Sandra takes a quick moment to appraise her surroundings. Jumping from world to world is a chaotic and confusing process at the best of times. Jumping into a swirling chaos portal doesn't lend itself to controlled travel. Taking a few moments to reach out with her senses, she doesn't sense anything too out of the normal, but senses no people either. Odd, but it's not the first time she's found herself in an empty location.

She decides to drink in the air of the new world. New worlds mean new things for her senses to perceive after all, and she loves new sensations. She'll check the cottage first, and if it's devoid of anything interesting she'll start exploring the rest of the locale.

The cottage looks... Abandoned. There are spots where there clearly hung some painting or picture, or where there used to be a dresser at some point, but it's just bare. The fireplace is devoid even of ash, rain having washed it out so often. The windows are all missing. Some of the curious stone walls are cracked. Moss and mold and rot in every corner. It's probably decent shelter from the weather, but it's no longer a home.

The rest of the locale, similarly, looks like it was a farm at one point. Fields, paths, and a cracked water tank of some sort. But there's only so much here before she comes to a dizzying fall into open air. There doesn't seem to be any land below her. Just blue and grey. And the air here is... Different, subtly.

At the thought of homes, Sandra gets a little wistful. Her and homes have never really gone together, she's always moved from place to place, sleeping wherever is convenient. Regardless, a former home without people is sad, the fact that she came far too late to help anyone is sadder.

Well, there's not much she can do about that right now. So the best thing to do is to try and make the most of what she's got. Fortunately, she's relatively well-prepared for wilderness living. She's got about two week's worth of rations and materials to make a shelter in her backpack. She'll see if she can salvage anything for firewood so she can have some warmth. Never know how cold it'll get. Technically she might be able to survive without, but that's a theory she doesn't particularly want to test, all she knows is that she's felt hunger and extreme cold before and it isn't fun.

It's pretty warm for now. There are a few trees on the island. That dominant floaty species of grass looks pretty flammable too.

The islands in the distance are drifting slightly.

One isn't drifting. It has windows... And propellers.

Her senses can definitely tell it's moving in a more controlled manner. Propellers is interesting, it means technology.

Can she tell how far away it is? Her senses aren't the greatest at accurately defining distance, but they should be able to give her a rough idea of how far out it is and it's coming her way.

If it doesn't look like it's coming to her, she'll try to use the firewood to send a smoke signal.

It can pretty clearly see her. A light flashes at her. Morse code? Or something similar, at any rate. 

Assuming the windows are reasonably person-sized, it's probably only a mile or two away. The propellers' low buzzing grows louder.

It doesn't appear to be heading for her... Until it's close to passing, and then it slows and turns, seemingly angling to come in above the island she is on. She can see a figure in a glass-walled room at the front.

Awesome, everything is awesome. She doesn't understand the light code, but that's OK, everything is working out. Just like it always does.

She'll excitedly wave at the figure, grab her backpack and get ready to meet this stranger. Which is great, because meeting new people is great.

The ship drops ropes as it settles in above.

A redheaded girls half-leaps from a doorway and slides down one, wearing some kind of safety harness. "Hello, whoever you are! I convinced 'Cap to come and get you, so help me tie the ship down!"

Sandra does just that. She happens to be really good at it too, she deftly finds some solid things to tie the rope to and ties the rope with grace.

While she's working, she'll call out. "Hello! I'm Sandra, I can pay for my passage." And she can, or she should be able to at least, assuming they'll take any of the various valuables in her backpack that she carries around just in case she needs to pay for something.

"Good, because that's exactly what bossman was going to ask you as soon as he comes down! I woulda had to give up wages for your ticket otherwise. Cap can be a bit prickly, but he's fair, don't worry."

Once there are six ropes trying the ship, she looks satisfied. "The name's Walta, nice to meet you."

"Thank you for the advice, Walta, it's nice to meet you too, you're nice!" Sandra says with a wide smile.

"Thanks for thinking so. Why're you out here?"

"It's complicated, and you'd think I'm crazy." She pauses.

"Well, I probably am, a little, but not about this. For now let's just say that I'm an explorer." 

"Shouldn't you be more north than here then?"

A different voice shouts down. "Ground crew, for the third time! Confirm that we are secured!"

"-Yes sir! Six points of contact are secured! Island integrity seems good!"

"Right. I'm shutting down and coming to talk to your strandee. Get started on reprovisioning, if you please."

"...Looks like you get to meet Nick. I'm off to work again."

"Like I said, it's complicated, I'll explain later." Though she tucks away the tidbit about north for later, maybe the north might be interesting to explore?

"Alright then, it was nice meeting you Walta!"

All that's left to do is wait for the Captain.

The captain descends presently, in a fashionable-looking uniform-style coat. "Good afternoon, miss or ma'am. I'm Captain Nicholas Vauners. Whatever has led you to be resting on an abandoned farm?"

Sandra appreciates good fashion. She herself is wearing a modified version of her costume, a large cloak and a practical but elegant vest.

"Miss Styles, at your service." She then chews her lip for a second. Should she just out and tell him? He probably won't believe her. She sighs, it's going to come out sooner or later.

"I came here from another world."

"Another planet? Offworld?"

"Something like that. Suffice it to say, I had a way to get here, but in order to explore I need a way off this island. Which is where you showed up. I told Walta I can pay, and I will. Do you want to conduct business here or on the ship?"

"I think you misunderstood. Are you from another planet and if so where is your spaceship and can I buy some offworld tech?"

She sighs. This part of communication is always dodgy.

"I don't have a spaceship, I came through a portal." Which was mostly true.

"I do have some off world tech. Nothing dangerous, just some gadgets that I've worked on."

Whatever conclusions the captain reaches, he just says, "Hmm," and shrugs. "Those gadgets could be very valuable depending on what exactly they do. And I'd rather discuss things out here before allowing you onto my ship."

Sandra is going to take a moment to scan the ship, try to discern what kind of technological capability it implies is it steam-powered? Coal? Magic?. She always has to be careful with technology, she's not here to bring a revolution.

She'll take her backpack off and open one of the main pouches. This one is full of things that should be mostly safe.

"I don't know what kind of technology you have, so I don't know what might interest you, but I've got custom watches, some communications equipment I've cooked up, I also have a small assortment of gold and precious gems, if those are more your style."

The ship is steam-powered! It has bags of hydrogen gas providing lift and contains relatively little metal. It burns hydrogen into boilers for propulsion and alternators to run a little bit of electrical equipment. Some sort of... Polymer-glass? Makes up a significant fraction of the machinery.

"Precious is relative, offworlder. If you have any steel or aluminum that will fetch you nearly as much as the gold around here. Well, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but still. The watch would be good, depending on how accurate it is. Is the communications equipment based on radio? That's the kind of Lost Tech I hear about most for communication. I would love a RADAR set."

She does have a RADAR set, thank harmony. If they had the technology but lost it, she's not as responsible for how it gets used.

"I do have a RADAR set. Walta said you'd be fair, so what's it worth to you?"

"How much I'll give depends on how good it is, which I can only really tell by trying it out, but at least forty silver circles, possibly up to sixty or eighty. A month's rent in the cheap part of a town tends to be four or five circles."

"That's more than enough for my purposes, I don't know how long I'll be staying so enough to survive for a few months will be quite nice. I'd be willing to help you set it up and try it out for yourself."

"Very good. I should like to know how to repair it if possible, but I think that will cover fare to any altitude you like more than acceptably as well."

"I'll be honest, I was expecting more skepticism. Most people don't believe me when I say I'm not from around here."

She'll give him what he wants including how to fix it, it'll function quite adequately as a navigation device, it's miniaturized so it's not quite as powerful as a full-sized set, but it should be more than enough for his purposes.

"Oh, I'm still very skeptical. It's just that the story of the Stargate makes you quite strange instead of outright impossible. And, this radar will be more than acceptable. No more tiptoeing through fog or through the night quite as anxiously, since I will be able to see what's coming."

"I am quite strange, so that's a perfectly reasonable conclusion."

"Now that we have an understanding, here are the basic rules for passengers on my ship. One, no fire. Anywhere for any reason unless I specifically say otherwise. No sparks if you can possibly help it, either. Hydrogen is very flammable. Two, don't go into the machine spaces, workshop, or cargo bay without me or my assistant, Miss Hindenset. I'll be sure to show you where those are. Three, don't throw anything overboard or try to go on the outside of the ship without a harness. And four, have common sense. Any questions?"

"Would it be possible to go on the outside with a harness at some point? I do quite enjoy that sort of activity. Anyway, all of those rules seem quite reasonable, thank you for your consideration."

"If that is what you wish to do I'm sure we can arrange it at some point. Perhaps you can help me install the radar on my flag mast. We have some work to do before we can set off again, though."

"Oh, that sounds delightful! What kind of work, if you don't mind my asking?"

"Collecting floatgrass, mostly. And some checks and routine maintenance, since we are already stopped. Speaking of which, I probably shouldn't leave my crewmate to do all the work herself." He sets the radar down and grabs a big sack from the pack Walta set down. "You need not help help as well, since you're a paying passenger, but I wouldn't complain if you did."

"I get bored easily, and I like being useful. I'll be glad to help anyway I can." 

Walta returns just in time to hear her say this, with a bulging bag that seems to want to float upward like a balloon tied to her wrist. She clambers up a ladder and releases the sack into an open port on the bottom of the ship.

"I'll show ya how, it's not hard at all. I wager you can go up and do the checks, boss. There's not that much ripe grass here, us two can get it all before you're done with that."

Nick nods thoughtfully and heads for the ladder after picking up the shiny new radar set.

"Anyway, it's easy! You just take one of these bags, hook the loop around one wrist so it doesn't fly off, put one end over a bunch of floatgrass-" She demonstrates with a patch of the bulbous stalks. "-And shake it around a bit. Most of the seeds will come loose, and that's what we want, we get hydrogen from 'em."

"Interesting!" She then gets right to collecting the float grass, moving effortlessly. "How do you get the hydrogen from the seeds?" Sandra asks while she works.

Walta's slightly frumpy work clothes don't seem to impair her practiced movements either. "There's a press, squishes the seeds and spits out the husks. The gas inside isn't quite pure enough, so we pump it through this lichen at high pressure. A filter that can sort out gases! Nature is amazing, huh?"

"It is!" She agrees. "In all of my explorations, one thing that has never ceased to amaze me is just how amazing nature is. No matter where I go, it finds a way to work itself out."

"I wonder what all the other planets' life is like. A lot of what's here is from this place called 'Earth' originally. You can really tell what's Cloudbank vintage and what's Terran. Look at that nibbler."

She points to a jellyfish-like thing floating placidly. Its tentacles stick to floatgrass seeds as it passes, and occasionally it lifts one up to its center and eats the whole lot. "Anything with a gas bag is one hundred percent Cloudbank."

Non-earth worlds are always fascinating. "I've actually been to other planets, and there's a lot of variety. I come from a world like this one, but more ground and things don't fly nearly as much. For example, we have things like that, but they swim in the water, not float through the air. They also sting if you touch 'em."

"Lakes and oceans always sounded absurd to me. That much water would be unbelievably heavy."

"For a lot of people back home, a place without large bodies water would be pretty absurd. It's such an every day part of our existence, I used to live by a lake, as an example. Lakes and oceans formed the backbone of many societies back in the day. My home country wouldn't exist without it, considering my ancestors came in ships over the ocean." 

Walta sings what seems to be a nursery rhyme. "It's a big, big sky stretching far above. One day you will fly like a jay or dove..."

Then she stops, looking embarrassed. "Uh, old nursery rhyme. About exploring, I guess."

"You don't have to be embarrassed. Music is one of the most wonderful things humanity has ever discovered. Even something as simple as a nursery rhyme is powerful if it's meaningful to you."

Then Sandra starts to softly sing, she's clearly had training, because her singing is quite good.

"I saw a ship a-sailing, a-sailing on the sea and oh, it was all laden with pretty things for thee!"

"That's a nursery rhyme from my home."

Walta claps politely. "I have a big drum onboard. My brother made it before we parted."

"Your brother made instruments? That's very nice. Is he a drum maker specifically or does he make other kinds?"  She pauses.

"Can you play it?"

"He made all sorts. Mostly drums, though. I can hold a steady beat, but I mostly keep it for sentiment."

"I understand." she says gently. "I hope it brings you comfort. We all need reminders of people that aren't with us."

"It's nice to have something to remember family by, yeah. Most ship-folk have something. Hmm... I'd say we're about done. We don't need to get every last bit, floatgrass grows everywhere."

"Let's head to the ship then, maybe you can show me around."

"Certainly." Walta ties a rope around Sandra's waist before showing her the ladder. "Just in case."

Sandra flinches at the sudden contact, buy allows Walta to tie the safety-rope. After she is secure, she'll hurry excitedly up the ladder.

Walta follows up after. They come into a little room with a bunch of rope coils and a few pulleys and harnesses on hooks. Walta unhooks her safety harness and starts tidying up the ropes laying around. "Welcome to the Grumpy Squid. Cap named the ship. You can tell, can't you?"

She does a poor job of holding back a laugh and a strangled giggle comes out. "I wouldn't know, I've only seen him in a business mindset, but from that it fits."

"Heh. Captain Vauners is a... Defensive sort of guy. I think he pretends to be a lot more prickly than he really is, and is a softie underneath. But he's brilliant, I will tell you that. He built half the things on this ship, mostly before he even had me to help."

"I'm not at that level of inventing, but I've customized most of my gear. It was Devra who designed most of it, she's a genius, can build anything she puts her mind to."

"Sounds like we both have smart friends." Walta finishes coiling up the rope and leads Sandra out of this launch room into a hallway. The hall is nice and wide, and covered in some sort of carpet. Doors are here and there, and little cubbies with labelled equipment or boxes in them are here and there too. "Space is a bit cramped on a ship, but this one is better than most. Main corridor here... That door heads to the cargo bay, and past that is our workshop and the engines and things. Maybe I can give you a tour later. On the other side here we have access to the port wing, then galley and perishable stores. Cozy little dining room..." It's not really its own room, more of an offshoot from the galley. It has windows that give a nice view and light.

"That hallway leads to secondary systems and Nick's library-slash-trophy-room. There's more of the same fins and wings over there. Here's the bathroom. Laundry room right next to it. Then up here we have my cabin and Nick's cabin and the spare cabin which is being a storeroom right now but I can fix that... And then this relaxation room full of comfy chairs and stuff, the map room- the escape balloons are here- and then the bridge. Up that staircase is the gas level. Best not to go in there. But if you go past it one more level you get to our greenhouse, it's pretty up there, and there's a nice lookout station with a chair and a great view where you can open a window and feel the breeze... And that's our little world!" 

It's fairly cozy overall, but not cramped. There's a sense of being a home in the front sections that is missing from the more utilitarian areas she could see where they got in.

Sandra isn't talking much, she seems lost in thought. "I'd forgotten just how cramped ships are." she shudders, before switching over to a slightly subdued but happier expression. "I used to live on a ship, lots of bad memories." She explains.

"Huh. Sorry? The greenhouse really is pretty, if that helps. And you can see the whole sky."

"It's not your fault. And I would love to see the greenhouse." 

"Cool. In a minute though, boss will get mad if we don't cast off soon."

She darts to the back of the ship and has a conversation with the captain.

Captain walks past Sandra in the hall with a polite nod and goes to the bridge. In less than two minutes, they're free of the island and the engines are thrumming steadily. Walta comes back. "Sorry for the wait. Up we go?"

"Absolutely!" Contrary to before, Sandra seems almost giddy at seeing the green room.

Up they go. Past the cavernous gas room full of bulbous brown bags, up to the greenhouse.

...It is very pretty. A tall, wide space, decorated with rows of plants of various sorts. Earthly and -non, flowering and simply green, climbing and potted. Some gardeny-looking gadgets here and there as well as a shelf of supplies along a wall supporting the center of the construction, and lots and lots of clear glass showing the open sky beyond.

Walta sighs in contentment.

"Woah." Sandra says breathlessly. She lets her senses dance over the alien flora, there's so much life here. "I love it. Would it be possible for me to meditate in here?" 

"I don't see why not. Captain was raving about your radar, I don't think he'll mind much of anything you do short of lighting fires or breaking things."

"I would never light a fire, it would burn this down. That would be a tragedy."  Then turning towards Walta, "I'm glad I could make him happy. He seems like someone who could use something to rave about."

"Mm. Not going to argue with that."

Sandra giggles.
"What about you? What do you rave about?"

"I'm learning so much! The deal is a sort of apprenticeship thing. I was a handyman working on random bits and bobs, saw his clever cargo loading rig, I bothered him until he explained how it works," slight hesitation, "-And two days later I had a job."

"People doing what they love is always great. You must have impressed him in order to get the job that fast."

"Uh, anyway," she clumsily deflects. "Let me tell you about all the plants we have here... This is a different species of the floatgrass genus we saw earlier. It's much prettier, not as useful. This is castlevine. Named that because it grows over itself again and again until it's nearly unbreakably strong. This is....." She continues.

If Sandra notices, she's not telling.

"All these new plants are amazing."

If Walta keeps describing plants, Sandra will ask questions with enthusiastic gusto when appropriate.

Walta does not know everything about plants and gardening, but they can pass an hour like this easily enough. She ropes Sandra into helping water the plants too.

Sandra will gladly be roped in.

After that's done.

"I think I'll head for my room, unless there was something else you'd like to talk about. It's been a busy day."

"Yeah, I can imagine it has. I'll clear out the cabin for you real quick."

She leads the way back downstairs and starts lugging out the boxes in Sandra's room. Nick is visible through the open door of the bridge. He glances back but returns to his watch.

Sandra gives a grin in return. She helps Walta clear out the cabin. "Do you happen to know what time it is? I lost track of time."

"Uh... Should be around two, maybe three? The clock's on the bridge if you want to double check."

"No, I'm good. Thank you. When is dinner?"

"Whenever you or I or Cap'n makes it. I could make something in a couple hours of you don't want to."

"I should be able to, I've learned to cook a pretty wide range of stuff."

"Ooh, I kind of want to see some foreign meal, maybe I should show you how to use it right now."

"That sounds great! Let's go!." Sandra surges towards the kitchen.

They go to the galley. First, a tour of the available ingredients. Lots of vegetables (mostly Earthly and recognizable, a few not, like 'sweetsticks' which are some kind of Cloudbank carrot), a few fruits and nuts and cuts of various frozen meat. "Try not to use too much meat, though. It's pricey."

The place is reasonably organized. Their plates and utensils are all wooden, as are most of the other surfaces.

And then the tools... There is a walk-in freezer with some ice inside, but no fridge. The sink is recognizable and countertops are countertops. But the stove is... Strange. "It uses hot water from the boilers. Gets around the whole fire-kills-everyone thing. That's why the galley is so far back in the ship - closer to the engines."

Sandra nods "Low meat won't be a problem, I went through a vegetarian phase." Then, to herself. "Hmm... What could I make?" After a pause. "Chili! I'll have to cut the meat in half, but that should work."

She then turns back towards Walta. "Do you happen to have any spices?"

"Hmm... Some. Some of it's my own stash, most we grow in the greenhouse."

There's a decent variety.

Sandra will select a few spices with just enough kick to be interesting without actually being spicy. "Any dietary restrictions I need to be aware of?"

"...I kind of hate onions? I don't think there's anything else."

"No onions. Got it." She pulls together her ingredients, she's got something similar to the right ingredients, tomatoes, red beans, garlic, a small portion of meat, spices and some lemon juice. "It'll take a bit to brown the meat, then we can let it simmer until dinner." She sets to work, humming while she works.

No lemons are available. There's a local fruit that is sour enough and might serve as a substitute, though.

"So chili is some kind of stew?"

Yeah, that will work, hopefully. "Uh huh, 'chili con carne' it comes from a place called Spain, where my mother's ancestors came from. It's easy to make, has a lot of variation and doesn't require too much time. I'll show you how to make it." She'll lay out her process and recipe.

"Honestly, I usually just boil or steam things until it looks like real food. Heh. Maybe for lunch tomorrow I'll show you how to make frypods."

"I have a... complicated family situation, lots of people, most of them can't cook. That job fell on me, fortunately, cooking is a lot of fun."

"It is! It just takes a while. It's just that there's so much else to do and I'm tired by the time it's time to cook."

"I understand, I'm not quite like most people, I haven't been tired in a very long time. The opposite problem really, I've got so many thoughts and feelings buzzing around that I don't have time to feel tired." 

"I think that would make me tired by itself. You have to let go and do nothing once in a while."

"Yeah." She taps her forehead. "I'm a little differently wired, up there... It's not always a boon, it used to drive me and the other people around me crazy. Dealing with a person who doesn't stop very often can be frustrating."

"Lucky for you Cap'n and myself are both at the more active end of the spectrum."

"Good! Fortunately, I've learned to give people their space, it was more an issue while I was younger."

"Oh, yeah. Little kids are... Well, a lot of times people don't quite know how to deal with them and vice versa."

"Yeah..." Now it's Sandra's turn to deflect awkwardly, turning her attention to the chili. "Once the meat is browned, we'll throw everything together and get it simmering."  

Walta nods. "Maybe while it's simmering I can show you how to use the safety harness? I think you wanted to go outside the ship."

"Ooh, yes!" She perks up immediately. "I really, really want to." it's subtle, but she almost sounds a bit more childlike now.

"Cool. I can show you how to rig it up and maybe go out for a few minutes. But, uh, before long I have to get back to work. There's lots to do to keep things shipshape."

"That would be great." She says with a smile, but then she gets a little more serious. "You sure seem to do a lot of work around here." There's a very slight edge of concern to her voice.

"...Yeah, well, a one-twenty-footer ship like this one is supposed to have five or six crew, normally. He works hard, too. It's... Worth it. I get room and board, I get pay on top of that and it's adding up. I'm warm and fed, I have a pocket full of silver. Most of my old neighbors would jump at the chance to work twelve hour days for the same thing."

"That's good." Though something tells Sandra that this isn't the whole story. "I'm here for a bit, and I'd be glad to help. Like I said, I get bored easily."

"He wouldn't even need to pay, which should make him happy. I'll volunteer."

This startles a giggle out of her. "He would be happy at that. Let's go back to the rope room, we can go out for a little bit like you said. Just let me ask cap'n first."

...A minute later Walta returns with the captain in tow. "I'm afraid I can't allow you outside the ship until I have personally given you safety training, Miss Styles. If you do something silly out there you could get tangled in the lines, damage the control surfaces, hit the engine... Unsafe climbers endanger not only themselves, but the ship and her crew as well. Even if that is only Miss Hindenset and I."

"That wouldn't happen." She says with absolute confidence, then sighs. "Your ship, your rules." Though, she's clearly chafing a bit from having her fun spoiled for the time being. She looks like she wants to say something else, but remains silent.

"Precisely. I don't want to be too much of a spoil-sport, though... That radar really will be wonderful. So, perhaps we will set the ship down early for the night whenever your stew thing is ready, have dinner, and then I give you a proper safety lesson and perhaps have enough light left to install it somewhere."

Sandra, really, really looks like she wants to say something. She doesn't, instead she visibly forces herself to relax. "I understand." she says a bit begrudgingly. But she keeps her stare level at Nick.

"...Something wrong? Aha, I'll go get your money, right." He turns to leave.

"Money doesn't solve everything." She mumbles to herself once she thinks he can't hear.

The captain seems like the type who would disagree. Regardless, he returns and gives her a pouch full of little silver coins with swirl designs on them. "Eighty silver circles. Enough to live on for months. Your radar is the kind of thing treasure-hunters in the north bring back, so it's worth that much."

She hesitates, then smiles. "I'm glad I could get you something that will help you and Walta." She says pointedly.

He looks a little exasperated. "Well, it will. I can hook up a proximity alarm to it and give us both more time away from the helm, so it'll make watches easier."

"That's good, I'm glad." She says, seemingly sincerely. 

"It's a nice ship, wouldn't want anything to happen to it, or it's crew."

"Neither would I. 'Tis my pride and joy, I mostly built her myself. Walta helped with the finishing."

Sandra nods. "You're lucky to have her, she looks up to you, I can tell."

Was that a bit of a grimace? Embarrassment?

"Yeah, I know. She's admirable, too. Still has a little growing up to do I think, but clever."

"We all have a little growing up to do. Did Walta tell you that I volunteered to help out while I was here?"

"She did. Thanks, by the way. I'm not sure if you have the skills to pilot the Squid, but there's things you can help out with for sure. Speaking of which, what kind of place do you want to get off at?"

"A population center, preferably. I'm actually looking for someone."

She thinks.

"Is there anything weird going on right now? Something out of the normal happening in your world?"

"I don't know what counts as 'weird' to you, here. Nothing really springs out. A population center I can certainly do, I need somewhere to sell all the food in my hold anyway."

"Anything that wouldn't be normal to you, I guess, the person I'm looking for tends to find herself in strange situations, for whatever strange means in the context of the average experience."

She pauses thoughtfully for a second, then adds.

"Anyway, I have about a month to travel before I have to go back. I'm sort of on vacation."

"Back to your mysterious other world. I wonder if we could set up some kind of trade. It'd probably help someone. Well, if anything counts as a strange situation around here, it's treasure hunters heading north. There's more untouched ruins from before the Stargate closed up there."

"I'm not sure if trade would be possible. Right now, I'm the only one who can easily go in and out of my world, and while I can get home. I'd have to find the person I'm looking for to come back here. She's... something like an anchor for my traveling. I know one exists here, but I won't know anything else until I get closer."

She goes silent for a second.

"Treasure hunters? That wouldn't be a terrible place to start, that's the sort of thing she'd be... connected to."

"Action and adventure, eh? I went with a treasure hunting crew once. It was not as glamorous as it sounds. But that means for this region... Hmm, we probably want to aim for the city of Halth. It's popular as a lost tech market."

"Sounds as good as a place to start as any. I tend to just wander until I bump into the people I'm looking for. It's more successful than it sounds."

"That's a surprisingly good fit for Cloudbank. You can keep track of where all the different cities are, but most people don't bother with the details and just wander from place to place when they have ships."

"Oh, the landmasses float around? Which makes sense, now that I think about it. Given how everything around here floats and isn't grounded to anything. Amazing, seems like an explorer's paradise."

"You're not wrong! And yes, everything floats. There is a surface below, it's just too hot to survive on."

"Huh, that's something. Is all the hot air generated from the surface have something to do with how everything floats?"

"Not particularly. Well, perhaps some, there are some pretty consistent updrafts near the equator. But mostly it's floatstone. The stuff is incredibly light and filled with hydrogen, and most creatures have wings, gas bags, or both."

She nods politely.

"It must get lonely up here, with just you, Walta and the open air for days on end. You two seem a little tense, I hope everything is OK."

Nick shrugs. "It's a working relationship. We're not family. I expect her to decide she's learned all I can teach her soon enough, and move on."

"Are you sure about that? I haven't heard her talk about leaving once, even when she was talking about how hard you work her. I don't think she wants to leave, she thinks you saved her from her old life. I think there's more to her motivation here than just wanting to learn from you."

He sighs. "Yes, well. There might be something to that. But I am a loner at heart, you see."

"Loner? You're still human, just like she is, social animals all around. Wait, this is all starting to make sense... Working her to the bone, being all prickly, you keep acting like you expect her to leave.You're trying to do that thing loners do! You're keeping her at arms distance intentionally! Are you trying to make her want to leave?" She asks incredulously. 

"I have no idea what you're talking about. And if I did have any idea what you were talking about, you would not have full context on the situation anyway."

"Context? For something you refuse to acknowledge? If context would make us all walk away happy, you'd just tell me. So sorry, that's not good enough."

"Look, you don't just get to show up and demand that I explain myself. This is my ship, I'm paying her a fair damn wage and she can leave if she wants to. If you aren't ready to accept that and you really want to know why, ask her."

"Weren't you listening? She doesn't want to leave, as far as I can tell. You're the one who wants her to leave, but you're putting all of the pressure on her. Dick move." 

The captain turns around and walks away. Back to the bridge.

Sandra is rather peeved. She lost control again, damn it.

She takes a few moments to focus on her breathing.

Walta's busy, thanks to Captain Catcus over there. So she might as well check on dinner, it should be just about finished.

Dinner does not have any interpersonal problems to annoy her. It simmers in accordance with the laws of physics. This step is about done.

She can leave it simmering for a while before it becomes a problem, so she'll find Walta and let her know that dinner is ready.

Walta is in the engine room, looking at panels of dials and gauges, covered in grease.

"-Uh, you probably shouldn't be back here by yourself, but thanks for telling me about dinner. I'm about done with this. I can wash up and come eat in maybe ten minutes. Looking forward to it."

"Techinically, the Captain's rules are that I can't be here without him or his assistant. But I'll leave before either of us gets in trouble." She pauses, takes a deep breath and says.

"Can we talk later? In private?" just as she's about to leave.

"I mean, right here is as private as anywhere else on the ship if Cap'n isn't here. But okay?"

"I don't want to get us in trouble. You are supposed to be working."

"Maybe I hit a snag and it's taking longer than I expected. But sure, later, then."

Sandra will go back to the kitchen and get the chili ready to serve.

The captain stops the ship above another small floating island and rappels out the side to tie it down securely.

When he comes into the kitchen to find Walta looking at the chili, he says, "...Miss Hindenset, you can put the rest of that manifold rebuild off for a couple of days. No watch tonight either, we're set down. And, my, this does smell new and interesting."

"Ah, thanks, sir. I actually had a question for you about the manifold but it can wait. And, this stuff is good! I had a taste earlier. I think you'll like it. Shall we serve it up, Sandra?"

"Yes, indeed. It turned out quite well. I hope you like it.." She then proceeds to serve Walta and Nick.  

Walta enjoys the chili a lot more than Nick!

...Though the prickly captain does nod thoughtfully at the meal, appearing a bit lost in thought. "Could use more meat and maybe more salt. Too bad meat is so pricey compared to beans and such."

Sandra is quite pleased Walta likes it! She didn't really expect anything else from the Captain.

"Can't do much about the meat. I'll try adding more salt next time."

"I do have more meat, if I'd known this was going to need more I would have said you could use it. Next time, you can, in fact."

"Then it's a success, now we know and can fix it, make it better! I'm not the best cook, but I'm learning more and more."

"Cooking is a skillful and noble profession! If you keep making things like this for us we'll enjoy much better food than we usually do."

"I'm glad I got to make your lives better. That's why we exist, in my view, make the lives of others better than they could be alone." She glances briefly at Nick, but quickly moves her gaze.

"There are many valid philosophies on the meaning of life," Nick opines. "I think I hold a different one but I certainly won't begrudge yours. It's admirable."

Sandra is very proud that she doesn't drop her smile. "I think we'll have to agree to disagree, as I quite like mine very much. Everything should live in harmony."

"It's not impossible that I can profit while also benefiting others. But, agreeing to disagree, yes."

Walta glances between the two of them, looking slightly nervous.

She nods, sees Walta's nervous glance and gives a disarming smile. "I can't convert everyone!" She says with a gentle laugh.

"Being nice and having friends is good and all, but I don't know about it being the meaning of life. People can be... Bad, sometimes."

"But are they bad by nature, or because they never got the help they needed to be good? I know plenty of people who did bad things for a bit, but they got better and tried to help everyone they could."

"True enough." The other two go quiet after this, just enjoying the food.

Sandra is also quiet and her bowl is getting quite empty. "It was very nice to have dinner with you both."

"It was good stuff, yeah. And it's relaxing to eat together once in a while."

"Indeed. Would you like that safety lesson I promised earlier, Sandra?"

"People should eat together more. It helps build connections."

At the mention of the safety lesson Sandra perks up and nods vigorously.

"Yes please!"

Nick gives her a safety lesson, apparently unperturbed by the little confrontation earlier. He is thorough and not a particularly skilled teacher, but the various safety rules and how to use the harness correctly are simple enough. "Shall we go out for a few minutes to get you acclimated? Tonight or tomorrow at some point I'd like your help putting the radar on a mast."

Sandra also seems to have forgotten the older conversation. She follows the instructions carefully. "Yes, I'd like to try it, of course I'll help."

They go out onto the side of the ship. There are handholds and footholds. Nick shows her how to attach the clips to new holds as she moves over the ship. It's a fair bit like rock climbing.

The view is great. The island below them has a thickly overgrown patch of woods on it. The ship sways against its ropes a bit in the breeze.

Sandra is having the time of her life. She loves the view, she loves how she can feel the ship's swaying. She's quite a natural.

"This is amazing."

"This is why I have a ship. This feeling. The freedom. I get it even just standing at the controls. You're surprisingly good at this."

"Thank you, do you have rock climbing here? It's quite similar." That and her powers help quite a bit.

"I think freedom is something we agree on. Freedom is the best. No people trying to make you do bad things."

"Rock climbing? Climbing is an essential Cloudbank skill. We do a lot of different kinds of climbing, sometimes over rock faces." He sighs a bit, looking tired.

"You look tired, are you feeling alright? We can head back if we need to." 

"I'm fine. Just stressed. Probably a good idea to go back in, though, it's getting dark."

Sandra will start the climb back into the ship.

"I'm sorry if I stressed you out, I got overheated. I just don't want anyone getting hurt."

"These things happen. I don't know if you got the full story... Anyway I think I will play with the radar unit a little more and then catch up on sleep."

She nods. "I still don't know what's going on." She frowns. "I'll head to sleep myself." She doesn't feel tired, but her senses tell her that her body is starting to be worn out.

"Good night, then. I'll put up your clambering gear." He's stowing away his own as they speak.

On her way to bed, Sandra goes to find Walta.

Walta is writing in a notebook in the her cabin. "Hey, Sandra. What's up?"

"Hey Walta. I know it's probably none of my business, but I was talking to Nick and... He keeps acting as if you should already be wanting to leave, or that you're leaving soon. He said you would leave as soon as you had learned everything you could from him. But I think there's more to the story. I pressed him, but he said that I lacked context and to ask you. Is it something you would want to tell me? I know we've just met, but it could be good for you to get it off your chest."

"Well I think I know what he's talking about. It's kind of embarrassing. Kind of very embarrassing."

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to right now. But no matter how embarrassing it is, I will understand, I promise." The last part she says with absolute conviction.

"Remember my philosophy? Everything in harmony? I believe that 100%, and I see a situation not in harmony, but I want to help, if you want me too."

"I... Probably should talk about it at some point. We stop at ports and all but it's hard to get to know someone in the one or two days we hang out there. But it's..." She shrugs. "Embarrassing. I don't know."

"Well, how long until we land at Halth? It doesn't have to be today. We can take as long as you need. I don't want to rush you."

"Halth? Three, four days? ...Yeah. I think if I take a day to think about it and maybe tell you tomorrow it'd be for the best. I'm probably too tired to work though issues like this right now anyway."

"Sure, take your time, and if you don't feel comfortable about it, don't tell me. This isn't about me, it's about what's best for you." She says gently.

"If I can clear things up with him it'd be good. I obviously can't talk about it with him, I can see how that would go right now..." She takes a deep breath. "Yeah, I'll think about it. Goodnight for now?"

"Good night, I'll see you tomorrow." Sandra leaves quietly. Once she's alone, she sighs, did she do the right thing? She really hopes she didn't push to hard.

She gets set for bed.

The ship is quiet, it rocks gently with the calm winds. It rains briefly.

Sun sets and rises. Nick is up with the sun, collecting floatgrass from the island below. Walta still seems to be asleep.

Good morning wonderful world! Sandra is also up early. She'll head up to the greenhouse and meditate, she wants to be calm for today.

The greenhouse: Is still pretty. Those tomatoes look about ripe.

Maybe Sandra will ask Nick if she can pick those for dinner tonight. In the meantime, she gets up, stretches and feels much better. She's ready to face the day.

She should probably go find Nick, so she does.

Nick is methodically gathering floatgrass from the island below, like Sandra and Walta did the other day. He's humming and looks surprisingly relaxed.

"Hey, I wanted to know if you had anything that needed doing."

"Ah, good morning. Well, we could always use more hydrogen. I was planning to forage for edibles here, too. And I want to install the radar later, of course."

"Sure." Sandra will start exploring the island, keeping her senses primed for any possible dangers. If she sees anything that looks edible, she'll gather it up.

There's wild onions, roots and tubers, some berries, some tree nuts and acorns, some of that sweetly sour native fruit she used in the chili yesterday. A bunch of birds and rodents and some Cloudbank fauna and a small family of pigs!

Sandra gathers everything she can, then stumbles upon piggies! She remembers that Nick and Walta don't have the chance to eat much meat. She senses the life in the pigs, and she knows that she couldn't harm them, nor could she capture them to sell, knowing what they would become; she's OK with eating already dead animals, not indirectly causing the harm of another animal.

She's not Nick, there are many things more important to her than money.

The pigs are ignorant of her internal decision-making.

If she watches them for long enough they even show her their favorite patch of root vegetables. Seems to be wild potatoes.

She'll pick a potato or two, but leaves enough for the pigs. As she heads back to the ship, she thinks about Nick, she doesn't really know what to do with him. Maybe while she sets up the RADAR she'll be able to find out more about what makes him tick, and how she can connect with him. She doesn't want to be a hypocrite and only try to connect people she likes.

Walta is up and about by now. She waves at Sandra from the greenhouse on the roof as she comes in.

Sandra waves back, backpack of foraged goodies in tow. She'll drop off the veggies, and go up to see her.

Walta is harvesting and replanting carrots. "Hi, Sandra! I'm kind of surprised Nick hasn't had us get underway again yet. Surprisingly nice to have a day off like this."

"I think he wants to setup the RADAR first. Once the two of us do that, he'll probably have us get underway. It should make your lives easier by quite a bit."

"Besides from being really, really cool like all tech? Yeah. Then again the Captain might also use it as an excuse to sail through the night. Makes us faster, sure, but we'll need a third person to keep that up for sure."

"Would he do that though? Bring on a third person, I mean. It seems to me that he'd try to make it on just two people, even if it killed you both."

"Maybe. He can be hard to predict. He might also try to take a month off of sailing and have us both build more tools and automatic devices until it can be handled with two."

"That seems like a lot of lost time, when he could just hire someone else. I wonder if his loner nature is stronger than his pragmatism. Do you think he'd do something cost-ineffective in order to keep it to just the two of you?"

"Mm... Maybe. For all that he's all about profit he is also a nerd, he likes making that kind of stuff. And he gets touchy about the ship and the idea of more crew."

Sandra nods. "I think part of his idea of freedom means doing things on his own as much as he can. He seems very protective of his freedom."

"Yeah, I could see that. Maybe that's why he wouldn't..." She trails off and shakes her head. "I probably should just blurt it out, get it out there, but I can't make myself do that. The thing we were talking about yesterday."

"It's ok, is there anything I can do to make you more comfortable?"

"Tell me how everyone does something regrettable once in a while? How wanting something bad isn't bad if you don't do it? Heh. I'll convince myself at this rate."

"We all do. I once told my best friend that I loved her, but she didn't swing that way. We got over it, but it still hurts."

"I've gone over this in my head enough that I'm not actually sure I'm remembering it all right, exact words and stuff. Uh. I like Captain Vauners. I don't know if it's love but I definitely like him. One day we were doing something in the workshop - boiler or something, I don't know, but we were close and he'd just said something really clever so I kissed him. And then - well either he didn't act like he was against it or I didn't notice - I think he said 'we'll talk about this later'. I maybe wasn't thinking straight. I..." She goes redder than she already was. "I. Tried to. Sleep with him that night and we shouted at each other a bit and he just - said that it was a bad idea and sent me back to my own room. If he's trying to make me leave now... Maybe I should."

Oof, that's one doozy of a situation right there. "Is that really what you want? If you do leave, it should be on your own terms, not because he wants you to. It has to be right for you. I understand that this might make you feel uncomfortable, but only you know if you can live with that." She then pauses and smiles comfortingly. 

"What do you want?"

"I don't know. I want to- He got me out of the slums. I don't know what I'd do if I left this ship. He's the only... I don't know. He's been pretending it never happened. I'm going to keep... Wanting him, but I think I can not do anything about it and be content."

"You're strong, you'd find something to do, it's a big world out there. But, if you do want to say, you said it yourself. He's pretending it didn't happen, he's trying to ignore the situation until it goes away. But it happened and I think you need to confront him on that. Let him know that you regret what you did, but that you want to stay. Put the ball in his court, you shouldn't be the only one having to decide this."

"I think I was the one in the wrong, there... If he wants to ignore it and let the status quo keep... Agh, I dunno what I'm hoping for here. Don't know if confronting him will make it better or worse. If this was a novel he'd save my life from pirates one day and realize how sad he'd be without me but life is not a novel, damn it."

"Even if you were in the wrong, it doesn't diffuse responsibility. There's still a power structure here, he's your mentor and captain, he has a duty to actually manage interpersonal problems. That's what being in charge is all about. It means doing uncomfortable things for the sake of the ship and it's crew, the fact that Nick doesn't seem to get this concerns me greatly."

"Mm. I think Nick never really intended to be a captain of a crew. He was planning to run the ship by himself before I butted in, being clever and needing a way out of town."

"Intent only matters so much. I didn't intend to be in this situation, but I am, so I have a responsibility to try to make the best choice possible. So do you, and so does Nick. Except Nick made the choice to bring you on, no one forced him. His choice, he could have turned you down, but he didn't. Maybe you were manipulative, maybe you weren't, I don't know. What I know is that there is a problem now, and like it or not, he has responsibility. And even if you had equal power, responsibility must be shared equally."

She takes a deep breath, focusing her thoughts.

"This isn't just your responsibility, that's the rub, even when we mess up, sometimes other people have to help us smooth out the mess. Someday you'll have to do the same for someone else. It's how the world works."

Sigh. "Fiiine. Being a responsible adult and forcing Nick to do the same thing it is."

When did Sandra become the one convincing people to be responsible? It baffles her, when did she grow up?

"You're making the right decision." Then she'll let Walta and Nick have some privacy. She hasn't done any journaling in a while, that might be a good idea.

"Captain, we need to talk about that day. The day I kissed you."

"I suppose we probably should. I'm guessing our guest put you up to this? No matter, it's for the best. I... Am still of the opinion that us getting involved is a bad plan."

"But why? Because it will end in tears and stress? I don't think so. We're friends, even with this thing we are more friendly and work well together than most crews."

"You're an excellent worker. Clever and nimble and dedicated. But if we get romantic it's a fundamentally different thing now. We would lose what we have now."

"If you want to keep what we have now, then why are you trying to push me away? And - I did the same thing, just ignoring it, but... Deeps know it sucks and you're supposed to be the mature one, Captain."

"I take financial responsibility for provisions and maintenance and your time, and I work longer hours on harder tasks than you even recently. I think I'm plenty responsible."

"There's more than one kind of responsibility. Are you... I mean, I'm guessing you don't have too much practice working with other people. You were alone when I made that pulley for you. You never socialize much when we make port, you just go to the workshop."

"You have reached the heart of the matter. I stay to myself and mind my own business. I run my ship without getting involved in social mess."

"That social mess is life. You enjoy teaching me, I can tell. That's social. You enjoy wheeling and dealing, that's at least a little bit social..."

Nick sighs and rubs his forehead.

"...I know it's a little hypocritical to say this to you, but I did not have an easy childhood. I don't want to get into the details, but I felt like a thing that exists to do chores and parrot my father's beliefs, not a child. There is a voice that says everyone in the world is set to do the same thing again."

Ohh that's terrible. "I really want to hug you right now, Captain. Platonically. We were dirt poor and my folks weren't the best, but you sound like you barely had parents at all."

"...If you insist, I will hug."

She does. 

The hug ends soon enough. Nick sighs.

"Getting to the heart of the matter indeed."

"Sandra will be proud of us." She almost giggles.

"Coming onto my ship, telling me what to do... I jest. I will stop trying to push you away. No more crazy workload or acting standoffish. If you're going to leave, or if you're going to stay, that's up to you."

"Great! ...I still like you. I never stopped. I wouldn't call it love... But it could easily turn into that if I let it."

"I don't know what to think about that yet. I've been trying not to think about it. Plus, emotions are running high right now, I shouldn't make any more grand proclamations at the moment. I'll think about it."

"I understand. It's okay if you never want to... I can ignore it, push it down. Be on the lookout for somewhere else to go eventually."

"But then the entire onus is on you once again... Like I said, I'll think about it."

Nick goes and finds Sandra, leaving Walta smiling to herself wistfully. 

"This may well be the only time I say this to you. Thank you for meddling."

"I'm glad I meddled." She says happily. "And I promise not to meddle any more, unless it's something really, really bad. OK?" 

"Okay. We haven't decided if we'll part ways or what, yet, but at least there is no more of that tension under the surface you hated."

Ideas form in his head. Marriage is very, very premature... But would having a partner for good really be so bad? I was acting more like my father than I really like, before.

"Whatever you two decide is up to you, I'm not going to control your lives. I just can't stand it when there's something going on and it's hurting people, but they won't admit it. I hope things get better."

"The two paths I see are eventual amicable splitting, or just maybe some sort of romance. But like you said, that's our business. Shall we go set up the radar?"

"Well, that sounds better than the most likely scenario before, so I'm glad. Let's do it!"

Setting up the radar involves the same safety harnesses as yesterday and climbing out the side of the ship and to the top with the radar gear. Nick also has some tools.

"I brought conduit up from the workshop. I'm thinking we mount it on the mast and run wires down to the bridge at the front. I can put the screen and hook it into power there. We'll have to go around the greenhouse. Do you see any problems with this plan?"

"Hmm... The inventor who made this made it adaptable to just about any power source imaginable, and it should plug into just about any kind of electronics you've got. So we should be good, no problems I can foresee."

"Convenient, that. I was not looking forward to building a transformer or something. Well, let's get to it!"

"My source learned how to interface just about anything to anything, it's kind of a necessity in my world. Lot's of alien tech running about. But enough talking, let's get to it."

They get to it. The hardest part is putting the radar dish on top of the flag mast and securing it there. The slow swaying of the ship makes their ladders a slightly dubious prospect, but that's what the harnesses are for.

Nick has some pretty versatile tools. It takes a while, but not as long as it could.

Sandra helps, she's not as experienced as Nick, but she is able to keep up OK. Sandra gets up to the top of the mast without any difficulty whatsoever. She takes some time to admire Nick's engineering.

"You are quite good at this. If I ever find my way back here, maybe I'll bring along my inventor friend, Devra, she loves talking tech." 

"I bet my stuff looks silly compared to what she gets up to. Material constraints and so on. But I would probably enjoy that quite a bit either way."

"Comparing yourself to her wouldn't be close fair, she's got a pretty unfair advantage, but she'd be able to give you a few pointers."

"I buy up lost tech whenever I can. As you have seen. Trying to understand it, learn to make more. Like, I can make crude radios with silicon and quartz and glass, but it's a huge pain and quartz is rare. So is silicon, for that matter."

"It sounds like your making the most of a bad situation. I honestly wish I could help more, but I don't know how to solve material issues like that. I'm really only starting out when it comes to traveling to other worlds."

"Heh. Now I'm fantasizing about having an inter-dimensional freighter. That'd be a riot."

"You'll be the first to know if I get something like that going. I'm not that ambitious though, I'm not good at the whole infrastructure thing. I tend to content myself with making the worlds I visit a better place, person by person."

"Fair enough." He hums and goes back to work. Unless Sandra has other topics of conversation they will finish quietly.

Sandra doesn't have much to say, surprisingly.

They finish the RADAR set up and get underway, it takes three days to arrive at Halth. Everything goes very smoothly, especially thanks to the RADAR.

Once at Halth, Sandra says her goodbyes. She plans on listening out for rumors about treasure hunters in the area. Her plans pay off faster than she anticipates, she happens to hear a conversation where someone mentions that a very successful treasure hunter was supposedly docked. The captains name is Helena de Falcon, a name all too familiar to Sandra. "She did take up treasure hunting!" She thinks. Hopefully she isn't doing much in the way of piracy, but Sandra doubts it. She wanders the port for half an hour before finding Helena's ship, a beautiful Spanish galleon that Sandra would recognize anywhere.

Sandra waits until the right moment, but she knows she needs to confront her mother, if anyone knows where this universe's Sandra is, Helena will. That's unless... As much as she doesn't want to think about it, this Sandra may have never been able to runaway. She could still be at her mother's mercy, and that was not a good place to be. Sandra puts on her mask, which she brought just in case, and as soon as there aren't many of the crew on the ship, she sneaks aboard.

he puts her senses to work, and she sees

Her mother, sitting in the dining area.

And, to Sandra's shock, a version of herself, sitting next to her mother. Seemingly eating with Helena.

This... Isn't what Sandra expected. She checks quickly for anything that might be effecting this Sandra's mind. Drugs, alcohol, whatever.

Alessandra seems to be in perfect health and, from her posture and body language, seems quite friendly with her mother.

"Mother, I think I heard something, I'll go check it out." Sandra overhears.

Sandra freezes, apparently even unpowered harmonizers had good perceptive capabilities. Crap. Sandra hides and decides in an instant that the best way to get this over with is to talk to her mother while Alessandra is searching the ship.

She knows that this will go easier if Helena thinks she's harmless, and her powers should defend her well enough if Helena shows aggression. So she appears in the dining room entrance with her hands outstretched peacefully.

"I just want to talk, I'm not going to hurt you..." Beat, "Or your daughter."

"Who are you, and how dare you sneak aboard my vessel!"

But something stops Helena for crying out for her crew. There's something very familiar about the voice of the masked stranger.

"That's impossible." But she looks, that's Alessandra's body, and her voice. Definitely. 

Confused, she asks. "What do you want?"

"I'm here for her, I thought my best bet of finding her was through you. I was more right than I could have ever imagined. I guess you've already figured out who I am, you were always very perceptive. Mother." She says the last word with quite some severity.

"If you've hurt her, or somehow brainwashed her into staying aboard..." But the threat is pretty toothless, especially for someone so well used to dealing with people actually intent on carrying out threats as Helena.

She sighs. "I'm another one of her, I came from another universe where you and I have... A different sort of history, you kept me prisoner for years forcing me to help you plunder the multiverse." She says, darkly.

"I would never harm my daughter. She is my flesh and blood. I don't know your intentions either, for all I know you could be wanting to hurt her."

She pauses.

"No, that doesn't fit, you're clearly not used to issuing serious threats. If you'd wanted to hurt her, you could have done that while she was alone. For whatever this other me did, that has no relevance, I would never let Sandra come to harm. She is my legacy, she will inherit everything you see."

At this moment, Alessandra comes rushing in. "Mother, who are you talking to?"

She sees someone who while masked, has her exact same build.

"How?"

Sandra pulls her mask off with a heavy sigh, apparently that was a meaningless precaution. "I'm you, from another universe. I came to help you."

Alessandra takes this pretty well, considering what she's just heard. "Okay... I'm going to assume for a second that I'm not dreaming or hallucinating, and ask. Help me with what exactly?"

"I want to connect you to me, and the other Harmonizers. It's like how flocks of birds can operate as one unit despite being separate. It won't hurt and you don't have to share thoughts or anything. Without natural powers of your own, you'll probably just feel a bit more perceptive, a bit more in tune with nature and you may get the sense that there are others out there. We can use that sense to come visit you."

Sandra still isn't sure what to do about Helena, but she seems genuine.

Alessandra looks to her mother for a second, but then looks back to Sandra.

"Alright. I'll do it."

It only takes a second before it's done. Alessandra is now an official harmonizer. Sandra basks in the feeling of completeness that accompanies the linking of a new Sandra. Sandra feels something from her that's unlike anything she's ever felt towards her mother. Love, devotion and a sense of duty. Sandra trusts the judgement of her other selves, and this Sandra seems to think that she's good. The sense Sandra gets is that Helena is quite like Nick himself, fairly self-focused and has a keen sense of business.

Helena and Sandra talk for a bit. Helena tells Sandra her story of marrying a treasure hunter captain, not for love, but to be able to live freely. And to have a daughter to carry on her legacy. She is quite similar to Sandra's mother, except her sense of self-interest also extends to her family, and she seeks legitimate fortune, not plunder. Aside from that, the same ruthlessness, cleverness, leadership and forcefulness are all there.

She hears Sandra's story and is greatly disturbed by the idea that any version of herself could hurt their own daughter. She understands why Sandra was so worried now. Eventually Nick and Walta get brought up and Helena decides that meeting with them would be agreeable to her.