New Arcadia Recap: s01e02 "You've Got Mail"
The arbitrary time designated as morning on New Arcadia, and we watch our crew wake up. Ophelia is up and at it as soon as her alarm goes off. She has a post-it stuck to the ceiling above her bunk, and she touches it, but we still donât see what it says. We cut to Echo, who is fixated on her tablet the whole time sheâs dressing and brushing her teeth. Then we cut to Ves, who is woken up by Alpha Juliet, and instructs them to âsnoozeâ repeatedly until AJ refuses to stop talking and Ves gives in and gets up. All our crew members end up at a very awkward breakfast. Ves is half-asleep, Echo is focused on the tablet, and Ophelia keeps trying to make conversation that only AJ responds to.
Echo eventually groans and sets the tablet aside. She tells the others that the communications are extremely backed up; she keeps routing messages and then finding out that theyâre from months ago. Thatâs the problem with being the new staff on a formerly-derelict relay station, Ves says: everythingâs out of date. They all talk around the reason why the station was derelict. Ophelia offers to help Echo go through the messages. Ophelia looks meaningfully at Ves, trying to get him to offer to help, but they donât take the hint. When she makes it less of a hint, he tells them thereâs still too much to repair. AJ verifies this: Ves is still patching up a LOT of stuff that was supposed to be under maintenance.
Echo and Ophelia go through the messages together. Echo is working silently, but Ophelia keeps trying to start a conversation. After a lot of one-word responses, Ophelia says: itâs going to be hard to live out here on this station away from everybody else if we donât get to know each other. Echo looks at her and says, sometimes itâs easier not to know people. Then it doesnât hurt when things go wrong. Ophelia remembers Mitchell, and disagrees: sheâs glad she knew him, even though heâs gone now. And she regrets that the others didnât get the chance to know him like she did. Echo hesitates, then answers Opheliaâs last question, and they begin a real conversation.
Ves, meanwhile, has gone to try and repair pieces of the ship. Starting with the climate control, which is pretty wonky. AJ is giving...not incredibly good directions. When Ves points this out, AJ defensively tells them that they're sleepy! They were asleep for a while before the shuttle came in and woke them up. And Ves, who has a hard time getting up in the morning, should understand. Ves asks how long it was, but AJ doesn't know. Is it weird, to just have long periods of blank? No, it was just like sleeping.
Meanwhile, Echo and Ophelia's conversation is interrupted by a new message coming in for immediate response. Echo raises it, and itâs a very angry person, claiming that they sent a claim on an asteroid site for their colony, but someone else is also there, pretending itâs theirs! Echo tries to get information from them, but another message comes in. Ophelia takes this one: the other people, who also say they sent a claim. Uh oh.
Echo and Ophelia both promise to check the records and get back to them. They do find the claims. Both claims. With New Arcadia being down, neither was routed through to the central database, so both were filed and neither was informed there was a conflict.
Technically, neither of them went through to the registry, so neither has a claimâŚand the claim belongs to whichever message New Arcadia routes through first. Ophelia has AJ ping Ves for help. Ves can check the time stamps and figure out whose claim would have gone through first if New Arcadia had been functioning. Then theyâll send that one through, which is only fair. Echo, meanwhile, is doing research on both colonies. One of them is fairly large and successful: well-situated to trade routes and additional resources. The other one is much more distant. Ves reports that the larger colony actually filed later, but since theyâre much closer, their claim would have arrived first. If New Arcadia had been functioning properly, theyâd have the asteroid site.
Echo argues that they have an opportunity to do a lot of good by sending the smaller colonyâs claim through. The larger colony doesnât need the asteroid site, but the little one mightâand they DID claim it first, even if their position meant it wouldnât have mattered under other circumstances. Ves shrugs, and tells Ophelia itâs her call. âMy call?â Ophelia is surprised. Well, yeah, Ves says. Sheâs in charge.
Ophelia thinks about it. We flash back to her and Mitchell in training. She never expected to be mission commander; while she scored well on aptitude tests, she always lacked the confidence. She was really glad to be assigned as Mitchellâs second, because she trusted him to do the right thing. When he received command, he tells her that she could have had it too: she just needs to trust herself.
She tells them to send through the claim for the smaller colony. Ves does so, and Echo calls both the colonies to give them the result. The representative from the smaller colony is clearly relieved; the larger colony politely and coldly signs off. Once theyâre gone, the smaller colony rep admits that they were terrified they wouldnât get itâmessages pass so slowly from where they are. Echo tells them that they should always route through New Arcadia, and theyâll expedite it. She tells them sheâs glad theyâre there.
With the call ended, Ophelia tells them all sheâs glad theyâre there, too. That something like this is really hard, but much harder without a team. Ves checks with AJ that other repairs can wait, and joins them in going through the messages. Echo, a little hesitantly, asks them both about their families, and we fade out on the team beginning to get to know each other.