The other crew members had gradually drifted down from their posts. It had become apparent that this was going to be a quiet week of travel and each had started to think of ways to occupy themselves. Yors and Wensly decided to listen in on Duilim and Flik’s discussion.

Duilim had been shifting in his seat as they talked. The Glint hadn't noticed it yet but he was sure another human would have and most likely ended the conversation or moved to a less sensitive topic. As it was, they were all scientists and had been nudged to talking philosophy so things were going to get messy.

"Glint don't worry about what comes after death. One life is all one needs so why would we need an eternity afterwards to languish over our mistakes?” Flik said Duilim, “That sounds like torture, even if you did go to this ‘Heaven’, an eternity of good rewards would eventually become bland and repetitive. I’d prefer to just have it end like going to sleep or even starting again.”

“Well about that, we call that reincarnation or just having the soul dissipate. Honestly there are so many different religions and schools of thought on the matter it has entire schools of study dedicated to it." responded Duilim. This talk was really getting close to a deep dark fear of his. One that had never left him.

He squirmed in his chair as he continued, "There's even a theory of reincarnation, like you said with starting again, but then if everyone starts again does that mean everyone is the same person?"

Flik opened her mouth to respond but shut it as she thought. The characteristic glow of a Glint’s eyes dimming showed as she pondered what Duilim had said.

At this point the Wensly asked, "How does this affect you? You're copied data from a scan of something living. In this afterlife what place would you have?"

The Glint crew had noticed he always seemed to be doing something with his hands while they converesed; they had stopped, and Duilim's projected face was blank. Wensly turned and glanced at Yors with a worried set to his eyes and ears, but Yors only wrinkled his nose and shrugged.

Duilim made direct eye contact with Wensly and sternly said, "It upsets me deeply and profoundly. If there are such things as souls or an afterlife I probably don't have a soul, and even if souls don't exist the idea of just having my existence end is what prompted me- my original self, to be scanned and uploaded. I will never be comfortable with it. I only hope to distract myself with life until such a time my experience ends. I am functionally immortal but the chances of dying increase the longer I exist."

Duilim's face twitched then settled into a blank look as he leaned back into the chair and said,"That's the problem with living forever; it's only forever to other people."

"If you're so afraid of death, why did you become a Surveyor?" asked Stuhkey. Stuhkey hadn't spoken much earlier, content to listen in till now.

"Because I wanted to meet you. Well not you specifically but aliens, other species, other life in general." replied Duilim, "Because a universe with only humans is sad to think about."

"Because it would be far too lonely to imagine you only had those like you, nothing with a vast difference in viewpoint to Humanity's own. I had the same thoughts before I met you Duilim." replied Stuhkey.

"It's good to know I'm not the only one. Though there is something to be said for exploring the universe, even alone," stated Duilim, "I have some coordinates of some breathtaking scenery to show you when we have time. Because I would appreciate not talking about the previous subject for a bit, ok?"

"That doesn't sound good, why would we want to suffocate?"

——— Two Weeks Later, Sol System, near Ceres ———

Commander Saule was ready to arrive at Sol, he did not initially think traveling faster than light would be boring, but after the initial awe at being inside the phenomena wore it off it quickly became boring. The Tempered Longing was the most high tech ship the Glint had ever constructed, and the Humans had made most of the systems automated, with Duilim, Naytani and Flik being able to take care of any issues that arose. The others readied whatever pet projects they wanted to complete over the voyage. Saule had none, he wasn't so scientifically inclined as the rest of his crew, so he had spent his time familiarizing himself with the ship and their future destinations.

He had been given a list of stars the Humans had scrubbed from the Jeweller and Tharg systems, the two aliens that had caused the alliance of Humans and Glint. He was given discretion as to which systems they went to and which order, with some telemetry given by Duilim's surveying organization to help make decisions. When Duilim had recommended they actually go to Sol first he didn't think too much about it.

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Duilim had said stopping by the Sol system to pick up some equipment and resources from his personal dock.. Nor had he dwelled on how many humans there were. As he sat in the Captain's chair in the helm, he saw the overwhelming number of signals emanating from every single celestial body in the system. Even in empty space millions of units between orbits of the planets had signals. The sheer density of them made a small part of him shrink.

With a hesitant voice Commander Saule asked, "Duilim, how many Humans did you say there were?"

"Roughly, nearing thirty billion, but that's about as precise as I can give because it's almost impossible to get an accurate census on the floaters, planetoids and asteroid colonies. Always seems to be a new settlement popping up when a family gets enough money to buy an assembler and finds a decently sized rock to set up shop." replied Duilim.

"You have to be joking. Surely life on a cramped planet would be better than solitude on a cold asteroid."

"You'd be right for most people but hermits and people longing for their own space have always been a constant in human society. Hell, I spent the last two centuries as a space probe with very rare contact with another person." Duilim said, he then pointed at the third planet in the system, Earth and continued.

"That is where Humanity evolved and is also the center of the government. My hangar is on the Moon, we can stop there while we wait for the data from the Astronomer's Guild to compile and be sent."

Saule quirked an ear at that, then asked, "You've said that word a few times in regards to large organizations. What does `Guild` mean?"

"Uhh, that's a pretty big question to answer but I'll do my best.The closest I can get as a direct translation would be like a corporation or team in Glintish. As for a definition, it's defined as a group of craftsmen or people with a common focused goal." Duilim paused as he thought, staring at the map of Sol, "There are eleven major Guilds in Sol. The first is the Sol Governance Guild which operates off of Earth. Then there are the Three Guilds of Infrastructure, each one on Mars, Mercury and Lunar. After that there are the Mercantile Guilds of Jupiter and Saturn. The Neptunian and Urania Guilds are research based. Venus houses the Vesuvian Surveyor Guild, which I belong to, and Pluto is the home of the Astronomer's Guild."

"That's quite a few organizations, why not one centralized body of government?"

"Well the Sol Governance handles that, we call it being 'the first among equals' to show they have a veto over the other guilds if an issue is important or pertains to humanity itself. An example would be sending aid to the Glint. That fleet was composed of ships from every guild's fleet and the System Defence Fleet."

Saule sat still for a moment as he processed the information, ears twitching as he thought. He then asked, "You said there were thirty billion humans, yes? How long did it take you to get from where we Glint are to where you are bow technology-wise?"

Duilim was still looking at the multitude of signals while he responded, "It took us about two hundred and fifty years. You were actually progressing than we did. Humanity had a great deal of internal strife in our early years of space exploration and colonization."

Duilim sighed, with a low electronic buzz edging into the noise, and turned to Commander Saule. His shoulders dropped slightly as he continued, "Humans have a lot of history that is going to appall you. We have only just begun to weed out our own prejudices against ourselves, no doubt you will encounter some horrible people in the future. I hope you can look past our past crimes and current failings to see what we actually are."

Saule's green eyes nailed Duilims to his as Duilim spoke. When Duilim finished he asked, "And what is that Duilim? So far I know humans to be unfailingly brave, and kind people. Perhaps too kind but just as well."

The rest of the bridge crew concurred, but Stuhkey added, "I appreciate someone laying bare their cultural failings as much as the next person, but we have a request from Earth asking for our flight plan through the system so they can provide an escort."

"About that actually, Duilim, why have you added your personal hanger to our itinerary?", asked Saule. His gaze didn't waver from Duilim as he motioned to Stuhkey to send the information.

Sheepishly Duilim answered, "Well, when they were making the Tempered Longing, they used average Human level Tech for some things the military viewed as less important. Such as our assembler setup and micro refinery."

Saule didn't know Duilim's body was capable of shrinking, but Duilim did his best attempt under Saule's stern look.

"I was just thinking we could install my aftermarket stuff that is a bit more high-spec than what we currently have."

“We have a ship made from the combined efforts of your military’s best engineers and our top scientists. What could be more ‘High-Spec’ than that?”

“Weeeeeell, the Human military isn’t known for using the most cutting edge technology in its fleet and there is always someone who has a novel work around that isn’t widely known. I’m not talking about the whole ship, just things that will make things smoother for a more civilian crew.”

Duilim’s voice could have been sap for how sugary his tone was. Saule thought for a moment. Large groups did tend to design things with efficiency and replaceability in things. He thought about the Longing and its equipment, then asked. “What did you have in mind?”

“Oh nothing too extravagant, just an upgrade to our assembler and micro-refinery. Maybe a more potent asteroid defense for the ship.”