Lily sat in her captain’s seat, with Bay perched precariously on the dashboard to keep her company. An episode of Friends was playing half watched on the personal blu-ray player set on the seat to her left. It felt silly, but seeing and hearing other humans really made Lily feel like she was a little more grounded. The captain’s room, as Lily had started to think of it, was smaller than every other room on the boat except the bathroom. It had only two chairs, and was perched up a bit higher than the rest of the cabin to get a better view. The front of the room was a nearly 180 degree view through windows, and on the dashboard there were live feeds to cameras around the rest to get a full 360. The seats were nice, but the captain’s seat was obviously better. Lily thought whoever had made that choice must be a little full of themselves. Why not just have two nice chairs?

The room itself was warm and carpeted. Lily thought that was a strange choice for a boat, but no water had gotten in so maybe it was fine. The wood paneled walls were present here, but a nice finish had been applied to them rather than paint. It would have made the room feel a little cramped if not for the view out the windows, which Lily supposed must be the main point.

She’d been piloting the boat for about fifteen minutes now and was getting close to the northern edge of the bay. She hadn’t spotted exactly what she was looking for yet, but she also wasn’t too concerned about it. There were a shocking number of houses with private docks, and she’d made note of a few that might be worth checking out if she didn’t see one with visible satellite dishes and signs of electricity before she got too far north. She didn’t know why, but she felt like she wanted to stick around the Santa Del Mar area, even if not directly in the city. It was familiar, and while she could explore and branch out later, setting up a home base ought to be somewhere familiar, right?

To pass the time she’d been trying to figure out what all the tools on the boat console actually did. She was pretty sure she’d figured out the mysterious second screen. It seemed to be a depth meter, showing the topology (was that the right word?) of the seafloor around her. She didn’t know, but assumed it must use some kind of sonar to get a map of things. The number that she’d seen going down yesterday as she approached shore probably said how far away the seafloor was, and so it wasn’t directly a measure of how close she was to land, it was related.

Her speedometer also seemed to read in Knots. Which sounded right even if she didn’t quite understand. Google said it measured nautical miles per hour. She was unclear why that wasn’t the same as just miles per hour, but it wasn’t terribly important right now. Maybe it was because waves might change the distance to your destination, so it’s how fast you moved through the water specifically? In either case, now that she knew, Knots was a really cute term. Her perception of sailors as hardened salty men with no sense of humor was wavering. Knots, short for nautical right? It’s cute! She explained it to Bay, but Bay didn’t seem to care.

She had turned on the other screen as well for the compass. She wished she could break into it, but she really had no idea even where to begin looking for a password for a device she didn’t own. She had checked all the drawers and cabinets on the boat, and while there had been a surprisingly robust set of tools and items available, no notebook full of passwords or anything like that. She did have a full set of cooking tools though, as well as general tools. Hammer, screwdrivers, allen wrenches, all sorts of things. Whoever owned this boat before her had been well prepared.

…If anyone had owned this boat before her. That was still really bothering her. Beloved Lily. It was as if this boat existed just for her. How was that possible? She was learning more about the anomalies now, but there seemed to be two very distinct varieties, right? The business with her cell phone, and the boat showing up were one thing. The green fire and her neverburning flame were something else. The latter seemed to be natural phenomena that just existed now. They worked on rules, even if she didn’t understand them. She was pretty sure that with time and patience she could figure out that ‘magic’.

But, the rest didn’t make sense at all. Her phone leaving her life saving messages at just the right moments was not just something naturally happening. Neither was a boat appearing out of nowhere. Even if she assumed that she tapped into this natural ‘magic’ unconsciously, it didn’t seem to add up. She wouldn’t have known about events before they happened. Not to mention, the messages seemed to go against her direct wishes in the moment sometimes. When she couldn’t get a boat, she hated herself so much she wanted to die. But, the phone had saved her. The boat had saved her. It wasn’t some kind of subconscious self interest, she was pretty sure.

Plus… Beloved Lily. Why did that bother her so much? It really stuck out. It was like an itch in her brain she couldn’t quite get rid of.

“I think it’s because it’s the first thing I’ve found that I just can’t square away as something that came from me. I would never think of myself like that. Not in a million years.” It was kind of sad when she said it like that. It’s not like she hated everything about herself. But, she dealt with self hatred as a chronic issue. There was no layer of her mind that would have thought like that. She was very sure. So, it was the first magical occurrence that she felt very clearly came from something that wasn’t natural, but also wasn’t her.

The other obvious thing was right in front of her. She stared at the password screen. If she had conjured this boat, she should know the password. But she’d already tried all her regular passwords, and none of them worked. Hell, the little device had locked her out for five minutes. She had been watching the lock out timer tick down for a while now, and it was about to finish. Having gone through this train of thought, Lily was pretty sure she knew what it was now too. She just wasn’t happy about it.

As the display cleared, she reached over and typed the password. BelovedLily. Because of course it was. The display opened right up.

Lily let out a sigh. “Of course.” That didn’t make her feel any better about this. The point of a password would normally be to keep intruders out right? So why would it be the name of the boat? No, this was a checkpoint.

She felt like someone was asking her. ‘Did you see my message? Did you get my gift? Did you see how I protected you?’

It was an uncomfortable feeling. But, at least now she had access to the last bit of the boat she didn’t have before. She clicked through the device using the touch screen. It seemed to be running an OS like a phone, but not one she was directly familiar with. It had a number of apps though that seemed to give information about the on board devices.

Clicking on the one labeled ‘Water Services’ with an icon of a drop of water, she saw that it was basically what she expected. It said the on board tanks were 83.2% full. There was also a little bit that read that it was generating water somehow? She wasn’t sure what that was about, but sure enough she saw as it ticked over to 83.3% full. So, she wouldn’t need to worry about refilling it? She might have to watch some kind of filters or something. She made a mental note to check into that later.

‘Power Services’ showed a very similar layout. She was generating power, and there was a battery capacity. It also showed the boat’s fuel, which seemed a little odd to her because there was a fuel gauge on the dashboard. Maybe she could access this app remotely with a little effort?

There were a lot of other apps here too. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Overwhelming. It was so overwhelming! What was she supposed to do? She spoke out loud, sure that she was just speaking to herself but needing to say it anyway.

“Whoever you are, thank you for your help. But, I wish you’d just identify yourself. I scare easy, you know?”