Dear Jim,

Today my time on the Zephyrus is over, at least until it is again my turn to work here. In the morning I packed the few things I had brought with me and cleaned the tiny room I had slept in during my stay. Will I miss it? I don't know, but I will be happy to have a planet under my feet again. I said goodbye to the others and told the pretty flower lady to be nice and that I would visit her again.

It was Alejandra who took me down to Cluster 3 in the shuttle. As we descended I watched the ever changing pattern of clouds whirling above this ball in space. We have seen so little of this world so far. There are oceans and continents we have only seen from above. We have only seen our little pieces of land so far. Isn't that a pity? But we have only two shuttles.

Before I could continue to think about that, we dived through a cloud and the land stretched out below us. There was the dark streak of mountains to the west and then I saw the lake and the river. We landed on the meeting place, between the OMR's tent and Maia's and Arthur's pod. There was still a bit of snow in the shadow of the large tree, which stood there. Although the air was cool, the rays of the sun were warm and the ground was soft and muddy from unfreezing. The grass all around was brown and flattened from the snow.

As soon as we emerged from the shuttle, the door of the pod opened and Maia came down the stairs and gave me a hug. She told me how happy she was that I was back, then I had to introduce her to Alejandra and we were told to come over for lunch later. Until then I showed my new friend around. We went to the lake and Alejandra skipped a few stones on the water. Mine all just sank with a plop. It was fun nonetheless. We walked along the shores and I showed her the Pollaks' tent – which I had already told her about. It looked slightly battered, I noticed. Not, that I pity them for it.

When we returned to the shuttle, benches and tables had been put up in the meeting place. Arthur was just filling bowls with stew from a large pot and handed them out to everyone. At one table there were Barbara, Loreley and Maia. Tom and Peter were sitting at another. I introduced everyone to Alejandra and we sat down and received our food from Arthur.

After Alejandra and I told about all the things we had seen at the other clousters and all the boredom we had to endure up on the ship, I asked about what I had missed while not being there.

'Guess what?' Peter said. 'Two weeks ago there was a knock at my door and it was Pollak. That smegging robo-maid is not working again and he brought it straigth to my shed, like it is the most normal thing.'

I groaned.

'You groan?' Peter commented. 'I groan. I swear that smegging thing is moving around when I'm not looking!'

I rolled my eyes but promised to have a look at it right this evening. I didn't want to think about it at the moment and decided to change the topic.

'There's something I meant to ask you,' I said. 'Why did you all join this mission?' I was surpised I never thought of asking this before.

'My sister joined – she's on the Boreas, as you all know. We have always done everything together so I thought why not? It's a pity we can't be here together right now, but she'll get here,' Loreley told us. 'I really miss her, you know?'

Arthur nodded.

'Maia and I decided to come here together. It seemed like an opportunity, you know? A fresh start,' he explained.

'I guess this is the freshest start anyone can get,' Alejandra observed.

'I also needed a new start. My farm was destroyed. I couldn't afford rebuilding from scratch and so I thought why not going,' Tom explained.

'I wanted to see what's out there. What life can do, what is possible,' Barbara said.

'Rodents,' Peter said. 'Losts of rodents. Did I tell you when they stole my lunch last week? I had put it down on a rock just for a minute, while taking a sample.'

We laughed.

'So, tell us Peter, what gives us the pleasure of your presence?' Barbara asked mockingly.

'I wanted to get away from it all, you know?' he answered. 'Like... everything, the whole smeg.' He made an all encompassing gesture.

'That's just so typical for you, Peter. If you could you would have travelled to a planet all alone, would you?' I observed.

Peter shrugged. 'I don't know. I don't mind you being here, if it's that what you are worried about,' he answered, winking.

'Well, that's very kind of you,' I said, laughing.

Some time later, I hugged Alejandra goodbye and sat on abench while she went into the shuttle. I watched how it took off and soon lost sight of it as it flew up to the sky. Still, I was happy that I did not have to go with her and could stay with my feet on the ground. For a while I just sat there, looking up at the sky and watching the coulds pass by. Then I got up with a sigh and walked over the bridge and down the river towards the lake. I passed Barbara's and my pod and instead walked over to Peter's shed. I gave the door a short knock, but didn't wait for an answer and entered anyway.

Peter was sitting at his desk at the very back of the room, almost completely hidden by shelves.

'Welcome stranger!' he said, looking around the corner. 'I am sure you are very eager to start work on the robot? I'd really apreciate it getting out of here as soon as possible.'

I looked at the robo-maid standing in the corner next to the door. Someone had put a bag over its head. Someone had also put all my tools neatly in the shelf next to it.

'I see you missed me. Thanks for putting my things in order,' I said.

Peter laughed and turned back to his work.

'Anything to get that thing out of here. Why can't they have a faulty toaster or something?' he asked retorically.

I nodded to myself and took the bag off the robot to have a look at it. I saw that there were new scratches and dents on its hull from whatever had happened to it – or from someone transporting it to Peter's shed in not the best way. It gave me a warm feeling to know that Crystal Pollak was probably not very happy about that. I opened up the hull and ran diagnostics, but I wasn't really paying attention.

'You know, I think being up on the Zephyrus probably isn't so bad,' I noted.

Peter chuckled and a few minutes later came to me with a cup of tea. Then he rummaged in a box which was standing in one of the shelves at the back. He came over with something small, which was wrapped into some cloth. It looked like a piece of a shirt. When he put it into my hand I noticed that for its size it was rather heavy. I unwrapped the cloth and saw a small metal object. It was vaguely round-ish but not quite and had a pattern of thin lines all over its surface. I looked at it for a while.

'What is it?' I wanted to know.

Peter shrugged.

'I have no idea. I found it when I took soil samples. Had to clean it of course, but it looks how it shines,' he said, admiring the object in my hand.

'It looks like it is in perfect condition,' I agreed.

'No, I don't think we can say that. We have no idea what it is or what it should do. Its perfect condition might be something completely different,' Peter said thoughtfully.

I nodded, took a sip of thea and we spent the rest of the afternoon making guesses about what that thing could be and what it could be for. I am sure none of our guesses came close to the truth. However, I don't think we will ever know.

Love,
Sarah

Tavaron

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