That was the real crapshoot about moving the city, John thought. Of course, it had been the coolest thing ever to sit in the chair and access the stardrive and fly a fucking city. He still had a hard time with that one. The new place, called Pacifica by some smartass (but it stuck) had lots of ocean and more than one continent.

They'd moved the Athosians to the landmass closest to the equator, until Halling called in an emergency and they all had to be evacuated to a less temperate continent. It wasn't that the first one wasn't nice. Well, it was nice. But the wildlife had been a bit much to handle.

Snakes. Huge ones. Many were over a hundred feet long. And those were just the babies. When things settled down and contact with Earth was restored, the declassification continued to roll slowly along. John and Rodney went to visit Julian and Emmett and brought pictures.

Julian recoiled, but Emmett clutched the photos to his chest and turned pleading eyes on Julian, who buried his head in his head and said, "fuck."