"I knew it! I knew there was somebody else on the ship with you, I was even right that it was a girl!" Tayle declared with a triumphant smile.

"How did you know?" I pouted, walking over to stand beside Hailey.

"The Rama I knew when you left would never have become as responsible a man as you are now without a woman's touch."

"Hey, a man can change a lot in eight years, you know."

"Don't try to deceive me, Rama. A woman always knows." Gericht and Winri's heads were going back and forth like they were watching a game of cargo-ball.

" Look, I may have been a bit... impetuous when I left, and yes I was, and am, still a bit reckless. But you don't survive out there without growing up a bit. I do have this incredible ship now, but I've told you what my life was like before, so give me some credit, Tayle. I may not be the best pilot out there, but I'm good at thinking on my feet if nothing else. That counts for a lot out there." Tayle's face grew more serious at my tone of voice. I wasn't usually all that big on ego, there wasn't room in the void for it. Either you could do it or you couldn't, and if you couldn't, pretending you could was a quick way to frag yourself and everyone else relying on you. But hearing it from Tayle, even as a joke, hit a bit harder than I thought it would. Here was one of the two people who had practically raised me denigrating my accomplishments. Even if it was in jest, there were some things that you shouldn't make light of, and the danger of the void was pretty high on my list of those things.

"It's true, Rama is an excellent Captain. He works hard to learn what he doesn't know and tries to remember to listen to what I have to say. He may be reckless, but sometimes, you have to be a little reckless to succeed." I looked down in surprise at Hailey, who gave me a smile, as she defended me. I felt her hand reach out and grab mine where I had unconsciously clasped them behind my back.

"Ah, yea, sorry, Rama. I think I took it a little too far maybe, I didn't mean to make light of what you've experienced." Tayle gave me an apologetic smile which I returned with a shrug to tell her all was forgiven.

"Wah! Your hair is so pretty!" Any further conversation on the topic was cut off by the appearance of solar storm Winri in front of Hailey, eyes sparkling in interest at her full head of silvery-blonde hair. I covered my laugh with a cough as Hailey unconsciously took a step back, letting go of my hand, to preserve her personal space, only for Winri to follow her.

"Well, it's a bit late everyone, but I'd like you to meet Hailey, my second in command and the reason I'm alive to see you all again." Hailey had taken refuge behind me but peeked out at my words, giving everyone a shy smile.

"Ah, Hello. It's nice to meet you."

"Well met, Hailey." Gericht, as always, was a man of few words.

"It's good to meet you too, Hailey." Tayle gave her a soft smile that reminded me of the ones she gave me as a child.

"Oh! Oh! I'm Winri! You're so pretty! What do you use to keep your hair! Will it let me grow hair?! Why don't you have any radscars like me? Your skin's so pretty and smooth!" Solar storm Winri had arrived in full force, revealed to be a category nine in strength.

"Um..."

"Let's leave that topic for later, alright Winri? Breakfast is getting cold." Winri immediately shifted directions at the mention of food.

"Well, what's taking you so long then?! I'm hungry! Show me the food already!"

"Alright already, ease off on the throttle a bit, will you? Talk about people changing as they grow older, I would have thought you'd have lost some of this energy, Winri." I grabbed Hailey's hand, leading her beside me as she tried to recover from the passage of Winri through her area as we headed into the ship.

"Nope! Gericht says my boundless energy is one of my best points, so I make sure to take care of myself and stay healthy so that I'm always at max charge!" I was about to reply to Winri when I caught the sly grin on Tayle's face.

"What?"

"Nothing, just you and Hailey seem to be getting along quite well~"

"What's that supposed to mean?" I demanded.

"Well, here you are leading her by the hand. It makes one wonder what a young couple like you might be getting up to, all alone with this entire ship to yourself." Hailey recovered from her Winri-induced daze with a squeak, and we both let go like we'd been burned, our faces aflame.

"I- We're- We don't have that kind of relationship, she's my second in command. It wouldn't be right for a captain to be in a relationship with one of his officers." I sputtered.

"Hmm? If you say so. Well, whatever. You promised me food, so you better follow through." Tayle sauntered off ahead while I huffed in frustration. Obviously, this was payback for all the trouble I'd given her as a kid. But that meant that this was probably just the start of her retribution. I'm reconsidering my decision to invite her along all of a sudden.

Hailey remained quiet, a strange look in her eyes that I couldn't translate, as we walked the rest of the way to the cafeteria. Winri made up for the lack of other conversation all on her own easily enough though. The chatterbox was zooming around us as we walked talking at the speed of light about everything from the shade of paint used on the walls to the softness of the carpet or the height of the ceiling. Gericht was happy to let Winri do all the talking as usual, a fond smile on his lips. He was the calm center of the storm. Tayle, much like when we were kids looked on with fond exasperation, though I caught a bit of a more mischievous look to her smile when she looked at Hailey and me.

Coming to a halt outside the doors to the cafeteria, I had to wait for Winri to realize we had stopped. She reappeared between me and Gericht as if she'd never left, bouncing on her heels in anticipation. Shaking my head, I stepped forward triggering the doors and letting them inside.

I'd actually renovated the cafeteria for our breakfast. I don't know why I didn't think of doing it sooner, there aren't nearly enough people on the ship to need this many tables and chairs. So instead I'd reformed the smart matter furniture into a large round table with chairs, taking up about a quarter of the room. I made the rest of the cafeteria into a media room and lounge with couches, and coffee tables. I also fabbed up another holo-projector to watch movies on as well.

Winri made a beeline for where the food was all sitting on warmers along the counter between the cafeteria and kitchen. Gericht, ever aware of the thoughts of his energetic other half, grabbed her by the collar of her shirt bringing her charge to an abrupt halt.

"Hey! Geri~ why'd you stop me? I'm hungry. I wanna eat."

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

"Rude." I watched in amazement as it only took a single word from Gericht to calm Winri.

"Ah, sorry, Rama. I guess I got a little ahead of myself there huh?" She sheepishly apologized, ducking her head in shame.

"Don't worry about it, Winri. You wouldn't be the Winri we knew if you weren't one booster away from bouncing off the walls. But in this case, it's a good thing you stopped because I have dishes made specifically for each of you that I need to hand out. You still have that massive sweet tooth don't you?" I asked as she made her way over to the table and took a seat while I headed to the counter.

"Ah, actually that's Gericht." I turned and stared at her confused.

"But you were always spending all your money on sweets whenever we had a freighter visit."

"I was, um, buying them for Gericht. He's the one with the giant sweet tooth." Winri shrunk down in her chair, embarrassed.

I looked back and forth between the two. Gericht, the quiet one, and Winri, the excitable one with boundless energy. Out of the two of them, you would have expected Winri to be the one fueled by sugar. Well, that threw things off a bit. Hopefully, Winri was okay with a 'meat and potatoes' omelette instead.

"Alright, well I guess I'll swap your dishes then, I hope you'll like what I made as Gericht's dish. Everyone else, please go ahead and join Winri at the table and I'll serve you."

"Rama, you don't need to do it all yourself, let us help." Tayle protested.

"Nope, I'm the Captain. It's my ship, so my rules and my rules say guests sit down and wait for the Captain to serve them." I shooed her away back to the table as I loaded several of the grav-trays with food.

Returning to the table I set about serving everyone, placing the covered plates in front of them. I turned back to find that Hailey had snuck out of her chair and was helping by bringing the drinks to the table. I gave her a frown, but she merely gave me a smile in return and I could only shake my head. I studiously ignored Tayle's smirk at our interaction and my inability to tell Hailey no.

Soon, everyone had a covered plate in front of them while the middle of the table was filled with covered dishes that held the rest of the food I had spent all morning making. Looking around, I was pleased to see all their faces filled with anticipation.

"Well, what are you waiting for? Dig in." It was like throwing a solid chunk of carbon in front of a Kab.

The food disappeared astonishingly quickly now that I had given permission. The lids were removed and soon the only sound was that of cutlery and the visceral enjoyment of a good meal. The dishes in the middle of the table emptied rapidly.

Gericht had a tower of pancakes doused in syrup and fruit on his plate in front of him and appeared as if he was in heaven, his eyes closed in bliss as he chewed. Winri for her part had a mountain of hashbrowns on her plate topped with a cap of what appeared to be mustard, ketchup, and relish. I shuddered at the combination, but she appeared to find the taste appealing because she dove into it with wild abandon, smearing the unholy combination across her face. Tayle's plate held a variety of the different foods I had prepared, but most of it was reserved for the giant mound of bacon and sausage that she had acquired.

Hailey and I were content with our own moderate and balanced meals, watching in morbid fascination at the complete massacre of the food we'd cooked. The poor omelettes she'd worked so hard on had barely lasted a minute before meeting total destruction.

Finally, the massacre was over, and my guests relaxed, bellies full. Gericht was smiling in contentment, his sweet tooth satisfied while Winri idly kicked her legs as she sipped on a glass of juice. Tayle similarly was content to sip daintily at a mug of tea, her good manners belying the efficiency with which she had demolished the meal.

"That was delicious, Rama. Thank you for having us over for breakfast." Tayle said.

"Yea! The food was super delicious, beats anything we ever had on the hab." Winri agreed.

"Indeed, it was excellent." Getting more than a couple of words out of Gericht was high praise indeed.

"Well, I'm glad you all enjoyed it. Consider it a demonstration of some of the benefits of signing up with me, being able to eat food like this every day."

"Wait, you eat like this every day?" Tayle looked at me incredulously.

"Mhm, my ship has a full set of food synthesizers that can make just about anything you could ask for and keeps a ready supply of most common foodstuffs in stock. About the only thing I've found it has trouble with is making actual bones."

"Wow, that must be so nice," Winri commented dreamily, clearly fantasizing about all the different kinds of food I had to eat, and were my eyes lying to me or did Gericht have some drool leaking from the corner of his mouth?

"Yea, even the worst day isn't so bad when you can have a good meal." I agreed.

Speaking of bad days, Rama, I have the feeling you may have left out more details than just Hailey here." Leave it to Tayle to pick out my omissions.

"Ah, yea, I didn't want to scare you guys off and it would have kind of exposed the existence of Hailey here so I left a few things out."

"So, what? You made a stop somewhere to pick up your sweetheart here, sweeping her off her feet and saving her? Giving her the same makeover you got?" Oh, this was not going to go well, I could tell already.

"No, actually quite the opposite. Hailey saved me, she was on this ship sitting in subspace. If she hadn't shown up when she did, I would have suffocated on that asteroid." Tayle looked stricken, and Winri had turned pale. Even the ever-stoic Gericht showed some amount of shock to my revelation. For good reason too, suffocating is one of the most terrifying ways to die. Living in space means that you learn and train on how to deal with various disasters and problems that you might have to deal with, one of those is suffocation. We've all had to train on how to deal with a limited air supply and asphyxiation. It's one of the most terrifying things you can ever experience, that no matter how hard you breathe, you're dying. Having to fight the urge to take off your helmet in a hard vacuum as your mind desperately insists that there's air there and all you need to do is open your helmet.

"Technically, you did die, Rama. When I brought you aboard you were no longer breathing and your heart had stopped." Hailey interjected and Winri somehow went even paler while Tayle looked almost ready to pass out.

I admit, a morbid part of me felt good in a way, to know they still cared this much about me. That hearing about my near- well actual-death experience caused them this much distress. They had welcomed my return with open arms, and been quite happy to see me alive and well. But, seeing their fear really showed how much I meant to them. I know it's selfish, but I can't help feeling this way. After living for so long on my own, with nobody caring if I lived or died until I met Hailey, it was nice to know someone else did.

"Wait, you said that she found you, from Subspace? I'm no engineer but even I know that's impossible." Winri frowned.

"I know, right? I can tell you I was shocked when I learned what all this ship could do. It's far more advanced than anything I've ever seen the Itzli use. She can see in Subspace and from Subspace into real space too. You already know about the fabricators and food synthesizers. Oh, and she's fast too, really fast." Now that I had the chance, I couldn't help but brag.

"But how?" Winri burst out, "I mean if this ship is human, it must be hundreds of years old! Wait, that would also mean that Hailey is too!" I nodded.

"That's something for Hailey to talk about if she wants. As for the ship, as far as we've been able to figure Humans aren't native to around here at all. We think that maybe we're all the descendants of some long-lost expedition or fleet. Hailey and I were planning on seeing if we could find any traces of it after we were done here."

"So, here's the question that's been bugging me, Rama. If it's Hailey's ship, why are you in charge?" Tayle had apparently recovered from her earlier scare.

"Again, that's for Hailey to say if she wants. It's not my place to go around divulging the personal details of my officers." I looked to Hailey who shook her head.

"It's not really that important, I was the subject of a SUNS military and scientific program to produce next-generation technology. I was considered a 'strategic asset of critical importance' so I was restricted from holding any station or position that would put me at undue risk. The position of ship's captain, or indeed even crew, was considered one of those. I did however have the rank and authority under emergency regulations to appoint a new captain for the ship." Hailey shrugged at the slackjawed expressions of my friends.

"Yea, Hailey here is a certified super genius, who knew?" I desperately wanted to reach over and lift their jaws back up.

"I was classified as cargo on the ship's manifest until Rama broke it somehow, which I still want to know how you did." Hailey glared at me, a pout on her lips.

"Hey, your guess is as good as mine. I don't know what I did either, other than get angry at it. I don't think that counts though, I doubt the ship can be scared." I protested, hands raised.

"You'd be surprised." I heard Hailey mutter under her breath.

"So you've been in cold sleep pretty much this whole time?" Tayle asked.

"Yes, before Rama found the beacon, I only woke up to do necessary maintenance on the ship. The rest of the time I've been asleep. As best I can tell it's been over three hundred years at least since I was first ordered to standby."

"That's horrible, I can't even imagine what it's like. To wake up knowing that everyone you ever knew is dead." Hailey shook her head, hair swaying softly.

"I didn't know many people before it happened. I was a military asset, and the very knowledge of my existence was strictly controlled. There was no one that I would miss or be missed by."

"That's even worse! You're not some- some machine! You're a person! You deserve to have friends and family just like anyone else!" Tayle looked torn between wanting to hunt down some long-dead human officer to strangle them or leaping over the table to smother Hailey to death in a hug.

"It was worth it, I found Rama after all." My face felt hotter than the surface of the sun at Hailey's innocent declaration, a smile on her face.

"I- um, er well I guess so." Seeing Tayle lost for words was worth the embarrassment though.

"And on that note, let me show you around the rest of the ship now, that is if you can move yet." I smiled at the indignant reactions I received for my jest as they all stood up.

We moved on, and I showed them the various crew facilities. Winri was enamored with the recreation room's theater, and Gericht seemed content to simply take it all in while Tayle showed a keen interest in the exercise equipment. I explained what everything was and answered their questions, including Winri's thousand and one inane ones.

I showed off the smart matter furniture to many 'ooh's' and 'ah's' of appreciation as I repeatedly broke them down and rebuilt them. Winri demanded I turn the bedroom of the spare quarters I used for the demonstration into a giant bed so she could jump around on it. Tayle chided me for spoiling the little gremlin, but even she couldn't keep a smile off her face watching Winri bounce around on it.

I didn't take them to any of the important parts of the ship, like the bridge or engine room. There wasn't any point until I knew whether or not they were coming with me. The only exception was the medical bay, which I left as our last stop. By now it was getting late in the morning and they would need to leave soon for their shifts at their job. Well, Gericht and Tayle would, Winri was free because Gericht made enough to take care of both of them.

As we entered the medical bay, they were strangely quiet after realizing where they were. Winri stayed by Gericht's side instead of bouncing around all over the place looking at everything. Tayle huddled in on herself a little as she looked at the pristine row of medical beds.

"So, this is where..." I quickly caught on to where their minds had gone at Tayle's trailing words.

"Yea, this was where I woke up after I died."