say bye to kris kringle, it's a mingle!

[geonomy]

Who: The Vanquish crew and visitors!
Broadcast: Nein?
Action: On the Vanquish lollipop, and around it maybe!
When: During the month of January

[Hey crew! It looks like there's some new changes that have come over the ship as well as a couple of new crewmates from the past shuffle or two! Have you been enjoying the planet, or is it too cold for you? Have you caught a nasty cold like your poor captain a few posts down, or are you a Vanquish member and are fine? Come along for a mingle, let the viewers see what you're up to! And also meet the tiniest, cutest crew member too!]

Comments

[geonomy]

[There's a spoon in the bowl, and Clay carefully sets a glass of water near her too. Best to flush out all those germs, since they don't have real orange juice to help with that.]

You're welcome. [And he stays knelt down for a moment, just to ask:] You want me to stay? I can tell you some stories from my world. [And, you know, also take her bowl and cup away once she's done.]

[flickerflash]

[She brightens. Maybe it'll be like Princess Bride after all.]

Could you? Stories are very good for colds. [She shifts to tuck her knees up to her chest and balances the bowl on the edge of her pinafore, taking a careful spoonful. Heaven.]

[geonomy]

Gladly. [He knows full well that stories are good for colds, as he got a good one during his, even though he ended up laughing during it and thus coughed a lot.] What are you in the mood for? Fairy tales? Space adventures?

[flickerflash]

Space adventures! [Oh that reminds her--] Did you know Han Solo is here?

[omgggg]

[geonomy]

[... omggggg and now he goes all starry-eyed]

I know! He actually talked to me when I was sick! Like, actually texted me and everything! I didn't know anyone else here knew who he was!

[There was one person he had hopes for, but she dashed all of his hopes and dreams by asking "Who's Han Solo?". Who's Han Solo. Who's Han Solo.]

[flickerflash]

He did? [SHE KNEW SHE SHOULD HAVE STUCK AROUND LONGER. Let's be starry-eyed together foreverrr]

Does he like you because you're a pilot? He hasn't called me while I'm sick. [Sadness. Of course, she hasn't told anyone.] Do you know if he ever found Chewie? If he did I need to set him on--

[And too much talking equals coughing when you're sick so uh-- well, it's probably just as well she did stop there given where that last part was going.]

[geonomy]

[Look he's not going to tell the little girl that Han Solo gave him shitty porn as a way to keep him entertained while sick, but -

Once she starts coughing, Clay leans in to rub circles on her back, his other hand moving to steady the bowl of soup so that it won't spill.]

Hey, hey...

[flickerflash]

[Curse you and your standards, Clay. >:c

She coughs it out and then offers him a shaky thumbs up once she's done, shifting to take hold of the bowl properly and making a face with watery eyes.]

...being sick is lots of fun.

[Not like you don't know or anything.]

[geonomy]

[He gives a sympathetic smile as he runs a hand over the top of her head, then leans back again with a slight shake of his head.]

Oh yeah. Being sick is the most fun thing ever.

[He'll have to ask what's so bad about Chewie once she's better. He wouldn't want her having another coughing fit because of it.]

So! Space adventure. Oh, I should tell you about The HAT-1 Miracle!

[flickerflash]

[It's okay, she'll assure him she loves Chewie. Totally kidding about the setting him on fire thing. /cough

She sits up a little straighter, looking attentive, though she does take a moment to wipe a sleeve across her eyes first.] Miracles are always a good start! What happened?

[geonomy]

Okay. [He settles into a move comfortable position, sitting on the floor beside her nest and starts to gesture a bit as he talks.] Back in my world, I work as an astronaut with a company called the GYAXA Space Center. My mission before this was to board a ship called the HAT-2 to go to space. Because of what happened with HAT-1, extra precautions had to be made, including a lot of cover-ups and a lot of deceit.

[Which... he's not proud to be a part of, but that's why he's not going to talk about that, even though he feels like it'd strangely be okay to talk to her about it. But he is sworn to secrecy and all.]

So, what happened with the HAT-1 ship? What could make us go the extra mile to make sure HAT-2 would be safe? Well. It's safe to say that the fact HAT-1 came back home at all was nothing short of a miracle.

[flickerflash]

[Dude you have her full and complete attention the moment you say you're an astronaut omg.]

I always wanted to be an astronaut! You must be very strong, that's what my dad says. [Or fit, or... something.] Did HAT-1 have something wrong with it? Did an engine explode?

[geonomy]

[Clay grins at her excitement, feeling just as much of it just talking about his field, his passion. And well, hey, that's why Clay's built like a brick house, man.]

A lot of things happened. The mission was to land on the moon to collect samples from the rocks there, but what no one knew was that the ship had been sabotaged.

[Heck, Clay himself didn't know about it until just days before he got here. Kind of a hard pill to swallow and all, though he's had plenty of time to think about it now.]

There was a bomb on board planted by a spy. They didn't want the HAT-1 to reach the moon, so they detonated the bomb while the ship and its crew were in route to the moon. The explosion destroyed the oxygen tank, and from there, the problems only got worse.

[flickerflash]

What a rude thing for a spy to do. They're meant to sneak on board things and find out stuff, not blow it up. [Oh, but she feels bad anyway, because you don't stop such a great leap toward the sky like that. And people. There were people.]

Was everyone okay? Could they breathe? [She might not know what an explosion an oxygen tank would cause, but...]

[geonomy]

Right? [And, you know, murder one of their co-workers who was an amazing woman and doing such a great good for society, but this is a story about triumph, not sadness.]

Yeah, they had other tanks on the ship. But that one in particular was connected to other parts of the ship. It started to lose heat, the power it had was running out, the oxygen they did have was starting to run out, and the crew was running short on water. The ship was practically falling apart because of that bombing.

[He grins now, getting to the really good part of this whole thing.] But the captain of that team was a man named Solomon Starbuck. He dedicated himself entirely to getting his crew back safely. He worked on everything that went wrong, barely slept to make sure everything was working correctly, and did his best to turn the shuttle around when the trajectory itself was limited.

So guess what happened?

[flickerflash]

[With a name like Captain Starbuck oh my god this story clearly has an awesome ending. She grins.]

Did he fall asleep in the pilot's seat at the worst possible moment? [lol no. Her wide-eyed expression shows she's only kidding on that one.]