A somewhat familiar voice spoke behind Kwan. The male voice was full of disbelief and a hint of annoyance.
"You have got to be kidding me."
Kwan tried to place the voice in the second between hearing it and turning around, but all his brain provided was 'heard it a long time ago'. When he caught sight of the man who had uttered the sentence he still couldn't place him.
Black hair, a bit short, clothed in the easily recognizable blue NASA jumpsuit. No name came to mind. Kwan realized he should've said something by now, so he stumbled over his words to get a reply out.
"What's so hard to be kidding? I mean- why are you so surprised?"
The man's features hardened, his blue eyes roving over Kwan's own blue jumpsuit as if looking for something that proved it was a fake. Kwan took the opportunity to eye the nametag of the unfamiliar man. And then it came crashing back. He'd bellowed the name enough times in his high school years, after all.
"Fenton!"
"Ah, so you do know my real last name," said Fenton. Kwan furrowed his brow as he searched back along his memories why Fenton's tone was so bitter. He remembered a small boy his own age but a good head shorter. Kwan held no real grudge against him, but his old friend Dash had it out for the kid. Ah, that explained the tone. And now the kid was an astronaut, same as Kwan.
"I haven't seen you in years! How are you doing?" asked Kwan. He held out his hand for Fenton to shake (what was his first name? Something with a D?). Fenton looked at it for a second, sighed and shook it nonetheless. Kwan took that as a good sign.
"I'm fine, joined NASA, got married and trying to get into the next shuttle heading for the ISS. You?"
Kwan smiled at the broad life summary. "My life pretty much happened the same way. Though I'm engaged, not married yet."
"Congratulations, I suppose."
"And you," retorted Kwan. After that the conversation dried up, because what did you say to your regular bully victim in high school after this many years? Kwan only had one thing to ask, "What was your first name again? It's on the tip on my tongue…"
"Danny. And I never learned your last name, to be honest."
Kwan smiled at Danny before answering. "It's Lin, but I prefer 'Kwan'."
He wanted to add something about all the years they shared a classroom, all the crazy things that happened in and around Amity Park, but he was interrupted by his boss. Their boss now, if he understood Danny correctly about also being on the ISS-team.
"Ah, I see you two have met already. Let's get this show started then, shall we?"
Without waiting for an answer their boss began to explain the new training they would have to endure to qualify for the ISS-team. Kwan glanced sideways at Danny, who focused intently on the explanation. He hoped that they would be able to talk it out, because if all went well they would be stuck in a series of metal tubes which would give a squirrel claustrophobia, let alone a human being. Teamwork was essential.
A question still nagged him though: how did a, let's face it, scrawny kid like Fenton get into NASA?
XXX
They trained together for three months, but every milliliter of sweat was worth it when they got the memo that they were allowed on the next flight to the International Space Station. During those three months Kwan got to know Danny a lot better. He wasn't necessarily book smart like so many other geeks, but he had a way of turning problems upside down and shaking them until a solution fell out. And it worked, most of the time.
Danny was in charge of the ectoplasmic experiments they would perform on the space station. Kwan had to read up on a whole lot of ghost-related topics before his knowledge came even close to that of Danny's. It was as if the guy knew what ectoplasmic energy was on a first-person basis.
Their teamwork had improved a lot from the first frosty conversation, but Kwan didn't know if that was because Danny was determined to make it to the space station or if Danny genuinely liked Kwan. Kwan never disliked Danny in high school, it was Dash's doing that made Danny so often a bullying target. At that time it seemed simpler to stay with the popular crowd and push some geeks around. Now Kwan knew that those geeks often became the bosses of the jock-type kids. Luckily he had been able to let go of the stereotypical jock behavior.
And, truth be told, he had Danny to thank for that, and for his astronaut-ambition.
It had been a simple presentation in Astronomy class. They all had to do a presentation on a subject, be it about a planet or Einstein's theory of special relativity. Kwan had presented a paper about the possibilities of life in another galaxy, but Danny's presentation was by far the best. Even then Kwan could admire the way Danny spoke with such enthusiasm, such conviction that he'd be out there one day. Kwan had forgotten what the subject was, but the notion of 'become an astronaut' had somehow stuck.
After the disaster with Miss Spectra's 'counseling', where he had realized he wasn't working towards a future at all, he decided to at least choose one ambitious career path besides football player. He chose 'astronaut'.
Gradually he had realized that space interested him. He began to read more about it, and slowly he worked on improving his grades. Miss Spectra had told him that after high school it would be all downhill for him, but he became determined to prove her wrong. He took on extra math classes, trained even more to keep his body in shape and read his way through the library.
It had been grueling work to keep up with NASA's outrageous demands, but somehow he made the cut. The fact that he knew a thing or two about ectoplasm was a huge bonus, which probably got him into the program. This new science branch had very few reputable scientists, and NASA probably saw applications for space travel strewn all over. Ghosts could fly effortlessly, and ghost energy was real and could be harnessed. The ecto-converter they were going to install to power part of the ISS proved that.
And now Kwan and Danny were ready to take on their first mission together. They would fly out to the ISS, where the current crew would train them further in handling the space station. Then they would leave , leaving Danny and Kwan alone to man the station. They could conduct their experiments for twenty days, and then a new crew would join for them to train. After twenty more days it was back to Earth for them.
Kwan felt ready.
XXX
"I've been meaning to ask," said Kwan two nights before they were scheduled to launch. "How did you get into NASA? If you'd followed the regular road, I'd have met you before."
Danny looked up at Kwan from his book. He vaguely waved a hand in a direction. "Oh, I got in on a special training about ectoplasm and such. Got my parents to thank for that, to be honest. If it weren't for their expertise, I'd probably be working in an office, dreaming of the stars."
Kwan was a bit taken aback. He came from Amity Park, why hadn't NASA offered him the same special training? If relatively weak guy like Danny could get into the ISS program, Kwan would be a perfect candidate. Not that he was resentful, he just found it a bit odd.
"Your parents… they always wore jumpsuits, didn't they?" asked Kwan. Danny blew out a long-suffering sigh and laid his book down. Kwan saw that it was the manual for the ecto-converter they'd bring to and install on the ISS.
"Yeah, and they still do. Bright blue and neon orange, quite hard to miss. They made me wear one to high school one day."
"Wow, rough."
Danny stretched out before replying, "Yeah, that day kinda sucked. But I survived and now it's only two days until launch. I still can't quite believe it."
"Tell me about it," said Kwan. "I can't wait till they countdown for the lift-off. Maybe then I'll realize it's real."
XXX
Danny's grin was so wide Kwan feared his face might split open. The endless black expanse of space was spread out in front of them, with the Earth revolving below. Kwan had seen thousands of pictures of the Earth at this angle, but none of them could have prepared him for the beauty of it. It was so huge and so small, so fragile but somehow it sustained life, and lots of it. Kwan had never been good with words, so he settled for 'majestic' and focused on his own body instead of the view.
"It's real," whispered Kwan to himself. Since he was strapped down he couldn't feel himself float off, but he certainly felt something screwing with his equilibrium.
The radio jerked them both back into reality.
"Come in, Akh's Vessel."
Kwan touched the microphone on his helmet and replied, "We hear you, ground control, over."
Ground control guided them to the waiting bosom of the docks of the ISS. With skills trained a thousand times in the simulator Danny and Kwan guided the shuttle into one of its docks. Without a sound the two manmade space faring objects joined together. Only then did Kwan dare release his own relieved grin, and he made a motion to high-five Danny. Their clothed hands met and although the sound was muffled, the gesture was honest. Somehow these two kids from Amity Park had made it into space.
And now the real work began.
On board their ship they had taken a dozen ecto samples with them, to test and manipulate and see if any of it could be used as fuel. It was a lot cheaper to manufacture than rocket fuel, and the versatile energy form could be used for other purposes as well. But first they had to get to know the ISS. Kwan had trained himself silly on the simulator, with Danny right by his side. Danny knew more about the controls at first, but Kwan quickly caught up to him, thanks in part to Danny's unusual behavior.
Sometimes Danny dropped everything and left for a few hours. NASA had given him special permission to do so.
One time Kwan had tried to question him about it, but Danny cut him off and refused to answer any questions about the subject. But since NASA had given permission, Kwan wasn't the one to question him. Their superior thought it was fine, even when Kwan brought up it with him. So he let it drop too, though not without occasionally asking Danny where he went when he did that. But Danny was a master of evasion, always changing the subject and giving non-committal answers.
But on board the ISS Danny had nowhere to run. The space they could move around in was tiny, no more than 350 square feet. Kwan had to get used to that the first few days, as well as sleeping while being bound to a wall. He had practiced the whole routine on Earth, but in space it was different. The first days were exhausting enough though, so he had little trouble with that.
Space sickness was more of an issue for him. Weighing nothing was incredibly disorientating and as a result he threw up five times in the space of two days. After that his body adjusted to the alien surroundings. Danny didn't seem bothered at all. He floated around like he had done this a thousand times before. Kwan brought it up once.
"All this floating, it just feels so ... unnatural," he said.
"It doesn't to me," replied Danny. "Then again, I guess that's expected," he muttered.
"Why's that?" asked Kwan. Danny jerked as if he'd just realized he had said that out loud. His eyes shot in all directions as he tried to come up with a reply.
"Because, err, in the special training I got a lot of zero g training. A lot," he emphasized for good measure.
"Cool," replied Kwan. And with that the subject was closed.
After having been trained enough by the current crew, they left. The moment Kwan saw the space shuttle disappear, swallowed against the backdrop of the Earth, the responsibility crushed down upon him. If he screwed up, they would both die. And he would probably come back as a ghost and have to endure those ghost hunters in Amity Park.
"Want to get to work on those samples?" asked Danny at Kwan's back.
Kwan pushed himself off the side of the room to turn himself around and look Danny in the eyes. Danny floated in mid-air, not touching the walls. Kwan scowled at that. They had been instructed to always keep a hand on the walls to propel themselves. When they got better at navigating in micro gravity, they could float around like seasoned astronauts. But for now they had better keep a hand on the walls or suffer having to flail around, not able to touch anything and get some Newton laws action. There were very few spots where that could happen, thanks to the claustrophobia-inducing space station, but there were a few. And Danny the Genius managed to float in one.
"Hang on, I'll get you out," sighed Kwan. Danny looked around quizzically.
"Get me out of what?" he asked.
"A dead spot." Kwan gestured towards the space around Danny. It was devoid of walls or anything to grab onto, not even if you stretched out. And since Danny was short, he had no chance of getting himself out.
"Oh, no need to-" Danny stopped talking and slapped himself in the forehead. "I mean, of course, thanks. Can you give me a little push?"
Kwan raised one eyebrow at the sudden change in attitude, but he pushed off nonetheless. He gently shoved Danny away and he himself slowly floated towards the wall.
"Thanks," said Danny. "Now, the experiments. Shall we?"
"Lead the way," replied Kwan.
XXX
It took them three days before they broached the subject 'high school'. They mentioned it before, shared a few laughs over teachers, but they hadn't really talked about it. Somehow being enclosed in such a small space made the whole situation seem surreal. Casper High was thousands of miles away, but their shared history in that building hung in the air like an invisible wall. It separated them, just like the clothes and friends had separated them in high school.
Kwan had thought back a lot to those days since he first saw Danny at NASA. He wished he could go back and tell his younger self that it all worked out in the end. Life didn't end after high school, it became better than ever before. Even for a jock like him, as long as you were willing to work for it.
On the third day of their solo mission he asked Danny a question, the answer to which would haunt him for weeks.
They worked on inspecting the ecto-samples to determine if the energy it gave off while in microgravity was the same as on Earth. This process involved a lot of waiting while the computer processed the batches. They maximized efficiency by constantly creating new batches for the computer to process, but even so there was a lot of downtime.
During one of those downtimes Kwan positioned himself closer to Danny.
"If you could talk to your younger self, what would you say?"
Danny shot him a glance while he worked on the batch. He didn't look at Kwan while answering.
"I'd tell him to try to get home schooled, to avoid a whole lot of trouble."
Kwan cocked his head at that answer. "What kind of trouble?"
Danny blew out a sigh which made his black bangs wave around as if possessed. "Usual and unusual high school trouble. Oversleeping, sports, ghost hunter parents… And you?"
"I'd tell myself to work harder and not worry so much about how life was going to be after high school. They say it's the best time of your life, but I think it just got better and better."
Danny threw a half-hearted grin at Kwan. The grin was an attempt at humor, but Kwan spotted the hard eyes.
"It sure did. I couldn't wait to get out of high school. It had the best highs, but also the worst lows. I'd tell my younger self to… endure it, I guess, because life became a whole lot better when I got into college. Even if it was community college."
Kwan filed the tidbit about community college away for later. No astronaut who went to community college had ever gotten into NASA, but Danny somehow made it.
But the invisible wall which was becoming a shimmering haze was more important right now.
"What was so bad about it?" asked Kwan. He feared he already knew the answer, but he wanted to hear it from Danny's mouth.
Danny loaded the batch into the computer before turning around and looking Kwan in the eyes. The grin had vacated Danny's face completely. Instead he wore the look of someone who saw his childhood dreams die at an early age. And he pulled no punches.
"All the bullying made it some pretty horrible years, Kwan. Constantly getting slammed into lockers, made fun of, pushed off gym equipment… And let's not forget the ridicule, the name-calling, the beat downs. I was so happy to get out of that place I could've flown out of there. Err, not literally, of course."
"Oh," replied Kwan. It was all he could think of to say. He didn't know if he wanted to continue the conversation, but now that the botched train was in motion he should punch it and wait for the wreck.
"I guess we were kind of hard on you. Though it wasn't… personal." Kwan realized how stupid that sounded the second it left his mouth. He waved his hands in the air and spoke quickly to head off Danny's reply.
"I mean, it wasn't with me. Dash kind of had it in for you. I still have no idea why, cause you're a pretty cool guy. But I guess-"
"Guessing isn't going to help me, Kwan," replied Danny coolly. He crossed his arms and frowned, but then released the frown with a sigh. "At least you didn't pick on me. Much. I can't imagine having to stay here with Dash. That used to be the stuff of nightmares for me. Did you know he once made me eat his underwear?"
Kwan gagged at the thought alone. But then the memory came floating back. "I thought that was a dare. You lost that one fair and square."
"He would've made me eat his underwear even if I won, Kwan. Though, trust me, I tried everything in my power to win that dare. What I'm trying to say… I don't really know what I'm trying to say. High school was a time of highs and lows for me, Kwan. Some really low lows, but I got over them."
Danny pushed off the wall and turned his back to Kwan. Kwan heard him mutter one more thing to himself before he floated off into Columbus, one of the two laboratories. "Yeah, that's what I'd say."
This conversation rattled Kwan's assuredness that his behavior in high school wasn't really out of the norm. Apparently, to a bully victim like Danny, he had been one of the guys who made his life miserable. Even as a natural optimist who saw figures in the darkest thunderclouds, this made Kwan unhappy. He had deluded himself into thinking that his words hadn't really had that much impact, that he'd just gone along to make his own life easier.
"I wasn't that bad… was I?" he asked the emptiness of space. But it gave him no answer.
XXX
The conversation replayed itself over and over in Kwan's head. His work didn't suffer under it, nor did his conversations with Danny, but in his mind he devised a plan to make amends. He'd been hard on Danny once, now he was going to go soft.
Kwan worked even harder to ease Danny's work and life. He always made sure to have the entire batch of ecto-samples analyzed by the time Danny was in Columbus so Danny could process it, he was more considerate of Danny's sleep patterns and sacrificed the best bits of his food to Danny.
All this attention hadn't gone unnoticed.
"I don't know what you're trying to pull," began Danny three days after Kwan had decided to make Danny's life easier, "but I'm not sure I like it. This is becoming … creepy, the way you act around me."
"I didn't mean anything by it," tried Kwan, but Danny's disbelieving upraised eyebrow was enough to break Kwan. He sighed.
"Alright, I guess I'm trying to say - I'm sorry about high school."
"Oh." This time it was Danny who had nothing to say. He floated there, dumbfounded. His slow momentum carried him into a dead spot again while he was trying to think of something to say. Danny had a habit of doing that, Kwan noticed.
"So just… accept it, alright? It makes me feel better."
"Alright, but you don't have to-"
"And let me help you with that dead spot," interjected Kwan. It really did make him feel better. Every bit of decency was a bit of debt repaid, or so Kwan thought. He pushed off the wall and once again bumped into Danny, to help him grab onto the walls of the space station.
"Thanks," said Danny. Kwan wasn't sure which of the two things he was talking about.
XXX
Over the next days Kwan's special treatment tapered off. He simply couldn't keep up his attentions. He barely got any sleep and that affected his work performance. And when a thin bit of steel was all that stood between you and death, paying attention was very, very important. So he let it go. Danny didn't seem to mind. He even seemed happier now that Kwan was back to his old self, the optimistic guy who didn't let that much guilt bother him into the point of blind obedience.
On the fifth day, while Danny was strapped to his bed, Kwan floated by the bedroom.
"Hey, Kwan?" called Danny. Kwan floated back to the entrance.
"Yeah?"
"I forgive you."
Kwan had trouble forming a reply in his mind for a few long seconds. What do you say to that? He never had anyone forgive him like that, so vocally. It usually happened with a smile, a wave, a hug. To have the words spoken out loud was like picking up a bowling ball and finding out it's a cannonball.
Finally he decided there was only one reply Danny wanted to hear.
"Thanks," said Kwan. He floated near the man for a few seconds before he pushed off and disappeared into one the narrow tubes leading to Columbus.
XXX
Kwan looked at the readouts. If they were correct, this was bad. Amity-Park-transported-to-Ghost-Zone bad. Now that had been an ordeal to remember. But Kwan's mind didn't wander to remember the ordeal, he was focused on the readouts and what they implied.
"Danny? Could you come over here for a second?"
Kwan didn't quite manage to keep his voice steady, so Danny was by his side in under thirty seconds.
"Could you run this batch again and compare the readouts?"
Danny didn't complain but immediately set to work. Seven minutes later Kwan floated right next to Danny as they both read the numbers off the computer screen.
"No, no, this isn't right. It can't be right," mumbled Danny. He scrolled through the numbers so fast they became a blur, skipping up and down through the results, looking for something which would debunk Kwan's growing worry. But Kwan knew that Danny felt the same worry.
"I'm afraid it is. Which means-"
"Let's do the next batch," interrupted Danny. Already he grabbed the softly glowing ectoplasm and shoved it into the machinery. During the tense seven minute wait they didn't speak a word but just kept looking at the samples. Kwan sent silent prayers that the previous two readouts were somehow false or fake or a computer error.
Danny cursed long and loud when the computer beeped and the numbers appeared on the screen. Kwan joined him with a curse or two before scrolling through the numbers. The computer was in perfect condition, the equipment was barely used, so the problem had to lay with the samples.
"How could that ecto-virus get on board? We're in space!" yelled Danny.
"Maybe not every batch is contaminated. We've still got the separate ones in Leonardo."
"Those are contaminated too," growled Danny. "This is a very potent virus, I've dealt with it before. This one renders all the samples unusable for research. It's in constant-phase, so it just floats through everything, whether it's in Leonardo or not."
"But we have a shield set up around the samples-"
"But put one contaminated batch back with the others inside the shield…" Danny trailed off and Kwan's mind filled in the gaps. He thought that the ghost shield would prevent any and all ecto-impurities from sauntering in and contaminating the healthy batches.
"I think we should test all the batches before we draw any conclusions," said Kwan. He immediately set to work, Danny right beside him.
It took them six hours to test all of them for the virus, forgoing lunch and their exercise break. Kwan would catch up to that later, but for now it was more important to know if their entire project would ground to a halt this early on. He prayed to whatever deity came to mind, but it didn't help.
"All of them!" cried Danny. "Every. single. one. We're screwed."
Kwan, always the optimistic one, peered at the numbers one last time. But they didn't change and didn't show him what he was hoping for.
"We always have the ecto-converter to test," began Kwan, but Danny leveled him with such an ugly look he stopped talking.
"Just, just… let me think about it, okay? Maybe we can find a way to get the virus out of the samples. Or maybe there's another way…"
Danny pushed himself off the wall and floated off. Kwan heard him softly talking to himself as he drifted through the space station. With a sigh Kwan began to clean up the mess of samples they had created in their desperate search for a good batch. After that he grabbed his tablet PC and began to read up on the virus. He wasn't going to give up that easily.
XXX
"Did you-" began Danny, but his hopeful tone deflated into a sullen "okay" when Kwan shook his head.
"Nothing in the literature, nothing on the internet, nothing according to your parents."
Danny did a double-take at that. "You asked my parents?"
Kwan raised one eyebrow. "You do know that they're leading scientists on ectoscience? They somehow get information no one else is able to procure."
Danny refused to look Kwan in the eyes as he slowly revolved around until he was upside-down. From Kwan's perspective at least, because there was no 'up' and 'down' in a space station.
"Did you think of anything?" asked Kwan. He could already guess the answer, but he was quite surprised when Danny nodded.
"There is one thing… but you'll find it very hard to believe."
Kwan also revolved himself around until he could look Danny in the eyes again. "What is it?"
Danny fidgeted with a piece of his jumpsuit, rolling it between his fingers. His whole demeanor spoke of nervousness, something Kwan didn't associate with Danny. The man was amazing in a moment of crisis, able to keep a level head and think up plans while under extreme pressure. But now he looked as nervous as a first-time mom who just heard she was going to give birth to triplets.
Danny took a deep breath and plunged into his story. Kwan listened with rapt interest.
"When I was fourteen," began Danny, "I was stupid enough to go into my parents' lab with Sam and Tucker. Sam dared me to walk into the non-functional ghost portal. I hit a button I shouldn't have and the thing turned on. With me still inside."
Danny stuck a hand inside his jumpsuit and got a needle out. Without even bothering to find an artery he plunged it into his arm and pulled on the plunger. Kwan winced at the action, but then the needle began to fill up and he could only gawk.
"Somehow ectoplasm bound itself to my blood. It doesn't harm me, but it doesn't do anything either. I often even forget it's there."
The needle was filled with a brown fluid, not even resembling human blood. It looked more like someone decided to go to a swamp and scrounge around in the mud until the needle was full. Small green flecks interspersed the muddy brown color. Red streaks were also visible in the mixture. The blood had a much higher density than normal human blood, and Kwan wondered how Danny's heart pumped this … porridge around.
Kwan looked back at Danny. Danny's gaze was intense, and Kwan couldn't blame him. There were so many things wrong with that explanation he wouldn't bet even two cents that it was true.
"So… the ectoplasm doesn't evaporate under those temperatures, like it should?"
Danny shook his head. "No, it doesn't. Or wait, yes, it doesn't. Anyhow - it's attached itself to my blood and something keeps them bound together. I haven't been able to figure out what yet, but I think I'm getting closer."
He took the needle out and rubbed over the sore spot for a second before he handed the needle to Kwan.
"We can separate the ectoplasm and the blood in the centrifuge. It should be pure enough to use it as samples. It's basic ectoplasm, after all."
Kwan kept the needle away from his body. He gave Danny one last, long look before he pushed off the wall and floated towards Destiny, the other laboratory where they kept the centrifuge.
"You owe me the complete version," he merely said, and looked Danny deep into his eyes. The man nodded slowly, as if weighing several life-altering options.
XXX
Once separated from the blood, the ectoplasm proved to be usable and virus-free. It was amazing what effects the ectoplasm had on the blood. The density of it appeared to be much higher, but it flowed like normal blood. The murky brown color disappeared once Kwan used the centrifuge, and only red and green remained.
"Must've been some accident," remarked Kwan when Danny floated into Columbus to check on his progress. "The ectoplasm has even attached itself to all your red blood cells."
"Yeah, it was. But we can use the ectoplasm, right?"
Kwan indicated the test tube filled with the green goo. "Surprisingly, yes. It's as pure as it's going to get, and virus-free. I think thanks to your immune system. As long as we keep destroy the contaminated batches, this one should be of use to us. We may have to redesign the original experiment, though, to make use of what we've got."
Danny sagged in relief at the announcement. "Thank god, I don't know what I would've done if we couldn't use this. This whole mission would've been for nothing."
Kwan hesitated before he asked the next question. "We do need more samples, though. I really don't want to come off as a vampire, but-"
"You need my blood," concluded Danny. "Don't worry, I've already begun loading up on iron-rich food. Not that we've got much of that on board, but I should be okay to donate some more ectoplasm."
"Here, let me help," said Kwan. But Danny didn't hand him the needle. Kwan noticed that it was the same needle Danny had used before. Medical supplies were limited and as long as Danny thoroughly sterilized that needle, it was safe for him to use it again. Kwan shuddered to think what would happen if any ectoplasm came into contact with his own blood.
Within seconds Danny and Kwan were now in possession of more ectoplasm for them to use. Kwan set the centrifuge to work and turned to Danny.
"Now I've got some questions for you, because I've never heard of a human having ectoplasm in his blood."
Danny crossed his arms defensively, the momentum of said action sent him slowly revolving around.
"And now you have. I really don't like to talk about it. Makes me feel like a freak."
Kwan was torn between pressing on and letting the subject lie. If he pressed on, he could break the tentative real friendship that was building between them. They were civil colleagues and could throw a joke or two around, but lately he'd begun to appreciate Danny a lot more than a normal colleague. If he pressed on now, their tiny bond might break. But he sensed that if he let it die now, he'd never get the chance to ask Danny about it again. It'd be a taboo subject.
He compromised.
"Alright, but I just want to know one thing - are there any other ghost-related side effects I should know about? Anything that could endanger the mission?"
It took Danny too long to answer. He chewed his cheek for a second or two, drew in a deep breath and replied, "No."
Kwan narrowed his eyes as he searched Danny for any sign that he was lying. He was no expert in psychology, but Danny's body language was as open as a guestbook. Anyone who came along could write things in it, defining the guestbook. And Danny didn't appear to be lying.
"Alright," said Kwan. "I believe you."
Even this small manipulation didn't wield any results, so he turned towards the centrifuge to process the ectoplasm.
"Thanks, Kwan," said Danny.
XXX
Things turned back to normal over the next few days. They used Danny's ectoplasm to run their experiments, Kwan never even mentioned the fact that it came from Danny's body and life was good on board the International Space Station.
They talked like before, and Danny seemed to open up a lot more. Kwan knew that if he brought up the ectoplasm bit he'd just get a cold shoulder, so he tried his best to be as nice as possible. He'd be stuck in small metal tubes with Danny for quite a bit, and a row was the last thing they needed right now.
They got to talking about their wives, or in Kwan's case, fiancée. Kwan had been engaged for six months and the wedding would in the spring, when he was safely back home.
"How did you meet?" asked Danny after another long day of floating around in the lab, performing the experiments.
"It's a funny story, actually," began Kwan with a soft laugh. "I met my fiancée at… alright, I met my fiancée at the gym. Nothing special about that."
Kwan ended with a bit of a disappointed note. It was the truth, but it just felt so boring. Danny laughed at Kwan's ending.
"Kwan, I met my wife at high school. There's nothing more boring than that."
Danny seemed to realize what he had just said and he looked at Kwan, a pleading look in his eyes. "Please don't tell her I said that."
"My lips are sealed," replied Kwan with a smile. He vaguely remembered Sam from his high school days. She was one of those Goth types, a vocal one at that. He'd joined her at a Goth poetry slam one time, but that had turned out to be a mistake. She was nice, he remembered that much.
She was the complete opposite of his own fiancée. Strange that he and Danny got along quite well, while if you put their wives into one room it'd be torn down in minutes.
There was one subject which was not open for discussion though, and he was suddenly curious whether Danny had thought about it yet.
"You thinking about having kids?"
He heard Danny sigh from his sleeping bag. "I don't know. It's quite a risk, and I don't know if we're ready."
"The risks aren't that great, right? Millions of women are pregnant right now."
"Yeah, but our situation is … special."
Kwan decided not to pry any further. If Danny wanted to tell, he'd tell.
"And you?" asked Danny politely. Kwan looked up at the ceiling as he answered with a vague smile playing across his lips.
"We've been trying, but my fiancée has just gotten off the pill, so it could be a while."
"And you're not afraid. At all."
"Terrified," replied Kwan. "But I figure it's something that comes natural, like throwing a ball. You've got all these books and TV-shows and who knows what about raising a kid, but I think it's just about following your gut."
"Yeah…" said Danny. "I hope it'll be like that. If Sam and I ever have a child."
"I hope so. I think you'll make a great dad," said Kwan. He saw Danny smile, and his tone was genuine as he said, "You too, Kwan, you too."
The conversation died down after that, and strange ideas and images started to float through Kwan's head. He recognized it as his almost-asleep thoughts and he let the half-formed sentences drift through his brain.
And then something hit the side of the International Space Station.
A/N: I hope you enjoyed this part, the set-up, the first arc, the establishing chapter. Since I'm ESL, please let me know if you come across any awkward sentences.
Next chapter won't be long in coming, hopefully somewhere next week.