Cook lowered Rose's borrowed pair of binoculars, which despite their altered outward appearance retained the superior optics of digital-age technology, and offered them to the pegasus who'd come to relieve him as aft look-out. "All right, you've gotten back some of your own. You wouldn't be the first to let me know I have a terrible sense of humor." He turned back to the unglazed aft wrap-around window, through which the tail gun pointed directly astern, locked in place until needed. His thoughtful gaze ranged over the landscape scrolling away below—slowly for one accustomed to jet airliners; quickly for one who was not. "Geology? Climate? Magic? Some combination? I have no idea why that, ah, habitat looks the way it does, and I suspect nopony on the ship has the background to tell us." He lowered his voice still further. "I doubt the science exists here, for that matter. After all, back home it's only a few decades old."