"It's so quiet." Jeremy said.

"Yeah. Where are the bars? I don't even see a single restaurant." Tammy said.

It was a residential neighborhood. Full of rows of copied and pasted Neo-Latine houses with slightly different shades of blue, grey, and brown.

"Just the way life is here. Mars doesn't breed the most sociable people." I said.

"Yeah. Corporate exploitation, generational trauma, and all." Zak said.

"We're exploited on earth too. Doesn't mean we don't have fun." Tammy protested.

"Earth's old. This isn't. The human spirit is easier to change when reminders of happier times aren't visible." Zak said.

"Or when the reminders aren't of happier times." I added.

We continued walking in silence. 502 Diagonel 14 wasn't a house. It looked like a warehouse. Essentially a concrete block with two large doors.

"Do we just knock?" Tammy asked.

"If we're dealing with a drug cartel that's probably not the best option." Jeremy said.

"I think you guys should hang back. You're clearly tourists." I said.

"You're not?" Tammy asked.

"I know enough Arcadian to get by. I may not be a local but I'm closer than you are." I said.

"I know more than you do. And, I'm actually from Mars. I should stay too." Zak said.

"When I said 'you guys' I meant them two." I pointed at Jeremy and Tammy.

"What are we supposed to do?!" Tammy clearly didn't want to miss the action.

"Go look for some cerzi's." Zak said.

"We're not going to find cerzi's anywhere within a 5 kilometer radius!" She exclaimed.

"C'mon." Jeremy grabbed her arm and pulled her away from us, "I'm sure we'll find something. If not, these guys owe us a round."

They walked off in to the neighborhood.

"What's the plan?" Zak asked.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

"There is none." I said and knocked on one of the doors.

Zak shook his head but said nothing.

There was a brief silence. Then, a deep voice shouted from the other side, "Qien is?"

"Houle, estes qie pou ien entregou fer le mis. Lou pid il Sacerzi." Zak's accent was surprisingly colloquial, almost Tarresian.

The door slowly slid up. A buff Arcadian with ochre skin and no hair greeted us.

"Betvin hirmes. Setge, il entregou ist in il Sigle petsou." He said.

The package was on the second floor. Zak followed and I trailed behind. There was a large, torn apart, buggy in the corner. The engine was on the other side of the room; being held up by a robotic arm. The rest of the open space was empty. We followed the Arcadian to a small doorway at the end of it. There was a stairway beyond it.

"Sieb et il jif lou deré usti." He said.

He turned around and walked back to the engine. Zak looked at me and I nodded. He started heading up the staircase.

The room at the top had been furnished better. There were mock martian artifacts displayed along the walls, paintings of the local landscape, and there were plants. Real plants. Two large monstera deliciosas at both ends of a red marble desk that stood on the farthest wall. Two closed doors were past the desk.

"Houle!" I shouted.

One of the doors opened and a stout man came out. He was short. I would have confused him for a kid if it wasn't for the wrinkly mess that was his face. A Martian native- clearly familiar with it's sun.

"Dib sir lous entrigedis. Setge, il entregou ist four ec." He said and walked towards the other door.

We followed him through a dark hallway. A door was at the end. He opened it.

The walls in the room were light pink. There was a small bed in the corner. A few plushies on the shelves and a piles of toys strewn throughout.

"Nete oun iste?" He shouted in to the empty room.

A small girl crawled out from under the bed.

"Lir, lir. Tie mi pirdiet." She said, and started laughing.

"Netem is oure. Ils ti iever," He told her.

Her laughing instantly faded.

"Ils mi iever?" She asked.

"Set." He turned to look at us and said, "Le seb qie ec. Les le selet tresi."

He headed back through the doorway, closing the door behind him.

Zak looked at me, "What the hell did we get ourselves in to?" He asked me.

"I don't know. I don't like it." I said.

The girl took a small backpack out from her bed and started putting her toys in to it.

"Do we take her?" Zak asked.

"They don't seem to be hurting her. But she's clearly not theirs." I said.

"Nou feblou etglis." She told us with a mock-stern expression.

"Dou ti ieves?" Zak asked.

"Nou sí. Fir il jij det qie ale siri une prense." She said.

She smiled. The facade was clear. The poor thing was frightened. But it didn't seem to be of us.

"Let's just take her to the authorities." Zak said.

'What? Haven't you been to Ruife before?" I asked.

"No. I dated a girl from Tarre. She taught me Arcadian. Outside of that I haven't studied the region much." He said.

"The cops here are some of the most crooked you can find west of Saturn. They'll sell her to pirates who'll harvest her organs or make her in to a sex slave." I said.

"Fourfev ievet cou tet. Iea nou qarou ist soule." She said.

"She asked nicely." I said.

Zak shook his head then said, "Fine. But we're delivering her. She doesn't have papers and we're not exactly a group of caretakers."

"Vem cou nous." I told her.

She grabbed Zak's hand. He looked at me, asking for help. I shrugged and started walking towards the back exit.

"Coum ti iem's?" She asked Zak.

"Zak." He said.

"I tie?" She asked me.

"Liam. Qie tel ti?" I asked her.

"Sounie." She said.

"Qie bounet noum." I told her.

"Greca." She said.

"Don't get attached." Zak said.