"Thanks." Jim flashes him a small, grateful smile. At least somebody's backing him up on how dumb this all is. "We're gonna have five years to prove the point. Should be plenty, I hope."

He almost wants to ask more about Steve's apparently more hostile history with extraterrestrials, but that seems like something that'll just depress them both. Time to shift gears. "There's really no telling what we're gonna find out there. Terran astronomy's centuries old and we still haven't even scratched the surface of what's possible."