Nice Place To Rot I Guess

ohhh leif you. you you you you OH

"you won't find me. i'll be long gone. at the end of summer, look low on the horizon, you'll see sirius, the dog star. that's where i've gone. i'll take to the stars to meet all the different versions of myself. maybe even one day, round them all up into one person. i go to the stars to meet myself, as we all should. i may fail. but i know i'll never look back. best of luck to you." "good job kid." FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU OOOOOOHHHHHHHHHH I'M GONNA LOSE IT OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

JOE WHEN I CATCH YOU, EVAN GULACK WHEN I CATCH YOU, TOM MOORMAN WHEN I CATCH YOU

this episode oh my god oh my god oh my god

because even though leif is technically part of the crew, he's not.. *one* of them, he has this past and these walls and even though he's "leif the engine, leif the criminal, leif the cook, all wrapped into one", he's not *truly* let his guard down

his first instinct when he realizes the ship is stuck in the sheliak/barnard-68 *is to call it the sheliak* because that's what he knows! because that's what verge taught him! because he was just a kid! because as he told himself in even older leifs voice in that same episode, "he stopped being a human when he stepped onto sirius a"

and then he gets to talk to bert bert again, and he's at *home* again because she *knows*, because he goes "i built it again, the gun" and berts *gets it*, she goes "what g- OH! THE GROGIE?" and then he gets to talk to alice again, and he's in his 20s again, sailing the stars just him and the vast expanse, and he's so *happy*

and then he tells alice goodbye again, albeit under much better circumstances than last time, and he goes to tell berts goodbye and she tells him they stopped saying goodbye a long time ago because he always comes back to her, and he pauses, and you can hear him smile, and he says until next time, and just like that he's back being "the guy on the roof"

i love the others (caspva, my beloved)(they also make me very very ill this episode but that's another post) but there's a disconnect, ava belittles him (when does she not), gloria is always a little mad at him (understandable usually but not the point), caspar is the closest because of the time they spent together (but there was the whole johns wilks booth moment), effie and zeb are well... effie and zeb (they're my cuties but cmon guys), and so there's this kind of gap between leif and the others

even the sleeping arrangements, caspar and ava share avas booth (which. we need to talk about more.), gloria has the managers office that she decorates to be her own, and leif is distant, he's on the roof, sleeping under the stars by himself surrounded by tech just like he always has

yes, gloria reminds everyone that she's proud of them all at the end of the episode and that they've all done well, yes she gave him encouragement earlier in the ep, but something about how he interacts with everyone just. MM