The Floret in the Mirror Chapter 7 Advance Draft - "Handshake Signals"

Okay, back on schedule!! This week's chapter may well change significantly in the next week or so, so don't get too used to how it looks right now, but that's the nature of seeing things less far along in the process of being written and edited — as outlined, this chapter did a lot of other things that might still sneak in! 

Content Warnings for: None, really, apart from Jess's ongoing memory issues and being generally sad and overwhelmed a lot. She gets hugs though! And the promise of future cookies! 

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Handshake Signals

1.0.0-a1

The ground curving up to become the sky didn’t make her want to vomit anymore. That was progress. Jess could stare up at it now without too much difficulty, her lizard-brain finally coming to terms with the implicit understanding that she wasn’t about to plunge to her death. It was beautiful, really — the sunline, bright and yet somehow not painful to look at, scratched a brilliant line across the vista, anchored at the two ends of the cylinder she was standing inside.

The inside of the ship, and it still felt strange to call something this big a ship, was made up of three cylindrical segments. Two were of the same size, heavily wooded but dotted with settlements whose tall spires reached almost all the way to the sunline, but the third was much larger, stretching all the way to the far end of the cylinder in a broad swathe of open green space. It was something impossible, something one rarely saw even in fluff documentaries about quadrillionaires, for they didn’t often invite the common folk into their palatial havens.

Explore, Gallica had said. Shit, Jess thought, pulling her jacket around herself in a way that had nothing to do with the ambient temperature, I could probably spend half my life just doing that here.

Something was different now, though. It had only taken

swim deep, swim deep and hide

a few moments outside of Gallica’s hab for her see an Affini in the wild, leading a spaced-out Terran along on a leash. More had followed, and though she’d tried to avoid them, she’d been stopped and given affection by several — and each time, she’d gone a bit weak in the knees, right on schedule, her body responding without her. She’d taken refuge in the corner of what looked like a small park, only to discover as another gaggle of Affini showed up that it was, in fact, an office, and that she simply hadn’t noticed the curving arcs of the alien trees made for excellent desks at the typical Affini’s height. She’d gotten even more affection there.

I’m going to lose it at this rate, she thought, huddling between a pair of bushes alongside the path. Something vibrated in her jacket — the minitablet Gallica had given to her. She’d insisted Jess keep it on her, and use it to contact her if she got overwhelmed or needed help with something. Overwhelmed definitely described Jess’s emotional state at the moment, but she wasn’t about to dial home just yet — she came out here to get away from Gallica, to clear her head, to actually figure out what the fuck was going on.

The tablet had automatically opened itself (a behavior Jess was going to have to switch off; horribly insecure, no wonder her account had been hacked) and was displaying a message from someone called “Pinecone.”

<Pinecone> Heyyyyy babe

<Pinecone> How goes the search?

Jess squinted at the screen, hoping that she’d have one of those flashes of memory to bail her out of this, but nothing happened. She typed a quick reply:

<sudont> what?

Huh. She was already logged in as “sudont.” Whoever had been in her account, Gallica must have found out and summarily booted them. She flicked away from the message and began to explore the tablet, but her dataspace was strangely empty. The first thing she looked for were logs, but they’d all been removed, even when she switched over to a terminal view and dug through the directory tree. Same for any other data that wasn’t just some form of media stash; if she wanted to watch all twenty seasons of Sabine & Selenipedium, whatever the hell that was, she was in luck, but as for personal information it was like the account had been scrubbed clean. Wonderful, she thought, grumbling at the hacker who’d clearly fucked her over. Very helpful. Asshole.

<Pinecone> Wait, am I talking to the right one?

The message popped up in GUI form, nestling itself in at the top corner of the terminal screen. Annoying — she thought she’d shut off the GUI, but apparently the terminal was just running in a wrapper. She tapped in another reply:

<sudont> What the hell does that even mean??

<Pinecone> Okay yeah wrong account, sorry hon!

<sudont> ???????

No reply came back. Frustrated, Jess began to click around, looking for a way to dig up information on whoever this “Pinecone” was. It didn’t take her long to open up what seemed to be a contact profile for one Aletheia Chlorosar, First Floret, which sported a picture of a woman with long, wavy, brilliantly red hair. It was obviously a selfie, in which she was wearing absolutely nothing and was leering at the camera, pupils blown out even more than Layla’s had been, one hand on–

Oh fuck. Jess recognized the head between Pinecone’s legs, the blue undercut seized tight in the fingers of Pinecone’s free hand. Her face went bright red as she closed the profile. How many of these people have I had sex with?!

Trying to forget what she’d just seen, she went back to the GUI and began to browse. At least she had network access again. That was a step up, but not much of one — it was easy enough to navigate, but so much of the content on offer was utterly incomprehensible. Half of it seemed to be some kind of social media feed that was primarily pictures of extremely intoxicated Terrans in colorful outfits, pictures of extremely intoxicated Terrans wearing nothing at all, and outright porn. Jess closed that tab quickly, her face flushing as she looked around furtively purely as a reflex. Her bits were getting hard again, which, given how everything around here seemed to be geared for maximum titillation, was not exactly surprising.

The problem was she had no direction, no idea of where she should even begin her search — at least, not until her mind returned to the subject of the redhead Pinecone, and Jess had a sudden brainwave. The attacker who’d wiped her account hadn’t erased whatever that profile was, so somewhere on this tablet her friend list was probably completely intact! She found it in less than thirty seconds of frantic tapping and sweeping, a long list that spilled down the screen, little circular portraits nestled safely at the center of a spray of colorful flower petals. Stars, she thought, everything is flowers with these aliens. She started scrolling up and down the list, opening contacts more or less at random, hoping that something would prompt a memory.

AllDucklingsAreValid, aka Ella Koriannon, Second Floret — a dark skinned woman with messy brown hair and thick arms, one of which was wrapped around a laughing Jess’s shoulders while Ella took the selfie. One of her fingers was hooked into Past Jess’s mouth, and Past Jess looked more than a little stoned. Starting to sense a theme here, Jess thought. At least this one wasn’t of her going down on someone!

magnumopus, aka Imogen Koriannon, First Floret — Related to AllDucklingsAreValid, clearly, but Jess had no idea how. She wasn’t even sure this was a picture of a person, but some sort of doll posed to stare blankly into the camera from extreme close range. She squeezed her thighs together and tried to ignore the warm, ticklish feeling building inside her. What the fuck? She was here to remember things, not get spun up!

EternalWeekend, aka Jillian Viridia, First Floret. This picture, at least, wasn’t of her having sex — the extremely-baked brunette was simply lying on top of her, and Past Jess was laughing and apparently trying to squirm her way out from under her. Wholesome, by comparison to what she’d seen so far, but it didn’t prompt any memories.

PropagandaOfTheDeed, aka — Layla! Finally, Jess thought, someone I recognize. The picture seemed to be from a while ago, if the amount of grey in Layla’s hair was anything to go by, rather less than what Jess remembered from the day before. The Layla in the picture had Jess’s earlobe between her teeth, and the camera had perfectly captured the rogueish wink she was giving it. Jess couldn’t help but bite her lip a little. Okay, so maybe Past Jess had a point, she thought. Still, she’d taken up so much of Layla’s time yesterday, and she still had a lot of friendlist to go. Maybe she should find someone else to bother, like…

VanguardsLittleHelper, aka Nell Macranthera, Fourth Floret. The lithe, dark-haired woman with flushed cheeks in center frame was staring into the camera, arms bound behind her by something green and ropeline, and was biting her lip as she– Wait a second. Nell?! Her gut clenched as she remembered a voice, loud and irate, laying into her for having a difference of opinion about Vladimir Illych, whoever the hell he was. She shook her head — if this woman was in her friendlist, they must have reconciled — and went back to the photo, realizing that, like so many of the others, she was in this one too, on her hands and knees below Nell, tied up with the same green ropes with a–

Nope. She closed the window, set the tablet down on the moss-grass-stuff that covered the ground, and buried her face in her hands to attempt to hide a blush that’d be visible from light-years off. She did not need to think about the woman she was still a little scared of pegging her. That was not something she needed in her brain, and her bits needed to stop being so fucking excited and tingly over it. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Why have I had sex with almost everyone on my friendlist?! Am I some kind of slut?

This was too much. It was entirely too much for her. This Past Jess, whoever she’d been, was like a completely different person, and Jess couldn’t

twist, shiver, escape; sacrifice a limb if you must, but seek familiar waters

bridge the gap between who she understood herself to be and who she clearly had become. How was she supposed to slot seamlessly into a life like this, a life where she was this gregarious, outgoing, sexually available person when she’d only ever been a basement-dwelling goblin who could barely handle talking to the clerk at the corner store when she occasionally emerged to seek out a fresh load of synthcubes? She wasn’t good enough to be Past Jess.

Stars. She was fucking crying again. She wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her jacket, and even though it was glossy and shiny and looked like it had some kind of incredibly waterproof surface, it drank the tears right up. She wasn’t getting any answers, not like this, not if every digital rock she turned off set her off. She needed help, but she was a mess. She couldn’t go back to Gallica, not yet, and not like this — another touch of the massive alien’s vines and she’d be right back where she started, unable to so much as join two thoughts together, let alone articulate them.

She took a deep breath, picked up her tablet again, and began to type.

<sudont> hey, uhm, this isn’t a bad time, is it?

It took a few gut-wrenching moments for the reply to come back.

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> Of course not. What’s wrong?

<sudont> whoever got into my account erased a lot of my stuff

<sudont> I went on a walk because I have no idea how to be around Gallica and I’ve just been looking around my contacts list and uh

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> Someone got into your account?

<sudont> Yeah I talked to them yesterday on your tablet

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> Ah, I see

<sudont> I kinda might have hacked it sorry

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> Wouldn’t be the first time.

<sudont> I mean for me it was

<sudont> but besides that

<sudont> look this is really weird okay????

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> I know. I had my own deeply confusing first experience with the Affini, and while it might have been a while ago, I remember it all very well. Speaking of memories, have you remembered anything else?

<sudont> A couple things

<sudont> Some stuff about Gallica

<sudont> and uhh… Nell

<sudont> Not a lot just that she’s gonna yell at me about some guy named Vladimir and being a splitter, whatever that means

Layla sent a little animated emoji that looked like some kind of laughing anthropomorphic bee. It laughed so hard it fell over and started rolling around on the floor.

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> I don’t think you need to worry about that.

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> If it helps, trust me, Nell adores you.

<sudont> Yeah that’s the other thing uhhhhhh are we dating???

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> You and Nell, or you and me?

“Uuuuugh!” Jess dropped her tablet between her feet and pulled her jacket over her head to hide. She hadn’t even thought about that — she meant to ask about Nell, and here she’d accidentally implied that she thought she was dating the (admittedly hot) granny instead. Maybe she was.

By the time she worked up the courage to look back at the tablet and pick it up, there were more messages waiting:

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> Anyway, it’s kind of hard to say. Floret culture, at least on this ship, is very open about that sort of thing. I will say that sex doesn’t necessarily imply deep emotional connections. For what it’s worth, I think you and Nell are just friends, and I’m pretty sure that’s the same sort of relationship we had.

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> Sorry. I probably should have broken that up more so you didn’t have to wait for it all.

<sudont> Okay

<sudont> Sorry it’s just

<sudont> Look uh I’m not a virgin or anything but

<sudont> I’m pretty sure that I’ve uh

<sudont> done that

<sudont> with a LOT of people

<sudont> way more than I thought I had

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> If it helps, so have I.

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> And no one is going to think less of either of us for it. Alright?

<sudont> Okay but

<sudont> fuck

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> Jess, why don’t you come over and spend a little more time with us? You seem like you’re having a hard time and I don’t want you to have to go through it alone.

Jess’s face flushed and her eyes started to tear up again. She felt guilty — she hadn’t want to ask for it, but now that Layla had offered, she realized that she’d probably been hoping for the offer the whole time. Stars, what a manipulative little shit I am. But then, that’s what made her such a good hacker. Socially engineering legitimate access was frequently the best solution to a difficult problem.

<sudont> You’re sure?

<PropagandaOfTheDeed> I’m not president of the Terran Florets Union for nothing.

She added another emoji, again of a cartoon bee person, this one winking and flashing a thumbs up.

<hr>

Finding Layla’s habitat wasn’t hard, nor was it a long way off — her tablet happily not only displayed a map of the ring she was on (Ring Heartwood, apparently), but when held up displayed an overlay on the ring itself that actually highlighted the hab she was heading for, along with a handful of transit stations as well as the Network Services building (which, even without the the overlay, Jess could easily pick out now that she knew what she was looking for).

It was bizarre — the whole ship was laid out like a small, very walkable town, with little clusters of buildings here and there, none of which Jess could readily identify, save for the absolutely enormous grocery market whose broad, tall windows let her peer inside at the absolutely absurd bounty held within, shelves upon shelves and floors upon floors of food, real food, not prepackaged synthcubes or freeze-dried snack packs or canned crap. It was enough to make her want to weep then and there, but she pulled herself away from the sight and kept on walking.

Past the market, and past the other buildings surrounding it, and down a mossy path she went. Its sides were lined with flowers in a hundred hues, some of them vaguely familiar, some of them almost certainly alien in origin — Jess was fairly certain there were no plants on Earth that hummed when you walked past them. The breadcrumb led her down a side path, then another, until she came to a little wooded corner and a cluster of buildings that were absolutely overrun with floral growth and greenery. One in particular, a broad one that sprawled a little more than the others, was lit up in her minitablet’s display.

Well. Shit. She took a deep breath, tried to calm herself down, and walked up to the door, reminding herself with each step that she was invited, she was allowed to be here, and that even if she’d swindled her way into it, whatever, as long as she kept her head down she–

“Jessie!” Jess barely had time to look up before she felt the impact, something warm and soft that all but slammed into her, a small, ever so slightly heavyset woman who wrapped her arms around Jess. She was surrounded by the heavy scent of a working bakery, flour and sugar and bread and a dozen other good things cramming their way into Jess’s nostrils with much the same force as the little blonde was squeezing her. “Good, good, you’re here! Come inside, Layla said you were having a rough time, so I made so many cookies for you!”

“Uh, wh-what?”

“I made the orange cardamom chocolate chip ones you really like!” the woman continued, releasing Jess only to take her firmly by the hand and pull her inside the now-open doorway — and into a forest straight out of a fairy tale. Above, gentle sunlight filtered down through branches so festooned with flowers they put the paths outside to shame, and in place of a carpet there was a soft green grass that made Jess want to kick off her shoes and wiggle her toes in it just for the sheer luxurious joy of it all. In the weft and weave of woodland foliage, she could makes out the shapes of a home — a couch here, a table there — but it was all wrought in grown wood, in river-polished stone, in foliage bent to serve. It was also all at least twice the size that it should have been, maybe more, scaled to fit the Affini rather than Terrans.

Still, after Gallica’s hab, it felt strangely small.

“Layla! She’s here! Come out and–” Suddenly, the woman stopped and turned, and Jess got her first good look at her — she was small, only coming up to about Jess’s shoulders, in her mid to late 30s, maybe 40 or so, with long blonde hair bound back in a loose ponytail. She wore an apron streaked with flour (which was now also all over Jess’s shirt), a pair of short-shorts, a camisole, and not much else. “Oh gosh, I’m sorry, I got carried away, didn’t I?” She rolled her eyes. “I swear, sometimes I’d forget my head if it wasn’t screwed on! You probably don’t remember me, do you?”

“I..w-well…” Jess looked away awkwardly. Something was tickling at the back of her head, but calling it a memory would be giving it far too much credit. Stars damn it, fucking work, stupid brain!

“I’m Leah,” the woman said, smiling up at Jess. “Leah Aptenia, First Floret, she/her! I’m Layla’s pinnate!” She bit her lip and giggling. “Laylaaaa! Come on! The baklava’s gonna take another half hour at least!”

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” a familiar voice called from around a hollow formed by an absurdly massive tree. A moment later, Layla emerged, wearing an apron identical to Leah’s, which she deftly removed and hung across a convenient branch before she too embraced Jess in a tight hug. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said softly before giving Jess a squeeze and stepping back.

“Y-yeah,” Jess mumbled. Layla had an inch or two on her, which wasn’t a lot but was just enough to be noticeable. Instead of the red dress from yesterday, she was wearing a simple white blouse and a long, swishy skirt with an intricate abstract pattern reminiscent of flowers; like Leah, she was barefoot. “S-sorry for interrupting your baking…?”

“Silly, we started baking because you were coming over,” Leah said, hugging Jess from behind and burrowing into the small of her back.

“Leah’s baking reflex is far too powerful to fight,” Layla added with an ever-so-slightly lopsided grin. Her pupils, Jess, noticed, were no less dilated than they’d been the day before, and she began to wonder if the woman was just habitually stoned out of her gourd.

“Cookies make everything better,” Leah protested, her voice slightly muffled by Jess’s back, “and so do pastries, and donuts, and fresh bread, and cakes… everything! And baking them is great because then you get to give others all those good things, and see them make people happy! Oh! Do you want something to drink? Milk? Tea? Coffee?”

“Uh, y-you don’t have to get me anything,” Jess protested weakly. “I’m already causing you enough trouble–”

“Nonsense,” Layla said firmly, a little bit of that stern voice coming back as she reached up and put a hand to Jess’s cheek, steering her gaze to meet her own. “You are not a burden,” she said. “You never have been, and you never will be.” She broke eye contact almost immediately thereafter, pulling Jess (and Leah with her) into a hug.

“You’re our friend,” Leah added. “We love you, and we care about you, and we worry about you when you’re not feeling good.”

“I… I don’t…” Something hot built up in Jess’s chest, crawling its way up to her face in short order as tears began to gather at the corners of her eyes. “It’s…”

“Well! Isn’t this just the most precious thing?” Jess bolted upright at the sound of another Affini voice — after a morning of being petted, stroked, and cooed over, she was fast developing reflexes for seeing it coming — and twisted around in the twin embrace to find the source. The massive woman woven of vines had snuck up on the three Terrans, a waterfall of red flowers mimicking hair spilling over her shoulders. Of all the Affini Jess had seen so far, this one was perhaps the most eerily human-looking, even using her foliage to mimic a loose skirt. “Oh, Jess, you’re crying. Is everything alright?”

“I..wh-?” Before she could respond, a vine came down on her head, gently ruffling her hair, and even though

withdraw, flee, find a crevasse and stay there

a part of her was terrified, the rest of her was melting into the touch, just as she had each and every other time she’d been given affection like this. It was like she didn’t have a choice in the matter — it wasn’t like it was with Gallica, where her brain simply switched off, but it was in the same ballpark. Something kept her rooted to the spot while the Affini had their way with her.

“I think she’s just a little overwhelmed, Miss Phylla,” Layla said. She, too, had a vine in her hair, and she was smiling and leaning into the touch. “But she’ll be okay. We’ll ply her with cookies and whatever else she needs.”

“Good girl, Layla. And good girl, Leah.” Leah let out a little squee at the praise and squirmed behind Jess. And Jess… may I take it you don’t quite remember me?”

Jess looked up into the bright, colorful eyes staring

a behemoth stirs in the depths

down at her, her heart shuddering over a single beat as she swallowed and desperately tried to call something up from the murky waters of her memory. Nothing came. “S-sorry,” she whispered quietly.

“No, no, no apologies, little one. I’m Polyphylla Aptenia, Second Bloom, she/her. I’m Leah’s owner, and I take care of Layla too when Tsuga’s busy, just as she does for Leah when I am.” The vine shifted down off Jess’s head and cupped her chin, and the soft face woven from countless vines pursed its lips. “Hmmm. Interesting microexpressions. There’s something right at the tip of your tongue, but you don’t know what, am I right?”

“Y-yeah, kinda,” Jess said, swallowing heavily, unable to tear her eyes away.

“Well, once your neurocognitive stability has recovered somewhat, maybe I’ll take a peek in there and see what I can’t do for you, hmm?”

“Mistress is the best mnemonic cartographer on the whoooooole ship!” Leah added proudly.

“As far as Terrans are concerned, perhaps,” Polyphylla clarified with a chuckle. “Which reminds me, Leah, I forgot my tablet in my office. <Fetch.>”

“Yes, Mistress!” Leah let go of Jess and was off like a shot, around a bend in the faux forest and gone in seconds, leaving Jess still paralyzed by Polyphylla’s stare, Layla’s warmth at her side barely registering in her peripheral awareness.

“Hmm. Still quite receptive, though,” Polyphylla mused. “Perhaps a little skim wouldn’t go amiss?”

“You’re the expert,” Layla said. “And it’s nearly–” She was interrupted by a sudden, distant call, a human voice singing in long, hanging notes. “Ah, there it is. I’ll be back in just a minute, alright?” she added, giving Jess a squeeze and a little kiss on the cheek.

“Uhhh…?” Jess finally managed to pull her gaze away from Polyphylla’s long enough to watch Layla walking away. “Where’s she–?”

“That’s the adhan, the call to prayer,” Polyphylla answered quietly. “A recording, naturally, of a particularly talented mu’azzin from the 23rd Century, if memory serves. She’ll be back in just a little while.”

“…prayer?” Something was tickling right behind Jess’s eyes. There was a connection to be made, but what?

“Mmhmm. Five times each day, facing Mecca, which is to say, facing Earth. And, of course, we’re not quite on the same calendar here, and with relativity having its way–”

Jess was no longer really processing what Polyphylla was saying, though. Like an internal combustion engine struggling to turn over into full operation, the starter motor of Jess’s memory was chugging and spluttering as little facts coalesced into a broader knowledge. “So… she’s a Muslim?”

“Yes! Very good!” Another headpat, the vine brushing gently across her scalp and leaving little tingles in its wake. “See, your memory’s recovering!”

“I don’t know if that’s something I remembered or just worked out,” Jess mumbled. There was all kinds of completely useless information in her head she was finding it easy enough to recall: commercial jingles, zombie slogans for products that had been discontinued almost as soon as they’d been introduced, the way to get from her shithole apartment to the nearest vending machine. One thing that consistently welled up, that she didn’t quite want to admit to, was the sheer amount of talking-head propaganda. The only reason she knew the first thing about Islam was from osmosis from that saturated-with-bullshit source, and she had no way of knowing what was real and what was invented by some shithead producer with an ideological axe to grind about the perceived enemies of Terran unity, a.k.a. the eternal churn of the profit-seeking avatar of capital that was the Terran Accord.

Huh. Maybe she was remembering more than she gave herself credit for.

“Well, either way, it’s a good sign,” Polyphylla said, her vines coiling around Jess and pulling her up into her lap as she sat on the grassy floor. She was warm and smelled, perhaps unsurprisingly, like a bed of flowers; her vines and her arms were gentle, yet Jess could sense a terrific strength in them as well. Somehow, that didn’t

it crushes the shell, it crushes the shell

frighten her, but made her feel safer. “You’re going to recover, it’s just a question of how much how fast. And I’ll be here to help however I can, of course.”

“O-Okay,” Jess mumbled, burying her face in Polyphylla’s vines to hide her blush. “But…what if I don’t? What if this is it?”

“Then you will be loved and cherished and cared for just as you are, little one,” Polyphylla said, stroking Jess’s hair with one of her massive hands. “I’ve known your owner for some years, and I say that with absolute confidence.”

The tears came back, but Polyphylla’s vines drank them down almost as soon as she’d shed them.