"They taste horrible."

Parael slips out the door while they're talking about food. She doesn't leave listening range, but she gets to her post, where she can hear the thoughts of everyone in the barracks for crews six, four, and two.

"They really, really do," agrees Imrainai, and goes off to get them a pair of nutrient blocks and some vegetables from the greenhouse. Normally she would eat her greenhouse ration herself, or at least give it to Taz or Ves, but they seem like they've had a rough time of things, and she'll get another chance in like a week.

It takes her about five minutes to come back. "So you're - where are you from, exactly?"

"I was dropped off on Earth when I was ten. Sher hath lived there his entire life. Then we were kidnapped by Alteri on a ship called Niath and put in cryosuspension for a few hundred years, and then we came hither."

"Thou wouldst not have been able to keep it secret forever."

"Huh. I guess ships did go missing in this area..."

She doesn't sound entirely convinced, but she does feel like it's probably best not to press the issue right this second.

"We have been in cryo for centuries, I doubt thou wouldst have heard of the missing ship."

"Oh, sure, I don't know any specific ships that've gone missing. I mean, except the ones I do know. It's just, the people on Earth didn't know anything about the Alteri before ten years ago, so it's weird that they've been taking people for - "

She frowns.

"How did you learn Etra La without knowing what a nutrient block is?"

"Because when I got dropped off there I didn't speak Kimbundu, so Sher picked up Etra La from me. And I didn't talk about nutrient blocks because wherefore would I talk about nutrient blocks?"

"This," Asher says, his mouth full of half-chewed nutrient block, "is disgusting."

"But why would they - I'm sorry, y'know what, you don't need this right now, you should sleep. They have us on fourteen-hour shifts right now and you don't want to go into one of those without at least a nap."

"Uh, yeah, about those fourteen-hour shifts-- I have something important to tell you."

"Yes?"

"Neither Sher nor I have any idea how to be a spacer."

Sher successfully hides his "I hate this and I am going to kill you" facial expression from everyone other than his husband of fifteen years.

"...OK. That's fine. We can train you up. I can fix this," she says, with the air of someone who has very little idea how to fix this. "You should still sleep. I should sleep. Uh, I don't know if they did centuries ago but the chips they use now have sleep monitors, and if you don't get at least four hours in every twenty-four - maybe more for you, I'm weirdly functional on four - then after a certain number of infractions they take you out of the barracks and move you to the pods, and you just don't want to go to the pods to sleep, they're really boring."

"Do not fear. I'm useless, but Sher is good."

"You'll be OK. We can cover for you."

"No, we can't," says the woman from earlier, who has finished whatever else she was doing. "They pull a third of their own weight in two weeks or they're out."

" - you can't learn the basics in two weeks, you've gotta give them, I dunno, four or six or something."

"We don't have six weeks. I'm Atekri Spacer 572061. Do either of you remember your numbers?"

"83462," Vel says, because he used to be a slave and he remembers things. 

"73264, and thou art 572061, and Imrainai was 97816, and the serial number on yond bulkhead is 3525-351251." Sher pauses. "Vel told you I was good."

"Good. Finish eating and go to sleep. I don't have time to train anyone else, so - actually, Imrainai, you're going to check up on them no matter who I assign, aren't you."