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Twenty-two marbecs have elapsed since the ball-rolling-down-fall of Gust Weatherall, and Skip is again trying to get a hold of Norman Takamori.
Hey, Skipper. I think we could figure out this symbiosis thing?
Despite whatever urgency he’s experiencing, on Norman’s side of the consciousness there is a sticky silence of the kind that betrays a living creature wanting to stay hidden.
Norman had figured that within just a couple dozen malton units, Skip had managed to crease his face with loud smiles more thoroughly than the near-perpetual scowl had in close to fifty cycles. Norman had told the crew that he had grown to like it when Skip was lodged in his head, that it was a little more comfortable. He tried not to let on how he’d grown beyond comfortable with it, a new leather jacket that held shape so well he might as well not be there underneath.
Ribecs after his hands had been hastily left to Norman at the battle of Rubian V, his fingers had instinctively landed on the lit-up switchboard of the only craft he was good at piloting. If he had to steer the hands around to helm the Red Hot, no, The Wurst, well then, that was worth it. So was he, for about a martron, at least. Void, but now–
The Skipper? Norman?
Cold tools had removed metal scars not meant to be in his brain, and so had Norman been in the way of the craniobolt. In the way of– Hell, every scared step he takes he trips over himself. Over timelines of him that never were, drawn taut into spectral webs.
He can feel the slug’s impatience bleeding into their shared thoughts.
“Shut up. Skip.” When spitting Valdrinor’s name his lungs burn with a trace of resentment, finally familiar anger. After all, the crew wanted their pilot to be called Skip, had they not made it clear? He grasps at the dignity prerequisite to his notorious indignation. The shaking hands start to form a fist, then immediately stop. Someone makes the lungs inhale shallowly, and behind unclosing eyes he notes some new skid marks on the interior of the ship’s hull. Luckily the walls were not very reflective to start with.
Um.
He feels their face contract as Skip winces.
Hey, so, we should talk about the specifics of this …arrangement… more? Right, Skipper?
A few ribecs later there comes a “Right on,” with no loud smile to accompany. It drips resignation for two heartbeats, then evaporates into another stretch of static.
Norman?
Hey. Norman.
“Fuck off. These are the specifics: Leave me alone.” He tries to telegraph irritation, but he can guess that the rest seeps out. He’s not used to talking with – thinking at? – the slug. He doesn’t know fully what Skip can sense of his thoughts, right now or any damned memories. Not that it matters.
Skipper, I am not doing that. I am trying to know better now! And I need your, uh, collaboration– I need your say in this.
Though unsure Skip intended for him to, Norman also hears the fear behind his probably reasonable words. Figures that they are both invested in making the galaxy change for the better, starting with their own minds. So the Random Factor brought them together, quite fortunate.
The Skipper? Norman?
He attempts to stay entirely still in his mind, which he presumes should usually be a difficult ordeal. Especially with the barely a malton unit old medpacked gash on their abdomen, stitches from that damn brain surgery, aching over-stretched muscles all around, and a cerebro slug prodding at his side of the consciousness with increasing frequency.
Uh. …Norm?
He has put many cycles into this exercise. Norman believes, knows, he can detach himself from the motions of the marbecs. Just like that blaster training he did as a cadet, head not quite there: disassembling, assembling, disassembling…
You can’t leave it all to me! I'm sorry! Um, come back? …Please?
There is a memory, details overly sharp from how polished it has become. The recollection is through Norman’s eyes, of words said with his voice, heard with those jumbled harmonics from passing his skull. It rapidly bubbles up to the surface thoughts before Norman can wrest it back.
“Hey, man, I think I figured you out. And, uh, I’m sorry that your life was what it was. And I’m sorry that I’m in control of your body, but I think I can do a lot better with it than you were doing.”
The ship’s hull integrity is not so low. The Wurst holds its inhale indefinitely, even throughout the too frequent hot exits. The crew needs air and its pressure, broadly speaking. And the airlock would freeze Skip too, because he fucking knows the damned slug wouldn’t let himself be sneezed out at this point. Barry Syx would maybe help Norman with it, if Syx wasn’t such a good person. Where are the cryoblasters even kept anymore? He supposes he wouldn’t be able to aim safely away from Skip when his hands are shaking.
He can hear the engine’s resolved hum, feel the coarse fabric of Skip’s new favorite shirt, taste– not champagne – some kind of alcohol, smell iron on the back of their throat. And he can’t see the stars. Skip’s not facing anywhere near the windows.
I don’t mean what I said there anymore.
That could be true, for all he cares, because Norman knows that he did. Staring at that mirror, the control Skip remembers experiencing came from him resigning it.
Upon that, a kind of panic pools into the shared consciousness from Skip’s side. Push comes to shove as the once-prince leaves the reins of the bodycraft entirely to him. The intended recipient is decidedly unwilling to hold them, for The Skipper is better for having become Skip; the galaxy is simply better without– Norman will do the crew a favor for the first time.
Over the span of a long ribec, the body wavers around its standing position, then starts falling towards the nearest wall of the giant hot dog ship. In the last moments before impact, Skip steps into piloting with a now well-practiced sequence and braces their arms in front of their face. It's not fast enough to avoid a loud, resonating clang against metal that will definitely alert the crew, but they’re not really injured. He broke the fall.
At the opportunity, Norman sinks further with a burst willpower and resolve as a crushing pressure grounds him. His waking dream forms into a once-captain floating in wine-dark open sea, surrounded by invisible shores and the exploded heads of his night terrors. Then, there’s no water to resist treading, and the glinting light on the crests of waves have become swirling starlight, and it’s cold. The cold is not locking his joints and forcing each breath sharp, but the cold is unbearable. Still, he would endure it if it meant– That must not be from his memory. Just the same, it wraps tightly around him. He reaches to return an embrace, after so long, and numbness more lacking than turned off pain sensors settles in.
A background process achieves completion; some kind of tension in the pilot’s brain slackens such that it can no longer make sound when struck. Among all the panic from Skip and none from The Skipper, Skip once again feels a sense of control come over this craft Skip is piloting as Norman accepts that the galaxy is better for whatever this symbiosis is.