Dr. Rush was not a hugger. In fact if anyone came near him with any hugging intentions he would back away immediately and try to find a way to escape the area or at least maneuver himself out of the calculated grasping range of any suspected hugger.
Colonel Young however being a life-long hugger had noticed immediately that Rush resisted all his best hugging ploys, including the side-by-side backslapping bro-hug that Young had thought worked on everybody, even Greer. But not on Doctor Nicholas Rush, not only would Dr. Rush not allow Col. Young to hug him, the man even avoiding being touched! Young had even seen Rush flinch occasionally when someone got too close to touching him and if Rush was unfortunate enough to be caught unawares and hugged against his will he did his level best to slither out of it as soon as possible and it appeared he was more than willing to throw a punch if need be. Young knew that from personal experience.
But Colonel Everett Young was determined to change that. You see Young believed in hugging like Doctor Cain believes in prayer. Young was sure that hugs could cure any illness of the mind or spirit and he wasn't entirely sure how medical doctors cured anybody without prescribing copious amounts of hugs to their patients both before and after their operations and he was doubly sure that a regular dose of hugs could cure whatever mental illness or social dysfunction that Nicholas Rush was displaying.
He didn't know why Rush was a non-hugger, he'd asked Camille and she'd simply told him that some people just weren't huggers, that they were probably just born that way. But what did she know. Young knew the true power of hugs and if Camille Wray didn't believe in them, then he would show her! Young still didn't know why Rush was so touchy about being touched. He knew that Rush had had a wife once, so Young assumed they'd at least hugged at some point in their marriage. Or some vague approximation of a hug anyway, Young mused archly. Basically Young couldn't seem to understand how someone could be so standoffish with people when Young himself enjoyed interacting with others, especially if a hug was on offer, so he was baffled as to why Dr. Rush seemed so resistant to what Young considered an essential part of life.
An audacious plan formed in his mind. He could fix him. He would fix him!
One by one Young pulled the crew aside and told them his plan. Many were skeptical, some like Dr. Lisa Park were enthusiastic and a sad few were intensely opposed to his Hug Therapy plan (he would deal with them and their sad anti-hug issues later), even Camille agreed to participate in the 'experiment', though Young suspected she was only in it for a laugh at Young (and Rush's) expense.
He had no intention of hiding this from Rush and once the whole crew (more or less) had agreed to participate, he went straight to the apple core room to inform him that he (his commanding officer), Lt. Johansson (ranking medic) and Miss Wray (the civilian authority) had all agreed that he (Dr. Rush) needed to loosen up and that he had been 'prescribed' an intense hugging regimen to correct his abhorrent social behavior, wherein Dr. Rush would be receiving hugs, whether he wanted them or not, from every single member of the crew on a daily basis until he (Dr. Rush) stopped being such an anti-social bastard.
As expected Dr. Rush didn't exactly seemed pleased by this arrangement and when Young moved in to give Rush his first hug of the day, Rush retaliated with a right hook that would've connected with Young's jaw had he not been expecting it. Instead Young bobbed and weaved around the angry scientist like a seasoned prize-fighter until he managed to take Rush down in manner that looked more like a wrestling hold than a hug, but even so he felt that it satisfied his own daily hug requirement so once Rush finally stopped struggling and lay still 'accepting' Young's 'hug' as it were, Young allowed Rush back on his feet and he smiled saying to the visibly furious Doctor, "You see how much better you feel already?". Young even leaned over to muss up Rush's hair before he strode whistling out of the control interface room. The cheery whistling by the way did a decent job of drowning out the worst of the curses that Rush started spewing the minute he got his breath back.
I mean really. Rush had never even met the Colonel's mother.
(O)
Rush was in Hell. He'd always suspected that Colonel Young had unnatural designs on him, leaving him to die on a desolate planet had been a major clue, but this was above and beyond anything he'd had to deal with before. The hugging simply never stopped! Every single person he met insisted on hugging him, some even chased him down if he ran! Most simply lay in wait to jump him when he came back down the hall. Rush had started taking the long way round whenever he had to be somewhere. He even contemplated getting into one of the spacesuits to do his work in the unpressurized areas of the ship, but unfortunately the suits seemed to be guarded by a trio of especially enthusiastic huggers, who appeared to think they should give Rush more than one hug a day, in fact he was sure Lt. James had given him at least six hugs before he was able to escape the storage bay with as much dignity intact as he could possibly salvage.
Each crew member had their own methods of getting their daily hug. Chloe's hugs were actually rather tender and they reminded him every day of how their relationship had shifted after he rescued her from the alien ship. They were practically friends now. Though it still felt weird to Rush to admit it to himself. It must've been weird for a few others too because both Scott and Eli nearly always managed to be nearby when Chloe offered her daily hugs and Rush suspected that a wee bit of jealousy must somehow have crept into the pair of them because their hugs always felt a bit stiff and occasionally a little too tight as well.
But of course Greer's 'hugs' were the worst. They would come out of nowhere, Rush would go into a room that looked empty, but as soon as he'd turn his back Greer would come barreling out of nowhere and bodyslam him into a wall in a manner that felt far more like an assault than a hug! He didn't bother complaining to Young because he knew it was a waste of time and frankly some of Young's hugs were nearly as violent.
Brody's hugs were the shortest. He seemed to find the whole thing as distasteful as Rush did and he never let it last longer than a split second. More like they'd accidently bumped into each then an actual hug.
Volker's were the most awkward. For some reason once he'd gotten inside Rush's personal space for the hug, Funnily Volker never seemed to want to hug him and yet once he'd finally worked his way in close enough to do it, he stayed in Rush's personal space trying to engage him in conversation from an uncomfortably close distance. It almost made him miss Greer. Almost.
Park's hugs were Rush's favorite, not that he would've admitted that to her. She always asked permission first, which he appreciated and she had a way of doing it that made Rush feel like she actually cared. Rush wished she'd teach her technic to Volker (so did Volker as it happens).
Camille's hugs felt like a business arrangement. They met, they hugged, business concluded.
Young's hugs were always as public as possible. Young loved an audience, it was almost as if he expected Rush to break into tears mid-hug someday and expound to the crew on how the hug therapy had changed his life.
Rush would rather die.
After more than a week of constant hugging Rush was slowly being driven insane. He was not a touchy-feely hippy and Colonel Young just needed to deal with that! But how? Young clearly had the power to make this happen, so it would have to be Young that put a stop to it. But how could he convince him that this hug theory of his was a bad idea? Rush wracked his overworked brain until a particularly cunning plan appeared. It was against everything he believed was appropriate both personally and professionally... but after all Young started it.
Perhaps what Colonel really needed was a dose of his own medicine.
(O)
Rush waited for the ideal moment. He walked into the mess hall at noon, a time he knew would be the busiest of the day and when Young advanced for his customary public hug, Rush surprised Young by hugging him instead for what the astonished crew seemed like an indecently long time. When Young opened his mouth to babble some kind of hippy nonsense about whether Rush was finally 'cured' now... Rush grabbed his head and pulled him in for the biggest sloppiest kiss he could manage while the mess denizens hall fell into mouth-agape silence.
When Rush was finally finished he winked at the Colonel, smacked him on the tushy and whispered "checkmate" in his ear just before he turned and walked out leaving a deafening silence in his wake.
As Young looked around at the astonished and now clearly amused crew he felt his entire face going red to the tips of his ears. And then the laughter started. Young wished he could sink into the floor. That man is a lot of work! he murmured as he fled from the room as fast as he could to escape the seemingly unending peels of raucous laughter that would echo throughout the ship for some time to come.
(O)
Rush couldn't have been more pleased at the results. Now you might think kissing his way out of this hug-conundrum was going a little overboard and you would be absolutely right. But after all the hugs stopped. And now the crew had something new to talk about and boy did they ever.
Now all Rush really needed was a talk with Mr. Brody to see about persuading him to briefly convert his still to produce mouthwash for him. One dozen bottles should just about suffice.
THE END
2019 - Freshly updated to fix a few typos and add in some extra hugs.