#(Which endings are Yvonne's and which are Morgan's? That's an answer for another day :3c)

[xshatteredreflectionsx]

“I think I might be as old as you now. Maybe even older.”

Morgan’s “voice” echoed in Yvonne’s ears, giving her momentary pause as she continued to oversee the construction of the colony.  They were still too tired to Front, hovering groggily near the surface. “Not literally, ‘cause of timeloops and all that. But emotionally. Soulfully? One of those two.”

Yvonne hummed and flicked through another report that had been sent to her datapad. She had gotten quite accustomed to the technology of this era, if she did say so herself. At the very least she didn’t “peck at the screen like a granny”. An outsider looking in probably wouldn’t notice unless they really examined Yvonne’s body language; the way she squinted at the screen sometimes, or how her hand would hover awkwardly over buttons and touchpads while she tried to remember what did what. She walked on eggshells around the terminal on the ship, but could anyone blame her? In the wormhole, it ignited if someone looked at it wrong.  

“Maybe.” Yvonne replied after a moment. Neither of them knew how old Morgan had been when they died in the timelines where they lived on those parallel colonies; anywhere between fifty to ninty. In at least one timeline, they had been kept alive for centuries due to the machinations of a tyrannical lunatic.  Yvonne couldn’t help the icy sting of pity piercing her gut as the realization settled in.  One hundred and twenty-four years as of their last birthday had felt too long to her. But it was far too late for her to pass on. The tangled, gnarled mess she had made of her’s and Morgan’s souls when she had still been bitter and angry and half-mad had seen to that.  Her rest would probably not come until Actor -wherever he was skulking about- finally got tired of this fa��ade.  “Why bring it up?”

“Cause I need to tell someone. If I told any of the crew: ‘hey, I’m actually old as fuck because of timey-whimey bullshit’, they’ll think I’ve gone crazy. I don’t know how much they remember, and honestly I hope they don’t remember everything.” Their voice lowered, heavy with remorse and lifetimes of grief. “It’s better for everyone if I’m the only one who does.” 

“You do not wear martyrdom well,” Yvonne said. She could almost feel Morgan recoil, retreating that much deeper into their inner world. “In any case, it is not as though you are the only one to blame. I know you are fond of him, but your Head Engineer made just as many mistakes as we did. Perhaps even more egregiously- and before you say it: No. I am not just saying that because he has more than a passing resemblance to the Mark I knew.” Yvonne let out a breath through her nose and ran a hand over her hair, attempting to coax a few loose curls back into place. It didn’t stay for very long, and fell back against her forehead as if to spite her. 

Morgan was silent for a long period of time- so long Yvonne speculated that they had fully withdrawn into their inner world, wrapping themself in the bliss of “slumber” like a blanket on a cold night.  Yvonne went back to work. If the Head Engineer noticed her being particularly curt with him, he did well to mask it (a flicker of remorse and guilt. A flash of genuine hurt before he swallowed it down and replaced with with a porcelain mask of professionalism. Yvonne knew her bias would never allow her to speak to him; that was for Morgan to do.) 

“You said ‘we’ earlier.” Morgan piped up after a few hours of silence. By this point the work day had been completed. Yvonne snapped the uniform jacket crisply on the clothes hanger.  

“I do not know. In time, mayhaps. When we can start learning how to forgive ourselves.” 

“...What do you think I did when I was Fronting? I made my fair share of bad decisions. Choices that antagonized your friends, made things harder for us and got people killed. I will carry that weight with me forever.” 

“Will it ever go away?”

Morgan was silent again, contemplative. Yvonne settled into bed, pushing aside two of the three overstuffed pillows. She turned to look outside the small window in Morgan’s quarters. This world two moons looking over it, sharing a space in the sky and glowing gently against an expanse of a thousand, thousand glittering stars. It was poetic in a way she could not quite put her finger on, but it felt significant somehow.  Ruminations for another day, mayhaps.