sixth molotov cocktail made ☾ ( video ) ☾ look out to the future but it tells you nothing.

[mathematically]

[ lydia looks like she's exhausted and if she's truthful about it she honestly is exhausted. for a moment it looks like she's not going to say anything, that she just wanted to broadcast her own face just to show how she appears before she ends up just exhaling. ]

I've been here two years. I know we don't measure things by months and years here but— it's been 25 jumps and where I come from that might as well mean two years. I've been home for months at a time and it felt like a blink of an eye. [ she pauses. ] I'm tired of being on this ship. You get people who are dead at home here and there's no guarantee they'll stay. If you're lucky they stay and you get to bond with them. If you're not, they just leave and you don't. You— who can totally go back home and be alive. They can't.

I get wanting to stay because of that. You all can enjoy being on a creepy horror ship that I'm honestly pretty sure wants us dead or something even worse. It's better than being dead at home, I'll give you that. But I want to go home already. I want to see my mom again and not find myself back here afterward.

[ lydia clears her throat. ] I want to find a way home. I don't want to make this place my home any more than I have. And to do that, I need to do a little research. Now, if you're the type that's getting a little tired of being here and would like to help, you should come talk to me. And maybe, with any luck and a lack of another plague happening, we might actually make some headway.

Comments

[voice|private|100% locked]

[ryuuzaki]

What kind of research?

[Measured, but interested -- maybe it will be a good idea, maybe it will be a good idea to dissuade her.

He's been here for two years, too. He's never gone home. There are loose ends, and his real work, which has felt very far away for some time. The situation is unsatisfying.]

[voice|private|100% locked]

[mathematically]

Research in how we got here. How other people leave, not by death of course. Those are outliers that don't need to be counted if you're researching.

[ It sounds more clinical than she means it to, than she really feels, because all deaths here are important. Death itself is important, but she doesn't want to leave by dying. That defeats the purpose. ]

[ryuuzaki]

When I was brought here, around the same time as you, I was told that it had been done in the past, and that the inquiries hadn't turned up any useful results. I didn't pursue further inquiries partly because I anticipated that there would be enough resistance to make the attempt useless.

That said, I didn't think it was very likely that the research had been anything other than anecdotal. We can't compel participation, so variables in the data will include things like people who don't respond, and people who lie, and people who are unavailable for comment.

They might be more likely to admit what happened if they left and came back. It's hard to say.

[mathematically]

They also hadn't been here for this long or gone through as many things. From any of the stories, it wasn't great but it wasn't anything like last jump or when we all found ourselves sharing memories or anything like that. It could be more effective now.

Even if people lie or don't respond. Besides, you can make people talk. If it sounds too outlandish, they just won't count.

[ she pauses. ] What are you defining as leaving and coming back? Because I've felt like I've left, I have new memories of home but my number didn't change. And really, there are people who leave and come back who don't remember anything.