The Keeper is staring, in question, in careful caution, crawling on all fours in a deceivingly awkward scuttle.

The Keeper crawls closer, giving a sweet chitter. The words make her pause, as they are just incomprehensible sounds.

I don't have a universal translator. The annoyance irritates her, and she wonders why the Keeper is not trying to speak with it. Maybe it doesn't want to alarm her?

"I don't understand, Grey," she tells it simply. She uses a name she has heard her older cousin use to refer to the Earth's interpretation of Keeper sightings.

Something in the image of round heads and those dark eyes had always felt familiar to Jupiter. Now with one in front of her, she knows why. Seraphi's memories are not ever-present, strange, disconnected without context sometimes, scattered and across new neural pathways that somehow have ninety thousand, six hundred and ninety-one years of memories hidden the farthest reaches of her young mind.

A scent here, a gleam of color, odd things trigger her memories.

The sight of the Keeper crawling into her room and things that are connected to the Keepers fly across her mind.

Memories in Jupiter's head remind her how quick the Keepers of a Harvest planet can be. They may be thin to the point of skeletal, but their long limbs are ideal for jumping, and they can adhere to vertical surfaces. She takes a breath, ever conscious of how she can't run, and the fact that on its hip belt, along with various tools it would need for its trade, the standard device for memory erasure is present. The Keeper, curious, tilts its head. She knows if she makes a fuss, the creature will use the thing on its hip. The fact that it hasn't already, makes something cold travel up Jupiter's spine.

Standard protocol is to never erase human children 70 years before a Harvest- the stock is delicate in its brain chemistry. Only major events may be the exception for the sake of population control. This gives me a frame of reference for when Seraphi died. The Earth was two hundred years away from Harvest. Its been at least a hundred and thirty years. Or, at the other extreme this is another Harvest with the stock already close… No. It can't be. This planet was made to prefection by Seraphi... No one would put the same care as Seraphi did.

The Keeper freezes at the sound of her voice. Jupiter keeps her face pleasant, with a little unashamed curiosity. The small creature tilts its head and takes out a sheeve. Presses against its screen quickly. Jupiter frowns as the Keeper crawls to her arm, its other hand reaching for one of the many devices on its hip. Dark, large and bulbous eyes look at her in faint curiosity. At her lack of reaction or her obvious tension, Jupiter doesn't know. She sighs, slightly, before she gives the Keeper a reassuring smile.

"I won't tell," she tells it seriously, "But you need to check something with me, don't you?"

The Keeper stares at her, before chittering something. Frowning, the Keeper than gives a clumsily nod. So it does have a universal translator, but it won't talk… How queer. With a quickness, the Keeper reached for another device on its hip.

It's slightly changed, sleekier, slimmer and glossier than in the memories but Jupiter can recognize the DNA reader. The Keeper reaches forward with its three-fingered hand towards her IV free arm, humming in question.

No child is ever scanned for a Recurrence. Only their DNA is kept on file until the age of maturity. The only exception is come Harvest time. The fact is in her mind, that her DNA will be on file for future testing if the old ways still adhere too... Something in her chest that is startling close to panic. I am four standard years by the correct time on Orous. The technical day of majority or old enough to claim any inheritance would be when I turn 12 years old. I have exactly eight years on Earth to assemble what I need to claim what was left to me in Serahphi's will. Earth, the crown jewel, the whole solar system, and a few planetary bodies scattered across the known universe... The Jupiter Refinery. If there is something she knows will hold, it is the fact that the Verse is slow to decide to change and slow to implicate said change. She had a set deadline to maneuver things on a terrestrial planet until anyone would be alerted to her exsitance.

Balem, Kalique, Titus.

The names of Seraphi's children are seared into her heart. They will come for her. What that meant, Jupiter couldn't possibly know. Balem murdered her in her first life and Jupiter knew that would have tortured him beyond reason. Into madness or a state of despair that Seraphi had not cared to think about. He had loved her more than she had loved him. Kalique had turned her back on what Seraphi had wanted in the end. The woman who revealed in the beauty and wanted to paint the Verse itself to prefection... No matter the consequences. She just wanted beauty no matter the bones it would be carved from. Titus was vain and self-absorbed and wanted more responsibilities. He wanted and wanted and wanted to be more than either sibling, falling short of Balem's astuteness and Kalique's gorgeousity. Seraphi had denied them to all, had treated her children horribly. All three of those members of her House would have scores to settle… And that was even if they had no knowledge of the fact that Jupiter remembered her past life.

If they knew they would worship her or tare into her for all the slights that Seraphi had done to them.

She sighed again. She knew this was not a Harvest by the almost lazy manner the Keeper pressed its cool, dry skin against her free arm. Jupiter Jones holds her head high, and smiles as the DNA reader chimes softly, a noise indication that Jupiter Jones' DNA was now in the system.

And so my countdown begins.

"Thank you for being so efficient at your job," she told the Keeper.

Technically, they were Balem's until her DNA registered itself as a Reccurance in eight years' time. But they were by right Jupiter's, and she would not repeat Seraphi's inhuman treatment of them… The Keeper tilted its head, and chittered softly, gently, almost in comfort. It clumsily patted her hand. It couldn't smile, but there was something warm in its eyes.

"My cousin told me about you, you're an alien, right?" she asked it, unnecessary.

The Keeper tilted its head, again, before it gave another clumsy nod.

"My name is Jupiter," she told them, softly, "Do you have a name?"

It gave a shrug.

"You can't speak to me? 'Cause you can understand me. I know you can."

The Keeper looked over its shoulder. Then they looked back at Jupiter. Jupiter nodded, slowly.

"You're not allowed?"

It gave an eager nod.

"But I can talk to you?"

Another nod. Jupiter stared at the Keeper.

"Will you be my friend, then, Grey? If you want me to talk to you?"

It chittered again. Patted her hand again.

How horrible it must feel to be a Keeper… Taking care of sentient beings for centuries only to see them ripped away? And forced to start the cycle again and again?

Jupiter smiled in their direction. You are my responsibility… I will take care of you.

"Come visit me, then," she told the Keeper, newly dubbed Grey, "I'm in the hospital for a couple more months. So I'll be here."


AN:

Cough. Well. This is an alternate universe. I have to give a reasonable time-line when things are going down, and why Jupes hasn't been snatched up by the Verse at large. Things are in motion my friends: I already have Jupiter moving next to a Bee Farm. Her having a Keeper Buddy was always the plan, good eye on that one review that asked why she hadn't been flagged down for having Seraphi's DNA. Here is my reasoning, most Reccurances would be caught as babies in really 'developed' worlds. With how Bueratic Humanity was in the movie, I felt that them having age restrictions however arbitrary they are, would be natural. I choose 12 because it gives Jupiter time, it's just before she's physically an adult so that means the Abbraxs would underestimate her... And I want to give her time on Earth before she's launched to space.

AND before anyone says that the Keepers were just villains... I always thought that was boring. Their sentient too. They technically work for Balem in the film. They were just following orders. There has to be more to them. This me giving them more.