We Shadows

Chapter 31: Earth advice.

Levi couldn't stay at Walsh's berth. He wanted to tell Walsh why he was upset, but was pretty sure that Walsh wasn't in a position be sympathetic. He had been partners with Taylor who had been previously with Harper and his whole relationship with Taylor had been shadowed by that fact. He didn't want to sound like he was whining, but Levi certain felt like he wanted to whine.

He couldn't go to Alcott's. He didn't know what to say to her. He couldn't go home; he hadn't messaged Dylan yet and he didn't know what to say to her either. Levi had no idea how Earth people did relationships without the rules of the base. He was having trouble with just his little slice of drama.

He didn't want to go to botany and accidentally run into Alcott there, so he made his way down to archives, the one place no one would look for him. When the door slid open, his heart sank; someone was already here. He wasn't in the mood to attempt conversation.

"Oh hello!" said Libba's cheerful voice. "Why are you here on a weekend? Or here at all, shouldn't you be in botany?"

"I could ask the same of you," Levi replied, mustering up a smile. "What are you reading?

Libba held out the sheets of paper and a pencil in her hand.

"Dashiell finished the constitution last night," she said. "And I can't edit it on a holo-rib, it's just too weird. And I'm here because Biscuit loves paper and will try to jump on the table and eat it. I can't get any work done at home. So you?"

"Just restless," Levi shrugged. "Dylan and I had a fight."

He didn't know why he was telling Libba, but she nodded understandingly, moving her papers to one side.

"Do you need something to take your mind off it?" she inquired. "I've finished with the first page. I'm sure it could use fresh eyes."

"Sure," Levi found a chair and sat next to Libba.

She scrounged for another pen and handed it to him. Levi hadn't used a pen in a while; he had made the labels for Alcott's garden. He normally worked on his holo-rib now, but he enjoyed the feel of pen to paper. Libba had found typos and grammatical mistakes, but it was the content that Levi focused on. He agreed with most of what he saw. According to this, people deserved the right to live and work how they chose, to not be discriminated against because of where they were from, that congress agreed to create laws and guidelines that benefited all people and that the first priority was the salvation of mankind as this could very well be the only place left that was populated with humans.

"This is rather sad to think about," Levi remarked.

"What?"

"That we're alone in the universe," he explained. "I think it would be sad if Earth fell and there were no human life there."

"True," Libba agreed. "I don't know. Dashiell wouldn't have taken us from Earth if he thought it could be saved. So if there is something still there, I would wonder if Dashiell and I made the right choice."

"How did you two meet?" Levi inquired, wondering if Libba would be able to give him advice on how to deal with Dylan and Alcott.

"In college," she said. "He went on to law school and I started working at my mother's non-profit." Libba smiled. "He was so fun back then. He loved to go to expensive restaurants we didn't have reservations for and attempt to get a table. Most of the time he would, and our friends would be so jealous. Not that we have restaurants or enough people to need reservations here. Sorry, the story takes a lot of Earth context."

"That's okay," Levi told her. "Did you have other choices in college? What made you decide on Dashiell?"

Libba frowned thoughtfully. "I've never thought of it like that. He liked me and I liked him and I guess, we both knew he was headed into politics. At the time, I wanted to make an impact on the world, the bigger and grander, the better. I knew that Dashiell was going to do amazing things." She gestured around the room and at the paper in her hand. "Of course, I could have never predicted traveling across the universe and rewriting a new constitution for a new planet. I'm not sure if that college girl would have chosen Dashiell if she knew that this is where we would have ended up."