do: read; don't: visit 214

[giftedandtalented]

Mehitabel reads a lot.

She starts calling herself "Tab", for short, not that anyone calls her anything apart from Kers. She writes suitably encrypted emails to Aelise about ideas for fixing the world - mostly she asks questions, to start, forming a picture of the exact problem she has to solve.

She misses her parents, but not very much. At least she got to say goodbye.

When her brain won't absorb new information, she bounces around in zero-g.

After six months, Aelise visits again.

Tab says, "Anybody you store up here must be important somehow. If I don't know about the other secret person, I won't know how to come up with ideas that work with them being important however they're important."

Comments

[alicornucopia]

"He's north by -" Demauri pauses. "He's gone."

[queensidecastle]

"Dammit," says Kers. She sighs. "Thank you. You can go back to sleep."

[alicornucopia]

"Love 'n loyalty," mumbles Demauri, "sorry," and he goes back to sleep.

[lookingforwardtoit]

Anneia finally answers, with a sleepy, wordless mumble.

[queensidecastle]

She takes a breath.

"Corona just killed himself. I called to see if you could get to him in time, but - you couldn't have. It was maybe half a minute from when he cut me out."

[lookingforwardtoit]

"Shit," says Anneia.

[warmfeelings]

In the morning, Chelsa winds up curled up to Tima, since Corona isn't there.

She isn't worried right away. He may have gone to get a snack. It would be sort of thoughtless of him to go on a trip while she's so frazzled, but she never said he couldn't, she supposes.

[lookingforwardtoit]

And she continue supposing that until she sees Anneia, a little while later.

She's been up half the night trying to think of some way to say it - she's sure Kers has told Aelise by now, but Aelise isn't going to make a special trip to Chelsa's friends' quarters just to break the news, she doesn't think - and in the end she just blurts out, "Corona killed himself last night."

[warmfeelings]

[lookingforwardtoit]

"I don't know - why, or where, or anything - Kers called me when he shut her out, but she says it wasn't more than a minute from then until Demauri couldn't find him."

She sniffles. She liked Corona. Well - of course she did.

[warmfeelings]

Chelsa hugs her and bawls.

[lookingforwardtoit]

Anneia hugs her tightly.

[warmfeelings]

Chelsa is inconsolable.

She is not in a position to deliver announcements for the next time zone cluster's morning.

[lookingforwardtoit]

Anneia and Sandre both stay with her.

[salus_populi]

In three hundred years, this is not the first time that Chelsa has missed a set of morning announcements. Aelise fills in just like always, greeting the appropriate section of the world with a smile and some inconsequential news, and explaining that Chelsa was called away because one of her close friends died unexpectedly that morning.

Then she finds the time to notify Tab, because in no way is Chelsa ready for another flicker, and she probably won't be for a while.

[giftedandtalented]

Tab agrees to wait.

Maybe Chelsa will just fall apart all by herself.

[warmfeelings]

That sure looks like it's a possibility.

Chelsa can't stop crying. She'll let Amdon feed her, when he begs her to eat something, but mostly she just cries.

[salus_populi]

This is... not ideal.

But it's not the worst way it could've happened, she supposes.

Aelise visits Chelsa, amidst her friends. She expresses her condolences and gives Chelsa a hug.

[warmfeelings]

Chelsa will take hugs. She is very tearfully welcoming of hugs.

[salus_populi]

Then Aelise will give her hugs.

[warmfeelings]

Chelsa doesn't really get better.

She's bidden friends goodbye before, to trade them in for warmer models, but they don't die, not anytime soon, and they don't kill themselves, and none of them were her warm sun.

She does a few announcements, on her better days, but she has to have someone sitting with her, out of sight of the camera, and her smile is a little forced.

She stops crying perpetually, but she's listless, and she sleeps a lot.

[salus_populi]

Aelise observes all this.

She suggests gently that maybe Chelsa would like to retire, to a comfortable little island, with all her special friends.

[warmfeelings]

Chelsa would like that.

[salus_populi]

Aelise makes the arrangements. She would like it if Chelsa did one last set of announcements, to say goodbye to everyone, reassure them as much as she can. But she'll understand if Chelsa doesn't feel up to it.

[warmfeelings]

Chelsa doesn't want to upset anyone. She'll do the set, but it will have to wait for a good morning, which delays her departure.

Finally, she has an unusually calm-dreamed night and wakes up and tells the world she's going into retirement, and will miss them.