All too soon, Clara's “long” commute to Agilis ended, and she still had little idea how to convince her teammates to return with her to Almitas. After parking her hovercraft, Clara jammed her hands into her pockets and walked into the Sapphire Hotel with a worried mind and anxious heart. She felt like a doctor getting ready to deliver terminal news. No amount of pleasantness would erase the awful prognosis; she and her teammates would shrivel into old men and women in a matter of days and would likely never see their home planet again – nor the people they loved on it.