Song: Cheikh Lô - Bambay Gueej

"So, tell us everything. What happened while we found a place to stay?" Gaige asked, a cup of coffee in her hand. She took a sip from the cup and grimaced, but she tried to pretend she liked it.

"I feel like a lot has happened." I said.

"Well, we've got time, I suppose." Axton replied with a grin.

"Nova's daughter is living below us and they bonded over coffee." Mordecai said. Gaige choked on her coffee and started coughing violently. Axton looked only mildly surprised as he was rubbing Gaige's back.

"WHAT." Gaige finally shouted after she could breathe again. I smiled nervously, because I hadn't really intended to tell them anything about that yet. But well. Mordy was just faster than I was, I guess.

"Yeah, well, those two girls knocked on our door after we had just settled in and I opened, not thinking anything of it. Well, I did think they looked pretty familiar, but yeah. Anyways, they asked me for some help to fix something and they introduced themselves as Anouk and Nadia. So yeah." I explained.

"Hold up, hold up, hold up. You just had a chat with them at the door? Like... how did you not freak or anything?" Gaige asked.

"She's constantly freaking." Mordecai commented.

"Yeah, first of all that and also... I mean, what else could I have done? Without being weird or suspicious or what not? So I fixed their espresso machine and then we all went to the market. They went off looking for stuff, trying to find me one of them, too, because they're honestly good and it would be a crime to pass up a chance like that. But yeah. It's so weird. I don't know for sure, she actually is my daughter, but I mean, I can pretty much consider that a fact by now. But we're talking like we're friends or something? It's kinda bizarre and kinda nice, I dunno."

I took a deep breath after I finished saying that, while everyone else just looked at me, seemingly at a loss for words. I suppose it was a lot. I mean, I had only just now realized all that.

"Wow." Gaige said after a while.

"Yeah. So that's that part. They're gonna meet us here, actually, so... I dunno, act normal?" I replied.

"Does she know you're her mom?" Gaige wanted to know. I sighed and shook my head, hoping Gaige wouldn't accidentally spill the tea.

"Okay. Oh God. I'll try and keep that in mind. Well, we better talk about something else, in case they turn up soon. What were you up to after you split up at the market?" Gaige asked.

"I got some clothes and then we went to buy some fruit and... well, I don't really know what exactly happened, Mordy promised me an explanation." I answered. Mordecai looked up from his coffee and shrugged.

"Well. People with bounties on their heads pass through markets like this one a lot. And there are bounty hunters and hitmen out to get them. But then there are people that are smart and less reckless and they just sit back and gather up information from everyone and then sell on that information. Or they get paid by the targets to keep their mouths shut. The girl that sold us the fruit was one of them." Mordecai said and took another sip from his cup of coffee.

"So? You don't have a bounty on your head anymore, right?" Axton mentioned. Mordecai nodded.

"Yeah, that's right. There's still people that want me dead, though, so yeah. That's good to know. We paid her to keep quiet and warn us of anyone that might find us. In exchange we'd keep her out of everything and protect her if she needs protection. So yeah. That's all that happened." he explained.

"When all that went down, it sounded like some serious stuff was going down. Like, it was scary and I had no idea what was going on." I added.

"Sounds scary. Never heard of anything like that." Gaige said.

"I've only heard of that on the border planets. Is that a thing that normally happens on planets like this?" Axton wanted to know. Mordecai looked pretty amused about our ignorance.

"It does happen everywhere, y'all just grew up way too privileged." he replied and snickered a little.

"I mean, if you think about it, it's a pretty smart thing to do. You know everyone's business and you can use it to your advantage without even getting your hands dirty. Pretty good way to get by, if you ask me." I said.

"Yeah. I'd have stayed away from her, if I had known, but I guess I'm a bit out of the loop myself. It used to be an old woman who would do some fortune telling on the side who would gather information around this area. She pretended to be blind, but she had eagle eyes, honestly. Guess, she died at some stage and this new girl took over. And fair play to her, she's doing a good job at being inconspicuous." Mordecai said with a shrug. I was starting to wonder if there was a way to find out if there were any bounties on someone's head on any planet out there.

"Wow. Okay. So what, you have like your personal warning system now? Will you even need it?" Gaige asked.

"Well, I suppose it can't hurt, if we decide to wander off into the slums. Knowing who's out to get you can never hurt. I don't even know why I expected there wouldn't be trouble if I came back." Mordecai answered with a shrug. For someone who knew that people weren't happy to see him alive he seemed really, really relaxed. Maybe he was just too used to it at this stage in his life.

"Man, that sounds like a... like a really grim outlook, dude." Gaige replied and still forced herself to drink more coffee even though she clearly didn't like it. She had told me she wanted to try and give up on hot chocolate now that she was leaving Pandora, since she wasn't a little girl anymore or something like that. It was bullshit, obviously, but she would find out for herself soon enough.

"So, how'd you guys find a place to stay? Where are you staying?" I wanted to know. Axton finished his coffee.

"Well. We went to the luxury places first to see what it was like and... damn, first of all, it all looks fantastic, but it's expensive as hell and people are pretty snobby for the most part. So yeah. Gaige said they'd kill her mojo, so we came to this area and there was a lady, maybe around 40 or so, with four little kids, who was renting out a flat in her house. Her husband apparently died and she's struggling to feed her children. We figured we'd do a good deed and stay there." he said.

"Sounds good. You should be fine there, I'd say." Mordecai replied. I was distracted by Anouk and Nadia approaching us quickly. Oh God. I wasn't sure if I was actually ready for them to be here and see Axton and Gaige and... I probably was worrying too much about things. The problem was, I couldn't just stop worrying.

"The girls are here." I mumbled, probably pale as a sheet, judging from Gaige's concerned look.

"Stay calm, okay? You got this. You had this when you first met them, you'll be fine. Take a deep breath." she said quietly.

"Shut up, Gaige, you're just making me more nervous." I whispered through clenched teeth, as I smiled at the girls and waved them over. It made me kind of proud to see Anouk wearing her long curly hair open and natural like that. I was always so afraid of what people would think of me, I constantly straightened it when I was her age. I wish I had just been myself more.

"Hey, everyone. Looks like you guys found some more people!", Nadia said with a big smile on her face. She definitely had the more outgoing personality here, which was probably why she had her own ECHOcast.

"No, they're actually our friends who came with us from Pandora. They're here to look for someone, so we all travelled together." I explained. Gaige smiled widely at them and I was praying this wouldn't get awkward.

"Sit down. Have some coffee." Mordecai added. Honestly, sometimes I thought he had way better social skills than all of us combined, he just decided to hide them from us. The girls pulled up two chairs and sat with us.

"Alright, our friends here are Gaige and Axton. Gaige and Axton, those two are Nadia and Anouk, my- who we met earlier." I said once everyone had settled down. Some quick introductions were made, more coffee was ordered and I was nervously holding onto Mordecai's hand under the table.

"Okay, first of all, I'm a huge fan of your ECHOcasts." Gaige immediately said to Nadia, once they were past the first few bits of small talk.

"Really? Thanks. I'm literally only doing them for the fun of it, I don't even know why there's so many people watching it. I mean, the stuff I cast isn't even that interesting." Nadia replied with a laugh. The two of them launched into a full on conversation about ECHOcasting.

"Sorry, guys, we couldn't find a second espresso machine. But you guys can use the one in our place, if you want." Anouk said to me and Mordecai.

"All good. I'm sure we'll have an easier time finding one on Pandora anyway, I just hadn't really thought about looking for them, you know?" I replied.

"Yeah, I know what you mean. It's like you forget about something completely for a while and then you suddenly think about it and then you want it."

"Ugh, yes! It's always like that, isn't it?"

"So, you've been to Artemis before?" Axton suddenly chimed in.

"No, I actually haven't. I've been to a few places - Demophon, Dionysus, Eden-7, Hermes and a good few times on Aquator, but I haven't been to Artemis before." Anouk answered. I raised an eyebrow at Axton, not sure what he was trying to achieve here. He wouldn't try to flirt with my daughter right in front of my eyes, would he?

"I haven't been to any of these places yet. You got a favourite?" he wanted to know. Anouk bit her lip and looked into the distance, thinking about the question.

"I don't know. I don't think I could decide. They all have their good points. I guess, my favourite would be Aquator, but I'm probably a little biased about that." she answered with a smile.

"What's Dionysus like?" I asked her. I knew it was where Lilith was from, so I was kinda curious about that one. Plus, I really didn't want to get talking about Aquator, in case I'd have some accidental slip-up.

"The architecture isn't that great, there are some nice landscapes to look at, but the parties are absolutely insane there. If you wanna go there, go for the night life." Anouk replied enthusiastically. My first thought was to go into full mum mode, especially since about 5 years of my life had been about the most insane parties and look where it got me. But I managed to control myself.

"You like going out?" I answered. Anouk shrugged.

"Yeah, from time to time. Not all the time, but I do enjoy it once in a while." she said. I smiled, feeling relieved to hear that. She seemed to be much more reasonable than I ever was.

"I know a good place here, if you ever wanna go out here. Not sure if it's still the same, but I doubt much has changed." Mordecai suddenly commented. He lightly squeezed my hand, as if he knew just how relieved I was that Anouk wasn't even close to being as bad as I was.

"Sure, sounds like fun." Anouk replied, as nadia nudged her.

"Sorry, guys, I think we'll have to go. Some of the other Vladof guys wanted to meet up for drinks soon, so we better get going. See you later!" she said and they got up and said their goodbyes.

When they had left, we just sat there. I knew everyone was looking at me, waiting for me to say something, but I was just completely dumbfounded. I felt like crying and laughing and shrugging it off all at the same time. I had started this thing, somehow, and now I didn't know what to do with it.

"Nova, that girl definitely is your daughter." Gaige said after a good while. I looked up at her.

"What makes you say that?"

"You look kinda similar, you have the same eyes, the way you talk, your gestures, facial expressions - it just makes sense." she replied.

"Yeah. When she said that thing about the most insane parties on Dionysus, it was almost like you were saying it. It was weird." Axton agreed. I didn't even think he had paid much attention at all.

"The way you looked at her gave it away. You looked at her like a mother would look at her child. You looked so proud." Mordecai finally added and that was what sent me over the edge. I started bawling my eyes out right there, in the middle of the street.