MEADOW LARK 🛰 INBOX

[testflight]

@larry.trainor | ■ ▲ ◌ ▼

Comments

[btryl]

[ The E-mail is forwarded, the return address is blank. The E-mail is from Johann P. Grey to Head Cybersecurity Officer at the UNA, Brandon Charpentier. The subject line reads RE: Problem and is from mid-March. The content involves a chiding from Johann that a fatal flaw in the backup system for the UNA-issued implants has not been patched up properly, and requires – as Johann puts it – "more creative engineering intent and dedicated team efforts." The E-mail further states that he doesn't want to extend his resources to "tidy up" a problem that the UNA brought on itself. It further details that he'll be expediting some software upgrades to aid the tireless efforts of the UNA's appointed engineers. He warns that if nothing is done soon with utilization of the proper resources, that many more soldiers will die on her watch. ]

@jyn.erso — via morningstar network

[realists]

[ she'd sent out the same message to a number of people but she hesitates before sending "you dead?" to larry. somehow it doesn't seem like the phrase to take with him. ]

You good?

[testflight]

[ he'd appreciate the different choice of words, if he knew. ]

i'm great

[ and unfortunately well-versed in the lack of nuance that comes from wearing bandages or, apparently, this. ]

that was sarcasm

[realists]

I gathered

Working on getting you out

[testflight]

that would be appreciated

[ and because he genuinely doesn't mean to be a dick: ]

how are you?

@eugene.hicks

[preseance]

Hey, pal. Just checking in.

[testflight]

Gene, hi.

Are you good?

[preseance]

Oh, you know me. No complaints here, fella.

What about you?

[testflight]

I'm great.

[ is he actually? is it just dry sarcasm? —yeah, it's the latter.

although ] I guess I can't complain. I found a job.

@jyn.erso

[realists]

[ late in the evening after things seem to have calmed down: ]

Were you sleeping at the safehouse?

[testflight]

[ late in the evening after cassian and then maine have saved his butt: ]

I was.

[realists]

You can stay with Cassian and I

[ maybe lead up would be better but jyn brought him to the safehouse the first time and now it is not safe so she is compelled to bring him to a new safehouse. which happens to be her... safe house. ]

[testflight]

[ that. is not at all what he was expecting. it's kind and, yes, he hasn't known her or cassian to be anything but kind in their actions, but — ]

Oh, no, I couldn't.

[ he wouldn't want to impose. ]

@august.jónsson

[bloodbathing]

Doing okay?

[ After all the monster madness. ]

[testflight]

Yes.

[ as okay as ever ]

Thanks to you.

[bloodbathing]

Glad I was there.

[testflight]

Me, too.

I have something for you. Not a thank you, exactly, but we talked about plants before.

@jyn.erso

[realists]

Have you got a bucket list?

[testflight]

For what?

[realists]

Stuff to do before you die?

I thought maybe it was an Earth thing.

[testflight]

Oh. Yes. It is an Earth thing.

I don't, though.




Do you?

@august.jónsson

[bloodbathing]

[ Sometime after everyone returns from the Aerie (and after a conversation with Gene): ]

Doing all right?

[ It's almost the same as the message Maine sent Larry after the monster invasion, but the words carry added meaning now. ]

vomits emotions @ u oops

[testflight]

[ larry's managed to have an actual conversation (of sorts) with gene; he can manage an actual conversation with maine, too. he can. it's just that now he also knows what maine looks like naked, what his skin feels like beneath larry's fingertips.

(would it feel the same if he touched him now? he wasn't scarred and burnt in the aerie.)

he's been thinking a lot. about the man he'd been there. about the man he is here. about joy and acceptance and positions of power and privilege. about loss, too. ]

Good enough.

[ he's fine. it's fine.

(what would not be fine: if maine felt that larry had abused his privilege or power in some way in the aerie. if maine liked the man he'd been there better than the man he is here?

of course maine would. anyone would, right?) ]

Are you?

WEEPS

[bloodbathing]

Good enough.

[ Echoing the words. They fit as well as any. And it's easier than trying to answer in more detail. Easier than tackling specifics. Easier than saying something like, "Not sure who I am," or, "Better since you're not dead."

"Good enough" is good enough.

There are plenty of ways that Maine could ease into things. Instead: ]

Want dinner Saturday? You, Gene, me. Deer and whiskey.

[ He's always preferred a blunt approach. ]

you and me both

[testflight]

[ good enough. larry doesn't know what that means —not when it comes to his own emotions, much less when it comes to maine's. they're both in one piece, then? probably, at the least, that's what it means. (maine would probably say 'good enough' if he was injured but not very. larry turns that thought over in his mind for a minute before shaking it off.)

the question, the dinner invite comes as a surprise and so it's an unguarded ]

Yes. [ followed immediately by ] If you're sure you want me there? [ you meaning maine. you meaning both maine and gene. the two men he'd been closest to in the aerie, the two most regular partners of the man he'd been there. the man he isn't here, doesn't know how to be.

(how desperately does he wish he could carry that certainty, that easy acceptance within himself here. how desperately does he wish he could wrap the person he'd been there around himself like a cloak, sink into it, stop worrying.) ]