Blinding white light; that was all Thomas could see. He squinted, holding his arm up above his head in a failed attempt to hide the piercing white glow. It did very little to help. He blinked, but it didn’t go away. Was he dead? Was this what they meant by “going into the light”? Oh shit, he can't die yet, can he??

“Hey, look who’s awake,” Thomas blinked again, and the light that was above him slowly came into focus, as did the kind face that had appeared before him. Emile smiled, and Thomas immediately felt the tension disappear from his shoulders upon recognizing his friend. He was just in the ship’s medical room; the bright white was only the room’s light. 

“How are you feeling, Thomas?” Emile asked, as his friend pushed himself into a sitting position. Thomas looked around for a moment, his mind becoming clearer as he felt more awake with each passing second. He put a hand to his forehead, frowning.

“Dizzy, and my head is pounding…” He mumbled, “What happened?”

“I’m not entirely sure,” Emile admitted slowly, “Apparently all of us fell unconscious at the same time, and we all woke up around the same time too. Everyone, even Giovanni! Except you - you’ve been asleep for almost a full day now, Thomas.”

“What?” Thomas asked, confusion etched into his features, “Why? How could -” He stopped talking, memories of what had just occured flooding into his mind. Memories of Joan, memories of his friends falling to the floor, memories of… him appearing. His eyes went wide, and he sat up straighter, a single question on his mind. “What about Joan?”

“They just woke up too!” Emile said happily, smiling, “They’re completely fine too, though they were pretty confused…” He trailed off, pushing his glasses up his nose before continuing. “But oddly enough, they still said they felt better than ever before, like they were a little kid again. There’s… absolutely nothing wrong with them. They seem even better and healthier than when we first started the journey. I checked, they’re one of the healthiest people I’ve ever seen now, it is almost as if they were even cured of what comes with aging. That coma or whatever in this universe it was somehow…. Healed them Thomas, down to their very DNA.”

“How…” Thomas looked down, amazed. If that was true then… what he saw, was it all real? Did it really happen? Did the Planet Venus really help his friend? It wasn’t just some crazy dream? The Planets… they’re real? 

“Yeah! This really was a miracle!” Emile laughed, oblivious to Thomas' inner turmoil, “I have no clue how that happened, or even what happened at all! But it did!”

“Are they awake??” Thomas sprung out of bed, only to be stopped by a hand on his chest. Emile looked at him sternly.

“No, they’re asleep. Resting. Just like you should be.”

“What? Emile, I’m fine -” Thomas protested, but Emile just shook his head. 

“You were unconscious way longer than all of us, and there's a huge bump on your head! You actually got injured, you are resting!” He grinned, “Doctor’s orders!”

Thomas sighed; he knew he wasn’t going to win this. There was no way. “Alright alright,” He said as he laid back down, smiling reassuringly. “I’ll rest.”

“Promise?”

“Promise,” Thomas agreed, nodding. Satisfied, Emile said goodbye one last time and exited the room. Thomas’s eyes followed him, and he could see Remy waiting outside as the door open. He waved, before the door shut and the two disappeared. Now alone, Thomas sighed, rolling over and staring at the wall, getting lost in his thoughts.

Well, “thoughts” is a nice way of putting it. More accurately, he got lost in his newest existential crisis.

***

The ship flew by, speeding past the dust and stars with no problems at all. Inside it contained humanity, the only members of the species outside of their Solar System. They were explorers, they were adventurers… they were courage, and they were bravery.

And so help him, Roman was going to meet them.

He and Patton sat on a lone and quiet star at quite a distance from the ship; so far in fact, that it didn’t look very fast at all. It cruised along gently across the horizon, the light gray standing out in stark contrast from the black void behind it. Both of the Planets’ eyes trailed it, before Roman smiled and stood up, breaking eye contact. Patton looked up at him in question.

“It is time! Now, we shall go meet them!” He announced proudly, his eyes glimmering with excitement. “Or rather, they’ll meet us. Can you imagine how excited they’ll be to meet us??? Oh Patton, they’re going to be thrilled!”

“Well, yes… But they might be a little scared too, Roman.” Patton pointed out, getting to his knees and then standing as well. Looking up at Roman, he frowned. “We look a lot different from them, like the gods or monsters they thought up in ancient times, or angels or something… The captain looked kind of terrified….”

“Should we disguise ourselves as humans then?” Roman asked, not losing even a trace of his excitement. He grinned as his eye’s turned to ones like those of the human’s, though his now green irises still shone abnormally bright. Before his hair finished changing to a textureless dark brown, Patton shook his head.

“There’s no point Roman, that’ll honestly probably freak them out even more, seeing some random human stranger on their ship.”

Roman groaned, changing back to normal as the green disappeared from his eyes. “Ughhhh come on, I haven’t gotten to act as a human for centuries! This sucks.”

“At least we’re meeting them.” Patton smiled, putting a hand on his shoulder, “Come on! Be grateful we’re getting this!”

“Yeah yeah,” Roman sighed, trying to hide his playful smile and look upset. “Logan is gonna kill us when we get back either way, so we might as well enjoy this while we can!”

“Exactly.” Patton nodded, and turned back to look at the ship. Surprisingly enough, it had managed to get quite a distance away in the short time that their conversation took. Maybe that tiny ship was a little faster than either of them had thought. He turned back to Roman, holding out his hand. 

“Let’s go meet this generation of humanity.”

Roman grinned, taking and shaking Patton’s hand solemnly. “Let’s do it.”

Together, the two flew off into the void, ready to meet everyone.