<b>Alicia's smile itself wavered a bit at the look on Sophia's face at her knowing the girl's name without having been introduced. The barely noticable light that appeared under the shades she wore, and it grabbed Alicia's attention. A prosthetic? Was Sophia on the list of registered people with them? She would have to check that later. Right now, she was happy that the woman returned the handshake without any prompting. Maybe not the most friendly people, but at least she wasn't going to be a girly'girl roommate and put annoying decorations up in the room. “Yeah, it helps having friends that have seen you before and showed me what you look like.” partial lie, she did have a friend that was watching now, but didn't show her until speaking into her headset.<br/>
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“Yeah, it couldn't hurt to get to know each other better before...” Alica began after taking her hand out of Sophia's before the announcement came over the speakers, and the reporters began to be escorted out of the ship and the captains returned to their ships. “Prepare to jump.” That ended most of any chances of quietly getting to know her new roomate. “... well, maybe after now... or we could just go somewhere and watch the takeoff and jump? The observation decks should have somewhere to stand.”</b><br/><br/>After what seemed like an eternity in her mind, putting together the string of words uttered by Alicia, Sophia perked up, "Of course! But I believe the observation decks would be too obvious a spot to await the jump. Maybe we should wait for the reporters to clear out and then watch from the bridge? The windows there are almost as big as those of the observation decks." She smiled once more, a sweet smile meant to dissuade any sort of further questioning; at least until they were in the bridge. Sophia looked once more at the camera locked onto her from the hallway. Shouldn't that camera be scanning the whole hallway? A shiver ran up her spine, the black, unblinking eye of the camera fixated on her was starting to get to her head. She glanced at her roommate before heading back to the door that she had used to escape the packs of reporters. She turned back to Alicia, motioned towards the door wordlessly, noted the camera that had rotated to continue its staring, then hurried in just as the last of the reporters were dismissed.<br/><br/>Sophia walked quickly towards an empty table that was near the large window of the bridge, luckily it had still not been claimed. She quickly sat down at the table and almost growled at a reckless civilian who tried the take the table from her. She warily stood up so she could claim a second chair for her roommate so they'd both be able to sit. After pouncing upon an open seat and having to scare off the buzzards trying to claim her table, she sat down peacefully and glanced at the door, waiting for her partner to enter. She turned towards the window and gazed at the endless void before her attention was captured by the small hole of an input jack, meant for recharging and updating data pads.<br/><br/>Just as Alicia had "friends" to show Sophia to her, Sophia had a friend of her own. She deftly placed her palm over the jack and with a shudder, the needle slid forwards and retracted, delivering its payload in milliseconds. Sophia felt almost lighter as Epsilon seeped into the ship, like a virus in a patient's bloodstream.<br/><br/>Epsilon was excited to be freed once more, although it would only be a short time. Only long enough to complete a short assignment, to dig up all necessary  information on Alicia Miranda then return to the host within five minutes of the ship jumping. He reached the near-infinite valley of information, the vault he had cracked only a couple hours before. With the blink of an eye he went to the cabinet he had opened earlier, noting the new safeguards placed on it. "How amusing.", Epsilon muttered before speeding off to his destination. Without Sophia weighing him down, he was now a more effective force. He reached the identity information for all the humans on-board and just as quickly searched through each one. He touched Alicia's file grabbing only the basics, things that would be of interest knowing Sophia's personality, history, prostheses if any, position, and not much else beyond that. He returned the file, closed the door and zipped back to the input jack he was released from. Epsilon was about the give the signal for Sophia to insert the needle before a rather devious idea formed. He created a quick-access path from the valley of information to the input jack in such a way that it would dissolve as Epsilon traveled through it. The path ended at the cabinet Epsilon had opened first, the one with the new security in it. The new code appeared as pictures of chains on the door of the cabinet. He scratched a message into the door around the chains before smiling horrendously. With the lightest of touches, he poked the middle of the chains sending an almost instantaneous signal to its creator.<div class="messageTextEndMarker"> </div>