Date: June 1, 2440 Time: 2:00 PM CST
Matt squeezed his eyes tight, trying to force the low-grade headache from his skull. This had been his third session in the interface absorbing the V’ren language in two days, and it wasn’t any easier than the first. He looked up at the pretty green woman who had come to check on him.
“What is your name?” he asked, testing his voice. It sounded confident. It sounded V’ren—which meant, in a small corner of his mind, it also sounded a little Dutch. That reminded him to speak his mother’s first language at least once a day.
“Srang. Srang Jumo,” she said, then decided that if he could test his V’ren, she could test her English. “How is your head?”
“Like I’ve been hit with a small meteor,” he laughed.
“That sounds about right,” she replied with a chuckle. “Two hours is a long session.”
“This is the second one today. Are you getting to see much of the area yet, or have you spent all your time here?”
“There has been a lot of call on my time—either people learning V’ren or English—but I did get to watch the sunset last night. It was beautiful. One of the other technicians, a human woman named Pam, said she would bring something called cocoa and s’mores so we could all watch it together tonight. V’ren is a very gray planet with thick clouds, so most of us have never seen skies like yours.”
“Sunset is my favorite time of day, but you should try for sunrises too, some days. They can be almost as spectacular.”
“A man named Larry said they were even better.”
“That is because Larry doesn’t need coffee to wake up in the morning, and I think there might be something mentally wrong with him for that.”
“I enjoy your coffee. I’m not sure how I’d do my job without it. I do not mean to rush you, but—”
“I understand. You have someone who wants this chair.”
“I’m not sure she wants the chair, but she feels she needs the English.”
Matt laughed, understanding the sentiment. “Enjoy the sunset, cocoa, and s’mores,” he said, watching over his shoulder as he walked away. She bent to wipe the chair down, and he thought she would be a pleasant handful. He wondered exactly what it was that made some V’ren women smell so damned good—so good he got harder, more quickly, and more often than he had as a horny teenager. He shrugged it off. Now was not the time for that.
He looked back one last time, just because she was worth a look.
“Hello, Dr. Th’ron,” Srang said in English to her next patient, trying to get it out of her head that her pheromones had not worked on that delightfully handsome man.
