Junebug felt comfortable for the first time since Fornax. After a few hours sleep, and a shower so hot that her skin was still warm minutes later, it felt as though a veil had been lifted. She sat at the galley table sipping hot bitter coffee and chewing determinedly toast which had been blackened to within a few degrees of ash. The clothes helped immeasurably too, few things were as subltey disorienting as strange garb, now she wore fatigue pants, combat boots and a tan brown cotton PT shirt. 

"Take that brush and pull it through the ring," she instructed, gesturing with a piece of imitation bacon. Taya, seated across from her and wearing some of Sayeeda's spare close, picked up a piece of the disassembled pistol spread on the table and started to scrub the capacitor ring. 

"Like this?" the girl asked. Junebug nodded her approval as she chewed her fakeon and took another swig of the bitter coffee. The smell of gun oil and cleaning products was a familiar and comforting one to the veteran and she picked up the stock of her own plasma rifle, a far more complex weapon than the one Taya was practicing with, and began snapping the pieces back together. Checking weapons and gear was a routine task but she couldn't pretend that her malfunctioning submachine gun hadn't made her a little more enthusiastic than usual.

"Hi-lo," came a sultry voice from the bulkhead door. Junebug looked up to see Quetzalli, clad in a gray jumpsuit, sniffing at the air. The girls eyes were wide and continued to dart from wonder to wonder. Junebug felt a pang of sympathy. Entering the Highlander would have been jarring for her under the best of circumstances but she had also taken a REM learning program while she slept. Sleep learning a language wasn't a matter of going to bed one night and waking up fluent. The technology provided equivalency to existing linguistic connections, it made learning a new language far easier than unaided study but a full course took weeks and relied on practice to consolidate the knowledge. Scrambling brain connections also left the student disoriented and made it hard to focus. Mercenary units enroute to theaters frequently used the technique to pick up enough local dialect to get by. Of course their primary concern was usually booze and companionship which were pretty much human universals.

"Hello," Junebug replied gesturing the girl into the compartment.

"Come, eat," she directed, pointing to the plate of bacon and toast in the middle of the table between the broken down weapons. She finished reassembling her rifle and clicked through the automated diagnostic before propping the weapon in a corner and wiping the tabletop clear of the minor detritus of the task. 

"First officer," she said formally before taking a mouthful of coffee, the word tripping the shipwide communication circuit.

"Please report to the Council of War and Breakfast in the galley."

 [@POOHEAD189]