Narrator M: In the frigid, desolate reaches of the Upper Unfold, six riders gallop through the snow. 

[Mechanical galloping. A mysterious electronic melody.]

Narrator X: Some of it’s snow, there’s a little bit of actual snow here, but a lot of this sparkling material, shimmering in the air around the riders, galloping now astride their bocular hosses, is actually mica particulate matter, sparkling on the wind.

Narrator S: The riders are galloping across the surface of a bleak, bright crystal, like a vast sheet of ice, but brilliantly bright, glowing from beneath their mounts’… uh, hooves? 

X: They’re kind of like robot hooves, because these are kind of robot horses. They’re bocular hosses, not to be mistaken for a bocular horse.

S: That’s totally different– 

M: Totally. 

S: –and does not need to be described. 

X: That’s fundamentally different. That’s an absolutely totally and completely different thing. A bocular hoss, on the other hand, is something you’ve seen recently. Ol’ Smoker, rusty and vintage, is loping here in step with the other newer hosses, shinier contemporary models with gleaming chassis, fresh pneumatics, all of them speeding along on bocular legs, kind of like a sort of a cross between kind of a steed and also a motorcycle with legs, and a headlamp for a head. 

S: The riders are decked out in protective gear: armored anoraks, respirators, ungoggles – shielding themselves in equal parts against the abrasive, cutting nature of the mica and the frigidity of the air.

M: As the bocular hoss hooves strike the ground with their urgent gait, candyfloss-like wafts of snow and weightless mica particles swirl and trail behind them. 

S: The air resounds with a strange noise, 

X: like distant icebergs cracking,

M: like asteroids colliding in space. But in a space where there is air for sound to move through.

S: The six riders approach a hillock, into which a thick set of bunker doors is set, like the doors of a cellar in a hillside. 

X: In the mica-laced wind, a banner flaps on the bitter breeze. Welcome crew, exclamation point, it reads, except it’s tattered, torn to shreds, hanging by a thread, lacerated by mica wind. It’s only been hanging up here for like maybe thirty minutes at most, and it’s already just ripped to hell. 

S: No wonder the mysterious riders are dressed as they are. 

X: The riders come to a stop, dismounting their hosses, urgently prying open the doors and cantering their steeds down a narrow causeway, descending under the ground here into the mica surface of this terrain.

S: They slam the heavy doors shut behind them, cutting off the wailing wind, the distant resonance of the crashing mica bergs.

[Echoing subterranean ambience.] 

M: But not the brightness of the mica they descend into. For just as it is a floating and sharp mineral, so too is it luminous. 

S: This antechamber that the group has entered into has kind of the feeling of an underground basement hallway with those harsh fluorescent lights shining down from above. But they aren’t actually light fixtures. It’s simply mica, exposed, naturally luminous. An additional airlock door of sorts waits ahead. 

X: The riders start peeling off their gear, disconnecting respirators, pulling back hoods, removing their goggles. Why, look! Surprise, surprise. Bet you weren’t expecting it to be the crew of the Ship!

S: The characters of the podcast you’re listening to!

X: It’s them, look at that. It’s Merlin! It’s the Bocular Man, hopping down from the hoss that he’s been riding–

M: (Bocular Man) “Hello.”

X: –his bocular arms encircled around Merlin’s waist.

M: (Bocular Man) “I am the Bocular Man.”

S: Mother Artifice is here, Timekeeper Felix, 

X: Everett Shearwater, and Dr. Rawfield. 

S: Everyone is brushing off the powdered abrasive mica dust from their outerwear – carefully, not using their bare hands, oh no. 

X: (Everett) [Coughing and laughing] “Ugh, this is extreme!” Everett is wiping her face, scooping tears from her eyes. The air is so cold.

S: The naturally sour-looking Felix now looks even more displeased, grimacing against the harshness of the environment. 

X: Merlin’s looking like he’s doing pretty good with it, though. He looks like he was built for this. He looks kind of windswept in kind of an awesome way, kind of cool and steely in the cold.

M: (Merlin) “You get used to it over time, but it doesn’t make it any more pleasant, I’ll say that.”

X: (Mother Artifice) “PRIMARILY, I WOULD DESCRIBE THE VENTURE TO THIS LOCATION AS THRILLING.” 

M: Mother Artifice is pulling some long, almost snow pants off of his head, revealing his horned wimple-like headdress.

X: Rawfield is stepping up to a little intercom box here against the bunker airlock. (Rawfield) “All right, let’s not waste any time here.” She buzzes in on the device next to the door. “Crew of the Ship here, ready to come inside. We’re mostly dusted off.”

S: An excited voice comes back through the little speaker. (Voice) “Please come in. We’re all ready for you.” And an unlocking mechanism clunks in the nearby set of heavy doors. “Welcome – and Merlin, welcome back – to Uppermost Unfold Monitoring Outpost.”

X: It’s not the homiest of locations here, this remote, essentially arctic, base at the highest imaginable altitudes habitable by human beings here in the cosmos. It’s a little–

S: Ehhh…

X: –utilitarian.

M: A little cramped. 

S: Could even be called “desolate” at its worst. 

M: It’s cozy. It has that lived-in feeling and kind of that faint scent of baked beans having been made in the recent past. 

S: Well, the researchers who are stationed here have done their darndest to make this a livable place, here on the outskirts of the cosmos, far, far away from the nearest civilization.

X: Cave-like rooms and tunnel-like passageways burrow through solid mica, 

S: carefully sanded down and lacquered and polished to make it safe (ish) for human habitation. To moderate the blinding glare natural to mica, the walls have been paneled, covered over in most places, leaving bare patches only where necessary for illumination.

M: Various curtains and tapestries are strung up around the perimeter of the room. 

S: Imagine living in a science bunker made completely of fluorescent light panels. You’d want to cover it up wherever possible. That would drive your eyes crazy after a while. 

M: Why, it might even drive YOU crazy after a while.

S: The entire group of researchers is assembled to greet them. There are six of them. They are all very excited for the company. 

X: They don’t see a lot of visitors up here at Uppermost, and most of them have been cooped up in here for months and months on end. Once you get here, you’re kind of here to stay. The bus, so to speak, doesn’t come all that often. 

S: One of the researchers, a lanky fellow with an eyepatch and tousled dark hair in a low ponytail, comes forward to fling his arms around Merlin with a broad smile. 

M: Merlin returns the embrace joyously. 

S: (Researcher) “Hey, buddy! It’s great to have you back.” 

M: (Merlin) “Good to see you too, Daggle.”

X: Introductions going around, the crew of the Ship greeting the crew of the outpost, all specialists in high-altitude cosmology, in teletheric analysis– 

S: Basically the most intense mica nerds in the cosmos. 

X: And also basically the closest thing to astronauts that exist in this cosmos. This whole operation here is, more or less – with probably emphasis on less – essentially the International Space Station of this cosmos, and these are the members of its crew. 

S: Daggle has led the crew through winding passages to the common area, 

M: a sort of dining room. Very spare, very simple. 

S: It is from here that the scent of baked beans emanates. 

X: (Everett) “Mmm, homey,” says Everett, looking around at the dingy bare-bones chamber.

S: She’s no stranger to baked beans.

M: (Merlin) “Daggle, what’s new?” Merlin says, taking a seat at the table. 

S: (Daggle) “Oh, nothing and everything, you know how it is monitoring the uppermost reaches of the Un.” Daggle and Merlin are about the same age, but Daggle has this boyish enthusiasm that makes him seem like an excited little kid.

X: Daggle’s excitingly enumerating recent scientific discoveries and observation, cascade resonances, teletheric feedbacks that they’ve been tracking. All the while, from under the eyepatch covering one of his eyes, there occasionally escapes a small pantry moth which flies off to buzz around the ceiling. 

S: This is normal. Don’t worry about it.

X: It’s almost beneath notice. Stranger things have happened and will still happen. Stay tuned. 

M: Merlin and Daggle shoot the shit, picking up a conversation like two old friends reuniting after an indeterminate period of time, but as though no time has passed at all. 

S: Felix is irritably shedding a few more layers of outerwear. He’s brought with him a case of cumbersome equipment. 

M: These are his chronoccoutrements,

X: to use a industry term.

[Various ticking noises.] 

S: He halts one of the other researchers, one of the shy ones who is clearly just trying to get back to her work and doesn’t really want to participate in this social hour. (Felix) “Hey, where are the clocks.”

X: (Researcher) “…Clocks?” 

S: (Felix) “Your timepieces.”

X: (Researcher) “I have a pocket– w-what do you– I have a pocket watch right here, do you want this?” 

S: (Felix) [Sighing exasperatedly] “I’m–”

X: (Researcher) “There’s another one in the kitchen.”

S: (Felix) “Felix Hustleworth, Timekeepers’ Guild. I’m here to make adjustments to your clocks, which have doubtlessly undergone significant drift–”

X: (Researcher) “Oh, you’re– you’re Felix!”

S: (Felix) “Yes, yes, Tertiary Chamberlain of the Timekeepers’ Guild, hello, hi, yes–”

X: (Researcher) “Oh, of course! Well, here’s my pocket watch. I can go get the clock from the kitchen, and I think there’s also one in the lab–” 

S: (Felix) “No, no, don’t go get the clocks, please. Just show me where the clocks are, and I will get to work.” 

X: Meanwhile, Dr. Rawfield is checking some of the other researchers for mica lung, another occupational hazard of residing up here.

M: (Rawfield) “It’s common enough in the Highest Light, but at these altitudes, who can say?” Rawfield is muttering under her breath. 

S: She wields a tongue compressor, peering into one of the researcher’s throats. 

X: Not to be mistaken for a tongue DEpressor. Here in this cosmos, they do things a little bit differently. 

M: That’s science fiction, baby.

S: (Rawfield) “Hmm. Standard abrasions, to be expected. At worst, we may have to perform a lavage.” 

M: A term which, here used, means a saline rinse of an internal cavity? 

S: Yes. Lavage, noun, washing out of a body cavity, such as the colon or stomach, with water or a medicated solution. 

X: Where there’s a will, there’s a way. 

M: And where there’s a doctor, there’s a lavage.

S: Felix charges through the room, doesn’t pause, just on his way from one clock to another clock, muttering under his breath, (Felix) “Fucking clocks…” 

X: Everett is kicking back in one of the lounge chairs here, she’s checking out their little recreational teletheric box here, she’s picking up and rummaging through a couple of tapes that they’ve got here. (Everett) “Oh my god, you all listen to Unsmoke?” 

S: Daggle whips his head around. (Daggle) “You bet we do! You’re an Unsmoke fan?”

[Distorted music from the teletheric.]

X: (Everett) “I’m a lifelong fan! Have you, did you, the latest, the–” 

S: (Daggle) “Oh my god, the cliffhanger!” 

X: (Everett) “Oh man, I have no idea if they’re ever gonna find the sheriff’s head.”

S: (Daggle) “Or if it will still be spouting lies!”

M: (Merlin) “Clearly I missed something,” Merlin says. 

X: (Everett) “It’s okay, we’ve got – I taped it, I’ve got it in the Stagecoach, we’ll, I’ll play it for you later–”

M: (Merlin) “Excellent.” 

X: (Everett) “–when you all come around to grill next time.”

S: Merlin takes a nostalgic little stroll by himself when he can sneak away from the others, retracing his steps through these once very familiar hallways where he spent a few months, 

M: and finds his old room, the workshop where the Bocular Man was constructed, where he was first prototyped.

S: Space being at a premium here, the room is of course no longer unoccupied.

M: It is occupied by beans. 

X: In many cans of many shapes and many sizes. Gotta store your beans somewhere. 

M: There are even some in planters. Why, they’re trying to grow MORE beans. 

S: Beans: keeping the scientific community running since time immemorial.

[Metallic footsteps.]

M: The Bocular Man is schlepping cases of fresh bean cans into a adjoining antechamber – (Bocular Man) “Hello.” – box after box –

S: that is, B-O-X–

M: carried down from the bocular–

S: B-O-C–

M: hosses parked in the atrium.

S: A-T-R-I-U-M. The researchers of Uppermost react to the Bocular Man with a sort of fond familiarity. They were here when he was born, more or less. He was a project that Merlin worked on during his tenure here. 

M: You’ve got to find something to do when you’re alone on the effectively International Space Station. 

S: You can only play Monopoly so many times before you have to build a man. 

M: Not that they have Monopoly in this universe, but you get the idea.

X: (Watts) “Hello, Bocular Man,” says Watts, one of the cosmologists here in the bean room, passing through on his way to the kitchen. 

M: The Bocular Man turns his placid face toward Watts, and intones a simple (Bocular Man) “Hmm?” in reply. “I am the Bocular Man. I can do things that a person can.” 

X: Watts circles the Bocular Man, checking him out with a bemused smile. (Watts) “I see you have been upgraded quite a bit since the last time you were here. It has been a minute, hasn’t it?”

M: (Merlin) “Oh yes, I’m constantly fussing over him.”

X: Merlin is passing by the door to the storeroom, and, seeing this exchange, pops in. 

M: (Merlin) “I recently retouched the shoulder chassis, actually. This wood is from the gardens of Verdure, actually. We were able to get a nice case of it and… I could bore your ears off any time about upgrades with the Bocular Man – (Bocular Man) “Hello.” – but he proves a very nimble and willing assistant. He’s extremely helpful at moving heavy devices, heavy objects, and was chiefly responsible for unloading all of the supplies that we were able to bring you.”

[Distant wind.]

S: Let’s zoom out for a moment. Time has passed since the Ship’s last port of call in the Highest Light. It’s been about a week, a journey that Merlin has made from the Highest Light before, but it took him months last time. 

M: Usually it takes months. 

S: That’s just how long it takes without a magic ship. This is faster and further than anyone usually ever goes.

X: Normally, this is one of the most precarious journeys known to civilization, and the Ship has done it with ease, speed, grace, and navigational accuracy that has never been seen before in the history of… well, of going places. 

S: The crew and the researchers of Uppermost are currently the most distant known humans in the cosmos – at least in the up direction.

M: Beyond this point, there are no further settlements. 

S: We are so high in the cosmos right now. 

M: So fucking high. 

X: Belying these terrifyingly vertiginous circumstances, outpost scientists and Ship crew are just hanging out here, eating hot beans, catching up on the times. 

S: Daggle absentmindedly scratches at his eyepatch, and one of those tiny little almost papery-looking grayish-green moths escapes and flutters upwards towards the ceiling, joining a few others that are there, buzzing and swirling in a strange little cyclone.

X: Artifice watches the moths swirling around the light source. (Mother Artifice) “ARE YOU CULTIVATING A UNIQUE BIOME INSIDE OF YOUR EYEPATCH?” 

S: (Daggle) “Oh, uh–”

X: (Mother Artifice) “IS IT FOR RECREATIONAL PURPOSES OR DOES IT HAVE SOME OTHER MEANING OR ORIGIN?”

S: Daggle laughs a little bit nervously. He’s very deferential, almost reverent, towards the Mother. A little bit intimidated, clearly. (Daggle) “I mean, that’s, that’s not really something I could say. I don’t know a whole lot about tearrors. It’s just something that happened to me as a boy, and I’m used to it by now. Almost forget it’s there.” 

X: (Mother Artifice) “I SEE. YOU ARE FROM THE FOLD.”

S: (Daggle) “Yes, yes, quite deep in the Fold, actually. Yes, sir – yes, Mother.”

X: Ah! Proper respect and deference shown to Artifice here, something we don’t often see from all these devil-may-care scientist types. Daggle knows his place.

M: Artifice even seems to react to this, tilting his head and casting what could only be described as a impenetrable blank gaze. 

X: (Mother Artifice) “YOU HAVE NOT SOUGHT TREATMENT FOR THIS FROM THE MOTHERS. YOU DO NOT PERCEIVE IT TO BE AN AILMENT.”

S: Daggle looks a little bit alarmed for a moment, like he’s been caught out. (Daggle) “IS it an ailment? Do– are you saying I should get it checked out? It’s never bothered me. I guess I never thought to, uh, go in for a checkup about it.”

X: (Mother Artifice) “NOT AT ALL. IT IS REFRESHING TO ENCOUNTER SOMEONE WHO EMBRACES THE WHIMSY OF THE FOLD WITHOUT CONCERN.”

S: (Daggle) “Oh!” Daggle gives a little relieved chuckle. 

M: (Mother Artifice)  “PARTICULARLY AT POINTS OF ALTITUDE WITHIN THE COSMOS ABOVE THE MEDIUN.”

S: (Daggle) “Oh! Well, that’s good to hear. Like I said, it doesn’t really bother me. In fact, I’m kind of fond of the little guys.” 

X: This is all pretty nice, but Merlin here is ready to get along to some more science. 

M: (Merlin) “So,” he says, clapping his hands together. “How about them readings?”

S: [laughing]

X: Whoa.

M: [laughing]

S: Merlin is in his element here, and revealing a more casual side of his personality. (Daggle) “I thought you’d never ask, buddy,” says Daggle. “Let me take you to the lab, show you what we’ve been working on.” [Transition to a space filled with low droning, static, and beeps.] The monitoring station at Uppermost is a claustrophobic low-ceilinged chamber crammed full of all kinds of mysterious instruments –

X: weird oscilloscopes, strange antennae, 

S: UNtennae, telethiriscopes,

X: notebooks and papers everywhere, strange charts, bizarre maps. 

S: A researcher hunches in here over a logbook, huge over-the-ear headphones cutting off all exterior sound, listening intently to something only they can hear, 

X: something far, far above. Something quiet, something distant, something strange.

M: (Merlin) “So, what have you been hearing, Daggle?” 

S: (Daggle) “A lot of the usual. That shouldn’t surprise you.” Daggle turns to everyone else and kind of explains that a lot of what they do here is essentially boring, rote observation. 

X: Repetitive. Usually quite mundane. 

S: A lot of nothing for the chance of the occasional glorious something. (Daggle) “So, there IS something kind of interesting, actually. We’ve been able to isolate this… Mmm, we don’t really have a term for it yet. We’ve been calling it the ‘tonality.’ It’s a kind of a… Well, here, just listen!”

X: He plugs a few things into a few other things, cranks up a little speaker. 

S: (Daggle) “You have to filter out all the usual crashing and banging, of course.”

X: He does some equalization, removing the clatter of mica colliding in the firmament high above. 

S: (Daggle) “But if you correct for that and adjust the frequency, you’ll start to hear this kind of a…”

X: Well, kind of a…kind of a this.

[A mysterious ringing noise.]

M: (Merlin) “Mmm.”

S: Daggle watches Merlin’s face curiously. 

X: He looks focused, attentive. So does Dr. Rawfield. Everett is listening as well, eyebrow cocked. (Everett) “This…you’re… This is coming from above?” 

S: (Daggle) “Yeah.”

X: (Everett) “What is that?”

S: Daggle shrugs, looking confused, and looking excited that he’s confused. (Daggle) “We don’t really know. It’s not coming from all over the place, it’s not, like, uniform. There are isolated points of origin every now and then, and they’re not always the same. They change.”

M: (Merlin) “So the source points are changing, you’re saying?”

S: (Daggle) “Yeah, exactly!”

M: (Merlin) “What??”

X: Mother Artifice, listening as well, turns to Merlin. (Mother Artifice) “THIS IS NOT A SOUND THAT YOU BECAME AWARE OF WHEN YOU WERE STATIONED HERE PREVIOUSLY?” 

M: (Merlin) “Not in this way. We would occasionally get some – we were just sort of thinking of them as overtones at the time, that we would sometimes pipe through the intrabase speaker system. It was pleasant enough, but this is, this is like, unbridled. This is–” 

S: (Daggle) “Exactly! At the time Merlin was stationed here, we didn’t know if it was a feedback issue, if it was just some extra resonance interference. But it seems to be something separate, something sort of, um…”

M: (Merlin) “This is beautiful.”

S: (Daggle) “Isn’t it?”

X: (Scientist) “It is,” says the scientist here who had been wearing those headphones just minutes ago. “Sometimes I just kind of put it on in the background, you know? Read a book.” 

S: (Daggle) “Yeah, we all do. It’s, well, for one thing, there’s not a whole lot to entertain us up here, but for another, it’s just…kind of relaxing.” 

X: Even Felix, who notoriously is one of the less relaxed members of the crew, is now leaning in the doorway of the lab, looking slightly more chill than usual.

S: But when he notices the others watching, he goes rushing off. 

X: (Rawfield) “So what do you think it is?” Dr. Rawfield asks, listening intently, peering at some cosmological charts, her brow furrowed. 

S: (Daggle) “Well, we’re juggling a few different hypotheses right now. It could be that at that altitude, the crystalline lattice – the makeup of mica itself – is different, and those are the sounds of mica bergs crashing into each other, making some kind of clear crystal ringing noise. That’s the best we’re able to tell at this distance. We are so far away from whatever it is that we’re actually hearing, so… We were actually hoping the answer to that question is something that you all might be able to find out for us. You can, you can get up there, closer than anyone has ever been before.” 

X: (Everett) “We sure can,” says Everett, looking a little hyped. 

S: Daggle, by the way, is just smiling as he says this. This is clearly a guy who loves his job so much. (Daggle) “We don’t know how far up it goes, we don’t know if there’s any life up there, probably not, we don’t even really know where mica COMES from, just generally that it comes from up there somewhere, and slowly descends on a downward trajectory, but we don’t know if there’s an unlimited supply of it, how it’s created… So we certainly don’t know what that sound is or what it means.” 

X: The members of the Ship’s crew all look at each other, bright-eyed, intent, absolutely electric excitement, adrenaline, surging in them all. This shit gives you goosebumps, goddamn. 

S: Up until this point, it’s all been launch celebrations and lectures and retracing already well-trodden territory, but this is a taste of what they are really here to do with this expedition. This is a taste of the unknown. 

X: Mother Artifice, covered in a blanket now, which he’s extracted from one of the counters here in the lab, has taken a seat in one of the lab chairs and is leaning in closer to the little speaker, listening intently to the strange sound.

S: Daggle holds a warm tin cup of fried beans in his hands. It’s cold in this outpost. (Daggle) “Um, Mother, sir, what do you make of all this? I would be really curious to hear a Mother’s perspective on some of the mysteries of the Upper Unfold.”

X: Hmm, a good question. This is, of course, the first time ever that a Mother, basically a Fold wizard, has ever come to the International Space Station, ever come to the Uppermost Outpost. Artifice is clearly listening intently. Presumably. He could be asleep underneath that blank mask, they don’t really know. 

M: But his head is cocked in a attention-giving sort of way, 

S: the large headphones draped at an awkward angle over his horned headdress. 

X: (Mother Artifice) “IN SOME WAYS, IT IS A SONG…THAT REMINDS ME…OF THE FOLD.”

S: (Daggle) “Do you mean to say,” asks Daggle, “that you think there could be more Fold up there?”

X: (Mother Artifice) “I DO NOT MEAN THAT NECESSARILY.” 

M: (Merlin) “That seems highly improbable,” Merlin says. 

X: (Mother Artifice) “I AM MERELY NOTICING A SIMILARITY. I COULD BE MISTAKEN. PERHAPS THE TWO EXTREMES OF THE COSMOS ARE NOT ENTIRELY AS DISCONNECTED AND DISSIMILAR AS SOME OF YOUR PRIOR RESEARCH WOULD LEAD US TO BELIEVE.”

M: (Merlin) “Well, there’s only one way to find out.”

X: (Everett) “Yeah there is,” says Everett. 

M: (Merlin) “Daggle, this is tremendous. If you don’t mind just walking me through this process that you’ve used to extract this sound, I would be interested in bringing this with, seeing what additional research we are able to effect further up and further in.”

S: (Daggle) “Oh, yeah! Oh, you bet. Let’s get nerdy.” [Whistling wind.] As much as the researchers here do love their science, they are a little bit tired of the outpost, and the temptation, the opportunity, to go aboard a dark mica ship is too much to resist. When will they next get an opportunity? 

M: They won’t, probably. At least that’s a possibility. So they go!

S: Everyone has been invited aboard to get a break from the outpost life and a chance at a fresh meal, not canned beans. Not beans at all! Unless they want beans. 

X: The Ship has completed its rewind process, the Foldlight has recuperated, the bocular systems have once again reenergized, and the Ship now redeploys one of its sloops, the very same that dropped off the bocular hoss crew earlier, now to retrieve the rest of the squad.

M: Even through the armored helmet that Daggle is wearing, it is clear that his jaw is dropped.

X: The crystal sloop winds its way through the air, retracting along its black crystal umbilical, relinking with the lowermost spearpoint of the Ship, and everyone steps aboard. 

S: Daggle looks thunderstruck, a little bit teary-eyed, even,

X: as they ride the crystal elevator up the backbone of the Ship, transiting up into the Ship’s main atrium. 

S: Goosebumps rise on Daggle’s arms. 

[Indistinct echoing conversation.]

X: You know what people who’ve been subsisting on pretty much nothing but canned beans while living in a high-altitude research base for months on end would enjoy? (Quino) “My friends, welcome aboard!” says Quino Del Belsaban. Fresh, fine coffee and pastries available immediately for everyone upon arrival. He’s here in the atrium bringing down a fantastic little rolling service tray covered in delicacies.

S: Oh, the researchers fall upon that ravenously. 

X: Tea and cakes. Coffee. 

S: Jam. 

M: Pearlfruit mimosas. 

S: The rest of the crew is excited to say hello as well. Cleo, of course, flounces forward exuberantly, introducing herself. (Cleo) “Hi! Make yourselves at home. Look around, enjoy the atrium! Quino can make you anything you want to eat.” 

X: Daggle, pastry in hand, stands with Merlin by an atrium wall, looking out through the dark mica material into that wind-ravaged expanse, at the bleak shelf of mica the research outpost is built within.

M: Mica fragments whip past the window in the wind, bright white streaks throwing trails of sparks into the snowy mix as they scrape and skitter off of the Ship’s dark hull.

S: But for the moment, Daggle’s attention is primarily focused on the Ship itself, on the window between him and the view. There’s more than just scientific interest in his expression. He is moved. (Daggle) “This isn’t the first time a piece of Midst’s moon has blown my mind. The tiny fragment that ended up on my home islet changed the course of my life forever. And this piece… I feel like it’s going to change a lot more people’s lives, in ways we can hardly imagine right now.”

M: Merlin is nodding. (Merlin) “Yes, I think that’s exactly what it will probably do.”

S: (Daggle) “I mean, for the last however many years it’s been, through the course of its development, I’ve been reading every paper I could get my hands on. But being in it, seeing it, touching it? It’s different.”

X: Everett is sitting here in a chair now, piled on top of Micky, listening to folks chat about the Ship, and, uh, blinking heavily for a moment, gets up and wanders over to the dining cart to get herself a coffee before stepping out for a minute. 

S: Another moth escapes from under Daggle’s eyepatch as he reaches up to wipe away a tear, and the moth flies upwards into the uppermost point of the atrium. 

X: Micky, getting out of her chair, is strolling over toward the conversation pit where Everett has repositioned herself. There, across that circular seating area, the Foldlight glowing warmly in the center, sits the Granddaughter, just on the other side of the pit from Everett now, gazing quietly, placidly, into the Foldlight’s flickering luminance.

S: Communing. Studying. Meditating. 

X: Everett and Micky sit together. Micky is whispering something to Everett. Everett shakes her head, leaning her head on Micky’s shoulder. 

S: The Granddaughter pays no heed to any of this, to any of the people or the conversations in the atrium around them. Their eyes are fixed on the Foldlight.

X: Daggle is gazing up into the high peak of the atrium, watching his strange moths twirl and flutter. 

S: (Daggle) “I’ve been wondering why they fly UP like that. I swear they never used to do that when I lived at lower altitudes.” 

M: (Merlin) “Is it not just the closest light they are attracted to?”

S: (Daggle) “They never seemed to care about light before. Maybe they’re just obsessed with going up, like I am.” 

X: Yes, wherever the moths seem to want to go, our crew must go as well. It is time. 

S: (Daggle) “Gosh, it’s killing me that I can’t come with you, Merlin.” 

M: (Merlin) “Surely this is just the beginning of the dark mica exploration age. There will be future opportunities, mark my words, even if it is not this exact ship.”

X: (Mother Artifice) “AND THE WORK THAT YOU ARE DOING AT THE OUTPOST IS VERY VALUABLE INDEED, IN SOME WAYS MORE VALUABLE THAN THE WORK WE ARE DOING ON THIS SHIP. YOU IN YOUR OWN WAYS ARE CONTRIBUTING TO HISTORIC SCIENCE IN IMMEASURABLE CAPACITIES.”

M: (Merlin) “Crucially so.”

S: (Daggle) “Thank you, Mother, Merlin. That means a lot.”

M: (Merlin) “No, thank YOU.” Merlin raises his pearlfruit mimosa. [Clink.] “To the unknown.”