"I'd like to see more of Earth. When I was there I was focused on other things, I only saw a little of Europe and the Eastern seaboard of your United States."

She coughed a little. "There are people who if they knew me would attack, at once. They might attack me just because of my species...And they might attack you, just for being with me. You would be safer if I masked."

An old pain, the deepest pain ever cut into her heart: someone being hurt because of her. She could still feel that scar tissue, all the way through her, like a piercing sword-blade that had rusted in her soul.