[Ankari can perceive that kind of placating charm even while half swimming in alcoholic brain fog. He uses it all the time, it's a good trick. It works on him in the moment, there's something comforting about being on the receiving end of it for once,]

I see... nothing dramatic going on? H, h, here I was... thinking maybe this place drags people away under intense stress. I don't know... just an idea that came to mind. [his mind is desperate for common ground, maybe, something to relate to others who arrived. He's somewhere so new, so far from how he's lived before, why consign himself to being an outsider? Ankari has never really known comradery. It would be nice to feel that, here.]