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Chapter 32

Chapter 32

 January 22nd, 2158

Logan followed Mike thought the hallways to the cafeteria.  Along the way neither spoke to the other.  Logan couldn't help but stew over what he had learned and the potential conspiracies that might be in play.

They reached the cafeteria picked up some food and sat down at a table in the sea of tables.  Mike sat next to Logan, the proximity made Logan uncomfortable.  He didn't feel as if he could trust Mike.  Upon reaching the station there has been such a huge emphasis placed on keeping information secure and secret.  Mike was part of what kept that secret.

Mike couldn't have been a part of Jake's death, but for the time being, it was safer to not include Mike in his confidence.  Instead he would need to find a way to circumvent Mike to find the truth.

What were his possible options, there were not many.  What ever he had to do, it would have to be discrete.  It would be hard to involve James and Nora, without alerting their escorts.  So, what else was there?

Logan played out a few different scenarios, but continually ran into dead ends.

"Logan, are you OK?"

Logan looked up and found Mike with a concerned look on his face.  He realized that he had barley touched his breakfast.

"I..." Logan was stunned, he couldn't tell Mike the truth, at least not yet.  "I guess I'm a little scared."  It was the first thing that came to his mind.

"Scared, of what?"

"I have always known life was fragile, but yesterdays training emphasized just how dangerous our expedition will be.  Small amounts of stress can kill on that exoplanet.  I'm not sure that I am cut out for that."

"You will be," Mike said with a warm smile on his face.  "We have two more weeks until we are going to the exoplanet.  We will train, and we will be ready.  Plus, we will have the station checking in on us a couple times a day in case there is a problem.  We will be trained to handle most all situations, and we will be able to adapt to those that we have not trained for."

Logan knew that Mike was trying to be comforting, but considering his current point of view, it sounded condescending.

"We'll see." Logan responded.

Once again the two fell silent.  Logan pushed some of the food around on his plate.  He once again tried to think of how he could find out if Jake's death was an accident or if it was murder.  The two sat there in silence for another ten minutes before Logan had become so frustrated with not coming up with a solution that he suddenly stood up from the table.

Mike didn't say anything; he simply glanced up at him.

"I, I'm done, are you?"  Logan said in fractured English.

"Yes," Mike said as he gathered his tray and followed Logan to the busing station.  The two stowed their trays away and headed towards one of the exits.  Before they could leave the room, the door opened in front of them by the old man and the NBS that Logan had seen twice before.

Logan noticed that the old man sized Mike up quickly, and then stepped aside followed by the NBS.  Mike held the door open not taking his eyes off of the man and let Logan step though before he followed.

The first thought that Logan had was how funny it was that Mike thought he needed to protect him from that old man and the seemingly timid NBS.  But then Logan's thoughts went back to when he had asked Mike about him the last time they saw each other.