Chapter Text
The door -- the one to her balcony, not the one to the stairs -- flew open. Startled, Lucca jumped half out of her seat, knocking everything off her desk.
“Lucca! It’s a beautiful day and you are not going to spend it all inside reading!” Marle told her, hands on hips. Chrono noded in fervent agreement.
“That Telepod’s for my mom,” Lucca grumbled, kneeling to retrieve the scattered pieces of paper from the floor. Admittedly, she also used it to transport her laundry downstairs, and herself when she was feeling especially lazy, but admitting that would mean ceding moral ground. “Also, you could have knocked.”
“We did. You were just lost in thought and didn’t hear us.” Marle bent to help. “Hey, what’s this you were looking at? Printouts, like they had in 2300 AD.” She fingered the page, smoother and whiter than anything Guardia had in the present. “Except they’re just a bunch of dots.”
Chrono picked one up and studied it. “Not dots. These are star charts.” He tapped the one he was holding. “I recognize the Big Bear and Little Bear. But…. the north star is missing.” He raised an eyebrow.
Lucca rubbed the back of her neck. “Yeah. Back when we were trying to figure out how to stop Lavos, I had Robo map all the stars for me, at all the different times. I should’ve gotten more specific data on at least some of them -- the spectra of some of the stars, or at least noted down which were actually nebulae or galaxies. I didn’t think of it.”
“So how about we go ask him to? Chrono was saying, we haven’t seen Ayla or the rest in a while. Not since we brought back his cat. The second time, I mean.” She elbowed him.
Chrono looked peeved. “It’s not my fault my cat keeps finding new Gates. And why was there one under the kitchen sink?”
“Well, there was the one that opened into someone’s kitchen cupboard in Media, so-”
“Uh….” Lucca cleared her throat. “I’d really - really - love to hop in the Epoch and go on a quick jaunt to the future. But there’s… complications.” She shuffled her papers and adjusted her glasses.
“What kind of complications?” Chrono asked suspiciously.
Lucca reordered her star-charts in chronological order and set them on the desk before she answered. “Well, the Epoch, er… it’s kind of halfways disassembled right now. But don’t worry, I can fix it! It will just take a while.”
“You took our time machine apart? ” Marle demanded. “Lucca… that’s our only way to see our friends! It belongs to all of us! How could you do such a thing without asking?”
“It was going to be a surprise…” Lucca mumbled. “I didn’t think it would take me this long! I thought I’d have everything ready before either of you thought to ask.”
Marle folded her arms. “Have what ready?”
“Oh, didn’t I say? I’m upgrading the Epoch.” Lucca made herself grin, and felt better just for doing that. “See, we’ve been all around the world… we’ve seen the past, the present, and the future… but there’s one place we haven’t gone yet!”
“And… where’s that?” Marle asked.
Lucca smiled her widest and thrust a pointing finger at her pile of star-charts. “Here!”
Chrono peered at the page. “To your desk?” he asked.
“No, to the stars.” Lucca huffed. “The moon! Other planets! Space! It’s the last frontier! And we’re going to be the pioneers!”
“Is this going to hurt?” Chrono wanted to know.