Between

Episode 2

Episode 2

Philo scratched his head as he looked out the door of his capsule. If he'd sat down and made a list of the things he might have imagined he'd find when he opened the door, "blank space" probably wouldn't have been one of the things at the top of the list... although technically it would have already been on the list before he started, so it would have been at the very top and he would have been less correct with each guess. Lesson learned? Don't bother guessing.

Once he got over the strangeness of discovering that there was nothing to discover, he started to note some of the other unusual things. Despite the endless field of white that surrounded his capsule, there didn't actually seem to be any light. When he put his hand outside he could see it clearly, when he pulled it inside, it was in shadow. The light stopped at the door, like it was afraid to come inside.

"I've discovered shy light," he remarked, jutting his hand in and out a few times. He stuck his head out and looked down. "I wonder how far down it goes."

After digging around in one of the boxes to find something he wouldn't mind losing, he pulled the scuba mask from the Disembarkation Kit and leaned out the door.

"So long, mask," he said, tossing it down. The mask darted downward, then hooked under the capsule and out of sight. He leaned out farther to try to keep an eye on it. "Hey, stay where I can see you, you stupid..." Something cracked him on the back of the head. "Ow!" He twisted to look up and found the scuba mask twirling in the air above him for a moment before dropping to the outer surface of the capsule. "... What are you doing back here?"

He grabbed the mask again and gave it another toss, this time ducking back into the door and looking warily upward. A moment later the mask plummeted by the doorway. A moment after that it plummeted by again. The third time it passed he reached out and caught it. Experimentally, he threw it to the left. A moment later, it whipped by from the right.

"So gravity is kind of a wildcard out there," he observed. "Good to know. I should be writing this down."

A bit of searching turned up a pad and pen. He jotted "Important Discoveries" at the top of the first page, then started a bulleted list. The first two points were "Shy Light" and "Indecisive Gravity." He watched the mask whiz by for a while.

"This is fun, discovering things and such. I'll bet when my faculties return it'll turn out I'm a scientist or something. Heck, I'll bet I'm supposed to be doing all sorts of science stuff right now. Where's that tablet? Let's get to business, Darva."

He stepped back to the stubbornly dark interior of the capsule and pulled himself up into the chair. The tablet still dangled from the roof of the capsule by a rubber-coated coil. He investigated it for a bit, then discovered that the coil was just some sort of tether, and it could be unhooked without much difficulty.

"Let's hear it," he stated, leaning back in the seat and tapping the screen.

A video began to play, with the woman he knew only as Darva continuing in a flavorless monotone. "By now your faculties should have returned..."

"Wrong, Darva."

"... so you can proceed with the activities covered in your prephase briefing. If not, pause this video and consult the Test Subject Overview Packet to familiarize yourself with the key points of your identity and mission."

He tapped the screen. "Excellent! Cheat sheet for the faculty challenged!" He hopped down and clicked on the flashlight, looking through the increasingly disorganized mound of materials on the floor around the chair. "Stupid faculties. Wandering off and not returning. 'Faculties' is a stupid term to use anyway. It makes my head sound like a university or something. Ah, here we are. Test Subject Overview."