Happily entombed in the black

She abandoned me after threatening me if I got up again.

His foot hurts like fire despite the painkiller he's taken, his head feels stuffed full of cotton because of those same painkillers, and from the way his ears are ringing he's suspecting that the fever might be back. But Jonas is limping around in one of the dustier rooms of the station, trying his best to get it clean before Alayna returns from checking on her animals.

He frowns as he shakes a curtain, then coughs and sneezes as the dust billows. -Ugh, stupid idea, Shephard....-

Wheezing, he stumbles back, then groans as he steps on something on the floor and feels himself falling.

"Ouch...."

Pepper looks in and whickers at him quizzically.

Jonas blinked and opened his eyes, then frowned as he realized that he was looking at the familiar ceiling of his bedroom. Still frowning at how groggy he felt, he lifted his head and was non-plussed to see no sign of Pepper on her mat at the foot of the bed. His foot ached dully, but he suspected that the lack of pain and his grogginess came from the same source.

"Alayna?"

*headdesk* *double headdesk*

The large room was in semi-darkness, the only light coming from a lamp on Jonas' desk as he leaned over an ancient book that he'd just traded a space ship engine for a few days earlier. It was the tale of a small creature called a 'Hobbit', and though it was fantasy it was clear from the style and the writer's voice that he had been an educated man. Despite his preference for straight facts Jonas found himself drawn deeply into the tale, undisturbed by the occasional faint creak that echoed down the corridors outside.