A / N : Thanks Kaci, person who likes, Jack Frost lover cadi93, LadyBender and frogspell16860 for the reviews. It looks like I got a bunch more likes and follows too, but I'm not sure how to view those on here, so I'll just say thanks and hope you guys know who you are!

"Are you okay? Hey . . . wake up!"

Fry groaned.

He was lying face-down in the dirt, and someone was prodding him. And somehow shaking him with both hands at the same time. Maybe it was more than one person? That made more sense. Fry groaned again, louder this time, and the shaking stopped.

"Sorry," the same anxious voice said.

Fry pried his eyes open. He was met with an arid, orange-hued landscape, like a desert. The sky was orange-hued too, and the patch of vegetation he could make out in the distance was purple and jungle-like. Mars, he decided. Probably. He forced himself into a sitting position. His mouth tasted like Nibbler's poop tray and his skin was hot and inflamed to the touch. It looked like Zoidberg might look if you cracked open his shell and boiled him in hot water. Sunburn, he thought. But the sun was starting to go down. He must have been out here all day.

"Thanks for waking me," he mumbled.

His savior turned out to be a young Neptunian guy. Fry figured he was Neptunian, anyway. He looked the same species as Elzar – purple skin, four arms, and a snout-like nose. This guy was much younger though, and his build was slighter. He had straight, lank hair, sharp cheekbones, and large round eyes, which blinked nervously at Fry from behind equally round glasses. Nervousness seemed to be his general disposition. He was sweating in the Martian heat, and his glasses kept sliding down his nose. Nerd, Fry decided, and immediately felt more comfortable. He knew where he stood with nerds. They were mostly smarter than him, but his encyclopaedic knowledge of Star Trek tended to win their respect, so they didn't sneer at him too much.

"I thought you were dead," the unknown nerd said.

"Sorry." Fry cradled his forehead in his hands. It felt like his skull was splitting in two. "I guess I must've scared you."

The Neptunian nodded.

"It happens out a lot out here," he said. "Especially with humans. People get drunk and leave the casino - but if you pass out in the open you can die of dehydration."

"Oh. Well, I'm glad I didn't do that."

Fry tried to sit up. He managed it on the third attempt.

"Uh . . . wait a minute . . . casino?" This didn't sound familiar.

"Mars Vegas." The nerd gestured in the other direction. "Isn't that where you came from?"

"I don't remember. I hitched a ride with some guy," Fry muttered. "He pushed me out. I think because I drank all the beer in his cooler, but I don't remember much. Maybe he just didn't like me."

The nerd stared.

"Well . . . I'm Gomez," he said. He stuck out a hand. "What's your name?"

Fry opened his mouth to tell him, but the word wouldn't come out. 'Fry' was what Leela called him. He only had to think it to see her saying it a hundred different ways, and that hurt.

"Phil," he said instead, but it tasted funny in his mouth. Fry didn't know why – it was his name, it had always been his name – but it didn't feel like it fit him any more. Still, he had to be something.

"But you can call me Yancy," he blurted out. It was his brother's crummy name, but stealing Yancy's name for once seemed like fun. Besides, it was all he could think of.

"Hey, Yancy."

Gomez reached down, wrapped two surprisingly strong arms around Fry, and hauled him to his feet.

"You were hitching?" he said curiously. "You running away from something?"

Fry shrugged. It seemed he wasn't drunk or dehydrated enough to drive Leela from his mind.

"Someone," he admitted. "Her name's Leela."

Her name felt worse than his to say. He could see her all over again as he said it, like her face was tattooed onto his eyeballs.

Actually, eyeball tattoos would probably hurt less than this.

"Oh." Gomez stuck two of his hands in his pockets. "Crazy ex?" he ventured.

"No." Fry swallowed. "I love her."

"And she hates your guts?"

"No . . ." Fry hesitated, unsure how much of this messed-up story he was willing to tell. "She's married," he said. "And I sort of slept with her . . . a few times."

Gomez grimaced. He looked furtively at the ground.

"If it makes you feel any better," he said at last, "I'm running away too. My parents own a huge methane pocket on Neptune," he explained. "We've been mining it for generations and I'm supposed to take over but I can't do it. I hate mining. Methane makes me sneeze, and I get claustrophobic in my closet."

"Sucks," Fry commiserated.

"Yeah. So I thought I'd come work a minimum wage job at a casino. Maybe in twenty years I'll have enough to buy my parents out of the mine, and they won't be so mad." He adjusted his glasses again, blinking worriedly. "That's a good idea, right?"

Fry shrugged.

"I 'unno."

They limped toward the casino complex, Fry still leaning heavily on the nerdy Neptunian.

"So, uh . . . could I stay with you?" he asked. "I'm broke."

Gomez smiled. He tried to hide his enthusiasm, but it was obvious he liked the idea.

"Sure!" he said. "Hey, I could get you a job in the casino too. They're always looking for bellhops. They burn out real fast."

He performed a quick, impromptu mime – glugging back liquor ; snorting something ; throwing money or chips on the table ; crying ; raising an imaginary shotgun to his head.

Fry nodded to show he got it. The picture Gomez was painting was no more depressing than the reality he was running away from. Besides, it might work out. Gambling wasn't really Fry's thing, but he'd spent enough time around Bender to know how it worked, and to recognize the most common scams. He wouldn't see as much of the universe as he had as a delivery boy, but he could probably do it, and anyway . . . he was down to his last dime. He didn't have much of a choice.

He stared up at the sky.

The sun was going down. Maybe it had gone down already on Earth. Or maybe not. Maybe that wasn't how it worked? But anyway, at some point, that sun had been shining on Leela. The same sun.

Maybe she'd looked at it. Maybe she'd missed him.

Fry stared at it until his eyes watered, and tried to pretend he didn't miss her too.

It turned out Fry wasn't the first drifter Gomez had taken on. The Neptunian had been working at Mars Vegas for a year, and had become lonely enough to lend his couch to any off-worlder who wanted a bed. As far as Fry could make out, these had included : a 300 pound trucker who'd gambled away a DOOP arms shipment and spent 24 hours frantically trying to win it back ; a Trisolian runaway with dreams of being a burlesque dancer ; and a former blernsball couch suspected of dealing Nectar to his high school team.

"No-one lasts long out here," Gomez explained miserably. "They burn out or skip out or get dragged out by the cops after a couple of weeks. Most of them are crazy, but it's someone to talk to, y'know?"

Fry shrugged. "I guess."

He'd been there two weeks when he met Xandri. He was bartending at the casino and she was drunk, slumped over a stool and trying not to retch as she forced down shots. She was young – maybe nineteen – and human, with blond cornrows, lilac-colored lipstick, and perspex bangles stacked up to her elbows on both arms. She was a student at Mars University, but had run away after a bad break-up with her boyfriend. She'd stolen his moped, hawked it for cash, and headed to the casino to forget all about him.

She wasn't doing a great job.

"He was always trying to control me," she slurred. "Y'know? And I was done. You know what I mean?"

Fry shrugged, wiping off an empty glass with a rag.

"I guess."

"You're sweet." Xandri smiled drunkenly. "You're so sweet. You're my friend."

She wrapped her fingers around his collar and pulled him over the bar top into a sloppy, drunken kiss.

She kissed him, and Fry felt . . . nothing. She tasted like the blue colorant in alcopops, he thought vaguely. She was all wrong, and the longer the kiss lasted, the worse he felt.

He wanted Leela.

It was a physical ache, like a pulled tooth. Leela had been right – sleeping with her had been a bad idea. Fry had never needed anyone like this before. It was agony, and leaving her hadn't dulled the pain any.

He pushed Xandri away.

"I . . . I think we should just be friends," he said awkwardly.

Fortunately, she seemed too drunk to be offended by this. Or maybe Fry just wasn't much of a catch. Either way, she nodded.

"Okay. Friends. Friends!"

She shook his hand enthusiastically and winked. (One of her eyelids drooped anyway, which was about as coordinated as anyone would be after that much alcohol.)

"Friend?" she slurred. "I'm broke. Can I have some tequila? Please? Pretty please?"

Fry poured them both a double and downed his, feeling miserable again. Xandri swallowed her own tequila eagerly, only to puke it back up a moment later. She groaned.

"Tha' one doesn't . . . count."

Fry spent the rest of the night refilling her glass. He matched her shot for shot, but it seemed he couldn't even get drunk the right way any more. The alcohol wasn't making him drunk or happy – it just made him cranky and depressed. He was glad when Xandri stopped talking.

The bar fell quiet around four in the morning. Fry gave up his attempts to build a house of cards out of beer mats (he kept knocking them over) and took one last swig of tequila from the bottle. It burned his throat going down, and the room lurched. By now he'd forgotten everything except Leela. He had the feeling this was the opposite of his original intention, but couldn't remember why that mattered. Couldn't form any coherent thought at all, if he was honest. If Leela had suddenly showed up he wouldn't even have been able to talk to her, but that was okay. Talking wasn't what he wanted to do.

It took him a while to realize Gomez was there, and was talking to him. The Neptunian must have come off the night shift. He was helping Xandri up and he seemed to be mad at Fry. For serving her? For not noticing she'd passed out? Who knew? Fry shrugged. In his experience, someone was always mad at him for something. It was a waste of time to get specific.

Whatever the reason his friend was mad, the net result was that he gave Xandri the couch. Fry spent the night on the floor, and dreamed of Leela. He dreamed they were fighting. Dream-Leela was mad at him for something he didn't remember doing, and when he told her he loved her she got angry and called him a child.

He woke up in a pool of tequila sick, feeling lonelier than ever.