Chapter 6: Flatting Agreements

For the… second? third? time since arriving, Juniper was waking up from a drug induced haze in the most comfortable bedding she could have ever imagined. And yet in the blissful haze of it all, there was something disturbingly familiar like an itch she couldn’t quite pin down. Naturally the haze of the cocktail of chemicals in her system would keep the anxiety of it away, even as she struggled to place a finger on what exactly it was, but under that merciful blanket a softly encroaching dread filled her.

Since talking before with the doc, she’d started in her more lucid moments to realize a subtle yet beautiful floral scent seemed to be infused into the air, leaving a small tingle with every breath she took. Her body seemed to be wrapped in the gentle sensation more generally, subtly of course, but the effect was still there if she could focus enough for a second. If only the crew could have experienced this instead of however long of rotten rusted hell that seemed to have been rammed into their lives.

If this was just a way to make Juniper talk, and the Affini were planning to throw her into something much less comfortable after learning what they needed, it’d all still be worth it to have surrendered. No more starch rations, no more near fatal repair accidents, and no more paranoid murder happy officers. Frankly until… however long ago she first learned of the shore leave, Juniper was convinced she’d be simultaneously boiled and flash frozen to death in a decompression accident. This was all more than she could have ever hoped to have had as what essentially boiled down to a conscript pushed through naval academy, and now she was being taken care of by the Affini.

Taken care by the Affini she thought. How many of the people she knew in the academy were still alive? How many had the pig bastard she had to call captain murdered? They were all braver people, better people, than Juniper was. They all believed in freedom or tried to find ways to get everybody out without falling to the Affini, why did they have to be thrown into the vacuum of space like so much garbage? Why did Juniper get to survive that when she just kept her head down and slept?

The anxious feeling started to rise in Juniper’s chest, the collars on her wrists started blinking green before transitioning to a solid yellow tone. Nope. She wanted to have at least some lucidity for a bit, and that line of thought was going to fast track her to sleeptown. So she resorted to the tried and true tactic - Stuffing that thought into a box, the box into a bigger box, the bigger box into a safe and the safe into a pit filled with toxic waste… and then build a memorial to literally any other thought on top of that hole. Juniper knew that wouldn’t last for long though as she struggled to think of literally anything else.

The door sliding open with Doctor Rimu proved the exact distraction she needed, so effective was the distracting nature of the affini that Juniper didn’t quite comprehend that she wasn’t just imagining it. Soon enough though the Affini had already made her way to Juniper’s bedside, smiling down at Juniper with that smile she always seemed to have.

“And how is my lovely little terran doing today?” Doctor Rimu asked, always in that playful, near condescending tone that she used in her previous visits. “I hope your xenodrug regimen hasn’t been too hard on you this time around?” Juniper took a breath and looked up at the Affini and tried to put together something to say how she felt. Drawing a blank she sighed and put her head back against the pillows as she tried to think of what to say. For her part, Doctor Rimu had seemed to pick up on how tongue tied Juniper was and smiled softly, giving her mental space to think.

“I’ve been thinking. Since I got here, everything has been so comfortable, like I’m the guest of some fancy hotel rather than a prisoner of war. When the accord took prisoners of war…” she trailed off, looking at the affini, who looked at her concerned but slowly nodding in encouragement. “When the accord took prisoners of war, they would be abused, harshly and frequently. They’d be given basically steel slabs for beds and the barest of rations, beatings for any perceived wrong.” Juniper grimaced. “Compared to that even being just kept in this bed is like I’m being more waited on in a massively fancy hotel I’d never afford to spend an hour in, let alone a week.”

Rimu’s expression was slightly muted as she seemed to write what Juniper had told her into her tablet. “Do you find the difference in treatment to be… how do you terrans describe it? Like whiplash?” her tone soft and the condescending cadence giving way to concerned sincerity. “Because it is entirely understandable why. The suffering we’ve encountered on this station alone is enough to make my vines crawl in horrified disgust, and that’s apparently your species’ norm to do?”

Juniper nodded. “It’s the life we were all brought up in I guess. In the naval academy we were taught techniques to resist torture, it was mostly for higher officers but we were given scraps of training for it too. It was a given that if you were in the position where you’d be captured, torture was the inevitable fate you’d get, assuming you weren’t rescued or summarily executed first. That’s the baseline assumption in our conflicts.”

“It’s barbaric.” Rimu softly added, to which Juniper nodded. “May I ask. With that in mind, that baseline assumption like you said… why did you defect? We don’t necessarily see it happen in such a spectacular manner as yours by those not already working for us as agents, with a few exceptions in recent months” Rimu smiled, remembering the report of an adorable little terran in a different sector.

“I was sick of running and I didn’t want to die.” Juniper replied flatly, frowning as it stirred up memories of being aboard. “Have you seen the state of the ship? I was in charge of fixing it, and Jaxx was the only other one who knew how to repair anything aboard.”

“Hmmm, yes dear, I managed to skim through a few reports. It’s horrifying how many of your systems were chained together temporary fixes that were pushed beyond their limits, I’d dare to say the ship should have been renamed to the ‘health and safety violation’” It took a second, but Juniper snorted at the suggestion, her frown turning to a weak smile.

“That’s what I’m calling it now, Doc. The CNS Health and Safety Violation” she giggled. “I’m sure if the original designers saw her they’d be horrified with just how far I had to cannibalize the internals. Hell, I’d say they’d collectively shit their guts out at what I had to do to keep it running”

“That’d be a horrifying sight dear.”

“It would. But I think my workarounds would horrify them more”

“So was it that? That the CNS Health and Safety Violation was going to inevitably fail deadly that pushed you to surrender dear?” Rimu asked, slowly pushing the conversation back. “If so it’s probably the most interesting, though understandable, reason to defect. Nobody wants to die in the vacuum like that.” Juniper took in another breath.”

To be honest that’s just the intellectual side of the reason why. The real reason why I wanted to was I was just sick of it all. I’d lost any want to be in the fight before Terra even surrendered, but I couldn’t escape. After the surrender when the bastard of a captain installed themselves, I was just too scared to.” Juniper winced, blinking rapidly as the memories came back to her again, some of them felt like they weren’t quite her memories though. Rimu shifted, moving closer and resting a hand on the Terran’s shoulder.

“What happened, dear?” she asked, even as she saw the memories and emotions well up in Juniper. “If you want to stop telling me at any time, don’t feel like you’re obliged to keep going” adding on quickly afterwards.

Tears welled up in Juniper’s eyes as those memories came back. She could smell the reek of the ship again, the pain and the repressed hatred that welled up, her own impotence against the injustice. “No. I want to tell you, so the pig” she started after a moment, eyes locking with the affini’s, “so the pig gets exactly what’s coming to them” Doctor Rimu looked into her eyes as she looked into Doctor Rimu’s.

Rimu nodded “What happened, little one?”

“Not long after Terra fell, the bastard led a mutiny against the old man, he was considering complying with the order to surrender” Juniper started, more flooding back. “The pig was a vicious type off the ship, only held in check by the fact mutiny would get them in the pre-war days canned and probably arrested. When they took over though…” Juniper trailed off, remembering the fallout of the mutiny, the first purge. Blurry memories rose to the surface of the lake that made up her consciousness, days where she played dumb, almost unnaturally happy and blocking out the reality of the situation.

Juniper looked at Doctor Rimu. “When they took over, they killed the officers loyal to the old man. Threw them in the airlock after beating them senseless and vented them… threw them naked into the vacuum of space” an angry tone filling her voice, the lights on her collar turning from blinking green to solid yellow once more.

Despite herself, Rimu was horrified, there was no way she could hide it, the very image was so perversely wrong and barbaric. Of course the interrogation reports had already stated as much - but there was a visceral difference between a dry report saying that the captain regularly purged suspected traitors, and the Terran staring into her eyes as she recalled it. Pity for the little terran bloomed in Rimu’s mind. She checked her tablet, disabling the xenodrug injections in the collars so they wouldn’t threaten to flood her with enough sedatives to smother her righteous rage. The poor girl should be given time to let it all out if she wished.

“And that happened, killing us off and starving us as the bridge crew and their inner circle grew fat and fanatical. Nobody dared to stop them, they’d started offering increased rations to anyone who would ‘come forward’ with ‘evidence’ of more traitors in our midst.” Juniper’s voice rose in volume and pitch, words taking on a ragged edge. “At first I just kept my head down. Then I found myself and Jaxx the only people able to repair the ship after they vented the maintenance crew chief, so they couldn’t kill me if they still wanted a working ship. They all had to die and I got to live.” More of those blurred images that weren’t quite her own memories where she seemed to play dumb to the horrors around her floated up from the depths of the lake. More blurred memories lay in sharp contrast to the ones that didn’t have the blurry sheen to them, and the times where she had no memory at all, they all bubbled up to the surface. The guilty rage she tried to bury snaked out for a moment, the intensity of her loathing sustaining her rant peaked, then suddenly evaporated, leaving her to sob.

Rimu softly rubbed Juniper’s shoulder. “I… No. No words can describe even half of what you’ve experienced. I’m sorry that you had to endure even a tenth of that. But you’re safe now, dear. And I’ll guarantee that no harm will ever come to you again.” Juniper looked up at her, the embers of her rage still in her eyes.

“I don’t give a fuck about that. I really don’t. What I care about right now. All I care about is that the pig bastard of a murderous cunt gets what’s coming to them. For my dead friends, for the people they destroyed, I hope that bastard is burned to death in an engine plume.” she finished, breathing ragged and her eyes turning red from the tears, head dropping back onto the pillow. Rimu grimaced at that last want of the poor terran.

Pulling over a box of tissues, Rimu slowly dabbed at Juniper’s tears as the dear little terran started to calm down, breathing slowing down. After a few minutes, Rimu made an approximation of clearing her throat.

“Little dear.” She started, squeezing Juniper’s shoulder softly. “There’s a reason I came here. If you feel in a state to discuss something important.” she said softly, trying to see if her ward was in the right state for the real reason she was here.

“What did you want to talk about?” Juniper asked, half paying attention. She started feeling like she was shrinking inside her own body, not really recognizing much around her save the Affini and the comforting arm on her shoulder. More of those memories of her clearly playing dumb bubbled to the surface of the lake, some underexposed mass slowly floating up close to the surface.

“Well. It’d be your accommodations, dear.” Rimu started, pulling Juniper’s attention onto the affini. “When you surrendered yourself and gave up the ship, we were already at peak capacity with patients. Several who were waiting for procedures had to be delayed to accommodate you all. There was a lot more overflow to start here than we thought. And at this point, you’re physically healed, albeit still malnourished.

“A pit grew in Juniper’s stomach. She’d heard similar when… she didn’t know what exactly, but she knew that type of talk, it always came at the head of being kicked out onto the street, even if she couldn’t remember how she knew that.”Just get it over with and tell me you’re throwing me out” she said softly, her righteous rant had drained her totally. “I’ll be able to find a way to survive homelessness again.” again she didn’t know why but she just knew. The hand on her shoulder squeezed again.

“No dear, that’s not what I was going to say” Rimu softly replied, causing Juniper to look up into the affini’s eyes, seeing the soft purple light and the beautiful gold specks in deepest black now that she wasn’t so consumed by the rage she felt to the past. “We wouldn’t be so barbaric. What I was going to ask is if you would be comfortable with me taking you to live with me and my roommate? It’s much more spacious and well furnished than this little room”

Juniper looked at the Affini, for the second time not quite believing that she wasn’t imagining it. She blinked “I… I wh- did i hear you right?”.

“Well, little one, it sounds like you have a lot of things to process and it may be better if you were to be housed in more comfortable arrangements, and we have a spare Terran sized room for you. Of course if you just want to live alone I can easily arrange an apartment in the Affini quarter. But I’d be honoured, as your assigned doctor, if you were to take my offer” Rimu offered, a little quicker than her normal calm demeanour. The little terran was so irresistibly adorable as she thought for a moment.

“And this isn’t just a ploy to make me into one of your… what do you call them?”

“A floret, and no dear. Given your… not exactly non-violent but definitely non-lethal and well intentioned surrender” Rimu started diplomatically. “You aren’t seen as a danger that would force us to domesticate you. Living with me you’ll still have all the same rights you have in this moment as a terran citizen of the Affini Compact. Unless you prove yourself a danger to either you or to others, domestication will be a purely voluntary option for you. You’ll be allowed to wander freely around the Affini district but I’d advise for now not venturing into the rest of the station. Rebel sympathisers will likely see you as a target for propaganda.”

“And do I need to pay rent? Work shifts here or some other to pay for it?” Juniper asked. Rimu chuckled a low, amused laugh at that.

“Well dear, if helping a bit with the dishes and other housework is working shifts, then yes.” Rimu said with a wink. The hole in Juniper’s stomach collapsed as she laughed. She could live with some dishes as long as she never needed to see the inside of a ductway ever again. A part of her was suspicious of the Affini’s promise, but fuck it she reasoned, there wasn’t really anything she could do either way if the affini was lying. The part of her that protested seemed horrified but distant enough for Juniper to nod. Anything for three hot meals a day and a comfy bed like this one.

“I’ll take it” she said, the tension she didn’t even realize was building up suddenly releasing. Rimu smiled softly as she tapped a few times on her tablet.

“It’s done then, little dear” she said, the playful and subtly condescending tone returning. “I need to go do some paperwork to approve it. But you should be good to go in the next few days.” As she stood up she made a few final taps of her tablet before turning. Watching her go, a question suddenly bubbled to the surface of Juniper’s mind.

“Doc…” she asked, slowly. Rimu turned back to look at her, raising a fake eyebrow.

“Yes dear?”

“Why” she started, trying to think of the words. “I have these spots in my memory that are just. Completely blanked out, and others where they don’t feel like my own… do you know what that means?” Rimu tensed up a little at that question. Dirt she’s going to need to find a way to ease the Terran into it.

“I think I do dear. But I think it’ll be best if you take a couple days before we bridge that issue.” Rimu replied eventually, leaving Juniper obviously a bit weary. “I promise you though, we will discuss it once you’re settled into my place.”

Leaving the room, Rimu breathed a sigh of relief. ‘That’s the easy part done’ she said to herself. ‘Now to convince Kauri’.

“Excuse me?” Kauri asked, looking at Rimu in a mix of shock and confusion. “What did you just say you were considering?”

“The hospital” Rimu replied, vines slurping nutrient filled water down.

“Yes I understand it’s to do with the hospital, but you’re wanting to have one of the patients come and live here?” Xe asked, putting down the pile of electronic doodads, whirlygigs and spinsters that xe were working on when Rimu returned home. “What would make you think that’s a good idea, Rimu?” xe continued, one leg tapping the ground.

“Well, it’s a few reasons, darling.” Rimu started, offering a vine to Kauri to help ground xem. Kauri grasped it and let out a little sigh, slouching and looking at the ground. “The big one is that the hospital was already in a dire state in terms of bed space. When the adorable little Terran surrendered we had to push back a good number of procedures to accommodate everyone there, and with the mycelium still a good few weeks away we just don’t have the spill over capacity to keep all the captured terrans in the hospital”

“I can understand that Rimu” xe started, tapping xyr foot. “But why do we have to house them with us? Can’t we give them a free apartment or something?” a few vines tensed up as Kauri grimaced. Rimu knew well why Kauri would be hesitant to have any sophont living with them, why couldn’t she back down now?

“Kauri, dear, I have a duty to protect and heal those who come through the hospital’s doors. That means making decisions on when we need to rotate the healthy ones out and the more sick ones in. I-”

“But why do you have to do it, Rimu? We all know Hilijan or any number of the other ward doctors can handle a Terran who needs some housing. Dirt like I asked, what if we just gave them their own place?” Kauri interrupted, leaving Rimu somewhat stunned at how quickly Kauri had turned it around. “If this is some sort of exposure therapy you’re trying behind my back, count me out of it… please”

Rimu tried to reply, but words caught in her mind. ‘Wrong tack’ she thought to herself, trying to find a way to explain what she was wanting to get to. Kauri leaned back in xyr chair, crossing xyr arms but with still tapping feet. Of course it wouldn’t be so easy as to just try to appeal to Kauri in that utilitarian way, xe wasn’t some computer after all.

“Look, I’ll just be forward with this then. There’s a good chunk of my personal curiosity I’ve put into this patient. They’re physically fine, on the thin side and in need of some micronutrients and other stuff to return their body to physical health.” Rimu looked at Kauri. “But if I’m going to be honest, that’s the least concerning thing. Right now the big issue is that well… psychologically I suspect they’re not in a very good place.”

“You alluded to them being a Pluribius. Right?” Kauri asked. Dirt and roots, was Rimu…

“Caught me red vined there.” Rimu chuckled. “Yes they are. And that’s what worries me.”“Haven’t you met plenty of florets from other species that exhibit the same thing? Even in just your day to day practice back closer to the core worlds there were a few you told me about.” xyr body shifted uncomfortably, trying to find a way to find a way to lead Rimu off this whole idea.

“True, very true.” Rimu nodded. “But there’s two factors here that are different. The first one is that terrans seem to treat those who share a body like a disorder to be universally loathed and feared. That it’s all manner of perversion, daemonic incursion, or otherwise an aspect of moral failing, to mention a few opinions many have.”

“Right…” Kauri softly sighed, of course the terrans would be so monstrous, isn’t that why xe was doing their job, to protect the terran species from itself? “So that’s another bigotry terran society weighs itself down with. What a lovely time they must have with each other.”

“The other aspect, alongside the flaws of Terran society is that I don’t believe those who inhabit that body are… conscious of each other. They all have somewhat constructed their sense of selves around the idea that they are sole sovereigns of their body. Their brain seems to have suppressed the ability for them to find memories or otherwise experience the other’s presence, then suppressed the ability to comprehend that suppression.”

“I’m sure that will be a recipe for disaster, Rimu. Isn’t that something that means they need to stay in the hospital?” Kauri asked, genuinely, but still hoping to find an out in all this. Shifting weight from one foot to the other to stop them tapping too much, memories of fire and horror bubbling to the fore of xyr memory, everbloom damn xem and damn her for causing the guilt to come back to xyr mind again.

“That’s the thing dear. I think staying in the hospital for too much longer will negatively affect them. I suspect the two more docile of the three I’ve met are slowly coming closer to contact but the third, I think being kept in the hospital unaware of her own wider context will just lead her to try hurting others more.”

“So you’re saying that we need to monitor them then?” Kauri stood up, looking Rimu in the eye, trying to find some way to win or at least delay all of this coming.

Rimu again was silent for a moment. “Yes. I feel like being in a more homely environment will help them slowly to figure out how to speak with one another and diffuse some vectors of anxiety. They need stability and comfort, something a hospital isn’t necessarily equipped for right now.”

“So why do you have to do it then, Rimu? You’re not giving me a reason as to why it’s specifically you who has to carry this burden, because I’m going to be party to it in some way. I don’t want to deal with a repeat of… you know” Kauri asked, taking a step forward. Guilt welled up, what happened before- The sophont- please just let this be some bizarre test please.

Rimu sighed. She tried to pick her words carefully but they didn’t come to the fore. Time to be frank then she guessed. “When I first saw them, when I started interacting with them and looking at what they’d all been through, what they’re going through right now, it all fascinated me. Here’s an interesting case of psychology seen repeated in other species, my curiosity was ignited because it’s the first time I’ve seen it in a Terran. And as I came to understand what position they were in, I realized that I pitied them. The adorable little thing, did something brave and foolish, and I pitied them for having to do that. And I think that’s one of those… you know, those checkboxes I told you about before. How I never saw a sophont who ticked all my boxes, and I didn’t know what all of them were. I think I know two of them now.”

Kauri sighed in response, that was the reason, xe thought as the tension loosened in defeat. “I don’t want what happened before to happen again, Rimu. I’m already unable to forgive myself for it. I don’t think I can handle being around a sophont again in this sort of situation… what if it happens again?” Rimu wrapped a few vines around Kauri comfortingly.

“It’s ok dear. I know it’ll remind you about what happened with Cyathea. But I promise you, what happened. The loss we all sustained when she passed. Those very real regrets you have. They won’t happen again. I promise you that.”

Kauri looked at Rimu. “Please hold that promise true.” xe whispered softly. “Because if it happens again, it’ll break me.” some of xyr vines reached out, wrapping around Rimu tightly, gravity imposing itself seemingly harder now than before.

“I promise Kauri. It will never happen again.”