#gizzie

Nyota sat back and felt Marcy sink against her as her weight shifted. “Gizzie has already heard my thoughts on their situation, and offered a few hints. It sounds like their situation is not too far from ours, to start: a refugee from Earth who got lucky enough to survive. My guess is that the luck did not last.”

She was careful to avoid saying that Gizzie was directly like them. The situation was delicate already.

“I found my way to a lush garden planet, by luck alone. Marcy, did you reach Patchwork first?”

Marcy nodded. “We were adrift for a while. Two, three weeks. We didn’t know where to go,” she said. She leaned her head against Nyota’s arm. “One of the people with us had family on that planet, though, so they helped figure out the coordinates.”

Nyota put her hand over Marcy’s, a small gesture of comfort. “Luck, in a way, then. I’m glad you found somewhere safe.” She looked back at her prisoner. “Gizzie found somewhere safe too, I believe. Or was found by someone. They gave you food and new clothes, but not too new, treated any wounds you earned in surviving, and gave you a place to stay.”

She made eye contact and went for the kill. “Then, when you were too dependent on them to go anywhere else, they stopped giving. They told you that you had to earn it.”

Gizzie shivered, and Nyota knew her guess was still accurate.  

Marcy went tense again, but it was a different kind, this time. It was no longer hostile. It might have been afraid.

No one spoke, so Nyota continued, her voice quieter now. “No doubt the earning started small. A little spying, a propaganda poster. You met others who were in your situation, and saw them welcomed into the fold one by one. They said only kind things about your rescuers. They loved their new home. Were you proud of your first set of hand-me-down robes? Of being allowed to belong?”

Gizzie held her gaze with an awestruck stare. “Again…? Ma’am, how? Every time, you get even sharper.”

The scar on the back of Nyota’s neck burned cold as she kept her hands still in her lap with sheer will. “It’s more than a lucky guess.” She pressed on—stubborn, merciless. “It didn’t stay with posters and spying, did it? I won’t guess if you wish it did. Wishing is a luxury. I think—” She let her hard stare fall on the worn-out robes, on the lines in Gizzie’s face formed by too much weight lost too fast—“that you were not given much room for luxury.”

“Just like before,” Gizzie whispered. “We’ve barely… barely talked, and you’re spot-on. How could you tell?” Their hands shook. Their voice didn’t, with great effort. “Are… are you psychic?”

“I didn’t read your mind, if that is what you’re asking,” Nyota replied. The room was silent. She poured herself another cup of coffee. She would feel it later, probably. But she needed the warmth. “I have seen this happen before.”

“I have too.” Marcy’s hands tightened in her lap as all eyes turned to her. “It’s happened throughout human history.” She looked down. “Not that we have any real record of that now… But evil people like to use the weak. I’ve seen Occasus go after my classmates when I was in high school. They lured you in when you were having a hard time. They gave you a sympathetic ear, a little help with your homework.”

“Or they give you food and shelter after you just lost everything,” Gizzie said quietly. “And they give you someone easy to blame for it.”

Marcy nodded. “And all the while they would whisper things to you that you wouldn’t believe anyone could say, but this person was too nice to be evil, right?” She sighed, reached up to tuck her hair behind her ear, stopped, and reached out to offer Gizzie her hand instead. “I… almost fell for it myself, but Mom and Dad snapped me out of it. And then I met Nyota. That proved everything they said was a lie. But if I hadn’t, I might have ended up where you are now.”

She smiled, thin and bitter but not at Gizzie now. “I think that’s why I’m angry. I don’t like seeing myself like that.”

Nyota waited, then gently closed her hand around Marcy’s free hand. Gizzie summoned their courage and took the one offered.

𝐜𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐭 (𝐢𝐳𝐳𝐢𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐬 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐲𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭)