Alden was really the only one who ever tried to get to know Harker.

To everyone else, she was the recluse luminary Laureate, the smart one, the botany nerd, the lucky one, Jotham's younger sister. To Alden, she was one of the most amazing people he'd ever met. He had this gentle infatuation with quite literally everything she did. The way she took care of the lab plants. The way she wrote.

The way she sang.

Whenever there was a Luminary event on the holopad, he always turned it on just to see what she had to say. She was quite literally the voice of the people. Their generation, at least, she was only a Junior Galactic Laureate. Still, her informed poems, speeches, and songs, made him admire her even more. She was one of his best friends, and he knew how to handle her. Her fears, her tics, her hopes...He could listen to her talk for hours. And best of all, he could be his confident, quirky self around her. She never had any objections.

Tonight, he was sitting in his dorm room. Bastian, Jotham, and Rio were all at a party in the Cetus wing, but he wanted to get some homework done. He was never one for big parties. He hummed quietly as he sat at the desk in front of the viewport, scribbling on his datapad.