When Acinos appeared in the window of the transport shuttle, Seph let out a long sigh of relief. Green and yellow forests and blue oceans covered the planet. There was life here, not just sand and ruins. The shuttle passed the nearest big city, far above the skyscrapers and lanes of flying traffic, before landing at the spaceport outside of the smaller college town.

Hundreds of students flooded the sidewalks of the familiar town. Seph weaved through the crowd, his hands stuffed into his coat pockets, shoulders hunched against the icy wind.

Brick buildings lined the streets, and small hover bikes zoomed past. He stood in front of the building where Bria worked, running his fingers over the fabric of his scarf. He pulled back his sleeve to reach his wearable, opening up the holographic display and sending Antony a message that hopefully would ring pleasant and neutral.

Hey, just wanted to see how you were doing, he wrote. They hadn’t talked since Seph left the medical station, and he told himself that Antony was either still traveling or still getting settled.

The building’s front door creaked open as a group of students filed out, and Seph walked inside before he changed his mind. Yellow light suffused the hallway, and his shoes clicked against the tile as he climbed to the third floor. He opened the door to the lab and found it empty of students. Light spilled in through the windows, casting a bright glow over the benches and equipment.

He peered down at the street. The flood of students on the sidewalks below dried up as classes started. Snowflakes danced in the air outside. It wasn’t cold enough for them to stick, but inside they were melting in his hair and on his coat.

The door to Bria’s office was open a crack, and he knocked, poking his head inside. She sat hunched over her desk, glancing between the holographic display of her computer and a tablet on her desk. Her jaw was clenched and he could practically hear her grinding her teeth.

“Hey, Bria,” he said.

She jumped. “Oh gosh, I didn’t hear you there.”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”

“No, it’s fine. Please, come in,” she said. “Is that a new coat?”

He pulled up a chair and sat, smoothing his hands over the wool of his coat. This close, the dark circles under her eyes stood out. “Yeah, I bought it in on the way into town, when I realized hadn’t exactly packed for cold weather.”

“It’s good to see you.” She glanced at her computer. “My students aren’t back from their expedition yet, but everything seems to be going well.”

“Good, that’s good.” His voice came out pinched, and he cleared his throat. “So, what are you doing in the lab? Thought you were going to rest,” he said in what he hoped was a gentle tone and not an accusatory one.

Bria rubbed her temples. “I’ll rest better when I’m finished with this paperwork,” she said, her words clipped as she turned back to her screen.

“Ah. Well, better to finish it than take it home, I suppose,” Seph said. The tension in her voice and frame was stirring up his own anxiety.

“How long will you be in town?”

“I’m not sure. I was planning on staying here while I get my next move sorted, so it may be a few weeks.”

Bria looked away from her computer, facing him. “I should be free to spend more time with you in a few days,” she said, smiling weakly.

“It’s alright. I wanted to see how you were, and to settle my nerves for a bit. I thought familiar scenery might help,” Seph said, unsure whether he believed himself. He stood. “I’ll get out of your hair. Let me know if you want to get dinner or whatnot.”

“I will,” she said.

Once out of the lab, he jogged down the stairs and into the cold. The wind kicked up, and he hunched his shoulders against it, tucking his chin into his scarf.

The walk did nothing to ease his tension, and his heart pounded as he fumbled with the lock to his hotel room. On the third try, the door clicked, and he flopped onto the bed. Bria had been tense from head to foot, her entire demeanor tight and closed off.

Right beneath that bubbled a whole stew of anxiety that had radiated off her. Did she even recognize it? Or was her anxiety so baked into her routine that she didn’t notice it until she was on the verge of breaking?

“Oh my god, why am I freaking out,” Seph muttered. “Nothing happened. It was nothing. I only said hi and now I’m a mess.” He rolled over, grabbing a pillow to stuff his face into and groan. “I knew it was a bad idea to come back here. It’s not like I can do anything for Bria, and I probably wrecked things with Antony, anyway.”

He pulled up his conversation with Antony and saw no new messages from him. Hands shaking, he began to type.

Hey, I wanted to say I’m sorry for the other day. None of us were responsible for what happened on the expedition, and I know that. I wanted to get some things off my chest then. I wanted to know if you blamed me for what happened.

He let out a rattling breath and continued.

But I vented that to you, and it didn’t help either of us. I’m sorry for how everything turned out. Anyway, I’d like to talk to you when you can.

Relief washed over him, and he felt better for a few moments. And then he reread what he wrote and his anxiety returned. Did he do the same thing again that he was trying to apologize for, broadcasting his anxieties and making both of them feel worse?

He curled up on the bed, still wearing his coat. Fumbling with his wearable, he undid the watch strap and tossed it onto the couch, out of reach.

He woke to a loud buzzing.

Blinking his eyes, he sat up, whirling around for the source of the sound but becoming tangled in his coat. Blearily, he reached for his wearable. Antony was calling him.

“Hey, I got your messages. Are you alright?” Antony asked, his head and shoulders popping up in holographic form.

“No, yeah, I mean, I was trying to apologize for doing this whole thing, and then I did it again. Got all my anxieties all over you,” Seph said.

“Don’t worry about that. Are you okay, like are you safe?” He sounded concerned.

“Safe, yeah. I am. I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to worry you.”

“Where are you, anyway?” Antony squinted at him. “Did you just get in?”

“Ah, not exactly. I got in a little while ago and then met Bria. Got back to the hotel, upset myself, and then I suppose I fell asleep.”

“With you coat on?”

Seph shrugged out of his coat and tossed it over the couch’s arm. “It certainly looks that way.”

“It’s all good. I would’ve gotten back to you earlier, but I had my wearable off.” He ran his hand through his hair, leaving it fluffy. Seph badly wanted to run his fingers through it as well. “So, I moved over to this moon for the time being, the one we could see from the medical station. The moon is a popular stopover point for people coming from there. They have good therapy programs for folks who need some time to adjust.”

“Of course.”

“Anyway, I enrolled in the soonest one, not realizing it was an art therapy program. It isn’t what I would have picked, but it is kinda fun. I made a vase today. Anyway, I took off my wearable today, so I didn’t get clay all over it.”

“I understand,” Seph said. “Are you doing alright, then?”

“I’m alright. Could be better, could be worse.” He cleared his throat. “About what you said in the message, I don’t blame you for any of this. I don’t have any bad feelings toward you, and I want you to know that.”

Seph’s breath hitched, and he exhaled slowly. “Thank you, Antony.”

Antony nodded, looking off at something out of frame. “The other day was a mess, but it was a mutually created mess. Could have been a lot worse, frankly. I think that you and I need to take care we aren’t setting each other off. I don’t mean walk on eggshells, but to be aware of what we’re saying and catch it if we get reactive.”

“Do you …” Seph trailed off. “I’m not saying this to be self-deprecating, but do you really want to be in contact with me right now?”

Antony met his gaze. “Yes, I do. I’m not the greatest company, but I don’t want to give up.”

“You don’t need to be the greatest company. I appreciate you being you,” Seph said.

“That’s good to hear,” Antony said. “You know, I’ve wanted to get to know you for a long time, back since I first saw you present.”

Seph tilted his head. “I didn’t present at that conference when we met.”

“No, I mean before that, when you had your own lab. You gave this keynote presentation one night and honestly, I was a little intimidated. I mean, you seemed like such a rock star on stage there. Talking about big ideas and backing them up with solid data,” Antony said. “You were on fire.”

“Oh,” Seph said softly, nodding. “I was proud of that talk, but I’m not a rock star. I’ve only ever been a person. And I had no idea you were there. Wonder what would have happened if we’d met properly then.”

Antony snorted. “I was pretty different back then. Even with everything that happened, I’m thinking we have a better chance of getting along now. Anyway, that reminds me, how was Bria?”

“Oh, radiating tension and stress. But she’s out and about, trying to finish the rest of her paperwork before taking time off.”

“Yeah, she’s been in contact with me, so, figured as much,” Antony said with a nod. “How does it feel being back there on Acinos? I thought it made sense for you to go, but it also seems like … a lot.”

Seph shrugged. “Being here feels kinda bad, but I would have wondered how she was, and now I can put this part of my life to bed,” he said, gesturing at the town behind him, where the street lights and brick buildings were visible through the window.

“So, you lived there for a few years, but you had moved on while we were planning the expedition, right?”

“Yeah. I gave Bria about a month’s notice that I was done. Sold my furniture, moved out, hauled the rest of my stuff to the space station at the edge of Acinos’s system. Lived there for about four months before Bria contacted me about this expedition.”

Antony’s eyebrows shot up. “I know that station. That place is a bit … gritty.”

“Rough and tumble, yes, but the people I met there were kind. And it’s a good place to be anonymous.”

“Can I ask you, did you and Bria have a blow-up? For you to leave, I mean,” Antony said.

Seph considered. “Not so much a blow-up as a gradual erosion of our working relationship. Much of it centered on this postdoctoral researcher in her lab. According to this woman, the only true research was academic research at traditional, planet-bound universities with traditional funding. She gave horrendous advice to younger grad students and undergrads, and Bria did nothing.”

“Gross,” Antony said with a grimace. “That kind of elitism excludes universities in places that don’t have government grant programs. Those places need non-traditional funding to survive.”

Seph threw his hands up. “Exactly! It’s not like Bria agreed with her, but she also refused to talk to her about this, and it destroyed the work environment in her lab.”

“Infuriating.”

“Anyway, as bad as that was, my charming ex-boyfriend was the last straw. When he broke up with me, he told me that my work had ruined my personality, and he didn’t see a way to fix it,” Seph said.

Antony scowled in disgust. “What a piece of sh—”

“Oh, I know. But that was the end of our relationship.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you, Seph. There is nothing wrong with your personality,” Antony said.

“Well, there are things I’d change, but thank you,” Seph said. “It hurt, but I was able to discredit a lot of the garbage that he said when I found out he was dating someone else three weeks later. We were together for three years.”

“Does he still live around there? You won’t run into him there, will you?”

“No, he later jetted off to the other side of the galaxy with his new friend.”

“Good grief, you had a bad time of it the last few years. I’m sorry,” Antony said. “Wish we could hug it out right now.”

Seph smiled at him. “Me too.”

Despite the less than stellar start to his trip, Seph relaxed enough to enjoy revisiting his favorite restaurants and museums, intermittently chatting with Antony. He spent an afternoon shopping, finally buying a few pairs of well-fitting pants. His new jeans hugged his waist in a pleasing way and were stretchy enough that he had some leeway if his butt ever returned.

Early Friday morning, Bria messaged him, asking if he would meet her for lunch. He obliged.

She waved to him from the break room as he entered the lab. “Good morning,” she said, taking another sip of her coffee. The dark circles under her eyes weren’t as visible today, and she dressed in a white and purple blouse and black slacks. Her auburn hair was tied back in its usual neat braid.

“Hey, how’s it going?”

“Good, good,” she said. “I’ve finished up all the paperwork for the funders. They have their diagnostics data, and the writeup on the ruins is ours to publish as we see fit.”

“Well, that’s good.” Seph didn’t want to think about that right now. “I can’t say I’m ready to work on that at the moment, though.”

The door of the lab creaked open, and a woman entered, her long navy coat swishing around her knees. She had warm tan skin and shoulder length black hair with a touch of white around her temples.

Her eyes lit up. “Seph, I didn’t know you were going to be here!”

“H-hello there!” he said. The lilt to her voice was familiar, but he couldn’t place her. She stepped closer, standing at eye level with Seph, and Bria popped out of the break room.

“Isabelle, hello!” Bria said, more enthusiastic than she’d been when he came in.

She flashed Bria a brilliant smile. “Good morning, my friend.” Then her expression shifted to concern, and she turned to Seph.

“I heard what happened on your expedition. I am truly sorry. It’s hard to lose a colleague, and especially under such difficult circumstances,” she said.

He nodded. “Yes, it was.”

“Is your other colleague doing okay? Antony, was it?”

“That’s right,” Seph said, surprised. “He’s stable, doing better now that he’s off that medical station.”

“Good, that’s good.”

Bria stepped forward, a familiar tension back in her expression. “So Isabelle, what brought you over to this side of campus this morning?”

“I was stopping by to see if you wanted to get lunch. But now I’d like to invite you both, if you’re free,” she said, gesturing between Bria and Seph.

The three of them walked to the main street, away from the campus buildings, closer to the center of town. Restaurants and bookstores lined the way, with delicious smells wafting down the street.

“I was thinking Phil’s, if that sounds good to you,” Isabelle said, pointing to the dark brick building with gold lettering in front of them.

“Certainly,” Bria said.

“Is this place new?” Seph asked as they walked inside. The lighting was low and inviting, with red wood walls and ornate wrought iron lamps hanging from the ceiling.

“It’s been here about six months,” Isabelle said. “Fantastic brunch. Bria and I started coming here when I could drag her out of the office.”

Bria huffed, going pink in the face. She slid into the booth after Isabelle and Seph sat across from them. They ordered an appetizer to share, roasted red pepper hummus on toasted bread. It was crunchy and delicious, savory with a hint of sweetness from the peppers.

“I was on this side of campus for a seminar earlier today. One of the biochemistry students is working on the serotonin synthesis pathway,” Isabelle said.

“How was it?” Bria asked.

“Good. It was a solid story. They also did some mathematical analysis with learning algorithms and such. That’s more your field, isn’t it, Seph?” Her eyes twinkled with intensity and curiosity.

“That’s right. I was more in the realm of neural circuit mapping than biochemistry,” he said. Something about her speech pattern was so familiar, but he still couldn’t place her. It wasn’t like him to forget a colleague.

She nodded. “Good, good. You know me. If there’s anything serotonin-related, I have to check it out,” she said.

In a moment, he realized who she was—there was only one professor he had known in the biology department who loved anything and everything serotonin.

“Naturally,” Seph said, unable to keep his sudden recognition from his face.

Isabelle caught his reaction and lightly tapped her palm against her forehead. “Oh my goodness, I forgot we haven’t seen each other in a while, Seph. I suppose I thought Bria may have mentioned something.”

Bria’s face and ears reddened again, but Isabelle didn’t notice.

“Oh, you’re fine, Isabelle. I apologize; I ought to have asked for a reintroduction,” he said.

“I suppose serotonin is typically enough of an introduction for me,” she said with a laugh. “As it happened, I came out, oh, a month or two after you left the university.”

“That’s wonderful,” Seph said. “You look positively joyful.”

“That’s kind of you.” Isabelle’s eyes lit up, and she looked at Bria. “Oh, on a related note, we were able to convince the university to add time to the tenure clock for anyone undergoing a gender transition. Technically, their previous policy should have covered transitions, but now it’s all officially written in, so fewer hoops to jump through.”

“Wow, that’s great,” Seph said.

Bria smiled at her. “Not that you’d need an extension. You’re a shoo-in.”

“Thanks. Of course, this wasn’t just about me, it was about setting a precedent. And Bria was lovely, really instrumental in working with the university.” Isabelle turned to her. “Really, I appreciated it, and I appreciated how often you made time to check up on me during your expedition.”

Isabelle smiled brightly enough to warm the entire room, and Bria’s face was blazing red. “Oh, well, naturally, I was happy to offer support,” she said.

Then their food arrived, saving Bria from near spontaneous combustion. Seph caught her eye and quirked an eyebrow, but she shut down again, busying herself with her lunch.