Sherry paged through her notes as she picked at her dinner.
"Hey Michi, did you understand that bit about pseudo-chlorophyll?"
"Hm?"
Sherry hilighted the section on her bookreader and passed it over.
Michi read it. "Oh. It's just something that does pretty much the same thing as chlorophyll back on Earth."
"Which is...?"
Michi looked up from her own notes. "Haven't you done any biology before?"
"Yeah, but I never paid attention. It's a lot more interesting when you describe it than when the teacher does."
"I'm not going to cut into my study time to repeat what the teacher just explained."
"That's not what I said. I am trying to pay attention in class, it's just that she assumes I know about stuff like chlorophyll already."
"That's because you should know about it. My school did it a couple of years ago."
Cathy put her plate down beside Michi, and sat down with a loud groan. "Ow. Ow, and damn."
"Gymnastics not treating you well?" Michi handed Sherry back her bookreader.
"Not. At. All." She shifted in her seat. "Ow. I am so not flexible enough for this. And today we did balance exercises, I was wobbling all over the place and had to keep putting my other foot down so I didn't tip over. I was the only person who didn't get to go on the low whatsits, those skinny things that gymnasts run and do cartwheels and stuff on."
"Ahh, you'll get better." Kara looked up from her notes. "Can you pass the water? The others have probably done gymnastics before."
"Not all of them." Cathy rested her head on her hand and chewed slowly, poking at her salad.
"It's not your fault you aren't built tiny," Kara said. "Plus a lot of those gymnasts look way underweight. Did you get the eating disorders talk at school back home? It's pretty crazy what some people will do to make themselves weigh less."
"Easy for you to say, beanpole."
An uncomfortable silence fell over the table for a few minutes, as they all picked at their food.
"Cathy, any chance I can pick your brains?" Michi said finally. "I'd like to do an article or two on the kinds of things we'll be seeing out the windows along the way, for the newsletter."
Cathy smiled. "Sure, no problem."
"Great. First deadline is tomorrow; can we start tonight, during study time?"
Sherry remembered with a wince that she hadn't yet started planning her article.
She took her time packing up, still trying to think of a way to angle a description of Velfard colony that hadn't been done a million times already, when Michi closed her bookreader's cover and stood up to go to the newsletter meeting.
"Come on, Sherry, we don't want to be late. It'll look bad if the editor can't be bothered to show up on time."
"Does it really matter? I mean, we're only going to be doing it for two months."
"If I say I'll do it, I'll do it. Anything less and I'd be lying to myself."
"Um, ok. Didn't know it was that important to you."
Michi stopped in the middle of the stairs and turned to face Sherry. "It's not the newsletter that's important. It's that I will always do as I say I will, when I say I will. It's a reputation I've earned and one I want to keep."
Sherry backed up a half-step, startled by the intensity of Michi's glare.
"Now, we will be late unless we run."
They ran the rest of the way to deck three, stopping only to catch their breath before walking calmly into the meeting room.
"Excellent, most of you are here," Michi said, clapping her hands once. "Now, has everybody got an outline for their article? Or a full rough draft for those who like to work ahead?"
A murmur and a wave of mostly nodding heads brushed past.
Michi started organizing people into groups with instructions to run over their outlines, talk about improvements, then get writing.
#
Sherry pressed a key to activate the library terminal. Subject search. Velfard colony.
She rested her chin on her hand and skimmed the titles that appeared, selecting ones that seemed relevant for download to her bookreader.
A vacuum cleaner trundled past, cleaning the carpet around the library stations. A crew member walked past the end of the corridor, paused to look at her, then kept going.
Sherry checked the time. 1 AM--she'd already been there for an hour! She sat up straight and paged back up through the results, not recognising any of them. She started reading the titles again, determined not to fall asleep.
Finally, she logged out, got her ID card back, and disconnected her bookreader.
How to stay awake... this damn article had to be finished by tomorrow. She started walking slowly down the middle of the hall, reading the articles and news items she'd selected and copying bits and quotes from them.
There was probably enough material here for several articles, but she needed a general introduction first.
General. General. And preferably a bit different than what was covered in history class. Which wouldn't be too hard yet, they had barely gotten to the decision to send a scout out to see what kind of life was producing the oxygen in its atmosphere.
Sherry saw the library terminal to the side as she walked past it.
Focus, focus... maybe compare and contrast the things you see on a typical day in Velfard colony with an Earth city. Or country. According to the article, the colony was mostly rural with one big city around the spaceport.
Now, what was typical. A few alien fruits and animals in the grocery stores. Sherry rubbed her eyes. No wood or brick houses in the city, all prefab plastic hovels. Even Calgary, which had burned down a few times, still had some old wood or brick houses. She had lived in a neighbourhood full of them once, in various states of disrepair and with ivy and tarnish hiding the "heritage building" plaques.
It was still a very human city, she was disappointed to find. Not much unusual, except a few native things in the stores. And a few native-made things. And... Sherry rubbed her eyes, but the picture stayed the same. And aliens sometimes came into the city to buy and sell stuff. Cathy would be thrilled.
She started pulling her notes into some semblance of order, then writing her article. It was slower to write while walking, but at least she knew she'd stay awake.