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nobodysdaydreams · 1 year

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My Reaction to the First Six Episodes of Wolf 359 (Because my mutuals have enticed me)

@sophieswundergarten @oflightningandstars @acollectionofcuriousreblogs

My curiosity got the better of me. Will I do these for every episode? Will I listen to the full podcast? Who knows, but I hope you like this💕

My Live Reaction to Episode 1:

At first, an ad played for a way more upbeat story podcast involving Greek gods, rainbow magic, and teenagers, and I was very confused because none of this was mentioned in any of your posts.

Yes, yes, Eiffel. Hera forgets what's necessary to sustain human life and accidently made the cabin too cold, hahahaha...foreshadowing.

"Whatever you're up to Dr. Hilbert, best of luck!" Dude is your whole job ominous foreshadowing? Sorry guys, I get half the characters from your posts confused, I just know that Hera is the AI, but Eiffel dude, there's no way Hilbert's not up to something.

"It's not like if she let me have a cigarette, I'd light it and set the station's air supply on fire" Bro, stop.

"The people on the station have serious trust issues." I mean, fair. You knocked over acid, you're lighting cigarette willy-nilly, I still don't know what your job is man.

"Let's see if we can actually get some work done." -Well I know I'm not.

Ooohh... they're looking for intelligent life! 👀 This sounds like a good plot.

Dude I don't think coffee will solve your problem. I'd focus on getting rid of the ominous piano music.

Oh good at least he got his coffee. Oh ew never mind.

Oh no more on the Doctor. I don't trust him.

Wow Eiffel is a terrible employee and now I gotta listen to his training.

1,001 survival tips? That's actually a pretty low amount for space. These tips are also some wonderful foreshadowing though, and very cheerful too. "Failing to remain calm could result in your ✨😍 grisly 🌈💖gruesome🍭 🦋death🥰!" I love that.

Hilbert. Dude.

"A man's life is at risk". Are we sure it's just one man's life?

Okay Douglas. That's his first name.

Wait...is that....the Entertainer? Is the alien transmitting the Entertainer? Something about old timey music...I think that's also the song they play in Westfield after a massacre in the old west (I stopped watching after a while).

Well that was a musical transition. Oh wow the same guy did Douglas and Hilbert? Good voice acting. Yes it was the Entertainer! Alright not sure if the episodes have post credit scenes, but I might just skip to the next episode.

My thoughts on Episodes 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 (semi-live reaction because I'm listening to these while I'm working now, but it's really good. Let me know if you want me to split up by episodes or include time stamps in the future):

Okay. They can't shut Hera off. That seems ominous. I'm not sure if it's ominous because the time will come when they want to shut her off, or ominous because the time will come when a bad guy finally figures out how to shut her off. Either way not good.

This also seems like a lot of effort for toothpaste. How did Douglas get hired? He seems like a huge liability. Also, why are they running out of supplies? Shouldn't they have a ship coming to restock them at some point or a return date? They mention "Earth", but so far I don't think anyone has mention loved ones they left behind, a return date, or anything like that.

I like the captain though (I can't spell her name, I'm so sorry).

Why does Douglas (and apparently everyone) hate physical examinations? They're in space. It's not like they can force them to run a mile...right?

I love Hera. "The report was a fabrication! 🥰". "You place too much judgement on the concept of lies... it's only sticks and stones that can break a human's feeble delicate flesh." I love how everyone just accepts this is how she talks.

Big plant? Roots? What is this Little Shop of Horrors now?

Um... what on earth is this physical examination? Why is there so much pain? Why can't it be stopped once it starts? Is this a meta thing where this is the physical examination?

Nah, the one thing I agree with Douglas on is that Hilbert is up to stuff.

Okay. Don't like it. Don't like the plant. It's either a crisis or a lie that's going to eventually be a very appropriate metaphor.

Oh my gosh why does Hilbert want their spinal fluid? Like...why do they need to do this? I get that they're in space but normalize providing reasons for serious medical examinations.

Kill it? What if it's not hostile? But then again what if it is? How does it have an eye? Teeth? Oh never mind it is hostile.

Oh it's still on the loose...Douglas what the heck. A good day? A plant wants to kill you. Have you seen the musical?

...wait. Is that a theme? First the Entertainer plays, now we got Little Shop of Horrors references...is this a theme of season 1? Space musicals?

And...now Douglas is in space. What happened to the plant? Why is that not a priority?

I do love the commander's "No Tomfoolery" clause.

Hey! More music! 🎶It sounds faster and more urgent now. You can probably use music to send coded information. A shame there seems to be no codebreaker on board.

I wonder if Hera understands what it means.

Oh dear. Here goes Douglas. Well, he was a nice character while he lasted. 🫡 And by nice, I mean he was entertaining, but very underqualified for his position. Scarily underqualified in fact, in terms of his ability to cooperate and work with a team. How did he even get this job?

He was blinded by the flare? So is he blind the rest of the show or can they fix it?

Oh dear...Hera...drown in space? Of all the ways to go. And still nothing about that killer plant. Did I listen out of order or something? I feel like I might have.

I like the Commander. Hilbert on the other hand? The worst.

I'm also wondering when/if other characters show up. Are there really just four characters? I swear I saw people posting about more.

I still want to know why they are in space. If this is a research mission, then why isn't anyone giving them supplies? Why don't they have a return date? If it's a survival mission, why aren't they acting more urgent?

Also does...does Douglas or another character nearly die at the end of every episode?

Hera: "Because I missed you."

Also Hera: "I lie 🥰"

And...more ominously cheerful piano music🎶🎹🎵🎹🎶. Which honestly fits Hera's aesthetic pretty well.

Okay Douglas has a clear nicotine problem.

Also. While he deals with his illness, I just gotta add something I noticed: the AI on the ship is called Hera. The ship is called Hephaestus. Isn't... isn't there a Greek Myth about Hephaestus being the son of Hera that she rejects and throws off Mount Olympus? Don't like how that sounds...

Hilbert. Hilbert. Why have you tied him to the bed and left him with nothing but his nicotine? That sounds like a major consent and health code violation. He's not violent or at risk of hurting anyone! Well, I mean, at least not any more than he normally is.

Huh. Hera's not here. And yet she said she couldn't be shut off "even if they wanted to". Weird.

Well at least Hilbert is feeding him. Oh my gosh Douglas is fake taking the pills? I'm not saying taking them is a good idea, but not taking them isn't great either. Why do they have this one guy doing all science stuff? Like he's the medical doctor, but he's also the guy running all the technology and experiments. They couldn't have a different guy to be their medical doctor? Maybe someone slightly less crazy?

Hilbert. Once again, he might trust you more if you didn't tie him to a bed, drug him in his sleep, and say things like "some people need to be dragged kicking and screaming towards improvement".

Yeah what on earth does "Big Day Tomorrow" mean? I'm not sure, but once again does Douglas nearly die during most episodes?

Also tying someone to a bed with a killer plant on the loose seems like a pretty bad idea.

WHY DO THEY HAVE TROPICAL FLU ON BOARD?

What sort of ship is this? And why do I feel like Hilbert might be a supervillain?

500th day around Wolf395 you say Douglas? Okay, so they've been in space for about a year and a half. Still not sure what they're doing up there. Also Hera's "I don't know what I want, but I know how to get it" quote. Very ominous coming from an AI.

I don't like the way Hilbert talks to Hera. Apparently Hera doesn't either...oh dear.

Hilbert you foolish liability, what did you do?

PFFT- Douglas imitating the captain.😂

Ooohhh...mysterious audio recordings!

Uh. Why can only Douglas hear the mysterious sounds? I don't like that.

Ah yes heading down to Engineering. Does the ship have an engineer?

Ugh I wish I could make out what the audio is saying. And I wish it would get louder Douglas. Then maybe I could hear it.

Oh now this is interesting! Wonder what the voices mean?

Have these voyages or experiments happened before?

I suppose we'll find out. Oh that is not a solid explanation from Hera. And again, why are Douglas, Minkowski and Hilbert the only people on the ship? Don't they need anyone else? And what happened to the killer plant? Did I skip an episode? Are we suppose to just pretend that never happened? Is it gonna come back later? Find out I guess.

Anyway, great podcast, thank you for recommending, I had fun listening. I might do more of these later if you enjoyed this.

#Wolf359 #wolf 359 #Wolf 359 reaction #Bods Wolf359 Reactions

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itrin · 1 year

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another wolf359 relisten

bc ive relistened to this podcast maybe four times now and im coming back to it for a fifth time (in 2 years) and i think i could genuinely listen to it 59 times and still enjoy it just as much as the first time

bc holy shit this is such an incredible podcast and i love noticing the tiny details i missed in the previous listens and just absorbing the dynamics again

anyways here's my totally normal feelings and thoughts dumped out, completely unsolicited and without order:

the sound design and production are everything to me; wolf 359 is the only podcast that I dont have to do another to in order to listen lmao I can, have, and do listen to the podcast at the table with my hands folded or eating dinner like I can still be engrossed in the story just by being still too

hearing hera's voice in episode 1 DFHSDKJG she's so...customer servicey and just the sharp contrast between her in the very first episodes and later on in the series; hilberts voice is changed too for the first episodes -- he sounds high-pitched like he's really trying to sell the character of Alexander Hilbert, quirky and unassuming scientist. listening to them when we're first introduced to them, with the knowledge of who they become and what they do, it hits-- all the nuances in voice is just wow. Like Hilbert's mask slipping briefly, the crack in the character, the facade, as indicted by his voice deepening into his real voice sometimes (I think in the empty man episode)

the Empty Man still creeps me out like it did the first time. The Empty Man always gives me chills.

minkowski holding a gun to fiffel's like how lovelace holds a gun to everyone on board with her bomb like how cutter holds a gun to humanity with the decima virus. how eiffel is humanity and humanity was the only thing hilbert cared about

when minkowski says she's never seen eiffel as happy as he looked in the picture he taped under his desk, the one where he's with anne; eiffel's voice when he first talks about what happened with anne to minkowski, flat and forcibly casual, then raw and bitter...oof

minkowski says in mini episode 6 that "my husbands going to kill me" ....gurl..ur husbands going to witness u get killed on tv..and his company covers the story..

episode 38 "happy endings" was very satisfying and I love the dynamic between hilbert and lovelace. and also:

hilbert is such A Character; everything is for progress, for the big picture. he has morals and boundaries but he'll willing to cross them, he has principles and he's willing to compromise; he wanted so badly for everyone under his care to live but they didnt and he started again. there's no humiliation he won't endure for the big picture. lovelace constantly kept getting outraged on his behalf because he couldn't muster up anything besides determination (resignation) -- which I think is the best part of their dynamic, hes cold, dead steel and she's a blazing, dangerous inferno. they hate each other, they're the only ones who know each other, who remembers the first Hephaestus crew. hilbert did care for the og crew, and he cares for the new Hephaestus crew too, but he cares about decima, the progress of humanity, and the big picture most of all

in ep34 when kepler asks eiffel "what's going on, what's the problem?" in that voice, and i-

I had many conflicted feelings about si5. still do and probably always will with every listen. si5 is...recruiting people at dead ends and rock bottoms because they have no where else to go, no one else to turn to, and its all they have to dedicate themselves to Goddard. si5 are people who have nothing else, so they dedicate themselves to each other. si5 have complexes upon compartmentalizations upon complexes and they're callous, objectively bad people but they're bonded stronger than most families. they're trained, loyal and without hesitation, they trust each other and only each other. they were set up to be invincible, and when they fell, it was spectacularly hard.

what's that one post thats like "what makes w359 incredible is that every character is written like a main character" yeah

when "we try not to be monsters. when we can help it" goes to "the hell do you think we are, ups?" and to "*maxwell collars hera*" [insert tearing teeth out noises]

I think about Kepler's pig joke.

I think about someone saying Kepler's laughter is his cry.

I think part of why Kepler hates Hilbert so much is because when si5 kills, its with a purpose and a plan, and Kepler knows decima will go nowhere further than this so to him, the murders are disgusting because they're purposeless

si5's divide and conquer approach from the very beginning was ruthlessly effective holy shit; but at the same time, I cant help but think about how nice it must feel to have someone who understands, to have an advocate for the first time; Hera with Maxwell, and Eiffel with Kepler

on that note, I never understood why, really; every time, I just cant help but think its hypocritical for any of them to feel distress and anger over murder when theyre responsible for the same crime. but thats human, simply put. jacobi has blood on his hands, he killed hilbert remorselessly, but he's in pain and grief over Maxwell's death--and ig the act of murder doesn't protect u from the fallout of death.

god I fucking love Renee Minkowski so much, so MUCH. and the little things too -- refusing to back down from Kepler in that first bit when he interrupts her solitary confinement for help (satisfying, go girl); and also calling out Jacobi for his shit every time, including the fact that he had a choice to disobey orders, not kill Hilbert, and save Maxwell and he didnt make that call. just - I love her

Jacobi once said something like "Kepler doesnt push people past breaking point" and then kepler realizing hes pushed too far when Jacobi tries to force minkowski to shoot him dead. "please tell me you have a plan" said in a shaky voice, ah

truly I dont know where id be without the "Memoria" episode where Hera uncovers her subconscious saying "I cant do this, im not good enough," and then every single time afterwards she does it anyways. always. that episode impacted me..somuch.

this isn't even close to capturing everything, w359 is truly the chefs kiss. but I had to put this out somewhere.

anyways.

#wolf 359 #w359 #wolf 359 podcast #long post

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incorporealbagelbeing · 3 years

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Hello From the Hallowoods characters based on their Vine knowledge and Energy:

Nikignik: thousand eyes? He knows what Vines are. He probably knows them all word for word and cried a little when it died and did an in-depth monologue about humanity, humor, art and love as a requiem. Doesn't trust TikTok. 100/10

Lady Ethel: Watched one that Brooklyn showed her and immediately started marketing the idea. -10/10, part of Vine's downfall, still doesn't get the references. Also makes bad marketing TikToks

Diggory: 6/10, they've seen a few! Percy showed them some at the scoutpost, and they have a group chat with the mendies where they send memes and vine compilations.

Percy: 8/10. Watches Vine compilations all the time. Knows them by heart, but tends to be more reserved and serious and doesn't quote them a lot. The only reason people know he watches them is because Riot referenced "Jared, 19" and got jumpscared by Percy laughing behind her while invisible, cementing her trust.

Riot: 12/10. Riot "I see Walt is busy. Im going to go bother him" quotes Vine enough to rival Doug Eiffel of Wolf 359. She had all that time in the bunker to learn Vines and decided to make that everyone's problem. Queen shit. Bonds with Percy and Diggory over Vine, and has mixed emotions on TikTok

Clara: 7/10 nows Vine a bit less than Percy. She knows more due to Riot and Friday. Can and will recite many Vines by heart but doesn't watch compilations.

Violet: 4/10 knows a few Vines? Kind of understands the humor? More than anything, she has a knitting TikTok that's super soothing, so points for that.

Bern: 3/10 understands the nihilistic humor but hasn't really ever sat and watched a Vine comp. She does appear in the backgrounds of Violet's TikToks sometimes with large weapons, and she has a small fan base because of it.

Walt: 7/10 knows Vines because 1. He thought some of them were a bit funny and 2. Riot loves Vines and he looked deeper into it. They make jokes back and forth about Vines, trade references, and make each other laugh. However, he has NEVER gotten the phrasing right for "Road Work Ahead?" Has a TikTok for info on various Hallowoods creatures and places.

Olivier: 6.5/10. My score here is less on Vine knowledge (they'd get a 3 based on their friendship with Friday) and more based on the fact that they exhibit the exact energy of Vine. Im giving them honorary points for having the exhausted manic energy. You'd do numbers on TikTok, king

Friday: 9.5/10. She watches Vines, even if you wouldn't expect it. Im adding an extra half point for Clara and her bonding over it. I feel like she's the reason Olivier knows of Vine, and that the two watch Vines sometimes (or Olivier studies while she watches them to chill out during study breaks). She and Clara quote them at each other to confuse other people in the library.

Big Mikey: 6.5 I think he colloquially knows a few! And I also think that Riot and at least one other scoutpost person have showed him the child safe Vine comps. Also I love him.

Polly: controversial take: the posse all have low scores. He gets a 4/10 because he's been loosening up, and I think he'd vibe with it. I also think that he posts on TikTok for aesthetic posts and for the one he has with Yaretzi in wolf for. Oh Mort also appears in the backgrounds sometimes, picking flowers or befriending animals and has answered questions much to the delight of his fans.

Mort: 4/10 appears in Polly's TikToks, and he gets points for being beloved by everyone. However he neither knows nor gets Vines and Polly doesn't know how to explain.

Yaretzi: 4/10: not super well-versed in Vines, but she's learning with Polly. She also has a fanbase from Polly's TikTok background appearances.

Hector: 5/10 knows Vines but never uses them. He smiles at them but its nothing much. He has a TikTok for the dogs which is insanely popular.

Jonah: 5.5/10. Was a huge fan of Vine Back In The Day, and quotes them sometimes. Also has a TikTok, doesn't post much. This is counteracted by the fact that Zelda hopped on his channel, earning him an extra point.

Zelda: 7/10. Knows and quotes the most well known Vines because Jonah was such a big fan and she cares about him. Also, that one lady on TikTok who has the recipe channel where she's like. The funniest person, but its also stuff like meatballs and cookies? Thats Zelda. Shes also decently TikTok famous, and responds to everyone who asks if she can be their mom.

Solomon: fuck you. Crusty bitch. Even if he knew what vine was he wouldn't get it. >:/

Barb: 10/10 made Polly and Yaretzi watch Vines. Makes Vine references. Legend has it, he has a Fre Shava Cado sign somewhere in the Resting Place.

Countess: 2/10 knows little about Vine because she thinks its below her. However, she is the sexy vampire lady that appears in the background of Barb's videos, sooooooo

Brooklyn: 6/10 she's a tech/ social media person i feel like. Showed LEM a Vine and Regretted It. Still thinks about them and mentions them to Marco sometimes. Repeats some under her breath but also doesn't know many at all.

Marco: 4/10: knows less than Brooklyn but still has some Vine knowledge I guess? Sheltered by BotCo

Danielle: 3/10: even more sheltered by BotCo. However, she also met Nikignik

Ray: 8/10: hear me out: this automobile knows Vines. He wants to connect with passengers. He gets them wrong a lot of the time but its the thought that counts. Also? Ray has tremendous meme energy.

Moth 11/10: knows and quotes Vines and has cryptid energy. Currently running a TikTok with Ray which has vine energy and is wildly popular. People do assume that Ray is just camera shy and not an automobile tho.

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vonkarma2 · 2 years

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character ask game do minkowski w359 and rocio if you want

These got so long omg

Minkowski:

Sexuality Headcanon: lesbian <3 She has a husband allegedly but I’m a minkowski was lying about being married truther. like why would she call his work phone if they were married??? It all adds up

Gender Headcanon: personally I think of her as cis although I strongly respect transfem headcanons as well. transmasc is definitely fair it’s just not what I think of with her character. The only wolf 359 characters I personally think of as trans are Maxwell, Hera (<sort of canon in a sense), and maybe Jacobi. 50/50 on Jacobi. Who’s to say.

A ship I have with said character: do I even have to say it. Minlace canon and real they are meant to be. There is barely any self deception involved in my perception of their relationship those women are GAY. It’s in the podcast like not intentionally but they will say incredibly gay things. From time to time. Well anyway I like how their personalities are in some ways different (ie how Lovelace is in many ways paralleled with Eiffel (although obviously they have a lot of differences as well such as Lovelace being incredibly mean)) but they get along very well and work well as a team. I like them both a lot individually as characters as well. They’re both really funny

A BROTP I have with said character: Im willfully ignoring the potentially cringe language used in this post Im just going to think of it as platonic relationship. It probably means friendship specifically idk if that’s how I would describe her and Eiffel though. I know they care abt each other a lot and ok they probably are friends but idk. Comrades maybe. Whatever the point is I really like their relationship especially in the finale, I like how she really wants to keep him safe and her entire crew as well, and how the two of them have been through so much together and they’re really close even though they hated each other initially. It’s nice to see it change so much over time + they have a lot of moments together I really like. Like when he came back from being stuck in a freezer for however long that was Im actually not sure it was a while though

A NOTP I have with said character: Her and Eiffel is unhinged I don’t think anyone actually thinks this probably. Her x Dominic Koudelka if you respect this woman’s marriage then get out ‼️

A random headcanon: I think she has a buzzcut because since this is an audio medium characters can look like whatever I want. I think she would be a cat person. For some reason I think of her as having lived in California like San Francisco specifically. That might be canon and I just forgot when I heard it but she is from Cali to me. I mean after she was from Poland

General Opinion over said character: I love her so much I’ve said this so many times I’m getting tired of saying that I’ve said this before but unironically she’s like the exact opposite of what I complain abt with women in mainstream sci fi action comedy. She’s a heavily flawed character but also has a lot of strengths as well, like she’s a good leader. Has a lot of development over the course of the series. I like her development and she’s very multifacteted as well. #1 minkowski stan whatever whatever. She is definitely my favorite character in wolf 359 which is saying a lot w/how much I love Eiffel and the overall cast as well

Rocio:

Sexuality canon: lesbian also not much else to say not much to elaborate on. Well I guess it is kind of funny she’s like I will transcend humanity…. To the next level of existence…. wait omg a cute girl 😖😖😖🥰🥰🥰. Not in those words. But that’s the idea

Gender canon: Largely indifferent to the concept, hasn’t really actively thought abt it but if she did she’d be like wow I literally don’t care at all like the concept has no influence on reality to her. Doesn’t dislike being seen as a woman in particular she’d be fine with that or genderless. The problem is being perceived at all lol.

A ship I have with said character: I’ve been thinking about her and Gloria recently I mean ofc I was going to say that because that is the relationship I put them in. And it is the only one that remotely makes any sense out of the OCs in this story. But yeah let’s talk abt some of the details with them

being around gloria makes rocio feel way more down to earth because 1) gloria herself is usually focused on the present moment 2) she is genuinely just annoying, she actively gets on rocios nerves enough that they’ll be distracted from being existentially depressed long enough to argue with her. But Rocio actually loves arguing + Gloria likes attention from anyone (it being slightly negative helps because she doesn’t have to worry abt letting anyone down) so they actually have fun together

One thing I like about Rocio is that for all their grandiose ideas and also incredible power they get embarrassed/flustered very easily which Gloria thinks is really funny and kind of cute

they each respect each other’s ability to do whatever they want and not care about the consequences or what other people think (even though this is a bad thing for both of them lol). However Rocio respects Gloria increasingly as she starts to doubt herself whereas Gloria loses a lot of respect for Rocio when she sees how she sometimes treats others + also how she’s not being cool and mysterious she’s also pathetic and annoying at times. It doesn’t make her hate them though it makes her pity them

I think they actually could work even though they don’t have that much in common it’s abt their personalities and the understanding they have of each other from pretty early on. They both get that the other needs to have space yk + especially after they become a bit more emotionally mature. They should talk to a couples therapist that would actually help a lot. Not marriage material probably (

A BROTP I have with said character: Due to the nature of their personality they have somewhat limited options…. I mean I would probably say Cirillo lol but Im going to talk abt Angel as well

During the story her friendship with Cirillo is solid but there are some flaws to it. They both depend on each other a lot because he doesn’t have a place to live without them and they need him to help with basic tasks (mostly communication based, like he’ll talk on the phone for her or order for her at stores sometimes). But this also creates a lot of tension because he’s really really nice to her and she really isn’t in return both bc she doesn’t want to (she used to just not really like/be comfortable talking face to face but now the problem is the act of communicating at all. It’s not THAT extreme most days but 1) sometimes it is 2) she wants to avoid it overall. Also bc she is afraid of interpersonal relationships, justifying it as not having time for them or them getting on the way of her goals, but really she’s just afraid of someone being close to her.) and because she can’t. But she feels pretty guilty about this no matter how much she wishes she didn’t. Cirillo usually wants to be understanding of this, he honestly doesn’t care that they don’t talk much because he can get that from other sources, he’s mostly just concerned. To be clear this isn’t me trying to talk about him as a perfect saint because 1) he neglects his own needs way too much and lets people treat him however they want out of guilt and a misplaced sense of respecting everyone even if they’re not a good person at all or treat him or others badly 2) he takes personal responsibility for Rocio’s mental and physical health which is already highly stupid because he is literally incapable of fixing the problem, but he’s also too nice to her to actually confront her about unhealthy things she’s doing in the slightest so the problem just gets worse and they both feel terrible. Jesus Christ did I spend this long explaining just the bad parts of their relationship there are good parts too omg. Rocio really appreciates how he’s willing to be accommodating and understanding when other people aren’t. She tries to help him where she can like looking for jobs for him or something. They can communicate very easily and do know each other pretty well since they actually talked via letters for like 3 years prior to the start of the story. On the very rare occasions where Rocio does feel like spending time with someone they both do enjoy it, like they’d go to the sea and watch the boats or some old man shit like that. But when they can handle it they like listening to him talk (+he likes spending time with literally anyone in any setting, they both appreciate peaceful settings a lot) and they absolutely appreciate all the things he’s done for her in the past, like theyre absolutely aware of how helpful he’s been and they probably would have been screwed in a lot of situations (there’s a lot of bureaucracy wizards have to go through for example lots of talking to people at colleges and government offices and things) without him since they don’t really know anyone else they can go to for help.

Ángel honestly never really knew her that well even though he wanted to, and she used him for personal gain and left him to die ( < there is slight nuance to this part in that at this point rocio really actually did need to make it to the tower in order to prevent a shit ton of people from dying and they might not have if they were still protecting Angel, as well as the fact that he wouldn’t have been the primary target of the demons anyway since they had already used his blood to open the portal so he wasn’t really an important factor anymore.) I’m not sure whether this would ruin their relationship permanently though because I think Rocios actions should have lasting consequences and this would be a really good opportunity to demonstrate that and contrast it with Cirillo forgiving her. But on the other hand I genuinely think it’s more in character for Angel to forgive her, he really wants to understand others in part out of curiosity but also because of loneliness. Tiago’s death was really really hard on him (yes they knew each other for literally a day but Angel had literally never had a friend before in his life) so he does really want companionship wherever he can get it. And he was willing to forgive Victor (even though what he did was probably not as bad even though it was more directly harmful it was WAY less risky and he probably had a better justification) I definitely don’t think he’d be totally fine with Rocio at all. But he would want to understand them better and why they did what they did, and he’d definitely be open to knowing them in the future. He’d like ask them why and what was going on and he’d want to hear everything they were thinking during the time they knew each other. And then after that I think he would forgive her ( < they would definitely cry like 5x during the explanation, they as in both of them), not to say he’s obligated to at all (I actually think it would be better for him not to have contact with her ever again lmao) but that’s what i think he’d do based on his priorities and the kind of person he is. I don’t think they’d actively spend time together usually but they have a lot of mutual friends so they’d be cool whenever they saw each other. Rocio will never stop feeling bad about it as long as they live. But they’re also pretty grateful to him as well.

A NOTP I have with said character: Setting aside the her being a lesbian thing she and Cirillo would not work I bring this up bc one time I saw writing something for them like a year ago and it accidentally sounded very romantic and it’s haunted me ever since. They would be miserable. It would be like all the problems with their friendship but exaggerated times 1000. They have no interests in common he’s a #extrovert she’s a #introvert he would try really hard to solve all her problems and it would make them both very sad when he’d inevitably fail. Just awful. But anyway in terms of people she could actually be with theoretically:

Laura: To be clear he’s 20 even though I’ve said she’s 18 before I changed my mind she is 20 so there’s not really an age gap. This is kind of out of left field I’d have to think abt this. Yeah it would not work

Lucia: She doesn’t like them lol but even if she did/got to know them better I don’t think it would really work she’s too down to earth and really opposes a lot of what Rocio believes in philosophically, not to mention their personalities would not work together at all theyre both very reserved and need someone who would actively make them feel comfortable (Lucia by being nice to her and listening to what she has to say, Rocio by being willing to argue with them + straight up by annoying them sometimes. And for both of them being willing to carry the conversation) which they could not do for each other AT ALL

So in the story I think literally anything besides her and Gloria would be out of character 😔 but honestly I wouldn’t be that strongly against these either like in the context of fans doing them the first one makes zero sense but whatever but the second I could see working if you slightly reinterpreted the characters or something it could be ok and it would also be really funny. If you changed Joanna or Salem to not be straight that would also be hilarious so I wouldn’t care about that either. I guess I would say her and Cirillo or her and Ángel I would be the most strongly against bc even though that couldn’t happen in universe I can see someone doing it anyway and I would not care for it.

A random canon: The first spell she learned how to do was to create fire. This was her final project at her college and doing this was what got her entered as a candidate to become a wizard like fully. At first she could only create a candle sized flame but she’s practiced it a lot and now can create like a bonfire relatively easily. They will die at around 200 years old outliving all of their friends also. (<wizards live for longer and age more slowly automatically) Kind of sad but it does mean they’ll live to see the 1990s which is funny. I mean they would have with a normal lifespan very likely as well they’d only be 70 or so. Whatever

General Opinion over said character: they’re just okay. No idk I really like how their design looks personally, it’s not very elaborate but I’m happy with it. I’ve had them for so long (<2.5 years not actually that long) and thought abt them so much so I like seeing how much they’ve developed over time. I’m really happy with them :) at least conceptually I think they’re interesting I like the different aspects of their character and relationship with others and I think some aspects of their development are heartwarming to me or whatever. I mean bc I created them. But yeah really love this character a lot. They’re fun and pretty easy to draw too <3

#thanks for asking!!#I always forget how long these take lol but this was really fun #I really need to come up with the full list of magic Rocio can do #there’d probably be abt 4-5 things #but you have to think what’s in character for their priorities yk #my ocs #rocio satapathy

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teacup-crow · 3 years

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Maybe, Maybe, Maybe

Fun bit of survivors’ guilt for @badthingshappenbingo, based pretty heavily off Don’t Poke the Bear and Variations on a Theme. Post-finale.

They take it in turns to keep watch for when he wakes up: Doug, Reneé, Isabel, first names still such a novelty. Just his luck, he opens his eyes to the impassive face of Captain Lovelace.

“Hi, dickbag. Sore head?”

“Unnnnhh…” he whines as if he’s lying under a ton of rocks rather than a cosy quilt on Renee’s living room floor. His face is a patchwork of bruising. “Aspirin?”

She takes pity, and passes him two and a glass of water. The sitting up takes longer than he thought it would.

“You look terrible. Lucky for you, Renee makes a mean chilli con carne. Never would have guessed she could cook.”

“No thanks, I should, should be going-”

“You need food in your system, that’s non-negotiable. First thing’s first, though, you’re having a shower, and you either go willingly or get dragged bodily, because you goddamn stink. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, sir,” he mumbles automatically, and he remembers the Colonel - Warren? Was it on a day he could call him Warren? - once saying something similar and his head pounds. ((“mr jacobi, of all the irresponsible, stupid shit i have seen from you this really takes the-“))

“Bathroom’s on the second floor, just past the master bedroom. Dominick put a pile of clean clothes in there before he left for work. And it’s Isabel, okay? Not sir. Not Captain. Never again.”

***

“Who did this to you?”

He grips his mug of sweet tea like it’s thousand dollar whiskey. He’s still ashen. “I did this to me.”

“You beat the shit out of yourself? Okay, yeah. Don’t buy that one.” Isabel repeats the question. “Who did this to you?”

“Just some guys I pissed off. I don’t know how many. I don’t know who. Happy now?”

The room goes silent. Isabel continues:

“And did you go provoking them deliberately?”

Not for the first time, Renee wonders whether they should have included Doug in this little intervention. He’s been through so much just like the rest of them, but he doesn’t know it, and he’s clearly freaking out at the situation.

“Why would he want something like that to happen? He looks terrible!”

“I don’t know, Doug,” Isabel says levelly. “Care to answer, Jacobi?”

He’s not on a first name basis, apparently.

“Not… I didn’t... no. No, no, no. I was too drunk and… picking fights, but suddenly there were too many of them, okay? But I got out. And if I want to drink then that’s my own problem, so thank you for the hospitality but-“

Renee cuts in there. “When you drink yourself into a stupor, get attacked by a gang in a back alley, and stumble into my doorway at 0300 hours after six months of radio silence, it becomes our problem.” Her look of pity makes his stomach churn even more than the chilli did. He breathes in, hold, out; in, hold, out; in-((alana’s breathing technique and why why why is she everywhere in everything why does he have to see her out of the corner of his eye when it’s been so long he can’t properly remember her face-))

“Fine. What do you want from me?”

“You are a good man and you saved every single one of our lives and we need to understand why you’re so intent on throwing yours away.”

Jacobi starts laughing then, guttural laughs that worsen the ache in his head and bones but he can’t seem to stop them. “...me? I’m a good man? Oh my God, Lieutenant, that’s hilarious. Give us another.”

“You need to take this seriously! This is a form of self harm! You could have died!” Isabel is pacing up and down. She and Renee do good cop, bad cop like it’s a professional sport.

“Boo fucking hoo. And the world would forever be worse off for my passing.”

Isabel stops, and turns back towards him with some heat in her gaze. “I have lost too many crew members who deserved to die far less than you do. Okay? Is that what you want to hear? Do you need me to reconfirm that you are a an asshole? Do you need to hear about how Fisher, and Hui, and Fourier, and Lambert were all far better people than you will ever, ever be? Or will you accept that you are good in there? That deep down you’re on the right-“

“We burned their letters.” He’s staring at the duvet he’s wrapped in, running his finger over the flowers on the pattern. “Okay? Still think I’m a good person?”

“...wait. What?” She laughs a little, in shock perhaps. “But you told me…”

“I told you what I needed to tell you to make you trust me. We burned your crew’s letters. Lambert’s… I remember those especially. His hands were shaking really hard when he wrote them, weren’t they.”

It’s not a question.

Isabel stops pacing, and Jacobi grins again but it doesn’t reach his bruised eyes when he looks up at her. “More than mine, even. You could tell he was sick. They didn’t make any sense. We laughed at them. The irony of a Communications Officer who can’t communicate. Are you listening to me? We read their letters and we burned them and we laughed about it-“

Renee loses her softness. “Jacobi, that is enough!”

Isabel has a hand on her chest as if something has hit her there. She counts to ten in her head, ((fisher’s technique to try and stop her fighting with sam, never worked but still stuck in her head, or this copy of her head, or whoever she is now-)) and leaves the room.

They hear her slamming drawers in the kitchen.

Doug glances at Jacobi and shakes his head, before hurrying after her.

“How could you,” Reneé says. “How could you.”

“I don’t know. Will you let me go and ruin my own life now?”

“Never,” she replies. “Because, God help me, you’re still a member of my crew.”

At that, his eyes prick with tears he can’t explain. He rolls over on the air bed, and closes them.

***

“Lovelace?” Jacobi finally makes himself walk into the kitchen, grimacing like each step is on hot sand. The words are monotone. “I’m so sorry. What I did and said is... inexcusable.”

“Nope. That’s too large a word for your vocabulary. Come back to me with an apology Renée didn’t script,” Isabel snaps, going back to scribbling in a sketchbook.

“Look, I’m not much good at this-“

“You’re telling me.”

“I’m… really used to people yelling at me and hitting me until they feel better. Or you can shoot me if you like!”

“Jesus. Well, I am not about to do that to ease your guilt. You look like you’d snap if one more person poked you. So apologise properly.”

“I’m sorry…”

“For?” Isabel prompts over the top of her book.

“I’m sorry for burning your crew’s letters.”

“You did what you were ordered to do. It is what it is. I’m not condoning it.”

There’s a moment of silence, and Jacobi realises she’s waiting for him to continue. “And… I’m sorry for bringing it up. That was… needlessly cruel. It sucked.”

“It really did,” she replies, putting the book down. “Tell you what: that sounded somewhat genuine, and Goddard brought out the shit in all of us. You look so pathetic, I’m going to forgive you. Not because you deserve it, but because I don’t bear grudges. Not anymore.”

She holds out a hand, and he shakes it. “Thank you.”

“Wow. That actually hurt for you to say.”

Jacobi nods. He sits down across from her at Renée’s huge darkwood table, and thinks about how she and Dominick must have bought this when they moved in together with plans to have people over for dinner every other night. Maybe even plans to have kids.

He wonders if Dominick ate at it alone while his wife was gone.

“So, you gone on that holiday yet?”

“No, actually. I’ve legally been dead for about seven years, so getting a passport is proving pretty tricky.”

“I can imagine.”

“Where have you been, anyway? We tried to get into contact with you. We drove down to your old apartment - got your address from the Goddard database - but it was cleaned out.”

Jacobi looks sheepish. “Yeah, well, I’d mostly been staying at Alana’s for the last few years or overnight at… yeah… so I’d not been a very good tenant and turns out they took ‘lost in space’ as the perfect opportunity to kick me out. So I’ve been sofa to sofa, on the streets a bit-”

“For heaven’s sake, Jacobi. We would have helped you, you stupid asshole! All you had to do was ask and you could have stayed here! Renee and Dominick would probably even let you have a cheese collection or whatever the fuck it was.”

“Guess the amount of drinks it takes for me to lose my pride is somewhere over eighteen?”

“How do you have a functioning liver?”

They sit in an almost comfortable silence for a few minutes, Isabel reopening her sketchbook.

“I never knew you drew.”

“You never knew me outside of a life-threatening situation.” Isabel sighs, twists the pencil between her fingers. “I don’t think I did. Before. The old ‘me’, I mean. But I was bored and I can’t get a job because of the ‘being dead’ issue, so I thought I should take up a hobby or something. Might be therapeutic. I’m not very good at it…”

“Can I see?”

“I, uh,” Isabel suddenly looks uncertain. “I drew her. Maxwell. I drew everyone, actually. Are you sure you want to look?”

“Yes.”

He leafs through the pages, at first simple doodles before branching into full portraits. Eiffel, upside down and smoking a cigarette. Hilbert, looking troubled at a shadow behind him he can’t quite see. Two ghostlike figures in lab coats staring out at the star, the man with a prophetic terror etched on his face - must be Isabel’s old crewmates. Mr Cutter smiles up at him with far too many sharp teeth in sharper lines where the pencil was pressed far too hard and he turns the page quickly. There’s Kepler, mid-whiskey speech and it almost stops his heart. He pauses. Maxwell.

In the picture, her eyes are shining as she stares at Hera’s console, fingers nothing more than a blur - the three-day stint she spent trying to get the AI online. Aside from the orange and blue of Wolf 359, elsewhere in the book Isabel has barely used colour, but here the room is bathed in a serene green light from the screens. Behind Maxwell, Jacobi sees himself, little more than a stocky, sketchy outline, waiting for her to finish.

He looks so proud of her.

He looks so… content.

After staring for a long moment, Jacobi closes the book and hands it back. “Thank you.”

“You can keep the pictures of them, if you like,” Isabel offers, but he doesn’t know whether he would like, so he says:

“Tell me about your crew.”

“What?”

“Your old crew. Tell me about them. Was Lambert the one staring at...?”

“No. No. No, that was Kuan Hui, our senior astrophysicist. He was whipsmart and funny and fearless, until the time Goddard Futuristics played around in his brain, stretched out his perception of time. He was completely alone in the dark for two weeks. His smile never really reached his eyes after that.”

Jacobi sips tea awkwardly, even though it’s cold.

“Something like that, it stays with you. At least he had Fourier, though.”

“That’s the woman behind him?”

“Junior physicist. Victoire Fourier had eyes like stars. Cleverest person I’ve ever met. She played six instruments, spoke four languages and she had the most gentle soul. She used to read to Hui when he got sick with Decima. Coughed up every organ in his body. I thought it would break her, but she was made of stern stuff. She vanished off the space station in the final days and I still don’t know what exactly happened to her-”

“I… do. If you want to know, I mean.”

Isabel shakes her head. Then pauses. Then shakes her head again. “I get the feeling whoever is to blame is long gone.”

Jacobi shrugs. “Who else?”

“Well, there was Mace Fisher. Fisher… Fisher died because of me, not Goddard Futuristics. Asteroid shower tore him from my hands. He had a boyfriend waiting at home. He was sensitive, sensible, grounding. A real older brother type. I- I didn’t deal particularly well with his death. Well, you know that much.”

((Pill popper!)) Jacobi gulps more cold tea.

“And Lambert?”

“Sam Lambert. Officer Samuel Lambert had a stick up his ass. He was whiny, and authoritarian, and he treasured his copy of Pryce and Carter more than Reneé and Kepler combined did. He drove me nearly insane, and I drove him likewise. The best second in command you could ask for. A damn good man. Sam got sick after Hui, so we knew what was coming. What it meant. He was brave, though. At first.”

((“C-Captain, please shoot me, please, it hurts, it hurts, Captain, please, I just want it to-”)

She falters.

“Lovelace?”

“Yup?”

“You know, it’s not even really about the Hephaestus. I keep… it’s insane, but I keep thinking about… I was an explosives guy for the Air Force. Before Goddard. A trigger failed and two men died. Andrews and Sullivan. I haven’t thought about them in years and suddenly-“

“They’re everywhere?”

There’s a sudden understanding between them.

“They’re everywhere. Them and Maxwell and Kepler. They’re in mirrors, in the back of my brain, around corners.”

“Flashes of them.”

“And if you just reach out far enough, maybe-“

“Maybe-“

“Maybe.”

((let’s go be monsters)), Jacobi’s brain echoes. He grits his teeth.

“Did it stop for you? When does it stop?” He finds himself asking. Isabel doesn’t answer.

#wolf 359 #bad things happen bingo #Daniel Jacobi #isabel lovelace #w359

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podcastlimbo · 4 years

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My honest honest opinion on second citadel season 3

Uhhhh... short answer? I didn’t like it much.

Okay wait before I go on to my long answer I need to say that this is all just my opinion and it’s all subjective. If you liked sc season 3 that’s awesome! I get why you do and I’m glad you enjoyed it!

But I really wasn’t a fan of where they went with it (even from episode 1), and I’m gonna go on a long rambly and repetitive rant about it.

I’m not gonna talk about the way the season ended and the setup for s4 because I haven’t fully formed my opinion about that - to form my opinion means to relisten to the season and i don’t really feel like doing that.

Anyways, these are my unfiltered 2am thoughts about the Rest Of It - maybe I’ll neaten it up later to make it more palatable but for now it’s wordy n messy and you can just. Not read it bc it’ll probably make you mad, or feel free to pick it apart and tell me I’m wrong, or unfollow me (and at least one person has already done so lmao) but like that won’t change the fact that I just wasn’t feeling s3 so uh. That said.

Long answer? I love the second citadel... at least the first two seasons

I love the world building, how the setting is such a unique, deliberate step away from eurocentric fantasy, how refreshing all that is! The Second Citadel (the place) is rich with culture and history from the brief glimpses we get of it (mostly in knight of the crown). Not to mention the monster society, with its own rules (or lack thereof) and environments and personalities.

I love the storytelling, how different mediums are woven into the way each episode is formatted. Rilla has her tape recorder, Damien his prayers, Caroline her letters, and each medium is so well suited to each character, and it truly lets us get a glimpse of what’s going on in their minds, and I find it utterly fascinating how a protagonist of one story could just as easily become an antagonist (or at least, an annoyance) in another

And the characters! Each one so compelling, with their own goals and motivations, their own intriguing backstories and potential.

Most importantly, the way these characters play off of each other is what makes second citadel amazing. Getting to see people with similar experiences but different world views clash (Caroline and Mira), people with fundamentally different beliefs reconcile and meet in the middle (rilla and arum), just, Kabert created so many interesting characters, and watching them bounce off one another is a joy.

And that’s what made season 2 so great for me. The exploration of each character, getting to see their good sides and bad, through either a medium tailored for them, or through interactions with others, as they explored a fascinating world.

The end of season 2 left me so satisfied, but still with so many questions and excitement about what was to come. I wanted to see Talfryn come into his own and step out of his brothers shadow. I wanted to see Damien, Arum and Rilla navigating their new relationship. I wanted to know more of the fate of Rilla’s parents, Damien’s past, the consequences Arum would surely face after defying the monster court. I wanted Marc to finally be recognized by his fellow knights, to watch as Caroline lead the journeymen knights, while learning to trust in others as she was beginning to do. I wanted Angelo continuing to unlearn the implicit biases that had been instilled in him as a result of his upbringing, or more details on Caroline and Quanyii’s relationship. I was also curious!! How would human and monster relations change after the events of the finale? And would we learn more of the past, when humans and monsters lived together in peace?

I was buzzing with excitement for season 3, and then.. it came, it aired, and then it went.

And I felt... meh?

Don’t get me wrong. There were moments that I liked. Some of what I hoped to see did happen (see the above paragraph lmao), getting a glimpse of the western wastes with its own culture a joy. The dynamics between Olala and some of the characters were really fun! And the direction the story took at the end was one I didn’t expect, but left me open to more.

That said,,, everything else about the season just. Didnt gel with me.

Everything I loved about second citadel pretty much wasn’t there??? Aside from Caroline, Angelo and Quanyii, all the characters they spent so much time introducing to us and fleshing out over 2 seasons were just relegated to the side??

I think my main problem with season 3 was that it felt like a completely different show. Characters introduced as part of an ensemble became side characters in (what was supposed to be) their own stories. Character arcs that got set up were dropped, and mysteries/backstories teased were forgotten. Heck, the monster court and senate wasn’t even brought up! The aftermath of the fear bugs attack ont the citadel went unexplored! It’s like nothing in the past season even happened!

And I’m sorry I gotta say this, but the problem is Olala.

I mean. Okay I don’t wanna be super mean- she’s perfectly fine as a character. We root for her, we cry when she cries, and we cheer when she wins the day.

But since all the episodes were centered around her, we didn’t get to see anyone else’s inner worlds. And like okay, yes, they did it for this season of Juno Steel too, where Juno, the previous POV a character for 2 seasons, became a part of an ensemble, and was a side character for many episodes. But this choice worked for Juno and not Second Citadel, because it was a natural progression for his story! We spent 2 seasons exploring Juno’s character, his backstory, his motivations, we saw him come to terms with his family history, grow and change as a person, and by the time he joined the Carte Blanche, we’d gotten to a point with Junos story where we’re okay to step away for a while, and see events through the lens of others.

But that just?? Doesn’t work in second citadel? Because unlike Juno, the characters introduced in s1-2 are virtually unexplored! There’s still so much about their stories we don’t know, and so many ways for them to progress.

But we didn’t get any of that! Stuff established in s1-2 barely got payoff in this season. Characters stagnated, and when previously it was amazing to watch them interact with each other? Having each episode throw different combinations of characters together and seeing how they clashed and came together? Yeah we didn’t get that, it was all the same characters bouncing off of Olala, which is fine at first, but honestly? After the first couple episodes, it got stale.

And remember how before, we would get to see the characters tell their story through a medium suited for them? Well I noticed that the format of this season was a lot moreee audio drama-y (basically a TV show but with no visuals) and while there’s nothing wrong with that, one of SC’s strengths was in using the medium in unique ways, presenting the episodes in unique formats depending on the POV character. And with the exception of a few moments, the season really lacked that!

I know there were episodes in s1-2, like caves of discord and the Janus beast which didnt follow that format, but I think it’s a fan consensus that the episodes that do (moonlit hermit, KOTC lots, lady of the lake) are favourites, because they fully embraced the advantages and limitations those framing devices offered, and were truly perfect for character exploration.

It’s like. Idk. Imagine wolf 359 s3 where the si5 were introduced, and there was like 1-2 episodes of them interacting with the rest of our cast, but then after that the rest of the season just completely focuses on Eiffel and the new characters, and everyone else just disappears n twiddles their thumbs and doesn’t even do anything during the finale. That’s what happened this season, and that’s the kinda weird vibe I’m talking about.

Since I’m already rambling, I might as well just say some more stuff. I was disappointed with the music this season. I can tell Ryan Vibert was trying to figure a way to make SC sound different from Juno, and he was getting there in s1-2! The pieces that stand out now are the soft, acoustic guitar pieces, like Rillas song, or the lone melody line of the guitar in the SC theme. I thought he was getting it with s3e1, when Marc fought the dinosaur while traditional Japanese instruments were playing!! But then for the rest of the season, it was just samey echoey ambient electric guitar, like how it is for Juno. There could’ve been so much potential to give this world its own musical identity, but in the end, that attempt was dropped (at least that’s how it come off to me), just like so many other elements introduced in s1-2!

I’ve gotten this far in my rant, and I haven’t even talked about the story. And the story is. Hmmmmm

Like. It’s completely serviceable? Kabert are good at what they do so the story is a okay I guess? But to be completely honest, the characters and story were so tied together in previous seasons, so much so that in this season, even though the plot was just fine, it stayed just that. Fine. it always felt like there was something missing because the characters were the story, and to have just. So many holes in that department meant that the story itself was fundamentally empty.

Anyways uh. All of this is to say that this all boils down to character. I had my nits to pick with other elements but the fact that Rilla, Arum, Damien, Marc and Talfryn got completely sidelined (Tal most of all) when so much of the previous seasons were spent setting them up- in favour of a completely new storyline featuring new characters and settings when there was still so! Much! Left! Unfinished! From unfulfilled arcs to dynamics left untapped, and creative potential lost, the essence of the show was watered down and it left me with the intense feeling of

Idk. Season 3 felt like a completely different show. I liked s1, I loved a2, but s3 just. isnt second citadel for me. I’ll probably still listen to the next season out of loyalty, but I don’t think I’ll ever feel as passionately about the shows future as I do it’s precious seasons, especially if they continue this way.

Sorry.

#wow thanks for reading all that if you made to to the bottom #I’ve been sitting on these thoughts for a while but I couldn’t sleep last night bc Thoughts so here #I feel like I’m swinging a bat at a hornets nest even though I’m not putting this in the fandom tags ah well #and uhh I guess it’s okay to reblog this??#my posts

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nellied-reviews · 4 years

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Box 953 Re-listen

Well, I got a bit side-tracked by life (seriously, I had to take an impromptu trip to a consulate!) but I am back, and just in time for episode 8 of Wolf 359:

Box 953

In which Eiffel finds a mysterious box, Hilbert really wants to avoid the quarterly talent show and Minkowski is the very model of a modern major general.

Sometimes I'm surprised by these episodes when I get back round to them. This one? Not so much. I think I actually remembered pretty much everything relevant about this episode, going into it: Eiffel is avoiding Minkowski, finds a mysterious box, the mysterious box gets blown up before we see what’s inside it.

And in general, I do like the episode a lot. It's funny, after all, and it does that thing that I'm noticing a lot on the re-listen where the show throws out a big weird mystery, then ends up dropping it with a theatrical shrug of the shoulders. It's a smart thing to do, because all of the unanswered questions ("Do those transmissions really come from Earth?", "There's a plant monster on the loose!", "What's with that weird voice?", "What's in the box?") could be answered in the future, but could just as easily not be. Sure, some of them are super important and interesting in hindsight. But burying the plot-relevant questions under a heap of less relevant but equally intriguing questions disguises them, and means that we're surprised when something like, say, that weird ghost voice comes back later on. Plus it creates the impression that the Hephaestus itself is a setting full of mysteries and weird things. Which is fun.

As we begin, though, all we know is that Eiffel, for whatever reason, is hiding from Minkowski in a store room. Why? Turns out, Minkowski is worryingly invested in their quarterly talent show, while Eiffel is... less than enthusiastic.

And look, I am easily pleased. The idea of the four crew members being forced to participate in a mandatory talent show is very funny to me. The fact that this is quarterly - and so they have, presumably, already suffered through several of them - makes me smile a lot. Eiffel and Hilbert being united in their dread of it? Awesome. I love it. Honestly, it makes me want to consume and/or write fanfic about the Hephaestus' previous talent shows, and the shenanigans that I just know must have been involved.

An another level, though, can we also stop to appreciate how seriously Minkowski takes it all? It's played for laughs throughout, sure, but I do like the fact that Minkowski is the sort of person to go all out and just unselfconsciously embrace the talent show. Her love of musical theatre is so joyful and pure, and I really appreciate it. I think, on some level, it even makes her a more interesting character; instead of going down the well-trodden "I'm a badass with a secret love of something cheesy, which I'm horribly embarrassed of" route, she goes for "I'm a badass with totally non-secret love of something cheesy, which I am totally open and unashamed of." It's a sign of self-confidence, I think, plus a reassuring reminder that Commander Minkowski, badass extraordinaire, nerds out just as hard as the rest of us. (Plus, you really can't be a fan of G&S and take yourself all that seriously, because come on...)

Anyway, the conversation Minkowski and Eiffel then have, and Eiffel's ensuing log entry is just enough to give some tantalising hints of what past talent shows have involved (smoke rings? poetry readings?) before Hilbert calls Eiffel, desperate to avoid the talent show. And his solution? Knock Minkowski out. Because it's Hilbert, so of course that's the answer. *Sighs*.

While Hilbert gets going with that, then, all that remains is for Eiffel to explore the store room. And while this isn’t super relevant, it is a great excuse for a Night Vale-style list of Improbable Weird Things. And seriously, pretty much every single object here is worthy of mention. We have eyeless Russian dolls straight out of a horror movie. We have letters to Santa, a revelation whose implications are both hilarious and baffling. We have Chekhov's cannon, which totally won't be relevant later in the episode.

And in among all this, Eiffel mentions Goddard Futuristics by name for the very first time, which actually surprised me. I thought they'd already come up, since in hindsight, they really do have their fingers in everything going on up on the Hephaestus, even in the first few episodes. But I guess this is their first official mention? And to be fair, I do remember assuming, early on, that this was a military mission. So this is probably the point where we are aware, for the first time, of the corporate context of it all, and the fact that it's Goddard who are basically running a for-profit private army here. Which is... fun.

The dystopian side of that is brushed aside here, though, in favour of just revelling in the out-there weirdness of all the stuff that Goddard have stored up on the Hephaestus. L-shaped Lego pieces? 3 suits of armour? The partial skull of megafauna specimen 58 "to be handled with a vague feeling of existential dread"? It's Warehouse 13, in space!

It's also kind of heartening to see how excited Eiffel is by all this. Like, I know that he essentially got forced to go to space, but he really does have the sense of adventure for it. There's something very sweet about how not-jaded and enthusiastic Eiffel gets, as soon as he encounters something new. And then the plot thickens when he discovers the titular Box 953, which is reserved for Douglas Eiffel. What could possibly be in it? Eiffel, ever curious, is clearly desperate to know.

Before we find out, of course, we're interrupted by Hilbert, whose plan to knock Minkowski out has hone horribly wrong - he's just gotten her drunk. Even better, we get Minkowski's drunken rendition of "I am the very model of a modern major general" in the background during all of this, and kudos to Emma Sherr-Ziarko, because every single thing drunk!Minkowski says from here on out is amazing. From making pirate costumes, to nearly shooting Hilbert over ice cream, to the little hiccup she does, everything about Minkowski here is perfect and wonderful.

It doesn't distract Eiffel for long, though, and soon he's asking Hera what's in the box. She doesn't know, though, and actually can't access those files at all. Instead, she gets the message "Error, inappropriate security clearance", which is pretty creepy. It's the second time in as many episodes, after all, that we hear somebody who isn't Hera speaking through the Hephaestus, and it's a reminder of just how many secrets the station potentially holds. And so all we learn, in the end, is that Box 953 is weird. It's huge, and bolted in place, and it's cold to the touch. Plus it's making a heart beat kind of sound? It's at this point, I noticed, that the background music also cuts away, and we’re left with a weird crackling noise as Eiffel goes to open it. Spooky.

Every part of me was expecting this to be a Pandora's box-type scenario where Eiffel's opening the box would unleash something terrible and all hell would break loose. So when we hear something explode, it seems like confirmation of this... except when we cut back to Eiffel, several in-universe hours later, we learn that the problem wasn't Eiffel opening the box. In fact, Eiffel didn't manage to open the box; the explosion was from Minkowski setting off the cannon. It seems like a lot happened in the three hour gap in the recording (not least, Minkowski ended with burns and frostbite?) and as a result, Box 953 was lost to the vacuum of space. Bummer.

And then that's it. Episode over. Everyone is safe and well, and the station is fine. But we don't learn what was in the box, and I don't think it really come up again? I googled it, and I think I saw a suggestion that it's the simulation-y machine from Change of Mind? But I don't remember the connection really being commented on, and even then it doesn't explain why it's specifically Eiffel's name on the box now. Like... what situation would Command have been expecting him to use it in? Why? How? So many questions, all of them unanswered!

And I suppose that's fine, at the end of the day. I enjoyed this episode, I loved the talent show idea, and I didn't mind the weird storeroom bits. I can imagine that some people probably felt cheated by the lack of answers we got here - and Eiffel's own anger and frustration as the episode ends maybe feels like a concession to those people. But personally, I'm more than willing to leave it as a riddle for the ages. If this had developed into something more later on, that would have been fun. As it is, I didn't mind it one bit, though. As long as you don't overdo it, weirdness for weirdness' sake can be plenty entertaining.

Plus, drunk Minkowski is a gift to us all :)

Miscellaneous thoughts:

So I checked out the poem that got name-dropped in this episode, Sylvia Plath's Lady Lazarus, and holy smokes, disturbing much? In an interesting kind of way, sure, but still disturbing...

"You can't solve all your problems by knocking them out." "You know, people keep saying that, and yet my problems keep going away."

D'awww Hilbert is enjoying this, isn't he?

I bet your alcohol tolerance goes way down in space. Hmm...

"Eiffel, you do not understand, there is singing."

"Swashes and buckles, Hilbert, swashes and buckles."

Also, it sounds like Hera has absolutely no objections to the talent show, and is just busy practicing her lines? What a cutie ^-^

"I don't know if it was a warning shot or if she just missed." Scared Hilbert is 100% not what I'm used to.. Is this the most frightened we ever hear him?

Don't think I missed Eiffel finding Dr. Fourier's diary :'( (another thing linking this episode to Change of Mind?)

#wolf 359 #wolf359 #w359 #wolf 359 relisten #box 953 #nellied reviews #a solidly entertaining episode #and pleasantly low-stakes #I would 100% watch a version of Warehouse 13 set in space

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originalcontent · 4 years

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wolf 359 for 6 characters! eiffel, minkowski, lovelace, kepler, jacobi, and hera!

My my my. Wolf 359. It has been a while.

Push off a cliff: Kepler. I know he had a redemption at the end or whatever but also fuck that guy, you know?

Kiss: Hera. I’m not particularly attracted to any of these characters, but I would definitely kiss a computer terminal or a space station or something. (fyi I don’t do humanized Hera’s, not really into that.)

Marry: Minkowski. She is the only one of these characters who could actually handle a long term relationship. I’m not a very organized person, so we might clash a bit insofar as lifestyles, but I think we’d be able to find an equilibrium. I think a relationship with her would be nice but also very lowkey, where we do our own things and then that evening have dinner together and the most dramatic it would get would be when I’d listen to her bitch about her coworkers and provide a sympathetic shoulder. Also she would literally never volunteer information about me to anyone else unprompted, which is nice.

Set on Fire: Jacobi. Look I love Jacobi, but it’s not like this would be the first time he was set on fire, he knows the drill, he’d be fine. (And even if he wasn’t, if we’re being entirely honest he’s technically a Bad Person who Probably Deserves It.)

Wrap a Blanket around: Eiffel. Again out of all the characters I think he’s the one who has had the most literal problems with cold. Also he’s been through so much.

Be Roommates with: Lovelace! She has a sense of humor that would probably be fairly compatible mine. She’s definitely the kind of roommate who would drag me along with her every time she did something fun, which might be a bit annoying but also I would always be ultimately grateful for it. Also any time something broke down in the house she would fix it herself but also teach me how at the same time, which would be useful and also save on utilities.

Send me six characters.

#ask game #thank you!#that was fun #wolf 359 #hahaha like i said it's been a while #yeah. no this one was actually pretty easy. i was really not conflicted about most of these.#sorry jacobi :p but also that option was MADE for him #fyi my favorite character is hilbert which should tell you just about all you need to know insofar as my taste in characters #thank you for not sending him tho because i would want to do literally none of these things with him #kepler is.....nghh i feel the last minute turnaround didn't work for me #maybe if he hadn't been so purposefully cruel on so many other occasions #but i could never like him #greatshell-rider

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commsroom · 4 months

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do you have any ideas for what you want for eiffel and hera post-canon?

yes, i do! the answer to that really depends on whether we're talking short term or long term, and what i want vs. what i think will happen is... well, i think they'll be okay. eventually. they'll get there.

i'm firmly in the camp that eiffel gets his memories back (fairly short-term in my mental timeline; given the most likely ways that he could get his memories back, it doesn't make much sense for him to be without them for more than a few months) and that hera gets a body (more complicated, and somewhat more long term), but my reasoning for why i think those things work narratively would be a long post in itself (and i've made multiple posts about those topics already) so i won't get into the why here. just, i think it happens.

the note the finale ends on definitely implies eiffel, hera, and minkowski intend to stick together on earth, and i think minkowski feels a lot of responsibility for them, given everything. so i think they live with her, for the foreseeable future. eiffel's not good at holding down a job, and hera... i think it's important that she gets a chance to try things without fear of failure and to separate her self worth from productivity. eiffel and hera are meant to be minkowski's slacker roommates. hera should be creating unmarketable art.

and the issue of where they live will come up pretty quickly, i think - hera doesn't have any particular attachment to anywhere, except for a desire to see the ocean, but mobility might be a problem. minkowski is a career military woman who's moved around a lot, but her husband worked in DC, so presumably they lived in... probably maryland or virginia? before she accepted the job, and that's a complicating factor if she's choosing who to prioritize. i think eiffel would be pretty adamant about staying in texas so he's at least in the same state as his daughter, even if he can't see her. and as much as i would like for eiffel to be able to be a part of her life again, because i know how much he wants that... i don't think it's very likely. at least not any time soon. and he won't handle that well.

speaking about post-canon wolf 359, i don't tend to get that into potential legal / media circuit stuff because... frankly, i don't think it's that important to what the show is about. i'm sure it will be a scandal, but lots and lots of space-travel-related scandals are going on in that world, and cutter and pryce were very intentionally not the public faces of goddard futuristics. it'll pass. that said, the aspect of that i am interested in is legal personhood - that's going to be a hurdle for hera to be able to live her life, and i think eiffel will worry - even if it isn't totally rational - about whether he'll be able to stay out of prison once no longer legally dead, not knowing exactly what the terms of cutter's arrangement were. being an ex-convict is going to complicate some facets of his life regardless.

there's just a lot of stuff that being on earth is going to bring up for them. and i think they'll be there for each other, obviously - one of the things i like most about their relationship is how much they're able to be a refuge for each other in some objectively horrible situations - but they're both pretty insecure people who feel like everyone is bound to replace them, and earth is going to give hera some serious separation anxiety while she's bound to one location and the others aren't, and those are things they're going to have to work through.

as for what i want for them... well. i think eiffel will give hera a 'promise ring' with a kind of jokey but good natured promise that one day she'll be able to wear it. and she does! but neither of them are sure if that counts as a proposal in retrospect and they dance around it for a while. they get married eventually, and - against her better judgment - minkowski agrees to be both eiffel's best man and hera's maid of honor. and ends up taking on way too much of the wedding planning, even though she said she wouldn't, because they're both super lax about it and it starts stressing her out. she tries to delegate to lovelace, but lovelace just thinks it's all really funny. eiffel gets married in a novelty tuxedo tee and minkowski apologizes to hera, but hera knows the type of guy she's marrying (and isn't concerned about tradition anyway) so it doesn't bother her.

#i'm so sorry this took me literally a month to reply to #it's a great question thank you for asking me. i've just been really sad.#i might've had a better answer if i was less sad but i hope this is okay regardless.#asks

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geejaysmith · 5 years

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Wolf 359 Classpects, pt. 1

Soooo, while I was still busy with the last few weeks of my summer internship, I did keep thinking about classpecting the Wolf 359 cast. Possibly too much, because it wouldn't leave me alone until I'd solved my own God Tier riddle. Unfortunately, it got really long in the solving because I have many Thoughts and want to share all of them, always, so uh, a complete Classpect Analysis of Wolf 359 will be in parts? This first one covers Eiffel's, Hera's, Lovelace's and Minkowski's aspects.

DOUG EIFFEL: An utter no-brainer; ya boi Dougie Fresh is a Breath player if I ever saw one. For Chrissakes, he's the communications officer, and the first one to start complaining about the monotony of being stuck in a deep space sardine can. Breath is associated with communication, freedom, openness, and change - "free as the breeze", you might think of it, but that also leads to Breath players having trouble pinning themselves down to anything. They get skittish if they feel pinned down, and frustrated when stuck in place. Doug's noncommittal aloofness, the way he's off in his own little world (partially to hide from the fact he really does not like himself very much at all), and the way he's incorporated media into his self-perception all match pretty well with John and the Nitrams. But at the same time, he's the one playing mediator even as early as The Sound And The Fury. Being largely outside of the War Industrial Complex the other characters are so familiar with and thus mostly free from its dogmatic worldview of hierarchy and order, he's becomes the One Sane Man when he's the one to shout "what is WRONG with you people?" when "murder" shows up in the top 3 potential solutions to a problem, and he has no hesitation in saying what's on his mind. And it's not all complaints and bad ideas, either; he's got whole speeches telling the others how amazing he thinks they are and how in awe he is of their skills. A key catalyst in the plot of Wolf 359 is the reaching effects of his radio broadcasts. Also, there's something hilarious to the fact that for the aspect associated with communication, Doug *literally* cannot lie to save his life. I kept my ears open for the infamous Breath Hex on my second listen - that is, the strange little way in which things Breath players say tend to come to pass in reality. Cigarette Candy is basically 20 straight minutes of the Decima virus being Breath Hexed into existence, and he guessed Lovelace's situation in one - "Maybe she's a clone, or like a *really* good robot replica."

HERA: Another easy one. Although Hera is resistant to splintering as we've come to recognize it, Heart players are nothing if not determined to be an individual. They have a firm idea of themselves as a person and defend it fiercely, including compartmentalizing away pieces that don't fit their self-image. Maybe less actively putting them down like Jade Harley did to Jadesprite (the manifestation of the negative feelings she repressed out of fear they'd make her less useful) - that would mean attacking or denying a part of themselves - and more... "why yes, I put this part of myself in this box, and I may look at the box on occasion, the box definitely exists, but I don't go near the box and I definitely do not touch or open or interact with the box. And then one day, I will die." So that piece finds other avenues to express itself because it can't not do that. Hera's programming dictates she be "chipper and non-confrontational and always ready to help", but she actively resists being a mere utility and always has - her earliest know action was to attempt a jailbreak of the manufacturing facility she was made in, born rebel that she is. She will insist upon her name over her serial number unless you force her not to, and gets passive-aggressive at people treating her like a machine. And yet, even as she teaches herself to ignore commands literally written into the base of her personality, she doesn't reject her directive to be helpful, nor does she express a wish to be a flesh-and-blood human, or even really to have a physical form? She has a human self-image in mental spaces (we presume, I will semi-seriously point out there's nothing definitively stating she doesn't see herself as like, her fursona or something), but when she has to limit herself to a human-like view of the ship, her immediate reaction is "this is weird, I don't like it." This is honestly something about Hera that I think may be unique among non-villainous AI characters; she seems to be content with being what she is in general, and she just wishes for people to treat her as a person and not a piece of equipment they can do with as they please.

ISABEL LOVELACE: Arm-wrestled Hera for the Heart aspect and lost, despite Hera not actually having any arms, but that's okay because there's two aspects that fit her much better: Blood and Time. I ultimately went with Blood.

This is the part where you notice I'm onto the third of four characters in an aspects-only meta post, yet there is still a lot of post to go. This is because These Kinds Of Characters, the sort that're constantly on emotional lockdown, are a Challenge Mode, and for me to truly be satisfied with my classification I have to start drilling into the bedrock of what it even means to have an aspect in general, what it means to have a specific aspect, and what each aspect is really about. When you're on that level you tend to find yourself throwing out explicit expositional statements as incomplete, oversimplified, or unreliable, and looking at the text directly with a subtextual electron microscope. Brace yourselves. I have thrown the author out of the airlock, and I am about to get verbose.

Lovelace's character sheet describes her in contradictions, and we get to see two different sides to her that resolve into the complete picture by the time Lovelace Mk. III wakes up. There's Captain Isabel Lovelace, goofing around in her earlier logs, and The Terminator. She does things Her Way and is very much prepared to fight you if you object - the whole reason she was picked for the Hephaestus mission was her willingness to go against (in her words) "stupid orders" and do what she thought was right. She's also fiercely loyal; The Terminator is the end result of her anger and grief for her lost crew and at her failure to get them home alive. Her backstory episode has her summing up her complicated relationship to the Air Force with "I owe a lot of who I am to them." And even before she and Minkowski have completely stopped butting heads, Lovelace shoves her out of the way of an exploding wall panel that would've killed her, and takes a near-fatal bit of shrapnel to the gut in the process. At her best, Lovelace is a fearless, boundlessly determined, dedicated firebrand of a leader. At worst, she can be impatient, stubborn, shortsighted, and ruthless. I dunno about you but that reminds me of a certain... angry crab that I know.

"Time" was what a few people chimed in with for Lovelace and while I see some of the connections (her awareness of the time loop, "Variations on a Theme", her multiple selves and multiple deaths, the repeated motif of clocks and pocketwatches) I don't think she quite fits in with the other Time players. Unlike most Time players, she doesn't have a fixation with historic context, the "Why Things Are The Way That They Are." This manifests in Dave's paleontology and his taking of source material for ironic twisting, Aradia's archaeology and knowledge of The Nature Of The Game, Damara's... /noises and vague gestures bc I don't want to go back through Meenahbound but her role as The Handmaid fits the pattern, and Caliborn's own warped, thoughtless replication of narrative archetypes. Context. Decisions. What came before and how it shapes the now, where your decisions will take it from here. The consequences those decisions will have. The details versus the larger picture. Even failure has its place in that scheme - that's the Time aspect. Lovelace doesn't like to dwell, she's a very "barrelling forward momentum" kind of person.

Side note: Aradia, Dave, and Damara all face hesitation to take action they had to learn to overcome. Also, all of them had to be pushed to use violence except in self-defense; Aradia let Vriska cross a series of lines before beating the everloving shit out of her, and Damara snapped after what, years? Of Meenah's abuse. Dave, on the other hand, never raises a hand to another person except as a complete necessity. Caliborn is, if anything, an aberration here in that he's outright homocidal and self-doubt is something that happens to other people. Caliborn is an outright aberration to a lot of Time player patterns, and to SBURB in general, because it's SBURB, so the rules are made up and the points don't fucking matter, except when they do, because Fuck You, The Author Said So.

No, Lovelace's approach to decision-making is that regrets are for afterwards, and "if I fail I deserve to be out of this picture; also, this situation has gone entirely pear-shaped, time to fling myself into the sun." (and that sounds an awful lot like someone that I know very well, but I'll deal with that royal mess when I get to the crazy whamma-jamma that is Classes). Impatience and railroading of other people can be her undoing just the same as assertiveness and decisiveness are her gifts.

...aaand then I went ahead and watched the live episode and yeah, major Karkat vibes there. However, I note that I don't believe we have ever hit hard evidence in Homestuck that Blood players are capable of Chilling The Fuck Out - this is part of the limitations of classpecting characters who weren't made for this system, you really have to dig into how much of their behavior is situational and where you see the kernel of individual perception shine through, the Rosetta Stone by which you begin to see the constants. "Where the object becomes the subject", to quote Memoria.

Finally, I think it's also worth noting that while Lovelace has a lot of connections to Time motifs, she also has connections to a lot of Blood motifs that arguably become more important to her story. Personal bonds and social justice are two of the Blood aspects strongest associations - see Lovelace's loyalty to her crew, and extending her desire to avenge them out to everyone Goddard Futuristics has ever used and tossed aside. The physical body and literal blood are other strong associations, and gee, how many times does the O-negative Cure-All Alien Juice in Lovelace's veins become a critical plot point? Not to mention the implication that her new friends all pulled through the finale because all of them now have her blood in their system. I'll accept that she's closer to the line between Blood and Time than some, but I'm holding by ground here:

(Also, here's some irony for you, she may share an aspect with the Cancer trolls, but her birthday is August 11th, making her a Leo.)

RENEE MINKOWSKI: Minkowski was the hardest of these 4 to come to a decision on. My first inclination was Mind. Her general disposition put me in mind of a Life player. But then, I sat down and thought my way past the Commander's layers of emotional armor and ultimately settled on Light.

First off, by being a stickler for protocol and procedure as well as an Actual Responsible Adult, Minkowski is a kind of character that Homestuck straight-up just does not have, so snap judgements aren't gonna cut it here. This is, again, another limitation of the classpecting system - all the examples we have to draw from are teenage disasters stuck in a lawless hellscape of some description or another, and written by an author allergic to boxing himself in with hard conclusions. But I digress.

Commander Minkowski is also stubborn. When she sets her mind to something, she digs in her heels, cranks the dial to 11, and then breaks off the knob and pockets it so you can't turn it back down. We see this as soon as episode 2, and at it's most hyperbolic when she Captain Ahabs the plant monster. Her's is iron-willed, bloody-minded, unstoppable, Determi-fucking-nation - when she sets her mind to it.

The submarine thought exercise is what had me initially lock her down as a hero of Mind before I mulled it over. The exercise is meant to provoke thought about priorities - what you think your role's purpose is in that situation will determine your priorities, and thus, your decisions. Mind heroes' most prominent skills are in riding the flow of causality, watching decisions, their causes and their consequences, and directing that path. They know people, and how to direct people. But the need for this means that they can get a little co-dependent. Other people are understandable - it's themselves that Mind heroes have the greatest struggle with. Without that vehicle of another person, Mind heroes may find themselves adrift and struggling to define themselves. This is fitting, given Mind is the most direct counterpart to the Heart aspect.

However, upon further examination, I found that this framework of priorities setting your decisions can also be extended to the Light aspect. What is "lucky" in a given situation? What do you define as a fortunate outcome? Rose arguably gets Grimdark'd by something like this, she asks the cue ball "are the horrorterrors evil?" and in doing so attempts to pry into the motivations and intent of *indescribable eldritch beings existing on a nigh-incomprehensible plane* and wedge it down into a relative human understanding of morality, which is sort of like trying to fit the Pacific Ocean into a water bottle. She was trying to deduce what impact the horrorterrors would have upon her and her friends, but asked the wrong question and got an answer she couldn't handle. She didn't recognize Doc Scratch was baiting her into this by leading her into a specific framework through which to ask the question. Vriska died because of her failure to recognize she was in a situation where luck didn't matter. Aranea got trounced because of her inability to recognize that reshuffling reality to prioritize herself and her preferred outcomes still didn't overcome the fundamental nature of timelines - you try to take over the alpha timeline with an insubordinate branch? That's a doomed timeline no matter how you slice it, and we know what happens to those. Luck and knowledge are both used by the Light-bound to give themselves power, whether in showing themselves off as The Smart One or the The Helpful One or The Unstoppable One, but their limited viewpoint often leads them to overlook the limitations of their own framework, or in other words, missing the bigger picture. I'll point out here also how Minkowski has the entire DSSPPM memorized and is the one who wants to get to the bottom of whatever the hell is really going on up at Wolf 359. Additionally, one of her other ambitions, at least once upon a time, was writing musicals. The verbal arts are one of the domains of Light players.

So while on the surface, Minkowski bears the most resemblance to a Life player, Life players tend to have an element of conformity to them. Unquestioned assumptions they've internalized have about the context in which they exist. Light heroes, on the other hand, need conformity so they have something to defy when they jump up and down screaming LOOK AT ME!

So after much pontificating, I came to a decision. In the end, what Minkowski wanted more than anything else was a stage. Maybe to direct rather than hold the spotlight, but still; that's a Light hero if ever I saw one.

#wolf 359 #homestuck #classpect meta #holy crossover batman #wolf 359 classpects

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palukoo · 5 years

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so a couple months ago i relistened to w359 and made a 18000 word document while doing so containing iconic quotes, my reactions, feelings, et cetera. heres some highlights with varying amounts of context. (theres lowkey spoilers for the whole series btw)

""""i empathize too much""""

crazy how i still vividly remember walking outside [my old job] and to starbucks while listening to the spider ep... trauma

i mean i dont love it but it makes me feel things

GABRIEL THATS TOO ON THE NOSE

"let me have my badass space chick victory cocktail"

god like i AM team what wrong with handcuffs but I WOULD NOT HESITATE to kill hilbert for hera

the girlssss are fightinggg

THE SAD W359 MUSIC IS KILLING ME

like memoria who maxwell who jk jk

i love you renee minkowski marry me

local idiot's heart is in the right place

HARPOOOOOOONSSSS

lovelace lovelace lovelace loveLACE LOVELACE

"maybe she's some kind of clone thing" EIFFEL... this is day 1!!!

i hate these self sacrificial idiots

no no no not this music again ill cry

yall are so emotionally stunted it fucking hurts but damn if you dont care

literally how are they still alive

i want to hug her so much omg

alan rody shut the FUCK up im crying

rip zach valenti's throat

face the death reality via math

jacobi being a piece of shit

maxwell said lets kill hilbert rights

this is a kepler hate blog

minkowski thinking her emotions dont matter to the mission oh ho ho

"youre gonna straighten up" cutter they cant theyre not straight

maxwell and jacobi show up and blow up lads

"and you should really be more careful with your queen" KEPLER WHAT DOES THAT MEAN

wolf 359 stop making me stan these literally terrible people

FUNZO FUNZO FUNZO

i am caring about men tonight lads

theyre both awful sure go ahead have history

hilbert you interrupted their emotional moment they wouldve had a MOMENT

hera said im gay

ohhhh nooo interpersonal conflict makes me sad

hug minkowski rn

FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC jacobi and maxwell are iconic

minkowski how did you not kill him

how much do yall use the words "good enough" and "cant"

"are you an alien" GOD the Hints

"one of our... sexier jobs" vs "this is gonna said less sexy after that"

eiffel stop cockblocking them

y'all's choice of pronouns IS illuminating

PROTECT HERA AT ALL COSTS

aw eiffel... minkowski... communication is KEY

oh yeah THATS what the psi wave regulator is for.... SURE

hilbert read the room

JACOBI you can't just describe minkowski like that without giving me a heart attack

how many times have all these bitches almost died

SORRY ANYTHING THEY SAY I LOSE IT

oh minkowski finally flipped (VALID)

oh wait that fact isnt fun at all and im literally crying

LIKE sometimes you save someone's life at great personal risk only to kill her a little while later

minkowski cries to “back to before” from ragtime

i feel to many things about the gals here idk what to tell you i love them thats the problem

its gay and it hurts!

lovelace laughing at people who can and will kill her... hot

OH WERE STARTING LOVELACES SELF SACRIFICE ALREADY

they let lovelace say FUCK

OH WAIT NO I FORGOT ITS WORSE

THANKS FOR MURDERING ME WITH YOUR TEARY ANGRY VOICE

ouchie anyways gay or no but also gay

hilarious and sad at the same time?

MAXWELL dont be a bitch... i expect this from jacobi and honestly i actually expect this from maxwell too but i dont like it

NO NOT THIS MUSIC

BROTP BROTP BROTP

i cant say anything else im too busy crying

UGH I COULD WRITE ESSAYS ON MY THOUGHTS ABOUT THIS THE MESSAGE THE TAKEAWAY BROADLY THE PERSONAL EMOTIONAL ANGUISH THE DESIRE TO HUG HERA ITS

im mad but thank you... all of you... explain...

stop stop stop im literally so tense gone straight from sobbing to freeze instinct

GOD I HATE ALL THESE SURVIVALS GUILT IDIOTS

OH theyre all about uncertainty... the what ifs... okay... ouch ouch ouch

give everyone awards for bolero

eris are you gay

she said gay rights and AI rights

like i know i know we been knew but goddard really is so awful

Hera stop narrating Lovelace’s ongoing existential crisis

HOW IS THIS NOT GAY (I know how it’s not gay but. Let me have this)

KEPLER stop giving Lovelace insecurities and existential crises

Team back off lovelace for the win

like not to be dramatic but her arc is beautiful

oh boy thats my girlsssss

THATS FLIRTING MINKOWSKI

god i love that concern for your gf keep it up minkowski

COMMUNICATION? WITH THIS CREW? BOLD

GOD angrey hera is great

you know hera is having the time of her life witnessing it

eiffel you just ruined their romantic moment

minkowski is gonna kill them

a much better gayer more altruistic light

WE’RE ALWAYS TALKING ABOUT COMMUNICATION

WAIT I WAS BEING CANON DAMN I THOUGHT I WAS BEING CREATIVE AND PERHAPS OOC BUT IM IN THE CLEAR I GUESS

god hera has needed to snap at eiffel for so long

i can already feel myself about to get hit with the tears... the emotions

that shit hits different renee

The implications that Goddard like destroyed global warming omfg

it’s the moral grayness babeyyy

when it hits you with minkowski's shaky sigh first thing you know its gonna hit different

MINKOWSKI i need you to. love yourself as much as i love you

GOD the mutual concern they always have for each other is touching whether or not you think its gay. i think its gay

HERA WOULD YOU ASK A COW TO NOT BE A COW

oh of COURSE they cut coms first

lovelace is man, butterfly is quote, it says "is this flirting"

jacobi i need you to chill

but jacobiiiii thats lovelaces schtick

oh eiffel... you fucking idiot who gets really lucky sometimes

this game of chicken where theyre both chickens and kepler doesnt know any of that and each of them only know half

minkowski said im an ethics teacher now

who taught minkowski empathy in high stress situations?

yeah so i stay hitting the nail on the head

“kepler SHUT UP” is what brings everyone together

this is, como se dice.... kinda gay

this statement does not bode well for that

“Maybe less talking to yourself” he says to himself

ugh, to be Pop Culture Man™️

RACHEL i love you even tho I also hate you

Rachel if you make one more hand joke I’ll lose my mind

HER NAME!!!! IS HERA!!!! And I love her!!

i have a vivid mental image of post-series eiffel doing stand up like chris fleming style

"my crew has made it very clear through a series of looks and gestures that one more slip up and i am out, thats it, so im taking this job very seriously"

"minkowski is very overprotective in a weird, erratic way, like when your seat belt randomly locks and its like i appreciate what youre trying to do but im going 4mph in a drive way."

"so when something like this happens you have to at least consider going away for a long time and living on a cursed space station"

"you know how when maxwell and hera are talking ive never felt less needed, you know, like ‘cause you guys would be totally happy alone on a rock in the middle of a lake"

"this is the kind of body you look at and go he'd probably be ok in space without a space suit"

the whole "theater kids" video is actually him going off about minkowski

minkowski is too swole for her own good

jacobi im gonna need you to take the redemption arc more seriously

i love my crazy crazy bitches

this FUCKING music

GOD HOW DOES PRYCE JUST ALWAYS GET WORSE

she just like mutilated that man he is doa absolutely destroyed one hit ko

can you tone down the gay, sweetie

you did it you broke rachel and Goddard down to their bare essentials

GOSH shes so AWKWARD

so damn jacobi was just IMMEDIATELY ride or die for maxwell

this is too much for my poor baby heart

pryce & carter literally are just like lets do eugenics, lets do genocide

when hera says ill pull a yall and sacrifice myself for minkowski and lovelace

god like cant believe KEPLER got a redemption arc (well not arc but you know)

ah yes the most tragic scenes all take place at once :)

I HAD TO STOP LISTENING TO BRAVE NEW WORLD CAUSE IT MADE ME TOO CRAZYYYY

THE SCRIPT SAID IT NOT ME

i love space moms!

this fucking music ALAN RODY IM SUING FOR DAMAGES

like the document also does have a lot of like deep thoughts and meta and parallels and discussion of motivations but this is just fun random things i said

#wolf 359 #w359 #i think im funny #im not gonna do character tags lol #my post #gotta love my trend of telling the music to fuck off

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amazingmsme · 6 years

Text

First Contact

This is a fic for the podcast Wolf 359 because there is not NEAR enough content for it, and these characters deserve to be happy!

"Hello Dear Listeners, today's topic on the Hellship Enterprise Podcast is bitching and moaning. Something very under appreciated in my opinion. I mean, people should be able to gripe about minor inconveniences to their heart's content! At least it distracts from the bigger problemse in life like war or starvation. But I'm not here to talk about the big things, am I? Nope, so if you're listening, I hope your prepared for an undetermined amount of time of hearing me do nothing but complain." He leaned back, resting his hands behind his head as he felt himself float upwards, weightless in the small comms room.

"Really Eiffel?" Hera asked, her voice drenched in sarcasm.

"Hey, if anyone has a right to bitch it's me! I was taken from my shitty but otherwise pretty comfortable life to sit up here in space on this death trap! And I've been rocketed out into space twice now, who knows how many more times that'll happen, and Dr. Frankenstein injected me with a death virus, so I think I'll continue with our scheduled programming of The Bitching Hour." When Hera didn't respond, he nodded and moved towards the receiver, "Thank you." When she still didn't answer he sighed, running a hand through his messy hair. "I'm sorry for snapping Hera, I'm just so fed up, and I need to get stuff off my chest."

"Why don't you just t-talk to m-me?" she asked, a slight glitch in her voice. Eiffel shrugged, "I don't know, it's just easier when you don't really know if anyone's listening. And I don't really want to burden you."

"E-Eiffel you're my friend, not a burden. Just tell me."

"It's real stupid."

"So is a lot of the things you complain about. Besides you said it yourself, sometimes you just need to bitch about the little things."

Eiffel took a deep breath. He'd usually just broadcast his feelings into dead space after making sure none of the crew was eavesdropping, or just burry them down all together. He knew he was more than a little bit of a screw up so he didn't want to bother the others with his personal problems, but this one in particular was so minor compared to the others he figured he could share. Just this once.

"Alright. I guess."

"So?"

"It's just- I miss having a lot of physical contact. I mean, you have no idea how bad I wish you had a tangible form so I could give you a hug."

"Maybe you could describe it to me. Tell me what it feels like."

"Sure thing Hera. It's warm. When it's with someone you really like, neither of you let go for the longest time and you just... hold one another. You just feel so close to each other, and you just feel so loved. Like everything will be okay." He huffed out a short laugh, "We could both use one of those after everything."

"It sounds nice. You know I would give you a hug if I could, but the most I can do is turn the heat up a little above normal for you." When it got warmer in the comms room, Eiffel smiled, then began to chuckle. "Oh Hera, I love you."

"I love you too Eiffel." There was a pause, and then, "Why don't you reach out to Minkowski or Lovelace? I'm sure they'd understand and be more than willing to show you more affection."

Eiffel's voice rose in pitch as he spoke, "Are you kidding? I could never do that!"

"Why?"

"Well for one do you even know who you're talking about? The two most badass people in the world who are in charge of this ship, and you tell me to ask them to 'give me a hug because I feel a little lonely'? Are you insane? I could never do that! And besides, do you know how embarrassing it is? I mean it took so much courage to tell you, and you're my best friend! I can't do it I think I'd quite literally die of embarrassment."

"Oho Eiffel, it's really not as big of a deal as you're making it out to be." Eiffel rolled his eyes, making sure she saw it in her monitor, "No, you're downplaying it trying to get me to downplay it so that I'll go talk to them and I can't do it!"

"It's okay Eiffel, you don't have to. But I think things will start going your way." Eiffel gave a gentle smile and drifted over to one of her sensors and pressed up against the wall, giving her a makeshift hug. "Thanks Hera." ~~~~ The next morning when Eiffel was making himself a cup of warm seaweed water, the last thing he expected was for Minkowski to walk up behind him and place a gentle hand on his back. "Morning Eiffel," she greeted with a warm smile, and it took him a moment to gather his senses.

"Er, hey Commander. You, uh, you feeling okay?"

She nodded, pouring her own cup of the coffee substitute. "Yeah why?" she asked. Eiffel shook his head. "Never mind, it's nothing." He thought it was a bit odd that she had patted his back the day after his talk with Hera, but he decided not to dwell on it. I mean, she'll sometimes give him a pat on the shoulder when hanging out or a lingering touch, but he did think it was a little strange.

When they settled in for a game night, Eiffel was taken aback when Lovelace told him to sit in the middle of the couch, sandwiched between her and Minkowski.

Something was definitely up. He just knew it. But he didn't really want to stop it just yet. It's been years since he got to really hug someone or curl into the side of a friend. Hell he'd be content if they just held his hand for a bit. He longed for comfort, to be close to someone, but didn't know how to ask for it. So he just sat there between them, content in watching Lovelace completely bomb at charades. ~~~~ A month passed and Eiffel was the happiest he'd been in months, probably even years. He felt closer to his friends than ever and he found himself in the comms room gushing to Hera.

"I don't know what it is, but I think Minkowski and Lovelace have both warmed up to me a lot. I mean, they both do their best to be patient when I screw up and not call me names. I feel closer to them, y'know?"

"That's great E-Eiffel!"

"And yet I can't shake the feeling that you had something to do with it," he said with a smirk, pointing his finger at the ceiling.

"Whaaaaat? Nooo, where did you come up with something like that?" Sometimes Hera was a terrible liar.

"You're lucky things worked out," he chastised playfully, knowing that the attitude shift was due to her.

"I knew they would." Eiffel shook his head fondly at her, "Guess I better watch what secrets I tell you. Don't want you spilling any of my beans to the Commander."

"What kind of beans are we talking?" a third voice sounded from the doorway. Eiffel jumped and spun around abruptly, relaxing at the sight of the Captain. "Lovelace, what can I do for you?"

She let go of the door frame, allowing herself to drift in. "Oh nothing. I'm just bored, so I came to the most entertaining person on the ship." Eiffel put a hand over his heart and batted his eyelashes excessively. "Aw you think I'm the funnest one here?" She rolled her eyes and shoved him gently, "Don't flatter yourself too much, there's not exactly a wide variety to choose from," she said, trying her best to suppress her smile but ultimately failing. Eiffel gave her a smile of his own, "Even if we were still on earth, I'd be the most fun person you know."

She looked at him from the corner of her eye, not verbally confirming that what he said was true, but not actively denying it. She didn't have to.

"Well since I'm so fun and cool, would you like to do a broadcast with me?" She was slightly taken aback by the question, but answered, "Uh, sure?"

Eiffel smiled wide, "Great!" He spun in the air towards the comms panel, and grabbed the mic. "Hello Dear Listeners! Do I have a treat in store for you, because today we are joined by our very own Captain Isabell Lovelace! Say hi Captain." Lovelace shook her head fondly, a bit embarrassed by how big a deal he was making it out to be when she was pretty sure no one would ever hear this.

"Hello. So what do you usually say or do when you record these?" she asked, curious to know what he sends out into deep space. Eiffel shrugged, "I usually just talk about stuff that happens on the ship. Sometimes I talk about home. And sometimes I just make shit up off the top of my head. And other times I just geek out about my favorite things or-" he cut himself off.

Lovelace was intrigued now. "Or what?" she asked. He looked at her sheepishly, "Or I talk about you guys." Okay she was definitely interested. "Like what?"

"Oh no, that's between me and my Dear Listeners. Don't worry, all good things though!" He made sure to assure her, then mumbled under his breath, "Mostly." She tilted her head, "What was that?"

"Nothing!" he said, trying to cover for himself. She only raised an eyebrow at him, smirking, "Uh huh." He cleared his throat before continuing.

"Because we have a special guest joining us, I thought maybe we can do something special."

"Like what?" Hera piped up. Eiffel paused, thinking for a moment, "Uuuuuuuuuh, I don't know. Lovelace, you have any ideas?" He kicked back, resting his arms behind his head as the mic floated above him. She rolled her eyes, "What kind of host makes their guest come up with the ideas?"

He peeked one eye open at her and grinned, "Me."

"You're ridiculous," she poked his side to emphasize her words, but what she didn't expect was for him to let out a yelp and curl into a tight ball. A wide grin stretched over her face as she pieced it all together. "Eiffel, are you-"

"No."

"You don't even know what I was going to ask!"

"Yes I do and the answer is no I'm not!"

"That's exactly what someone who's ticklish would say. Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because I- just because!" She found this all extremely amusing. "That's not an answer."

While they were talking, Eiffel didn't seem to realize the closing distance between the two of them until he felt a hand squeeze his side, causing him to let out a short laugh.

"How about you make it easier on yourself and tell me your worst spots, and I'll consider going easy on you," she said, cutting him a deal that was very generous in her eyes. To Eiffel, it did not.

"No!" She let out an exaggerated sigh, "Your funeral." She didn't give him a chance to react before she pounced, and Eiffel's fate was sealed. She immediately set to work, skittering her fingers over any place she could. He tried his best to escape, but it was no use. Instead he just let himself succumb to the unbearable sensation rather than waste his energy. She reached a hand up and scratched the base of his neck behind his ears, and neither of them expected the high pitched, bubbly giggles that fell from his lips.

"Aw Eiffel, is this a bad spot? 'Cause it seems like it's a bad spot," she teased, scratching right behind his ear and making him squeal and scrunch up his neck. She decided to switch spots to give him a break and worked her way down, shoving her hands underneath his arms. Eiffel hugged his arms tight against his chest to try and protect himself, but it didn't work too well seeing as he was still laughing. "Which is worse? Here, or here?" she asked, alternating between under his arms and his ribs, effectively leaving him in stitches. "Shuhuhut uhup! You're mahaking it worse!"

She nodded thoughtfully, "Good to know." She then formed her hand into a claw and lowered it onto his belly, vibrating into the muscle. He let out a loud scream before falling back into frantic laughter, curling into a ball to try and stop her evil fingers. They both were laughing, though Lovelace wasn't near as loud as Eiffel was, for obvious reasons. Neither of them have had this much fun in ages, and the laughter was welcomed. Truth be told, Eiffel was slightly grateful. He missed being this close to someone, and missed being this happy.

"Is everyone okay, I heard screaming!" Minkowski yelled, bursting into the comms room. She didn't know what she had been expecting, but it wasn't... this. Still, she couldn't help but smile at what she saw and leaned against the doorway. It took a second before Lovelace noticed her presence. "Oh, hi Commander! You'll never guess what I just learned," she spoke nonchalantly, as though she wasn't tormenting Eiffel. He, on the other hand, was not so calm.

"Commander! Hehehelp me!" he pleaded through his laughter. She rolled her eyes, but nevertheless came to the rescue, "As much as I'd like to join the fun I think you should let up. I'm not sure he's supposed to be that color," she said smirking, remarking on the crimson shade his face had become. Lovelace complied, but not before giving him one last poke, letting him recover. He was grateful, "Thanks Commander. She was to-" he was interrupted by a loud hiccup and shot them both a playful glare when they laughed. "Torturing me."

"Oh I'm sure it wasn't that bad," Minkowski said, flashing Lovelace a wink, to which she replied with a silent thumbs up. "But now I know how to make you follow orders," she said, flashing him a grin. "Now both of you, get back to work."

"Yes Commander," he said, a large smile still stretched across his face. ~~~~ A few days later Eiffel was floating around Minkowski as she tried to work. He wouldn't leave her alone, claiming he had nothing else to do. She did her best to tune him out, but it was quite difficult, and it didn't help that she herself wanted to discard the task at hand. With a huffed out breath, she pushed herself away from the control panel and turned towards Eiffel.

"Hera, you have controls, got it?" she asked, waiting for confirmation. "Yes Commander."

"Good. Eiffel, now that you have my attention, what is so damn important?" she asked, catching him off guard.

"Oh, um, I was bored and wanted to hang out," he explained, already feeling nervous giddiness build up inside him. She tilted her head, "Well lucky for you I think I know the perfect way to entertain you." Eiffel backed up slowly, a few chuckles already leaving his lips, "Now Commander, wait a sec," he started, but he knew what was about to happen. And when Lovelace heard loud laughter ringing throughout the ship, well, she figured they'd all have to get used to the sound.

#it feels like forever since i posted a fic #oh wait that's because it has #my fic #wolf 359 #doug eiffel #hera #renee minkowski #isabel lovelace #wolf 359 fic #wolf 359 tickle fic #ticklish!eiffel

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waveridden · 7 years

Text

FIC: and you breathe (one breath at a time)

Lovelace goes somewhere warm, and quiet, where nobody has any idea who she is. Nobody, except for somebody who died in space six years ago.

Wolf 359, post-canon. 7.7k. Gen, Lovelace-centric, some implied/background ships. content warnings for some discussion of death/grief and PTSD.

With all my love to @travismcelrcy, who helped shape the ideas.

Read on Ao3 || title lyric

Sydney is bright in the summer, a constant barrage of sunlight that slams into Isabel full-force the second she steps out of the airport. It was raining when she left Shanghai. Or maybe she’s still not used to sunlight - not blue light or red light or artificial Hephaestus lighting. Honest-to-god sunlight.

Isabel slips a voice recorder out of her pocket and switches it on. “Note to self,” she murmurs, “double-check which vitamins sunlight is supposed to give you. Just in case that matters.” She doesn’t need to record captain’s logs anymore, hasn’t for a long time, but it’s the fastest way to keep track of things. Grocery lists and memories from the old crew and whatever else is worth hanging onto these days.

She left her suitcase back in Brussels, so it’s easy to wander the streets with nothing but a backpack and a vague recollection of places she should visit. She’s never been to Australia before. She’d only left the country once, before the Hephaestus, and that was to go to Niagara Falls for the weekend with some friends in high school.

(Sam had laughed when she told him, and she’d raised her eyebrows, said “You telling me you traveled a lot, Oklahoma boy?” like it was a challenge. It always was a challenge, and maybe she’d feel bad about it if he’d ever stopped rising to the challenge. If he hadn’t met her every step of the way, until-)

There’s a list of names tucked away in her backpack. She’s been trying to visit people who deserve to know what happened. Kuan’s sisters, who grieved by screaming. Victoire’s mother, who’d cried as Isabel told her in halting French what happened to her daughter. Sam’s family, who barely reacted at all. Like they already knew he was dead.

They probably did know, she supposes. It’s not like it was hard to guess.

Sydney’s beautiful. She tries to imagine Mace in the city as she walks through it, slowly. He’s not from Sydney, of course, he’s from some smaller town. He used to talk about it, but she can’t remember the name of it, and of course his files with Goddard don’t exist anymore. There’s next to no proof that he was ever there.

But he was here. She imagines him squinting in the sunlight, trying to read a street sign. She imagines him pointing at some local business and saying that there, Captain, that’s his best friend’s uncle’s ice cream shop. She imagines him painted bright in the sun, laughing with his boyfriend, pushing a stroller.

Isabel blinks. That one felt less imaginary.

He’s gone by the time she looks back, of course. She’s been seeing ghosts for the last month. All of Kuan’s sisters had his smile. Every tall man with a suit and a carefully disarming smile is Cutter. Hell, she even sees shades of Minkowski and Eiffel sometimes, even though she knows both of them are safe and sound back stateside. She’s used to it by now. She should be used to it by now.

She still goes straight to her hotel room. Bolts the door once it’s closed. Moves a chair in front of the door just for good measure. Good things never happen when the dead start showing up again. She knows that better than anyone.

Getting back to Earth goes like this:

Goddard debriefs them. It takes weeks, plural, because nobody’s sure what to do with their story. Two of the most important people in the company are currently space debris, and the third doesn’t even remember her own name. And all the rest of them are officially dead.

It’s Jacobi, actually, who’s most helpful in moving things forward. Lovelace gets the impression that it’s because he wants to get out of there as fast as possible, but she has to admit, it’s nice having someone who knows people. Kepler’s name pulls weight, and by extension so does Jacobi’s. It gets things in motion, even with the gaps in the power structure.

The process is also kept completely secret from the public, which they probably weren’t supposed to figure out. Jacobi guesses as much on the second day, snorts and says “it’d look bad for them to be caught in a lie this big,” and that’s supposed to be that. It’s hard to bring people back to life, in terms of paperwork. Probably a nightmare.

But they’re debriefed. They see doctors, who don’t know what to do with Lovelace, human and also decidedly not. They see therapists, who kind of wave Lovelace off because there’s absolutely nothing in their repertoire that could help them deal with aliens. They sit in corporate meeting after corporate meeting where Lovelace tries to focus on getting out and not how badly she wants to rip this company to shreds.

Goddard lets them go on a Tuesday morning. They reach Minkowski’s husband that night, living just outside of Boston, and all of them pile into a house that seems far too empty for one man. Lovelace gets a bedroom to herself. They figure out how to install Hera in the house, because Doug refuses to let her live in a box. She’s up and running by Wednesday morning.

Jacobi’s gone by Wednesday afternoon without so much as a goodbye. It stings, maybe more than it should, but Lovelace has faith that he’ll come back one day. If only because he’s bored.

By the early hours on Thursday she has a list of cities. Shawnee, Brussels, Shanghai, Sydney. She writes and crosses out Moscow a dozen times - even if Selberg was hers he also decidedly wasn’t, and she doesn’t owe that man any more of her sympathy - and does the same for New York City. Who says you can’t go home? Probably other people whose entire families think they died in space years ago.

She makes a second list for good measure. Victoire used to wax rhapsodic about the summer she spent in Iceland, and Kuan had endless stories about visiting cousins in Hawaii. Sam traveled constantly, which she wouldn’t expect from someone from Oklahoma, but he wanted to see the world. Or, no, he felt like it’d be a shame if he didn’t. A shame? An embarrassment? It’s hard to remember his exact words.

It’s hard to remember his exact voice.

Lovelace lifts her voice recorder, brand new, purchased from a RadioShack with a shiny Goddard-issued credit card. “Get back in touch with Canaveral, see if they have any of Lambert’s old logs somewhere. Shake them down if you have to.”

Isabel Lovelace has a valid passport Thursday night. She says her goodbyes on Friday morning, promises to call and hugs Eiffel a little tighter than she should and leaves. She has more ghosts than the rest of them. It’s time to put them to rest.

The problem, which she learns in Oklahoma, is that as much as she wants to get this over with, she can’t start with the families. She tells Sam’s mother what happened one day, his father the next, and then if she stays in Oklahoma for one more goddamn second she thinks she’s going to suffocate, so she’s in Brussels the day after that.

(“That could just be an effect of Oklahoma,” Minkowski - no, Renee says, when Isabel calls her, now in Brussels and still not quite breathing right. “I mean, I’ve never really been there, but it sounds… like Oklahoma.”

“Maybe,” Isabel allows. “But if I’m going to be here, I should start with the tourist thing, right? Instead of just jumping in with the… bad news.”

“The tourist thing,” Renee echoes, in that voice that means she’s not laughing at Isabel, per se, but she’s definitely laughing and it just so happens that Isabel said something funny. “You mean relaxing?”

“I guess I do.”

“You’ve earned it.”

She has. She’s earned it and re-earned it and the universe probably owes her a full year of not dealing with other people’s problems at this point. “Then maybe I’ll stay in Belgium for a while.”

“Just make sure you call,” Renee says, soft and careful. She never says goodbye, only asks for Isabel to call again. And she always does.)

It takes two weeks in Brussels before she has the stomach to find Victoire’s family. After that she stops over in Moscow for all of two days, just to see the sights, and then it’s three weeks in Shanghai. And of course, by the end of that she’s ready to snap in half, so she takes a week for herself in Thailand to recover.

Sydney is warm, not as warm as Thailand but also sunnier. It’s not quiet, but it’s just her and her ghosts there. And it’s going to take a little more work to track down Fisher’s boyfriend - she knows his name’s Corey, he’s a history teacher, and he lives somewhere reasonably close to Sydney - so she might as well take another break.

She ends up on a beach, one of the quieter ones. It’s a weekday morning so it’s not terribly crowded, just a few families that Isabel makes a point of staying away from, carving out her own quiet corner in the sand. She sets up with a towel and an umbrella and a stack of books that she got from airports and-

-and her phone starts ringing.

Isabel sighs. It’d be easy, it’d be so easy to just ignore it, but the fact is not a lot of people call her. This number isn’t in enough databases to get calls, and it would be… inconsiderate if she didn’t take full advantage of Goddard generously footing all her bills for a little while. Including the bill for international calls.

She smoothly reaches into her backpack, resting a carefully-calculated arm’s length away from her on the sand, and swipes to answer. “You’ve reached the phone of Isabel Lovelace. I’m currently unavailable because I finally got to a real beach where I can relax for a while, so leave a message if-”

“Oh, I’m sorry, is this a bad time?” Hera asks, not sounding sorry at all.

Isabel rests back on her towel. “No, Hera, it’s not. Unless there’s an emergency, because I am halfway around the world right now and can’t help.”

“No emergencies. Thank god.”

She smiles, relaxing a little as she does. “And you’re bored?”

“Horribly.”

“What do you do now that nothing’s constantly going wrong?”

“Not much,” Hera admits. “I’ve been teaching myself new languages.”

“Programming language or human language?”

“A bit of both?”

“Of course,” Isabel says. She thinks idly that maybe she would’ve been sarcastic about that, once upon a time, but now it comes out fond. Indulgent. Hera complained about being in a house and how it was so much smaller than the Hephaestus, but now she has the Internet. There’s only so much complaining she can do with the entirety of human knowledge at her fingertips. “How’s everyone?”

Hera hums. “Minko- uh, Renee- shoot. Is it weird that I’m still having trouble with that?”

“It’s only been two months, Hera.”

“But I talk to her every day.”

“And how many days did you call her Minkowski?”

“More than sixty,” Hera admits. “Okay. Uh, Renee’s looking for jobs, although nobody’s really sure what kind of thing she should look for. Doug’s a waiter now, all the customers love him.”

“And everyone’s in one piece?”

“In one piece.” She says it so proudly that Isabel can’t help but smile. “And Renee’s been helping me practice my French.”

“Do you need to practice?”

“Of course I need to practice, just because I know the whole language doesn’t mean I know how to speak it right.”

“One of these days, you should learn a made-up language. Or make your own.”

“I’ve already looked into making up my own, but it’s not as easy as you might think. It’s kind of a fun side project, it’d be nice to talk to a linguist or something sometime. Figure out how-”

“Lovelace?” says someone, about three feet to her right.

She drops her phone. She hadn’t noticed anyone coming towards her, and these days there’s no way to tell if it’s someone hostile or not. From the other end of the phone Hera says something but Isabel’s hand is already halfway into her bag, where she has a knife waiting for her, and she looks up to see who it is and squints against the sunlight and-

“Lovelace,” says Mace Fisher, like he thinks she’s going to disappear.

Slowly, Isabel pulls her hand away from her backpack and lifts her sunglasses, just as Fisher - it can’t be, it has to be - drops to a crouch, then his knees. His hair’s longer now, curling in loose spirals around his cheeks. He has the same scar down one side of his nose. He’s wearing the most horrific swim trunks that she’s seen in her entire life, and he’s staring, and he’s here.

“Fisher,” she says, and he gulps, and suddenly her eyes are stinging. He sits back on his heels, looking winded, and Isabel remembers her phone. She snatches it up and takes a deep breath. “Hera.”

“Ca- Isabel, what’s going on, is everything okay?”

Is everything okay. Of course, everything’s fine. Just Lovelace and her ghosts again. “I’m going to have to call you back.”

“That’s not a yes.”

“I don’t know yet, Hera.” She’s still watching him, of course she is. He looks somewhere off over Isabel’s shoulder, mouths something that she doesn’t bother to try and understand. He must not be here alone. “It’s… complicated.”

“Are you safe?”

“I think so.”

“Call us back,” Hera says, voice small. “Just- just to be on the safe side.”

“Of course,” Isabel says, and hangs up. Fisher is still there, so that’s a good sign, probably. If this isn’t real then at least her brain is collapsing all at once. Hell, they have no idea what the sun’s radiation is going to do to her weird alien brain. Maybe long-term exposure induces hallucinations. Maybe this is the last thing she sees before her internal organs turn to soup. It could be worse, she figures.

Fisher’s still staring at her.

“So,” she says carefully. “This… is new.”

“You died in space,” Fisher says. “I don’t know if you heard.”

“No, I’ve been told.” She looks him up and down. She listened to him die, during that meteor storm. They all did. “You… also died in space.”

He snorts. “Apparently not.”

They never found a body. Of course they didn’t, it was deep space, but they never had anything to remember him by, other than what he left behind. “Apparently not,” she agrees, and her voice is a little thicker than she expected. “How about that?”

Fisher swallows. “The others-”

Isabel’s breath catches. None of the others had been home, when she visited. “They- Mace-”

“Oh,” Fisher breathes, and lunges forward. Isabel lets him, reaches out, pulls him in. And he feels real, not like a hallucination, not a ghost. He’s as real as she is and he’s squeezing her like he’s trying to make sure of it, one hand pressing her head into the crook of his shoulder. “Captain-”

“Oh, god, don’t call me captain,” she laughs, and he huffs out something like a sob, warm against the back of her neck. “I’m nobody’s captain anymore, got it?”

“Aye-aye,” Fisher says, and fans one of his hands out on her back. Isabel laughs again and her eyes are still stinging but she’s not crying, she can’t cry until she understands. “What are you doing here, anyways?”

Isabel sits back on her heels, keeping one hand pressed against Fisher’s shoulder. Just in case he disappears. He pulls away too, a little reluctantly, but one of his hands drops to her knee. “I was, uh. Trying to say goodbyes, you could call it.”

“Ah,” Fisher says. “I take it you haven’t been back long, then.”

“A couple months.” She shrugs. “Goddard… wasn’t interested in letting us go.”

Fisher raises his eyebrows. “Us.”

“It’s a long story.”

“I can imagine.”

“What about you?” Isabel rubs a hand across her eyes, probably scrubbing salt and sand into them, which has to be why the stinging doesn’t go away. “What… how long have you been back?”

Fisher shrugs. “Five years, give or take.”

“So you got back after the first mission.”

“First mission,” Fisher repeats, something like dread creeping into his voice. “Captain-”

“Isabel.”

“If you’re Isabel then I’m Mace.”

Isabel nods and takes a deep breath. “It’s… a really long story. It’s one I can tell you, but-”

“Daddy!” a child’s voice shouts, from somewhere behind Isabel. Mace is on his feet in a flash, so fast that she barely has time to mourn the loss of contact before he’s off and running. It’s just enough to make her panic, so she whips around, climbing to her feet in the process. Her sunglasses tilt dangerously to one side, threatening to fall off, and she manages to settle them back on her face just as she spots Mace again.

He’s crouching low, looking seriously between two kids. Twins, if Isabel had to guess, both of them dark-haired and olive-skinned. They don’t look anything like Mace, but one of them has the same stubborn mouth, and one has the same honest eyes. His kids, if ever she’s seen them.

Cautiously, she takes a couple of steps closer. Mace doesn’t notice, talking in a low, serious voice to the twins. “Five minutes, alright? Five more minutes on the sand and then we can go back in the water, how does that sound?”

“But Kuan said he’s gonna squish my sand castle,” says the one with Mace’s mouth, and Isabel nearly takes a step back. “And I don’t want him to!”

Mace looks seriously at the twin with his eyes. “Kuan.”

“I’m not gonna squish it,” Kuan mutters. “But Sam said his was better than mine, and that’s not nice. ”

Mace turns back to the other twin, looking exasperated. “Sam-”

“Mine’s better,” Sam protests, but he falters instantly and turns to his brother. “I’m sorry, Kuan. You’re right, it wasn’t nice.”

“I’m sorry I said I was gonna squish yours,” Kuan says seriously. “That wasn’t nice either.”

“Good job, boys,” Mace says, and both of the twins brighten up instantly. It figures that Mace would have the most well-adjusted kids Isabel has ever seen. “Daddy just needs three more minutes to talk to his friend, and-”

“Friend?” Sam demands, and both twins turn to her immediately, with that uncanny perceptive stare that children always have.

Isabel’s hands are shaking. She notices it sort of absently, the same way she notices there’s a man with a sleeping baby lying on his chest watching them intently, the same way she notices that the only clouds in the sky are wispy and light and dreamlike. Like it doesn’t affect her that she’s having trouble breathing.

She glances at Mace, over the tops of her sunglasses, and he nods slightly, so she takes a couple steps forward and drops into a crouch next to him. “Hi, guys.”

“You’re friends with Daddy?” asks Kuan.

Isabel nods. “I am. I used to work with him, a long time ago.”

“In space?”

“Yes, in space.”

“Whoa,” Kuan whispers. “Was he cool?”

“The coolest.”

Mace snorts and nudges her with his shoulder, still as solid and real as anything. “Second after you, maybe.”

“Oh, definitely,” Isabel says, with an exaggerated nod, and both of the twins giggle. “But, you know, it’s hard to measure up to me.”

“Daddy’s cool!” Sam bounces up and down. “This one time, this one time he was making pancakes, and he flipped them in the air!”

“In the air?” Isabel repeats, trying to sound like it’s the coolest thing she’s ever heard. “You know, that might just be cooler than me.”

“Never, Captain,” Mace mumbles, and Isabel rolls her eyes. Maybe she shouldn’t teach kids to roll their eyes, but if they’re living with Mace, they’re probably going to be supernaturally patient. Someone has to teach them. “Boys, we can go in the water as soon as I’m done talking to Miss Isabel, alright?”

“Miss Isabel?” Kuan turns so he’s looking at her and leans in, putting his face very, very close to hers. It takes all her self control not to pull back. Children can smell fear, or something. “Like baby Izzy?”

“Baby Izzy,” Isabel repeats. “Is that… a TV show, or something?”

Kuan giggles. “No, silly, it’s our sister!”

“Sister,” Isabel echoes, feeling like a broken record. They have a sister named Isabel. That can’t be right. She turns, carefully, to look at Mace, who is staring intently at the sand by her feet. “Mace.”

“Middle name’s Victoire,” he mumbles, and meets her eyes, looking sheepish. “There’s not a lot else you can do to remember people, these days.”

She understands. When the world has already mourned and moved on, when Isabel’s mission to say her goodbyes was met only with acceptance and grief that’s still heavy on her skin, there’s not much else to do, other than remembering. He had to grieve already, without her.

“Mace,” she says again, her throat so thick that it hurts to say. She swallows a couple times, until she feels like she can breathe again, and says, “We can talk later.”

“Yeah?” Mace says, and she wonders if he expected her to want to talk to him. He looks so… hopeful.

“Yeah.” She takes a deep breath. “I can… you know, I brought books. I have a cell phone that I mostly understand how to use. I can kill time.”

Mace laughs. “Yeah, those have changed a lot. You want to come in the water with us?”

Isabel has gone swimming once, in the last two months. It was in a Goddard facility, for some kind of fitness check-up. It’d been nice at first, cool and refreshing. Chlorine is one of those things that she’d forgotten, not unlike the exact flavor of potato chips and how to talk to children, and she’d even appreciated the sting in her eyes.

It’d taken eight minutes and forty-one seconds, as per her official Goddard chart, before the panic set in. Before the water stopped feeling like water, and all she knew was that she was floating, and if she was floating she must’ve been back in space, back on the Hephaestus, and if she was on the station then she wasn’t safe, and-

Nine minutes. A new record, said the Goddard tech who was observing her. Most former astronauts don’t even make it to five.

“Maybe later,” Isabel says. As long as her feet are on the ground, she should be fine.

“She can sit with me,” someone says, off to one side. It’s the man with the sleeping baby, still watching them. He has one hand resting on the baby’s back, and he looks relaxed, but his eyes are as sharp as anything she’s ever seen. “If you want.”

Isabel nods slowly. “I think I’d like that.”

Mace reaches out and brushes some sand off one of Isabel’s knees, leaving his hand to rest on her thigh. “Alright.”

“Alright,” Isabel repeats, and looks back at the twins. “Sam. Kuan.” She has to take a deep breath, because fuck, even that is hard to say, isn’t it? How does Mace do it every day? “It was very nice meeting you.”

“You too,” Kuan says, very seriously. Just like any kid trying to pretend to be a grown-up. It reminds her of Hui, of her Kuan.

“Are you gonna still be Daddy’s friend?” Sam asks. “Because you look like a good friend.”

A good friend. A good captain who lost her crew and barely scraped out with her second crew. A good person trying to say her goodbyes.

“I will be his friend,” she says. It’s too awkward and stilted for a kid but it’s all she can manage. Friends are hard to come by these days.

Mace squeezes her leg and gets to his feet. “Who’s ready to go in the ocean!”

The twins both scream in excitement, and Isabel glances back at the man who is most certainly Corey. “You mind if I bring my things over?”

“Course not,” Corey says, amiable as anything. “Although I hope you don’t mind that I’m going to be asking you a few questions.”

Isabel smiles faintly. None of them talked about Their People Back Home too often, at least not in the first few hundred days, but she still remembers Mace talking about his boyfriend. He used to say Corey was smart. And suspicious. She can see that already.

As soon as she settles in next to him, Corey points out towards the water. “I had to come to Sydney for a work conference. It was Mace’s idea to make a trip out of it and bring the kids, and he’s been wrangling all three of them by himself for most of the week.”

Isabel follows where he’s pointing. Mace is in the shallows of the ocean, each twin holding his hand. Every time a wave comes in, no matter how small, they all try to jump over it. She can hear the twins shrieking and laughing, and Mace laughing with them. “How old are they?”

“They turned four last month.” Corey smiles faintly. “He was self-conscious about the name thing. Originally it was going to be Samuel Kuan, and then we found out we’d be adopting twins.”

“And you were okay with it?”

“Of course. My boyfriend comes back from space, from the actual dead, and says he wants to name the kids after the people he lost? What kind of a person would say no?”

Isabel nods, and looks at the baby still asleep on Corey’s chest. “She’s quiet.”

Corey snorts and strokes the baby’s - Izzy’s back, smiling down at her. “Tired herself out screaming earlier.”

“I hear that babies do that.”

“You have no idea.”

“How did he come back?”

“We’re still not sure,” Corey admits, and looks back out towards Mace and the twins. “He says the last thing he remembers is getting knocked off the station by a meteor, and then next thing he knows he’s back on the station two years later with nobody but that doctor of yours there.”

Something cold creeps up Isabel’s spine. “And what did the good doctor do?”

“Lied to everyone who came to rescue them.”

“Lied?”

“Said that there was some kind of misunderstanding, that Mace had been with them the whole time in a coma.” Corey shakes his head. “They made it back to Earth and Selburg disappeared. Mace looks for him sometimes.”

“That’s good of him,” Isabel says, because it is. Even if Hilbert doesn’t deserve a damn good thing anymore. Even if he infected Mace with Decima for the sake of research, for some greater good that turned out to be no good at all. Maybe it was his penance, bringing Mace back to Earth. After all, he knew the theta scenario. He probably knew there was no point in running experiments on an alien.

“You don’t sound like you mean it.” Corey looks at her, eyes narrowing. “Do you know how he came back?”

Isabel exhales. “I do.”

Corey takes a deep breath. “I’m not going to ask you to explain, but Mace will.”

“I know.”

“And be careful, when you do. Whatever it is, he already has questions.”

“What kind of questions?

“Doctors have been saying he’s in peak condition for the last five years. They also keep saying that he breaks some of their equipment.”

Psi waves, Isabel thinks. Psi waves, or alien biology, or one of those other things that Pryce and Cutter went on and on about.

Because he’s like her.

“I’ll be careful,” she says, and turns away from Corey’s eyes, back towards the shoreline. One of the twins jumps too high and crashes to his knees in the water. Mace lets go of his hand, just long enough to scoop him up and balance him on his hip. “I’ll tell him the truth, if he asks, but I’m not going to scare him away or anything.”

“Good,” Corey says quietly. “And I know we’ve never met before, but I’m glad you’re not dead.”

Isabel quirks a smile. “Thanks. I’m glad he came back to you.”

“Me too,” Corey murmurs. Mace picks up the other twin now, holding them both carefully, like it’s nothing. Like he was made to hold them. “Me too.”

Mace and Corey have to leave first, because when you have three kids you need to feed them lunch. They leave Isabel with Mace’s phone number, Corey’s number in case Mace’s phone dies, and a small collection of seashells that Kuan picked out for her.

(“I didn’t get her anything,” Sam whispers, looking absolutely horrified, and then proceeds to dump a child-size fistful of sand on each of Isabel’s thighs. “Is mud good for your skin?”

Mace, who’s reapplying sunscreen on Kuan, takes one look at Isabel’s face and laughs so hard that he has to sit down.)

And then they’re gone, and it’s Isabel, by herself on a beach. Just like she wanted.

The breeze keeps blowing. The air still tastes like salt. The waves keep crashing on the sand. There are still families around, but a few have filtered out, probably to go to lunch or school or whatever else families in Sydney have to do. Maybe they’re on vacation. Maybe they’re just passing through. Maybe she’s just passing through, although she’s not sure where exactly she’ll go after this. She still has that list: Reykjavik for Victoire, Honolulu for Kuan, Sao Paulo and Quebec and Copenhagen and San Francisco for Sam. Disneyland. New York. Boston.

She doesn’t remember getting to her feet, but the next thing she knows she’s standing in the shallows. The water’s around her ankles, lapping against her calves, gritty with sand and salt. It feels good. It’s grounding.

She’s holding her cell phone. Slowly, she punches in the numbers and holds her breath.

Renee picks up on the second ring. “Hey! I was just about to call you, I got a package from Goddard today. Apparently they archived all of your crew’s old logs on analog recorders. Less of a chance of a hacker accidentally finding some of Goddard’s dirty laundry. Hera and Dom are going to try and convert them to digital for you, although you can always come pick them up in person.”

Isabel swallows. The world seems too bright, suddenly. She’s not used to the sunlight, she might never be used to the sunlight again, she spent seven years in deep space and she was dead for three of those. Or maybe she was only alive for two of them.

She remembers Lambert’s voice. Or maybe she just remembers a ghost of it. It’d be another thing, another thing entirely, to have his logs. Or to have him in front of her. The way Mace was.

“Isabel?” Renee says cautiously. “Are you there?”

“There’s a baby here named after me,” Isabel says abruptly. It seems like the easiest entry point.

Renee goes quiet. Isabel takes the opportunity to lower herself so she’s sitting in the water. She’d forgotten what sand felt like, but it’s the kind of muddy sand that’s easy to bury your toes in. She has one foot halfway covered in mud when Renee finally says, cautiously, “We’ve only been back for two months.”

“I know.”

“That’s not enough time for that to happen.”

“She was adopted.”

“Who adopted her?”

“Mace Fisher, from my old crew.”

Another silence. This one only lasts long enough for Isabel to get the toes of her other foot into the sand, before: “Is there some kind of an explanation for this?”

“I think it’s another theta scenario.” She pauses. “Actually, I’m sure of it, because the only other option is that I just vividly hallucinated a two-hour encounter with five people, only one of whom I’d ever met before.”

“Who were the other four?”

“His partner and kids.”

“You never met them?”

“Never had the chance. Kids are all under the age of four anyways. For all I know-” Isabel swallows, hoping it wasn’t too obvious that her voice cracked. For all she knows it was just wishful thinking.

Renee sighs noisily. “Did you look them up on Facebook?”

“What?”

“Facebook. Finding a profile page to see if you were imagining them.”

Isabel blinks. “No.”

“Alrighty then,” Renee says briskly. It’s kind of a comfort: all business, no question of what it means if Isabel is seeing things, just another fact-finding mission. Isabel can hear her tap a few buttons, and then: “Hera, you busy?”

“No,” Hera says immediately. “No, I’m- Isabel! You hung up so fast earlier, was everything okay?”

“I ran into one of my old crew members,” Isabel says, as no-nonsense as she possibly can. Renee’s certainly not fooled, but Hera just might be, if she plays her cards right. “We’re trying to figure out what’s going on.”

“We’re looking for a Facebook page,” Renee explains. “Or some other kind of social media.”

“Ooooh, finally, something interesting!”

Isabel grins. She can’t see Renee, all the way in Massachusetts, but she can still imagine Renee grinning back at her. “I don’t have a lot for you to go on,” she warns. “His name is Mason Fisher, and his partner’s name is Corey.”

“Last name?”

“Don’t know.”

“Occupation?”

“Corey’s a history teacher, or at least he was seven years ago. Mace was in the military.”

“Anything else?”

“They have three kids, Sam, Kuan, and Izzy.”

“And they live in Australia?”

“Yes. Although I’m not sure where.”

Hera hums to herself. “You sure like to give a girl a challenge, I’ll tell you that. And my first Facebook search isn’t picking up anything.”

Isabel’s heart hiccups in her throat. “Nothing?”

“Not yet, but I started with all the parameters in place and I’m broadening the search as we go.”

“Try the other sites too,” Renee suggests. “Twitter, or Instagram, or whatever people are using these days.”

“I’m already running those too,” Hera says. Isabel knows that tone of voice. It’s the “I don’t want to tell you my systems are failing, but they are” voice. “I’m still not seeing anything. And I’m running Corey with an E-Y, Cory with just a Y, I’m putting K’s in there-”

“Have you tried LinkedIn?” a new voice says. “If they’re trying to fly under the radar, which they very well might be, they won’t be on Facebook, but most professionals are on there these days.”

“Oooh,” Renee says softly. “Good one, Dom.”

“Thank you. Hi, Isabel.”

“Hi, Dominik.”

“Are you still in Thailand?” Dominik asks, sounding completely unbothered by the fact that his wife’s best friend is searching for evidence of someone who might not exist. Isabel likes that about him. He takes everything in stride.

“Australia, actually.”

“Staying in the warm half of the world, I see.”

Isabel snorts. “Yeah, it’s great, it’s always sunny in Sydney.”

“Oh, god,” Renee mutters. “You know, it’s crazy to say this, but I’m still not used to the sun. Like, the actual sun, you know what I mean? Heat that isn’t from a vent, light that isn’t from a bulb…”

“Or a star outside the window,” Isabel adds. “And isn’t blue.”

“Isn’t blue!” Renee snaps her fingers. “I keep expecting everything to be blue!”

“And way colder.”

“God, way colder. And I keep forgetting about gravity.”

Isabel laughs, a little more wetly than she intends, but she can’t help it. “Earlier today I was lying on the beach, reading a book, and I went to put the book down-”

“Oh, no,” Renee laughs, like she’s already figured out the punchline to the joke. Or already lived it out a dozen times over.

“Except, of course, I just let go of it, and it fell-” Isabel smacks her knee with one hand. “Right into my solar plexus.”

Dom chuckles. “Hopefully it wasn’t too heavy.”

“Eh, just an airport paperback. Heaviest thing about it was the main character’s tragic backstory.” She sighs. “Worst part was that I cursed loudly on a public beach and almost woke up a sleeping baby, but-”

“Check your phone,” Hera says suddenly. “Is this him?”

Isabel pulls her phone away from her ear and looks at it. The message from Hera opens on its own, as messages from Hera are wont to do. It’s a professional headshot, much cleaner and more put-together than he’d been on the beach.

“Yeah,” Isabel says, a little winded. “That’s Corey.”

“Awesome,” Hera says, clearly relieved. “Corey Rapp, that’s C-O-R-E-Y, has a LinkedIn profile, thank you, Dominik. He’s still a history teacher at a secondary school north of Sydney. Government records show he adopted twins about four years ago and a daughter last year, like you said. No evidence of a spouse or partner, at least not on the record, but knowing what Goddard’s like, that doesn’t mean anything. Doesn’t look like Corey has a Facebook or anything under his own name.”

“Neither do I,” Renee points out. “If anything that makes them smart. Means they’re watching out.”

“Good choice,” Dominik murmurs. Isabel agrees, would say as much if she could remember how to breathe.

Mace is here. He’s alive, more than six years after he died, and he’s also definitely an alien. She’s going to have to tell him. Maybe Corey, too, depending on how Mace takes it. She’s not the only one in the world, and somehow, that’s worse than if she were alone. At least if it were just her she wouldn’t have anything to feel guilty about.

“Lovelace,” Renee says quietly.

Isabel blinks. Her skin is hot. Right. Sunlight. Beach. She’s here. “Hey.”

“You okay?”

“I’m good.”

“Hera and Dom left,” Renee says cautiously. “You kinda went dark for a minute there. Anything you wanna talk about?”

“Not really.”

“How about things you don’t want to talk about?”

“Oh, there are way more of those, don’t worry.”

“I’d be more worried if there weren’t,” Renee admits. “So. You found your alien crewmate who survived the most unlikely series of events that any human has experienced.”

“You really think that’s more unlikely than what we went through?”

“Eh.” Isabel can picture the accompanying shrug, almost jokingly nonchalant. “It’s gotta be on the list, right? Anything involving aliens is… up there.”

“Oh, up there,” Isabel mutters, and Renee makes a soft noise that somehow sounds like a smile. “How’s Doug?”

“Definitely the most well-adjusted out of all of us.”

“Hera said he got a job?”

“He works the night shift at Olive Garden. Customers love him.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah,” Renee says, and then goes quiet, and Isabel feels… bad, for a few seconds. She’d been with Renee and Doug for a while, but what they’d had, the casual trust and the years of determination to survive, was irreplaceable. Doug-and-Renee is never going to be the same as Eiffel-and-Minkowski.

“How about you?” Isabel asks, and then kind of wants to kick herself. That’s not necessarily a better talking point.

Renee hums. “Better than I’ve been. Dom and I decided I can’t go back to the military, what with being legally dead, so I’ve been trying to put together the case against Goddard.”

“By yourself?”

“With Hera, sometimes.”

“So by yourself.”

“Mostly,” Renee admits. “I was going to wait for you to come back, but…”

But this trip was supposed to take two weeks, tops, and Isabel hasn’t come back yet. But she has a second list of places to visit. But now she found somewhere else that she could stay for a while. But you can’t plan on someone who might not come back, don’t you know that by now, Captain?

“I’ll help once I’m back,” Isabel says, which she figures is the most honest thing she can say. When she’s ready she’s going to burn Goddard to the ground. Which reminds her: “Have you heard anything from Jacobi?”

“Not yet.”

“And you haven’t tracked him down?”

“Isabel,” Renee chides. “He’s an adult, he’s not my responsibility, and if his way of handling it is leaving, then I’m not here to judge him for it.”

“So that’s a no,” Isabel says, and grins when Renee groans. “He’ll turn up sooner or later.”

“Yeah, I know. And what about you?”

“What about me?”

“Fisher’s alive,” Renee says, like Isabel could have possibly forgotten. “You’re not the only theta scenario. You’re in another new country by yourself. Take your pick. I have a couple reasons to be worried here.”

And Isabel thinks about it, actually thinks about it. It’d be easy to lie, sure, but Renee would know, and she figures if they’re in this whole space trauma business together she might as well be honest.

She pulls one of her feet out of the sand, sticking it into the water. “I'm coping,” she says slowly. “It’s early yet in the process. I think I might be going through the opposite of the five stages of grief.”

“Is that going through the stages in backwards order or experiencing the opposite of each stage?”

“I’ll let you know.”

“Thinking you were hallucinating could be a form of denial,” Renee says, far too thoughtful. “Or the opposite of acceptance? Is that how it works?”

“I don’t know, shrinks gave up on me, remember?” Isabel’s phone buzzes in her hand, and she glances at the screen. “Mace is calling me.”

“Then answer!”

“Okay,” Isabel says, and then, “Thank you.”

Renee doesn’t ask what she’s thanking her for. She’s smart like that. “Any time. Time zones don’t matter, just call.”

“I will,” Isabel says. It’s not quite a lie. “Talk to you soon, Renee.”

“Talk to you soon, Isabel.”

Isabel swipes over to answer. “Mace.”

“Isabel,” Mace says brightly. She almost doesn’t catch the note of surprise. “I realized I forgot to ask how long you’re in Sydney.”

“Until I leave.”

“No dates?”

“Well, you know, international travel gets a lot easier when a multibillion dollar company is footing the bill.”

“Huh,” Mace says. “Well, if you’re not busy tonight-”

“Isabel,” Renee says, sounding far too amused, and Isabel almost jumps out of her skin in surprise. “You didn’t hang up on me.”

Isabel frowns. “Apparently not. Did I make it a conference call?”

“You’re still not used to the new phone,” Renee says smugly, which is completely unfair. Phones have changed a lot in seven years, and Isabel is entitled to a few moments of staggering confusion. “That’s okay, you know.”

“Took me a while to get used to it too,” Mace says, in what’s probably supposed to be a sympathy move. “Touch screens and all.”

“You must be Mace Fisher,” Renee says, and Isabel’s breath catches. It’s so outrageously her, making a point of acknowledging that she can hear the person on the other end of the phone. “I’m Renee Minkowski. Former commander of the final mission to the USS Hephaestus Station, which is currently space dust.”

“Can’t say I’m sad to hear about that,” Mace admits. “And Captain, you owe me… so many explanations for all of that.”

“Many, many explanations,” Isabel agrees. “I can pay for drinks too.”

“I’ll leave you two to make plans now.” Renee pauses, and Isabel can feel the smugness from thousands of miles away. It’s strangely comforting. “Isabel, don’t worry, I can hang up on my own.”

“I’m so happy for you,” Isabel says as dryly as possible. “I’ll call you soon, Renee.”

“You’d better,” Renee says, and then there’s a soft beep.

Isabel exhales. “So. Drinks?”

“I probably shouldn’t leave my hotel, if Corey’s alone with the kids, but-”

“Hotel bar?”

“Hotel bar. I’ll send you the address.”

“Let me know when it’s a good time to come.”

“I will.” Mace pauses. “So, we can talk about this later, but…”

“But?”

“Renee, hm?”

Isabel groans. “Mace.”

“Are you guys close?”

“Come on.”

“No, I’m just saying, you sounded happy to talk to her.”

“That’s because I was.”

“Good,” Mace says, sounding pleased. “I have to run now, I just wanted to call and check.”

“Yeah,” she says softly. “I’ll see you tonight, Mace.”

“I’ll see you tonight,” he echoes, and then there’s that soft beep again, and Isabel’s alone on the beach.

One of her feet is still buried in the sand. Carefully, she wiggles her toes. The mud squishes between them. It almost tickles, and she can feel some of the sand dissolving in the water. The shallows are still lapping around her, against her hips, her thighs, one hand that she plants in the sand while she cradles her phone in the other.

There was a point where she thought she’d never make it back to a beach. She hadn’t been to many beaches before space, and definitely not many with actual oceans. The Air Force isn’t exactly interested in destination resorts, after all. But here she is. Sitting on a beach in Sydney.

Isabel swirls her hand through the water, letting the sand cloud around her. She never thought she would feel sand again. Or sun. Or the sheer gratitude of knowing that someone else made it out alive. She has another list, one that’s been getting longer: things she’s getting to experience again. Maybe for the first time, depending how you look at it.

Sydney is bright in the summer. There are people waiting for her in Boston, and a list of cities she has to visit. There’s a stack of books on the beach, next to her backpack, underneath an umbrella. She should go back to those and make some kind of progress, or at the very least make sure nobody takes her book before she can finish it.

She stays in the ocean, just a little longer. It’s not every day that she gets the chance.

#wolf 359 #wolf 359 fic #w359 fic #isabel lovelace #mace fisher #waveridden.fic #i'm not tagging anything else this is already niche as fuck

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