Who's that at the bar?
20 Jan 2022Lily Flemmon
OOC: This entry was prompted by coming across an NPC that was a spitting image of Jordanna Frost, and I decided to build her into a more developed character. (The only screenshot I actually managed to take was in weird lighting in Inter Astra, and in hindsight, the similarity wasn’t that exact. The NPC didn’t even have freckles.)My contact in the Pilots Federation reached out to me regarding my “conspicuous letter” to Edmund Mahon. As far as I know, Silas might have eyes on me now, but we’re certain that he doesn’t know I’m his child. In her words, “your gender transition is not only incredibly touching and heartwarming, it makes my job of witness protection that much easier.” I opted to meet privately in person in a temporary structure on a planet surface, mostly for practice in case things get hairy in the future. It was a few days before I got back, since I had other errands to run around the Bubble. Normally I don’t frequent the Pilot’s Lounge at a starport, but that’s one of the myriad of ways that Chilton Terminal is an exception. Usually I’ll go there to unwind and get out of “Commander Mode” when I get back to Chilton after more than a few days away, which this certainly was.
I sat down at the bar, and while I normally don’t pay too much attention to the other patrons until after I get my drink (Non-alcoholic, always. The bartender, Haley, knows my usual order by now), this time I couldn’t help but do a double-take at the woman sitting next to me. I’d never seen her before, yet she seemed somehow familiar.
I couldn’t resist the temptation to turn to her and ask. “Hey, you, uh… you seem somehow familiar. Or at least, you look familiar.”
She responded immediately, without turning her head. “I get that a lot. Let me guess, Jordanna Frost?”
“Yeah, and she’s… yeah. Dead.” I looked away and sighed.
The woman downed the rest of her drink. “Yeah. Being a near-spitting image of a famous dead person- recently dead person, it’s… not exactly comforting. Especially when people say to me, ‘Wait, aren’t you supposed to be dead?’ I just… I can’t quite get used to it.”
I, not knowing how to respond, fell back on my usual clumsy empathy. “Well, at least you look like someone everyone looked up to. I know it doesn’t help much, but when people mistake you for Jordanna, it’s… kind of a compliment? I guess?”
She paused, looking down at her empty glass. “I… I guess it’s a compliment. Sort of. Not a very good one, but still I’ve never thought of it that way.” She looked up at me and let out a half-hearted chuckle. “I guess it’s better than the compliments I get from certain freight crew guys.”
I got a bit of a chuckle out of that myself. ”Tell me about it.”
She waved to Haley to refill her drink.
Haley came over with a bottle of Harma Rum. “Tough day, huh?”
“Not horrible,” the Jordanna-look-alike replied, as Haley filled her glass.
“Ah, we’ve all been there,” Haley replied gently. Then she turned to me. “And you have a package to pick up for me from the co-op distillery. About time I got some of that “experimental” stuff, and besides, I’m out of your usual. Maybe get Mirabella McKay to help me out here too? I could use some shorter shifts.”
“Well, I’m waiting ‘til it’s ready, then I’ll get it up here for you. And I’ll second your request to Mira,” I replied, half-lying, and knowing Haley could see right through it. But she let it slide, as she usually does, and headed over to another patron who just sat down.
I tried starting up my little conversation again. “Say, I’ve seen you around a few times here, more than other pilots. Are you based here, at Chilton?”
She turned to look at me, finally. “Well, I’m a courier for Brewer Corp, and with everything CTAC is doing, the station’s seen a lot of refitting. I did one delivery here and that’s all it took for me to pull every string I had to get myself permanently stationed here. This place is beautiful, it’s peaceful, and it’s somewhere to settle down… maybe even start a family one day.”
I noticed myself blushing slightly as the tension in the air between us was relieved. “Well, we do what we can to make it this way. It always gets a little rough when a couple factions pick a fight, sometimes it gets to a full-on war, but…” I sighed again. “We do our best. And hey, now you can help too.”
She squinted at me a bit and tilted her head. “You know, now that I think of it… you look like someone I know.”
“Well, maybe? I’m nowhere near as well-known as Jordanna Frost, that’s for sure.”
Her face lit up. “Wait, yeah, you're- you're Chilton’s Flower? Commander Lily?”
I was confused for a moment until she said my name. “Wait, is that what they call me now? Wow, I went off-station for 4 days and now I’ve got a damn colloquial honorific.”
“What, you don’t like it?”
I suddenly felt flustered, and looked at my hands, which were awkwardly not holding a drink. “I- I do like it. I really like it. I just feel like… like I’m not worthy of that. What did I do that’s so incredible? What-”
She interrupted me, possibly driven a bit by the rum. Don’t tell me you didn’t actually save 20 people who were stranded two thousand lightyears outside of Colonia. Don’t tell me you didn’t stay with them as they were revived, and that you didn’t make sure the search and rescue medbay had extra crisis counselors there too. You’re…” She trailed off as she noticed my eyes start to water, and a tear fell onto the bar. I hadn’t realized until then how raw and unprocessed those events still were to me. “I’m sorry. That was probably a bit much for you.”
There was a pause for what seemed like an hour while I held my head in my hands, trying to hold myself together, and she watched me nervously, afraid to ask if I was okay.
Eventually, I gathered myself enough to look up at her and softly ask, “What… What's your name?”
“Oh, sorry, I’m Sara Avery, I guess I forgot to tell you.”
I still couldn’t get my voice to be much louder than a lullaby. “Thank you, Sara.”
Sara looked at me with a bittersweet smile, but didn’t say anything. Her eyes were starting to glisten a bit, too.
I pulled myself back together as well as I could in the moment. “Well, I better go down to get that package. If you’re lucky, the bartender might let you taste test what she mixes up. Or maybe unlucky. It is the “experimental” stuff, after all.”
I got off the barstool, and Sara finally mustered the courage to ask, “You sure you’ll be okay?”
I looked back at her, gently smiling and fixing my hair a bit. “This is Chilton Terminal. We all do our best.”