"How come Stevie gets'ta stay up?" asked the child, his mind racing for answers as he clutched a pale pink security blanket tight in his right hand, his left hand tucked into his mouth. The taste of apple-rice this time of day was always a little bitter -- it meant bedtime was near. "Because Stevie," his mama's familiar lilt and smile forever able to ease whatever news she had to give, "is old enough to be learning a trade now." The child frowned. "I could learn tradin'," he said, thinking on the many occasions he'd agreed to swap snacks with his older brother or Mali, the girl who lived next door and who he saw at nursery some times, "I'm good at tradin'." Mama's smile briefly broke into a sigh. "I'm sure you could, and will. But you know what's needed to learn a good trade? Being strong and healthy. And you know what's needed to be strong and healthy?" He frowned. He knew the answer but right now it meant he [i]didn't[/i] want to be strong [i]or[/i] healthy, thank you very much. "...stayin' up for da come home?" Mama sighed again, this time reaching down and picking him up. "[i]Nooo,[/i] don't give me those eyes. Come on, off to bed. You'll see your da tomorrow." The child's room was still not very large, but it had gotten a little larger; his da's job at the signal station had gotten busier and busier with new folks moving into town, and he'd overheard last night -- through the gaps in the door frame -- that some kind of exciting news had broken, but they weren't supposed to be sharing it just yet. Right now, it just meant that -- especially since Stevie was getting a little older now and 'needed a little more space for his learning' -- the little boy suddenly found himself with a lot more space, and a lot more quiet. [i]'They'll share it at the town hall when it's good and proper to share it,'[/i] was what his mama usually said about that kind of secret news, not that it happened often. [i]'But what if it's bad? Shouldn't they share it sooner?'[/i] whispered Teddy. The child had been safely tucked in and alone in his room for what felt like forever when his teddy bear decided to interrupt his thinking. The first time it had happened a few nights back he'd tried to ignore Teddy, but when he told the bear it was weird for a bear to talk Teddy got all offended about it. Besides, Teddy was nice and usually had fun ideas, so in the last few days the child had realized that he was a very clever young boy, actually, who could talk to whoever he wanted. "What d'ya mean?" he whispered back. [i]'Well what if it's dangerous? People need t'know, y'know?'[/i] "But mama said it's-" [i]'Yeah but mama doesn't always know best, does she? Remember when she thought it was a Tuesday and it was actually a Monday? Or when she gave you apple slices instead of apple-rice, that's totally different!'[/i] He couldn't help but nibble on his blanket slightly, his mind racing. Every question he thought up, Teddy would come up with an answer that sounded good -- though at least one time Teddy [i]did[/i] get stumped, only for the curtains to chime in with a solution. [hr] Fifteen minutes away by ladder and passage the child’s father was starting on his next coffee. He couldn’t help but grimace, even if he knew he’d need it to get through the night. [i]‘Help lay the groundwork of a new frontier, they said,’[/i] he thought, [i]‘Be part of Avalon’s history, they said. Never mentioned the coffee would taste like piss.’[/i] Not that it wasn’t worth it, of course; his parents had moved to a new homestead when he was a wee lad himself, and that sense of meaning and constant growth, of new progress and things to look forward to had always stuck with him. He wanted that for Steve and Barri. But as he stared in front of him the console screens glowed a hearty green, the message leaving a strange pit in his chest. For the past two days he’d agreed to take the overtime pay in the wake of the news, in theory to help pay for new work on the house, but in truth… his brain was constantly ringing with the wait for news. He’d found ways to pass the time of course – his engineering and computer science degrees at the university of Monmouth having finally paid off as he’d busied himself with new jobs and upgrades around the generally lonely station. But still, the darkness lingered. The question of the message. Schrodinger’s crisis. [color=00a651][b]NOTICE TO ALL SIGNAL STATION CREWS: We wish to inform you that readings have been detected in close proximity to the Gate. Please know that we have a number of physicists and engineers investigating the situation and CANNOT CONFIRM THE STATUS OF THE GATE. Knight-Marshalls are on standby. It should be remembered that it has-[/b][/color] The coffee cup trembled in his hand, the bitterness leaving a sting in his mind as he tried to focus. The photo of his wife that he kept by his desk at all times frowned at him. [i]‘Don’t you think it’s strange for them to let us know like this? Surely this is broadcast worthy.’[/i] He rolled his eyes at the suggestion. “Ava would never suggest what I think you're suggesting.” [i]‘I know that, but I’m not Ava. I’m a photo of her. I can’t lie to you, Liam.’[/i] He scoffed as he took another sip of the coffee and sneered. The photo sneered at exactly the same time – yet another telltale sign that the photo was simply a faerie synced up to his subconscious, though he'd had enough conversations with the photo and the town's lone member of the ranger's syndicate to know what faeries were like. “You absolutely can lie, ya liar. And as for your question, I [i]don’t[/i] think it’s strange – this wouldn’t be the first false alarm, y’know.” [i]‘And if it isn’t…?’[/i] He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. Tried to push out the possibility, wonderful and terrible all at once -- if mostly terrible all the same. “Then it won’t matter, will it? I’ll broadcast the news when we get it.” [i]'And give the kids one more day of normal life,'[/i] he thought. Because he knew it, all the same. Despite all the protests in the surface of his mind. No more false alarms.