It was a perfectly lovely afternoon; sun shining, birds twittering, people going happily about their day to day business.

That is, on some planets, it was a lovely afternoon. And only on some, were the people actually what the average human might refer to as people. And, not to mention, not everyone was happy about it. Especially not a certain Arthur Dent, who, though a million light years and a lifetime away from his beloved but literally shattered home planet, was in a rather distressing pickle of a situation at the moment.

It had actually begun that morning. For some reason unbeknownst to Arthur, they had decided to go out for a little ride on the Heart of Gold. Why had he gone with them, again? Oh, right; only because he truly had no other place to go. Except for Earth. Which, unfortunately, was not really Earth, but a rather accurate reconstruction.. a replica, in fact.

He was fairly sure that the joyride had been Zaphod's idea, particularily because he despised Zaphod with a seething and vigorous passion, but Ford had quickly taken all credit for the idea (if only to prevent Arthur from becoming another Marvin). And we all know that the Universe, although known for being overly cool with and confident about extravagantly nonsensical and usually exceedingly ridiculous concepts, could not handle two Marvins. It has also been suggested that not even God, if there is or was or ever will be a God, could handle another Marvin. In fact, 2000 years following the discombobulation of Marvin, a philosopher dedicated 488 of his 500 years writing a very large tome on exactly how the Universe would invariably collapse if there had been, or ever would be, an additional Marvin-type of being. This proved, naturally, to be an enormously futile waste of time, and so miserable was Schnurmelpuff, as he had named himself, that he took the trouble to go back in time, track the android down, and give him a swift kick in the rear. Astonishingly, this reconnected a malfunctioning chip in Marvin's brain, causing him perpetual happiness, much like Calvin the herring-ceiling-everything-loving dog robot. Thus the philosopher changed the entire course of history, and had to hire, though it made him cringe, Dirk Gently, to make things right again. (To put it one way, to make everything equal to 42 again.)

Arthur had awoken that morning in a cold sweat. He had been having the strangest nightmares about the Earth lately. They seemed to have frightened him a lot. Quite a lot. So much, indeed, that he did not remember that Fenchurch had brought herself with him until after he had decided to indulge in a good, dramatic scream.

Fenchurch did not sleep like Trillian, which was lucky on Arthur's part. If Fenchurch shared Trillian's sleeping habits, he would have been sliced, diced, and poured into a stew right then and there. But Fenchurch was blessed (and, it should not be ignored, cursed) with the ability to sleep through anything, and therefore not even Arthur's bloodcurdling scream could awaken her.

Later that morning, Arthur and Fenchurch made their way to the Tea Area (sadly transformed into a coffee area by Zaphod) and searched in vain for tea. Ford was already quite awake and chattering away at a billion miles per second. Arthur made himself a mental note to keep Ford away from any and all future sources of caffeine.

"So have you heard about the hoopy froody happening news, my friends?" Ford stopped his chatter for a blissful moment, only to take a quick break and then resumed conversation.

"No," said Fenchurch in a voice that sent a chill even down Arthur's spine.

"Ah, neither have I. I was hoping that you had." Ford did not seem to have taken notice of the warning tone in her voice, and continued. "We've got a long day ahead of us," he beamed as he poured himself another tankard of coffee, "First we're stopping by Milliways for breakfast," Arthur's heart sunk at the mention of the Restaurant.

"We are not stopping at Milliways," Arthur glared pointedly at Ford, who had chosen to be obliviously unperceptive at the moment. "That last incident...order, of bacon was a little too.. er, intimate, you know. I mean.. I've never particularily enjoyed watching an animal cook itself."

"Oh, brilliant!" nodded Ford distantly. He hadn't taken in a word. He downed yet another kettle of coffee.

Fenchurch pushed Arthur decidedly AWAY from the coffee machine (and maniac).

"Are you OK?"

He wasn't quite sure. Lately he'd been especially nostalgic for his peaceful home back on planet Earth. He felt a strange yet pressing urge to make a sandwich, which seemed odd, at least at this point in his life. He had only vague memories of being a Sandwich Maker. He suddenly felt an onslaught of confused emotions and decided he would simply give up on paying attention to them for the moment.

"Oh yeah," he sighed, "Positively brilliant." Fenchurch grinned at him and he felt profoundly happier. Or at least less frenzied.

She took him by the arm and dragged him over to a strange computerized device, urged him to sit down in front of it, and gestured at the vast array of buttons. "Check this out," she pressed a rather urgent looking, enormous red button (surrounded by signs that read, in order,"DO NOT TOUCH! " "DO NOT PRESS!" "YOU'RE ASKING FOR IT!" and "DON'T SAY WE DIDN'T WARN YOU!") much to Arthur's surprise. To Arthur's even more immense surprise, nothing seemed to happen.

"Er.. ehm..uh.." he muttered helplessly. "The signs.."

Fenchurch laughed and dragged him away from the machine, to a round window. "Watch."

The ship was shooting out small, star shaped objects that exploded in very impressive patterns. It took him a few moments to realize that they were fireworks. Tears came to his eyes.

Silently, they stood, watching the fireworks go off.