CASE [GL]

I walked behind Luna as she showed off the living room to Ellie. It was pretty funny to watch her walk around with the holo stick in her hand. 

“And this is the fireplace we used to keep ourselves from freezing yesterday evening!” Luna crouched in front of the fireplace. 

“Seems a bit low-tech.” Ellie replied. Her little avatar raising her hand to her chin. 

“Just needed to get some hands on the actual heater. Everything is working fine now.” I smiled. “That said, you should see the fireplace when it’s actually burning, it looks a lot more impressive with… you know… fire. I can light it up later.” 

“I’d very much like to see that.” Ellie’s avatar nodded. 

Luna then hopped over to the sofa where we had spent the night and got up to the window, presumably to show Ellie the outside world. As it was already dark outside, when Luna opened the curtains far enough to be able to peek through, the only thing really visible was the street lanterns and the lighting from the houses on the other side of the street. Apparently it was snowing again though so that was something. 

“It is a very white landscape, isn’t it?” Ellie asked. 

“It definitely is.” I agreed. “Very hard for anything green to grow around here, unless it’s in a dome. That’s why the homes tend to be decorated with a decent amount of colors. You generally won’t find many plain white interiors.” 

Luna looked around. “You could use a little more colour yourself, though. You don’t really have much around, apart from that painting.” 

“I know. If it weren’t too obvious, I haven’t spent much time at home before I went up into space. Feel free to give me suggestions, though. A couple of paintings if you like… or perhaps a statue. I think a bust would fit in quite nicely.” I smiled and put my hand on her lower back. 

I could feel a shiver go up her back quickly as her cheeks turned just that tiny bit redder. “I think I have a suggestion or two…” She replied with a pout. 

“That’s what I like to hear.” I smirked at her reaction. 

Ellie faked a cough. “Please do tell me when you are about to perform intercourse, in that case I will shut off the connection.” 

“We were merely talking about decorations, Ellie!” Luna’s face was now bright red. 

“Well, there were certainly some undertones present. At least on my part.” 

“Commander, please make sure not to overload the XO too much.” 

“I can’t promise that.” 

Luna held on to her pout and walked off with the holo stick. Her puffed up cheeks making me giggle. “Let’s move on.” 

“Yeah, good idea. Let’s go to the bedroom next.” I smirked, but in return I did get a little pillow from my sofa thrown at me. Totally worth it though. 

 

Luna showed Ellie around the kitchen and my storage room first before we headed up the stairs. As a big part of the second floor was built on top of the garage, it was a lot bigger than the ground floor was. The first room upstairs Luna showed was, not surprisingly, the bathroom. 

“A bathroom with an actual bath!” Luna excitedly pronounced as she walked in with Ellie in her hand. “It’s so comfy, Ellie.” 

“I will gladly believe that. And I see it has some massage jets too. Good for relaxing your musculature.” 

“I haven’t experienced those yet.” Luna replied. 

“We kind of forgot about it due to circumstances. But we’ll get around to it next time, I’m sure.” 

“Circumstances?” 

“I refuse to elaborate.” Luna quickly went outside and into the hallway, drawing some chuckles out of me, and even Ellie couldn’t keep it silent. The tag team between me and my esteemed colleague was going great. 

Luna seemed a bit lost now which side to pick. In the end, she decided to head to the left and headed into my office. I had some weights, a treadmill and a power bench sat on one side of my office while I had a desk area set up on the other side. And I still had room to spare if I wanted to add anything else in the room. 

“Have you used these much?” Luna sat down on my power bench and looked at my sporting equipment. 

I nodded. “When I was home, I used these pretty much every day. I do like to keep in shape.” I ran my hand over one of the weights, wiping off some of the dust. I have had my workout for today with my heating unit maintenance, though. “I have used my desk a lot less.” 

“It all looks brand new.” 

“That’s because it is. I think I can count the times I’ve powered up that computer with two hands.” 

“According to my research, that is also rather expensive equipment, is it not?” Ellie asked. 

I nodded again. “I just asked the store to give me the best they had and it was within budget, so I thought why not. I know I’m in a rather privileged position.” 

“You did sacrifice a lot for it though…” Luna stood up from my power bench and walked over. 

“But so did a lot of other people, and they didn’t get paid nearly as much.” I looked down at the floor as I closed my fist and tapped the weights a couple of times. 

Luna put her hand on my good shoulder and gave me a little squeeze. Not really saying anything, but her just being there for me kept the thoughts in my mind from getting darker. 

“Should we move on to the other rooms?” Ellie proposed, clearly wanting to shift the subject away as well. 

“Yeah, let’s do that.” I put my other hand on Luna’s and turned around, so I could walk hand in hand with her as we went to the next room. 

 

“And this here is the guest bedroom.” I opened the door to a mostly empty room. The only thing I really had in this room was a spare twin bed, an empty closet, and an empty desk with a chair and a greenish rug to match the yellow wallpaper. “Hasn’t been used before either, as you have guessed.” 

“You could invite Eva over.” Luna replied as she walked around the room. “But maybe you could decorate it a bit more before that, though.” 

“Yeah.” I nodded. “Otherwise Eva would bug me about it, wouldn’t she.” 

Luna chuckled. “She would.” 

“This home definitely could use some plants from what I have seen. According to many home decoration sources, that helps to live up houses quite a lot.” Ellie added. 

“I know, but the problem is that I would need someone to look over them when I’m not home.” 

“There are solutions for that. You have an auto duster too, don't you?” 

“Yes, but that doesn’t always work, clearly.” 

“That’s because you haven’t had your enhanced AI take a look at it.” 

“Hmm. Are you offering to give me some free improvements?” 

“If you let me.” Ellie’s avatar nodded. “I actually do have something I want to ask of you, but that can wait until after the rest of the tour.” 

“Well, there’s not much else to see.” I walked Luna out of the room with her hand still in mine and walked her into the master bedroom. “This is the last room after all.” 

“You have another set of weights here?” Luna pointed at the weights I had set down next to my night table. 

“I think I brought them from my office and never bothered to put them back in their spot.” 

“Lauren… That’s lazy…” 

“I know.” I chuckled. “I will put them back, okay?” 

Luna smiled and walked over to my bed, taking me with her. She then sat down on top of it. 

“Hope the mattress is not too hard for you?” 

She shook her head. “No, it feels fine. I think it’s softer than the one in your cabin. I think I’ll sleep very good on this one.”  

“At least it will be more comfortable than the sofa.” Even though Luna herself hadn’t really slept on the sofa, but on me for most of the night. 

“We will see.” She blushed.

I let go of Luna’s hand for a bit so I could take the weights into my hands and bring them back to my office. 

“You said this was where your parental house was, right?” Luna asked as she continued looking around my room. “And that you kept the configuration mostly the same?” 

“Yeah. More or less.” I nodded. 

“Did this then used to be your parents' bedroom?” 

I shook my head. “No, it didn’t. That would be where my office is right now. I couldn’t really bring myself to sleep in the same part of the house where my parents did. Why are you asking?”

“I was just wondering…” Luna replied. “Because you don’t really have pictures around, but I was under the impression that you did like your parents a lot.” 

I smiled. “I do have some pictures of them, but I still need to frame them.” I put the weights back down again and opened the cabinet, pulling out a box. “Would you like to see them?” 

“It would be my honor.” Luna put her hand on her chest and gave me an affirmative nod.