The next morning the captain is sleeping with the utiphone cradled in his arms, drool running down his cheek. Myrha feels sort of sorry for him, so she sets a particularly caffeine-laden drink by his elbow, and then gets breakfast. Bartin is cheerfully getting his own, and Myrha thinks it’s way too early to be dealing with him, but she sits there and tries to make polite conversation anyway. How else is she going to get any useful information out of him?

“Going exploring again today?” he practically chirps.

Like a fucking bird.

She is not awake enough to cope with this.

“Well, Spinner’s still missing, and Lynne seems to be on a pretty hard-core rescue mission, so…I guess.”

“Let me know if you find anything interesting.”

“Like what: the plants that will melt my skin off?”

“You have such a sense of humor,” he says and pats her hand.

“Yeah, ha ha,” she drawls.

She refrains from pinning his hand to the table with her knife. Instead, she stabs viciously at the fried worm she’s consuming for breakfast. It’s poisonous to the members of its home planet, but it has become something of a tasty treat on Earth. It’s cheap and is often sold in vends at big events or large amusement stadiums. It’s fat and greasy and tastes delicious with ketchup.

“So, listen, Lynne has this theory that Spinner went off to find the research facility here. Do you know where it is?”

Bartin coughs up some of his drink, “What?”

“Yeah, we figured he might have been the one setting off the strange lights Fossam was rambling about.”

“That place is near the east side of the island’s jungle. I don’t have layouts of the island or anything, I couldn’t tell you how to get to it, but that’s its general location.”

“So, you’ve never once stumbled upon it?”

“No, why would I ever want to visit there?”

Because you seem to be the explorer type? She doesn’t say that though, just cuts up another piece of her worm.

“What kind of research was done there?” she asks.

“Well, according to the reports released, the Newfall Lieval Research Center was conducting experiments using the tree bark and plants of the island. I think the idea was to create some sort of chemical weapon or drug. The hallucination effects could be, I’m not sure, perhaps administered as some sort of torture drug. The plants, well, that’s rather obvious, considering that they burn human flesh.”

“Ugh, that’s horrible,” Myrha rears back.

No wonder he never wanted to find it.

“Yes, well,” Bartin looks as grave as she’s ever seen him, “as humans continue to explore the new frontier, we constantly find new ways to kill each other. Never mind the fact that chemical weaponry is banned on Earth and is frowned upon in many alien cultures we have alliances with; but because it’s new and unknown it can be unregulated. It can be explored in the name of science.”

“So, no one knew what they were doing out here?”

“The Newfall Company never revealed their true purpose to the public. Not until something went wrong.”

Uh-oh.

“What happened?”

“It’s hard to say, exactly. The Interstellar Alliance of Scientific Regulation and Control stepped in and declared the planet banned. They never revealed a reason beyond ‘chemical contamination’. I’m sure it was all classified.”

“It must have been something bad, then.”

“That, and I imagine they didn’t want any of the weaponry discoveries falling into the ‘wrong hands’. It was all hush-hush.”

“So, Spinner,” a flash of unease goes through her, “you don’t think that maybe he’s trying to find out what they were doing?”

“The facility was supposed to have been gutted, all contents removed, all documents confiscated, and all personnel sworn to silence. It would be difficult for someone to find out all the details.”

And Spinner doesn’t seem like the type to try to dig up chemical weapon secrets.

“But everything’s supposed to be okay now? No more contamination?”

“According to the Alliance. The only evidence I’ve found of previous human interference was a discarded pile of metal along one of the beaches, must have been scrap or something. As I haven’t had any troubles, I suppose they’re right and the planet is fine now.”

“Let me get this straight: you set up a hotel on a possibly-still-contaminated-with-chemical-weaponry planet no one else would want to visit, all because Turobeck might’ve crashed here?”

“I’m a romantic.”

“Oh really,” she says sourly.

“But wouldn’t it be glorious?” he gives her a shrewd glance, “To find Turobeck’s lost space craft? To find his body?”

“Um, gross.”

Bartin fiddles with the cord of his necklace, looking oddly intent.

“Maybe to find some of his poems? Imagine how much those would be worth!”

“Well, yeah. But his body? Gross.”

Bartin sighs and morosely picks at his food, “I thought you, of all people, would’ve understood me.”

She laughs, “You’re totally in love with Turobeck like how Req was in love with his imaginary fiancée Janice.”

“Ah, Captain Req,” Bartin says dreamily, “love poems to last throughout the ages!”

“Yuck, no way! Req was like, a total sop who had to make-up a girlfriend to write to because he didn’t have a real one.”

Bartin glares at her and she sits up straighter and they’re going to have a poetry battle, she can tell. Awesome.

“Req was an explorer at the dawn of the new space age! When interstellar flight took years! He had a right to write as much soppy love poems as he pleased!”

“Yeah, yeah, he’s the Magellan of space flight, I get it. Still doesn’t excuse bad poetry.”

“And yet, we still use some of his phrases in everyday speech! ‘By Jupiter’s moons’ was a phrase from one of his poems.”

“Yes, I know,” she cringes. She hates that phrase because she hates that poem, and yet she still has to catch herself from saying it.

“Just because it’s popular, doesn’t mean it’s good though,” she argues.

“But because it’s popular, doesn’t that mean it’s good?” he asks with a challenging glint in his eye.

“You’re a fan of Turobeck,” she cries, “how can you like Req as well? They’re like, total opposites. Turobeck describes the loneliness and grandness of exploring deep space while Req just sobs about a girl back home. An imaginary girl.”

“You are very single minded,” Bartin says, “just because you appreciate one type of poetry, does not mean you can’t appreciate another.”

Myrha slumps against the chair and folds her arms. Fine. Bartin may have won this round, but there was always next time.

“I knew you more intelligent than you’d led us to believe,” Lynne says.

Myrha turns to see her at the doorway, looking as neat and pretty as if she had never lain down to sleep.

“Tell Bartin that Req’s poetry is awful,” Myrha pleads.

Bartin’s eyes dart between the two of them in surprise.

“Please?” Myrha continues to beg, “It’s all about gross and icky stuff like love and feelings for someone who isn’t even real. Plus, it’s just bad. Like, he has no sense of grace or style or subtlety.”

Lynne puts a finger to her chin, clearly in thinking mode. Bartin still looks shocked that Lynne even knows what poetry is. Then Lynne meets Myrha’s eyes and begins to recite, in a very particular low and thoughtful voice, a Req poem:

“By Jupiter’s moons I can count the ways I love you. Shall I start at one and continue until you come undone? Two, three, four, my love bared to you forevermore? Five through ten, I’ll whisper to you again and again. I’ll run through eleven straight to sixty-seven; and even then I’d still have more ways than there are moons in the Heavens, to describe the ways I love you.”

Myrha is glad she’s sitting down. She feels a little weak-kneed right now.

“See?” she says faintly, “It’s bad poetry.”

“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” Bartin says.

“Yes, I get it,” Myrha grumbles, “I may think the poem’s crap, but that doesn’t mean it is. I get it. Okay.”

“You are annoyed,” Lynne points out very unhelpfully.

Well, she did just lose a poetry battle to a crazy isolated liar and an android.

Luckily, she’s distracted from her bad mood when someone stumbles in and basically runs Lynne over. Lynne helps steady the frantically breathing woman, and Myrha recognizes her as the older lady with the silent husband.

“I ran all the way here!” She flaps her hands wildly, blowing air at her eyes to dry the presence of tears.

“What’s the matter?” Bartin stands up.

“It’s Fossam. He’s gone. Missing. Disappeared.”

And then she bursts out into fresh tears. Lynne awkwardly pats her on the back, seeing as how the lady is now clinging to her.

“Start from the beginning,” Bartin commands wearily.

“My husband and I were at campsite four. We decided to have breakfast with Fossam, but when we arrived, he was gone. All of his things were still there, but he was gone.”

“He went for a leak?” Myrha suggests.

“You are particularly enamored with that theory,” Lynne says wryly.

“We waited for him for an hour,” the lady says stubbornly.

Myrha shrugs, “Okay, a dump then.”

“His things were trashed!”

“He had a temper?”

Lynne’s trying to stop from laughing. The lady looks like she’s ready to strangle Myrha.

“Think of what might have happened! He might have been eaten by something.”

“There aren’t large animals on the surface of this planet,” Lynne says.

Bartin nods in confirmation.

“Well, as far as we know anyway,” Myrha grins, a touch sadistically.

The lady lets out a wail. Bartin cuts her off before she can completely fall apart.

“Where’s your husband?” Bartin asks.

“Karry’s at the campsite. He can’t walk well, gets tried easily.”

“You left him there?” Myrha asks.

“Well he wanted to be there in case Fossam returned. And just because he can’t walk, doesn’t mean he can’t fight. He’s got a weapon.”

“Okay, listen, I want you to sit, get a drink, and calm down. We’ll go to the campsite for Karry and keep a lookout for Fossam, all right?” Bartin says.

She nods and collapses in a chair.

Myrha sighs and guesses breakfast is over. It’s going to be one of those days. She can tell.