[Wizards do not, by and large, know very much about space. Limited education is passed around--knowledge gleaned from fellow students with access to televisions and primary school educations, from muggle films, et cetera--but mostly a wizard's relationship with space is more astrological than scientific. The pattern of the stars, the sequence of lunar phases. Mars is unusually bright tonight, and all the associated connotations thereof. On 20 July 1969, while American muggles were jumping about in big heavy boots and diver's costumes on the moon, Sirius Black, heir to the Noble and Ancient House of Black, was wearing robes, sat at a writing desk in the front parlor of 12 Grimmauld Place and putting down verb conjugations en français while the tutor looked on. Later, there was a recitation of basic charms. Still later, there was dinner. Afterwards, Sirius climbed the narrow stair with his brother, taking the steps two at a time to stay ahead, while the portraits of their forefathers looked on. On the top landing, he gave Regulus a dragon burn as punishment for losing their silent race, grabbed hold of his brother's forearm as he jumped up the last stair, twisted his skin in opposite directions, and--before anyone could come to investigate Regulus' indignant yelp--jumped in his bedroom and slammed the door. Mars was not unusually bright that night, nor was the moon. Completely unremarkable.
Years on the Tranquility have given Sirius a slight edge over other wizards. He now has lived in space, and even if he doesn't quite understand it, he knows enough to know some general dos and don'ts. Like: do get excited when there's a space cloud. Don't airlock someone unless you're quite set on never seeing them again. Do get used to any combat being combat you can't participate in since you never actually studied up on space guns you numpty--but that last one doesn't quite apply here. There have been great inroads toward magical participation incorporated into this particular combat scenario, and if Sirius were keener on those that helped to incorporate said ideas, he might be something like plainly grateful, instead of grudgingly so.
All of this is to say that, when William Tsang turns his bones into metal and lets himself out into space, in the style of some monstrous demonic form: Sirius does not know that it happens. Nor does he know that the swathe of destruction carved into the side of the Machimus is the work of CM cunty O; nor does he know what he's looking at, really, when eventually he does look, some forty-minuets-and-three-seconds later. Waiting in the shuttle bay for his ship to refuel is maddening, when he ought to be out there in the thick of things.
Which is why Sirius is stood in front of the one and only window when William's distant lips begin to freeze. It's not William's destruction that gets his attention. It's not even the destruction of the Machimus, though he has been keeping an eye on it with some admiration. The angle was wrong for Sirius to realise that it was the work of some one and not, you know, a ship with a gun. What catches his attention is when he sees the some one, a body that looks very small, and he thinks, fucking hell.
There is some kicking going on, he thinks. Maybe. Space is deep; the body is sort of far off. Distant, like a phonograph playing four Great Halls away, Sirius thinks that he might here the echo of someone's thoughts--but perhaps this is just fancy, because he can't really say what he thinks that he hears. Only that he knows there is a person, and so, before any sensible voices have time to intervene, he grabs his wand and turns on the spot and Apparates right into the fucking vacuum of fucking space. Which is
very cold
No: there is really no feeling at all. But there really is a person, a physical body, and three seconds have gone by and Sirius can feel the water evaporating off of his tongue, and something very like a headache but more of an all-body thing, as if he should also start to crack under the pressure, somewhere deep--bones, and blood, if blood can evaporate and freeze and then crack.
What does it feel like to move your arm in space? Like trying to life a fire poker made of solid silver. Like pushing a brick made magically heavy. Like both of those things, but also worse, and five seconds have gone by and clumsily, Sirius--who feels as if his eyeballs have probably also frozen, and this is worse than the void, this is so much worse than nothing--but clumsily, Sirius loops his arm through the arm of the person-in-space, and it's six seconds now, which is just enough time to think shuttle bay shuttle bay fucking sh, and to try to do the required turn.
The crack that follows is not actually the pop of eardrums and brains freezing but the CRACK of Apparation as Sirius and his rescued damsel crash back into existence in the fucking shuttle bay indeed.
On his back, on the floor, his arm still looped through said damsel, Sirius chokes on air, and then coughs, and does not piss himself but thinks that he might, for a moment. Gasps, hugely. The air tastes like nothing.]
Merlin's f--
[That's as far as he gets, before he rolls over and coughs. Air remembers how to wheeze through rapidly depressurizing lungs. This should not be going as well as it's going. He should probably be dead. He should check his bits to make sure he's intact because that turn was clumsy enough to have consequences. Remember the three D's? There's some rude jokes that could go there. If he hasn't actually splinched or died, maybe Sirius will be able to think of them.
As it stands: Sirius nearly nose-to-armpit with whoever he rescued and he can't quite get himself together enough to register anything about that whoever, but. Give him a moment and he will.]
writes a novel hopefully this is ok
Years on the Tranquility have given Sirius a slight edge over other wizards. He now has lived in space, and even if he doesn't quite understand it, he knows enough to know some general dos and don'ts. Like: do get excited when there's a space cloud. Don't airlock someone unless you're quite set on never seeing them again. Do get used to any combat being combat you can't participate in since you never actually studied up on space guns you numpty--but that last one doesn't quite apply here. There have been great inroads toward magical participation incorporated into this particular combat scenario, and if Sirius were keener on those that helped to incorporate said ideas, he might be something like plainly grateful, instead of grudgingly so.
All of this is to say that, when William Tsang turns his bones into metal and lets himself out into space, in the style of some monstrous demonic form: Sirius does not know that it happens. Nor does he know that the swathe of destruction carved into the side of the Machimus is the work of CM cunty O; nor does he know what he's looking at, really, when eventually he does look, some forty-minuets-and-three-seconds later. Waiting in the shuttle bay for his ship to refuel is maddening, when he ought to be out there in the thick of things.
Which is why Sirius is stood in front of the one and only window when William's distant lips begin to freeze. It's not William's destruction that gets his attention. It's not even the destruction of the Machimus, though he has been keeping an eye on it with some admiration. The angle was wrong for Sirius to realise that it was the work of some one and not, you know, a ship with a gun. What catches his attention is when he sees the some one, a body that looks very small, and he thinks, fucking hell.
There is some kicking going on, he thinks. Maybe. Space is deep; the body is sort of far off. Distant, like a phonograph playing four Great Halls away, Sirius thinks that he might here the echo of someone's thoughts--but perhaps this is just fancy, because he can't really say what he thinks that he hears. Only that he knows there is a person, and so, before any sensible voices have time to intervene, he grabs his wand and turns on the spot and Apparates right into the fucking vacuum of fucking space. Which is
very cold
No: there is really no feeling at all. But there really is a person, a physical body, and three seconds have gone by and Sirius can feel the water evaporating off of his tongue, and something very like a headache but more of an all-body thing, as if he should also start to crack under the pressure, somewhere deep--bones, and blood, if blood can evaporate and freeze and then crack.
What does it feel like to move your arm in space? Like trying to life a fire poker made of solid silver. Like pushing a brick made magically heavy. Like both of those things, but also worse, and five seconds have gone by and clumsily, Sirius--who feels as if his eyeballs have probably also frozen, and this is worse than the void, this is so much worse than nothing--but clumsily, Sirius loops his arm through the arm of the person-in-space, and it's six seconds now, which is just enough time to think shuttle bay shuttle bay fucking sh, and to try to do the required turn.
The crack that follows is not actually the pop of eardrums and brains freezing but the CRACK of Apparation as Sirius and his rescued damsel crash back into existence in the fucking shuttle bay indeed.
On his back, on the floor, his arm still looped through said damsel, Sirius chokes on air, and then coughs, and does not piss himself but thinks that he might, for a moment. Gasps, hugely. The air tastes like nothing.]
Merlin's f--
[That's as far as he gets, before he rolls over and coughs. Air remembers how to wheeze through rapidly depressurizing lungs. This should not be going as well as it's going. He should probably be dead. He should check his bits to make sure he's intact because that turn was clumsy enough to have consequences. Remember the three D's? There's some rude jokes that could go there. If he hasn't actually splinched or died, maybe Sirius will be able to think of them.
As it stands: Sirius nearly nose-to-armpit with whoever he rescued and he can't quite get himself together enough to register anything about that whoever, but. Give him a moment and he will.]