I awake to a knock at my door, a quick check confirms that I’ve been sleeping for seven hours fifteen minutes.

“Yes, come in,” I say, rolling out of bed and turning the lights on. I’m surprised to see Thomas when the door opens.

“Hey Gabriel, I didn’t want to wake you any earlier, but I’ve been talking to Juno about what happened on Airis, and she’s been trying to take responsibility for what happened. Saying that the only reason the estate was destroyed is because she volunteered to take everyone there. I made it clear to her that it was no one’s fault but Rossum’s and that no one of us is to blame for anything bad that happened. I don’t know you particularly well, but I know that your relic was the reason that they attacked us. I just wanted you to know that I don’t blame you for anything,” he says all this very sincerely. He apparently needed to get all that off his chest bad enough to wake me up from a dead sleep.

“Look, I’m grateful that you don’t want any bad blood, but this isn’t necessary. Everyone’s sorry about what happened but I think the only people losing sleep over it are you and Juno, and now me. You’re more than welcome to stay with us for as long as you wish, I don’t have anywhere to be, so it looks like we’ll be sightseeing for the foreseeable future, which I’m completely fine with. Is there anything else you need?” I respond. Thomas’ internal feelings about what happened and who’s to blame are not particularly important to me, and in response to what I said he just begins to blubber and apologize for waking me up.

After Thomas leaves, I lay back down and try to go back to sleep, to no avail. I again roll out of bed, putting a fresh set of clothes on. I wonder what everyone else is up to. If Thomas is awake, I doubt he’s the only one. I exit my quarters and walk down the hall and down the stairs to the access point to Evelyn’s room. I enter after a few moments. I’m greeted by Liam and Juno on a couch in front of me as I am spat out into the room. I can see Thomas and Evelyn in the library through the archway on the right. She’s standing over him while he looks at some book. She glances up at me and lets out a little snicker, apparently well aware of Thomas’ earlier confession, or whatever it was.

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“Hey Gabriel, sleep well?” Evelyn yells from the library.

“Fantastic. Why has no one else been sleeping?” I ask. They all respond in one way or another. Juno slept after the house burnt down, Thomas slept while the registration paperwork was being written up, Liam’s high on some stimulant, apparently Evelyn doesn’t need much sleep to begin with, and Cicero is in his quarters sleeping as I was. “So, we’re here, when do you all want to go planet-side?” I ask.

“We’ve been waiting for you to wake up man. We’ve been ready,” Liam replies.

“Okay then, don’t let me hold you up any longer, let’s go look at some alien architecture,” I respond, only half in jest, I am a little interested now that we’re almost there.

“Here we go, I’ll bring us in then,” Juno says, getting up off the couch and heading to the access point I just used. Hearing Juno move to leave, Thomas stands up as well, the wooden chair making a loud racket on the hard stone floor. He goes to pick up the book he was looking at when Evelyn reaches out her hand and places it atop the book.

“Ah Ah, everything from here stays here, you can come back and finish looking at it later,” she says, almost motherly, a very odd thought. He sheepishly bows his head and similar to earlier in my room starts apologizing. After a few moments more, Thomas and Liam are gone, following Juno to the bridge.

“Sorry for Thomas waking you up, I held him off for as long as I could,” Evelyn says, putting Thomas’ book back in its place.

“It’s fine, I honestly don’t even mind that much about being woken up, the guy is just weird is all. I don’t need to hear all that about Juno and whether he blames me for what happened,” I reply.

“I would cut him some slack, I don’t think he had many friends on Airis, the human interaction is unfamiliar territory for him I think. I mean look at him when I told him he couldn’t take the book. He doesn’t deal with confrontation very well, that’s all,” she says.

“Oh well, its not a big deal. Tell me a little about this place we’re going. What’s it like?” I ask.

“There’s really not much to it, the only notable thing on the whole planet is the Prelude structures, and even there, we don’t understand them enough to get anything out of them. I just find it very humbling, watching the work of beings so far beyond us. The way the whole thing moves and flows is mesmerizing. It may also do us some good to be out in nature, even if it’s not one we’re native to,” she says.