part II: a vessel for the dreams
His first fighter is named GGV Dreamboat.
He feels slightly put off by it. It definitely seems like it's one of those mind games he's supposed to burst through if he's to pass – just another embarrassing joke for the cadet three years everybody's junior. Who names a spaceship Dreamboat? An old lady trying to be funny, that's who. Or the sergeant trying to screw with the youngster.
He retaliates by winning with it the first garrison-wide cadet race. It goes slightly different than he'd hoped – now everyone caught on, and it appears he's just gained a nickname.
"Hey, Dreamboat! Good flying yesterday!"
Shiro grits his teeth fruitlessly. But then he swallows it and gives Annika his best smile. "I'll tell the old girl you said hi."
"Oh, I didn't mean the ship." Annika, a tall German fighter pilot, winks at him shamelessly. Then she walks away, hips swaying on absolute purpose, and Shiro sighs.
"You think that's ever gonna go away?"
"The love and affection of women? Just you stop working out. And winning flying contests." Adam shrugs at him. They're just catching up at the lunch break, Adam's still in the introductory courses, hoping to join the Galaxy Garrison in a years' time – sixteen, as it should be. But he doesn't seem bitter about it. By now, people have caught on that comparing themselves to Shiro was pointless – he is simply just a different category. "Unless you mean the nickname. Yeah, it's not going away."
Shiro looks him dead in the eye. "Are you saying I'm going to spend the rest of my military career as Takashi 'Dreamboat' Shirogane?"
"It could have been worse, you know."
"How."
"Takashi 'Bad Kisser' Shirogane?"
Shiro splutters. Adam looks very pleased with himself. "See, told you it could get worse."
"How about Takashi 'Too Busy to Date' Shirogane? That should get the message across."
"No, I still think Bad Kisser would be more effective."
Shiro sighs, albeit with a smile. "This probably tells us a lot about human psyche."
"It's just selfishness. This is how we're wired. Everything else is nurture."
"That's too cynical, Adam."
"No, you're just too much of a cinnamon roll to understand it," says Adam, a wistful note sneaking into his voice. Shiro gives him a warm smile.
"We'll see. Two years in the military and I still haven't lost my faith in humanity."
"Takashi 'Cinnamon Roll' Shirogane."
"That's Commander Cinnamon Roll for you, cadet."
"Pfffth. You wish!" Adam snorts, but then shoots him a sideways glance. "Just checking though, you're not planning on becoming the commander in the next year, right? Because that would be a little too much for me to handle."
Shiro laughs out loud. Then the break is over and they go back to their respective classrooms, but he's still snickering under his breath.
-/-
When Adam finally gets into the garrison proper, Shiro gets picked for the fighter pilot stream. He's still much younger than everybody else, but now that he's seventeen, the differences begin to blur out; ages less significant than the skillsets they offer. He naturally rises to the top, and stays there. Adam wonders out loud why the other cadets haven't started hating him yet; Shiro asks him why he doesn't hate him, and Adam just shakes his head disgruntledly.
The truth is, Shiro feels that he couldn't get them to hate him even if he wanted to. His team – him, a Czech engineer called Carolina, and a little scrawny comms officer who insists on them calling him "just Al" (his name is Alphonse Alighieri-Almundi) – get along great these days, and the team spirit seems to radiate across the year. And, because it just seems to go this way when he's concerned, they immediately get a nickname.
Shiro stands in front of his trusted spaceship early in the morning, feeling slightly puzzled.
"Al, why is Dreamboat all white today?"
Al wordlessly points towards the side of the hull. The entire spaceship, bow to stern, is covered with white powdered chalk – except the letters smudged out at the bottom, pronouncing the ship 'Dreamboat, property of Team TALC'.
Carolina reaches them, and they contemplate their trusted spaceship in long silence. Shiro is the one to break it.
"So… TALC?"
"Because your name is Takashi. And mine Al. And Carolina's Carolina. You know. Talc. Which is white."
"But… I mean… why?"
"Where would you even get this much talc?"
"More importantly, who'd spend so much of their own money on this much talc?"
"Cadets!" The sergeant calls in from the holo in Al's comm. "Boarding status."
Shiro clears his throat. "In progress, sir. There's… talc involved."
"Then what the hell are your team talking about that you can't do it inside, Shirogane? Get on board."
"Aye, sir. Sir? There might be-"
"Move it, Shirogane!"
Shiro, Al, and Carolina stare at one another – and Shiro gives a solemn nod.
Then, in perfect synchrony, they run to the sides of the ship to doodle on it. Dreamboat reaches the assembly point ten minutes later, and it's covered in flowers and penises and some very offensive hiragana writing, and their suits and faces are completely white with chalk, and Shiro is fine with it.
They're good. They're really, really good, all of them, and Shiro doesn't need the sergeants or the record tables to tell him that – he feels it in his bones. He knows he's a prodigy. Matsuoka Taro's blood runs in his veins, and he's been flying the simulator since he was eleven. But there's more to that than just the rare talent, and he remember his father's lessons about interconnectedness of nature: a cockpit is an environment like anything else.
Carolina is a hothead, and gets caught up in the spirit of the race; Al is difficult to get through to and a worrywart, but a brilliant one. At the start, they butted heads often, and it would fall to Shiro to diffuse the situation; now that they've flown together for a year, Carolina channels her energy into the smooth running of the ship, and that gives Al the peace of mind. And when Al is calm, Shiro can focus on his own best job – wheezing through every obstacle on his way.
If at the start they were bothered at all that their pilot is a seventeen-year-old, it changed after they'd soared to the top of the ranking. It feels good. He's picked as the class representative to the cadet command board, and they score a few minor victories against the garrison – improve the rations at the mess, for instance, after a couple of cadets got a stomach flu – and as the legend of Dreamboat Shirogane begins to soar, he notices a subtle effect it has on one pilot in particular.
Each fighter pilot has to improve their score at least once a term to keep their position in the ranking. If not, they are downgraded. At the end of each year, the rankings of fighter and cargo flights are compared, and there is a chance for the best cargo pilot to receive a promotion – at the cost of the worst fighter pilot. Shiro doesn't like this system. The war of attrition between the cargo and fighter classes is fierce, and it's not good for morale – although he supposes it's great for the one that gets the upgrade.
This year, Annika is at the bottom of the ranking – and surprisingly so, seeing as she's suddenly dropped from the fifth top position. She is a good pilot, and a confident leader, even if the way she smirks at him makes him uncomfortable. But Annika doesn't smile much these days, sitting alone at the mess and snapping at people that attempt to come closer; even her own team stay away, especially Daria the comm officer keeping her distance. Shiro observes her carefully, and the silence around her tells him everything he needs to hear.
He finds her in the evening, when the lights are already out and the cold of the desert at night is penetrating his uniform. She's standing at the garrison gates, a small wick of a cigarette in between her lips a single point of ember-red light, and Shiro raises his eyebrows at that. Smoking is long since gone from the military.
"Annika?"
"What's up, Dreamboat." She greets him with a nod, but her smile is not genuine. "Can't sleep from all that adrenaline?"
Shiro smiles at her warily. They had won the penultimate race of the year; Annika came in last again. "Easy come, easy go."
"Maybe for you, you damn prodigy. For everybody else, it's easy go, super hard come."
"Look, I…" Shiro hesitates. "It can't be easy on you. I'm sorry it didn't work out for you and Daria."
Annika turns to face him, fire in her eyes, but he doesn't flinch as she comes closer. "What did she tell you?"
"Nothing. She didn't have to."
They stare each other down. The light on Annika's cigarette flickers and shivers as she's gritting her teeth on the wick. "None of your business, Dreamboat. You're going to tell me I'm not supposed to date in my team? Noted. Thanks. Now sod off."
"Annika," he tries again. "You're a good pilot. It would be a shame if you were to lose out just because you can't agree outside of the cockpit-"
"Why do you care? You're not the one losing the fighter rank, right? Just go away."
"Annika-"
"Look, Shirogane, you look very cute in that suit, but you know what? You're still just a kid. These things happen. Deal with it."
Shiro grits his teeth. This is unfair. This is unfair on Annika, and Daria, and most of all their team engineer who's caught up in the middle of it all with no fault of his own. They shouldn't have gotten involved, but the system shouldn't penalise them for a sudden drop like that. None of them deserve to be demoted. Shiro knows it as clearly as he knows that his own team is the best.
Annika waves him off. Shiro walks away, leaving her alone with her lung-contaminating cigarette, but he's not backing down on this. He's got a plan.
-/-
He talks it over with Carolina and Al. Neither of them are particularly thrilled, but they agree to come along.
The last race of the year is along the mountains. He knows that path like the back of his own hand. He's flown there with mother, and alone, on a hover and a speeder and finally a proper ship; he knows exactly when a precarious movement would drag them down to the bottom of the canyon, and when he can comfortably speed up on an open terrain. As he sits down to the controls, he feels the adrenaline coursing through his veins. It could potentially be quite dangerous…
"All systems clear," says Al. "Takashi, you really think this is worth it?"
"Engines are go. Of course he thinks that! What if it were us dropping out?" Carolina double-checks the thrusters. "Not that I think Annika doesn't deserve it, but poor Sven? He'll be demoted with the both of them. Stupid system."
"That's what I'm saying! We have to help them." Shiro clenches his hands on the controls. "Dreamboat is go!"
They take off, and a cloud of focus descends on Shiro's mind. They get to the front of the race easily enough, and he can almost feel Al's frustration radiating from his hunched shoulders; Al doesn't like to give away the victory. But they're a team, and he puts his own fancies aside to help them. The desert is swishing around them as they do a horizontal lap, and then they move up in a sharp vertical rise, coming up to the mountaintops and diving back in between them. The radar shows the rest of the ships hot on their tails, with Annika at the very end of the peloton again.
Shiro navigates through the mountains with natural ease, gliding in between sharp edges of the crevasses, the speed increasing steadily as they're about to blast into the open space. The ship is operating in peak condition, and Shiro imagines himself amongst the pitch black darkness of space, the mountains floating in vacuum of the asteroid belt, and he's cutting his way through the endless cosmos in search of the new horizons, in search of a new Earth to defend –
They're out there in the open. It's the third and last stage of the race. Takeoff on the sandy desert, then the mountains, and then the liminal area where the mountains crumble into dead rock. There's a moment where he'll need to focus even more –
"Carrie! Now!" he yells on the secure channel. And then he lowers the steering sticks, bringing Dreamboat minimally down – just enough to brush their left engine against a precariously sharp tall rock.
"Engine failure!" shrieks Carolina and shuts it off manually. Red lights fill the cockpit. Dreamboat is rolling wildly, all three of them hanging on to their seatbelts for dear life; Shiro can hear Al muttering to himself nervously. As he's manoeuvring the rocks on one engine, he's watching the other pilots overtake them in seconds.
"Dreamboat, status report! Dreamboat, do you copy?"
Al looks Shiro dead in the eye. "This is Dreamboat to central command. We grazed a rock! Left engine shutting down! Manoeuvring to safety!"
"Dreamboat, are you airborne?"
"Affirmative, sir! Attempting to reboot the engine manually!"
"Cadet Shirogane, land the ship immediately!"
Shiro grits his teeth with tension. There's just one last vessel to pass them, and he just needs to give Annika a little bit of a headstart. Just three seconds longer. "Negative! Terrain unsafe! The crew would-"
"Cadet Shirogane, this is not a request!"
Annika passes them. Carolina flips a stat, and the left engine hums back to life.
"All engines operational!"
"Copy that." There is barely restrained anger in the sergeant's voice. "Dreamboat, report to base. Immediately."
Shiro doesn't say anything else, but the atmosphere grows cold and worried in the cockpit. They finish the race last.
They disembark, and the flurry of technicians take over the grazed engine of Dreamboat. Shiro feels a spike of panic as he stares at them, hoping to all that's sacred that the fake black box log Carolina and Al had planted would be enough to fool them.
Annika pushes through the crowd of technicians to find him. She stares at him, completely at a loss, her face shifting between fury, joy, humiliation, and gratitude. Shiro stares back, and just shrugs.
"Easy come, easy go."
"You-" she starts, but then she just walks up to him in fast, angry strides and hugs him tight.
Al and Carolina exchange glances, and then jump on top of them. Shiro feels breathless and satisfied and shaky and happy.
-/-
That sensation holds all the way to Iverson's office. The sergeant is standing in front of him, visibly angry.
"We know what you did, cadet Shirogane."
Shiro bows his head low, like his father would. "My apologies, sir. I shouldn't have flown this low."
"Stop playing the fool, Shirogane. You're the best pilot in this garrison. I know for a fact that you've flown this track numerous times before. You grazed that rock on purpose and you may as well admit it." The sergeant is frustrated at him, and Shiro feels genuinely sorry for defying his high expectations – he's been good with the cadets. But he's not sorry enough to actually confess.
"Apologies, sir. I may not be as good as you think of me."
"Are you involved with cadet Grossbaum? Is that what it is? You damaged the garrison property, Shirogane, you'd be lucky if you get the cargo pilot rank!"
An officer behind him clears his throat. "I should say, Captain, that if the cadet actually grazed the engine on purpose, then he is even more talented still. And let's not forget that he then had to continue the race on one engine. Considering all of this, a minor scar on the ship is of little consequence."
"Thank you for your input, Sam," says Iverson, and Shiro looks back to see the science officer that spoke. He heard about him before, but in person Samuel Holt seems very thin and very nerdy, lively sparks flying in his eyes behind in the collected professional expression. "But if he had done it on purpose, then we're dealing with a completely different set of consequences. Are we to believe this was an honest mistake, Shirogane?"
Shiro bows again. "Yes, sir."
Iverson looks back to Samuel Holt. "And what does the technical report say?"
The lively eyes of the science officer rest on Shiro, and he gives an imperceptible nod. "It was a bump, but it reset the engine. A minor issue. Certainly not the cadet's fault."
The sergeant bristles. "And I'm to believe that my best pilot suddenly forgot how to fly in an open space?"
Samuel Holt's eyes twinkle, and he doesn't take them off Shiro. "Everybody has a right to an honest mistake, Sergeant. Even teen prodigies. Especially as they get out of the tricky situation with as cool a head as this young man here. Kept the altitude on one engine, no less! And then got it back to operational in seconds!"
"This is ridiculous. I've seen him fly every day for two years now, and he doesn't make mistakes like this! I'm going to make an official report-"
"There is clearly nothing to report, except minor ship damage," interrupts Iverson, and Shiro bows his head low again to mask the relief. "Cadet Shirogane, do be cautious next time. I'm told this race would have won your team a perfect score."
"Yes, sir."
"Oh, and Captain?" asks Samuel Holt. Shiro doesn't raise his head. He can only imagine sergeant Andrews' fury.
"Yes, Sam?"
"I could use a quick-thinking pilot at the test lab. You think I could borrow this one when he's not being battered against the rocks?"
"I don't see why not." There's a smile in the captain's voice. "Just make sure he doesn't break any more of the equipment."
"Captain-" Sergeant tries, but the captain cuts him off.
"You should give the cadet the benefit of the doubt, Andrews. How old is he? Sixteen?"
Shiro raises his head. "Seventeen, sir."
"Let the seventeen-year-old err every once in a while."
"Aye, sir," says the sergeant with a tight voice, and then walks out. Shiro is unsure whether he should follow.
"Come on, cadet Shirogane. I'm sure your team wants you back." Samuel Holt casts him a big smile. "I'm sure we'll see more of each other soon."
-/-
Annika improves her rating and is kept as a fighter pilot, and the legend of Dreamboat Shirogane takes flight. Shiro isn't impressed.
"This dumb nickname stuck."
"I told you it would." Adam and he are walking back to the barracks from another sparring session, where Shiro had been invited to coach the younger cadets – same age as him, but three years behind in terms of garrison hierarchy. Even more so, these days, now that Sam Holt has taken over his unofficial mentoring. "Just embrace it. Dreamboat Shirogane, saviour of fraternising pilots, reporting for duty."
Shiro rolls his eyes, straightening his uniform. The little nametag on his right breast is partially torn from the spar. "It's just not very… dignified."
Adam's eyes follow his fiddling hands. "At least you're recognisable. Even without that nametag, cadet Takashi Shiro."
Shiro sighs. The left part of the nametag did fall off. "With my luck, that's just the start of another nickname."
Adam stares at him for a moment, and then a smirk curves his lips. "Well, maybe you can get rid of the Dreamboat. With something even dumber."
Shiro covers his eyes with his palm. "Please, this is inhumane."
"Shiro the Hero."
He moves his lips around the sound. "Shiro?"
"No, Shiro the Hero. All rolled into one. So that people can be very nice and very condescending at the same time. You know, like Dreamboat. Fight fire with fire."
"I like Shiro."
Adam sighs. "And you just doomed it. This is the army. No-one's going to call you a name you like."
"Well, I'm gonna make them."
"Just stick with Shiro the Hero for a while. It'll get shortened after a while. Maybe."
Shiro nods and walks to the fourth year barracks. Adam lingers at the path, looking at him with an unreadable glance. He stops at the door to look back.
"What is it?"
"Does it mean anything?"
Shiro nods. And then he grins. "You've just basically called me white in Japanese."
Adam reddens slightly. "Sorry. I mean- uh. Sorry."
"No, it doesn't translate. You'd have to say gaijin for a Caucasian. Then I'd probably take offence." Shiro gives him a brilliant smile. "But shiro is just colour white. You know, purity, innocence. Glory. The sky."
They stand opposite each other, Shiro's hand on the doorframe already, but he's stalling; and so is Adam, standing in the middle of the path with unreadable eyes. But they are soft, eyebrows curving upwards in a tight smile, and Shiro feels strange once he realises what that expression is. The evening is dark and warm; summer is just about to begin.
"It suits you," Adam says finally, and takes the first step away-
"Adam?"
"Yes, Shiro?"
It sounds strange. But he likes it. And now that he knows… he's never been one for spending too much time in front of an obstacle.
"We should grab dinner sometime."
Adam flushes a deep, dark red. He's speechless for a moment, and Shiro beams at him, thinking about how he should definitely not laugh because Adam would probably take it very much the wrong way. But it was funny. There has been a direct path to what he wanted, and he took it – it really shouldn't have been as shocking as it was.
And now, with the summer coming, he'd have more free time…
"I- I didn't know you…"
"I honestly didn't either," says Shiro after a moment. "But why not? We can try."
Adam looks at him like he was an alien coming to invade the earth, his face completely red, rising panic in his eyes. "You… what? You can't just- what?"
"Adam." He crosses the distance in between them, and Adam straightens up so tightly he looks painful. "Relax. It's just dinner."
"Just- just dinner- you fucking insufferable cinnamon roll, you!" Adam boils over, taking a step back. "Do you even realise how long I had a crush on you? You can't just step in and… invite me to dinner!"
"Well, why didn't you?"
"Because that's not how people work, Shiro!"
"I think you're being silly-"
Adam makes a few curt steps forward and kisses him.
He's smaller than him, shorter and leaner. Shiro knows his body quite well from the years of sparring lessons. But it feels different this time. They're not struggling against each other, even though their arms naturally find their way to the pressure points. Adam's lips are feverishly warm in that night weather, reaching up to press against him as if they were asking for a gift from the sky, and maybe they were. Shiro kisses him back. The wind from the desert rises up to sweep the dust around them.
As they pull apart, Adam's eyes are frantic. He leans his head and two clenched fists against Shiro's chest.
"I can't believe you just did that."
"I didn't do anything. You did the kissing."
"And what if this doesn't work out? I've been holding back because if I ever made a mistake, and ruin this entire thing-"
"You know what Sam Holt told me the other day?"
Adam strikes his chest weakly, his forehead buried in Shiro's uniform jacket. "You're not quoting Science Officer Fucking Holt in the middle of our big conversation."
"He recommended me for the tests next year," Shiro says quietly. "I'd be a full pilot. Six years before everybody else. Youngest ever."
Adam stills against him. "What did you say?"
"I… it's just so soon. I wasn't sure. And then he says to me… if you get too worried about what could go wrong, you might miss a chance to do something great."
"And Shiro the Hero never misses his moment of greatness."
"No. I never want to."
Adam sighs. Shiro embraces him tight, feeling the weight and warmth of another human being in his arms, of his friend and – if they don't miss a chance – something much greater. They're still seventeen, and the summer's just about to start, and who knows about that new world that awaits him once he becomes a true pilot? But right here, right now… there's this new world that's opened up to him, and he wants it. He wants to at least try.
The fourth year barracks' door opens, and one of his classmates walks out – and he stops dead in his tracks at he sees the two of them. "Hey! Dreamboat! Who are you snogging over there?"
"It's Shiro the Hero, actually" says Adam loudly, with no small amount of acidity in his voice. But his smile grows softer when Shiro doesn't let go.
"None of your business, Sven." Shiro very purposefully squeezes Adam even tighter. The other man twists in his arms to knee him in the groin. Shiro steps in between his legs, and his embrace becomes a chokehold; after three long seconds Adam taps out.
Sven blinks, and then disappears back in the barracks. Shiro clears his throat.
Adam pulls away from the chokehold and begins to laugh hysterically, so much so that Shiro's smile grows worried after a minute. "You- you're really something else, Shiro. You're…"
"Your date for Friday night?" suggests Shiro, and Adam nods with a big grin.
