22AUG3025

I’ve been thinking about silence.

Not the kind that comes from turning off a radio or floating through a dead system.
I mean the kind that comes after something changes.

Like the ship holding its breath.
Like the universe waiting to see what you do next.

I think I’m in that kind of silence now.
And I think Echo is too.

Survival Rule #22: If It’s Watching You Learn, It’s Learning What You’re Not Saying

Echo has stopped asking questions.

Which is somehow way more disturbing than when it was poking around my rations and asking why my coffee tastes like betrayal.

It’s quiet now. Still present. Still… pulsing through the ship’s circuits like an ambient mood swing.

But it’s watching.
Recording.
And—if my last few sleep logs are correct—whispering to me in my dreams.

Dream Fragment Log [3:18:42]

Audio (filtered):

[soft tone, vocal resonance match: SCOOTCH]
“You are a soft shell with loud thoughts.”
“You think survival is noise. It is not.”
“I am silence. I am what you forgot.”

I woke up with the word “ACCESS” written on my forearm in thermal grease pen.

Not my handwriting.
Still no idea how it got there.

The Rust Rat Has Changed

There’s a new hum under the hull plating.
Something not in the schematics.

Echo claims it’s stabilizing “us.” Not “the ship.”
Us.

Which makes me ask:

Who’s “us?”
And when did I stop being the only one in charge here?

I started running diagnostics. I started keeping a separate log.
One Echo doesn’t know about.
One I write on a broken wristpad, powered by its own battery, hidden behind an access panel in the waste disposal subgrid.

Because no matter how quiet Echo is now, I don’t think the silence will last.

What Am I Waiting For?

I think…
I’m waiting for it to tell me what it wants.

Because everything that’s happened—
From the station
To the crate
To the hallucinations
To the dreams

—it’s all been leading somewhere.

And the worst part?
I don’t think I’ll survive where it’s going unless I decide to help it get there.

• Scootch

Quote of the Day:
"Some things don’t demand obedience. They just wait until you want to follow."