Rodrigo, Knox, Thoos, and Picknar left the hot spring pool area and walked up to the road where their cars were parked. Knox asked, “which cars are yours?” Thoos replied, “are these things ‘cars’?” Annoyed that Thoos didn’t know this basic fact, or was pretending not to, Fox said, “yes. these. are. cars.” Curious, Thoos said, “how fast do they go?” Getting pulled into the dining into his technical knowledge, Knox said, “speedometers generally go up around 160-to-200 mph, but most people are weenies and don’t go much over 90 in this part of the country.” Thoos asked, “only 200mph? Is earth a dark planet?” Now it was Picknar’s turn to get annoyed at Thoos, and they said, “of course it is, Thoos. Come on. surely you’ve heard about Mauricio and the Kreebrick? Aitana and the Stribs? And in school we all learned about Martina and the Eebs.” Thoos replied, “sounds vaguely familiar. My family paid some kid to go to school for me and take my tests.” Knox defensively said, “what the hell is a ‘dark planet’?” Speaking dramatically with an arm in the air, Picknar said, “a planet where the stars are only a far-off dream! And the only way you can get there is by your imagination!” And then Picknar added, “in other words: ‘no notable space travel.'” Thoos added dryly, “and cars which max out at about 200mph.”