Jin regarded the box in new doubt.  It was certainly secure, but it did seem rather airtight.  The wolf spider scratched futilely at the walls of her prison with fine claws.  "For a while, anyway."

"What's her name?"

"I haven't named her yet."

"She needs a name."

Jin nodded full agreement.  All right, sometimes Mina could be sensible.  It was said there were thousands of wolf spider species back on Old Earth, but the Kibou terraformers, stingily, had only imported half a dozen or so for their new ecosystem.  But with no comlink here, he couldn't look up his new pet's real scientific name.  He hoped it would turn out to be something as sophisticated as the spider herself.

"You could call her Spinner.  Except you said she doesn't spin.  Wolfie?"

"Sounds like a boy's name," Jin objected.  "It ought to be a lady's name, to fit her.  Something from Old Earth."

Mina scowled in thought a moment, then brightened.  "Lady Murasaki!  That's the oldest lady's name I know of."

Jin, about to pooh-pooh her idea in brotherly reflex, paused.  He eyed his spider.  The name did fit.  "All right."

Mina grinned in triumph.  "What does she eat?"

"Littler bugs.  I should catch her some in the garden before we leave.  I'm not sure how much longer it will take us to get, um.  Home."

Growing more interested after all this, Mina said, "Can I help feed her?"

"Sure."

Mina stretched, and, perhaps reminded of food, dug in her pillaged backpack for another lunch bar.  "Maybe we better split this.  To make them last."

"Good idea," Jin admitted.  He set the spider box aside and went out to rinse and fill their milk bottles with water from the garden spigot.

When he slipped back inside the shed, closing the door with a creak, Mina asked, "What time is it out there?"

"I'm not sure.  Afternoon, anyway."

"Do you think school's out yet?  Can we go on the streets again?"

"Pretty soon."

They divided the lunch bar and the water.

"Maybe you should put Lady Murasaki in one of our water bottles, instead," said Mina, draining hers and holding it up to the light falling through the shed's one grimy window.  "We could poke breath holes through it."

"I was going to rinse those out and fill them up with water to take with us.  You know how you were yammering you were so hot and thirsty yesterday afternoon."

"My feet were so sweaty inside my shoes," Mina said.  "They felt nasty."  She looked up at him, still a bit puffy-eyed from their uncomfortable day's sleep.  "How much longer is it going to take to get to your place?"

"Hard to say."  Jin shrugged uneasily.  "I've been gone way longer than I'd planned.  I sure hope Miles-san is taking care of all my creatures."

"That's your galactic friend, right?"