Why did he and Rene have to put away that bottle of whiskey so quickly? He could have used some for questions like what planet is this, and it probably helped a great deal in turning panicked arrivals into new friends. Instead, all he has is a towel and a blanket with sleeves.

He's dealt with hostile women before--more hostile than this, really--but he'd had some handle of those situations, and he'd had his life on its measured and logical path to return to whatever the outcome. "I hadn't really thought to ask that myself," he says, sparing the trees around them only a moment's look. If she's anything like the other arrivals, she doesn't have anything in that pack that can do him any harm, but he knows what hands--and fingernails--can do in a pinch. "Mostly because it looks like places I've been on Earth, if that's anything to you."

Here's fucking hoping. "I came up out of that not even a week ago," he adds. "And I don't have half the hair you're contending with." Flipping the towel over to one arm, he gathers it in a scoop and twist of his hand, holding it out for her. "Everyone here claims to have come out of that fountain at some point, and unless a very large group of them are lying, we've never seen the people responsible."