"I've seen stars, before, but maybe these are different."

"Of course they are different! They are these stars, and you saw those stars..."

He begins describing individual stars. This one is Gelidus, and that one Pyrhos; the former is blue, the latter red, and they are in love. There is one named Columbidae, and she is very bright, and very white, and a bit of a wallflower. One is named Harry. He is in a bad place, at the moment, but the Prince is optimistic that things will improve for him.

"How did you learn their names?"

"I do not know how they talk amongst themselves, or what name Harry may give to his friends, but Harry is what I call him."

"So, if you can't talk to them the way you can talk to the apple tree, how do you know if they're in love?"

"Because - you cannot see it, but Gelidus grows so bright when they are both together, and he fades when they are apart. And Pyrhos stays strong, even when they are apart; but his light becomes a bit bluer, thinking of his love."

"And you can tell when he's thinking it?"

"Well, he turns bluer. I would be awfully surprised if there were no reason for it."

"Ah-huh."

"And Columbidae is never nearer to another star than they are to each other - and Harry, he had a companion, but she went away a long time ago to join the great star at the center, and has not stayed with him. And he has been very dim, ever since. And a few stars have stopped by, but he has not been pleasing company, and they have all gone as well. But this new one, I do not know any name for him yet, has stayed by his side very steadfastly, and he has grown brighter again. They like each other very well, I think."

"Great star at the center?"

"Oh, yes. There is one very great star, in the very pinnacle of the sky, and when a star is done with their time, they make their journey into its embrace. One day every star will have gone into it, except one, the star at the bottom of the sky - and then they will embrace, and they will be everything and nothing."

"That's not how stars work where I've been before."

"How dull it would be, if all stars were the same!"

They come within Annie-sight of another asteroid. It's got thick grass over rich black soil, unlike the moon-dust of her own.

"Is this where you live?"

"No, the Mother I told you about. I think she is baking - I smell cinnamon..."

A woman emerges from the cottage coming into view and squints into the sky.

"It's you. You have a friend. Hello."

"Hello. My name's Annie."

"Do you like butterscotch? I've been baking a pie. It's one of the things I know how to do well, so I do it a lot even though it's not very practical all things considered."

"I like butterscotch. Why isn't it practical?"

"I do not have many friends, and so I cannot distribute baked goods at the rate with which I make them without alienating my existing friends by burying them in pastry. Given this, the most efficient thing to bake would be cookies, since they keep better than pie and can be distributed piecemeal. But I like pie."

She says this while entering her cottage, retrieving a cooling pie, and setting it out on a folding table. She begins cutting into it.

"It does seem like it would be more difficult to maintain friendships when you have to go between planetoids to see anyone. Where do you get your groceries?"

"...my kitchen."

The Mother offers Annie a slice of pie, hot enough to be careful with but not hot enough to scald her too badly if she isn't.

Is there a fork? Annie will fork her way through a slice of pie. "Your kitchen... magically spawns ingredients?"

"I have little to no idea what 'magically' means to you. My kitchen has what I need. Some people have apple trees, or roses. I have a kitchen."