December 20, 2363

Ever since we arrived, Grace has been begging me to take her out flying again. Blue is utterly perplexed by the hero worship that Grace directs at me, but where he usually gives children a wide berth, Grace has endeared herself to him. I was worried when right off the bat she'd started asking him all about his blue skin and antennae. He's handled the questioning well, and even laughed when one day Grace emerged from her bedroom in the morning with a crudely fashioned pair of antennae, made of what looked to be blue pipe cleaners attached to her headband. Her mother was horrified, but as Blue chuckled at it, the rest of the family relaxed.

Travis had been worried about how his family and Blue would get along. Sure, they accepted me well enough, but Travis' concern wasn't about being alien, at least not with the direct family, but the weaponry. Yeah, I'm usually just as armed as Blue, but he's a lot more open about what he has on his person at any given time. I usually tuck my stuff away where it won't be noticed, and he wears everything on open display.

If Travis has paid attention when we visited Andor, he would have noticed that Andorian culture does condition its people into disarming themselves when entering a family home. Granted, the ship we work on is kind of like a home to us, but Blue's always armed there, so that might have colored Travis' perspective. That's out of necessity though, given that pirates could attack at any time, and having to run to a storage locker for weapons can make the difference between surviving or not.

It was entertaining when Cindy greeted us at the door, and her eyes got large as the moon when Blue started to disarm himself and politely asked where he was supposed to leave all of it. I had to bite my lip to not laugh at the look on her face. She took it in stride though, as she quickly directed him to the coat closet, and found a box she could keep on the top shelf so she wouldn't have to worry about Grace and Andrea happening across any of it.

Once he'd put away his armament, and saw that I hadn't pulled out any of my hidden toys, he seemed to realize something was off. It only took him a moment more to realize that he'd surprised Cindy, and was quick to apologize for it. Being the good hostess she is, she assured him to think nothing of it, and I could see that she was starting to calculate in her head some changes she'd need to make in order to accommodate her son's companions properly.

Later, after she'd shown Blue to the guest room, and Travis had gone to take a shower while I listened to music in his room, Blue came and started to question me about what'd happened. He opened up with asking me about why I was still armed, and why it'd surprised Cindy so when he'd shown her the respect of disarming himself upon entering her home. I pointed out that most of Travis' friends here on earth aren't the sort who feel the need to be prepared to defend themselves, and that Earth was generally less chaotic than the places we frequented. Cindy simply never had encountered a need to worry about if anyone Travis brought home was armed. Also, those who arm themselves on Earth don't typically do so in a obvious fashion, so if someone were to arrive armed to the teeth, most people wouldn't notice it and most wouldn't worry about disarming themselves upon arrival. If there was going to be a problem with being armed where they were headed, they'd typically either conceal better, or they'd simply go without arms.

This prompted him to ask if perhaps next time he shouldn't bother removing his weaponry, and just plan on going lighter on what he carried. I explained that Cindy adapted pretty well, and that if it made him more comfortable to show respect by disarming on his way in the door, to go ahead and continue doing so. If he wanted to, he could talk to Cindy about it to make sure it wasn't going to cause a problem. He hadn't met Grace and Andrea yet, but when he later did, he was quick to realize that they weren't familiar with the sight of weapons, not to mention the safe treatment of them, and this prompted him to ask me how I kept mine out of their hands. When I showed him a little box that had a bio-lock on it, which opened quickly for my touch, but required a much more complex set of actions for anyone else to attempt to open it, he asked me where he might get one of his own.