Lost on Titan

{Part 11}

~Videl~

The night in the Aviary/Arboretum had felt like a dream. She had so much fun that she had completely forgotten about how guilty and embarrassed she felt for dumping her problems on Kane and Dare. She even forgot about Cryo-Level 3, about feeling like some sort of impostor, about everything that was constantly troubling her. Videl had just felt free, and very much alive. Her exhaustion had been temporarily replaced by child-like wonder, excitement and joy. She also found that it was possible to be filled with a kind of fear that was pleasurable, that was thrilling.

Once she was back home and the adrenaline had worn off, however, she collapsed onto her bed, too tired to care that she was sweaty and dirty, hair full of grass and twigs. She passed out instantly, shoes still on and everything. And by some miracle, she slept like a rock, without a nightmare to interrupt her rest, for the first time since waking from cryo-sleep. She slept for 12 straight hours. When she woke up, she felt disoriented. She didn't recognize where she was right away. She sat up slowly, blinking and yawning.

"Oh," Videl mumbled groggily, looking down at her grass-stained and dirt-smudged clothes and shoes that she hadn't bothered to change out of. With a small smile, she climbed out of the bed and decided to take a long, hot bath. When she was all cleaned up and dressed in fresh clothes, she gathered the dirty ones from the night before and carried them to the laundry room. There was a laundry basket in front of the strange laundry machine and she dropped the clothes in the basket, but before she began to try and figure out yet another futuristic cleaning device, she realized she might need to wash her pillowcases and blankets too, after laying on them covered in filth, so she went back to the bedroom to strip the bedding.

As she did, something hit the floor with a thump. Curious, she sat down the wad of sheets and blankets, and bent down to see what it was. The thing that had fallen to the floor was a small, pearlescent tablet of some kind, with a matching stylus attached to the side.

"Huh," Videl wondered aloud, plucking the stylus from the magnetic pull that held it to the tablet.

As soon as the stylus left the tablet, the screen blinked to life and Videl froze. It was a digital diary. The real  Videl's digital diary. She started to shake. It felt wrong to hold it in her hands. That strange feeling of déjà vu came back with a vengeance, and nearly sank her to her knees. The Videl of the past must have recorded years of memories on this device, and she wrestled with the urge to read them.

They're her memories, she chastised herself. Not mine.

"I can't," Videl whispered as she hurriedly returned the stylus to its rightful place with trembling fingers.

The screen went dark again, and she made herself set it on the nightstand, and then covered it with a stuffed bear from the dresser like a kid hiding a candy stash from their parents. The fuzzy purple bear was too small to fully conceal it, but it made her feel better anyway. Resolute, she resumed her task of gathering the laundry. She went to the guest bathroom and retrieved her white Cryo clothes, and brought everything into the laundry room. Videl willed away the goosebumps on her arms, and after she had managed to find the release catch to open the laundry machine, she deposited everything in the chamber, surprised that it all fit with room to spare. Once she found the setting to start the washing procedure and initiated it, she eagerly joined Belle on the couch.

Videl pulled her knees to her chest, and wrapped her arms around them, ignoring the protest from her sore calves. Belle's blinking, yellow standby light flashed at her disapprovingly.