Everything else had gone to plan. It was supposed to go to plan, wasn't it? Everything Brains designs is over-engineered. Safety in excellence, remember?

We weren't even pushing the limits this time around. It was just routine. Or at least, so I thought. Brains and Alan had docked with Five to refresh my supplies and refit one of the modules in the memory core. All routine. It was all going to plan.

Brains was tinkering at an open panel and the more he pulled at the guts of Five, the more I started to sweat. He wasn't doing anything wrong, of course. It just made me nervous to think that something could go wrong. It brought back bad memories of the incident with EOS, when I had been 99.9% certain I would have to destroy my 'Bird.

My home.

Thankfully it hadn't come to that, and now I didn't just have my baby back, but I had someone to share it with, too. EOS was more than a computer program or an AI. She was…my friend.

For safety, she had isolated herself in the Space Elevator just in case there was a problem with the core refit.

"I wouldn't want to be accidently deleted, John!" she had joked, sounding her trademark giggle. "I don't think you could cope without me anymore!"

I had smiled at that.

"I wouldn't want that either, EOS."

And I meant it. She was part of my family now. I know I come across as stand-offish and serious, and I don't get jokes and 52.4 hours is the maximum amount of time I can stand to spend with them, but… I would do anything for my family. Even die for them – and that includes Brains and Kayo, too. They are as much family to me as Scott or Virg, Squid Boy or Mini Me.

Thus.

When Brains had removed part of the circuitry and Alan was babbling about Newton's Second Law, I raised a hand. I could hear something. A dull whine. A something that was not supposed to be there. Within a nanosecond, I knew what it was. I had heard the sound before, back when Brains and I were still designing Five.

That sound was a harbinger of danger. Of death.

"Brains, look out!"

Before the engineer had a chance to speak, I had shoved Alan backwards and flung myself forwards. My hands collided with Brains' shoulder and arm, rocketing the slight man out of the way, just as I caught the brunt of the explosion. Full in the face.

~oOo~

Traumatic brain injury, dead centre of the back of the head. Damage to the occipital lobe. X-ray. MRI. CT. I heard all of this information loud and clear. But I didn't need to in order to understand what had happened.

I had gone blind.

It wasn't permanent. The GDF doctors said it would heal, just like the skull fracture and the broken eye socket and arm – and the many ribs – not to mention the extensive bruising that was turning my skin black and blue – not that I could see it. I just had to give it time. My snort of derision was delightfully inelegant. Time wasn't a problem. It was how to pass that time that was difficult.

For the first week, I hadn't even been able to stand up. The usual dizziness that accompanied my return from space was intensified by a factor of infinity due to sight loss. The first time I fell, Virgil had been there to catch me. At first, Virg had tried to enable my space-dork, blind-guy hobble but clearly I was not going fast enough for him. So, in the most embarrassing of moments since Lou-Beth Gwyn shoved mac and cheese down the front of my pants in eighth grade – to this day, I still don't get how that was flirting – Virgil actually lifted me and carried me to my bed.

Oy.

After that, I didn't need a fully operational occipital lobe to know that my brother had become an ever-present, flannel-clad guardian.

It was so annoying.

Don't get me wrong, I like Virgil. He's a sort of manly Picasso with a heart of gold. But boy, do we ever butt heads – and not just physically, what with my inability to see. That lump was a doozy. His skull must be made of granite.

Anyway, I digress.

Virgil and I do not always see eye to eye – pun not intended. I call it like I see it – damn it. I did it again. Anyway. My philosophy in life is that while you catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar, you also encourage those flies – id est, Squid Boy and Mini Me – to do stupid things. When they came to me, aged stupid and stupider, and asked if they thought jumping off the roof onto a trampoline would be a good way to get into the pool, I told them exactly what I thought.

"That is, without a doubt, the stupidest thing I have ever heard. Consider yourselves banned from the trampoline."

Alright, so Squiddy looked like he was going to blow his top and Mini Me started to cry, but it was still a valid and accurate point.

Virgil, on the other hand, would have got out the pom-poms and started cheerleading.

"You can do it, guys! Go team!"

No. Just no.

Grandma calls Virg the peacemaker of our family and of course she would. Since we were kids, he's always been her precious little cinnamon roll, all liquid amber eyes and unreasonable piano skills and did he really have to be the artistic one as well?

Peacemaker, my ass. More like sass-master.

"Don't underestimate them. Don't judge Alan just because he's the youngest. Don't do this. Don't do that. I'm Virgil and I'm so perfect…"

Pfft. Whatever. To return to the point, Virg and I might be the closest of everyone in terms of age but that doesn't mean we're close. Chalk and cheese. Light and dark. A gourmet meal and Grandma's cooking. We are total opposites. So, having him as an omnipresent custodian in a lumberjack costume was a strange experience.

The worst part about it was that he was so nice. Seriously nice. And there I was, thinking he didn't even like me.

"You okay there, Jay?"

Startled from my thoughts, I jumped a mile in the air and yelped. And there he was, hands on my shoulders and breath on my face, haloed by the aroma of a cologne that made him smell like a mountain lodge – and the manly custodian of ovaries that he is – using a nickname that I hadn't heard in years.

"Jay, seriously, you okay, buddy?"

Maybe it was the disorientation. Maybe it was the shock of hearing a resurrected pet name.

It was probably the Tramadol.

Whatever it was, however, I blame it entirely for the next six words that blurted out of my big fat stupid mouth.

"Why don't you like me, Virg?"

I could hear his stunned expression. My blind eyes whirled in their broken sockets. The leather of his boots crinkled as he sat back on his haunches. Shit, shit, shit. Why the hell did I say that? Dumb!

That was not the last, nor least, of the dumbassery of the evening.

Picture this (you'll have to use your imagination because I couldn't see it): stunned lumberjack sitting on the floor. Idiot space-dork blind guy panicking on the bed. Idiot space-dork blind guy then jumps to his feet and tries to run away.

May I reiterate? I was blind.

Stunned lumberjack falls back on his ass (I assume that's what happened, anyway) as idiot space-dork blind guy leaps to his feet and runs – face-first into a dresser. Which then falls on him.

Did I mention before that I had a skull fracture, a broken eye socket, broken arm and many broken ribs? Just checking.

"SHIT!"

That was the sound of the black-haired lumberjack. A usually unflappable creature, calm in the face of danger, it was brought to a state of alarm when its change, the rare ginger space fool, was in danger of extinction. Seriously, I thought I was going to die. How tragic, to be crushed to death under a dresser when I had survived 25G.

"John, what the hell?"

He was in the dark about my reaction; I was in the dark for real. It was so terrifying, to be squished like a bug and have no idea what was happening. Was it a dresser? Was it an elephant? How would I know? Well, obviously I did know it was a dresser because I don't keep my socks and boxers in an elephant's ass but you get the point.

Within a few seconds the burden was lifted and then Virgil's hands were all over me – steady, ladies; not like that – checking to see how much damage I had done to my already blinded, crippled body.

"What the hell was that all about?" he asked as he checked to see how many pieces my ribcage was in.

He deserved a reasonable explanation. After all, I had just behaved in a completely irrational manner. So of course, I planned to give him such an explanation.

And then.

"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings."

Oh, dear. That was not what I had meant to say at all. That was from Julius Caesar, Shakespeare's words, not mine. And certainly not what I had meant to say.

I couldn't see it but I could sense Virgil's brows drawing together. I could hear his confusion.

Well, that wasn't too difficult, really, since the next thing he said was, "I'm really confused."

Satisfied that I was not more broken now than I had been before, Virgil plucked me up like a delicate little flower (vomit) and deposited me back on the bed again. He sat down. I heard him cross his arms. Without words, he was saying, "Spill it, brother."

You know when you're a kid, you think that when you close your eyes, no one else can see you? There's a curiously similar sensation when you're blind. I lay on the bed, a limp noodle of despair, hoping and praying that – I don't know – he'd suddenly sense that a forest needed clearing and he would make like a tree – and leaf.

Yeah, I didn't laugh. Virg wasn't laughing either.

"I'm waiting, Jay," he said.

Goddamnit.

"I don't know, Virg," was all I could muster.

"Bullshit."

Ah, straight to the point, as always.

I heard him lean forward. His boots scuffed the wooden floor. My bedsheets ruffled as I shifted – more like squirmed. I couldn't see it, but that didn't mean I couldn't feel his expectant gaze.

"Okay," he said. "If you're not going to talk, I'm going to talk."

Whew, off the hook.

"I am seriously worried about you, Jay."

Fuck. Not off the hook, then.

"What do you mean, why don't I like you? Of course I like you! You're my brother, for Christ's sake. Where did that even come from?" I could hear the sudden interjection of a smile into his voice. "I thought that blow to the head would have knocked some sense into you, not more out of you. And what the hell was that about, running away like I'm some kind of monster?" The smile was gone again. "You could have hurt yourself even more – and you're already plenty hurt, John! Did you hit your head again? Because you don't normally quote Shakespeare at me and I am really, really concerned for you."

For the first time, I was glad I had lost my sight. I don't think I could have coped with the look on his face, all puppy-dog eyes and such extreme earnestness that he could make even a man ovulate. I opened my mouth to speak but nothing came out – not even Shakespeare – and then, the worst thing that could have happened, happened.

Worse than mac and cheese down the pants. Worse than being scooped up into your brother's arms like some kind of freakish damsel in distress. Worse even than randomly quoting Shakespeare.

I started to cry.

Totally the Tramadol. Definitely the Tramadol.

"Oh, Jay..."

Virgil's voice was unbearably gentle and I have no idea how I ended up cradled in his arms like a fucking dead kitten or a stuffed penguin or something but it happened and in that moment, it was exactly what I needed.

I didn't think much in that time. I just existed, head buried in my brother's shoulder, a little of the weight I didn't even realise I had been carrying being taken from me.

After all that, what I needed was a handkerchief because there was snot all over my face and, made of flannel or not, Virgil's shirt was not the appropriate place to wipe it. A tissue was pressed into my palm and I blew my snout clean and had to hold the slimy remains in my hand because if I didn't know where the dresser was, I sure as hell didn't know where the garbage can was – even though I knew I should probably throw myself into it, too.

"Sorry," I mumbled. "I feel like trash."

"You are trash, Jay," Virgil said. "Space trash."

I snorted.

"Lumberjack."

"Bagel muncher."

"See?" I joked, though it wasn't really a joke. "I knew you didn't like me."

The atmosphere was immediately soured. Stupid.

"What's that all about, Jay?" Virgil asked, all hand on my shoulder and reeking of kindness. "What on Earth – or above it – would make you think that?"

I shrugged and fiddled with the sling my right arm was captured in.

"Seriously, spill it," Virgil said, his voice commanding.

What the hell? I had already made a complete fool of myself, so why not go the whole hog? Who cared?

"It just seems like…" I sighed and ran a hand through my hair. "We don't really have anything in common. We're very different. We always have been. I'm track and you're field. I'm black and you're white. I'm ballet and you're… Demolition derby!"

When Virgil laughed, he sent a puff of hot air onto my cheek.

"Just because we're different, doesn't mean I don't like you."

"Yeah, I know," I said. My sneakers squeaked on the hardwood. "But it just seems like… Well, you shoot me down all the time. You sort of tell me off a lot and…" I sighed and hung my head. "I'm sorry. I'm being stupid."

"No, you're not," Virgil said, squeezing my shoulder. "I guess I do 'tell you off' a lot, but that's because, well… I hate to break it to you, Jay, but you're a fatalist. You always think the absolute worst. Sometimes it seems like you have no faith in us. Like when Alan was in trouble on the asteroid mine rescue. You voluntarily came down from space. You seriously thought he wasn't going to make it. But I knew he would do it. It just… I guess it bothers me sometimes because it feels like you don't trust us. And maybe that comes across in the way I speak to you."

My face snapped towards him, which was a futile gesture because my sightless eyes were useless. But I could imagine the anguish on his face and it made me want to cry a bit again (though I didn't – manly man things and all that).

"It's not that at all," I said, my words catching in my throat. "I do trust you. I trust you all. I've do anything for you. But I suppose…"

Alert, alert! Truth coming through!

"I'm so scared that the day will come when I'll send one of you guys out to a rescue and you won't come back. And I… I'm not sure if I can cope with that. We lost Mom and Grandpa Grant. We have no idea where Dad is. And… It hurts, Virg. It really does. More than any injury ever could."

In that moment, I truly understood. It all became crystal clear. I didn't feel like crying anymore. I just felt the burn of shame. And once the truth was out, it kept on coming.

"I've spirited myself away to Five because I don't know what else to do," I said. "I'm afraid that one day, I'll lose someone else and it'll be the end of me." I reached out, my hands searching for Virgil's face. I pressed my palm to his cheek, feeling the stubble, hearing the soft scratch of the hairs on my skin. "It's easier to be a space trash, bagel munching robot that only focuses on the job than it is to be…" I trailed off.

"Vulnerable?" Virgil offered.

"Yeah," I replied, removing my hand from his face and feeling for his shoulder. The muscles were hard under my fingertips, even through the thick material of his shirt. "'The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings,'" I said again. "I feel like my fault is that I do see myself as an underling. That I can't cope as well with everything as the rest of you can. I just scurry off and hide in my 'Bird and I really wish I would stop talking now."

"Don't," Virgil said. "You clearly need to." The smile was back in his voice. "I just wish it didn't take an explosion, being blinded by a head injury, a skull fracture, a broken eye socket, broken arm, broken ribs, bruises over, like, 98% of your body, high doses of painkillers and a falling dresser to make you open your mouth."

I shrugged.

"I am not good with words."

"And yet you quote Shakespeare."

"Not my words."

"True."

I looked down – not that I could see anything – and swallowed.

"I'm sorry, Virg," I said. "I'm sorry I got everything so wrong."

I heard him reach for my hair before I felt the ruffle. I hoped that my expression was suitably grumpy.

"Don't worry," he said. "I understand."

And he did. That lumberjack Picasso with a heart of gold, that mountain lodge-smelling, ovary-melting, peace-making, precious cinnamon roll, polar opposite of mine really did understand.

"I love you, Jay," he said.

Oh my god.

"Love you too," I replied.

And we hugged again. And it was all very sweet and disgusting and brotherly and I felt a bit like I was going to barf.

Yet at the same time, I did feel a warmth in my heart that I hadn't even noticed had been missing. It disappeared when Dad disappeared. For a moment, I couldn't quite make out what it was – and this time, my lack of perception was nothing to do with my lack of sight. Now, Virg had rekindled it.

Trust. The feeling was trust.