As Lauren put the box she’d taken out on her bed, Ellie spoke out to us. “Luna, Lauren, I will have to excuse myself for now. It looks like I have some background programs to run.”

“Background programs, huh?” Lauren looked back at the holostick I was holding. “I hope it isn’t something too serious?”

“It’s just a routine check on the maintenance bots.” Ellie replied.

“Hmm, well, feel free to join us later when you are done with your checks. It was nice talking to you.”

“Take care, Ellie.”

“Thank you. See you later Commander, XO.” And with that, Ellie broke off the line.

“Background programs…” Lauren rolled her eyes and smiled.

“You don’t believe her?”

“Not really, no.” She shook her head. “Do you?”

“I guess it sounds a bit suspicious for a super AI like her to have to ‘run background programs.’”

“Exactly. I think she just wants to give us some alone time. Much appreciated, by the way, but she could have just said that.”

“Maybe she didn’t want to be so on the nose about it.”

Lauren smiled. “Ellie is becoming more human-like by the moment, isn’t she?”

With her wanting to have an avatar, I think there’s little I could say to deny that. “Maybe it’s because of the update she got?”

“That’s what I’m thinking, too. Well, as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone, I really don’t see any negatives about it.”

I nodded and then gave the holostick back to Lauren so we could focus fully on the box in front of us. Not that I am a certified box expert, but it did look rather old. Way older than most things I’ve seen around here.

“Already staring that intently? I haven't even opened it yet.” Lauren chuckled as she put the holostick in her pocket.

“I was just thinking it looked rather old.” I admitted.

Lauren smiled and gave me a nod. “It is.” She then looked at the box and gently brushed her good hand over the lid. “It’s one of the few things that got out of the house unscathed. My parents had taken the precaution to put the things they treasured most in their safe. The safe itself was rather banged up when we found it, but at least what was inside had been kept safe.” She paused for a couple of seconds, but before the silence became too loaded, she sighed and lifted the lid off the box using both her hands.

It revealed two albums, with some packs of photos packed in robust looking plastic boxes. It also included two metal looking sticks which I assumed were memory drives.

“My parents were those kinds of people who really liked to keep things physical ‘just in case one day the internet might die’. It’s a bit silly, but it’s really nice to have these things now.” Lauren started by taking out both of the albums and putting them down on the bed next to the box. “The green one contains the pictures that are chronologically the oldest. The blue ones have the newer ones. And the photos in the boxes are the newest pictures that they were planning to frame but never got the chance to.”

I put my hand on her back and gave it a good rub. She seemed to appreciate it.

She smiled “So which one do you want to start with?”

“I think the green one. Does it have baby Lauren?”

Lauren rolled her eyes and chuckled. “Yes, yes it does.”

“I can’t wait.” I clapped my hands.

Lauren moved everything out of the way so we could sit on the bed and look at the pictures together. She then gave the green album to me, which I put on my lap. Gently turning over the cover.

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

“These are pictures from before I was born.” She pointed at one of the first pictures. It showed a young couple in their early twenties standing in front of a stately building. The guy, who looked quite a bit taller than the girl he was with, had his arm around her waist.

“Your parents?”

“Yep, this is after they started dating back at college.” Lauren nodded.

“Looks like you got your height from your dad.” I giggled.

“Yeah, my dad was even taller than I am now, though. However, people did say I looked more like my mom.”

I inspected the picture more closely. It’s true that their faces looked rather similar.

“Wait, there’s a picture in here where it’s clearer.” Lauren took the page and flipped it, she then pointed at a picture on the bottom left of the page. It was a close-up of Lauren’s mom, who had her picture taken with her friends in what looks to be a bar of some kind. With her brown hair tied back in a ponytail, the similarities did become very obvious.

“Wow, it’s almost like two buckets of water.”

“Two drops.” Lauren laughed. “Not two buckets.”

“Ah. Whoops.”

Lauren continued chuckling. “But when it comes to personality, I’m a bit of a combination between my mom and my dad though. I’m not nearly as much of a party animal like my mom was when she was young.”

“Didn’t you say you used to go out to watch the polar lights quite often?”

“I didn’t say I was the quiet homely type either.” She bumped her shoulder against mine.

“Hehe.”

We browsed through some more pictures of Lauren’s parents before we finally got to the marriage pictures.

“My mom was a couple of weeks pregnant with me when they got married. She didn’t really know that at the time, though.”

“Oh, it must have been quite the surprise, then?”

“Well, my mom did always say I was the wedding gift that she enjoyed the most.” She started to tear up a little after she’d said that.

“We don’t need to look at these if you don’t want to.”

“No, it’s fine. I just… I just miss her… A lot… And my dad too of course... But I also really want to share these pictures with you. I’m just going to be a bit emotional.”

“That’s perfectly understandable.” I once again rubbed her back. “Don’t hold anything back, okay? You can be as open with me as you want.”

“I know.” She quickly took out a handkerchief and blew her nose. “It’s going to be a rainy day too when we go to visit them, but I will definitely feel better afterwards.”

It took me a couple of seconds to understand what she had said, but when I got it, it did make sense. “Mhmm,” I nodded. “After rain comes sunshine, right?”

Lauren laughed and wiped away a tear from the corner of her eye. “It does. That was quite a good one.”

“Ready to continue?”

“Yeah, let’s.” She nodded.

Some more pages later we arrived at Lauren’s first baby pictures. It was really cute to see baby Lauren all dressed up in her pink onesies. But sadly for me the baby picture period ended too soon, but on the other hand, it did mean seeing more pictures about the rest of her life. The first photo album came to an end when Lauren was about ten years old.

After that we swiftly moved on to the blue album. This one contained the first holiday pictures that I’d seen of her together with her parents.

“Do you remember this trip?” I asked, pointing at a picture where Lauren was building a sand-castle with her dad.

“I do.” She nodded. “That’s our trip we took to the Australian Commonwealth. I distinctly remember it feeling way too hot for my liking. And I’m pretty sure my dad went home with a heat stroke. Apparently it wasn’t even that much of a warm period for the locals. But when you are used to the Antarctic climate…”

“I can imagine that. Did you have fun though?”

“Definitely!” Lauren smiled brightly. “For my dad that was also one of his first trips outside of the Antarctic region so we had lots of fun doing things that neither of us had done before. Like building castles in sand. Sand is quite a rubbish construction material compared to snow though when it comes to small castles.”

I chuckled. “I suppose it is. Not that I have tried myself though.”

“Well if I take you on that trip I promised, then you can try out for yourself so you can tell the difference.”

“That’d be fun, yeah. But do be careful not to get a heatstroke yourself.”

“Should bring Eva along so I got my doctor with me already.”

I laughed. “I wouldn’t mind it if she would come along.”

“Wouldn’t you? I was just joking.”

I shrugged. “There’s still plenty of times we can be alone right? Even if we take the trip together. A holiday with her wouldn’t be bad. She is one of my only friends after all.”

“Huh, I hadn’t thought about it that way. I’ll ask her when I talk to her again.” Lauren nodded. “A trip with friends is definitely something that we should do before we get called back to action.”

“Plus, I kind of want to know what Eva looks like in a bathing suit.”

That comment made Lauren laugh quite badly. “That’s not a very pure thought of you but I can understand the sentiment.”

“I’m just curious, that’s all.” After I had said that, a thought suddenly came to mind. Wait… Would Lauren even be able to go to a beach with her shoulder…