You don't talk about it, aside from that one moment of acknowledgment on Mark's part. It's better to let things lie as they are, and try to get some rest.

Well, as much rest as you can while exploring, terraforming, and waking up the colonists.

With your vast experience (both of yours, you're a team after all, and you tend to collaborate with Mark, even if you make the final decisions), it's startlingly easy to direct and assign tasks. And you're not afraid to get your hands dirty, metaphorically and physically. Dirt looks much better than blood, after all.

This planet isn't earth, and the difference is stark, but it's close enough that in a generation or two, humans living here will find earth strange instead. The stars stand different, the night and day cycles and seasons stretch different; even dawn and dusk are different. But it's not bad. There's a consistency, and you get used to the difference fast.

Burt and Celci work together to set up clean technology - even though, slowly, the damage done back home is being fixed, the same mistake won't be made here. The air will stay crisp, the seasons set, the oceans and lakes clean. They enlist the help of the crew who were tasked and trained, including Mark. And while your word is final, you do what you can, even if it's bringing water to those working.

(Sometimes you catch Mark staring at his hands, confused. You pat his shoulder, and compliment him in a way that reminds him of what he was doing.

Sometimes your eyes go unfocused, and the scenery blurs, and you're jostled by a firm clap on the back.

It's enough.)

Surprisingly it's three months in when you finally acknowledge all that's happened.

Mark is sitting on a porch, juice pouch in hand. He's staring at the horizon, stained orange and red with great, swirling clouds. He's not lost, but he's verging on it, mind wandering far.

You plop down next to him. Quiet for a while.

Is he tired?

He laughs. "Always." Voice low, but not cracking. Not broken. He rubs his eyes with his sleeve. "Long day today. But . . .not the longest. Been sleeping better. Not always, but sometimes."

You nod. You get it; dreams, even if not nightmares, are persistant. More often than not memories, but sometimes, something slips through the cracks. Something. . .you're not sure if had or could have happened, or if it was some bullcrap your kind made up.

With a sharp turn of his head, Mark looks at you, his eyes bright, focused. He relaxes, suddenly, sighing. ". . .yeah. Something like- no, exactly like that."

It sucks.

A snort. "Understatement, Captain."

You huff, a quiet laugh. Both of you made stupid choices, both of you faced horrible things where there were no good choices. Both of you died, horribly.

"You know," and he tries to sound annoyed, but you know him, "this isn't really helping."

You punch him in the shoulder, lightly, even though he whines. Big baby.

In the end, you are both here. When all is said and done, your choices led here.

"That's . . .true. It's just, it's hard to stay in the present, y'know?"

And you do.

You lean back on your hands and close your eyes - there's always a flash of tumultuous blue, when you do - and your mind wants to pull you back, but you don't let it.

Forwards can't be taken too long term, either. You're all working on the colony and that's all the thought you'll give it.

So instead you tell Mark that you can hear those bugs that trill in the undergrowth starting up, and you can feel the starlight growing weaker as the star-sun goes down. There's a nip in the breeze that comes on with the frosty night, and some hunting animal starts hrroo-ing in the distance. There's wood grain under your hands, and you can hear both your breathing.

You hear Mark shift, and you know he's copying you. He starts saying what he can hear and feel too. The crinkle of leaves as something slinks around in the nearby woods, the drone of flapping wings, the sound of the breeze like a wooden wind chime as it rustles the hollow, needle-like leaves of he trees.

You both sit quiet for awhile, listening, and feeling, and being in this moment.

Because when all is said and done, you are here, and now. And that's what matters most.