“It’s incredible. You’ve gotten us stranded out in the wild twice in one month. That’s got to be some kind of record,” said Figaro.

Alix stood in front of him and Lyle, faintly wishing the ground of the tree hollow would swallow her up. “Let’s not jump to conclusions. Figaro can just ping the station to come meet us with another battery.”

“Oh, sure,” said Figaro. “Why didn’t I think of that? Sure, we’re out of range of the station comms, but I can just use the hovership’s signal booster— OH WAIT.”

Lyle ran a hand over his face. “What about Nick and Maisie? It wouldn’t be the safest thing in the world, but maybe we could cram ourselves into their hovership on the ride back.”

“I’ve been pinging them since we landed with zero response,” Figaro huffed. “I’ll bet you anything those two dum-dums ran out the battery on their ship too. Gah, this is what I get for working with humans! What is it about being made of meat that makes y’all so unreliable?”

“At least we know where we are,” Alix offered weakly. “Worst case scenario, we walk back.”

“Alix, we’re so far from the station, that could take over a week.” Lyle gestured skyward. “We’ve got the worst storm in a century due to sweep through here in seven days.”

A chill ran through Alix at his words. She looked around at the thick walls of the tree, wondering just how sturdy it was and how well it would hold up to the catastrophic winds and rains the Metamorph captain had described.

“Well ain’t this is a bitch and a half. Here, take this back, Boss.” Figaro handed the plastic face back to Alix. “Our best chance is for me to walk back ten goddamn miles into signal range and call the station from there. Assuming their goddamn comms aren’t still completely and utterly jacked up—”

“A big assumption, considering they only just began repairs,” Lyle muttered.

“—then they’ll be able to send some help.” Figaro turned and scuttled toward the exit of the hollow. He called back a few final words before leaving. “You two dunderheads keep collecting samples. I should be back in about, oh, I don’t know, four fuckin’ hours!”

***

It took half an hour after Figaro left for Lyle to speak to Alix.

“I found a hand.”

He held up a plastic hand by its detached wrist. He was on the far side of the hollow by the remains of a control panel, where he’d retreated after Figaro’s departure. His face was stuck in the sort of blankness he only had when he was trying to hold back a tsunami of anger. Alix had only seen that look a handful of times. If there was ever a time she’d well and truly earned it, it was definitely now.

Alix walked over to him. He wordlessly handed it to her to inspect. Alix turned it over, bending the fingers and pinching the exposed tubes hanging from where the wrist had been ripped off. In what sunlight made it into the hollow, Alix could see that the hand was tinged with dark blue, unlike the translucent face she held under her arm. Her mind reeled at the fact that millennia ago, that very hand had tapped at the controls of a starship. That hand had served its owner through lightyears. And now it was here in Alix’s grip, for her to do as she saw fit.

Alix curled all but the index finger into a fist, then poked Lyle in the nose.

“Gotcha,” Alix said with a weak laugh. Lyle did not seem amused.

“Alix—” he started.

“Gotcha again,” she said with another poke.

“I am trying very hard not to be furious with you.”

“You don’t look like you’re succeeding.”

Lyle sighed deeply and ran his hand across his face.

“Look, there’s no two ways around it, I screwed up. I’m really sorry,” said Alix, clasping her hand to the plastic one. “I got distracted. It won’t happen again.”

Lyle let out a harsh laugh and turned his back on her to fiddle with the control panel. “‘It’ happens all the time. This is why you always end up in some sort of trouble.”

“As my dad used to say, you can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs.” Alix shrugged. She leaned against the control panel next to Lyle, looking directly at him despite his refusal to meet her eyes. “You know, there was a time you thought my risk-taking, trouble-making ways were hot.”

Lyle raised an eyebrow. “There was?”

“Oh, yeah.” Alix grinned and leaned in closer. “Remember when we were scouting alone in Samuel’s Scarlet Wood right at sunset, just you and me? And then we stumbled into a Gravir’s den? My raygun was out of charge, but I fought the bastard off with a tree branch, a prayer, and some well-executed growls. Remember how after it ran off, you gave me the look and jumped my bones right then and there, and ended up moaning so loud you scared a flock of avians right out of the treetops?”

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Lyle was, by now, bright red. “I . . . have a vague recollection of that.”

“Just admit it!” Alix elbowed him playfully. “You love a bit of danger!”

“A bit, maybe!” Lyle whirled to face her, still blushing. “But not every damn day! There’s nothing sexy about being worried that you’re unconscious in a ditch somewhere! There’s something to be said for stability.”

“Stability?” Alix echoed. Her lip curled involuntarily at the word. “Baby, please. That’s a word for the retired or the married.”

“You say ‘married’ like it’s a bad thing.”

“Not bad. Just . . . stable.” Alix scratched the back of her neck with the plastic hand. “I mean, how stable do you want things? Would you want to go off-planet on a new contract together? Or are you thinking of renewing with Asteria and sticking around another four months here? Because that’s not so bad. I could do another four months on Deimos X.”

Lyle bit his lip. “I’m not renewing my contract exactly.”

Alix let out a breath of relief and smiled. Truthfully, four more months on Deimos X would be a long-ass time.

“I’m thinking of signing on for the colonization program.”

Alix’s heart dropped to her stomach.

“Hold up,” she said, holding the plastic hand up in protest. “You’re thinking of joining the planned colony? As in staying here permanently? As in living here? Forever?”

“For quite a while, at least.” Lyle folded his arms. “I’ve traveled a lot in my career. I like the adventure, the exploration, the excitement. But now . . . I don’t know. Lately, I’ve been feeling this urge to settle down, to put down roots.”

“Really? And Deimos freaking X is the planet of all places that’s made you want to do that?”

“Of course. All my research is here now. Don’t you get it? We’re helping build this place from the ground up. Not just moving in, but making it our home.”

“Your home, maybe.” Alix frowned. “I mean, signing up for a brand new colony. So much work establishing towns, and you’re kind of expected to do the whole marriage-and-kids thing . . .”

Lyle tilted his head. “Again, you say that like it’s a bad thing—”

“It’s not, it’s just a lot. It’s a lot.” Alix shrugged.

“Maybe it is. I don’t know.” Lyle glanced away. “I haven’t signed on the dotted line yet. Nothing is set in stone. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t thinking about it more and more the closer we get to our contracts’ end.”

“I just don’t think it’s you,” said Alix. She took a strand of his hair between her fingers and moved in closer. “I don’t think breaking up with me is you, either. Everything was fine before, wasn’t it? What’s changed?”

Lyle paused before answering. “I think I fell in love with you.”

Alix threw her hands up. “So what the hell’s the problem?”

“The problem is this.” Lyle took both her hands in his. “I want to wake up next to you every morning, come home to you every evening. Can you say the same?”

“Of course I can.”

“I don’t know that you can. I don’t think I, or any one person, can be enough for you that way. You’re always going to want to run off to some sort of uncharted jungle or ice planet or something. I can’t change that about you. But I can’t be with you if there’s always going to be some uncertainty about whether or not you’re going to throw yourself into some sort of crazy, fatal danger. I can’t take it.”

“I don’t throw myself into danger,” said Alix with a shrug. “I just occasionally walk into it. Look, the stress of these last few weeks is taking its toll on you, I get that. But at the end of the day, you’re a scientist, and explorer, same as me. You don’t want stable.”

“I don’t?” Lyle drawled.

“Hell no.”

“Then what do I want?” Lyle asked with a small smile.

“A lunatic like me,” Alix said, then leaned in and kissed him hard. He melted against her, kissing her back, and for a moment everything was the same as it had been before. Perfect.

Then Alix bumped the plastic hand against the console, and it flashed.

Alix and Lyle both started and looked down in shock as a series of symbols flashed on the console’s cracked screen in rapid succession, the image glitching every few seconds, before freezing on the final picture:

A diamond spire set against an alien sky.

***

“This is some bullshit,” Figaro grumbled as he rolled across the forest floor. “Bullshit of the highest degree!”

Even at his fastest, it would take him goddamn forever and a day to get back into range of the station comms. God help them if the comms were fritzing too much to take a message. Alix may have been Figaro’s best friend, but sometimes it felt as if she’d left all but one brain cell at home. Hopefully, she was at least being productive at the Gargantua hollow so that the day wouldn’t be a total wash.

“DAMN IT, HELP! LET US OUT!”

Figaro rolled to a stop at the sound of the voice. What the fresh hell?

He turned westward as the distant calls for help continued, a chill running through his wires as he recognized the voice. It was Nick, clear as day.

Figaro sped toward the voice as it got increasingly louder, and within minutes he found himself in front of a tree, from which hung a net, within which were an utterly panicked Nick and Maisie.

“Fig!” Nick’s eyes widened at the sight of him.

“The fuck are you two doing up there?” Figaro called up.

“They trapped us out of nowhere. Listen, you have to get us out before they come back—”

As the words left Nick’s mouth, Figaro heard small shuffling steps sound behind him.