Work Text:
Mia walks out of the cave, hands in her pockets, before looking up. A familiar fish shaped spaceship flying away from The Staircase, Alma’s spaceship.
“What…” Mia says, more to herself than anything. “No, that… that can’t be…” she continues, as panic sets in. That’s their ship, and it’s leaving without her. “That’s… That’s our ship! Where are they going?!” She starts to run, it’s difficult in the snow though. There is so much panic coursing through her, they’re leaving her behind. “Guys! Wait!”
“Alma!”
“Char!”
“Jules!”
“Elliot!”
She screams all their names, she knows they can’t hear her but she needs to try. She drops her backpack onto the snow, trying to run faster.
“No!” She screams, tripping and falling onto the snow as she does so. Tears fall down her face now, she’s being abandoned. “Wait!” She sits on the ground, and she’s sobbing. “What is going on?! That cant-” her voice breaks “-that can’t be them… They…” She leans forward, hitting the snow as her arms touch the ground. “...They wouldn’t leave me…”
She cries into the snow, she can’t believe this. They actually left her, she’s genuinely stuck on The Staircase. She can’t think in whole thoughts, she doesn’t know what to do. The ship is nowhere in sight anymore, she feels so alone.
That is, until she feels someone’s arms around her. She doesn’t have to look at who it is to know it’s Grace. They just stay there for a moment, letting Mia cry. She feels a little less alone, but she’s still so lost. What is she meant to do now? She’s confused.
“I’m sorry.” Grace says as Mia slowly stops crying. It’s not much but it’s all Grace can say, How do you help someone who’s just been abandoned on a planet they know nothing about?
“They wouldn’t leave me.” Mia repeats, this time actually to someone.
“I don’t think they had a choice.” Grace says, and Mia doesn’t respond. She doesn’t seem to know what Elliot had done to the ancient animal, and Grace isn’t sure whether she should tell her.
They stay there for a moment before Grace’s sisters eventually herd them back into the cave, away from the cold. Mia doesn’t say anything the entire time, as Grace and her sisters talk about how they’ll find space for Mia. They talk about how they can’t just leave Mia alone, but they also don’t exactly have an empty room. They haven’t needed one.
They’re talking like she isn’t there, but she can’t blame them, it’s not like she’s involving herself much in the conversation. She can’t bear to, there’s too many thoughts through her head. They left her. Why would they leave her? What is she going to do now? Will she never see her friends again? Oh my god, will she never see her mums again? She didn’t even want to go home to her mums, but at least she had the choice before. She’s stuck here, she’s actually stuck here.
“Okay, you’ll sleep in our living room, for now.” Jane’s voice snaps Mia out of her thoughts. “I’ll explain it to mum.”
She supposes the living room isn’t too bad, it’s a place to sleep. It’s probably better than the messy room on the ship she, Ell, and Jules shared anyway. Not that she minded the room on the ship being messy, it was nice either way, but it’ll be nice to sleep somewhere you can see the floor.
It’s just walking for a while, and Mia still won’t talk, she just can’t. Grace and her sisters talk though, about all sorts of things Mia refuses to listen to. She just wants to go to sleep, to pretend everything is normal and fine. Maybe if she imagines she’s fine hard enough, she will be.
She nearly falls five different times on the way to the Hill’s home, she doesn’t know how the underground works and she’s not paying attention to anything around her. They manage to get there with all Mia’s limbs intact nonetheless.
Jane leaves to go talk to her mother, Mattie, Helen, and Grace all help set up the sofa in the living room with blankets and cushions for Mia to sleep. Mia, on the other hand, just stands still in the room, not talking, not even thinking anything. She’s just standing there in almost complete silence, aside from her heavy breath. Her expression is ever so neutral it’s almost scary, considering what’s just happened. Nobody wants to say anything to her, they wouldn’t know what to say either way. What do you say to someone who just lost everything? Nothing can change that.
The next few months are proof of that, Mia and Grace started to go out again but it’s strange. Mia loves Grace, and she always will, but she is never paying much attention to her. She’s never paying much attention to anything, she’s always zoning out, she mumbles incoherent nonsense to herself, and every once in a while she just stops talking.
Even now as they walk together through the underground city, Grace is talking but Mia doesn’t seem to be listening. Not on purpose, she wouldn’t ignore Grace, but she just lives in her own world now.
Even as she gets used to The Staircase, and as she begins to love living with Grace and her family, she still can’t stay fully aware for very long. Sometimes she does things or says things but has no recollection of doing them, like she was simply working on autopilot. It’s getting better, that much is obvious, but it’s slow and none of them are sure how to fix her.
Mia’s life isn’t bad, but it’s not what it’s meant to be. At least that’s how she views it, like her life was supposed to be flying with her friends and her girlfriend, and not being settled on the staircase like this. She doesn’t mind it though, she just wishes she could say goodbye to her friends. She wonders what they’re up to, and what they think she’s up to. She wonders if they miss her as much as she misses them. Grace reckons they do.
“Trust me, they miss you, they’re imagining you here with me and hoping you’re okay everyday.” She tells Mia, it’s mostly just reassurance but she could be right.
Maybe one day she’ll find her friends again, maybe she’ll fly with them, or just say goodbye. Or maybe she’ll learn to live her life here normally, and that’s okay too. It’s not so bad on TS, after all. It’ll take a while, but someday, when she’s sitting with her girlfriend and they’re just talking, she’ll realise she hasn’t zoned out or dissociated in a while. She’ll realise she’s okay. It’ll be a distressing thought, that she could move on from her friends and be okay, but she knows they’d rather she did.