Aleph was having trouble settling.

After the panic of waking up to the ingrained alarm of a possible biohazard breach she was justifiably jittery.

It seemed like everything was going to be alright, but it took time to calm down.

And her jitters were not being helped with Squidgy’s explanation that apparently the terran made polymers and materials that had been expected to be impervious to organic intrusions were anything but.

“-numerous vacuum adapted organisms have enzymes for readily break down those suits. It’s not really a concern when aboard Tunie. Her immune system is quite aggressive in sterilizing everything of the sort from her holds but-”

She decided to cut off her overexcited ward.

“So you are telling us that the suits that protect us from vacuum are essentially biodegradable? That they are liable to rot away as soon as anything even vaguely like a... a... decomposing bacteria even lands on it?”

Elsie had apparently moved on to look at or talk with some of the other frog people.

“Oh! No no not bacteria, Well not in a vacuum anyway. Symbiotic digesters in-”

Aleph waved a hand to get her wards attention.

“Squidgee focus. Important safety features!”

“-are quite too small to- Oh sorry ma’am! Uhm, somewhat? It actually could already have started happening let me get a taste.”

Squidgie stuck a finger into a socket at her neck then ran it up and down Aleph’s suited arm twice before sticking it back against her neck and getting a thoughtful expression.

“Hummmm. Yes, there are already a few signs of cultures on the surface liable to degrade it. Maybe a contaminant from the local fauna? I’ll need to have Ship Mistress Pylo or Custodian Elsie verify it. Really we should probably get all of you something a lot more durable and properly preserved from putrefaction-”

That was enough for Aleph honestly.

She started disrobing and packing up the suit. Not thinking too hard about the thought that apparently it was already rotting.

That was going to be annoying, they probably needed to burn all of these and switch to the spares.

Which come to think of it? They needed to check because all the material used to seal them might be rotting in something too.

But that would have to wait until after. Right now they were approaching a-

Aleph was not even sure what exactly to call it?

It was a bit like a bush, spiraling out from its position perched in the air between three of what she was coming to realize were utterly massive ivory white spires.

The space felt so enormous.

She had hung by a thread in the open void with Tunie before.

But in some strange way being wrapped up in a significantly smaller envelope felt all the bigger than apprehending an entire star hollow.

The way in which the bush was not really like a bush at all was in how regular it all was.

With exacting angles to every bend, branch and spacing. Not to mention that as she got closer it became clear that it was not really all one piece either.

Furthermore it was still being added too as they approached.

Faintly curved nearly white structures that seemed to almost be trees but for their own regularity and almost abstract shapes.

Guided into position with the others, arrested by hand or the application of one of those strange staff things that many of the frogs seemed to have.

She was still not sure what exactly conveyed the things. Maybe it was resonance? Maybe it was magnets? Air pressure? Something else completely unknown to terran science?

As she watched the mostly spherical sculpture arrange itself as they approached a figure broke off from the milling, swirling crowds of working frog creatures.

She probably should start thinking of them how they wanted to be called?

But then again.

“Allow me to Introduce Chief Hospitalitor Tilafareidola. Esteemed Master of Ceremonies in feasting. Trainer of chefs and Tender of guests. Highest lorekeeper of the workings of hearth writers and temper-soothers of the inner circle.”

The Chief Hospitalitor was quite surprisingly very short haired compared to the voluminous and drifting braids present on most of the others.

The words as translated by Pylo were deep and buzzing like many others that had spoken to them. The timbre made Aleph a bit nervous, it was almost like a growling animal or the deeper howl of wind in the canyons.

It reminded her of beasts of burden that were still used in the lower valleys deep in the cliffs.

She thought they were called orx? Maybe Ox? She never paid all that much attention to them.

“Lo guests of Pylo Daught of Courtesan, Here you be. Let’s have a look and a check on you?”

Notably the figure drifted up to the bubble with no apparent conveyance. A trick Aleph noticed seemed a bit rare.

And then he was pressing through and into the space, causing her to recoil back a bit.

The reaction made the fr- the person pause and then continue at a slower pace.

“Heed no fear, no fear, just a working of my ways. I need a chance to touch and sing the words to your bones, We know the wordsong spoken true by Pylo Daughter of Courtesan.”

He inclined his head a bit and blinked slow at Pylo before turning back to Aleph and then Omega, Quarti and even Squidgie in turn.

“But to know a thing is to hold it true. And I would risk no life or limb a guest to our feasts so honored with merely the whispered word of hear say. I would know the truth in my own hand and mind first so be it on my honor as Hospitalitor.”

He offered a hand and while Aleph was still trying to get herself settled and ready Quarti bound up and faceplanted right into his palm.

There was not even the slightest incredulity before the fingers closed loosely around the back of her head. Engulfing Quarti;s entire skull in the alien figure.

And then there was a shrill almost imperceptible chirping hum that made the air almost tingle.

And then Quarti was gently pushed away and another hand offered.

Omega beat her to the test now, looking at the hand before offering her own palm to him.

“It’s alright if it’s just a hand right? We are not all like Quarti.”

Tilafareidola did that thing with parting lips that meant he was nodding but if you did not know that kind of suggested a hungry leer in Aleph’s opinion.

Although holding both ideas in her head at once was somehow kind of tricky right that moment.

She gave a glance at Pylo who made a vaguely apologetic dip of the head.

Ah there now she could hold both ideas and once and oh now she missed the chance and Squidgie was offering a hand to the Hospitalitor.

“I should warn sir, that I am not a terran and will have a different set of dietary considerations and intolerances. But I welcome the chance to assure your honor is met.”

He gaped slightly in assent to her and then again the buzzing almost chirping that just wavered in and out of audibility.

After that he released Squidgie to drift away with a murmuring soft complement of “such fine handcraft”.

Which made Squidgie blush and bob her head.

And then Aleph had her turn, she offered her hand to the figure and he took it, the texture was much warmer and softer then she was expecting. Almost hot and very dry. The similarity to frogs had been having Aleph expecting something cool and wet but it was if anything completely the opposite.

And then she felt the buzzing chirp and a tingling rattle in her hairs and skin. Even her eyelashes!

It was strange and suffusing.

When she let her jaw close slightly a faintest buzzy grating in her teeth shocked her a bit.

And then it was over and the Hospitalitor was gaping assent and then rolling all four of his eyes closed in sequence.

“I see, I see, you are not so different from a still brooded child. A bit lopsided compared to even the most imbalanced order or school of athleticism. Such a small mouth, soft in the tooth, no metal.”

He nodded and glanced at Pylo and then Squidgie with a fluttering in his eyes that Aleph though was something similar to what Quarti sometimes did.

“I think I can direct several proper dishes for you. But of your tastes? What do you like?”

Omega was quick to speak up.

“You aren't going to just feed us something that forces us to be happy are you? We’ve had that happen before.”

Pylo huffed in agitation and there was an undercurrent of anger there but nothing clear.

Tilafareidola considered a moment before laughing and shaking his head.

“No no, we are not so crude as to drug our guests! Truly you have had such trials in the forest beyond the forest? What strange monsters would be so terrible to guests?”

He grew somber after the roiling eye blinks of laughter.

“No, please do not fear between the work of myself and Pylo there will be nothing of that sort of impropriety. But you must have dishes you favor and enjoy? Flavors? Things of your home that you hunt and prepare? Tell me of them.”

Before she even realized properly what she was saying she was speaking.

“There’s a sandwich we used to have back home, it was uh, grains ground into a bread and then sliced up so you could hold things between them...”

She started to feel foolish, like the alien would be able to understand the idea of a sandwich.

But he simply nodded and murmured intently.

“Right well the sandwich has a fruit in it, that is salty and juicy, it’s a tomato. We have some of those on the... on Tunie if you need an example. Um but then there is also lettuce, and ba- a meat from a fat animal that has been cooked til it’s crispy but still juicy. It’s salted too and then there’s “

And at that point she felt tears in her eyes because it had been years and none of them had managed to find a way to make the stuff right ever since leaving terra and Aleph had not realized when she left how much she was going to miss something so simple and stupid.

“There’s a sauce... uh I think it’s made out of an oil and egg, and uh spices that makes it kind of sweet and kind of salty and just... yeah I haven’t had that in a while and...”

And now she was feeling lost and choked up over a stupid sandwich.

But at the same time it just was hitting her all at once in that moment.

It had been years since Aleph had last tasted a bacon, lettuce, tomato and mayonnaise sandwich.

And as if the memory was a thread she could not stop pulling at suddenly the enormity of everything else on terra she would never hear or smell or taste again just kind of unrolled all at once.

Everything they had brought with them was the only things of home she would ever know again.

In the weight of that realization she kind of lost track of what Quarti and Omega said about food.

But she felt gentle, alien and yet wholly familiar hands on her back, shoulder and elbow.

It was the gentle touch of Squidgie.

A glance over her shoulder to the friendly abstraction of a comforting face was blurry through the tears sticking in a blobby mess to her eyes.

And then with a few dabs of a towel they were pulled away.

She found herself smiling wide to her ward who beamed back.

Terra was gone but her home was here with her.