Chapter 75

TUELLER: They’d been on the float for a week coming back from New Vesta with a load of morkfish when Tueller, sitting on the bridge late at night noticed that the comms array had gotten a ping. WIth nothing else to do on the late shift, Tueller pulled up the commications and started to run diagnostics on it. The transmission was a high frequency pulsed microwave burst–definitely a repeated message over and over, of such high energy it seemed to be being broadcast via a pulsar. Tueller ran it through the astromaps on the Peregrine, and saw that there were no known civilizations at that location, but also, there were no known gates within thousands of lightyears. Tueller just flagged it as a potential new civilization in the system, sent the information back to the Ark, and went back to guiding them back on their delivery route.

—

STORY: The three of you are searching the ship for Yetide. Figgan’s locked herself in the bridge, and Erwin went after Astra after she freaked out and ran. What do you do?
TUELLER: “I’d like to test something, first.”
TUELLER: Tueller walks confidently to the med bay, where Millie has already been to see if Yetide is still there.
RYO: Ryo looks at him sidelong with a slight pouty frown.
TUELLER: “No offense Doc, but if you forgot her once I’m not sure i can trust your check-up again here.”
MILLICENT: “That’s fine, Tueller. I understand. We should put in some checks and balances. Mr. Hanaka, I’m seeing something strange on sensors down in the cargo bay. Would you accompany me to check it out?”
RYO: Ryo nods. “Okay.”
TUELLER: “Oh don’t mind me. I’ll be fine on my own, of course.”
TUELLER: “Though you did say we should all stick together.”
MILLICENT: “You’re worth two of us, no question.”
MILLICENT: Millie heads down to the cargo bay.
RYO: Ryo glances back at Tueller and then follows.
STORY: Ryo, you enter the cargo bay with Millie. It’s dark inside, speckled with a few status lights here and there confirming door seals and internal pressure. You find a light and switch it on, flooding the bay with light. Kahn stands inside, looking sadly at you.
STORY: “Hey.”
RYO: “Hi.”
RYO: Ryo stares at him for a long moment. “How, uh, are you here?”
STORY: He smiles, shrugs. “I missed you.”
RYO: Ryo smiles easily. “That confirms it. Something very strange is happening on this ship.”
STORY: “What do you mean?” He’s still just smiling, but takes a step towards you, comfortable with the space.
RYO: Ryo puzzles up his brow and looks at Millie. What’s she doing?
STORY: Millie’s not here.
RYO: Didn’t she enter the bay with Ryo?
STORY: She came in before you, yes.
STORY: Kahn takes another step towards you, turning your head by touching your cheek gently. “Hey.”
RYO: Ryo swallows and tilts his head. “Hey.” He smiles awkwardly.
RYO: After a moment he steps back, putting a little space between them again.
RYO: “So . . . did you see where Millie went?”
STORY: He shakes his head. “Want to see something?” He starts to climb the utility ladder on the side of the bay.
RYO: Ryo watches him climb for a moment, then glances around the bay, looking for Millie. Not seeing her, he looks back up at Kahn. “Where are you we going, Kahn? We . . . we have a real problem on this ship. Tueller’s sister. It’s a long story, but we really need to find her before she kills us all.”
STORY: “Oh, she doesn’t want to kill you. Now come on.”
STORY: Tueller!
STORY: Where are you going?
TUELLER: The med bay to see if Millie had a blind spot when it came to Yetide being in there.
STORY: Millie’s on the floor of the med bay.
TUELLER: Tueller stops in the doorway and then looks back down the hall, where he swore he saw Millie heading earlier.
STORY: No sign of her.
STORY: This one is unconscious, though.
TUELLER: “That’s odd. Hi, Doc. What are you doing there on the ground?”
TUELLER: Tueller goes to pick her up and set her on a med table.
MILLICENT: Millie groans and stirs
TUELLER: Tueller tries to do a field combat style medical diagnosis
MILLICENT: She opens her eyes slightly, winces, and closes them again. She points. “There, third cabinet from the left, with the broken latch. Give me two of those celecoxib tablets and get me a glass of water. Please and thank you.” She lays back.
MILLICENT: “None of you violent types every told me it hurts so much to be knocked out.”
TUELLER: “Sure Doc. What are you doing here?”
TUELLER: Tueller does what Millie asks.
MILLICENT: “Aching.”
TUELLER: “I’ve found getting knocked out is more mildly nauseatic rather than per se painful.”
MILLICENT: “Someone jumped me, I’m guessing it was Yet-oh God you’re right bucket BUCKET”
MILLICENT: Millie is sick for a while.
MILLICENT: Then she sits up and drinks some water.
MILLICENT: “I think I’m just about up to a sit rep, if you would be so kind.”
MILLICENT: “Did I use that right?”
TUELLER: “Well, the situation is that I left you in the hallway, came in here, and found you…wait a second. Things are kind of making sense here.”
TUELLER: “Let me guess, the last thing you remember is coming in here to check on Yetide and you got knocked out by her.”
MILLICENT: “By someone. I didn’t get a good look. But, yes.”
TUELLER: “Okay so to the rest of us you came back and said she was gone, which I think means we have a doppelganger or doppelgangers situation on the ship. Which is really interesting when you think about it.”
TUELLER: “That’s never happened quite this way before.”
STORY: Close up for Tueller
MILLICENT: “Oh, that is quite interesting!”
MILLICENT: She winces.
TUELLER: “She’s not a bad mimic of you, either. Also she’s down with Ryo in the cargohold, I think.”
TUELLER: “We should go down and see how well he’s handling that.”
MILLICENT: “We should probably not let her be alone with anyone, no.”
MILLICENT: Millie stands and leans a bit on Tueller.
MILLICENT: “I’m okay. I’ll shake it off. Almost certainly concussed, though.”
TUELLER: “Cool.”
TUELLER: Tueller starts helping Millie nonchalantly down towards the cargohold.
TUELLER: He looks curious more than anything.
STORY: When you get there, there’s no sign of Ryo for a minute
TUELLER: “Huh.”
TUELLER: “Well that’s disappointing.”
RYO: “Hello,” Ryo says from the catwalk above. He’s sitting and swinging his legs gently.
MILLICENT: Millie looks up. “Hmmmm.”
TUELLER: “Hey Ryo. See anyone else around here?”
RYO: Ryo looks down at them for a long moment. “Uhm, I don’t . . . no, I don’t think so.”
RYO: He stands and starts to climb down the ladder slowly.
TUELLER: “Hey, Ryo, do you remember how we first met?”
TUELLER: “You and me?”
RYO: Ryo frowns. “Alejo punched me in the face while you more or less watched.”
TUELLER: “Okay, cool, just checking.”
RYO: “Are we id-checking one another now?”
TUELLER: “Anyway, I think the Millie you came down here with was actually a doppelganger and the real Millie was knocked out on the floor of the med bay by, well, let’s just assume my sister in an Occam’s Razor sort of way.”
MILLICENT: “I think we ought to.”
MILLICENT: “Oh, I don’t think your sister was ever on Mercury.”
RYO: He nods. “Trouble is that we all seem to be forgetting some things.”
TUELLER: “Oh really?” Tueller turns to Millie.
TUELLER: “That would make sense. My memory is a bit spotty right now but I don’t think Yetide could change shape or wipe people’s memories. We’d definitely have used that to our advantage more if we could.
STORY: Figgan opens the door to the cargo bay, looks at the three of you wide-eyed and blank, then bolts. The door slides shut slowly without her.
MILLICENT: “Sure. This doppleganger seems to be able to read us, at least a little. Maybe it arrived after we talked to Yetide and before we arrived – ” Millie starts running after Figgan.
RYO: “Huh.” Ryo watches her leave.
TUELLER: “Why do people keep giving us that look and running away?”
RYO: Ryo looks him up and down. “You are very imposing.” Then he follows after Millie.
MILLICENT: “Come on, I can’t do this by myself!”
TUELLER: Tueller starts trotting after Millie.
STORY: Where do you go, Millie?
MILLICENT: After Figgan!
STORY: No sign of her!
MILLICENT: Millie slides to a stop
MILLICENT: “Boys?”
RYO: Ryo stops.
TUELLER: Tueller trots up, unfazed.
MILLICENT: “She’s gone.”
MILLICENT: Is there a door she could have gone in?
TUELLER: “Probably our doppler friend.”
RYO: “Perhaps we should check the bridge. If you’re right that there’s something else here, I had the real her, I hope, lock herself on the bridge.”
MILLICENT: “Wait, who?”
MILLICENT: “I got lost in the pronouns.”
RYO: “Figgan.”
TUELLER: “Fig is on the bridge. Not-Fig just checked in on us, and deciding it couldn’t fool all of us all the time, ran away.”
RYO: “I presume that’s who we were running after? By the way, I hate to run. Unless I’m exercising. And even then.”
RYO: “Well, are we sure real Fig is on the bridge?”
MILLICENT: “Okay, then maybe we should collect everyone in the crew and search together?”
MILLICENT: “What do you think?”
TUELLER: “So we can split up again and assume that they’ll come up and try to talk to us one on one, and we can handle it then, or hope to try to run it down together.”
TUELLER: Millie and Tueller say that at the same time, more or less.
STORY: Millie, from the cargo bay her only ways to go are engineering, crew quarters, or upstairs
MILLICENT: “I’ll do whatever.”
RYO: “So, our working hypothesis is what? We didn’t get Yetide but instead got some sort of shapechanger? What about the things we all seem to be forgetting. That woman, for me. Yetide for Millie. Etc.?”
TUELLER: Tueller shrugs. “Sure?”
RYO: “And that!” He points at Millie. “You don’t ever say you’ll ’do whatever.’” He shakes his head. “Definitely not your style. But I don’t think you’re . . . not you. Are you?”
MILLICENT: “I forgot a child, I think, but not Yetide.”
MILLICENT: “I think I’m me! But I could be wrong.”
TUELLER: “Where did we first meet, Doc?”
MILLICENT: “When you stole my ship.”
RYO: “And me, where did you first meet me?”
MILLICENT: “After I was kidnapped by your boss. I met you with a rather intense woman who worked security.”
MILLICENT: “Shiv Byrne, I believe.”
TUELLER: “Also I think we’re all us because it wouldn’t make sense otherwise why people we know walk into rooms and then run away from us.”
RYO: Ryo squints. “This is so strange.”
MILLICENT: “Yes, but there’s something missing from each of us. Tueller was ready to run to Akilah with no plan, which is crazy suicide.”
TUELLER: Tueller rips strips off his shirt, and says, “Give me your right arm, both of you.”
MILLICENT: Millie shrugs and does, no questions.
TUELLER: Tueller pushes up their sleeve, and ties a bit of his jumpsuit on Millie’s right arm, pushing the sleeve back down again. “Just so I can tell you’re you.”
TUELLER: He does so to himself.
RYO: Ryo watches him do this. But he does so after a moment.
TUELLER: And then to Ryo.
TUELLER: “So not something it can tell and mimic, if we get separated.”
MILLICENT: “Okay, but if we separate it can just knock me out again and then take my bandana.”
TUELLER: “It won’t know.”
RYO: “Smart. Impressive.”
TUELLER: Tueller looks at Ryo. “You may be wrong about who’s the second smartest person on this ship.”
RYO: He smiles at this. “I might just be.”
MILLICENT: “Also I’d really rather avoid getting knocked out again. The data on cumulative multiple head trauma and brain hemorrhage is quite alarming.”
MILLICENT: “Who? What?”
RYO: “Now that is definitely the Doctor Breedlove I know.” He smiles at her.
MILLICENT: “You might be, though, you are smarter than you give yourself credit for.”
RYO: “Since we all seem to be laboring to figure out what’s going on, perhaps we should focus on the puzzle instead of who’s the smartest?”
TUELLER: “Well, we probably have a doppler on board, who I’m sad to learn is probably not my sister.”
RYO: “We have two proposals on the table, I believe. Stick together and round up the crew. Or split up and . . . I was fuzzy about the details of the second proposal.”
MILLICENT: “Good idea, let’s just say it’s you two and focus on the problem.”
MILLICENT: “If my vote counts I’d say we should stick together.”
TUELLER: “Sure.”
RYO: “Together then. I suggest we double check to see if the ‘real’ Figgan is still on the bridge. If so, then the shape changer hypothesis does seem to be a strong one. If not . . . then we might have to rethink it.”
TUELLER: “Sure. Let’s go.”
STORY: The intercom clicks. Millie, Tueller, you recognize it as the sound it makes at the end of a message.
RYO: Ryo stops and looks around.
MILLICENT: “That’s odd.”
TUELLER: Like, eavesdropping was happening? Or a broadcast happened that we didn’t hear?
STORY: Unknown!
TUELLER: “Huh. That was the intercom.”
TUELLER: “Clicking off.”
TUELLER: “Did anyone hear something? If I did, I’ve forgotten it already.”
MILLICENT: Millie shakes her head.
RYO: Ryo shakes his head. as well.
STORY: There’s a knock at the door.
TUELLER: “Well that’s another interesting thing!”
TUELLER: Tueller walks over and opens the door.
STORY: It’s locked.
TUELLER: Tueller knocks back.
STORY: There’s a figure on the other side. You can’t get a clear view through the porthole.
STORY: Muffled, through the door, a voice none of you recognize: “Truce.”
RYO: “Uhh . . . ” Ryo watches this.
TUELLER: “Okay, sure! Hi!”
TUELLER: Tueller looks back at the others with a smile.
TUELLER: “That was easy.”
STORY: “Send one person through please.”
TUELLER: Tueller looks at the others, points at himself, shrugs?
MILLICENT: “Okay, which one of you is less compromised?”
TUELLER: “Or does someone else want to go?”
MILLICENT: “I don’t want to.”
TUELLER: “Millie, you’re the smart one.”
MILLICENT: Millie blushes
TUELLER: “Why wouldn’t you want to? This is really cool!”
MILLICENT: “It already knocked me out once.”
RYO: “Tueller is definitely compromised. Doctor, you don’t seem yourself. I . . . how compromised do I seem?”
TUELLER: “I don’t know. We don’t know you as well.”
MILLICENT: “I guess I don’t know you well enough to tell, Mr. Hanaka.”
MILLICENT: “I think you’re a good choice, though. Better than the two of us.”
RYO: He puffs air out. “Yeah. Well, I don’t think someone who doesn’t seem at all scared should go. But also someone who’s actively avoiding it shouldn’t go. So . . . ”
TUELLER: “All that what?”
RYO: Ryo looks at him. “Scared?”
TUELLER: Tueller looks confused.
TUELLER: “Nevermind your jargon. If you want, go ahead.”
RYO: Ryo looks confused back. He looks to Millie and back. Then he shrugs it off.
MILLICENT: “But if you’re in trouble, call out.”
MILLICENT: “We’ll be right here.”
TUELLER: “It’ll be fine.”
RYO: He starts taking a deep breath and then blows it all out as Tueller says this. “Oh for fuck’s sake.” He goes through the door.
TUELLER: Tueller smiles in response.
STORY: Your mother’s on the other side, Ryo. She leans over and cups your cheek gently. “Hello, sweetie.”
RYO: He stands rigid. “This is disconcerting.”
STORY: She sits down on a crate, pats the spot next to it. “What is, darling?”
RYO: He sits next to her. “You. Here. I mean, obviously, it’s not really you.”
RYO: “Still, it’s nice to see you.”
STORY: She combs back your hair with her fingers. “It’s wonderful to see you.” She rests a hand on your shoulder, smiling proudly.
STORY: “You’ve done so much with yourself.”
RYO: He stifles a laugh. “Perhaps. But not enough. But, I’m here to talk about this . . . what was the word? Truce.”
STORY: She smiles, understanding. “Maybe just a snack first?”
RYO: “No thank you.”
STORY: She holds her fingers close together, making the “a little bit” gesture.
STORY: It’s a question.
RYO: He stands. “No, Mom. Not Mom, whoever or whatever you are. I want to discuss the truce. Did you bring me here in bad faith?”
RYO: He fidgets with his glasses.
STORY: She stands and groans, “Oh come ON. Fiiine.” Walking to the door and sliding it open, she calls back to you. “You should have sent in the big one.”
TUELLER: “Told you so.”
STORY: An older woman takes Alejo’s form before the three of you and sits on a crate, one leg tucked underneath him in a pose Alejo would never make.
TUELLER: “Hi.”
STORY: “Hi! So where are you taking me?”
TUELLER: “That’s not a great form to take.”
TUELLER: “I mean, I guess you have to have someone we all know? But that’s kind of not great with us.”
MILLICENT: “So, who’s this supposed to be?”
TUELLER: “Anyway, we were GOING to take Yetide out of the system, but that’s not really in play anymore.”
TUELLER: “I guess you can stay on while we head to Io instead.”
RYO: Ryo looks at him. “We are not going to Io.”
RYO: “At least not without a plan, which we do not have.”
STORY: “What’s on Io?”
TUELLER: Tueller waves off Ryo.
MILLICENT: “Let’s take a pause for a moment, please.”
MILLICENT: “Can we?”
MILLICENT: Steeling herself she addresses the stranger. “You’ve taken some things from us. Memories of friends and I think some small pieces of our personalities.”
STORY: Alejo scowls. “Oh, I mean, just a little.”
MILLICENT: “We’d like them back, please. Before we discuss where we’re going and what we’re going to do.” Gulp. “With you.”
STORY: He shrugs, sucking in air through his teeth. “Sorry.”
STORY: “No can do.”
TUELLER: “I think I’m untouched, honestly.”
RYO: “Oh, you’re touched.” Ryo says this without looking at him and flatly.
MILLICENT: “Is this permanent?”
RYO: He keeps his focus on the Alejo imposter.
STORY: Alejo shrugs. “Not sure. Not exactly in my interest to stick around and find out, you know?”
RYO: “What do you want, in exchange for whatever you took?”
STORY: “Just a ride.”
MILLICENT: “Where to?”
STORY: He shrugs again. “Anyone on Io?”
RYO: “What do you mean, is there anyone on Io?”
STORY: Alejo looks at you incredulously. “I mean… Is there anyone… on Io?”
MILLICENT: “I think it means it wants a ride to somewhere with more people it can feed off.”
STORY: He points at you, then his nose.
TUELLER: “My sister, allegedly.”
TUELLER: “A bunch of soldiers, probably.”
STORY: “Ooooh, is she anything like Yetide?”
STORY: “Your family has so many neuroses.”
TUELLER: “Sort of. Meaner.”
TUELLER: “How much time did you spend with Yetide?”
MILLICENT: Millie reaches over and places a finger over Tueller’s mouth. She shakes her head.
MILLICENT: “I don’t think it’s a good idea to share any more personal information with them.”
RYO: Ryo nods and points at Millie. “A vampire! A memory sucking vampire!”
STORY: Alejo picks at his boot. “Couple months. God, I was STARVING by the end there. Lucky you guys showed up.”
MILLICENT: “Yes, lucky.”
TUELLER: “Where is she?”
STORY: Alejo looks at you, tilting his head. “Give me a ride and I”ll tell you.”
TUELLER: “Tell me or I put you out an airlock.”
STORY: He looks at his fingernails, picking something underneath one of them. “What makes you think that’ll hurt me?”
TUELLER: “Not many minds out there right now.”
STORY: “Fair. But you’ve still got a lot of memories left to eat, and I’m quick. How long do you think I need to take her from you?”
STORY: Having never been betrayed by Alejo, the look he gives you feels wrong.
STORY: But this creature is ice cold.
TUELLER: “You have no idea how much pain my memories bring me.”
TUELLER: Tueller gives the creature an ice cold look as well. He does not look at all afraid of losing his memories.
RYO: “So, just to understand. We give you a ride and you give us our memories back? So, you can give them back?”
MILLICENT: “I never heard it offer the pro quo part.”
RYO: Ryo nods. “Why I’m asking.”
STORY: “You give me a ride,” he looks over at Ryo, smiling coolly, “and I don’t take any more.”
RYO: Ryo walks to a com. “Figgan?”
STORY: From the intercom: “Go ahead.”
RYO: “Set a course for the nearest sun. Drive us right into it at top speed.”
STORY: A long pause.
STORY: “Uh, okay, roger that,” sarcastically.
STORY: “Millie, are you bonkers now too?”
RYO: “Seriously. We have a memory sucking vampire on board that isn’t negotiating. We’ll all die anyway. Just real slow. Trust me.”
MILLICENT: “Please do as he says, dear.”
TUELLER: “Not if I space it while it wipes out everything that’s ever given me pain. Then it’s over pretty quick and I’m probably much easier to deal with.”
TUELLER: Tueller stands up.
RYO: “Please don’t do that, Tueller. You also need to trust me.”
STORY: Alejo flails his arms in front of him, holding up a leg defensively, then stops when Ryo speaks up, settling and looking confident again.
RYO: “Or, maybe . . . ” Ryo watches this.
RYO: He looks at Tuller and then at Millie. “Airlock?”
RYO: He moves towards the Alejo imposter.
TUELLER: Tueller tries to pick it up by the scruff of the neck.
TUELLER: “Airlock.”
STORY: Alejo springs up and jumps clumsily behind the crate he was sitting on.
STORY: “No NO no nonononono, okay, no!”
RYO: Ryo chases and tries to help.
STORY: He rushes back to a corner and holds up both hands, “Okay, STOP, HOLD ON.”
STORY: “ACTUAL TRUCE THIS TIME.”
MILLICENT: “Oh good, an actual truce.”
RYO: “Scratch that flying into a sun shit, Fig!” Ryo shouts as he closes in.
RYO: “I think that I have it. When it was my mom, she asked me to do something. I refused. Just don’t say yes to whatever it wants.”
TUELLER: “Not a truce.”
STORY: Alejo morphs quickly into Sergio, then Manaaki, then Millie, Tueller, then Ryo.
TUELLER: “You’re doing what we say, or you’re floating in space starving to death.”
RYO: “Airlock. Unless you give us our memories back. Now.”
STORY: Does seeing any of those people make any of you have feelings?
RYO: Ryo is a bit startled to see himself for a brief moment.
MILLICENT: Nah, sorry.
TUELLER: No, Tueller’s feeling pretty blase right now.
STORY: Okay! The Ryo lookalike throws himself against the real Ryo and they tussle on the floor for a moment.
STORY: Rolling, one flipping the other over.
RYO: The real Ryo tires to use his ring to knock the thing out!
STORY: Launch Assault, Ryo.
RYO: /roll 2d6
STORY: ablair01 rolled 8
TUELLER: Tueller tries to separate them, but, you know, I like a good doppelganger dividing set up.
MILLICENT: — CLONES ON A ROOFTOP CLONES ON A ROOFTOP CLONES ON A ROOFTOP
STORY: The target suffers a lesser fate! You get a good shot on him, and it really rings his bell, but before you know what’s happening you’re both standing up, both a little hazy from the combat, both ready to convince your friends you’re the real one.
LEFT RYO: Ryo looks at you, Ryo.
RIGHT RYO: Ryo looks back, adjusting his glasses.
RIGHT RYO: “That was bracing.”
MILLICENT: “Hmmm.”
LEFT RYO: The Ryo on the left dusts off his jacket, adjusts his glasses, and looks unhappily at his doppelganger. “Oh, come on.”
MILLICENT: Millie leans over to Tueller and stage whispers. “You know, it occurs to me that we don’t really have to make a choice here. We could just space them both.”
TUELLER: “That works for me.”
MILLICENT: Millie shrugs.
TUELLER: “Okay, Ryo, show me what you were supposed to do to prove it’s you.”
RIGHT RYO: Ryo frowns at this. “Please.” He rolls up his sleeve to reveal the tie that Tueller gave him.
LEFT RYO: Ryo points animatedly. “He must have taken that off me when we were wrestling!”
MILLICENT: “Mmmmm.”
TUELLER: Turns to left Ryo. “What did I ask you to prove you were you last?”
RIGHT RYO: “Yes, because we were clearly expert wrestlers.”
LEFT RYO: Ryo shakes his head. “You asked where we first met.”
LEFT RYO: “This is absurd, you know that.”
RIGHT RYO: “I was going to say that.”
RIGHT RYO: “Seriously, this is silly. Alejo punched me in the face, I said, while you pretty much watched.”
LEFT RYO: “It was you listening on the intercom, then.” He gestures to Right Ryo. “We won’t get anywhere with this.”
RIGHT RYO: “On that we agree. Which is why the tie on my arm, under my shirt, should resolve the matter.”
TUELLER: “It’s a psychic vampire, which is why I…yes, the tie on the arm.”
RIGHT RYO: “That was its intended purpose, yes, Tueller?”
LEFT RYO: “Except he heard us planning that, made his own – you’re wearing a standard jumpsuit, yes? And tore mine off while we were wrestling.”
TUELLER: “It was, and” (I’m assuming Tueller didn’t see anything that would indicate that it was shifted) “that’s why I’m trusting it.”
STORY: Tueller, you saw the two of them rolling around and can’t be sure one didn’t get pulled off in the fracas.
MILLICENT: “What if you named your most significant ex?”
RIGHT RYO: “Ex? Like Ex boss? What do you mean?”
LEFT RYO: “Liar. He’s pretending to have forgotten.”
MILLICENT: “So who is it?”
RIGHT RYO: “Who is what? My most significant ex boss? My mom.”
RIGHT RYO: “Look, we saw that thing whimper away from us. It did not appear to be a very adept fighter. I can hardly imagine it being able to deftly remove a tie and then magically make it disappear.”
LEFT RYO: “He’s stalling.” Ryo hesitates, looking bashful. “Kahn, It was Kahn.”
RIGHT RYO: “Who?” Right Ryo looks at Left Ryo.
TUELLER: “Huh.”
MILLICENT: To Tueller, “What do you think?”
MILLICENT: “I mean, I don’t know why we’re doing this, I can just take a DNA sample and examine it in my lab.”
TUELLER: Pointing at Right Ryo: “Clearly the one going out into space.”
MILLICENT: “Do you boys feel up to that?”
RIGHT RYO: “I don’t know this Kahn person. Or I don’t remember.” He pauses. “Because you stole that memory, you memory thieving bastard.” Right Ryo walks over to Left Ryo and punches him as hard as he can in the face.
STORY: Let’s have a Launch Assault there Ryo
RYO: /roll 2d6
STORY: ablair01 rolled 7
TUELLER: “Oh. Shit.”
STORY: That one works, but you’re gonna break your hand. Proceed?
RYO: Yes.
TUELLER: “Oh man I made the wrong choice there that was silly of me.”
STORY: There’s a loud crack as Ryo punches his own teeth out and one of him crumples to the ground.
TUELLER: Tueller goes to help real Ryo.
RYO: “Mother. . . ” He winces. “Does punching someone like that always hurt this much. Jesus.”
STORY: The creature is knocked out cold, and you quickly arrange for DNA tests to confirm that you’ve got the correct Ryo. Also, he takes a Minor wound and is going to need that hand looked at, Millie.
TUELLER: “You need to have your thumb outside the fist, not in it.”
TUELLER: “We can work on it.”
RYO: “Pro tip.” He is grimacing in pain but he manages a smile.
MILLICENT: Millie works out a containment option that will hold a shapeshifter. Maybe cuffs with sensors that can react to a size change?
STORY: You fiddle with trying to build something like that, then settle for the old school method of putting it in a room and locking the door from the outside.
TUELLER: “We still don’t know how it steals memories.”
STORY: Erwin finds you. “I think I do.”
STORY: He pulls up an entry on the ship’s console. “This is from the offline databases, so it might be out of date, but this sounds like a Kinri.”
STORY: He points to a few lines of text and a blank space where the picture would typically be. “Mind eaters, they’re called on their homeworld. They subsist on emotions, manipulating the subjects into feeling strong emotions and then taking them, along with any associated memories.”
STORY: “Explains why we’re all forgetting each other.”
TUELLER: “Except me.”
MILLICENT: “Interesting.”
TUELLER: “Because I’m so calm.”
RYO: Ryo frowns. “You’ve got some screws not as tight as they should be. Trust me.”
MILLICENT: “Well done, child.”
STORY: “Unsurprisingly people hated this, and they were slaughtered nearly to extinction. This one’s probably never seen another one of its kind.”
TUELLER: “Useful survival mechanism, as the people who hate you and kill you promptly forget about it.”
RYO: “Does it say anything about how to get the memories back?”
MILLICENT: “So that brings us to the what do we do with it question.”
STORY: Erwin shakes his head. “Seems like… it might be permanent.”
RYO: Ryo frowns at this.
RYO: “I was worried you’d say that.”
MILLICENT: “Well, I think I’d like to run some tests. I don’t know what good it will do, but I’d like to try?”
TUELLER: “So, we wait for this thing to wake up, I interrogate it about my sister’s whereabouts, while keeping calm–maybe something from the medicine chest to ensure that–and then we get rid of it.”
RYO: Ryo sighs. “Doctor. I don’t know what it took from you. But, notwithstanding my glib jibes, you’re the smartest person I’ve ever met. This self-doubt does not become you.”
TUELLER: “Maybe it got taken away?”
MILLICENT: “I’m sorry. I’ll try to be better.”
RYO: Ryo smiles sympathetically. “Please try the tests. I believe that if anyone can help us, it’s you.”
STORY: Let’s do some tests!
STORY: Millie, give me Assessment + Expertise
MILLICENT: Can I use my data point on Yetide’s status here?
STORY: Sure.
MILLICENT: /roll 2d6 + 3
STORY: josh rolled 7 + 3 = 10
STORY: Are you doing these tests on the creature or on your friends?
MILLICENT: Friends first, then creature
STORY: Let’s just do friends for now. You ask everyone a barrage of questions, like a handmade Voight-Kampff test, and discover what everyone has lost
STORY: Everyone, what specifically have you lost?
MILLICENT: frustration pride confidence Erwin and Alejo
STORY: Astra doesn’t remember Erwin or the feeling of amusement, none of the rest of the crew remember Yetide or confusion.
TUELLER: Calixta/Noma, the existence of lust, romance, and fear
STORY: Also probably snakes, Tueller, I forgot that part
STORY: I imagine you don’t know about snakes anymore
TUELLER: Oh yes, snakes.
RYO: Astra, Chandra, Kahn, being conflicted, being sad, being lusty, being contented
TUELLER: Wow, two lust-free members of the crew.
STORY: Anyway, Millie, you do some prodding and figure out these details, and then try to talk them through situations where they might feel those emotions and you make some headway. Ryo’s even able to remember a little bit about Kahn. So you think with time the memories might come back.
STORY: Also you gain a data point about this psychic vampire.
MILLICENT: Thank yew
STORY: With that in mind, what do you do?
MILLICENT: I now examine it. I’d like to know a couple things: the extent of what it can do and how to stop it.
TUELLER: “I see why people committed genocide on these guys.”
STORY: Millie, what it can do is steal your memories if it’s able to make you feel anything.
STORY: You have no defense against psychic attack, so you can’t stop it through any kind of science or cleverness.
MILLICENT: Gotcha. Does it have a normal, killable body?
STORY: Yes!
MILLICENT: Okay, I report back.
MILLICENT: I feel like Millie is applying some really clinical CBT to everyone.
TUELLER: “I want to talk to it; it knew where Yetide is, and we need to get Yetide in to let…Nama…out?”
TUELLER: Tueller closes his eyes and shakes his head. “That’s not quite right, is it.”
MILLICENT: “Close.”
RYO: “Keep working at it, friend. You’re getting closer.”
RYO: “But what do we do with this thing? I want to kill it. I do. But, it could be the last of its kind in the universe.”
TUELLER: “So?”
MILLICENT: “We can talk to it, but I’d feel safer talking through a door. We’ve got it in a room with a porthole and we’ve got an intercom. Let’s talk to it.”
TUELLER: “There’s a reason for that.”
TUELLER: “It wipes out people’s histories for food.”
MILLICENT: “It’s got something we want and we’re it’s only hope for survival.”
TUELLER: “Some genocides are deserved.”
MILLICENT: “And I really don’t want to kill the last of its kind. I’m not going to be a part of any genociding.”
MILLICENT: Millie sounds sure of herself for the first time in days.
TUELLER: Tueller shrugs. He still sounds a little off.
MILLICENT: “So, we talk and if we don’t like what it says we drop it off on an inhabitable planetoid somewhere.”
MILLICENT: Millie looks around the room. “If we’re going to be the good guys it starts here.”
TUELLER: “I’m not sure putting a memory-eating monster on a planetoid with other people makes us the good guys.”
RYO: Ryo shrugs. “I think she meant an uninhabited planet, as a threat. What we do if it cooperates . . . that’s a different question.”
RYO: “Maybe we can come up with artificial food for it or something?”
RYO: He looks down. “I have no idea what I’m talking about.”
MILLICENT: “Oh, there’s an idea.”
MILLICENT: Millie looks into making fake food for the doppleganger
MILLICENT: Tries to figure out how memories nourish it and replicate it artificially.
STORY: You’d need extended examination of and interaction with the creature to figure that out, what Erwin found is basically a one page Encyclopedia Galactica entry.
MILLICENT: I mean, how long’s our trip back to the Ark?
STORY: Are you going to the Ark?
TUELLER: Tueller is quiet. “I have some things I’d be okay not remembering for awhile. If they grow back.”
MILLICENT: Well, wherever.
MILLICENT: How long will it take to make an artificial food source for this thing?
TUELLER: We’re not going back to the Ark.
TUELLER: We have no Ya’Makasis.
RYO: “So, we’re trying to find Yetide, yes? We picked this thing up with her people on Mercury. She must be there still, right? This thing would have run off, if it had some way to do so, presumably?”
STORY: Millie, you don’t know without examination.
STORY: You don’t even know if you can.
RYO: “Gone to Earth and a feast.”
TUELLER: “We need to interrogate this this. Either friendly, feeding it my painful memories, or unfriendly. I can do either.”
TUELLER: “If you really want to keep this thing alive, then we have to turn it into a sin eater.”
TUELLER: “Not a monster.”
MILLICENT: “Okay, well. It’s got a body. A physical one. But if it makes you feel anything it can feed on that and remove someone from your memory or something from your personality.”
RYO: “Do we though? That’s what I’m saying. We’re only a few days from Mercury. Why not just go back and check again before we expose ourselves to the risk of this thing?”
RYO: Ryo is apparently mostly talking to himself, at this point.
MILLICENT: “That would give me time to begin work on an artificial diet for this thing.”
RYO: Ryo points at her enthusiastically.
MILLICENT: “I’m with Mr. Hanaka. Let’s go back to Mercury and search for Yetide. See if she was ever there.”
TUELLER: “Sure, but this thing was there, and eating, it could help us.”
TUELLER: “If we talk to it either friendly or un-.”
RYO: Ryo nods. “It could. That’s true.”
TUELLER: “And honestly, I volunteer some of my baggage.”
MILLICENT: “Well, who’s going to interrogate it, then?”
MILLICENT: “Sold. We’ll wield weapons menacingly from outside the room in case it gets to you.”
TUELLER: “Keep your emotions in check.”
STORY: Okay! You come up to the door and when you open it, the creature inside looks like Tux, and it cowers.
TUELLER: Tueller goes in alone.
STORY: It’s as far into the corner as it can get, and it holds its hands out in front of it. “Please don’t hurt me.”
TUELLER: “Hi. I hope that neither of will hurt each other anymore.”
TUELLER: “I must admit, you took my sense of….afraidness…away, so I am bolder than even I normally am.”
TUELLER: “But I want to talk.”
TUELLER: “We’re turning around, and going back to get my sister, Yetide, if she’s still back on Mercury.”
STORY: “She is.”
STORY: “Please don’t leave me there.”
STORY: “I’ll starve.”
TUELLER: “Did you eat your fill of everyone there?”
STORY: It looks at the floor.
TUELLER: “It’s okay. Actually it is. The Doc learned something while you were unconscious. Our memories will heal. With practice, they come back faster.”
TUELLER: “Now, I don’t know what would happen if you eat the same memory over and over again–that might be rough. So we’re not testing that just yet. But the Doc wants to work with you, and maybe see if we can find a way to feed you without hurting others. That will take some time.”
STORY: Tux brightens, a bit.
STORY: “I have a cousin in Phebes who is a therapist.”
STORY: “Her patients never even know.”
TUELLER: “But. You know me. You can see my pain. And I don’t need that pain. I don’t need to carry it all the time. So. Here’s our proposal. You help us. And we’ll work with you.”
TUELLER: “And you can have her. For a little.”
TUELLER: “And you can have her as well, for a little.”
STORY: He looks surprised. “But you hold on to it so tightly.”
TUELLER: Tueller is silent and expressionless for a little bit.
TUELLER: “Does that make it better or worse for you?”
STORY: “Bigger emotions are more nourishing.”
TUELLER: “Anyway, if the Doc can come up with something so you don’t NEED this,” Tueller points at his heart for a moment, “then maybe you can, yes, work as a therapist, or a sin eater.”
STORY: Let’s have FA + Influence please!
TUELLER: I’ll use a close up.
TUELLER: /roll 2d6+1
STORY: chris.stuart rolled 9 + 1 = 10
STORY: All right! You strike a deal with the creature, and it agrees to stay in this room and work with Millie figuring out how to ethically eat memories.
STORY: It can’t subsist on anything else, so there’s no option to develop an Imitation Memory Extract, but Millie comes up with a few careers it can pursue once it gets somewhere populated that would keep it from doing long-term harm to its food.
STORY: It doesn’t have a name, and never knew its parents, so ethics are pretty new to it, but it takes to the idea of surviving without having to run every time things get hairy.
STORY: You return to Mercury and pick up Yetide and her crew, all of whom are effectively sucked dry and complacent. One Ya’Makasi down.
STORY: Where to next?
TUELLER: Well, Tueller has been in need of a therapist, too.
MILLICENT: Millie patiently explains to Tueller that therapists don’t help you erase your bad emotions, just deal with and contextualize them as they arise.
TUELLER: Yetide is sucked dry and uninterrogatable?
STORY: Yetide is very easy to interrogate, she tells you everything she knows which is what you already knew – Esinam is holed up on Io and has fended off everyone who has come, and Bilbo has disappeared but she suspects he’s somewhere in Erde-Maris territory.
STORY: And you already know how to get Musimbwa if you want.
TUELLER: “Let’s go to luna!”
TUELLER: “Please don’t eat that memory just because I got excited.”
MILLICENT: Millie sits up straight at dinner one night and points at Erwin. “You’re Tux’s kid!”