74

Midnight

"We're home!" Oga and Lamia went to work on putting groceries away as Furuichi walked into the kitchen.

"You're both home early. Not many sales today?"

Oga's translation badge sounded mildly fuzzy in his ears. As much as Oga wanted to hear Furuichi's natural voice without the piece of offending technology, Beelphiax was too difficult to understand without it.

"On the contrary," chimed Lamia, "Everything on our list was on sale. Look, I even got more hair dye!"

Furuichi knew that Lamia knew that this planet did not know the concept of hair dye since Belarian hair was too porous making coloring impossible. Lamia knew the box she was holding was actually food coloring, but it worked just like hair dye from back home.

"I don't know why you keep dying it pink. What's wrong with blond, brown or black?"

"Ew! If I let my hair grow out, it's that boring midnight black like yours. What's worse than that is we'd look related!"

Oga went to argue with Lamia that she'd wished to look so attractive when a puzzled voice sounded behind them. "What's a 'midnight'?"

"Ermm...like the hour right in the middle of morning and night.

"...I don't believe we have a time like that."

"Sure you do. Time doesn't feel that much different here than on Earth," Lamia said while settling in a stool, eating xiksa fruit.

"True, but Earth's concept of time revolves around how long the sun stays out. We only have actual sunlight for about six hours. When our moons come out, the warmth of the sun lingers, making the moons act more like a candle. The light remains bright until about seven which continues to dim until eleven. We're in complete darkness for two hours before the sun rises back again for the next day. So really we have 26 hours of a 'day', so to speak."

The two scientists pondered the riddle presented before them, was there really no such thing as a midnight after all? "Guess we've got to unlearn a lot of stuff," Oga laughed, Lamia hummed in agreement.

"Sure, but not before you explain why you call each other ass hats. I don't understand why an Earth donkey wearing a sombrero is an insult. It sounds rather cute to me."