What the fuck am I supposed to focus on? What do I know that well that I can think of the smallest detail? Prior to coming on this ship, my life was uneventful. And as much as I hated to admit it I was just drifting through. I wasn't an active participant in my own life. I thought of the small apartment I lived in with the other girls. Instinctively, I knew that I was familiar with the layout; I'd navigated it in the dark hundred of times, but I couldn't picture every tiny piece of it in my mind's eye.

What about my friends? How much can I remember of them?

What color were Charlotte's Eyes? Green. Dark or Light? Light? What color was her hair? Brown...Dark Brown? What was the emblem on her work scrubs? I have no idea. That grey sweatshirt that she always wears when it gets cool, what did the writing on it say? I don't know. Is she right handed or left handed? I don't know.

I felt like a terrible friend. Of all of the girls, I knew Gabby the best and while I could remember a lot about her I couldn't focus on that knowledge without it drifting through my fingers. If I really thought about what color hazel eyes she had I'd lose her voice. If I focused on her laugh I'd only see her with her short hair because of the memory I pulled the laugh from.

What can I think of? Jesus just fucking choose something he's waiting. And sure enough, Esayr was waiting patiently as always. Screw him for being understanding. I ducked my head down like I was still thinking before he could notice my cheeks burning. Fuck him for asking me personal questions. Why would he fucking ask if I were a virgin? Am I that obvious? ...Yes Addison, you idiot, you are that obvious. You blush like a sunrise and get angry whenever anything even remotely romantic happens. Stop thinking about it. You're only going to get more embarrassed. Just think of something else. The first thing you think of...A towel.

My towel. It certainly wasn't what I'd expected to use, but I grasped the thought and put all my effort into thinking about one of my two bath towels. The pink one because it was my favorite. It was too short to go all the way around me so I had to pull it tight and choose whether my chest or my legs would have a dangerous inch of gap between the ends of the towel. It was thinning and about ready to be replaced, the bottom left corner was already unraveling. The tag was a faint grey, the writing smoothed off from countless washes. "Ok. I'm thinking of it."

"I'm going to try to make you feel joyful."

I nodded, really focusing on that damn pink towel. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I worried about what it would be like to have my emotions tampered with. Back to the towel don't focus on that. It was a light pink. It'd been brighter when I first had gotten it from the clearance section. Now it was kind of a dusty pink, toward the middle there was a lighter stain, probably from our soap or something. I snapped the towel against Gabby's ass one time when she'd been ribbing me about getting a boyfriend. We'd burst into laughter.

I snickered and suddenly I was laughing along with the memory. I couldn't stop it. Gabby had looked shocked. She hadn't expected me to actually swat at her. I could see her face clear as day and caused me to laugh even harder. Tears were in my eyes.

Then just as suddenly I felt the laughter fade until I was panting trying to catch my breath. "So I take it, it didn't work," I asked between breaths. I glanced up at Esayr from where I was laying on the floor clutching my stomach.

He was staring down at me with such a look of happiness it made my heart hurt. The seconds felt like ages before he shook himself free of whatever thoughts were running through his head, "No. It didn't. What were you thinking of?"

"A towel."

"...A towel?" He sounded dumbfounded, "You chose a towel?"

"It was the first thing that came to mind," I felt silly but how was I supposed to know what was the best way to block out a man that could feel my every emotion?

"Try something more personal maybe, something closer to you. Addric and Kados think of each other--"

"Yeah well, they have that weird twin thing. I don't have any family to think of."

He paused a moment at my admission, "I remember Kados saying something about that. Would you like to talk about it?"

I shrugged, honestly I'd dealt with those feelings ages ago. Sometimes I would feel a twinge of sadness over some of the things I'd missed out on, but it wasn't fresh anymore. "Not particularly. It was a long time ago and even though I wish it weren't the case I've had the time to grieve. I was young when it happened. A lot of people don't have a family anymore."

"I'm here if you ever need to talk about anything, Addison."

"Thank you." His kindness made me feel like I had a lump in my throat and I didn't know why.

"What about your Rin--your friends? Why don't you think of them?"

"I don't feel like I can do them justice." I don't want to realize I can't remember them well enough if I fail when trying to think of them.

"You should try."

"Alright."

I thought of Gabby the small pretty spitfire who'd wanted to be a police officer so that she could make the world a little safer for girls than it had been for us. I thought of Charlotte, who'd been accepted into nursing school just after the government had rescinded a lot of scholarships and introduced fertility dues, thus crippling her dreams as well. I thought of Petra with Landon, ready to start her dream of love and a family, but secretly crying at night over the fact that applications to have children were all but impossible for couples of their standing. I thought of Alicia, who I still didn't really know all that well because she tended to disappear in the wake of Charlotte, but despite my inattention remembered even the smallest detail of what I mentioned in my life because it was important to her to make others feel noticed.

I could feel the emotions as they passed: sadness, pride, hope, disappointment. The undercurrent was joy, though. A joy I pulled from my friends. It built and built like a bubble deep in my stomach, filling up with memories of laughter. Charlotte telling the story of the man who'd smuggled three large purple dildos into a hospital toilet. Gabby busting her ass on the tile floor because she refused to mind Petra's warning about the newly mopped floor.

Just when I thought that bubble would pop and I'd start laughing another memory filtered in, almost an afterthought buried beneath all the others but I gripped it tight.

"We're doing everything we can. Stay strong. We love you." Petra's voice from her phone call after I'd been taken. The realization that I'd never see them again. I couldn't go back to them. I felt tears prick at my eyes. The bubble in my gut shivered and shrank just a little bit.

I heard Esayr exhale a breath and my concentration broke. The sadness dissolved like a smoke and I burst into laughter. The juxtaposition was jarring.

I blinked up at Esayr who looked as if he couldn't decide how he wanted to feel but had settled on impressed. "You are truly a remarkably empathetic race. You feel your emotions acutely enough that you could reasonably counteract my manipulations," He looked thoughtful, "It makes it harder to mask them from me, though."

"What does that mean for me? For us?"

"I'm worried that humans might lack a passive ability to dampen their emotions. You may just have to train yourself not to react so strongly to things, but that's a hard task. Regardless, this training was a resounding success, not necessarily in the way you wanted, but a success nonetheless."

So I'm still stuck feeling things and he's stuck with those feelings as well. Great.

****A/N****

I apologize for the last episode being so short, or at least short in comparison to some of the others. I write until it feels right to end the part and that one was a little bit harder to write in general for me. I actually backspaced through about 500 words 3 times over the course of writing it.

Also, it's more than crazy to me that this little story of mine has more than 10 views on it. 180 views is so beyond what I ever anticipated to receive, almost 20% more than what I was expecting. Thank you so much.

Love,

Layla