. Point and shoot. Stab the tip here into the rubber and pull the trigger. It’ll fill the tire with expanding sealant foam.”

“Cheer up the sad wheels. Got it.”

Apparently, this thing Slate was looking at was the motor. They had no idea how a turbine could fit into this space and also had no idea what a “glow plug” is, but apparently they had to be removed.

They got the glow plugs out with a good deal of elbow grease, some of them leaked out a mixture of oil and some runnier substance. It certainly smelled flammable.

They could hear the sounds of the “sealing kits” Gabbro was using slowly make its way to each of the wheels.

Cooper walked back to the rear of the bus to check on Slate.

“All set over here?”

“Yup, getting the last… one… now…”

thunk

The breaker bar jerked under their arms and they spun the last plug out of the hole. More of that liquid and oil. It smelled old and varnishy. They hoped this wasn’t the fuel they were going to be using.

“Whooo-weee! That stuff is potent!”

“Okay, get clear of the bus, I’m gonna move it now.”

They clambered up into the bus and Cooper sat in what was, apparently, the driver’s seat. Gabbro joined him by the door. He released a lever and put another into the middle of whatever mechanism it was connected to. It rolled slightly and settled back into place.

Cooper had strapped the bus up to Nite for some reason.

“Alright, Nite! Gimme a pull!”

Vrooom VROOOOM

Slate could hardly believe it, the bus started moving. The whole thing pulled along by Nite, who was pretty small compared to the bus. The hatchlings sitting on top of Nite giggled and gasped.

Cooper pushed the second lever into the slot marked as “1” and released a pedal by his foot. The entire machine violently ground to a halt.

Slamming the complex interior workings of a machine like that? It felt wrong, even by Slate’s standards.

“Alright, now push!”

He set it into “R” and released the pedal again.

“Hey! What’s going on over here?”

Here comes Rutile, looking a bit irritated, as per usual.

“Oh, hey, Rutile. Cooper here needs to get this ‘bus’ running so we can get everyone out of here.”

Rutile threw their hands up in exasperation, “This is the village center!”

Cooper dragged himself out of the bus and walked over, hoping to diffuse the situation.

“Hey, I’m Cooper.”

“Rutile. Now, what are you doing with our village center?”

“We need transportation to get you guys out of here, this is the only real option.”

“Why do we need to leave? We’re safe in the village right here!”

“Because in a couple hours, there won’t be a village.”

…What?

“... Really? Is it that bad?”

“I'm sure you've seen what kind of stuff goes on out here. Trust me, it gets worse.”

They calmed down, looking towards the ground with pursed lips. Obviously weighing their options.

“... Alright, go ahead, I was hoping to get us out of here anyway… But I don’t wanna see any fires, Slate.”

“No promises Rute!

Slate followed Cooper to the engine bay, he started looking around the rear of the engine.

“Don’t worry about them; They’re just a bit… wound up.”

“I’d imagine. Picked a hell of a place to camp out, I’ll say that much. Rust marks on the flywheel still line up, hasn’t budged at all yet.”

Cooper climbed back up into the driver’s seat and went through the motions with Nite again.

Gabbro was still sitting in the seat, “What did you mean by that?”

“What?”

“‘In a couple hours there won’t be a village?’”

Cooper had that serious look on his face again.

He propped his chin up on a fist, “I suppose we’re here to save you, but by coming here in the first place, we may have doomed you.”

That’s unnecessarily foreboding, “I could do without the ambiguity.”

“Foreign objects in the Well, where we are right now, cause destructive interference. Too much, and the place gets pissed. Eventually, everything breaks down and the whole place is scrambled worse than… beef in a blender.”

“What?”

“It’s just really bad. Right now, there’s a machine in Nite keeping our waveforms in sync. Once it runs out of energy though? The laws of physics turn off and the makeup of matter itself gets shuffled around.”

Slate was more engineering, not theoretical physics, that was more Hornfels and Chert’s thing, but they didn’t need to hear more than that to understand that yeah, that would be bad.

Gabbro spoke up, like they hadn’t even heard that conversation, “So… you’re uh… Cooper, right?”

“See any other humans around here?”

They chuckled, “No, I suppose I do not, bus-buddy.”

Cooper turned to face Gabbro with an expectant look, they just looked back confused.

Cooper smiled and shook his head, “Heh… bus-buddy.”

Was something going on between those two?

“Alright, hold on, we still have an engine to… ‘fix.’”

Slate could hear the quotes in that. “Fix” was definitely a stretch for what they were doing. The mechanical equivalent of waking up a coma patient with a cold water shower.

“Pull!”

Dump.

“Push!”

Dump.

“Pull!”

Dump

Thunk
Krrkrkkrrkrkrrrrrr

There was a nasty grinding coming from the engine that shook its way through the entire “bus.” Slate winced at the sound. Did they mess something up? They turned to face Cooper, he had a satisfied smile on his face.

Yeah, this was definitely worse than Slate’s standards.

Cooper rushed to the rear of the bus and placed the breaker bar on the engine, he forced it through a full rotation, which was apparently a good thing because he started pumping his fists.

“Whooooo Yeah! That’s how to break an engine free!”

“Really, genuinely surprised that worked… So… About the whole ‘Well getting pissed’ thing… How much time do we have?”

“We got 28 kLIM, currently being used up at a rate of 2.4 every hour… So, 9 at most, 8 if we’re being reasonable, and 7 if we’re being safe.”

7 hours to fix a piece of alien tech… And Gabbro's helping them... Those are good odds.

“So we gotta hurry.”

“Yeah.”

“... What’s next?”

Chapter Text

Okay, everything is fine. There’s just a Nomai. A living Nomai sitting there, in front of Riebeck. This is perfectly fine. These are normal circumstances.

Oh, golly.

This is a Nomai! A real Nomai! And her name is Solanum! She looks just like the statues, except so much more alive! Because she is! This is a living Nomai!

“Miss Solanum, how are you still alive? Aren’t you super old?”

“Riebeck!”

Their voice hung on that last syllable as it rose to an almost inaudible frequency. That was a bad question. That was a terrible first question! They’re making a fool of themselves!

Solanum must have noticed Riebeck’s immediate apprehension after the question because she smiled and giggled. She smiled! In reaction to something they did!

“You may just call me ‘Solanum.’ I was trapped on the Quantum Moon, as it turns out, when one becomes entangled with the Quantum Moon, time only passes for them when the possibility they happen to be entangled with is under observation.”

Quantum… Moon? Quantum phenomena are real? But… wouldn’t that mean… Gabbro? Was?? Right?????

“Do you know how that works?”

Solanum shrugged with her hands palm-up, “Quantum objects exist in multiple states; Superpositions. When under conscious observation, those superpositions collapse. As for the mechanism behind it? I am afraid we were never able to fully answer that riddle.”

Gabbro was right.

Hal had the eraser of a pencil pressed against their lip, “How did you learn Hearthian?”

She gestured to Laz with a warm smile, “Cooper and Laz helped me learn.”

“Yep! As it turns out, some members of Cooper’s species speak the same language as the Nomai. We just translated from there.”

Some of these people were lucky enough to be able to understand spoken Nomai?! What Riebeck wouldn’t have given to be able to learn Nomai… Probably nothing! This is crazy! But, apparently not crazy enough for Hal; They were just soaking in the information with wide eyes and an awe filled smile. Riebeck couldn’t believe they weren’t more excited.

Oh, golly… Was Riebeck being the weird one?!

Hal spoke up, “Hold on, Laz. These people speak multiple languages?”

Laz started gesturing widely with their hands while smiling, “Oh, you should’ve seen it, Hal! Their cities are huge! There’s six billion people living on this planet, so they were bound to end up developing separate languages.”

Uh-huh. Uh-huh. That makes sense. Keeping one language between six billion people would be nearly impossible. Six billion is a lot.

Woah. Woah.

“Six billion is a lot! We’re not even a drop in a bucket in a river! I guess it makes sense though… How big did you say this planet was? Forty hundred-”

“Forty thousand.”

“Forty thousand kilometers in diameter! Woah… Hal, just think of all the history, heritage, artifacts! And I don’t even have to go to space for it!”

Hal looked back towards them with a grin, “... And I’d bet you’re excit-”

“Of course I’m excited about that! Just when we’re finally able to dig into the secrets of the Nomai, we find a whole new planet! AAAaah!”

Riebeck tossed their hands up into the air.

Where’s their notebook and pencil…?

tink
thud

“Oh, uh… Let me just grab those…”

Okay, just pick them up.

Pick it up.

Okay, why are they struggling to pick up a PENCIL??

“Riebeck, you seem to be… Uncommonly interested in ancient history… Why is that?”

“Are you kidding? Archaeology is awesome! A lot of people think that time is like a locked door that you can’t pull anything through, but when it comes to knowledge… Time is more of a constant eroding force. And when you find out that the people you are researching were just that; People?! Like the rest of us?! It makes the whole thing so much more… interesting… I guess that point of view is kinda in bad taste, now that I’m talking to… Uh… Sorry.”

Riebeck started to hesitate over their words halfway through that rant, and for good reason. Laz was also trying to get them to stop, urgently swiping a flattened hand next to their neck. Hal just had their head in a facepalm.

Nice going, Riebeck.

Somehow, Solanum did not seem too upset. She looked a little… Down… But she was still smiling!

“There is no need to apologize. I am actually very glad that we were able to inspire such a deep curiosity in our legacy and, from what Laz told me, you have certainly put a significant amount of effort into your studies.”

Was she… complimenting them? That was a dizzying concept; A member of an ancient highly advanced alien species complementing them for their work. Oh golly.

Riebeck hadn’t noticed that they had spent the better part of the last half-minute unable to come up with any words before the door swung open.

“Hey, Laz, Sol… and uh… You’re Hal and… Riebeck, Right?”

“Yup.”

“Uh, yeah. Hello!”

It was Cooper, the other alien. This was becoming overwhelming!

“Need anything?”

“Yeah… Would either of you know if there’s any working batteries around here? Big ones. High current. Twelve volt.”

“Hello, Cooper. Isn’t there one attached to the back of Nite?”

Cooper pursed his lips and closed his eyes, “Yes… Yes there is in fact one there, forgot about that… Thanks, Sol.”

Laz stood up and made for the door, “Sure you don’t need any help out there?”

“Yeah, not much we can do until we’re sure the engine’s running. I’ll see ya.”

“See ya, Coop.”

Cooper disappeared out the door again. Probably for the best. Riebeck could barely handle one alien right now.

Oh, wait… they’re on a different planet… wouldn’t that make them the alien? Ohhh heebie-jeebies… but these are the good kind!

“W- Well… Uh… Solanum! What was Nomai culture like? Start with whatever you feel comfortable with… If you want, of course.”

There! Yes! Perfectly phrased question!

She closed her central eye and furrowed her brow. If Riebeck didn’t know any better, it looked like she was thinking.

“Oh! For us Nomai, we would have two parents of the opposite gender and, together, they would create one or more… kids. Yes, kids is the correct translation. These two Nomai, the mother and father, the parents, would then be responsible for raising the kids.”

Riebeck remembered reading translations that detailed relations between individual Nomai. It all made so much sense now…

Hal was the first to speak up, “Apairitied reproduction… Weird. Uh- Relatively speaking.”

Ha! Riebeck wasn’t the only one capable of embarrassing slip-ups!

“Ooh! Hal and I have a running bet on whether or not you were an interstellar species so…”

“Where did you come from?”

“I was born in Ember Twin…”

Darn…

“...but, my clan initially arrived from a distant star system.”

Not Darn!

“Ha! You owe me five silverfins… Or… Well, any other food or object of similar value.”

Hal had a sufficiently reserved smile on their face as they rolled their eyes, “Alright, fine. You were right.”

That was thoroughly deserved, though now Riebeck realized just how much they missed smoked silverfin…

“I’m kinda glad I was wrong, this is much more interesting! If you were an interstellar species then, why did your people come here?”

Hal had leaned in, pencil hovering over their notebook. Not realizing that Laz was swiping their hand in the “knock it off” gesture again, this time, towards Hal.

“We were looking for the… Eye… of the Universe…”

All of the sudden, the curious and excited look on that she had been wearing this whole time fell away. Her gaze fell to the ground and her brow tightened.

She looked… hurt…

“Hey… Uh… Solanum? Are you alright?”

Uh-oh, they just said that. They just said that without thinking… 

Riebeck should be much more careful than this; That could have been considered as an insult in her culture for all they know! But the whole ‘alien cultural exchange’ thing didn’t matter right now…They were both aliens here anyway. Solanum is, by all meanings of the word, a person, and it looks like she needs some comforting.

“Uh… Well, yes. I am alright. It’s just that we never were able to find the Eye…”

Oh.

Yeah, that makes sense. There were a lot of Nomai remains found in… strange locations. Hatchli- Wait, no… Kids too. Whatever happened must have been… big and… sudden…

“Wanna hug? You did have hugs, that was a thing you had, right?”

Her brow stayed pulled up, but she managed to smile at Riebeck, “Of course. And, yes, I would like one.”

Riebeck leaned over to give Solanum a nice, tight, hug. Hal was still wincing. Laz was giving them a thumbs up.

Riebeck did something right!

“I’m real sorry Solanum.”

“It is alright, Hal; There is no way you could have known.”

“That doesn’t make it any- Alright, tell us if there are any questions you don’t want us to… touch on. You speak about whatever you’re comfortable with.”

Both Laz and Solanum visibly relaxed at the statement. Laz must have already had to help her through everything.

Soooo… What could they ask?

It seemed like for every question Riebeck thought of, there were a thousand ways it could connect back to their extinction! This was going to be difficult.

…

Very difficult.

…

“Uhm… I can assure you that you may ask any question you wish.”

Riebeck snapped out of it to see Solanum wearing what could only be an awkward smile. They were both taking too long, weren’t they?

“Oh! Uh, how… uh… wha- Hmm…”

“How did you get around? Like, between planets?”

Oh! Yes! Good one, Hal!

“Excellent question! Both Ember Twin and Brittle Hollow had their own gravity cannon and shuttles. Any Nomai that needed to travel off-world could use these shuttles.”

“What if the shuttle was already in use?”

“We used a scheduling system and had a network of local warp pads.”

Having to wait in line to explore something? Maybe Riebeck was lucky to be able to go to space…

Wait, warp pads?

“Woah, woah. Sorry. Excuse me? Warp pads?”

“Yes! Each warp pad housed a paired white hole that linked to a black hole at the warp towers on Ash Twin. Each one was created at the Black Hole forge using the special conditions of the Brittle Hollow black hole.”

Oh, yeah. That. They were definitely not lucky to be able to go to space.

Hal finished scribbling in their notebook, “What made the Brittle Hollow black hole so special?”

“It was a naturally occurring linked black hole. Connected to the white hole at the edge of your system. I remember, after school my friends and I would jump into it for fun.”

…

For fun.

…

She would jump into the black hole for fun.

“You mean to say that whole time… The black hole was safe???”

She seemed genuinely shocked at that. Like she didn’t just admit to doing the one thing… Okay, one of the many things that Riebeck would never never never ever even chance a thought about doing.

“Of course? Surely you didn’t expect us to have built a hanging city above a normal black hole.”

Yeah, that… does seem pretty stupid now that they thought about it.

“But Slate got the warp cores from the… Does that mean I… was carrying a black hole with me all the time?!”

Hal was similarly shocked, but Laz was chuckling in the corner. They knew! Solanum told them! And they didn’t bother telling Riebeck until now!

“Yup, your Little Scout’s little buddy was a teeny tiny black hole.”

…

Oh, golly. They feel weird.

Where’s the window?

There’s the window.

shhhh-thunk

“Spare him his life from this mon-strosit-ty.”

There’s the ground.

…

And there’s their lunch.

“Hey, hey! Nice one Riebeck!”

“Thanks, Cooper.”

They just threw up. In front of both aliens. Great.

“Oh my stars! Riebeck! I apologize! I did not know the topic would be so uncomfortable for you!”

Solanum held them up by the shoulder, helping them back down.

“It’s alright. It was mostly Laz’s fault anyway.”

“You should’ve felt what it was like falling into the black… Hole… Uh, heh-heh.”

They WHAT?!

Hal quickly set their notebooks down, “You fell into the black hole without knowing it was safe?! Within the first half-hour OF YOUR LAUNCH?!”

Laz looked a little startled, “Uh, well… I went to Brittle Hollow and uh… A piece of it kinda… Fell down while I was on it?”

“... WHAT?! ”

“Hey, Hal, calm down. It wasn’t their fault! Before the sun… Well, blew up, Hollow’s Lantern went crazy! It started spitting out debris everywhere! Whole chunks of the surface fell into the black hole. It’s kinda the reason why I was too afraid to go back to my ship to check in.”

“Yeah, that’s what happened.”

Hal started tripping over their own words. Hey! That’s Riebeck’s thing!

“You are the most luckily unlucky person in the universe. You know that, right Laz?

Laz put their hands on their hips in mock pride, “Yeah, I guess I am.”

Hal lightly punched their shoulder, “I’m gonna kill you one a’ these days.”

“Ooh! Maybe that’s why we ended up here and you guys ended up wherever you ended up. You two were the only ones who’ve used warp travel!”

“That is an… interesting theory, Riebeck. I would be pressed to agree.”

A Nomai was agreeing with their theory…

Where’s that window?

Chapter Text

The larger intricacies of such a profoundly alien machine were truly a challenge to get a grasp on.

Or whatever Chert would say.

Turns out the ‘hound is actually a bus… Which is like a big car… Which is like a spaceship, but for the ground. Gabbro usually dozed off during Slate’s lectures on turbopump or "transonic transition nozzle" repairs. If something looked broken, Gabbro just fixed it. And there sure was a lot that looked broken

They had a wrench and was told to tighten a couple bolts. That was fine. That was cool. There was a reason Gabbro was on statue-duty. Takes a lotta oomph to heft a giant stone artpiece, thank you very much.

The only thing that was a little not cool was the person who had given them the wrench: Cooper. The alien dude that Gabbro saw whenever they slept or meditated.

Dream-buddy.

Now, Gabbro had always been good at keeping their mind active while they shuffled all their thoughts under the bed. It was the great paradox of meditation after all, but… This was just weeeeeeird.

They were no Laz. No great detective. They missed that geyser when they gave up on getting their ship back (Slate would have been sooooo mad if they didn’t all get incinerated), but they had to get to the bottom of this.

Maybe it was an out-of-body-thing? Memory-buddy sure threw any doubts about that out the window…

“Hey, how’s it going with these brake lines? They don’t look to be leaking anymore.”

Can’t he tell Gabbro’s thinking here?

“Eeeyup. Got ‘em all snugged down.”

“Cool, cool. Slate and I got some electricity hooked up and the thing didn’t burn down… So the wires are probably good.”

Aaaand spring the question! Blindside him!

“... Do you play any instruments?”

Nice. Suuuublte.

“... Why don’t you take a guess?”

Darn, he’s just as good out here as he was in there.

“How should I know?”

“Yeah, how could you know? Y’know, from what I heard, you’re not particularly the ‘up and at ‘em’ type… So, why are you helping us?”

Oh-ho! Excellent question! But, they were prepared for this one.

“This seems pretty important to get done, but everybody else is busy and I didn’t have much on my plate.”

Oh, he looks thoroughly unimpressed.

“Hey, Cooper? We may have an issue with the engine. Also, did you get that pump out yet?”

Phew! Saved by the Slate! Thanks, Slate.

“... Yeah, I got it right here. What’s wrong?”

“Might be a bit of a crack. Not sure how bad it is.”

Oooh a crack. Those are usually bad. Cracks usually meant losing all your oxygen in space or sinking to the bottom of the water.

They all walked over to the engine and, sure enough, surrounded by cleaned off metal, was a thin, but gnarly crack. On the scale of things Gabbro would see and fix, this would be… Like a 7. It ran from the bolts on the bottom, to the bolts on the top.

Must have hurt.

“Hooo, yeah. That’s a really bad one. Water must have gotten in and froze.”

Slate was getting tired. Gabbro could tell that they were tired too. Which was a pretty unfamiliar experience for them, since they were usually on top of the whole relaxing thing. Aside from the whole tiredness situation, Slate seemed very wound up. For once in their life, they weren’t being reckless.

Come on, it can’t be that bad; It’s just a tiny crack.

“So, it’s broken.”

“Yeah.”

Oh… Broken. That’s bad. That’s really bad. That makes this a 10.

Slate remained in their tired state, looking somewhat more unmotivated, “So, everything we did was for nothing?”

That was an even worse thought. They need this bus to move, it’s their way out of here. Gabbro didn’t much like the whole “laws of physics being turned off” thing; The laws of physics are cool!

“Not… Really. Look, Slate, why don’t you run this pump over to the Beating Hear- The uh… glowing tree and see if it can’t fix it?”

“But- … Sure.”

Gabbro watched Slate hurry over to the tree with a worried look. Gabbro could feel that same shape pushing its way to their face as well. Those past two weeks of pure, distilled not -worrying didn’t do much to help right now either.

“Gabbro? Come with me.”

“Got a plan?”

“Yeah.”

Oh, good. They’re gonna be okay. He’s walking them over to the car, Nite, where he probably has some cool problem-fixer device. He had a lot of those. Also very convenient for them, was that they were alone with Cooper. They can figure out this mystery at their own pace.

“... This is about the dreams, right?”

…

Huh.

“Wow. Uh, yeah. I thought I was going crazy there for a minute.”

“Ha! Weird stuff, right?”

He knew. Which means the dream stuff was real.

That’s… relieving. They felt great! Probably better than they had before they met memory-buddy. But, that was before they fully got used to the cyclones so… probably not a very fair comparison.

Wait… Doesn’t that mean… “So you know about what happened, right?”

“... Yeah, but you won’t hear a peep out of me. That’s you guys’ thing. Talking to a group of people about how they… Yeah, probably not easy.”

A strange feeling was starting to bubble up in Gabbro’s mind: uncertainty, worry. Things didn’t usually need worrying about; In one way or another they’d eventually end up working out, but now? After the loops? The permanence of everything was more prevalent than ever. Or Gabbro had just never realized before… Now they need guidance.

“What would you do? If you were in our situation?”

Cooper’s pace slowed, keeping the hatchlings rushing by out of earshot. He looked to the distance with a tightened brow and pursed lips.

“... I, uh… I don’t know. I’d probably just get it over with and tell everyone, but I wasn’t there; I don’t know what it was like.”

Gabbro really wasn’t there either…

“Hey, how’s it going, Nite?”

c-thuk

“-oad you travel, it stays, all uphill; Let’s work together. Come on, come on, let’s work togeth-”

chunk

“Here. Take one of these. Might need a good deal for a crack like that. Don’t get it on your skin, and definitely not on your bandages.”

He handed him a… bucket. The cool problem-fixer device was a bucket full of… putty.

Yup, Weird stuff.

“I wish you woulda told me you were here in the Well. I’d have brought the trailer.”

“Meditation isn’t a super reliable way to talk to people. I didn’t really think you were real.”

“Same here, at first.”

They started walking back towards the ‘hound. Gabbro hadn’t realized before, but it was in a sorry state. There were chunks of metal missing and places where glass should have been covered with wood or tarp… At least the wheels were round. It kinda sucked, but they had to use it to escape. So, they had a few hours to make it not suck enough to move.

Cooper suddenly turned to them with a raised eyebrow, “You’re avoiding them, aren’t you? That’s the reason you’re helping me.”

Now they’ve been blindsided!

“What? No, no that’s not it. I just don’t want to know if… they hate… me. Huh, yeah. I guess I am.”

“Dude, we talked about this, remember? They don’t… Look, they missed you. All of you. They thought you were all gone. Least you can do is talk to them. Sometimes you just gotta buckle down and get to it.”

They owe it to everybody else to at least be there…

“... ‘Up and at ‘em.’”

“Yeah, I didn’t expect you of all people to need to hear that.”

Gabbro didn’t expect that either.

“What? This place is suuuper weird.”

“Ha! You’ll get used to that quick.”

He was right. After everything they went through… What everyone went through… They had to at least talk to them.

“... Hey, Cooper?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks.”

They made it back to the ‘hound as Slate was rushing over with the pump. They were still wearing that worried look, but Gabbro didn’t feel worried when they saw it; They felt a lot better now. They knew what they had to do.

It certainly helped that their welding mask was bouncing up and down as they ran. That was always pretty funny looking.

Cooper waved them over, “Hey, Slate! How’s the pump?”

They held their hands out and shrugged, “Well, it moves now.”

He clapped his hands together, “Good! Let’s fix this block. Once we're done here we gotta hurry to check the drivetrain.”

Slate’s got that “Mica’s doing something stupid with their rocket” look again.

“What? You got a welder or a forge in that uh… car of yours?”

Cooper spoke matter-of-factly, “No, we got putty.”

“... Putty.”

Wow, look at that. Gabbro couldn’t even make out a single emotion on Slate’s face now. It was blank. A blank Slate. Ha!

“Alright, Gabbro, you’re gonna wanna lob off a good chunk of putty with that spade and lob it at the crack.”

Now this is the kind of repair job Gabbro could get behind. Whatever it was meant to accomplish.

crshhhht
fwoop
splat

The crack in the metal slowly drew back together and stitched itself up. Eventually, it looked like it was never even there in the first place.

The problem-fixer device was a bucket full of magic putty!

Gabbro watched as the blank Slate slowly became an artpiece of slightly irritated confusion as their jaw fell nearly past their neck.

Cooper could barely hold back an amused snort… Wait, no… that was Gabbro. Gabbro was struggling not to laugh.

“What th- How d- Huh?! What the hell was that?!”

“Repair putty.”

Cooper said it like it was as common as a pot in a kitchen, and that only seemed to make Slate look more ridiculous.

“Yeah, like that helps. How does it work?!”

“I bet it’s like magic.”

They shot Gabbro another look. Ridiculousity levels are becoming dangerously high.

“It’s a mixture of microscopic robots and all the material they need to fix something.”

“... Yup, it’s magic.”

“Gabbro? Shut up. Seriously, how does it work?”

Cooper just shrugged with a little smirk on his lips, “I dunno, I just make the stuff. It’s basically magic.”

There, ridicularity has reached critical mass. Gabbro started laughing. Like, suuuuuuuuuuper hard, and that's with ten u’s. They may not make it out of here if they can’t fix this bus, but this was too much! And they haven’t had a good laugh in… In a while. They could barely hear Slate’s complaints.

“... I’m kinda wishing I was breathing fumes right now.”

Chapter Text

Chert had holed themself up in the Travellers’ cabin since Laz’s sudden arrival, nursing down a cup of tea at this particular moment. Of course, the situation itself was profoundly strange; Laz had returned with not only a living Nomai, Solanum, but a member of this planet’s resident species, a human, Cooper. Chert was always more interested in astronomy and astrophysics, but they hadn’t paid the strange event much mind. They were moreso concerned with one, simple, halting question; Should they apologize?

Their outburst at Gabbro was unprompted and completely unbefitting of the situation. On top of that, Gabbro was the last person to deserve such a treatment; Their injuries from the statue had only barely hindered their willingness to help around the village. In fact, it almost seemed that upon arriving here, they had cultivated a significantly stronger sense of duty and purpose. So why had Chert snapped at Gabbro of all people? Surely it could not have only been because of their exhaustion, could it?

The door creaked open to reveal the now nearly unfamiliar face of Felspar, wearing a sufficiently restrained, supportive smile that forced the scars on their face into shape.

“Hey there, egghead. How’re you holding up?”

Chert gestured to the chair across the “trailer” as these were apparently called, “Better than you, if I had to hazard a guess.”

They set down with a thud, “Psssh, you’d be surprised at how far you can stretch your rations if you stay perfectly still.”

Chert looked over Feldspar’s bony frame with a raised eyebrow.

“... Yeah, I ran out of those a couple months in. Dark Bramble’s native bugs are not tasty by the way.”

“I’d imagine. Now, what brings you here?”

They threw their hands out with a good deal of theatrics, “What? Can’t check in on a pal? I wanted to make sure you were doing okay, catching up on sleep.”

Chert had been struggling these past few days, but the sludge of exhaustion and the weight of their limbs seemed to ease away every time they were able to manage more than five hours of sleep.

“I’ve been doing better, thank you.”

“Okay… Now, wanna tell me the whole truth?”

“What? I am doing better. Not great, mind you, but definitely better.”

“Oh no, I believe you. It’s just that you’re wearing it all over your face…”

Chert had realized that they still had all the hallmarks of deep thought plastered over their face. What everybody referred to as-

“... The ‘Problem Look?’”

Chert drew in a deep breath and sighed, more out of annoyance than anything, “It’s a personal thing. I feel I may have made a mistake.”

Feldspar’s shoulders drooped and they threw their head back to look at the ceiling, “Aauuuuugh. You really haven’t changed at all; You and your problems. Chert, sometimes results aren’t directly proportional to effort, but trust me, people know the kind of work you’re putting in.”

Seriously? They had changed. They got over that little issue thanks to their inability to find Feldspar in the first place!

“W- Wha- What you- No! That’s not what I’m talking about!”

Feldspar leaned in with their arms on their knees and moved their hand in a circular motion, “Then…?”

Oh, they’re not getting out of this, are they? Damn this, quite frankly, concerning condition they find themself in!

“My little argument with Gabbro. I feel as if I should apologize.”

Feldspar leaned back into their seat, “Ah, yeah. I heard that from across the camp. You probably should.”

“Oh, and how do you know I’m telling the ‘whole truth’ this time?”

“The ‘Problem Look’ is gone.”

Damn it.

“It’s just… I was so frustrated! Everybody was coming to me for help or to ask ‘What should I do here?’ I’m an astronomer! An astrophysicist! Why are they coming to me for… For… Architectural advice?! Like I’m the big know-it-all above all know-it-alls.”

“Ha! You kinda are… But I know how you feel. Yeah… Yeah, I get it.”

“Really?”

“Yeah; It was kinda… nice in Dark Bramble, away from all that riff-raff.”

“Nice enough to stay?”

Feldspar leaned back in and levelled a deadly, unimpressed look at Chert, “Abso-fucking-lu-hutely not! If I’m retiring somewhere, it’s gonna be in a nice cabin. I’d’ve probably stayed up with Esker or something. I may tell stories about it and how the anglerfish didn’t scare me, but lemme tell you this; If I wasn’t scared, I wouldn’t have crashed.”

“Hmmph. I believe that. What about the other times you crashed?”

They sunk back into their chair and waved their hand dismissively, “Purely circumstantial; Got a bit overzealous. And they weren’t really crashes, per se; My ship could still fly afterwards.”

“...”

“... It… Was nice enough to stay, actually. ‘Course, I would have tried to leave at some point, but never actually got around to it. Now, being back here with everybody else, looks like it actually wasn’t as bad as I thought. I came back to see that people weren’t missing ‘Feldspar the Daredevil’ or ‘Feldspar the Explorer’ or the ‘Pilot’ or the ‘Hero’ or anything. Heh, they were missing me; Just Feldspar.”

Wow, turns out Chert really was doing better than Feldspar.

“Sounds like you were trying to rationalize a reason why you were stuck.”

“Yeah, maybe. I should probably apologize.”

“... For getting stuck?”

“... Nevermind. Why do you think you snapped on Gabbro like that?”

Of course it wouldn’t be that easy.

“I just- I had been working so hard to keep things moving smoothly around here and they come up and tell me to 'take a break?' It made me, well, irrationally angry... and I still don’t know why.”

Feldspar had one corner of their mouth pulled up and to the side, like they had just seen something worthy of awe happen right in front of their eyes.

“Oh… Ha! Hahaha… Oh, stars. I know exactly what’s going on here.”

“... What?”

“You’re obviously telling me what you think is the truth, but that’s only because you’re lying to yourself! Ha!”

“What do you mean?”

“... Let’s just say you’re ‘trying to rationalize a reason.’”

“... Whatever you say.”

They both sat in silence for a while, quietly listening to the sounds of work being done on the “bus” muffled through the wall. It looked as if more people were working on the bus now. Chert could make out Porphy and Tuff hustling around. There were more, but  they could barely see through the grimy window. It was a constant reminder of the terrible consequences for the village if they couldn’t manage to get the machine working. Still, if Porphy was helping, then all the complicated tasks must be completed by now.

Feldspar suddenly shifted in their seat and spoke up, “Y’know what’s weird?”

“What?”

“When Laz got here, the first thing they said to me wasn’t ‘You’re alive!’ or ‘How’re you doing?’ or ‘You look like shit.’ It was, ‘Feldspar! You made it out of Dark Bramble!’”

“Yes? That’s a very reasonab- Wait…”

That was one of Lazurite’s first words after arriving here. Which doesn’t make sense since Felspar had never told them they were in Dark Bramble because they were in another place entirely.

“Chert, don’t lie to me here. Did. You. Know?”

Feldspar looked particularly irate and ready to throw a couple punches. Which Chert couldn't imagine would go well for either of them, given Feldspar's weakened state.

“What?! No! We had no idea! You had effectively disappeared for eight years! We would have gone to rescue you if we knew! Even in Dark Bramble. Hornfels especially.”

Feldspar fell back into their seat with their head in their hand, looking over into a corner. Oh, stars. They’re thinking. Feldspar is actually thinking about something.

“Yeah, then how did Laz know?”

“I couldn’t even begin to hazard a guess.”

It was… impossible! Paradoxical! An evident truth that is wholly disproved by past conditions. The only possible explanation being that Lazurite had somehow managed to locate Feldspar on their inaugural launch day. Now, Chert did not know when they had launched, but they could not have been up for more than an hour at most! There was simply no way that they had found Feldspar in such a short period of time, not after Chert spent the better part of several years trying to find them!

“Chert, I swear, if I find out that you guys knew I was in there that whole time…”

“We absolutely did not! We would have come for you.”

Feldspar let out an exasperated sigh, “... Then I guess we’ll have to ask Laz.”

“I suppose we wi-”

grr-rrrrrrr-rrrrrr-rrrr-rr-rr-vzzzzzzzzzmmmmm…
grrrr-rrrrrr-rrrrrrr-rrrrr-rrr-r-vVRRRMMMmmmm-VRMm-VRMmmmmmmmmmmm

“YES! YES! YES! FUCK YEAH! SHE LIVES!”

Chert and Feldspar both leaned out the door to see the… human, Cooper, jumping around wildly as a puff of black smoke slowly wafted away from the bus, which was now making a low rumbling sound. Similar to that of the “car” Cooper had, which he referred to as “Nite.”

Chert walked over to see what was going on.

“Oh, hey! I haven’t seen you before. You’re not Tephra or Arkose or-”

“My name’s Chert. And I’m not a hatchling.”

Cooper’s smile fell and he sucked his lips inwards as he stared blankly at them. Chert could see that Feldspar’s lips were pressed tightly together and their cheeks had flared out. Some air escaped, producing a short, but distinct buzzing sound.

Figures.

“I uh… Y’know I’m- I’m Cooper,” He shook their hand with an obviously pained smile, “The uh… The bus is working. We’re gonna have everyone bring their stuff over, we’re gonna run a few more checks, then we’re outta here. So, uh, gather your… stuff.”

“Alright then.”

Chert walked back over to the Travellers’ cabin with a deeply unimpressed look on their face.

“Soooo… what are you gonna grab, hatchli-”

“Shut up.”

Chapter Text

It’s go time. Everyone’s getting out of here.

Everyone in the village had been rushing back and forth from their trailers to pack whatever they could onto the, quite frankly, large cargo compartments of the bus. Cooper was underneath, doing some final checks and topping off fluids or something. Laz spied the flashes of acetylene underneath and the odd mad dash over to the “Beating Heart” with a broken part. He had Slate and Porphy running back and forth between the bus and a tanker truck, filling it up with “diesel” instead of the usual gasoline.

Laz was helping bring some of the objects that Riebeck had taken an interest in. Which is to say, nearly everything. They had a decent sized box of books and journals in their hands at this moment. They set it down inside the cargo hold and made their way back towards the cabin, not really enthusiastic about having to lug another map or globe or box or anything that they were sure that Riebeck would want.

Riebeck backed out of the trailer door with a stack of boxes and closed it with their foot, “Alright! That’s everything! Thanks, Laz!”

“Don’t mention it, it was nothing.”

It definitely was something, but they didn’t have the heart to tell Riebeck.

After Riebeck hefted their boxes into the cargo hold, they were closed up and fastened down. Everyone filtered into the bus and, very anxiously, waited. Cooper had finished with his final checks and was over by Nite, leaning into the window with the radio mic in his hand.

Time to see if they’re all set. Laz walked over, picking up the tail end of a conversation Cooper was having.

“... n’t worry, it’ll be fine. See ya, Francis. Cooper, out.”

“Alright… Francis, out.”

He leaned back out of the car to look at Laz. Face coated in soot, grime, and rust. Gross.

“Alright. Are we all set?”

“Everyone’s packed up and packed in. We’re all ready.”

Cooper clapped his hands together, spreading black dust in a cloud around him, “Alright! Let’s get you acquainted with the finer intricacies of the manual transmission.”

“Right…”

They walked over to the bus. Laz could definitely tell that there was a tension in the way Cooper walked, but… they realized that they were walking in the exact same way. Of course this was a tense situation! If this went wrong…

It wouldn’t. It couldn’t.

The doors on the bus swung open and they both hefted themselves inside. Everyone in the village had found their own seat and Gneiss had the rearmost part set up for medical aid for whatever may or, hopefully, may not happen. Cooper gestured for Laz to sit in the driver’s seat and they set down. Hands gripping the wheel with way too much force.

“Alright, you remember how this goes right?”

“Yup, clutch, brake, gas.”

Laz thought back to their little rundown and dress rehearsal of doing something that Nite had already proven to be easily done by a machine, but what are you gonna do?

“Right, good. Now, driving stick requires a good deal of muscle memory; You need an intimate feel for the vehicle…”

Okay.

“... You need to take the time to get familiar with where the bite point is…”

Uh-huh…

“... You need to get the throttle and clutch for any given speed down to instinct…”

Alright…?

“... We don’t have time for any of that, so, you’re just gonna wanna build up as many revs as possible and dump the clutch. This is diesel, so it’ll have the torque to just chew on it. It’s not the best idea, but we’re not really gonna be driving this with longevity in mind. Shifting while moving will be a zillion times easier though.”

Laz had become confident with going through the motions of shifting through gears, but actually doing it? Well, the bus hadn’t been working until now. They stared down at the steering wheel and instrument cluster. The gauges seemed to multiply in front of their face, numbers and lettering became blurry and nondescript. They felt like, at any moment, the shifter stick would come to life and pounce; Intent on biting and filling them with deadly venom.

There was a lot riding on them here. They could not- Would not mess up. Laz steeled their nerves and set their sights out through the village gate and into the hazy blue of… Whatever this place was.

“Sounds good. I’m ready.”

“Alright, I’m gonna head back to Nite now. You know the frequency?”

“27.185.”

“Yup. And Laz?” Cooper got up and paused at the door, “You’ll do just fine.”

Cooper left through the doors. Leaving the rest of them in this big ol’ metal box. Solanum was sat in the first row of seats at the top of the stairs and the Travellers were all on the lower rows, just behind Laz. The hatchlings were kept closest to the medical seats, just in case.

Laz’s gaze snapped back out the windshield as they saw Nite’s headlights shoot to life.

Okay, now it’s go time.

They heard Cooper’s voice tear through the static from the onboard radio, “Alright, we’re gonna be looking out to the north, straight out the gate and a slight right. Should be very little in the ways of debris that way, good for speed. Get rolling! I’ll be right behind you!”

Laz pushed down on the gas and watched as the tachometer spun around to the right. They lifted their foot off the clutch and the bus got moving with an uncomfortably sudden jerk.

“Alright! Opening now! -had a motor trouble that turned into a struggle halfway ‘cross Alabam’,”

The haze in the air turned from blue to deep red and the bus rolled out of the gate. Laz angled it towards the telltale yellow light in the distance. The revs almost topped out again and Laz brought the bus into second gear, sending another shudder through the frame.

“Well the ‘hound broke down and left us all stranded in downtown Birmingham.”

The bus slid a little, but managed to stay straight on the, thankfully, smooth ground that seemed common around here. Oh, wait, time to shift again. Third gear. Shudder.

Seriously, who’s idea was this?

“Right away I bought me a through train ticket right ‘cross Mississippi clean,”

The bus was making a good deal of speed now, clawing over the loose rocks in the area. Laz could hear worried whines from the hatchlings in the back, but for the most part, everyone was quiet.

“I was on that midnight flyer out of Birmingham, smokin’ into New Orleans.”

They were at really quite dangerous speeds for the size of this thing now. Laz imagined that whatever the hit would probably fare worse than they would in a collision… No, no, no, no, nope. They are not going to crash this thing.

“Somebody help me get out of Louisiana, just help me get to Houston town,”

Fourth gear. That one was smoother. The steering wheel started to rumble in their hands.

“There are people there who care a little ‘bout me and they won’t let the poor boy down.”

They were getting close now, the vague yellow glow had solidified into the familiar shape of that tall beacon as they shot past pillars and trees. Laz heard a couple of gasps coming from the back as more and more people saw that, yes, they were going to be driving right into that.

“It’s fine! This is all intentional!”

“Sure as you’re born, they bought me a silk suit and put luggage in my hand.”

“It’s gonna feel a little weird though!”

“And I woke up high over Albuquerque on a jet to the-”

Flash

Laz’s sight rematerialized into the now oh-so warm and familiar sight of the garage, barely coming to a stop before hitting the door due to the bus’s aging brakes. Laz quickly threw the shifter into reverse and got the bus out of the way for Cooper.

“Hey! Look! Trees! Lot’s of ‘em! And regular looking fog!”

The villagers started marveling at the world outside; It was dark, but seemingly safe and a far cry from that place they were stuck in before. Cheers started ringing out, but Laz couldn’t help but feel that something was fundamentally wrong.

That… ticking in their core had started up again, counting every otherwise benign second that passed. They hadn’t felt that since… a week ago.

It started with 10, then 20… then 30… and it kept going.

The cheers gradually subsided as the villagers also clocked that something was wrong. Solanum came up to the windshield next to Laz, staring at the spot they had always popped in at everytime they came back.

142. It took Laz 142 seconds to get up from their seat.

145 to get out of the bus.

171 to get into the garage.

There was no flash. No automated lifting of the garage door. No music muffled from the steel doors of a station wagon.

Cooper and Nite weren’t here.

People shuffled by as Laz stared dumbly at the scanner pad on the floor. It looked empty without Nite cozied up underneath the repair station. This wasn’t possible.

This would not do.

beep beep, beep beep, beep beep, beep beep

“Hello? Cooper? Is anyone there?”

Francis was talking through the F.A.X. Machine, sounding frightened and desperate.

“I’m here. Francis, what’s going on?”

“Laz? Where’s Cooper?”

“Not here. He’s not here!”

“What?! But that means… Uhm… He- He’s still got some time. He’ll be okay… He’ll be fine…”

Laz heard Francis’ voice fall in volume and what sounded like stepping back and forth across the room. He didn’t respond to anything else Laz said and just kept the line open.

Laz walked back over to the scanner pad and leaned against the Diagnostic Terminal. They waited. Cooper would be fine. He always came back. In every one of his stories, no matter how bad, he always found a way out. All of that effort, just to be done in for their sake? No. No, not possible.

They looked up towards the sign hung over the scanner readout. It was difficult to read, everything was blurry. They were… crying.

THIS GARAGE HAS
116 TRIPS
WITHOUT AN
ACCIDENT

They turned back to the garage door. Still closed. They hadn’t realized that Solanum was standing next to them, similarly numb. They hadn’t realized that everyone in the village had come by to check on them. They hadn’t realized that Gneiss alone had come to check on them ten or so times at this point. They hadn’t realized that Gabbro was standing there too, bouncing a worried glance between them and the garage door.

They’d closed themselves in again. It was the only way they were able to push through the loops without sobbing each time those 22 minutes were up. They hoped they would never have to end up like this again, but… Here they are.

517…

518…

519…

520…

click
screee-weee-eeee-chunk

In an instant, everyone froze. Staring out of the garage door. There was nothing there… But the door had opened automatically.

Was Cooper okay?

Flash

Oh, thank the stars!

The familiar sight of Nite’s frame materialized in front of them and lurched forwards into the garage. Cooper was alive! Coop was okay! Coop… was…

Something was off about the way Nite moved; It didn’t glide over the ground and gently cover each small bump. Instead, it sat at a strange angle, lifting the front right side of its frame up. No… the rear left had sagged down. Panels were missing, doors were absent from their hinges, the tires were flat and patchy, and Cooper… He laid there, unmoving in the driver’s seat.

“Gneiss! GNEISS! I NEED HELP HERE!”

Chapter Text

They didn’t have enough. They needed 5 kLIM at minimum, but they would only be left with 4 after opening the first gateway. It was actually 4.2, but that didn’t really matter anyway.

It thought… It hoped that it could just restabilize the existing gateway with however much anchor energy it had, but no. Nope. It collapsed in front of them. It half expected that was going to happen, but it couldn’t have hurt to hope. So now, they were stuck here in the Well, biding their time until the end.

The yellow front washed over its frame, bringing with it that familiar prickling sensation that came with the slow evaporation of the metal that made up its panels.

“Looks like we missed the last off-ramp, huh?”

Yeah, they sure did.

Cooper spoke to it and Francis about how they’d stretched their time thin, about how they might not have enough energy to stabilize two gateways. He told it about the whole situation. Of course it wanted both it and Cooper to live, but… Nite’s not a freaking psychopath! Or a sociopath… whatever the difference is. Of course it would want all those people to make it out of here.

They didn’t move or drive or do anything: There was nowhere safe from this. So, they just sat and waited.

“Telegraph sang a song about the world outside. Telegraph road got so deep and so wide.”

The red front crashed down on top of them. Less familiar, but Nite was still deeply acquainted. The prickling intensified to a harsh burning sensation, similar to the acid, except it reached frame-deep, ignoring the outer layers of physical protection that Cooper had worked so hard to put together for it. At least the cabin would stay safe, so long as the doors would hold up, which… wouldn’t be for long.

It was… strangely peaceful. The pain could be ignored, Nite knew that well. For every dent or tear or corroded panel, Cooper would always replace it with a brand new, shiny part. Everything would be fixed, given enough time. Still, here was always an uncertainty about this all; This place sucked! Eventually, something bad would happen. Now, being faced with the “something bad…” It stripped all that uncertainty away.

There was nothing either of them could do, so Cooper just gripped the wheel and Nite sat still. It was always reassuring; Nite had been built to drive, but it always seemed that Cooper had been born to drive. Probably because of his job… But still!

“I don’t have any regrets, I think. Ha! Aside from taking too much time, of course!”

Heh. Yeah, it didn’t have any either. None at all…

…

Okay, seriously? What the FUCK?! Pardon its French, but this is… BULLSHIT! For these past two months, Cooper had been keeping it in a working state despite the very trying conditions in this place. Cuts, bruises, labor… “blood, sweat, and tears,” as he’d always say, all to keep Nite working at 100%, well… Actually more than 100%! All the stuff Nite could do now, all the things it’s seen… 

None of it would have been possible without his help! He’s a good person… They’re good people! They gave it a name! A name! Nite never knew how much it wanted a name… But now it has one! And it belongs to Nite and Nite only. Nite, Nitinol…

Ouch.

There goes one of the doors, the rest will go soon too. Cooper’s probably feeling it now. He can’t last nearly as long in these conditions, what with being made of flesh and all that. 

There goes the trunk.

He’d only ever gone outside in the red once before, when a Bollard came up underneath them and left Nite stuck on its side. When Cooper got back to the garage, the skin beneath the thinner parts of his suit was red and it looked like it hurt to move. They had to call it for the day.

Another door.

“There’s six lanes of traffic, three lanes movin’ slow.”
“... lanes of traffic, three… lanes… movn…”

Cooper’s hands fell from the wheel.

No.

BEEP BEEP

No no no. Not yet!

beep boop beep

He wasn’t moving. His head hung limp, body held up by the seatbelts that were quickly starting to fray apart in the high energy storm.

All that effort! The work! Everything he’s ever done! And now it can only just sit here… Uselessly! He’d prbobaly say something like, “We had a good run” or something right now, but no! Cooper… He’s… No. No he’s not dead. He can’t be! But… he definitely will be soon.

He worked so hard… But what can Nite do in return? Nothing! Of all the new tech and other things Cooper had hooked up to it, none of it would help. All of this new control it had over itself from the extra energy from Cappy’s blast? Still, nothing it could do.

… Extra energy?

That might…

Why not?

Chapter Text

Of all the most uncomfortable places he’s ever woken up, the middle of the road sits firmly at the top of that list. Asphalt? Not very cushioning. What should be more concerning though, is that Cooper had absolutely no idea how he got out here. He really couldn’t remember what happened… yesterday? Yeah, yesterday. Kidnapped? Yeah, kidnapped made sense. The most sense, at least… Stuff check!

Keys? Check. Walkman? Check. Wallet? Check. Swiss Army Knife? Yeah. Lighter? Yup. Watcherino? Yuperooski.

The wallet still had all his money too… What the hell happened? He doesn’t feel drugged. Just a little drowsy and a bit detached…

Okay, he might be drugged. Nothing to do about it here though, he’s gotta get to a hospital if that’s the case. Might as well get to walking.

It’s… quiet. And, stereotypically, too quiet. This was a four-laner! Two on each side, crash barrier in the middle… Where are the cars? Sure, it’s dark, but cars should still be out here. What time is it anyway?

Apparently his watch isn’t working. Bummer, he liked this watch! Woah, wait, route sign. Where did he find himself?

Route 20… Well, that certainly narrows it down… The road only stretches across the entire country! Except for that weird spot just before getting into Yellowstone… But this doesn’t really look like Yellowstone anyway. He couldn’t have gone too far, this is probably still Massachusetts… Probably. He’d just have to wait for a car to come by and get directions or, if he’s too far, hitchhike… Eugh.

Okay, this is getting a bit weird now; He’s been walking for a while and still hasn’t seen a single car. Is it some kind of holliday? No… It’s already way past Labor Day. Wait, what? What is he thinking? It’s July, the Fourth of July was yesterday… Right?

Okay, probably drugged.

Oh hey, is that an engine behind him? Ha! Headlights! He’s just gotta wave ‘em down. Whoever this is will tell him where he’s found himself.

Thankfully, the truck pulled off to the side. Cooper could see the face of a middle-aged man with a little bit of stubble and short, black hair sitting inside. He looked a bit… Italian? Maybe? He wasn’t really sure, but Cooper could swear he looked familiar.

Yup, definitely drugged.

He rolled the window down.

“Are you ready tonight? Come on let us give your mind a ride.”

“Need some help here?”

“Hey, uh, yeah. Do you know which way Worcester is?”

“Oh yeah, I’m heading there right now.”

“Oh, good. Look, I’m in a bad way here. Think you could give me a ride?”

“Hey, kid? You gotta keep trying. There are people there depending on you. More than you think, and way more than you know.”

… Seriously?

“... What? I’m not in that kind of a bad way. I think I’ve been drugged.”

“You’re not gonna be able to do this with my help. See ya, kid.”

The truck pulled away and started accelerating down the road.

“Well could you at least tell me which way… Worcester… Is… I guess it’s that way.”

As the truck shrank down the road, Cooper could make out the distinctive shape of the Statue of Liberty on the license plate in bold red.

“Friggin’ New Yorkers.”

He kept walking in the direction the truck had gone, through the dark. As the time went on, he started feeling better. Whatever was wrong with him was slowly starting to ease away. Still, no cars aside from that guy in the truck.

He should probably head to his parents house first, they’d probably be worried sick. Unless he’d gotten jumped at a gas station… In that case… they would be worried sick when he gets back. Probably best to leave that part out. That van was getting fussy anyway. He’d have to call the delivery company when he gets home, tell them that that package wouldn’t be making it to Portland.

Eventually, the inky black of the sky started to become a darker blue and the buildings on the side of the road became more familiar. Not in a “I know that house” way, but in a “I’m pretty sure I’ve seen that house next to that building before” way. Like that feeling when he gets back onto main street and his brain starts to recognize gas station signs. Must be getting close. He was definitely in the suburbs now. Maybe… 4:30-ish? Still no cars. Those early-riser nuts should be out by now…

He passed through Union Hill, basically in the city at this point, but there were no lights in the windows. All the cars he had seen were just parked on the road. The first rays of sunlight were peeking over the valley, but everything was still quiet and… dead. The railroads were also uncharacteristically quiet, which was weird because those trains usually idle for days before going anywhere. Come to think of it, Cooper couldn’t remember if he’d even seen a train since he got back here.

Still no lights… What’s going on? Some kind of bombing drill? It’s 1998, not 1968!

Downtown was just as unnaturally quiet and desolate. He’d popped into a couple police stations and a hospital, but they were… empty.

The panic was starting to set in. What possible reason could there be for a whole city to suddenly become empty? He felt his steps become harder and more frequent. He stopped looking down the streets as he crossed, tempting fate in any way he could. His steps eventually were replaced by full-length strides and he suddenly broke into a dead sprint. He had to run. Run away from whatever happened here and it was obvious that something had happened. Living in cities like Worcester and Boston his whole life taught him one thing: Sound is good. Sound means that everything is working as planned. So, why was it so QUIET?

He looked up to the overpasses that cut through the city, 290 was mute. Route 9 was silent. Lincoln Street bore none of the telltale sounds of white noise and commuter engines he was so used to. Hell, the wind didn’t even buffet against his ears as he ran.

Something is so fundamentally wrong here. Is a chemical plant on fire? Nuclear meltdown? There are none nearby! And everyone’s cars are still here! Okay, he’s gotta run. Run back home, see if anyone’s there, get a call out. His dad probably still has that scanner in the cellar.

He was absolutely drugged. Right? Just a real bad trip. He’s gotta get home and sleep it off, check into a hospital when his brain is finally able to register that there are other people out.

He shot out of the city, legs carrying him on a rush of adrenaline. He didn’t even feel tired… Yup, without-a-doubt, drugged. Cooper careened through the suburbia on a nearly pre-programmed route, feeling the familiarity of each house he passed set in. Eventually, he turned the corner and was met with the sight of that oh-so familiar baby blue raised ranch. It always felt more like home than that brick sandwich he rented out in Boston.

He tore the door open and slammed it shut.

“Ma? Dad? Case? … Hello?”

No answer.

“... Anybody home?”

Still no answer… Cooper slumped down to the ground, back against the door, and rested his head in his hands.

Much ado about nothing… Or whatever… But this was definitely something. He’s gotta get in touch with somebody.

He walked through the unlit hallways of the house to the kitchen and grabbed the phone. The keypad lit up green. Good, power’s still on… But that means it wasn’t a blackout…

He called Mom.

brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

What about Dad?

brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Maybe… Maybe Case is around?

brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

The cops?

brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Coast guard?

brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

He didn’t know who else to call… He was gonna try the CDC or whoever runs the grid to see if it was some ecological disaster, but who the hell knows those numbers off the top of their head? So, he just dialed random numbers.

Every line was dead.

Something real bad has happened. Nobody else was here, so he should probably get going too. He’s gonna need that scanner though.

He went outside and rounded the house to the cellar. The doors groaned open. It was almost too loud against the backdrop of pure silence. Cooper could swear he heard it echo off the valley.

The place was nicely stocked in the event of a particularly bad hurricane. Which, basically, always fizzled out before they got too far up the coast anyway… But it helps to be prepared.

The little Uniden sat on the table and Cooper started fiddling with it. He set it to scan across every band it could. It would take a while, but he’s got time.

29.6000

Plenty of time.

52.7000

Oodles of time

143.2000

There goes the Military band.

418.8500

Government…

512.0000

That’s… all of them, but no live channels. Squelch was all the way down too. He tried the weather alert frequencies, but it just kept scanning through. Okay, he’ll just set it manually.

162.5500

sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

What about Providence?

162.4000

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Okay. The weather bands are down. Those never go down, but it’s fine. That’s fiiiine. He was gonna drive out of here either way.

Cooper grabbed the scanner and a good collection of supplies and loaded them into the Cherokee. He climbed in and settled into the driver’s seat.

As he sat there, something occurred to him; Why were all the cars still here? If this place was evacuated, which makes the most sense right now, why did nobody take their cars? Hell, the Challenger was still there. And that guy he met… Why was he driving in to Worcester? Did he hallucinate that? He still hadn’t ruled out the whole drugged thing… It doesn’t matter anyway.

He turned the key.

click
eeeer-er-r-r-r-r-r-er-r-r-r-r-r-er-r-r-r-r-r…

“The fuck?”

chunk
click
eeeer-er-r-r-r-r-r-er-r-r-r-r-r-er-r-r-r-r-r-er-r-r-r-r-r-er-r-r-r…

“What the fuck?”

The damn thing wouldn’t start! And this was a good engine! He could hear the fuel pump kick up and the tank was full… Bad spark? He probably doesn’t have time to fix that! Alright, he’s gonna have to try the other cars.

Corolla?

click

Nope.

The Grand Prix?

click

No…?

Maybe the… Challenger… It’s his last choice.

click

… Fuck.

“Fuuuuuuuuuck.”

He couldn’t do this right now. He’d just gone ahead and pushed himself through a dead sprint across half of the city, but he doesn’t feel tired. Once the drugs he is one-hundred-percent-ly on wear off, he’s gonna feel like shit.

He went back inside and shut the door. Towels were run under water and pushed to the cracks around the exterior doors. If what was going on was a nuclear accident, they’d definitely help. He didn’t know why he thought that would work, just that it felt right. He walked up to his room, kept the same ever since he went off to college. Shoes were kicked off and he sat down on the bed, looking out the window to the Sun… rising… outside…

The red Sun.

The big, red Sun.

Huh. Yeah. Okay. Cooper’s got a pretty good range on his bullshitometer, but this has gone clean over that scale. There was just something oddly familiar about that red sun that completely broke his suspension of disbelief; All the people being gone, the phone and radio being dead, every car not starting, not feeling tired, and the big, red sun? He’s not on drugs. What the hell kinda drugs do this? This is a nightmare or dream or something. But, now that he knows… shouldn’t he have woken up by now?

Maybe he can’t wake up. Maybe he’s passed out or in a coma or something, but what would screw him up that bad?

Ah shit.

The car.

The car!

The fucking car!

Some car must have come rolling down the street and hit him when it rolled out of the driveway! That’s  gotta be why he can’t remember yesterday very well. Ah… His Dad’s gonna be pissed.

He wasn't really sure whether being drugged or being knocked out was better, but, assuming he was knocked out, that answered a lot more questions.

Well, he’s got two possible scenarios and the coma one makes a lot more sense to him, apparently. Is he not gonna be able to sleep in here? That’s gonna suck. Oh! They almost had that figured out. If only they could… ask… Ask… Who, exactly? He could swear he was just thinking of someone, but the memory slipped away like a dream after waking up.

Dreams are always spontaneous… So, why wouldn’t… Whatever this is be? He might need to get used to that.

Chapter Text

Safety’s really, really nice. Think about it this way; After spending the better part of the past three weeks with the near-constant threat of not landing on a hammock the right way or starving to death in the middle of… Somewhere, Gabbro would be bound to have developed their game to a whole other level. The only issue was that they found the absence of a solid threat a little bit weird. Just the right level of novel to stop them from focusing in any good respect.

That might have lasting consequences. Being stuck dying over and over again for what felt like two weeks was probably not good for their psyche. They had become more familiar with cyclones and tornadoes than they had any right to, all things considered.

It had been a while, but it was still dark, that makes sense. If it happened to their star, why wouldn’t it happen to the rest? Wasn’t this a new universe though? Either way, everyone was shuffling around this little area they found themselves in, starting work on a couple trees to clear space and hopefully make more homes than just this one, albeit, very large building. “Little area” may also not be the best way to describe it… It was definitely bigger than the crater, but the trees made the space they had seem smaller than the “Well.” Still, looking out over the horizon, this place was definitely big. There was probably more stuff packed into that big wall than there ever was in their whole home system.

Cool.

…

They’re doing it again. Distracting themself from what really matters. That’s not just the “big building,” that’s the “garage,” Cooper’s garage. The person that told them that they need to at least talk with Laz. The person that’s sitting knocked out cold in a bed because he almost gave it all to get them somewhere safe.

They owe it to him to at least… Apparently they owe a lot of things as of late.

Their subconscious agreed, evidently, as they found themselves walking through the garage, past Nite, who Slate was apparently working on doing… Something with. Solanum was pointing to a group of small, black, plastic, book-looking things until Nite beeped when she pointed at a specific one. She brought it to a large tube screen and waved at them as they walked by. Gabbro snaked past a workbench to a room with a lot of tubes and cables and a sewing machine pushed aside to make room for the makeshift bed Cooper was on, watched over by Gneiss, but Laz wasn’t in here.

“Hey, Gneiss, how’s he doing?”

Her head snapped over to the door to look at Gabbro, “Oh, hello, Gabbro. Do you need your bandages changed?”

“Nah, it’s too early for that. It’s no biggie anyway.”

They couldn’t tell her why it was “no biggie.” They’d been through worse before; Sometimes they didn’t quite land exactly on their hammock. Turns out, if the spine breaks, the brain does a pretty good job at filling in the blank spot left behind by the now disconnected nervous system with pain, if they felt anything at all. They started absentmindedly rubbing their lower back.

Gneiss started wearing a disbelieving and slightly worried look, “It absolutely is a ‘biggie.’ You had cuts and burns all over your arm.”

Gabbro feigned a swat with their wrapped arm for emphasis, “I can still use my arm right? It’ll be okay with time. It’s nothing. How is he?”

Gneiss didn’t seem all too convinced, but shifted their gaze over to Cooper, relenting, “Well, you see all this red?” They gesture over nearly his whole body, most of it covered with bandages, but some spots were bare, “Looks like they- he went and got himself burned up pretty bad.”

Yeouch.

“Ah, right. He doesn’t have scales. It wouldn’t be purple.”

Gneiss’ gaze fell to the floor with a look of gentle frustration, “Yes, he’s a different species after all. Basic treatments should still work, but I’m afraid I wouldn’t know what to do if it’s something deeper. We don’t even have the equipment on hand if that’s the case.”

“Is he getting better?”

“No.”

They were awful quick to answer that one.

“Is he getting worse?”

“... No. I’d guess it’s a shock reaction more than anything.”

Not good, but not necessarily bad.

“Laz’d probably be glad to hear that. See where they went?”

Gneiss gestured vaguely through the walk with the weird tube machine in front of it, “They said they were going outside for some air. Don’t bother them too much.”

“I won’t! Honest.”

“Alright, make sure you come back in a few hours for the bandages. Don’t dally now, dear.”

“See ya ‘round, Gneiss.”

Gabbro left the door and was met with the sight of the tube screen showing… Moving objects. Slate seemed to be leaning over and looking at every little detail while Solanum just watched them with the occasional reserved chuckle.

“Well, listening to you explain that to the police officer should be quite fascinating.”

Pretty cool. Really cool, actually, but not important right now.

Gabbro shuffled through a relatively empty room and out through a door. Laz’s ship was sitting there, partially hidden under a tarp.

Huh. they weren’t expecting to see it here, but they weren’t really expecting not to either, so… Who cares? Well, if there was any place Laz would be, it’d probably be inside their ship. Just a matter of walking underneath and getting the hatch to ope-

“Hey! Don’t go in there! The reactor’s- Oh. Hey, Gabbro!”

Whoops; Looks like “ship” was a bad guess.

Gabbro looked up to see Laz nearly over the edge of the garage roof. One hand gripping the metal lip at the top of the wall while the other dangled down. It looked like they had got there in a hurry; There was still some snow falling from where they’d almost dove into place. It was obvious that they had relaxed considerably after realizing it was Gabbro.

“Hey, Laz. I was looking for you.”

“Yeah… Sorry, I was tied up with Riebeck and Solanum… Do you wanna… Talk?”

… No, not really.

“Yeah. What about you?”

Laz sat up and gestured to a wooden ramp that led to the roof, “... Yeah… Climb up here. It’s nice and quiet.”

As Gabbro climbed up, they realized the ramp was not really all too high on the structurally stable scale, by Gabbro’s count, but it still definitely ranked higher than the statue workshop. Much higher. This made Marl’s first creek bridge look like it was made with solid stone in comparison.

Laz had kicked some snow off the area of the roof they were now sitting on, overlooking the path below and the large, light-up sign declaring to the world that this was, in fact, the Pine Tree Auto Repair… place… whatever that meant. Gabbro still had to wade through the almost waist-high snow, but eventually made it over to where Laz was.

“So… What do you want to talk about?”

“... I wanted to say, ‘I’m sorry.’”

Laz quickly looked at them with a cartoonishly raised eyebrow, “... For what?”

That wasn’t what Gabbro was expecting. They were expecting something like, “You better” or, “You should have done way more than apologize,” but no. Those were obviously not correct.

“What do you mean? Aren’t you frustrated with me for, y’know, not helping you?”

Laz’s whole brow went up slowly and their mouth straightened out in an expression Gabbro could only describe as unimpressed.

“Of course I was frustrated, but not with you. I mean, what were you gonna do? Spend the first ten minutes of each loop swimming to your ship? Getting launched to space every other time? That’d be dumb. So, y’know, apology accepted? I guess? If anything, you should be mad with me; I didn’t fix the universe… I think I ended it… And then helped make this one?”

…

Huh. Time-buddy wasn’t mad with them, just generally upset… Probably for obvious reasons… It was this whole “making the new universe” thing that was throwing Gabbro for a loop, now’s not the time though.

“I’d like to hear that story at some point, but you shouldn’t be upset either. The universe was already ending, right? Bummer! Not a whole lot any of us would be able to do in a dead or dying universe, y’know? I’m just glad it didn’t go on for longer than… two weeks, maybe?”

It was cloudy, but sometimes, Gabbro could swear they saw little pinpricks of light peeking through every once in a while.

“Probe cannon said it was just over a thousand loops… So, yeah. About two weeks.”

Gabbro whistled, “Sleep has never felt quite so good.”

“Heh. In a way, kinda glad it was us, y’know? We did it, in one way or another. Who knows what would have happened if it was someone else.”

Those are very uncomfortable thoughts.

“Let’s just be happy with the coincidences we came across. We got the whole future ahead of us! Future. Fu-ture. When’s the last time you worried about the future?”

The upset on Laz’s face suddenly deepened, “... Right now.”

Gabbro may be a lot smarter than they let on, but right now? They felt like the biggest idiot in the universe… Well, two universes.

“Gneiss told me he isn’t getting worse so…”

Laz threw their head and back against the snow, “Yeah, but it doesn’t seem fair! He got us all outta there and now he’s stuck tucked into a bed! He didn’t ask for that! I thought I wouldn’t have to worry about this kinda stuff anymore.”

Gabbro was about to lie back too, but quickly realized they didn’t have a hat of their own, “Circumstance. It’s all just a load of super-duper lame circumstance. Just like us, when you think about it. Rotten luck plus determination can still turn out good. Now, imagine what could have happened if he was someone else.”

Laz flopped their arms on top of the snow in resignation, “Still sucks.”

“Wasn’t saying it didn’t.”

“I wish we could just know if he’s alright. Like, if only we could talk-”

Laz slowly rose from the snow and faced Gabbro with the detective look.

“He was able to talk to you while he was sleeping… What were you doing while he was talking to you?”

Oh.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh.

“I was meditating, or sleeping myself… You’re getting good at this detective thing, but that implies he’s doing something close to sleeping.”

“Yeah, but… It couldn’t hurt to try?”

“... Can’t argue with- Woah.”

The cloud cover finally drifted away, revealing the inky black night sky. Except, instead of being a pure, jet black like what Gabbro had seen when he was tossed up at the end of a loop, it was full of stars. More than that, there was a distinct cloud of… stuff glowing in the night sky, seemingly forming an endless band across its entire width. The stuff was… Probably everything, really. A mixture of interstellar gasses and debris or maybe even more stars clumped so close together that they seemed to create a fog in the very sky itself. The fog somehow appeared relatively darker than the backdrop of space, but the interstellar dust behind it glowed a dull white, probably with the light of billions of stars illuminating it.

Hornfels had always said that their system was orbiting around a “rogue star,” owing to its relatively sparse nighttime sky. Gabbro always wondered what it would look like if they were in one of those loose spirals of multicolored glowing gas that they were always shown, but they could have never guessed it would be quite like this.

“... Cool.”

There was a sudden loud rustling and the sound of several dropped pans from somewhere in the empty area behind the garage.

“Oh my STARS! Riebeck! Hornfels! Help me get my signalscope and star charts!”

They both looked at each other with incredibly flat, yet somewhat entertained faces.

“Chert.”
“Chert.”

It didn’t take long until sunny-side-up started hobbling up the wooden ramp, burdened by a tarp holding several rolls of paper and a telescope that was pretty large, even for a relatively tall Hearthian like Gabbro, let alone Chert.

Laz sat up and trudged through the snow, speaking to Chert with esoteric, incredibly subtle, soft undertones, “Need any help there?”

“Oh! Hello, Lazurite! I would appreciate that. Have you seen the sky?! It’s amazing!”

“I’ve seen it every night for the past week. I don’t think it’s getting old anytime soon.”

“I’ll get your telescope.”

Chert looked at Gabbro, somewhat surprised, but that makes sense; They weren’t all too close with Laz before the loops. Two weeks may be short, but when you can only spend that time talking to one person? There wasn’t much choice in the matter.

“Ah. Gabbro, how has the arm been holding up?”

They hefted up their side of the telescope to drive their point, “Much better.”

Laz’s gaze looked down to their arm, face in a questioning, worried look. Gabbro shrugged, Laz shrugged back, scooping up Chert’s star charts and making it back up to the roof. Gabbro stayed behind with Chert, carefully coaxing the ‘scope up the ramp.

“I want to apologize.”

Huh… Coincidences.

“That’s funny.”

Chert stopped in their tracks, probably offended, but Gabbro couldn’t see them past the ‘scope. The motion almost jerked the delicate tool out of their hands.

“What? Me saying, ‘sorry?’”

“Uh. No, I was looking at the sky.”

“Ah, yes. It’s a far cry from home, isn’t it? Right, I wanted to apologize for snapping at you back in that place. You didn’t deserve it. I was just frustrated… And... Well, Feldspar didn't tell me, but I think it may have been because you’re the lazy one and still, you had been doing so much more than me.”

That probably hurt to admit out loud. Especially given the speed they had to blurt out that last sentence.

“I bet everyone’s got a little frustration going on.”

“Yes, but that doesn-”

“Chert, I get it. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t feeling it too, but look; We all know how much you put into everything. I just got lucky, I’m still the ‘lazy one.’ Don’t you worry about that.”

They continued the rest of the way up the ramp, Laz was clearing snow off a plot of the roof for them to put the telescope and charts down on. They probably knew that the star charts would be useless here, Gabro did too, but they can’t exactly say that.

“You’re remarkably easy to talk to when I’m not trying to talk something into you.”

“Talking is easy. Thinking about it is the hard part. Sometimes it’s better to let the words flow.”

“Is that another jab?”

“Maaaaaybe.”

Chert let out an exasperated sigh as their boots carved a path through the snow, “Everyone appreciates the new effort you’re putting in. I don’t know what happened on Giant’s Deep, but I’m glad it did.”

Gabbro started feeling thoroughly unimpressed at that statement, “... That’s funny.”

“Something else in the sky?”

“... Yeah, the fog stuff. You think we’re actually in a galaxy now or something?”

“... As unlikely as it is, I believe it is the only possible explanation.”

“Cool.”

They set the ‘scope down near the star charts Laz had laid out on a tarp. Chert stepped out from behind it, facing Gabbro with something they never thought they’d see; Chert smiling.

“I’m glad we had this talk. Thanks for helping with the signalscope.”

“Anytime.”

Laz gestured back towards the ramp and Gabbro made to follow. This place definitely wasn’t going to be quiet for much longer.

“Oh! Lazurite! Would you mind if I spoke for a moment?”

“Sorry, Chert. I gotta help Gabbro with something. Some other time?”

Chert’s face somehow moved to form an expression that was equal parts disappointed and excited, “Alright, I’ll spend the time logging… All of this then.”

Gabbro followed Laz back down the ramp and into their ship. Despite all the time Gabbro had spent in the loops, they hadn’t gone inside once.

They whistled, “Snazzy stuff here. Slate did a good job. It’s mostly metal in here. Uh, didn’t you say something was up with the reactor?”

Laz quickly looked over to the reactor, confused look quickly disappearing, “Oh, I was just making sure that no one went inside. The computer still has all of the information on… Everything.”

“Hmm. Yeah, that would do it. We should tell them soon, right?”

Laz sat down on the floor, back against the pilot’s seat, “Yeah. they’d probably believe me, what with all of this going on, but I don’t know how to break it to them.”

Gabbro sat next to the very nicely organized medical shelf, “Me neither.”

“Think it’s quiet enough in here?”

“Trust me, quiet is not the issue. It’s distractions.”

“... What were the cyclones then?”

“Not quiet.”

Laz snorted, “Well, don’t let me keep you.”

Gabbro shut their eyes.

They focused on nothing.

They focused on their breathing.

They focused on nothing.

They focused on the feeling of wood through their clothes.

They focused on nothing.

They found themself on not Timber Hearth again. Red sun and all. The geysers still shot water into the endless sky, the horizon fell away at a normal angle, and the grass was just as unnaturally tall as it had always been here, but Cooper was nowhere to be seen.

Okay, it may be a bit more difficult this time, but Timber Hearth was, apparently, pretty small. It wouldn’t take Gabbro too long to search the whole place. 20 or so minutes around the whole thing at walking pace. No biggie.

So they walked, and walked, and walked, and walked, and walked, and walked.

Time was super difficult to keep track of in here, but Gabbro could swear that they had been walking for well over 20 minutes and yet, they never once came back to the point they started in. Constantly changing. Whoopee.

Can’t do much to change the constant force of change, so they kept walking. One step after another. More faux-minutes passed by until Gabbro heard something strange. It grew in volume until Gabbro suddenly jolted awake in the ship cabin. Laz had also woken up from the sound.

The villagers were cheering outside for some reason, Chert especially. There was something very strange about it that took a while to register in Gabbro’s mind; They could see them, all of them, clearly.

There was light outside.

The two of them left the lander to find Hornfels staring up at the blue in awe. Gabbro was stuck in the same trance and barely registered the conversation.

“What’s going on, Hornfels?”

“The sky! It’s blue! The night went on for so long and we knew that the Sun had gone supernova so we thought… It doesn’t matter! This place has a sun! Ha!”

It had been a while since Gabbro had felt that warm on their face. Well before the loops even started, before they went to Giant’s Deep. They remembered the filtered feeling of the sun peering through their helmet whenever they were ejected from the atmosphere, but it had been a while since they felt it for themself. It was barely up, barely shining its rays on the garage, but it still felt better than anything they felt in a long time.

“Oh yeah, I guess I was the same way when I ended up here.”

“I’m going to calm Chert down before they fall off the roof.”

Gabbro heard Hornfels jog away before their steps quickly slowed as they met wood, slowly scaling the ramp.

Laz snapped Gabbro out of it with a light tug, “See anything?”

“... No. It was the same place I always ended up, but he wasn’t there.”

Laz had their hand on their chin, lip pulled up on one side, “I don’t really… Maybe you need more subconscious thought about him? We can’t exactly have you meditating in the same room as him, though. That would weird Gneiss out.”

“I didn’t even know who he was the first time it happened. I don’t think so.”

“... Either way, we’re gonna need some place away from distractions… Maybe Nite would like to help? Let’s see if Slate was able to patch it up enough.”

Laz led Gabbro back into the garage. There were more lights on, but it was relatively empty compared to nighttime. Nite looked… Worse. Not the nicely lined up and uniformly painted way it was when Gabbro first saw it. It looked more hodge-podge now. Most of the panels didn’t match and the wheel on the back left looked to be a good deal thinner than the rest, probably a different kind of wheel then. Solanum was watching the big tube screen, they imagined that Nite probably was too.

“Michael, this is becoming tedious.”

“You do have a way with words, pal.”

That’s still really cool.

“Hey Sol. How you feeling, Nite?”

bzzz bzzzzz

“Hello, Laz. Oh! And Gabbro! Nite has been doing better. It is likely going through whatever the car equivalent of exhaustion is.”

Gabbro walked up to shake her hand, “Hey there, Sol. So, Nomai? That’s cool. How’s everyone been treating you?”

She took their hand with a warm smile, “They’ve been wonderful. Though, I imagine that I’ll be much more occupied once they have all finished getting settled.”

“With Riebeck especially.”

“Yes. I do enjoy speaking with them, though. How has Cooper been doing?” The politely warm expression in her face fell as she asked the question.

Laz shrugged and pursed their lips, “Hasn’t been doing worse. Which is why we’re here; We need to get Gabbro somewhere away from distractions and somewhere safe so they can do the whole talk-to-Cooper-through-meditation thing. We were hoping Nite could take them somewhere nearby, if that’s okay with you, Nite?”

beep boop beep

A little picture of a thumbs up had popped up on the screen next to the “steering wheel.” and the door on the back left side opened.

“Thanks Nite! I’ll stay here and wait for any messages from Francis. Hurry back once you’ve found anything at all.”

“Will do.”

Gabbro set down into the seat and closed the door after them. Nite’s engine started and it backed them out of the garage. They were coasting past the ship when Slate stopped them.

“Hey! Where are you going? You’re still not fully patched up- Gabbro? What are you doing?”

“Yeah, mighty machine here wanted to stretch its legs… Roll its wheels? And I wanted to see what it was like. Just a short jaunt.”

“... Alright, just be easy on it; That rear wheel’s not made for this terrain.”

“Cool, see ya, Slate.”

beep boop beep

There was a smiley face on the screen now.

“You’re welcome, pal.”

Nite brought them through a metal gate and down into a large ditch, lined on both sides with stone. A large grated pipe sat on one end. They continued under a stone bridge, then up a decently sized hill that overlooked the garage and the many lights that were beginning to pop up in the area behind it. Nite kept them moving through the forest, past a grouping of floating rocks and under a set of large pipes until they came across a small, run-down building with a large opening in one wall.

“Is this the place?”

beep boop beep

Thumbs up.