Nestira followed Rixx gaze, and for a while, simply regarded the crowd. So many different species, so many people from different backgrounds – and, somehow, the two Rodulans still didn’t fit in.

“It’s… very warm today.”, she said eventually. It was her means of telling him that she didn’t want to talk about what was really on her mind, but that didn’t mean the statement was untrue.

Rixx looked skyward. “It is hot. And humid.” he stated as a plain fact. “Unpleasantly so.”

And clearly they weren’t the only ones perceiving it as such, and he wondered if whoever was in charge of stabilizing the weather had taken a day off.

“I think I would like to go home – or sit down, at the very least.” Nestira said eventually, and he gave a nod.

At first he scanned for shade. That was easy, Risa was built for sunning and cooling off and playing and relaxing, and the architecture was specifically designed to provide paths of sun and paths of shade. Then he scanned for seats. Also easy, this was a tourists dream and benches were everywhere.

But as he steered her into the shade and towards the bench, he scanned for any indications of danger. Letting his natural telepathy open up, to sense the dark, the panicked, the terrified thoughts that mingled in the drunken joy and effervescent ecstasy of the Blackout party.

“Something is coming.” he murmured a low warning, his expression turning dark.

Nestira, who had been preoccupied with trying to ignore the bright light and loud noise, took a seat. Then she looked at him. “Something is… coming? What?”

“I don’t know.” He admitted. “But at the farthest reaches of my senses I can hear it. Panic.”

“I think you are being paranoid.”, Nestira scolded him, but her heart wasn’t entirely in it. Rixx wasn’t the most trusting of people to begin with, always making sure that where they stayed was safe, secure, defensible.

She, on the other hand, lived in the moment, never planning too far ahead. And sometimes, she was a little naive. “Nothing is coming.”

It turned out that they were both wrong.

Something – someone – was coming, but that person carried nothing of the panic and terror Rixx had picked up on. Intead, they radiated an odd mix of confusion and curiosity.

“I don’t mean to interrupt. I brought some water, you look like the heat today got to you.”

The voice belonged to a young woman, late teens from the looks of it, with pale skin, crimson hair, charming freckles and pitch black eyes. She felt Rodulan, but meeting one of their own here was so random that it bordered on impossible.

Their species didn’t leave home unless it was absolutely necessary. Why Nestira and Rixx were both exceptions to that rule, and how they had found each other, was a story they told no one.

“Yes… thank you.”, Nestira said, quickly regaining her composure, and glad for the sip of cool water.

“Why thank you, miss…”, nodded Rixx. He wasn’t great at conversation, and Nestira could feel him holding his telepathy at bay.

At bay like a dog straining against a fraying leash.