1. video

[rickitikitarr]

[Ricki Tarr, latest inmate arrival, is still getting his feet under him. He's been on board for a little while now, but let's face it, he's a field agent from the 1970s, getting used to graphical user interfaces of his messenger has put up a bit of a roadblock in terms of his making contact.

By the time he's confident enough with the flimsy, cheeping little device to make a video post, his stomach is growling, so the very first message is a simple video shot.

It's poorly framed, he has no real idea of how to centre himself in the lens, and the light in his room is dark and low and terrible for any sort of filming. But from the dark, what's visible of his half-in-the-frame expression is still and steady;]


The first living creature to orbit the earth was a little Russian mongrel named Laika. She was a pretty thing, with a clever cast to her eyes and pricked up, pointed ears. On the fourtieth anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution they flung the little thing into the sky.

In fact, the Russians had been launching dogs into suborbital flights for a few years before, but none attained the notoriety or captured the imaginations of the world like little Laika. I was rather young when she was sent to space, but recall thinking the entire proceedings terribly inhumane.

The Soviets say that she was euthanized before her oxygen ran out. The British and Americans question whether that is true. The Russians question whether that questioning is deliberately spread propaganda meant to make them seem monstrous. In the time since, I think both sides have lost track of the original truth of the matter. But the question of her ultimate cause of death aside, I wondered whether she might be hungry, thirsty or afraid, uncomprehending of how it was possible to see stars all around her... I actually can't recall reading whether Sputnik 2 was like this ship, with windows or not. Laika may not have seen stars spinning in the sky, but I'm sure the sounds and sudden lack of gravity must have been rather frightening for such a little dog.

[His voice is low and steady, the pictures his paints are matter-of-fact and vivid. He accent is an odd, old one, London tempered by a childhood racing through Penang streets and other colonial holds. He takes his time with the story before concluding;]

Which is all to say, given the apparent flexibility of space and time on this vessel, if we see her while we're out here, I must simply insist that we make a stop.

Comments

[video]

[routemistress]

[Iris replies from the couch in the laboratory break room: a small blonde lady of a certain age, her face set in exuberant smile lines. She wears a lab coat, its laundry-accident pink almost obscured with badges, stains, patches and scorch marks, and she shares the couch with two large, contented German Shepherds.]

Trust me, lovely, it's been taken care of. One day I'll take you to throw a ball for 'er. I'm Iris - Iris Wildthyme, transtemporal adventuress and lately interdimensional space prison warden. What should I call you, sweetheart?

[rickitikitarr]

[Ricki leans in to peer closer at the little screen. The jarring feeling of a tv character talking to him, so vividly and clearly, gives him a tell-tale two second delay in his response.]

Ricki is fine, thank you, Iris.

[Seriously, though, all of this. The first, most obvious, that he has gone mad. Unlikely. He feels he's seen it in others often enough, felt it nipping at his own heels often enough, to know that if he were going to crack up it would be nothing like this. He also thinks that he would be more alarmed if he were, or at least more agitated or enthusiastic, when what he actually feels is gloriously numb.

The sheer improbability of Iris's statement. her grin, her dogs, her... pinkness and yes, definitely that grin is subtly making him rethink insanity as an option, though. Mad people think the television is trying to communicate with them all the time, don't they?]

Inmate, I'm afraid to admit, and a rather new one at that.

Video

[demolitions]

[The accent of the speaker identifies him as a native of the southern US, with a distinctive twang more specific to Eastern Kentucky for those that might have an ear for such things. His tone is quiet, expression reverent.]

A good many animals died in space, sacrificed on the altar of scientific achievement. Not all of 'em got a statue in their honor.

[rickitikitarr]

She doesn't have a statue.

[A small cameo on the Monument to the Conquerors of space that he doesn't know about, but not the big one- not yet, in Ricki's day and age.]

Not on our side of the pond, at least. Did the Americans mount something up that I didn't hear about?

[velocette]

Astronauts say that space has a smell--something meaty, metallic, a little fruity. Supposedly every attempt to recreate the smell on earth has failed.

[So maybe the dog was a little distracted, at least, before she suffocated. He doesn't believe in propaganda, but he also doesn't believe a dog would be worth 'euthanasia' so far in space where no one could verify it was any better than the short minute or two without air.]

[rickitikitarr]

Really? Does the boat filter that out, do you think?

[Because he can't smell meat or fruit, though he does taste metal in the back of his mouth, but that might just be the panic.]

[video]

[tucky]

You really wanna stop for a dead dog?

[video]

[rickitikitarr]

Nonsense, dear, I'd like to go back and snatch her from the jaws of death. No one would need know we'd rescued her.

[babyfacedkiller]

Man, that's a fucked up thing to do. That poor dog.

[Lloyd sounds genuinely unsettled by Laika's story, even a little angry on the dog's behalf. Sure, it's only an animal, but stranding her in space like that is still fucking cruel. And it's not just that this guy is painting a pretty vivid picture of a little dog lost in space, it's that Lloyd can relate on a pretty personal level.]

I guess it's not impossible that we might run into her. Half the people on the ship are dead, no reason why we couldn't pick up a dead space dog.

[rickitikitarr]

My feelings precisely.

[He agrees, with a laugh that despite his best efforts is the tiniest bit hysterical. Newly arrived and flung out into space, he empathizes in a rather profound way with the lost dead dog in space.]

Wonder who we'd bring it up to, in a place like this?

Video

[voluntaryapnea]

[Stiles doesn't recognize the new face on the video feed, so he assumes this is someone who's just shown up.]

It didn't. Have windows like the Barge.

[He shrugs a little, though.] But I doubt you'll get much argument about rescuing a dog around this place.

Video

[rickitikitarr]

I've noticed that it does seem a little pet-friendly compared to your standard prison.

[A little droll, now that he has his feet under him.]

/throws one more at you

[anewlanguage]

Huh. I remember hearing about the dog--and a chimp, right? I must've been some dumb kid back then, cause I just assumed they made it back to earth.

In '86, though, seeing one of those shuttles explode...I think the dog made out easy.

more the merrier :D

[rickitikitarr]

...ahead of my time, I'm afraid.

[That's hair raising, that is.]

I died about a decade earlier.

[It takes a will of god damn iron to say it like that, smooth and matter of fact, but Ricki will not flinch from this, not now that he's here, not now that he's finding his feet.]

[termofendearment]

[Tig listens, carefully and intently, even without any (well, most) of his usual careless attitude. He knows the story, or at least the general outline, how in the beginning of the space race programs thew all kinds of critters up into space, just to see how they would do. If it was feasible. He hadn't given much thought, really, to what it would have been like for them. Hadn't seemed important. Apparently it was "safe" enough to throw people up there instead sooner or later, and that had mostly been good enough for him. Not like he'd ever had dreams of being an astronaut. But the story...well. Tig likes dogs better than people most days. It sticks with him.

It doesn't stop the usual devil-may-care smirk from slipping into place once he's finished, all teasing and apathetic, but he listened. He heard. It stuck.]

Thought they had those little martini shaker lookin' things. One window, good at spinning. Not really giant ocean liners.

[rickitikitarr]

Any room with a view.

[He answers, letting the memory go easily and meeting him with calm, unaffected banter of his own. It's all fine.]

I think those were the next step after the Sputniks. I'm not sure where 'ocean liner prison facility' fits into the precise evolution of man's journey into space, but it may be a few years on further down the line.

[imfollowinghim]

Pretty sure if this was the space she got launched into, she'd be on board already.

[rickitikitarr]

Well, it's a shame.

[Letting it go with a little breath. No hope for dead dogs spinning through space anywhere.]

Thought she might join in the fun.

[video]

[irishrotter]

[The broadcast piques Simon's interest, although he sits back at first and lets the others swarm the new face. He watches some of the conversations go by, and particularly the one with Tiffany, till he thinks he's got a grasp on things: inmate, Earthling, seemingly kind, displaced by time and space and death. By the time Simon cuts in, well after the others, he knows what he wants to say. Or, more importantly, he knows he wants to know more.

His accent is pure Dublin Irish, his face... probably a little jarring, to someone still used to the wholly human: he is very obviously and unabashedly undead, his face bloodless, eyes white. Despite that, his expression is warm, voice friendly.]

Welcome aboard, Ricki. Are you settling in okay?

[video]

[rickitikitarr]

[The question catches him off guard and gets a laugh out of him. Is it even possible to settle in okay here?]

Surviving, thanks. You've got the best of me, I'm afraid-?

[Curious about his name.]

[video]

[lydiascreams]

That's a nice thought. There are plenty of space dogs on board of the Barge. [Lydia says as she shows him Prada.]

I'm Lydia, this is Prada. You're new, right?

[video]

[rickitikitarr]

[That is quite the dog.]

Er- Ricki. Yes, I am, actually. Nice to meet you both.

[video]

[mockinjay]

[She still doesn't like this thing, she still feels like it's intrusive since her arrival, when she accidentally broadcast her freak out to the entire ship. But since it helped her protect Luna, she's more open to it. And anyway, she has a question:]

Why would you care so much about a dog?

[video]

[rickitikitarr]

Imagination, I suppose.

[He makes a gesture, something maybe about a rocket launch.]

Historically because it was the first creature to reach space, as part of a race between two major world powers. Whoever could conquer the skies first- and life in orbit was part of that.

[punched_hitler]

I read about that.

[He smiles, just a little, at the last part, of course.] I think you wouldn't be the only one who'd insist we adopt a Barge pet, if we pass her.

[rickitikitarr]

I'm amazed she remained famous as long as she did. I'm told on here they put a statue up for her, a half century later.

[He's made the assumption that Steve is reading about her from the past, like so many of the other men and women he's met on here.]

[maytakecenturies]

A dog is not sentient.

[Her curiosity is grasped, enough to respond at least, by the very mention of space. She's not foolish enough to get her hopes up, not anymore, and it becomes clear that he's not from a time comparable with her own quickly enough.

That doesn't incline her to hide her ears, though: he's right. Space and time is in a constant, somehow stable state of flux, here. Hiding the existence of sentient life on other planets from arrogant Humans would be pointless and exhausting.]

Even in the unlikely event we were to encounter Sputnik 2, she could tell you nothing.

[rickitikitarr]

I'm afraid that you've rather missed the point of this one.

[He says, not offended, not feeling the particular imperative to correct her. It isn't his place, it isn't his problem, but he doesn't mind telling her that she's wildly off the mark, at least.]

I'm not really an expert on the stars.

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[150th]

It hardly matters which way she died. It was at the hands of humans, for their amusement.

text

[rickitikitarr]

[It takes Ricki a very long time to figure out how to text on this thing, and when it works, he's fumbly, cautious, slow.]

Nah. Humans kill animals for amusement all the time. This was a little different- for knowledge and for power.

[thelastbullet]

[Every time he hears about the future, he has a little debate with himself: would he have wanted to live to see that? Or is he glad that he died before it could happen? In this case, it's undecided: he's not particular to animals, but it's a sad story, nonetheless. And even if he knows space travel is possible (obviously), it's strange to hear about how it developed.

He's wearing a sharp three-piece suit, a fedora hanging from a coat hanger in the background. It's all very 1920's gangster, even if it's just fashion to him. There's also two small round scars on his face, one below the eye, one in the middle of his forehead.]

I guess progress always comes at a cost.

[rickitikitarr]

So we tell ourselves.

[This man, at a first glance, looks like he's before his time rather than after it. Maybe he's making a snap assumption, he tells himself, maybe it's just that the clothing screams gangster because of all those old movies he liked as a kid. Either way, though, he settles into this conversation with a lot more familiarity, a little breath of tension released.

He doesn't feel any particular pressure to be quite so upstanding with this one.]

Does make you wonder whose souls were sold for this beauty of a ship, doesn't it? She puts Sputnik to shame.

[fridgetothefire]

Not ancient history for you, I take it?

[She's a little shiny-eyed. She was eight when Laika made her flight. She remembers lying on her stomach in one of the remote towers, crouched by a cobbled-together radio, wishing she could go.

She also has a severe white crown of bone spurs ruining her hairline, with a rough organic-art deco look, the largest as long as her handspan, a souvenir from their most recent adventure. Ironically, she's normally completely human, and is doing her best to ignore them completely.]

[rickitikitarr]

[This is his first visibly, visibly not-quite-normal thing he's stumbled across in a person, thanks to the Pokemon deciding to text rather than make a face to face call. For a glorious few seconds he's sure it's a hat.

But no, no, that's-]

Ah- twelve years ago, a little more, I think? Fourteen?

[video]

[doomed_copper]

[A pretty, yet pained-looking woman appears on his communicator. No stranger to the Cold War being from 1983, despite the anguished frown on her face at the awful fate of the famous space dog, she doesn't look surprised. When she speaks, her voice is a clear, smooth alto, accented with a crisp London clip.]

Sickening. I wouldn't have put it past those red bastards to've allowed that. And I'm with you if we do come across her.

[video]

[rickitikitarr]

[She sounds so much like home she actually knocks the breath out of him for a split second. Then, all he can do is laugh, and sit up straight.]

Well put ma'am.

[He's much less crisp, much more 'colony hodgepodge,' but still obviously from home, albeit a decade earlier. Close enough to feel the same to Ricki, in all honesty.]

No comrades aboard this good ship, I've been meaning to ask?

[He couldn't care less, but talking with that old, oversimplified public rhetoric is so indulgent, he can't resist.]