To be honest, I just wandered around to find the house that seemed familiar to me. I had no idea which direction I had come from. My stomach was quite opposed to the idea of walking around any longer and urged me to find something to eat. Luckily, this planet was full of plants. I was sure that I’d find something that looked edible. All I can say now is that you should never trust your eyes in a strange place.

There was a large park on one side of the town they had built specifically for us. A few signs indicated that we could use this park in whatever way we wanted and that the current plants were meant to offer food. Most plants didn’t seem familiar to me but one of them had fruits that I thought I recognised: apples. I took a closer look at them to identify the ones that were ready to be picked and chose two red ones. They were a bit bigger than the apples I remembered from Earth but that only encouraged my stomach to loudly point out its need for food.

Until that moment, I had planned to go home and give one of the “apples” to Tryox before eating the other one. I had hoped that the small gift would be a good start for the apology. The others had mentioned that their native partners missed parts of their own culture in our town. What worried me was that I had no idea if Tryox even liked this fruit.

However, my hunger decided that I needed to take a bite right away and eat the “apple” on my way back to the house. I took the first bite before I stepped away from the tree. To my surprise, it didn’t taste like an apple at all. It was much more fibrous and not as sweet. Although it wasn’t the tastiest fruit, I took another bite. That was when the first effects started - my tongue felt numb and my throat hurt. Then breathing got difficult and my vision got blurry. I heard someone shout my name and wanted to turn to where the voice came from which only resulted in the dizziness setting in. By now, I was sure I had some allergic reaction to the fruit. My thoughts seemed to be covered by a haze and my legs went limb before I could even identify who was calling my name. I passed out for a moment, falling to the ground that felt unexpectedly soft.

When I opened my eyes again, a green person with Tryox’s red eyes sat next to me on the ground, looking worried - almost panicked. “We need to get you to a doctor,” he said, but I barely heard him.

“You’re green,” I replied weakly, trying to smile to get that worried look off his face.

“You need a doctor or you’ll die!” he said a bit louder, probably attracting the attention of others.

When he looked like he was about to shout for help, I stopped him, “No, you’ll get in trouble. No doctors.” Somehow the knowledge that he was responsible for my well-being got through to my blurry mind. “Tell them I relapsed,” I mumbled, hoping he’d understand me despite the lack of energy in my body. I was missing oxygen and any control over most of my body.

The last image I remember is Tryox’s face of confusion and concern. I lost consciousness before he picked me up and ran for his life - or mine.