"She still hasn't stopped?" he asks with something between a laugh and an incredulous headshake. There's what someone could read as sympathy in there, but there's also a healthy bit of amusement. Maxwell is usually so deliberate.

They have seen Kepler sick exactly once that wasn't mission based. The mission-based one was a viral agent that his suit got contaminated with that nearly killed him and no laughing matter. The flu, however, had been an ordeal of watching a man nearly pass out while wearing a medical mask and seemingly pretending that he wasn't sick.

He'd still finished all his paperwork that week!