Syn would play those videos, reciting the lines. In isolation, she memorized each response from others when conversations happened.
Her favorite was a video greeting that Pote and his daughters had recorded in the evening. The setting was the very room she was in now. Pote would enter, the camera behind him, and announce, “I’m home!”
The girls would run out and yell, “Daddy.” Syn would mouth those words in unison as they shouted it.
“So what did you do today?” he would add.
Syn would mute the girls and fill in her own details, “Blip and I played, and then we watched videos about big buildings on Earth. He made me eat some nasty green things called asparagus. But I tricked him and spit it out when he wasn’t looking.”
That video was played over and over, even after she left the white room, and she would fill that space with details of her own day.
“The ship’s greatest advancement, our most powerful technology, is the people in the ship.” Pote, started each of his monthly “State-of-the-Ship” addresses with those words.
Yet, in that house, now empty and absent, Syn couldn’t escape the fact that Pote and his daughters rested in a dirt field two levels down below the base, amongst a field of the dead, dissolving in the body farms. After much digging, Syn had discovered a final, horrifying video of Pote’s last days, defending his family from the marauding passengers. Pote had killed seven himself before someone slammed a pipe wrench over his head and shattered his skull.
Blip flew around the table in a fast arc to float above the chair holding the stuffed bear that served as the Mad Hatter. In a wild, lilting voice, Blip shouted, “Move down!” Then he whipped over to the next chair, the chair that Syn was sitting in, and bumped her hard.
She teetered and then fell with a crash into the stuffed bunny serving as the March Hare. She cackled with laughter as she lost her balance, landing hard on the ground and giving a triumphant “Whoop!” She picked up a fallen tea cup, a tiny white piece with pink trim, and flung it high in the air. “That’s it, Blip!”
Blip rocked and smiled. “More tea, Hare!”
The March Hare was in no position to provide more tea. When it landed on the hard ground, it sent up a puff of dust before settling.
“March Hare, get back into character,” Blip said, narrowing his eyes.
Syn leaned over and picked up the stuffed rabbit up and waved him in the air, moving his arm as if he was responding to Blip. “Excuse me, sir,” she said, in a gruff voice meant to serve as the March Hare, “I have decided I have had quite enough tea for today and instead am going to watch the clouds float by. Come join us, our fine friend. Tell me what shapes you see as they float above.” Syn flopped him back to the ground and fell back staring up at the dark ceiling that was covered in cobwebs and numerous stains.
Syn spread out her hands and closed her eyes. “That one looks like a shark.” There were clouds in the Disc, but they were sparse and thin—the airflow was so limited that the clouds didn’t have much space to build up in. She had never seen cumulus clouds in real life. The large fluffy ones. She had also never seen a shark in real life. Both were as fanciful to her as the Earth from which the Olorun had departed. Images in videos replayed hundreds of times, but nothing tangible. They were not things she had sensed on her own. Only her imagination held them. Eyes shut hard, she said, “And that one looks like a farm tractor.” She had seen a farm tractor. There was one parked not too far from the tree. She had never been able to make it work, but that was not for a lack of trying.
Blip floated down to rest beside her. His eyes narrowed. “Perhaps I see a caterpillar. A great big worm moving through the sky.”
Her smile grew twice as large as she leaned into him and whispered, “I love you.”
Blip shifted his voice lower and replied with, “I know.”
Syn’s smile grew even bigger, and she giggled in delight. “I’d like some music.”
The robot gave an audible sigh, and a moment later a thin tune, its notes light and slow, filled the room. Despite the domestic surroundings, they were still on a ship hurtling through space—a ship integrated with countless processors and interfaces, all of which Blip could access at any moment.
Syn muttered as she turned the edges of her mouth into a small grin. “No. Not that. You can’t reply with ‘I know’ and then not play John Williams. Please get it right.”
Blip sighed. “Are we done with the tea party?” As he spoke, the music shifted into a familiar rising anthem.
“The tea party has evolved, dear Blip.”
Blip sighed again. “Devolved.”
“Watch the clouds. After all, we must be in Cloud City.”
“You truly belong here with us among the clouds, princess.”
It was Syn’s turn to sigh. “I’ll be Leia tomorrow. I’m Alice today.” She held Sir Hops-A-Lot up in front of Blip and said, “Can I put bunny ears on you?”
“You were Sleeping Beauty three days ago. Baba Yaga the day before that. And Luke Skywalker the day before that,” Blip whirled in the air and floated down next to her, positioning his eyes to the ceiling. “It gets a bit tough to keep it straight.”
“You’re a computer. Put it in a database. Timestamp it. Retrieve when necessary.” This feels so much better, she thought. Her suspicions had grown like a weed, thin and invasive at first, and soon consuming everything good around it
Another tease, use that big brain, was on her lips when the entire room shook. She let out a cry and flattened both hands to the ground to steady herself as the place rocked. Teacups slid from the shaking table and shattered on the floor. The entire room vibrated, and a bookshelf in the corner tottered then tipped over with a large crash.
Then an enormous, deafening boom sounded, and Syn brought her hands to her ears.
Syn shouted, “What’s happening?”
Eku came to her haunches, growling.
Blip didn’t respond. He turned smoothly in the air and darted straight to the front door and out. The shaking of the room and the entire house seemed to have no effect on him.
The sound ebbed away, but furniture was still crashing to the floor. Several books from a high shelf landed with thuds. The window in a far room, perhaps the kitchen, exploded and was followed by the tinkling sound as shattered glass fell to the floor like rain.
As the shaking lessened, Syn jumped to her feet and chased after Blip, Eku quick on her heels. “Where are you going? What’s happening?” The room was still rocking back and forth, and she was far less steady than she had anticipated. She gripped the wall to keep herself from falling and moved toward the open front door with one hand braced against the wall. Paintings that were hung by small screws and nails vibrated off of their hooks and crashed to the ground.