Chapter 8

Eden 5

The last morning, everyone got up late. Gaige's parents had taken the morning off, both in anticipation of a late night and wanting to see her off. Her mom had been up early preparing an elaborate breakfast for them, which consisted of stacks of light, fluffy, sweet, bread-like layers, drenched in various syrups and fruits. It turned out that she rarely made them, due to the challenges to making them come out right, but on this day, she had made the extra effort. Not that it hurt to have Deathtrap around to help.

After enjoying the leisurely meal, Gaige reluctantly started to get her stuff together. It wasn't that she didn't want to get back to space, in fact she had been going a bit stir crazy from having to behave herself in front of her parents. Still, she wanted to stay with them for longer. But the fact that she could come back whenever she wanted helped ease the sadness.

It wasn't long before she finished stacking boxes in the entryway. Stepping back, she was amazed at how much stuff she was taking back with her, and how much was left. Turning, she found Artemis looking at the stack.

"I don't know where we're gonna put it all, but this is what I was thinking of taking back with me." She explained.

"I was afraid of that." The other girl replied with a faux grim expression. She turned and pointed to another box that was sitting off to the side. "What's that?"

"Oh, that? That's the stuff that I was gonna try and return before we left. Birthday presents and stuff."

"Jeez." Artemis said looking at the overstuffed mound "Maybe we should push back departure for a day."

"Nah, as tempting as that sounds, we've gotta leave sooner or later, and we shouldn't put any more burden on my parents then we already have. Besides, I can get this knocked out in an hour or two, unless my mom drags me into a changing room. Still, the hard ones are the credits." She said lamenting the pile of cards stacked in another box that was currently sitting in the lounge.

"Credits?"

"Basically, money that can only be spent at the one store, or chain of stores."

"That sounds...less than useful."

"Yeah, but they tend to be good gifts for someone you haven't seen in like, eight years, so I can't really fault them for that. It's just that I wish they'd got them for somewhere that someone would actually go. Unless of course, you wanna go with me on a shopping spree?"

"I doubt I'd find anything that suits me."

"I donno, I bet we could find something interesting at 'Siren's Secret'."

"Siren's what?"

"Ah, it's an upscale lingerie store." She said watching the other girl's face as it tried to decide whether to turn red or white, unable to resist the final tease "It could be fun. It's supposed to make you feel...I'm sorry, I'll stop. Point is, that's the most useful one in the bunch, it's the only one that's for a store chain that extends off of Eden 5, well, there are a few Digi-structed food places that I also got cards for, but that's beside the point. Most of these places are only on Eden 5, and sell stuff I'd never wear."

"I see, ahem, well, if you want to get started on your returns, I can try and help Deathtrap get the rest of this stuff stored on the ship."

"I'd rather join you, but your plan's probably the best, so let's get this over with."

About Three Hours Later

Gaige was sitting in one of the chairs in the lounge, eyes closed. The returns had been worse than she'd imagined. It wasn't just that, like she'd feared, her mother wanted her to go into every changing room to try on some outfit or another, but at two of the stores they'd run into the relative that had given the gift in the first place, leading to some quickly spun half-truths, mostly about the color, or the fit.

This, of course, led to them having to try on other versions of the same outfit and made Gaige say things like 'It just isn't sitting right' or 'It doesn't come in a color combination that I like'. In one case she'd snapped and flat out said 'I hate the feel of it', to which the Aunt that had given it in the first place stormed out in a huff.

The worst part though, had been when she returned the outfit she'd shown Artemis the night before. While she was returning it, she noticed the same outfit in other colors, including a black and red one. Remembering what Artemis had said the night before, she felt compelled to try it on, and to her horror, found that it didn't look all that bad on her. In fact, she felt that Artemis might have been right, it did look good on her, though it wasn't something that she would wear often, if ever. Still, she had decided to exchange the one she had for it. She tried to convince herself that it was only because she had a little money from the refund her dad had got her, as well as that it was something to wear in a different, more formal setting then what she was normally dressed for, but she knew, deep down that it was cause she wanted to show the other girl that she'd been right.

She also ended up keeping the other outfit she'd shown Artemis the night before, as well as the 'Siren's Secret' card, in no small part because she couldn't face trying to return them with her mother along.

Which is what led her to be sitting, exhausted in the lounge, a few bags piled next to her when her dad walked in holding a couple of cups of coffee.

"Rough day?" He asked, handing her a cup.

"I'm beginning to think that these stores are worse than any bandit camp, at least there I can just shoot them and get it over with."

She took a sip and winced, it was straight black coffee.

Noticing that, her dad apologized "Sorry, you don't take it black?"

"I used to, but then I realized that I didn't have to torture myself to be an adult. Well, more of had it shouted into my ear until I listened, but either way, I prefer cream and sugar."

"Ah, I'll go grab some."

"Nah, I suffered through it for years, so one cup won't do me in. Besides, I'd rather spend more time with you."

He got a slightly goofy look on his face for a second before clearing his throat and looking at her, a serious expression on his face.

"Yes well, I'm glad we can talk one last time before you go, just the two of us."

"Uh oh. Is this gonna be one of 'Those' conversations?"

"What kind of conversation?"

"Dad, you know that I'm twenty-six now, right?"

Her dad looked at her, confusion clear on his face. Realizing that she may have misunderstood something, Gaige quickly added "What was it you wanted to talk about? Let's just start there."

"Well, it's about your future."

"I think I'd rather have the other conversation." Gaige muttered too softly for him to hear.

"What?"

"Nothing, I was just thinking, maybe I should've asked for that cream and sugar. So, what about my future? I already told you that I'm not sure what I wanna do next, career wise, so what else was there?"

"No, no, not that, though I am a bit concerned about it, I know that you'll find something. What I wanted to ask you about was your friend."

"Artemis? What about her?"

"Well, I was wondering what you were going to do next?"

"Next? We were gonna go to Wilina 2. She's apparently got a place there and we were gonna drop some of our stuff off there, after that...well, we're gonna contact A.I. ngel again and see what she wants to do, but other than that, we hadn't really talked about it."

"Again, not what I was meaning. What I was wondering about, was what you were going to do about the, well let's call it tension, between you two at the moment?"

"I donno. I mean, if you'd just tell me what I did wrong, that'd solve a lot of the problems."

"Still not my place."

"Yeah, I figured you'd say that. But that's the thing, until I know what I did wrong, I can't really do anything about it. So, until either someone tells me or I figure it out, I guess I'm gonna have to keep treating her like I have."

"And do you think that's a good idea?"

"What do ya mean?"

"Well, treating her like you have hasn't worked out has it?"

"Yeah, but I don't want to treat her differently. I mean, what if the way I start treating her is the exact opposite of what I should do and I just make things worse? Or if I act like anything I say is gonna set her off, I know that's just gonna make her more depressed, and she's gonna think that I'm trying to think of a way to ditch her or something. She's got a serious problem with that."

"She does seem to believe that, doesn't she?"

"Yeah, I mean, on that last thing we did, I said I wanted to talk to her, I mean, I just wanted to tell her to stand up for herself and such, but she thought that I was abandoning her, and she was ready to die so I could have her ship or something. Makes it really hard to talk to her."

"That would. But if I can give you one piece of fatherly advice about this, it would be to remember that without maintenance all things fall apart. You of all people should know that. And not just guns and robots. Friendships, family, marriages, they all take regular maintenance to keep functioning. Do you think that me and your mom always get along? That we haven't had so hard times, especially after you had to flee? Of course we did, and we got through it. How? By working on it. It wasn't easy, but we did it."

"I'm sorry."

"It wasn't your fault. We had other fights and rough patches long before that, and we've had our share since as well. The point is, it's not easy, and you can't always fix things. Think back to your first robot, there came a point where too much had gone wrong and he couldn't be fixed anymore. But then look at Deathtrap. He's still going strong after all these years. Why? Because you make sure to keep him in good repair. Friendships are the same. They easily break down. And many get broken past the point of fixing them. But the ones that last, the ones that are important enough to really try and keep, they have to be kept in good repair as well. So don't take anything for granted, always try and fix your problems instead of ignoring them, otherwise, one day, you might find that things have gone past the point you can. And then where will you be?"

Gaige sat in silence, thinking over what her father had said, before saying "Well, the best way to move forward would be to find out what's bothering her. And the best way to find that out is for you to tell me."

"Nope."

"Force her to tell me?"

"That would make things worse."

"Find someone else that knows, and get them to tell me?"

"No, you need to figure it out on your own. Just think about it and what you've talked with her about."

"I've tried, but I can't think of anything."

"I think the problem is, you've made some assumptions about her, and you know what they say about assumptions?"

"They make an ass out of you and leave me out of it?"

"No, they..." He looked at the smirk on her face and let out a sigh. "Dad-isms." he said with a shrug.

"Yeah, and I'm grateful that you don't make too many of them. But I gotta ask, what assumptions have I made?"

"I already gave you as much of a hint as I can. But rather than focusing on this, I'd rather have a good old father daughter moment before you go."

"What'd you have in mind?"

"Well, I know I shouldn't, but how about having one last drink with your old man."

Gaige looked at the bottles of alcohol and licked her lips, but sighed and said "Sure, but I'll have a root beer."

A quarter of an hour later, Artemis and Deathtrap returned to find them deep into a conversation about the best manufacturer of cybernetics versus making your own.