I was surprised how well Eris was received at the end of the last chapter. (Someone mentioned they wanted Eris to be Jack's scorned ex-girlfriend… and while that doesn't fit the story, I would REALLY like to see a story like that.)
I wish the landing scene was more tense and in depth… but I hope you guys like it.
Without further ado -
Chapter 24
Jack's first encounter with the being that called herself Eris had been just under two years earlier, on the freighter that had taken him from Burgess to the Academy. She was drawn to any form of chaos in the galaxy, and she had come to enjoy the show when a zealot from one of the many planets suffering under Gothel's tyranny had planned to hijack a freighter and crass it into the Imperial Palace on Pallash II.
Even as the time, as he'd prepared to enroll in the Academy, he wasn't opposed to statements against the Empire. But he wasn't a fan of suicide missions – especially when they would result in the deaths of innocents to the tune of thousands. The fact he would probably be among the dead had been reason 200,001 not to like the idea.
Eris had shown up at his side at some point on the trip, staring at him like he was some kind of novelty. His senses had told him she wasn't something to be messed with – even as her billowing black hair had told him she was more than she appeared. And she had no concept of personal space.
After asking a few questions he didn't understand, and didn't know why he answered them, Eris had looked at him with narrowed eyes.
"You're not supposed to be here." She had sidled around him like a cat, one hand on his neck while the other pressed a finger to her lips in though. "I'm not sure what you are – but you're not one of them. What are you?"
"Not one of who?" he asked, doing his best not to show how unnerved he was by her question and her presence.
Instinct told him she wasn't someone he wanted to risk insulting, so he had tried to take an inconspicuous step away from her to get some breathing space, if nothing else.
They had been standing in a shadowed hallway near the main area of the ship, where he had stepped in to try and get a grasp on all the thoughts that had been churning through his head since he left Warren, trying to figure out what he was going to do if he didn't make it into the Academy.
She didn't answer. Instead, her hand raised to his cheek, one finger curling. Jack's breath had caught in his throat when he felt the tip of a sharp nail against the skin on his cheek. But before he could flinch away, or her fingernail could scape across his skin, she had vanished from beside him.
Jack hated to admit he had gasp, spinning on his heel as his eyes darted around the hall in search of his tormentor.
When he had turned a full circle, he found her hovering a few feet away. Her eyes had been wide for several moments – the only time Jack had ever seen her unable to school her expression.
"You're one of Tsar Lunar's."
Jack had grimaced at her wording, but had forgotten that when her lips pulled in a smile, her surprise fading as she regained control.
"I came expecting on kind of show, but this is better," she said. "This is much better. I don't know how you got so far from home little moonbeam – but I'd like to keep you alive. And I get the feeling you're of the same mind. If so, you might want to keep an eye out for anything, os, shall we say… out of the ordinary?"
With that she had vanished, and Jack was left wondering what had just happened.
She had reappeared every half an hour or so, hinting him toward the would-be hijacker. Needless to say, he had managed to take down the hijacker, but not before the pilot and copilot had been knocked out, so he'd ended up having to land the freighter on his own.
The good news was that he'd gained automatic admission into the Academy, and they hadn't required him to take the admission exam.
Since then, he had encountered her several times, during assignments at the Academy. He wasn't sure what he liked least about her: the fact her presence automatically meant he was about to find himself in a life or death situation, or he would be stuck with her riddling talk while he figured out who was in a life or death situation and how to fix it. Her apparent fascination with him didn't make him any keener on seeing her.
It wasn't as creepy as Gothel's interest. Just as Gothel, Eris saw him as a toy – but as a completely different kind of toy.
Eris didn't believe in heroes – she was convinced it all came down to selfishness and ego when you stripped away the veneer. Jack couldn't deny that he could see her point. Once – for a moment – Jack had gotten what he believed to be frank honesty from her, and she had admitted that her fascination lay in testing him. She wanted to see what happened to already chaotic situations when he was a variable. She wanted to see what he did in life or death situations 0 how much he would really give to save someone he didn't know.
"I want to see how far I have to strip you down before you choose yourself," she had shrugged.
"Probably not very far," Jack had muttered at the time, looking down at the uniform jacket he had been about to put on.
"You underestimate yourself," Eris had said, chuckling. "Tsar Lunar only chooses the pure of heart – whatever that means. And I've already pushed you further than most."
That had been seven months ago.
#
"Just when I thought this couldn't get any better," Eris practically cooed. "It's been a while, Snowflake."
"Not long enough," Jack muttered. His left hand gripped the towel around his waist, making sure it stayed in place until Eris left and he could put on a pair of pants. "Why do you always show up when I'm getting dressed?"
"Because you're blush is so cute," she said, smirking. Her dark hair billowed around her, never stopped. "And the fact your mind never wanders down to the obvious, when I'm here—" she lay back on his bed, and stretched languidly "—and you're, shall we say… less than decent?"
Jack rolled his eyes.
"Actually, I didn't plan it this time," sighing as though it pained her to admit it. "You just dropped out of hyperspace and I ran right over when I realized Tsar Lunar's lost little snowflake had come to visit me."
At 'ran right over' she appeared at his side, walking her fingers across his shoulder emphasis.
He swatted her hand away. He wasn't fond of her 'Snowflake' nickname, but it was better than 'Moonbeam', which she had used before finding out his name and territory.
She smirked and sat on the edge of his bed, a couple feet from where he still stood by the closet.
"I can't tell you how glad I was to hear you'd left the Academy. You should have seen the fit Gothel threw when she found out. The only thing that woman does well is throw fits. I do my best to never miss a performance."
"I'm sure," Jack muttered, over Eris' laugh. He opened the closet and flicked through his clothes with his right hand, still keeping a firm grip on his towel.
"And you're right on time," Eris said, once she was done smiling fondly at the memory of Gothel's fits. "From what I can tell, it's just about to get good. Sometimes I really wish I knew what was going to happen…. But, I supposed, it's more interesting this way."
"Uh-huh." Jack pulled down a pair of cargo pants and tossed them onto his bed. "What exactly and I walking into?"
"Ah-ah." She wagged a finger at him. "You know that's against the rules."
She couldn't see ahead to what was going to happen, and she couldn't tell anyone something they didn't already know. Not specifics, at least. Gothel's fits, for example, were trivial enough she could tell him that. Though she loved her riddling talk so much he doubted she minded that one.
"But, I can tell you that it's shaping up like a fairytale," she said. "A mermaid, forbidden love… it's so mushy it's sickening. I would vomit, if I were capable. Too many sweet nothings – not enough screaming. But the tense political relations have been waiting to snap for the past three hundred years or so. One more stupid move from the right person, and it all should fall to pieces." She gace a wistful sigh. "And you. My favorite variable. Well, second favorite. No, third. Maybe fourth – oh, no, he's dead. Third favorite. And two new variables. Just when I thought it couldn't be any better."
Jack's hand froze on the hooded tshirt he'd just been about to pull off the hanger. "Leave Hiccup and Merida out of it."
Eris rolled her eyes. "Please, Snowflake. You know I never get people involved. They show up on their own, and I occasionally push them in the right direction." She looked at her nails, as though checking her manicure. "But it's cute how you try to protect them, when you know just as well as I do that I can't do anything to anyone. I just drift through the galaxy, drawn to any planet where something interesting is happening."
Jack added the hooded tshirt and a vest to the cargo pants already on his bed. They narrowly missed Eris, who glared at them for a moment as though they had caused her personal offense. "Then why are you talking to me?"
"Because I'm bored," Eris sighed. She lay down, rolling onto her stomach, chin on one palm while the other hand picked at the zipper on one of the pockets of the vest. "They're taking forever. Really, chaos is inevitable. A blind man could see it. I don't know how they're able to put it off for so long."
Jack gave a noncomital grunt and tossed a pair of boxers onto the bed, where they landed on Eris hand (the one playing with the zipper of the cest), and Jack smirked as he watched her stare at them in disgust for a moment before shaking them off and sitting up.
"Now that was just rude."
"You can leave now," he said, jerking his head toward the viewport for emphasis.
Her eyes widened in mock surprise. "You're kicking me out already?"
"I let you stay longer than necessary," Jack said. "Now I have to get dressed."
"And I have to leave for that?"
He threw a pair of socks directly at her, and smirked into the closet door when they hit her square on the forehead.
She actually let out a cry of surprise before fading away.
"And stay out," Jack muttered, as he shut the closet door.
Taking a deep breath, he rubbed his forehead. He wanted to climb back into the shower and wash away the stress talking to Eris always gave him. It was a good thing his hair was already white, or he'd probably go grey at a very young age. He wasn't sure the warning her presence gave him was actually worth their conversations.
His commlink beeped, telling him the shower was off limits. "Jack, are you coming?"
"Yeah." He sighed. "One sec."
#
When North taught him how to fly, he had insisted Jack first learn how to land on his own before he was allowed to land with assistance from the ship's software. And compared to the stress of landing The Sleigh in the North Pole hanger, with North silent and imposing behind him the whole time, bringing The Stormfly down was almost a walk in the park.
If the computer were online, the sensors would have told him exactly how much space he had on each side as he lowered the ship into the docking bay, and how far he was from the ground. He had to be aware of every wall, and at such a slow speed he wouldn't damage the landing gear if he miscalculated.
"If you need anything—"
"Just keep an eye on the hull sensors," Jack said, cutting Hiccup off as he looked over his own feed from the sensors on the computer screens. At least that part of the computer wasn't down. He could probably still bring them down without it, but that would be just begging for something to go wrong.
Jack flexed his finger's on the ship's yoke and took a deep breath before leveling the ship out above the docking bay that air traffic control had assigned to them. Hiccup had told them about the situation, so their bay was away from the others that were occupied, or where they were already directing other ships. This would take time, and there was no point in stalling traffic if they didn't have to.
Jack looked at the feed from the sensors on the ship's belly, calculating as best he could from this distance… and slowly started to take the ship down.
"You're too close to the right," Hiccup said as they got closer, just as Jack saw the same thing from his own feed.
"I see it." Came to a stop, adjusting his position to the walls.
In the back of his mind he wondered vaguely where Merida was – but asking would take too much of his attention away from the landing.
As they got closer he pulled the ship back a few feet, putting some room between the wall and the ship's nose.
"How are we on the tail?" he asked, his attention fixed on the belly sensors that told him he was getting closer to the ground. He decreased their speed a little more, and the ship's engines protested, not meant to go so slow for more than a second or two.
"We're fine."
The ship was still jostled when the landing gear touched down, but that was inevitable. Jack temporarily forgot about Eris and her riddles and allowed himself a moment to bask in the glow of accomplishment before spinning the pilot's chair to look at Hiccup, who was back in the navigator's chair.
His friend's brows were raised, visibly impressed. "If we weren't already splitting the profits 50-50, I'd give you a raise."
Jack chuckled. "It's the thought that counts. So, what now?"
Hiccup frowned. "We'll be here a few days, so we might as well do a full refuel and supply. We'll dump and refill the water, and recharge the back up. Might as well change the air filters as well, and anything else the engine might need. First, let's get the resets disks. If you'll do that, I'll take Merida into town to look around."
"What are the odds she'll actually be able to establish a life here?" Jack asked.
Hiccup looked over to meet his gaze, silently asking what he meant.
"She's a princess," Jack said, keeping his voice low in case she was trying to listen in. "She's never worked a day in her life, and she's never been off Caledonia. This planet is a melting pot – and she's bound to insult someone, and probably the wrong person. What is she going to do – wait tables? No offense, but if she has any understanding of customer service skills, I'll be really surprised. And with no experience, or qualifications, there's not much else she can do."
"What are our other options?" Hiccup asked, the same question that came up every time they talked about what to do with the temperamental red head.
That was enough to make Jack fall silent, and wish he hadn't brought it up in the first place. He looked down at the floor for a moment.
"Even if I could handle her staying onboard – which I probably could – you obviously can't."
"So we just leave her on Atlantis?" Jack asked, challenge creeping into her voice.
Hiccup sighed in frustration, rubbing his face. His agitation was almost painfully obvious from the fact Jack could see the S-shaped slacemark on Hiccup's temple, but the brunet didn't make a move to check that it was covered.
"Why the sudden charity on your part?" Hiccup asked. "I got the impression you wanted to kick her through the airlock the other day."
Jack looked back at the slate grey floor. And hour ago, he would have happily waved Merida off and left her on Atlantis without a second thought.
But an hour ago he hadn't known that Atlantis was about to be stage to enough chaos as to get Eris' attention. And if it was enough to entertain Eris, it usually meant liver were going to be lost. Jack had only been able to prevent that once or twice.
Annoying as Merida could be, Jack wasn't capable of leaving her on any planet with Eris so close. There was chaos everywhere, and the worst could happen everywhere. But there was a difference between knowing it could, and probably would happen, and knowing that it was brewing even as they sat there.
"I don't like that look," Hiccup said.
Jack smirked ruefully.
But what was he supposed to say? That the embodiment of discord had paid him a visit as he got out of the shower?
A little research after their first meeting when he had gotten to Pallash II had revealed that he wasn't the first person to run into her – far from it. There were a few societies across the galaxy that worshiped her as a goddess. But Warren was a monotheistic society, and Jack planned to maintain this in his own life, and he refused to give Eris the credit. He knew Eris limitations too well to consider her a deity.
Even in his head he couldn't come up with a way to explain it to Hiccup (practical, logical Hiccup) in a way that didn't sound absolutely insane. And he didn't have any warning chimes going off in his head, or in his gut, so he didn't want to say he had a haunch, or a bad feeling.
Well, he had a sense of foreboding. But he wasn't sure if it was a warning, or if it was just a result of talking to Eris. She always left him so unnerved, and his stomach contemplating if it wanted to return his last meal… he couldn't tell his stomach from his gut for a few hours after a visit with her. His only theory was that her propensity to chaos gave her an aura of discord, and that was what sent him on edge.
So, for now, he was instinctually blind. And he couldn't stand it. It was why he couldn't stand her.
Unable to answer Hiccup's unspoken question, Jack stood up.
"You and the princess have your date—"
"Jack!" Hiccup sputtered.
"I'll hunt down a set of disks." He grinned, only feeling a little bit sorry. He'd apologize later… if he thought about it.
For now, he had a job to do.
And, spinning the ring he wore on his middle left finger, he made a mental note to keep an eye out for mermaids.