The rest of the ride back to Earth was largely uneventful for Julian. He was still trying to come to terms with being in the future, but he hasn’t made much progress. He’s spent his time on the ship either in bed or staring out the window of the flight deck.

The members of the crew had attempted to talk to him, but he would just ignore them. Most of them were asking questions about life in the twenty-first century and how ‘sad and pathetic it must have been.’ Julia and Dylan, however, would just try to make casual conversation with him rather than the interrogations he was getting from the others. He liked talking to those two. They somehow made this terrible situation he found himself in slightly less shitty.

Dylan walks into Julian’s room. Well, not his room, since it’s actually just the infirmary, but he liked to think it was. “Hey Julian. How are you holding up?”

“I’m doing alright given the circumstances.”

Dylan lets out a small chuckle. “That’s good. Anyways, when we land later today, we’re going to have to talk with my higher-ups about your… situation. I don’t doubt, considering it’s the government, they’ll make it take as long as possible to get everything figured out.”

Julian can’t help but snort. “I guess some things don’t change with time.”

Dylan laughs. “I guess so. Do you want to come join us in the lounge? I was just about to make myself some coffee.”

“Sure. I probably shouldn’t just spend the rest of my days in bed,” he said. He pushes himself out of the bed and follows Dylan to the lounge. “I don’t think I’ve been to the lounge yet. In fact, I didn’t even know there was a lounge on the ship.”

“There’s more to the ship than just a flight deck and the infirmary!” Dylan said. “I would have shown you around earlier, but you didn’t seem like you were in the mood for a tour.”

Julian answers with a nod. After a short walk, the door to the lounge opens with a quiet swoosh. Julian makes eye contact with a number of the crew who are, as the name to the room would suggest, lounging around. However, he quickly looks away so as to not encourage them to keep barraging him with questions about his world. Dylan motions for him to sit down at a counter.

“Please tell me coffee hasn’t changed in the last three hundred years. I don’t know how much more I can handle,” Julian said desperately.

“Don’t worry, I don’t think it’s changed much. How do you like your coffee, black?”

“Yes please.”

Dylan prepares the coffee machine to make him and Julian a cup. Julian can’t help but marvel at the machine - something so simple, yet so technologically advanced. How could he have ever doubted he was in the future? He starts to frown, thinking about how stupid he was.

“Why the frown, Julian? Do you not like coffee?”

“No, sorry. I’m just thinking about how stupid I was to think I was anywhere but the future. The evidence is literally all around us. I mean, look at the coffee machine!”

“Don’t think like that. You were grieving over the loss of your time. Things that were cutting-edge in your time are either commonplace or obsolete today.”

“Yeah, I guess so. I’m sorry. I’m a mess right now.”

“Don’t worry about it. Since we’re talking, would you mind talking about yourself? You’ve been our guest now for a week yet we don’t know anything about you.”

Julian shifts uncomfortably in his seat. They really don’t know anything about him besides the fact he’s from the past. “Sorry about that. Sure, it’s the least I can do I suppose. I’m - or I was - a college student in California. How is California doing anyways?”

“It’s there, but climate change did a number to it. A lot of the beachside communities are underwater now. We were able to pretty much stop climate change though once we got our act together, especially when we were able to make a commercially viable nuclear fusion reactor. That’s enough about that though. What was your family like? Did you have a significant other in your life?” Dylan pauses momentarily to grab the two mugs of coffee and hands one to Julian.

“Thanks. My family was great. We did have a few arguments here and there, but we all loved each other. My mom is, was I mean, a doctor and my dad was an engineer. In terms of a significant other, I did have a girlfriend for a bit. We were together for a year, but we had a falling out and broke up.”

“I’m sorry about that. Your parents seemed like good people though.”

Julian stares down into the dark brown abyss of his coffee. “Yeah, they were great. I just wish I could have one more conversation with them and give each of them a hug and tell them I’m okay.” He can feel tears start to collect in his eyes, and quickly wipes them before Dylan can see. He’s been moping about for the last week. It’s about time he at least tried to put on a brave face. He can mourn later. He downs the rest of his coffee and stands up. “Do you have a computer or something I could go on?”

“Sure. Let me go find you something.” Dylan gets up and leaves the room. He comes back a few minutes later with what looks like a tablet. Other things don’t seem to have changed much either since the twenty-first century. “Here, this is a tablet. Are you familiar with this?”

Julian lets out a chuckle and nods. “Yes, don’t worry about that. Tablets came about when I was younger.”

“Okay, good. The last thing I need is to teach you how our basic technology works.”

He hands Julian the tablet. “You guys wouldn’t happen to still use Google, would you?”

“I’m sorry, what’s that?”

“You know, the search engine?”

“Oh, that’s what you meant. No, we use Torque for that stuff. It should be the symbol with the ‘T’.”

“I see it, thanks.”

With that, Julian embarks on the journey to discover what life is like today.

Three Hours Later…

“You guys have colonized and built up an entire fucking planet?”

“Two others actually, Julian,” Julia said, looking up from a tablet of her own.

“When did we colonize two planets?”

“The first one, as I’m sure you’re looking at, is Gaia. That planet was first colonized in the early twenty-third century by the New European Union, but the other nations quickly followed suit to the planet. The other planet was much more recent. I think the first colonization ship landed just over forty years ago, around 2276. They’re calling the planet ‘Nerth.’” Julian raises his eyebrow. “Don’t look at me like that. It’s a stupid name and everyone knows it. A bunch of kids from the initial colonization ship coined the term by combining ‘New’ and ‘Earth.’ The name stuck, and now that’s what everyone calls it.”

“That is a very human thing to do,” Julian said, shaking his head. Now onto the more serious topic. “How about the aliens? When did we meet them?”

Julia scrunches her forehead, deep in thought. “Our first contact was in 2101 with the Jiwa. We’re actually surprisingly similar, except instead of sharing a common ancestor with apes like we are, they share one with these furry avian mammals. They are bipedal like us, but their arms are wing-like with feathery protrusions. They actually look really neat. To this day, we are close friends and allies.”

Julian nods his head, his eyes open in wonder. “I hope I get to meet one someday.”

“You probably will. There are a large number of them on Gaia. One of their planets was suffering from widespread famine, and we took a bunch of them as refugees. One thing led to another, and now there’s over five million of them there. In terms of other species, there are the Mursk. I’m sure you’ve met them. They’re the ones that stole you from your life.”

“The tall pale people with three eyes?” he said shakily.

“That’s them. Don’t worry though. The ones who took you are what we call rogue Mursk - those who split off from the rest of the species to research by whatever means they deem necessary. Usually, the Mursk are kind people who have the highest ethical standards for science, as they are some of the best researchers and scientists in the galaxy. I’ll let you read more about them later. Lastly, of the major species, there are the Dar’Whaki. Their species is one of the oldest we are aware of. They have a tribal-like nature who almost always settle their disputes with war and bloodshed. Their military technology is second to none, and we along with the other species are currently at an uneasy white peace right now.”

Julian takes a moment to ponder the large dump of information dropped in his lap. “So, to sum it all up, we like the Jiwa and most of the Mursk, but not the Dar’Whaki?”

“Yep! There are a number of other races, which I’m sure you’ll see in time, but those are the major three humans interact with the most.”

Julian stands up and stretches. He had been sitting down for almost four hours, which should mean… A chime played through the speakers in the room. It’s time to go home.

He rushes up to the flight deck to see the view outside. Julian’s mouth opens in awe for what feels like the upteenth time today. Fletcher must have slowed the ship down as they got close to Earth as Julian can see a number of space stations and ships floating in space going about their business. He can only see so much until the view abruptly shifts from space to the ground. They’ve landed.