[ It is a beautiful day. The sun shines overhead, the ocean is blue and the colony bustles with life. Carapace go about their days doing as they would any other, none the wiser to what is unfolding inside Roxy's house.
She is waking up, too. She's sprawled on the floor of the observatory, head leaned on a pumpkin and an empty bottle in hand. She wakes up wondering how much she drank last night, and sitting up blearily. It doesn't take more than a good minute for her to register the familiar surroundings.
Roxy is back home like nothing ever happened.
It has been a little over a week since she arrived in Marina Nova, and now she's thrown back home without a word. Is this a fuck up? Is this a mistake? She thinks it must be. She was in jail after all.
But slowly the sounds flit in: she can hear the seagulls crying. She can hear the water. The last time she saw this place, it was on fire. But all seems to be just fine, and Roxy knows with a sickening lurch that she's back for real.
It's unknown to her what that means. Where are the drones, she wonders. They should have entered the game by now. They should be together by now. And more than that they shouldn't even be here, at home or in the game, whatever. She should be in the dome, together with her friends and waiting for her mom to show up.
Knowing that it's gone, all of that is gone-- and despite it just being a week-- it hurts a fuck of a lot. So she curls in on herself, hugging her knees up. She starts to think about the people she met there and how she will never see them again.
And it hits her: she realizes Calliope is probably dead. Memories, just like her previous arrival, maybe wiped clean: Jane might not remember them getting together. But Dirk and Jake might not be an item, she reassures herself. That is such an utterly despicable thought that she buries her face in her arms. All of these things combined means she quickly is reduced to tears.
Roxy doesn't cry often. But when she does, it's harsh: chest heaving, audible sobbing, snotty nose. It is not delicately or pretty how Roxy cries then. As far as she knows, she's all alone again. The brief contact with the people she loved had been so nice, and now she's alone.
She doesn't see or even sense Calliope hidden behind some of the bigger pumpkins. ]