At first, Iral just kept talking, wanting to finish his tirade and viewing his stopping as being defeated, but after a few moments he simply couldn’t hear himself talking anymore. Jupiter wasn’t saying any words. It was just noise that rendered him completely unable of hearing anything else. People back home would not believe this, he thought to himself as he started laughing his heart out again, despite being unable to hear his own laughter. Although the noise finally stopped, he still couldn’t hear anything over the ringing in his ears for a while, but he managed to say “What the hell was that?!” though he was unsure if he said any of the words correctly.

Jupiter apologized and explained that talking about food gave him an uncontrollable desire to call for a mate. Iral’s grinned widened as he stared at him in disbelief. He considered that maybe he was being sarcastic again, but he believed him. He started laughing. “That’s insane!” he said between laughs, his hearing returning to him and noticing that the noise caused an alarm to go off. “So what’s happening now? Are all the girls invading the station to have you? Why didn’t you think of that sooner?” he said, looking at the hallway that was painted with blinking red emergency lights.

“I was saying…” he continued, his grin disappearing. “That my name is Iral and that’s what you’re going to call me otherwise we’re going to have a hard time getting things done. Understand? The only other thing you can call me by is ‘Master’, if that’s preferable.”