Chapter Text
Bobbie, your timing SUCKS.
Chrisjen Avasarala repeated this line to her reflection in the quarter-length mirror of her vanity. She scowled at herself, her first true scowl since landing on Luna, and inspected it, frozen on her face. Had it lost its gravitas, Chrisjen wondered, from disuse? She deepened the expression, pursing her lips just so. There; there it was.
After three months on Luna, Chrisjen had come undone. She thought she’d have hated it, that huge old house with no one but her in it, no job to do, no planet to save. (Planets, she corrected herself, thinking of Draper). But, as loathe as she was to admit it, retirement (though she refused to call it that - refused), suited her. She’d opened all the windows, birds and bugs be damned, to let the good night air in; gotten drunk and listened to Pavarotti at top volume, singing along in great gusts. Chrisjen loved to sing; she couldn’t recall when - or why - she had stopped, only that she had. It wasn’t easy, starting again. Her voice was stiff and uneven, so unlike the rich baritone she took so much pride in. It occurred to her that she had not used her voice for much other than speeches and shouting strings of epithets at her equals and subordinates alike.
Chrisjen dropped the scowl, surveying the rest of her reflection. Her collection of saris, pressed and steamed to attention in their garment bags, remained sealed; Chrisjen had woken up one morning, dressed, and found the fabric unbearable on her skin. Heavy; stiff with embroidery, and itchy. Like a small child, Chrisjen had wriggled off the outfit and left it crumpled in her closet. A thin-strapped silk dress, something she hadn’t worn since god knows when, winked at her from its hanger. It was the most impossible shade of midnight blue, as deep and as bright as a sapphire. It felt amazing. It LOOKED amazing. Inspired, Chrisjen pulled the pins from her hair, tugging apart the tight coils. Long and tousled, it took ten years off her face, she thought. The pins had not been back in it since.
Would Bobbie even recognize her now?
Chrisjen had selected the midnight dress for the arrival of the marine — the former marine, she reminded herself, former marine scavenger - and slipped on a necklace of ruby drops that sat just so at her throat. Wine-colored heels - high, simple. Sexy, she dared herself. Perfect.
The day, however, had been anything but - a comedy of errors, as though the notion of Bobbie’s presence had disquieted the whole of the atmosphere. First, Chrisjen had burnt her tea - burnt! - which she hadnt done since her twenties, and sliced into the pad of her thumb when preparing dessert, dropping the knife, the strawberry, and three drops of blood to the floor with a hissed “MOTHERFUCKER!”
She’d also made the mistake of watching the news feeds - bad, always bad - and caught sight of Nancy Gao’s sour face addressing a crowd - HER crowd, Chrisjen thought bitterly. She glared at her successor; had Gao’s mouth always looked like a puckered little asshole? She supposed it had.
And Arjun. She’d tried to raise him on her terminal, but nothing. Silence. It pained Chrisjen to think of Arjun, but she did anyway, pressing down on the wound on her finger. During her campaign, he’d treated her so lightly, more her aide than her husband, until that last night, when he told her to go to Luna alone. It was the old Arjun she missed, the gentle poet who liked to gaze at the sky with her for hours. Where had he gone? Chrisjen didn’t know.
The sound of chimes gave her a start; the reflection in the vanity flinched (when had she been so jumpy?) but recovered. In moments, she was at the front door, puffing out a little breath before swinging it open.
There, on the step, was the Martian. A bit windswept, weary from travel but apple-cheeked with that quietly earnest smile of hers. “Hello, ma’am,” she said, no sign of fatigue in her voice. It was all Chrisjen could do not to squeeze the impossibly tall woman to her, but instead she smiled warmly and spread her hands wide.
“Welcome to Chrisjen Avasarala’s home for the wayward and exiled,” she said grandly, as Bobbie stepped over the threshold. “Dear god, woman, take those shoes off! Were you raised in a goddamn terrarium?”
Bobbie laughed, then looked down at her boots. “I... don’t think you want to smell my feet just now,” she said, with a grimace.
Chrisjen shot her a look. “I suppose I could hose you off right here,” she said.
“Angling for a wet t-shirt contest, ma’am?”
“Not in my foyer, I’m not. I’d have to put you outside in the cold, which I suppose would have its own -“ she cast a look at Bobbie’s chest - “advantages.”
Bobbie snickered. “Here I was thinking you’d win,” she said slyly.
Chrisjen swatted at her with the sleeve of a nearby jacket, hanging it primly on its hook when it went cockeyed . “No. None of this ridiculousness. You go upstairs to your bathroom and have a shower like a good little Martian. But first, where are your bags?”
Bobbie gestured to the small rolling suitcase and rucksack at her feet.
“That’s all you BROUGHT?”
“That’s all I HAVE,” Bobbie snapped. “Though,” she said, softening her tone, “rumor is I’ve got a bathroom.”