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Personal log, stardate unknown. Unknowable. After several weeks in this strange place called Milliways, I am still no closer to finding a way to return to my own timeline. It has become increasingly clear the guiding force or forces that brought me and the other inhabitants of the anomaly here wish me to either serve a greater purpose or receive some sort of lesson. I do not enjoy being treated like a student, and yet I cannot say that, compared to other such experiences, that this one is as unpleasant. Jim feels better being able to at least record his impressions. An echo, no doubt, of a career spent keeping records of his every experience. He pauses and wonders about the irony of a veteran instructor at the Academy being the student now. I remain determined to find a way home, but I am quite certain that what I want will not resolve the situation..

Jim turns off the recorder and stares out the window. At least, as chaotic as that view is, he can understand what he's seeing, name some of the phenomena. But at the same time, he longs to be out there. It would be, to paraphrase a book he still fondly recalls, an awfully big adventure.

[ooc: slowtime possible for work]

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That brings a half-smile to Jim's face. "Yes, I see how that would be something else.

"The man who insulted you, his world doesn't have the visually impaired?"

"No." she says quietly, "Or at least not Whistler's kind. They kill them before they're even born."

"Good lord. That's...barbaric." There is shock in his voice.

"Where is this Preston from?"

"I don't know. I just...I don't know. I got angry, we had harsh words, I slapped him, and he punched me. I didn't ask his where."

"You okay now?" And of course she'd know he's not asking aobut her black eye.

"I slapped someone, Jim." She shifts around until she can lean against him, "Its. I don't know if I'm alright or not. I slapped someone, even if he deserved it...I did it."

He gives her a supportive hug. And thinks about what to say. He never approves of violence, in theory. And yet how many people has he killed in his life? Indirectly, and directly? To be like her would be to change him too much, and yet he envies her commitment to restraint.

"It would be glib to just tell you not to do it again. but I also think that you won't."

"I hope I won't." She says after a moment, still leaning against him. Sime like touch, and Suzi needs it more than most in a place with such a depressed ambient, "But I can't. I don't know anymore?"

"Have you talked to Whistler about this?"

"I need to." she says wryly, "But I haven't yet. I keep getting into crisis things at him."

"I suspect he'll know how to help better than I do." He also has to wonder if Whistler will be secretly (or not so secretly) glad that she defended his honor. "I know a few things about trying not to resort to violence, but I doubt they'd apply here."

Whistler knows she slapped Preston. His glee was concealed from everyone except the only Sime in the building. "It, um. It can't hurt to explain them to me?"

He takes a breathe. And tries not to speechify too much.

"I know that humans are capable of great violence. In our collective past, and as individuals, we've been killers. It's not something we can deny.

"Sometimes, we need to resort to violence. I can't hide that. But most of the time, we need to hold off. To say to ourselves, I might be a killer, but I'm not going to kill today. I might be capable of hurting someone, but I'm not going to do that today.

"It's not easy. It can be merely...words. But if we start with those words, those thoughts, maybe we can change."

She freezes for a minute, and then says quietly, "Killing means something different in Simelang, Jim. It means, specifically, to strip someone of selyn. All other intentional deaths are murders."

He smiles sheepishly. "Oh. I'm sorry for the choice of word then. But I think you do understand what I'm trying to say, right?"

"I think so." As God is my witness, I shall not die a killer. "That...sometimes you just have to keep reminding yourself that you're better than that?"

He nods and smiles a little. "Yes. And I am quite sure that you are better than that." And batter than anyone whose world resorts to exposure as a method of eugenics.

She nods a little, "I still don't like it here. I wish that Whistler and I could go home and just stay there. We can't, we can't take enough supplements to keep us healthy the rest of our lives, but I wish we could."

"At least you have his home as a refuge, sometimes." He enarly sighs, but hes not one to pity himself.

"Let me ask you something. Do you think whoever or whatever is running this place brought you here for a reason?"

"I think that who or whatever runs this place is insane at best, and possibly evil." She says flatly.

"It's possible. Though I am not sure about he or she or it being evil. Corrupt, power-hungry or a self-proclaimed god, though, are more likely.

"I met someone who was quite convinced otherwise, though. A young and very perceptive woman named Rachel. i don;t know why she did this, but she took the time to tell me her ideas about this place." And even to analyze him, but he isn't saying that.

She shrugs, "I know Rachel. I know that lots of people think that this place is a good one. I'm not one of those people. I won't argue with people who think that they're in a good place, it wouldn't help anything.

But I hate it. I hate it, I fear it, and I want to leave it far, far away. I stand by possibly evil, because whatever forces us here seems to steal with no rhyme or reason. Dead people, living people. All worlds, all times. People who were doing things, people who were just drifting...and it forces us to a place where terrible, terrible things happen...and people say that's just the way it is."

Jim thinks for a moment. "If I ever leave, maybe I can take you with us. At least for a while. I really don't know what my own future holds, but there's always a possibility that our science can help you and Whistler produce whatever you need to live."

"I don't know." She says with a sigh, "Maybe. I don't think that this place will ever let anyone go enough to have their own life, free."

"I know that people choose to come and go. All things considered, there are worse places to have a drink. But I think that the only thing that would bring me back is the people I care about."