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Dr. Gemini Tay, the resident exobiologist of the Hermitheus Outpost, was starting to come to the conclusion that she was the only person on this goddamn space rock who had a single braincell in her skull. Between whatever the hell polycule situation Zed, Impulse, Tango, and Etho had going on; the… meat… that Keralis kept in the back of food storage; and Scar’s general Scar-ness, it was a miracle, really, that any science got done at all.
“Scar,” she said, immediately upon realising this, “Let me out of food storage now.”
“Well, now,” Scar – who was making absolutely no effort to hide the fact that he was holding the passkey in his hand – reasoned, “I don’t know how to do that, but maybe we could strike a deal of some sort?”
“Here’s a deal!” Gem smiled brightly, peeking through the triple-glazed circular window, “You let me out now, and I don’t tell Zedaph where you’ve hidden JELL-3 this time!”
“Oh…” Scar gasped, “No! No, you wouldn’t do that to a man! She’s my emotional support droid, I can’t have Zedaph, or any other miscreant, poking around in her insides!”
“Then let me out.” Gem’s smile widened slightly, turning more into a baring-of-fangs. Scar, seemingly, got the message and obliged, unlocking the door. Gem picked up the ingredients she had come into food storage for, and, carefully concealing it in case any prying eyes were curious about her actions, made her way into the habitation dome’s tiny kitchenette. Using her command privileges to disable the kitchenette’s security camera, she grinned and set to work.
–––
Psychologist’s Notes
Subject: Dr. Gemini Tay
Overseer: Dr. Zedaph Plaze
Stardate: 8-12-24XX
Gem, for the life of her, can’t hide that she’s keeping a secret. Unlike Impulse and Tango, however, she is quite good at keepping mum about what the secret actually is. This, in turn, is greatly inhibiting my role as outpost psychologist, because I can’t tell if what she’s lying to me about is a serious issue or not.
I bring this up because in our session this morning, she was even more secretive than usual, hurrying through the check-up – an incredibly inadvisable choice, given the sort of psychological strains the general isolation from the rest of humanity out here at Hermetheus can bring – and making her excuses.
The only explanation for this, of course, is that Scar has hidden JELL-3 in her room again. His attachment to that droid is deeply concerning, but not the subject of this report.
Beyond all the strange secrecy, Gem is holding up fairly well! She’s settled into the dynamic out here rather nicely, and has built a friendly rapport with her fellow scientists. She has maintained both her duties and hobbies with a reasonable amount of vigor, and is showing minimal signs of stress, overwork, or space-shock.
–––
“Gem,” the outpost’s engineer, one Tango of the Tek variety, walked into the room. Gem carefully positioned herself in front of the oven so that he couldn’t see the cake baking inside. “Why is the camera in this room off?”
“Oh, it must have malfunctioned!” Gem shrugged, trying to will him away by sheer force of charm. She had nothing against the man, not really, but she couldn’t risk Zed finding out about this, and Zed seemed to have the magical ability to know any secret Tango was trying to keep from him.
“It was turned off. With your authorization. That’s only supposed to happen in emergencies.”
“This is an emergency. One of the utmost importance.” Gem nodded at him, self-assured.
“Gem…” Tango sighed, sounding mildly disappointed. “What in the four elemental moons are you talking about?”
“Tango,” she prompted in turn, mimicking his tone, “What Earth-date is it?”
Instantly, Tango blanched, the soft glow to his skin dimming as his superheated blood drained from his face.
“Oh. Oh no.” Tango turned on his heel and ran from the room, only pausing to shriek back, “Don’t tell him I forgot!”
Gem laughed as the timer went off, and she grabbed a toothpick to test if the cake was done.
–––
Etho wasn’t sure if he should’ve been concerned when he received a communicator alert from Gem to escort Zed to the habitation block, preferably with the psychologist’s eyes covered. Still, recalling what had happened last time he’d tried to get out of helping Gem with some of her carefully-calculated shenanigans, he decided to go along with it.
“Hey Zed,” he greeted, sidling into Zed’s office as casusally as possible, “I’ve picked up an anomaly near the habitation block, and I need a second pair of eyes, but everyone else is busy. Wanna come help?”
“Would I!?” Zed gasped, practically leaping out of his desk chair. It was no secret that Zed’s role as the station’s therapist was, from his point of view, really just an excuse to go on ‘wacky space adventures’. Nobody really knew what he meant by that, but the odd escapades in and around the station seemed to sate his hunger for excitement – and, well, it was a reasonably good tool to get Zed to go to a specific location when needed.
The two made their way into the habitation block without much event, Zedaph’s bouncing steps making enough clatter for the both of them, perfectly making up for Etho’s silent feather-light tread. As they waited for the airlock to run through its pressurise/depressurise cycle and let them through, Etho subtly checked his communicator for some clue as to why Gem had asked him to do this. Was there some sort of Earth holiday celebrated on the 8th of December? He raised the question to Zedaph.
“Of course there is!” Zed replied, puffing himself up, “The most important day in the whole universe, in fact! I can’t believe you didn’t know!” Still, when Etho tried probing further, Zed refused to elaborate. Maybe it was some sort of parallel celebration to the one celebrated on the 1st of April – the weird one about mischief and pranks? Etho frowned. Surely Gem would explain when they got there.
As they got closer to the kitchen, Etho let his stride slow, bringing himself slightly behind Zed. He waited a moment to see if Zed noticed, then, in a flash, covered Zed’s eyes with his hands, causing the other to let out a startled yelp.
“Keep walking, I gotcha,” Etho reassured, smiling slightly.
“Is this some sort of weird trust exercise? I don’t like weird trust exercises! I demand, in future, I be given prior knowledge of all weird trust exercises!” Zed protested in response, although he did keep walking, thankfully.
–––
Zedaph was, as the cool kids would say, rather disgruntled. Being shepherded along by Etho in some silly game, today of all days, when nobody had even paused to acknowledge him before this, was really just adding insult to injury. He couldn’t really blame most of them, he supposed – the only other Earthling out here was Gem, and she probably didn’t know yet, and most other planet-colonies didn’t really put as much stock into yearly celebrations because the concept of a year kinda broke down a bit out here. Still, it would have been nice if someone had noticed.
Etho paused to adjust his grip such that only one arm covered Zed’s eyes, only causing Zed to stumble a little bit. There was the hissing of a door opening – where in the habitation block were they, even? And Zed was shuffled forward a few more steps before stopping again.
“You can uncover his eyes now, Etho,” Gem’s voice spoke up, and Zed could hear the joy in her voice. Sure enough, moments later, Zed could see again, and… his jaw dropped.
“Surprise!” called the voices of pretty much everyone else on the station, as Zed took in the sights of the birthday party that had been set up in the little kitchen area around him.
“Oh my god, you guys…” Zed couldn’t help but crack a wide, disbelieving grin
“Happy brithday, Zed!” Gem cheered, as she brought out the cake she’d made, covered in beautiful pink and yellow buttercream swirls.
Zed had to restrain himself from replying ‘you too’, and instead muttered out some gratitude, almost overwhelmed by the fact that his birthday had been remembered after all. After that, however, the party was in full swing, and Zed lost himself to the excitement.
–––
All in all, Gem considered the celebration to be a huge success. The biggest challenge had been keeping the whole business a secret from anyone who wouldn’t be able to keep it themselves. Zed seemed to be enjoying himself, the giant pink worm plush Tango had gotten him had already been given a name (and everyone had been given an ultimatum to cherish it), and the cake had mysteriously vanished.
Gem glanced out the window to the bleak, empty landscape of Titan. It was nice that even out here, a mind-boggling distance from even Jupiter, let alone the rest of humanity, she could bring a little bit of home to this outpost.