rickitikitarr | 1. video

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1. video

[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.

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Depends what's on offer.

[A bit of a shrug. If something appeals, he'll take it, but he's not going to be talked into promising himself or auditioning for something before he's checked the positions out.]

[Lest he think there's anything glamorous:]

Cook, scrub sweaty equipment in the gym, or work in the library. Pretty sure those are the main positions.

And it's what keeps us fed and housed?

[Mildly misunderstanding.]

You'd think, this being a prison. But no. If you sit on your ass you'll still get a cabin and three square meals.

A job will help you get to know people, though. And trust me when I say you need to know as many people as you can if you want to make it through the ports.

Why?

[He wonders, genuinely curious about this. He does best on his own, it's a hard mentality to shake.]

Well... [He grimaces, rubs the stubble on his jaw. How to explain this without sounding insane.] Some ports have got shopping malls. Some ports have rabid dinosaurs that will pick you off and eat you. Some of 'em will fuck with your had so bad you'll think you're another person with another life.

If you don't have someone to watch your back, you're fucked.

-right, good point, of course.

[Unconvinced, but a good enough liar not to be loud about it.]

I suppose like so much else, they're difficult to really believe in.

[Cain looks at him a moment and then scoffs. Ricki is hard to read, even for a man who literally turned body language into a full-fledged language, but Ricki is also young and new enough that it would be a shock if he took anyone at their word]

What's the weirdest thing that's ever happened to you?

[Ricki gives him a what is your fucking problem look, and answers;]

One morning I was thinking about a school chum from Penang, then there he was in the grocery store with me that very afternoon.

[Said with perfect credulity, as though clearly it was fate. But, he amends, softly;]

I believe it. I do. But my world is very lacking in the magical, paranormal, unusual, so when I mention my disbelief it's really that it's all taking some time to register, this new paradigm.

[He grunts] I get it. My world's got things that people balk at--nothing that can't be explained with science, but there are kids running around fourteen years old who can lift cars over their heads. There's a man I trained with who's immortal. You can shoot him, I mean, but he's never gonna wither and die like I will.

Nothing personal but I guess I'm just waiting for you to flip your lid and kill someone in a panic. We had a couple of newcomers who did that--they either came from places worse than this, or backgrounds that're really boring like yours sounds like.

[Seriously why would the Admiral bring an import-exporter here why (he can't imagine any real reasons anyone would lie about their job once they know they're dead. Haaah.)]

[His pride is nonexistent, but the importer-exporter's wouldn't be. That's the man he lets be goaded, protest;]

What year are you from?

[He's not sure their worlds match up so there's a spiel he gives for these questions:]

Most recent? I was in 2009. Gotham City--that's in New Jersey, United States. I was born in '46, though, so I've been around a bit.

[Ricki is about to crack, to give him a sharp lesson on the dear old Anti-British National Liberation War, but grinds his teeth instead like a man thwarted.

He'll hang on to his secrets just a little longer, instead, deflate as though stung.]

And that's so much less boring?

I wouldn't have ended up here if it was boring. But then, you wouldn't be either. Not as an inmate.

[He says it smoothly, only the littlest hint that he knows there has to be something more]

Relax, kid. I'm curious because it's part of my job but I'm not gonna interrogate you. At least I'll try not to.

[He flicks the feed to private, because Jimmy taught him how and anyways, best to. If he fucks this up he doesn't want anyone else to catch it.]

So as a warden, you're concerned I'm going to get someone killed.

If you're actually just some guy from the colonies who holds down a boring-but-stressful job and goes to bed at the same place every night? Hell no, I don't worry about you killing someone, I worry about you getting killed.

[Since he doesn't know what to expect of Ricki, though, he's worried both ways.]

And either way, spending a week in lock down or a week in the infirmary suffering is a pointless way to spend your first week in After-Life Prison. Trust me. I've done both.

What makes the dangerous ones kill other people, then? Something with tentacles takes a stab at them and some nice fellow gets caught in the crossfire?

That's part of it, yeah. A lot of people get mixed up by mistake; it's a small boat.

People end up here and panic, like I said. Personally I think that's the biggest reason people turn to violence around here. Not the only reason, though. I mean--I'm thinking of one guy in particular--sometimes back home they're serial killers or mass murderers, so they spend a lot of time seeing what they can get away with here. Sometimes they're racists who think they're doing the Barge a favor or who think they're entitled to it.

Don't worry about me. I have it on fairly good authority that I'm not a raging racist, and am not prone to panic.

[But that's about all he's willing to say to a stranger on the subject.]

...Yeah, when I say 'racist', I mean that- [oh God this sounds so ridiculous] -that we have vampires and werewolves and aliens on board who are racist against humans, just like we're sometimes racist against them.

Guy I know kept attacking the same vampire over and over for no damn reason except he hates 'em and hunts 'em back home.

That seems... truly repugnant and rather pointless.

[A tiny little frown.]

Was he an inmate?

Is an inmate, yeah. He was here as a warden back when--well actually he was my warden. Doesn't remember any of it though. My guess is he's some alternate version of the guy, but who the hell knows.

He's not the worst though. We had a cannibal on board.

Well, then I'm doubly glad I'm not a vampire.

[He purses his lips.]

Mind you, I could at least have stood a better chance against the cannibal. A bit of a round of rock paper scissors, isn't it?

Yeah, pretty close to it. You ever fired a gun, used a knife? Made a fist?

[Oh, to hell with this.]

Yes, yes, and yes. One competently, one excellently, and one well, though not in any particular order.

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