Entry #9 - 9.28.5502

It was early this morning, and Athena and I were just putting up coffee in the mess hall when 3.14 came scurrying in. "Mar's back! Mar's back!" He was squealing excitedly as he scampered across the room, followed closely by the rest of his pack.

"What?! Are you sure?" Athena gasped, holding back her own excitement till she was sure it was true. We hadn't been expecting Mar for weeks yet - it just didn't seem possible she could've made it home so quick.

"It's true, we're sure!" 45 chimed in, unable to maintain his customary cool with such exciting news to report. "We saw The Disposer landing just outside the main gate a few minutes ago." 14/2 added. "And from the looks of it I suspect..."

"Well, well, well! If this ain't a motley looking crew to be comin' home to!" Mar drawled teasingly from the door, looking a bit tired but otherwise none too worse for her ordeal.

"Granny!" Athena whispered, her voice catching as her eyes welled-up, overwhelmed at seeing the old lady once again.

"Now don't go gettin' all sappy on me, I ain't been gone that long." Mar advised as she strode across the room, making a beeline for the java. "So where's breakfast? I'm starved!"

"I'll make it!" 3.14 offered. "And I'll help," 50-50 countered, "three-cheese omelets all around?"

"Is it my imagination," Mar queried somewhat skeptically, "or have these rats gotten smarter since I've been away?"

"Quite a bit so, actually." I explained. "They've continued evolving - getting more sophisticated..."

"Hey Mar! Wanna see my new tattoo?" 45 interrupted while shoving his butt up into the air, offering all a view of his latest addition to a growing collection of body art.

"Very sophisticated!" Mar replied facetiously while eyeing the rat's uplifted derriere.

"OK, well, they're getting smarter, at any rate." I amended sheepishly, looking to Athena for support.

"So what happened to you out there, granny?" She asked, changing the subject. "Who are the 'ecila' you mentioned in your last message and how did they manage to save your life?"

"That, my dear, is a truly weird but fascinating story -- which I'll gladly share once I've got a full belly." She replied. Then, calling out to the kitchen with her typical impatience. "Ain't breakfast ready yet?"

And with that, the rats emerged from the kitchen bearing the sorriest looking omelets I'd ever seen - though I must admit, they tasted pretty good. Even Mar complimented 3.14 on his culinary skills which, given her usual unwillingness to acknowledge anyone's competence in the kitchen, was quite something. Afterwards, we all gathered around one of the long mess hall tables, fresh coffee at hand, and Mar proceeded to tell her tale.

"As you already know," she began, "I was forced to crash-land on a remote moon in the middle of nowhere after being attacked by the Grand Geckins - seems them lizards are still plenty peeved about my having supplied their cousins, the Little Geckins, with defensive materiel. Well, The Disposer was banged-up pretty bad, but I managed to set 'er down in a protected gully where I wouldn't be seen from above - down under a long sandstone ledge. At first, I thought I'd gotten out lucky with my skin in one piece and all - but then I started exploring the place." Mar paused and took a long, slow slurp of her coffee, smacking her lips afterwards - clearly enjoying the beverage as much as her audience's wide-eyed attention.

"The air," she continued at last, "was breathable, but barely. Temperature was hovering around 41 c., and gas from the sulfur vents had created a permanent acid haze. Not enough to burn your skin right away, mind you, but enough to eat away at ya nice and slow. After about 10 days my skin was peelin' off in sheets and I had lesions bloomin' in my lungs. Figured I was a goner, for sure. That's when I sent that message about seein' ghosts - 'cept the ghosts turned out to be the 'ecila'."

All this we already knew, of course, from Mar's messages. But we also knew enough not to interrupt the old lady when she was on a roll. And besides, after all she'd been through nobody was going to deny her the pleasure of drawing out her tale - and she was clearly relishing (and probably embellishing) the telling of her ordeal.

Mar took another noisy sip of coffee and continued. "So there I was, ready to give up the ghost and next thing I know I'm waking up in some underground chamber surrounded by things that look like big fat water bugs in polka-dotted overalls. Except I could see right through 'em like they weren't really there; like they were glowing shadows or something. Then I realized I could see myself laying there on the ground in the middle of 'em, body still alive but me not in it - and I seem to be lookin' out on it all from inside this big fuzzy pink mushroom!"

"Huh??" 45 grunted, clearly as confounded as the rest of us. Mar just smiled and allowed the dramatic pause to draw-out. Then, after way longer than necessary, she continued.

"Seems the ecila make their home in a parallel, but uniquely different, reality - one that overlaps our own. They can visit our plane in a semi-existent state, but can't fully materialize here. Seems they're highly evolved creatures - despite what their fashion choices might suggest - capable of projecting themselves across dimensional barriers. Which is something they do quite regularly as part of an elaborate inter-dimensional game they call 'Who's the purple pudding?' - best as I could translate. All I'm really sure of is that's it's a total obsession with them. And it was during the semi-finals of a major inter-galactic competition that they came upon 'yours truly' on the brink of extinction.

"Now, being as they weren't in solid form, they couldn't physically move me to safety - but they could enter and take control of my body so it could move itself. Only trouble was that the two life essences - theirs and mine - couldn't coexist in the body at the same time - had something to do with clashing dimensional harmonics."

"Or clashing jumpsuits." 45 chimed in. Mar ignored the barb.

So they took my essence and moved it into the big fuzzy mushroom - said it was the only biological host they could find that was compatible, though I'm still not sure I like the idea of being comparable to a fungus! Then they took turns inhabiting my body, to keep its systems running, till it healed - all the while I got to enjoy life as a pink portabello!"

"And the Disposer?" Athena aked. "How'd it get fixed?"

"Once I was back in my body, the ecila told me how to use the mushroom's outer membrane to make an enviro-suit and gas mask. So there I was, all in pink, workin' on my ship!"

"Now that must've been a sight!"

"Yeah, really not my color!"

The mental image of Mar all in pink, wild orange hair spilling over her shoulders, sent us all into gales of laughter - 50-50 spewing coffee out his nose. Afterwards, Mar excused herself to get some much-needed rest, while the rats cleared the table and Athena and I started planning our day's work.

It's just before midnight now. We didn't seem able get a whole lot done today - but it didn't seem to matter much to anyone. Mar's return made it feel too much like a holiday, and we all needed the break anyway. Tomorrow we'll get back to work - back to fixing up the labs and searching for 101.