Aleph awoke to a disturbing lack of noise.

She had gone to sleep to the slight buzz of activity from dozens of clerks working over the hydroponics, maintenance systems and more.

Far as she could get out of the clerks involved they were all here on temporary assignment via Squidgie.

But squidgie herself was apparently recovering from something.

Now it was quiet. All but silent.

That seemed wrong.

Then there was a sound, and then a smell. Cheese and ‘eggs’ seared in butter.

She popped her eyes open and briefly struggled to realize that she was still in free fall.

Afterwards she relaxed then blinked her eyes to clear them of sleep and turned towards the smell.

There was a stranger there at the kitchen shaking a metal contraption in one hand.

Aleph had been on this journey aboard tunie for years now. She knew Quarti, She knew Omega, She knew Elsie and Pylo and the teeming crowds of the clerks and the she even could recognize distinction in some of the squirmy tubes of flesh that were tunies’ motiles.

She was quite familiar with a lot of the ship and its interiors and the people around it.

She had met Aliens in redweed but in some ways those times were a bit muddled together and fuzzy compared to the comfortable routine of everyone right now.

But this was someone new.

Someone new had shown up on Tunie.

On a ship that last she had checked with Tunie was still coasting through space at quite a bit faster than Terra traveled around the sun.

And they were floating in Aleph’s kitchen making scrambled eggs in free fall with some kind of ingenious instrument!

The being turned towards her.

And it was distressingly adorable.

Like some one had somehow taken the impressions of a children’s song sung in the network choir and made it physical, real. Not just an impression of friendliness and the idea of a face but a solid embodiment before her very eyes.

“Miss Aleph! Sorry for being away. I had to make a few adjustments to better perform my duties to you and the others. I believe the eggs will be ready in a moment ma’am. The free fall makes them so much more fluffy!”

The stranger spoke exactly like Squidgie, only with a more robust and natural timbre. Less squeaking and shrill notes that had at first grated but then settled into the background of identity.

They sounded more like how Aleph imagined she would have sounded if she grew up as a human girl in Aoria.

“Squidgie... Wha? Is that you?! What happened?”

The figure’s screen flickered into a few different expressions before settling on something like a mono-eyed pout.

“Yes ma’am. It is I Von Squidgie Worth The First Esquire. I am still me and nothing but physical anatomy were changed. I did these adjustments to improve my comfort and efficiency. Of my own sound reasoning and because honestly...”

There was a sudden lilt in the voice, like a puppy cry and a child but not quite. Like an adult woman who was reveling in a childish moment.

The voice was very different from the smooth and professional affect that Squidgie had held with her and was occompanied by a little shimmy and hip shake in the air as they shook the enclosed pan to the sound of sizzling egg against its various surfaces.

“I Wanted to to be really cute Nya!”

The eye ‘closed’ to be precise it became a delta of colored light that was similar to how you might give the impression of a closed eye. The little squiggle below that was like a mouth and a letter and something so much more simple ‘opened’ with the final exclamation and she saw done in bright florid pink and magenta what seemed like a rendition of a throat and tongue.

But rendered flat upon the face.

And abstracted.

It reminded Aleph a lot of Squidgies drawings. The later ones when things did not inspire nightmares. She blinked a moment and tilted her head at it.

In fact...

“You have a screen now? Like Elsie?”

The face had that eye, and the little blobs of white that she only now realized were not in fact a reflection because they turned into little pointed stars and there was a lot more of them.

The voice was a bit more emotional still but closer to a calm and controlled manner akin to how Squidgie used to talk.

“Yes! Ell-Zieee helped me get the polymer software just right so I could properly articulate it. Also with the necessary branching and layering of social and visual cortices so that I can map the outputs. It also is doubling as inputs too! The dark is very good and I put a lenses behind it for extra focus so-”

Elsie was there, the massive collection of cubes and arms a scary degree of quiet in free fall.

“I think that a full disclosure of your upgrades should wait until the rest of the terrans are finished with their morning maintenance Squidgie.”

Omega was still snoring tied against one of the walls of billowing fluff.

When aleph turned back to Squidgie Quarti was floating relatively upside down next to the clerk (huh the clerk’s new ‘body was shorter than Aleph) had a little food bag open and waiting for breakfast.

“Wait... Elsie, you helped Squidgie do this? You helped with... how did you even do that is it some kind of drone that you are remoting? I uh, I think some of the other clerks can do-”

Squidgie shook her head hard and her face looked offended? Angry? It was very intense and exaggerated.

“No ma’am! I would waste away like any of my kin if I did that, I’d sit in a can and lose and lose and lose and lose more and more until I lost all context of what I was, who you were, what any of this was. No and no and definitely no!”

All while talking, voice sounding genuinely hurt, tone on the verge of tears. In fact the ‘eye’ on the screen had a little bubbly blue on the bottom that leaked down like a symbolic tear!

Aleph was so distracted by the screen that she almost missed the bag of steaming hot cheese and eggs gently floating into her hands.

Omega snorted hard and mumbled and opened her eyes blearily undoing her straps.

“Huh? Oooh breakfrst? Smellz-gud-aleph”

She looked down at her eggs in a bag and the little set of double spoons that would let her grab chunks of it for her mouth without them drifting away. It was a great idea and she had never thought of it. Food until now had always been finger manageable until they were under acceleration.

And then they had gone back.

She had been missing using spoons and forks.

“Please Ma’am. Eat, I promise it will be good! It’s not quite like your favorite recipe but it’s very similar”

Mechanically and in a bit of a daze Aleph pinched spherical spoonfuls out of the bag and tossed them into her mouth.

Quarti made really quite inappropriate noises over her own eggs and cheese.

Omega consumed her bag of eggs with gusto and slightly less lewd noises.

While they eat, the newly leggy Squidgie went about cleaning and scrubbing out the pan, putting it up in the cookware area after making sure it was clean. Then went around with a net to catch any wandering droplets of oil, soap or raw egg that had escaped during the exercise and wrung it out into the compost bin.

Only after she was a bit more awake and halfway through her eggs did Omega seem to actually properly wake up and become aware of what was going on.

“Who is that?!”

Aleph shrugged, having settled to roll with it.

“That’s Squidgie, apparently she was uncomfortable before and wanted a change.”

“Indeed Ma’am”