Shimmer, Glimmer, & Gleam - A Quest of Loss & Gain

You're taking a watch. Nattie shrugs at you, which feels vaguely like she's giving you shit (a thing that dovetails with a vague memory of officers that refuses to resolve into useful information), but you're taking one. In the meantime, though, you attempt to get some sleep by leaning against one of the spider-women while she's at rest; her glassy body is very warm, and very relaxing, and yet you cannot fucking sleep. While you're trying to, eyes closed, getting mad at yourself for being unable to sleep, you become vaguely aware that you are getting warmer. You crack open an eye and find that you are now surrounded by spiders, and the one you're leaning against is combing her glass talons gently through your long hair.

"...I wish I understood you better," you admit, in a small voice. She makes a chittering sound, and goes to lift her - "That didn't mean stop! I like it..."

After a moment, one of them turns her head - you've taken to thinking of her as Spider-Jill, for her short, bright-blue hair - and concentrates. Focuses. And says: "Kiss?"

Uhh..."No? Um. No, I'm..." Shit. Fuck. Uh. You gesture at yourself, just all of the yourself, which is easy since you're so FUCKING SMALL. "I'm still figuring myself out. I'm. Not sure who I am."

And at this Spider-Jill nods, sagely, and scoots herself in further, picks up your hand and holds it with an air of holy seriousness. The others are stirring, and they're all just looking at you. The blonde one, their leader, nods at you, and says: "Orchid friend."

"Yeah," you agree. "Definitely."

She tugs down at the bottom of her shirt. "Orchid...understand...?"

Understand what - no, that's easy. Understand what her job was. "I think so? People gave you money and you made them wanna take notes while watching porn."

Silence.

Absolute silence.

You could hear a pin drop in this circle of spiders.

The leader laughs, and laughs, and laughs, until she's crying just from laughing, wiping at her eyes with the back of her hand (so careful not to claw them out), holding on to her fellow for support so she doesn't flop her torso on you. She laughs, and she puts a hand on your shoulder, and the barest tips of her claws dig in. It hurts, a little. And you like it, a little.

She laughs, and in the most lucid voice you've ever heard from her, the spider you've been riding says: "I wish I'd met you before, Orchid."

* * *

"Jack I think I was just so fucking stupid that I turned a spider into a person," you say quickly as you literally slide across wet tile and into the computer repair store you spotted him inside. "What do I do what do I do what do I do?"

Your friend startles from where he's examining a laptop, and barks out a panicked, "How should I know?!?" before crossing the distance to put his hands on your shoulders. "Breathe. Is this bad in some way?"

"...I'm not sure? It'd be really inconvenient if she left..."

"But you'd let her?"

You nod, vigorously.

Jack breathes a sigh of relief. "Okay. Then nothing terrible has happened and something wonderful just might have. Also why the fuck are you awake? You've got watch in like twenty minutes." You whine pathetically, and he relents. "Okay, okay, okay...look, here. It's alright, I found you something. Stay right here."

You stay right there, obediently, and Jack slips into the back of the store and comes back with a data splinter labeled MOVIES. He presses it into your palm with a little smile. "I've been looking it over, and there's a lot of like, classics and popular movies and a bit of porn and also for some insane reason, 39 seasons of My Journey With The Sage Of Tomorrow. And I figured...I dunno, it won't tell you much about the world that used to be, but it might tell you things about...all of us. The things we think and assume and some of the references we make and...I dunno. You talk about 'the new world' sometimes, but..."

You fold your hand around the splinter with a ghostly little smile. "But it's made out of your world's bones." On impulse, you pop up on your toes and give Jack a little kiss on the cheek, which sends him into an adorably miniature panic attack. "I dunno when I can find time..." you demur. "But thank you. For thinking of me."

"...A lot of people are thinking of you, Orchid. All the time. You're kinda everyone's hero." He rubs at his cheek, and looks away, guilty and shy.

"Why do you do that?" you insist, pressing a finger into his chest. "How'd you do something wrong here?"

The question stops him in his tracks. He opens his mouth. Shuts it. Looks uncomfortable. Finally, in a small voice, he says: "I...I'm not sure."

"Well. Figure it out."

* * * *

Still no sleep. Your turn for watch. When you move to your post, it's with four of the former Asset Protection with you, which...

"...If I admit something really, really thoughtless, can you not tell anyone?" you mutter to the one standing next to you, who'd thanked you for breaking his glass helm what feels like ages ago and was honestly only weeks at most. The night is still, but it is not silent, and in flashes you track the movement of glass bats and the distant glow of the dragon wrapped around Harrow Tower.

"Of course, my liege," comes the pretty fucking unsettling answer. He just. He just calls you that. Like it's a rational thing to call a person. Okay.

Deep breath in. Calm breath out. "I've been thinking of you folks as 'Asset Protection' this entire time, and that's. Mean, right? I shouldn't do that?"

Oh hey, it's that look people get when they don't know how to answer your fucking questions. One hand runs down the glass lance he's holding, soothing himself. At long last he says: "You wouldn't have known any better, but I don't think any of the others would like it better than I do. Please don't. We're...your honor guard."

Oh. Your hand strays to Barkley, there on your belt, and you pet him absentmindedly while you look out into the night air. "...I don't like that," you admit, after a bit. "I'm not...I'm not a 'liege'. Leader I can barely handle, I'm not some, some monarch."

He scoffs, almost fondly, and his formal cadence breaks down when he says, "If you don't want to be a king, don't do king shit."

"Killing things in an insane fury that scares even me?" Should you be this vulnerable? Is it okay? Is it really okay to just be honest?

But his voice, while quiet, is not betrayed, or reproachful: "Protecting others better than you protect yourself."

* * * *

You're not sure why you stagger into the sex shop after your watch. Maybe it's because you've noticed that sex is very silly and you could use silly right now. And indeed you are greeted with silly; the very first thing in the eye's view is a comically large toy, deep purple in color, something that could never fit in the human body whose plastic case announces it as THE EMPEROR'S CHALLENGE, and you wheeze out a laugh while you support yourself against the doorway.

Jill pops out from behind a rack of lingerie like a fucking gopher and the two of you stare at each other for a long, long, long moment.

"...Okay, I know why I'm here," you lie. "Why're you here?"

"...Because the end of the world is strangely horny?" Oh she's dying. She's so cute when she's dying like this. You cross the destroyed, very wet store, and take a glance at what Jill's been looking at. There's a basket hanging from her elbow that's full of a selection of various toys and you frown at them. You've seen these before, in - "What?" Jill says, blinking at you.

"Are you trying to make new porn?"

"Flower!" Jill cuffs your shoulder. "These are not just for film! They're for private time too, y'know!" Pause. "...You do know, right? What to do when you're feelin'...?"

"When I'm - oh that feeling I get when Andrea does that head tilt or you're bouncing in a light shirt or the spiders almost take their tops off? Yeah, I know," you say confidently. "I book an hour in HR and take notes and eventually the sensation fades and I feel good but also kinda mad."

"...With'cher clothes on."

"Yep."

Jill drags a hand down her face. "I dunno what's more autistic, being autistic or whatever you have going on. C'mere, we're getting you things."

"What -"

Jill hauls you to and fro in the store, searching for something. Several films and books that claim to be 'educational' she discards, but in the end there is a small selection of ones she's deemed appropriate, along with several distinctly non-powered devices. You add one to the pile a little hesitantly, and Jill gives you a long, long look, but she can't judge you here, she's got some in her own pile, so there.

"Hey," you say as the two of you are, for some reason, hiding these in Jill's backpack as if they're some kind of shameful secret. Strange. "...It's not the end of the world."

"Sure seems like it to me," Jill mutters.

"...I think I only exist because it happened," you admit, in a small voice, and it stops Jill cold, but you just sort of. Continue. Rambling. Exhausted. "I dunno for sure. I've been scared to try anything with the Captain in case I...find out, you know? But that's what I think is probably it. And I get it, I think. If I lost like, you, I'd...I dunno. Kill everyone. It'd be like my world ended. But this is my only world. I wanna live in it." Softly, Jill takes your hand, and pulls you in close; you bury your face in her chest. "Is that bad? It's bad, isn't it..."

"Flower," Jill murmurs, "you need sleep."

"I know that!" you wail. "I don't know why I can't!"

"I can lash ya to your friend," she murmurs. "Jack and I can handle things. C'mon..."

Choose one
[ ] Accept Jill's offer and sleep off the next leg (skip all possible in-transit choices)
[ ] No. You have to stay awake. You're already letting everyone down.

You try to protest, but the fight isn't in you. Jill has a quiet word with Jack, who goes off to have one with Nattie. Your backpack is gently taken and entrusted to one of the spiders while everyone is getting ready to march, and you find yourself bundled onto the blonde spider and then lashed to her back with webbing. She's. So warm. You nuzzle your cheek against her shoulder and mutter another protest, but within half an hour the regular rhythm of her legs beneath you has lulled you to sleep. You think you hear something in that lucid voice, as you're drifting off. A lullaby?

She's so warm...

* * * *

Your dreams are in fragments. Nothing clear links up to anything else; an island in the rain, a bloody-faced rat chewing something, an endless scroll of images sent by someone named Jessie you still haven't met that blend in with faces of people who give you feelings. A friend's voice, playful, but kind, says: "I can be sorry it's like this, but still glad to have met you. Even things like me contain multitudes, little flower."

* * * *

You wake to the scent of the sea.

The docks you're at are a curious mix of tourist trap and industrial zone, the latter whacked onto the former like a parasite. Living Solutions International is branded everywhere on those bleaker docks, along with claims that they are THE WORLD'S INNOVATOR IN SEASTEADING! which you do not recognize consciously despite the way the word itself makes your fingers itch to kill. You tear your eyes away from it and look instead at the boardwalks and other attractions; food stands and novelty shops are everywhere, and off in the distance to the south you can see an amusement park. You wiggle against the spider, who looks over her shoulder and smiles at you.

"Binoculars?" you ask, dumbly.

She turns her head away and calls out: "Orchid is awake!" Oh shit. That's like. A whole sentence again. Wow. Uh. Alright. Sasha's gonna bite through leather with pure need.

...No, we're too sleepy to decide how we feel about that.

Jack helps you get down and steadies you when your attempt to stretch nearly puts you on your ass. After you have your stuff back you lift the binoculars to your face and oh that's not a mascot on top of the giant wheel that's the biggest fucking Corporate you've ever seen and it's looking back at you.

You lower the binoculars. Raise them again. The Corporate stops its new downwards journey from its perch to look right at you again. Lower the binoculars. Swear. Raise them. Yep. Still looking at you. You blindly and lightly slap Jack's shoulder - well, "slap", you give him your best flopping fish impression with one hand - before passing him the binoculars. He swears too.

Jill comes over, asks what's happening, and gets the binoculars, and she swears too.

"What are you clowns doing," Nattie calls, walking over, still unsteady on her new foot. She raises her binoculars and - "Fuck me until I mummify what the fucking fuck."

"...I mean..." Jill begins. "It's Harrow Park, they were kinda the entertainment giant for awhile, so..."

"So what, we go into the theme park and Corporate summons cartoons on our asses? Have you seen a falling piano in real life? I don't need that shit." Nattie drags her hands down her face and hangs her head. "Fucking shitting fuck, I had plans to try and make that our center of operations for Project Throwback. It's pretty defensible and there's so many machines to cannibalize...fuck it, one problem at a time, one problem at a time. Let's get to work."

As far as the actual rescue operation goes, coordination might be the biggest problem. Nattie doesn't know exactly where Station 104 is, but that is, in fact, your problem to solve. So let's start on solving that. What are we thinking?

Choose 1 initial approach
[ ] Try to contact Doctor Heller again via Familiar Strangers
[ ] Doctor Heller said she can influence fish. If you put a phone in a The engineers have informed you that the pressure would smash the phone.
[ ] Cash in one gift in an attempt to evolve Familiar Strangers further
[ ] What if you just. Row out. And see what happens?
[ ] Write-in?