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Part II.

 

January 23rd, 2248
The Horizon Sun

 

He only knew the date when he was told what it was.

It still hadn't mattered. Passing time didn't change anything. Before, Scotty would have probably automatically tried to run down the numbers to guess how long it would be before they made it back to their own solar system, back to Earth, but it didn't even cross his mind. Chalmers mentioned the date... for some reason. He didn't know what. And it flitted across his thoughts for just a moment, then it was gone again.

Mostly, they walked on eggshells around him. He registered that because it pissed him off, though only so much as he could bother being pissed off. He wasn't the one who died. He still worked, lived, breathed; there were too few engineers to allow for any bereavement leave. He still worked well, too, losing himself in the flow of energy patterns and connections and mechanical noise; losing himself through his hands and his skill and a need to set something right. It wasn't like he was going to fall to pieces and start sobbing like a child in the engine room.

He noted their caution because it pissed him off, but even that was far away.

He didn't know what to feel. There was one strong surge of anger, because after getting her letter with the solicitors', he got into it with his sister; they gave him all the subspace time he needed to make calls, and so he had called her. He wished he hadn't. It had been a very long time since Scotty actually snapped back at her when she got that passive-aggressive tone, but this time he did -- they were snarling over the line. Her in tears, him just-- just mad.

He hadn't started off mad, but she hit every single sore spot he had inside and it only ended when she cut off the connection. He would have gladly kept raging right back at her.

But then the call was over and the rage faded and he half-forgot that he'd even felt it in the first place.

He didn't know what to feel. Guilt, or anger, or sorrow, or-- he didn't know what to feel at all. So, he didn't even try.

All he really knew was that it didn't feel real.

But it wasn't that he denied it. Heart attack, on a personal transport coming back from some event on Io Station. Medics tried to revive her. Failed. She was pronounced dead after transfer to the closest medical facility, but she was likely dead within moments of hitting the deck. He got that, those cold facts. Believed them. There was no reason not to believe them.

Just...

He believed the facts. Why didn't those make it real?

They walked on eggshells around him. Tried to rearrange the schedules so that he could be off-shift more. Scott wouldn't have any of it. He went in and worked; preferred working, really, because then he felt as normal as he could. There was still a kind of impending sense of doom that ran 'round and 'round in the back of his mind, but he could mostly focus himself into the work.

The engine room, consequently, was slowly becoming cleaner and more organized than it ever had been before. Chalmers had tried on the first day to offer condolences and then had backed off when Scotty just peered back at him unblinking. The chief hadn't bothered him since then, though there were times it looked like he wanted to say something. Thatcher was the only one who persisted; talked about a dog he had that died when he was seven, and how you have to grieve and accept and... some other such nonsense.

Normally, Scott would have just tuned the chattering out once it became clear that it was just chatter. Mostly he did this time, too. But then Thatcher went and put an arm around his shoulders.

He nearly put Thatcher through the bulkhead, and it was Perez who barely stopped it.

Thatcher was white in the face. Chalmers was anxious too, staring wide-eyed. Only Perez stood his ground, giving Scotty's arm a tug and looking like he was ready to fend off a fist if need be, saying calmly, "He's learned his lesson."

After another moment of staring at his petrified crewmate, Scott shrugged it off; let go of Thatcher's uniform collar and went back to work. Chalmers started breathing again and Thatcher scurried away looking ready to break down into tears.

Perez stood a moment longer, but didn't say anything. Then he just gave Scott a solemn pat on the shoulder and headed back to his own post.

And for reasons Scotty couldn't quite piece together, that last act was the one that bothered him the most.

 

 

 

It wasn't that he really meant not to call Cor back, when he got the first message that he'd missed his best friend calling. He was going to, but then he forgot. Then Corry wrote and the letter was short and filled with worry, even just in text on a screen, and Scotty was going to call then, too, but he didn't know what he would say. He tried to imagine the conversation, but it didn't work; the words dissolved and left him going back to the engine room to look over the next bit of maintenance he had to do. He could work there, could focus there, could think there.

The letter after that bordered on frantic, and not too far on the heels of the first. And finally Scott managed to not put it off anymore, and forced himself to call.

He still didn't know what to say. It was only about two seconds before Corry was asking what was wrong, and six seconds before Scotty automatically answered that he was fine, and then it was a whole eternity of silence. Minutes or hours. Could have been either.

"Scotty, what happened?" Corry asked quietly, finally, and Scotty only really heard it because it had been silent for so long.

He thought again about how to explain it. About what to say. But without even actually meaning to, he just said, "My mother's dead."

Silence fell again, mercifully.  There, he'd said it.  Three words, stating the facts. He didn't try to sketch in the details, because really, they made no difference. Corry barely knew her anyway, had only met her the once, and it wasn't like it probably hadn't made some news outlet somewhere -- Caitlyn Scott really was renowned, was famous at least inside of culinary circles -- so he could probably find the rest on his own.

Three words, but Scotty had never spoken them before.  Three words, but he didn’t know what they really meant.  She hadn’t been on Earth that three weeks he had been the prior year; he didn’t even try to go back to Aberdeen once he knew she wasn’t going to be there and hadn’t been planning on staying there even if she had been.

They had exchanged two letters that whole first forty-five weeks he’d been in space.

So, rather than Aberdeen, he’d just had himself transported to the public platform station in Augusta, Maine; landed on the same platform he’d landed on so many times before when coming back from Lunar or the San Francisco Yards, and then he walked down the steps, bracing himself with little success against the inevitable half-tackle, half-hug that Corry ambushed him with, and he’d laughed even as he was knocked partly off of his feet and then lifted completely off of them.

He didn’t even realize the lack.  The loss of.  He didn’t feel any sorrow over his own mother not being there; it just didn’t really occur to him that he should.

Not until now.  Not until it was too late.

Silence held, long enough that he forgot he even had an open comm line. But then Corry asked, voice drawn tight with grief and pleading, "Tell me what I can do?"

And Scotty heard that.

Not just with his ears, not just through a distance, but right next to him; not some stranger, not a solicitor who wanted him to sign forms or a sister who still hated him for some reason he couldn't even fathom, but his best friend, his brother, who wanted to help, of all things, and--

Scotty shook his head, staring at the comm mic with his eyebrows drawn, trying to-- to--

And it hurt.

It was only when he started breathing again that he realized that he'd stopped, and it was only when he saw the light next to his monitor that he realized he was still connected, and he shook his head harder, an outright denial, even if he didn't know what the Hell he was trying to deny.

"I've gotta go," he said, a panicked edge creeping into his voice.

He didn't even give Corry a chance to reply, just slapped his palm down on the button, disconnecting the call.



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