There were very few things to do in quarantine.
Alex had spent his last two days sleeping as much as he could. There were six movies available to watch and nothing else. His techs steadfastly refused to tell him anything about the outside world, which was standard procedure. Nothing that would get him riled up, as Shawn put it. That sort of riled him up.
Aside from sleeping, the only thing that broke the monotony was meal time. First he would get scanned and then one of the nurses would drop off clean scrubs and a steaming hot bowl of nutragel in the small airlock. In the morning it tasted sort of like a cinnamon roll. The lunch nutragel bore some resemblance to chicken soup and the dinner nutragel was similar to but distinct from beef stew.
Nutragel was easily more dissatisfying to eat than anything else a dispenser produced. It provided everything he needed to live and made things easier on the scanner, but lacked any other redeemable features. Freedom could not come soon enough.
So he thought.
Being released was nearly as strange as being brought in. Shawn gave him his marching orders - There’d be a representative from the Civilian Pilot Program waiting for Carbon and him once he was out of the secure portion of the station, and said his goodbye before turning the airlock on. It cycled automatically around him and he walked from the quarantine room down the hall to the patient elevator. Even before the doors opened, he could smell the cleaning chemicals. A minute later his eyes were stinging and his scrubs smelled like something that would denature a prion, but it did deposit him in front of the first human he’d seen since the day he arrived.
The nurse behind the counter was not operating under the same conditions, and seemed pretty bored by his arrival. He pushed a bag with Alex’s name on it across the stainless countertop, and pointed out where the changing rooms were before turning back to his terminal.
There was technically a shower in the quarantine room. One of those dry ones that used ultrasonic waves and a vacuum. It allegedly did the job. The changing room had a real shower, towels, and the most generic little bottles of soap and shampoo Alex had ever seen. Even if everything was a little threadbare, this still felt like luxury. It had been longer than he cared to think about since he’d gotten the chance to take an actual water shower, and he was not going to skip the opportunity to wash the stink of chemicals off his body.
Once again clean, though looking a bit scruffy from nine days of stubble growth, he donned the same clothing that he had been brought in with, now so thoroughly decontaminated it appeared a shade lighter than it had started, and immediately sat down in the waiting room.
Carbon arrived about fifteen minutes later, slightly damp and visibly exhausted. While she did perk up when she spotted him, a brief flash of a smile tamped down as she glanced over at the attendant operating the elevator to the rest of the station. Alex followed suit, keeping it professional as he requested access to leave quarantine.
Once alone in the elevator, a brief look of longing may have been exchanged.
“Oh. It’s real.” Alex murmured to himself as the doors opened to the main deck of the small station, the smell of cooked food wafting through the air as they stepped out. They had arrived just in time for breakfast. He inhaled deeply. “I think they have bacon. And pancakes? You’ll like both of those, I’m sure.”
“Pilot Alex Sorenson? Shipmaster Tshalen?” An older man wearing a button down shirt and nice slacks stepped forward before Alex could determine which way to go to get to the food. He smiled affably, extending his hand. “Dae Yeong, I’m with the CPP.”
Alex barely kept his shit together and shook his hand. “Oh yes. We were told you’d be here.” He didn’t manage to keep the disappointment out of his voice, though.
Dae gave Carbon a short bow, which she returned, and he handed them both new CPP access badges. They were clearly labeled PILOT and ENGINEER respectively, with photos. Alex grinning like he’d won the lotto, Carbon straight-faced and looking a bit like she was getting a mugshot taken. It wasn’t necessary on the quarantine station, but they’d be needing them for access in secure areas elsewhere. “If you both don’t mind, we should be departing for McFadden station immediately. Traffic is already bad and there’s a lot to do.”
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Alex did mind, but he kept it to himself. It was a short walk to the hanger, and they quickly found themselves wedged into the back of a four seat transport. It was an inexpensive but serviceable civilian model with CPP branding all over the outside. Mr. Yeong kept his hands on the controls even though the short jaunt to McFadden station was likely to be entirely autopilot.
“I still cannot believe it is so large.” Carbon leaned over as far as her seat’s safety harness would allow, whispering to him as the station grew on the main screen, already lined up with one of the bays on the docking arc. Parking lot speeds were strictly enforced this close to a structure, they were still 30 minutes from actually coming aboard.
“Third largest in system, twelfth in all of human space.” Alex suppressed the urge to make that joke, keeping his voice down too. It was probably pointless, Mr. Yeong was just over an arms length away in the pilot’s seat and could easily hear them. It still felt sort of conspiratorial, almost fun.
“I am aware of that, but I do not know why.” She shifted back into her seat properly, ears twitching as they pressed into the headrest. Carbon had curled her antenna over her shoulder, preferring that to crushing them between her back and the seat that had not been made with that particular biological difference in mind.
He shrugged. “They had to make room for all the old spacecraft in the Exploration museum.”
Carbon straightened up and looked at him, perplexed. “A museum?”
“Uh huh.”
“You put a museum in space? In a station that some of your most advanced spacecraft are based from?” Carbon was starting to get that tone that said she may be offended by the very idea being discussed.
“Not me personally, no. But it does seem like a reasonable place for it.”
“I did not mean you specifically, Alex. I meant as a species. Space is not a reasonable place for a museum, no matter the subject.” She was adamant about that, a finger
“Space is the perfect place for a museum about space exploration. That was the jingle they used during construction.” He cleared his throat and sang, off key. “Space... is the per-fect place.”
Mr. Yeong chuckled quietly.
Carbon’s jaw set and she huffed with frustration. “Your species is so cavalier about so many things. Space is dangerous, it is no place to leave a collection of historical knowledge.”
Alex looked out of his window with a snort, watching a row of single-container cargo drones waiting for access queuing up as he dismissed her argument with a wave of his hand. “Oh yeah, nothing of value has ever been destroyed on a planet before, right?”
The back seat got very quiet.
When he looked back, Carbon was staring down at balled fists with deadly intensity, normally blue lips pressed so tight they were pale.
He figured out where he had fucked up a moment later. “I didn’t mean- Not like, I... Hell.”
Her words came slowly, precise. “I know you did not mean it that way.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You have nothing to apologize for. The statement is true, disaster or not. A planet can still oversee untold destruction.” She closed her eyes and exhaled, her body relaxing. ”It has been a difficult week.”
He had forgotten that isolation is hard on the Tsla’o. It had been annoying for him, but being nearly completely cut off from interaction in what was ultimately an alien prison cell must have weighed heavily on her. “Is it alright if I feel bad?”
Carbon took a deep breath and exhaled slowly again, watching her hands uncurl and fingers stretch as she recentered herself. She straightened back up, ears unfolding from being pressed tight against her head before she glanced over at him with a brief nod. A thin, wry smile slowly working across her short muzzle. “That is acceptable as long as you are done by the time we arrive.”
Alex laughed just as Mr. Yeong looked back at them over his shoulder. The older man gave them a bemused smile. “Has anyone told you two that you sound like a married couple?”
That shut both of them up for the rest of the trip.