Plan 9 From Outer Space! [ISS][Flashback]

The day had started fairly normally. Matthew was catching up on some paperwork that he hadn't touched in some time. To be fair, it was hardly his fault that he'd been shuffling between the warfront with Al, various meetings and a few failed peace conferences, and playing with his bear- did he say playing with his bear? No, wait, he meant very important, very serious business. Yes. That sounded like an appropriate excuse for the pile of untouched paperwork on his desk. With a sigh, he started checking over things, signing them, and looking for an excuse to go back to doing just about anything else. He had no such excuse. If he didn't finish these things without an absolutely foolproof, ridiculous emergency of an excuse, his boss was going to just about have his head.

He sighed as Kuma scratched at his leg, trying to climb up into his lap. "Careful," Matthew admonished, picking up the bear as he did. Kumajiro was probably a little big to be holding in his lap while trying to do anything involving paperwork, but Matthew figured it was better than having the polar bear whine at him about it- which, despite being just as old as Matthew was, if not older, Kumajiro was almost certain to do. In excess. Matthew sighed and started to try to write around Kuma instead. He'd gotten quite good at this over time, but the bear was still probably slowing him down somewhat (especially since Matthew was busy patting him with one hand).

Matthew was finally beginning to think he might be making some headway into the pile of stuff on his desk when his phone started ringing. He looked at the caller I.D. It was a military number, a base in the northern parts of Ontario. He grabbed the phone. This was about when his day went from just 'normal' to 'started normal'. "Hello, this is Matthew Williams," he said.

"Sir?" the man over the line said. He sounded slightly confused.

"Canada," Matthew said.

"Yes, of course," the man said. "I knew that." There was a long, somewhat uncomfortable pause. Matthew sighed internally. This sort of thing got old rather quickly, though he'd gotten used to it after about the first hundred times. The good news was that, with his own people, the whole forgetting-entirely-about-him thing didn't tend to happen in person. That didn't seem to extend properly to over the phone, though. Maybe it was because they couldn't see him? He really wasn't certain... "We have a... situation," the man finally began again, his voice still sounding a little embarrassed.

"A situation?" Matthew asked, curious.

"An 'Anastasia Jones' showed up here and is asking to see you, claims to be your niece," the man began, and Matthew didn't really hear anything about that. Anastasia Jones? As in, his niece? She'd said that much, too, and how the hell had she gotten here? Dimly, he could hear the man continuing to speak. Matthew was just busy trying to figure out how Anna had turned up in Northern Ontario. None of the reasons he could think of were very good. He was trying not to hyperventilate. Had she hurt herself? Had she even ever been out of the space station before? He didn't think she had! Kuma made an irritated noise as Matthew's hand, which had previously been petting him, curled into a tight ball, holding Kumajiro's fur.

"What's the earliest clear time for a flight to land?" he asked finally, a high degree of urgency. "Because I'll be getting one of those. Immediately."

"We can clear a place if it's that urgent," the man over the phone said, "but she's only maybe eleven, she doesn't seem like much of a threat-"

"She's supposed to be in space," Matthew almost shouted. This did not make the man over the phone seem any less confused.

"Sir?" he asked.

"I'll be getting a plane now," Matthew said. "This qualifies as an emergency." The still vaguely baffled man confirmed this with Matthew. They hung up. No more than forty minutes later, Matthew Williams was on a plane with a somewhat disgruntled Kumajiro and a somewhat startled pilot, going to where Anna was. He did not bring his paperwork. This, he decided, was as a ridiculous emergency, and his boss could just wait a few more days for that paperwork.

---

By the time Matthew's plane landed (a very short amount of time later, in fact) on a military base in Northern Ontario, he had calmed down slightly. Okay. So his niece had somehow gotten out of space, despite a general lack of shuttle programs at the moment. She'd also chosen to show up in the middle of nowhere for some reason. She'd somehow pulled something that seemed rather impossible, which, once Matthew thought about it, was so ridiculously like both of her fathers that he was almost surprised he'd been so surprised. Knowing his brother and his niece, it had probably been at least half thought-through but ridiculously dangerous and/or reckless. This was also a given, since she'd somehow ended up in Northern Ontario out of space.

He stepped out, carrying his bear. Matthew had nearly left Kumajiro behind in his haste, actually, but he'd snuck into Matthew's car and he wasn't about to just leave Kuma at the airport. That would have been a disaster, since Matthew doubted airport security would take a bear trying to sneak onto a plane terribly well. If Kuma had decided today was a good day to be absolutely determined to follow Matthew around, Matthew was not going to stop him. He didn't have time for that, since, despite having calmed down some, the fact that his niece was somehow no longer in space still seemed rather urgent.

He was quickly met by the man who had called him on the phone and lead through the rather small base. There weren't many people here, and the likelihood of much needing the base here was small. It was often used as a refueling point for surveillance jets or jets carrying researchers headed further North, and that was about it, most days. It only needed to be big enough for planes to land. Matthew had never been so happy to know it was here- the next closest airport was probably still a good hour, hour-and-a-half drive on a good day, and today was not a good day. The plane had nearly been delayed in landing due to a snowstorm that was about to hit. If he hadn't landed here, hadn't been so prompt in getting a plane, Matthew might not have landed at all, instead circling around to another, safer airport, or otherwise, been stuck driving the entire distance in the snow.

Did Anna even know what snow was? Matthew thought she might, intellectually, but wouldn't that have been something odd to wake up to. Let alone gravity- if Matthew thought his brother's short lived attempt to see if Matthew could stand going to space was rough, with simulated anti-gravity and g-forces (it had not gone well and Matthew had learned that he, unlike his brother, was rather determined not to end up one of the nine Canadians to be in space), he couldn't imagine what it would be like to suddenly end up with gravity.

He might have theoretically calmed down, but he was still freaking out just a little bit. He needed to see his niece okay before he stopped freaking out.

Finally, a door was opened, and there, sitting like nothing had happened, was a young girl with white hair, his brother's blue eyes, and a very familiar face. "Anna!" Matthew said, forgetting he was holding Kumajiro for a moment, instead dropping him and running up to grab her in a tight hug. (The bear made a startled noise before staring intently at Anna. She smelled like kin but also wasn't normal and he wasn't sure how to react yet.) "Are you okay? How did you get here?"