Lily shuts down the video link as violently as she can, fuming.
Some things just don't change. And it seems that James Potter is one of them.
"Lily?" Marlene has abandoned the handbook."Who was that? You know them?"
The door bursts open, banging loudly against the wall, and Lily winces, mentally calculating the myriad ways in which the ship is liable to fall apart. She spins in her chair, turning to face the entrant.
"Did you get them to let us - are we in?" demands Mary, looking slightly dishevelled and more than a little wild-eyed. She's out of breath, and Lily absentmindedly notes that she must have run from the engine room to the cockpit. After a moment, the brunette's eyes narrow. "Hold on - you look like you've seen a ghost, are you alright?"
Am I alright? she wonders. Her irritation is subsiding, and now that it is, her legs are going shaky with the sudden relief that being saved from certain death brings. Despite this, she feels oddly separated from the situation as a whole, as if she's looking down on it from above, and apropos of nothing, she starts to laugh.
"Lily?" Marlene repeats, looking slightly worried.
"I'm fine," she chokes out. "Yeah, we're in. Oh god, Mary. You're not going to believe what just happened."
"What?" Marlene steps closer, still looking worried. Mary flanks her, wearing the same expression.
"James bloody Potter. Is what just happened."
"James - ? What's he got to do with - oh." Lily can see the realisation spread across Mary's face. "You're joking. Of all the people."
"I know."
"No - wait, you're not telling me that James Potter's ship is the one..." Mary's features are loose, amused, and Lily recalls the lunchtimes that the other girl would spend with Remus Lupin and his friends back at university, working on complex mathematical equations together.
"Yep. And no prizes for guessing the names of the other three crew members."
"Not even going to bother. Jesus. Small universe."
"Is anybody going to tell me what the hell is going on."
"Sorry, Marlene," Lily smiles apologetically. "We knew the captain - and his crew - at university."
"Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?"
Lily grimaces. "Erm. Better not ask, really."
"Oh come on, Lily, they're not so bad."
"Lupin was fine. Even Pettigrew, he was alright."
"They might have changed, Lily. You never know."
Lily snorts indelicately.
"Well, it's them or death," says Marlene briskly. "So I for one am pretty fucking pleased they're here."
"Speaking of that, actually, Frank said we can hold out about another eight hours before things start getting messy. When can we beam up?"
"We said an hour. Don't pack too much - just the essentials." Lily stands up and reaching up towards the ceiling, yanks at the small handle there. The panel adjacent to it slides back smoothly, a ladder unfolding. "Mar, you go tell Frank to leave off whatever he's doing and go make sure we've got all our paperwork. Mary, come with me and we'll start packing up the lab. Also, Marley, while you're there, tell Alice to back up all our files and things. We'll take the computers and tablets, but just in case."
"What about our own things?"
Lily shrugs. "When you're done. He said we're heading to Hattan, we can always buy new things there."
"With what money?" grouses Mary. "We'll have to spend most of our savings on a new ship, not to mention equipment. This is going to set us back months."
"We'll manage. We're further ahead than any other research team. All we've got to do is keep our heads down - oh, Marlene, that reminds me. Don't say anything about our research to Potter and his crew. Not even a hint. Just say - say it's to do with a Ridge planet, or something. We're trying to make it inhabitable."
"I know, Lily." Marlene's tone is mild, but with an edge. "We've talked about this a million times."
"No, this is different. He'll kick us off if he knows what we're doing."
"He's an Imperialist?" Marlene's nose scrunches in distaste.
"He's as far from being an Imperialist as you can get. You have no idea, Marlene." Lily shakes her head, ponytail bobbing slightly.
"We can trust he won't rat us out, at least." Mary points out.
"Still, better not let him know. I told him we were an independent research group, entirely legal. Also, I threatened to sic Alice on him if he doesn't behave."
"Alice? She doesn't swat flies, Lily." Marlene raises an eyebrow, while Mary laughs.
"Yeah, but there's evil behind those baby blues, don't you know?"
James paces.
"Sit down, you're giving me a headache," orders Sirius. James ignores him, and runs a hand over the countertop as he walks. Pausing for a moment, he lifts his fingers up to eye level.
"Are you bloody dusting?"
"Leave it, Sirius," says Remus tiredly.
The kitchen of the Marauder is actually quite nice; Peter, who as the best cook spends the most time there, has done his best to brighten it up over the years, transforming it from a cheerless grey room to a place where you could actually spend some time in without losing the will to live. It's small, but cosy, with only the basic appliances and a small wooden table that is nailed to the floor in the middle. Remus, Peter, and Sirius sit around it, the last with his feet up on the table. Remus taps his fingers on the hard surface and Peter sits hunched in, arms crossed.
The crew of the Phoenix will beam down in half an hour.
"What are we going to tell them?"
"About what?"
"About - " Peter gestures expansively. "All of this! What we do. Why we're going to Hattan. What the goods are."
Sirius looks pointedly at James. "Captain. What are we going to say?"
"Nothing," replies James decisively. "We don't have to tell them anything. We're doing them the favour, after all. We've hidden the goods. They won't have to know a thing."
Remus exhales loudly. James turns, and stares at him. "Something wrong, Lupin?"
"I don't like this," he says reluctantly.
"Join the club, Remus." Sirius glares at James.
He throws his hands up. "What was I supposed to do? Say 'No, I can't help you, fuck off and die?'"
"You weren't supposed to let them on our ship! There's about twenty boxes of incredibly expensive weaponry beneath our feet! Nobody is even supposed to know about it, let alone bloody steal it, do you honestly think they're safer with us? We're pirates, James! You know that there's essentially a death sentence on our heads for this, and you're inviting them up to the gallows with us." By the time he finishes speaking, Sirius is on his feet.
"Between certain death and probable death, I'd choose the latter." James lifts up his head, eyes hard. "And you would, too. All of you. And so, I'd wager, would they."
"Is this about Lily Evans? Still?"
"It's not about - Sirius, this is about being a decent fucking person."
Sirius laughs, a humourless bark. "Passed that mark when you stole this ship, mate."
"It doesn't matter," interrupts Remus. "This isn't brilliant, not at all, but it's happening and the last thing we need is more questions. So we're going to have a story, and it's going to be this: after we left, we started a business, buying and selling. That's what we're going to Hattan to do. We'll tell them that."
"Sounds good to me," agrees James, too fast. "Look, it'll be three weeks, a month tops. We don't ask them questions, we don't answer theirs. They can stay on their side of the ship. We'll stay in ours. Evans clearly wants to spend as little time with us as possible."
"Do you even know how many people are on that ship?"
"No more than five. We've got supplies in plenty, Sirius. Look - " He walks over to the table, and sits down on the empty chair, leaning forward and looking his friend in the eye. "Don't worry about it. Evans is alright, even if there's a bit of a stick up her arse, you know she is. Any team of hers can't be too bad either."
"That doesn't even make grammatical sense," mutters Sirius, but he seems slightly mollified.
"And on the bright side, chances are at least one of them is a better cook than we are," he adds brightly.
"Be harder to be worse," offers Peter, who despite his status as the best cook, still occasionally burns water. He smiles tentatively, and the others, eventually, return it.
It takes no more than five minutes for the first snipes to be exchanged, and James has to hand her this: Lily's jibes are so razor sharp, even though they hit the most vulnerable places of him every time, that they feel like feathers. He barely even recognises them for what they are before he looks down and sees himself bleeding out all over his shoes.
Metaphorically, of course, though he wouldn't put it past her to pull a knife on him if he gets too cocky.
It's his fault, of course. He can't keep well enough away, when it comes to Lily Evans, because he's a masochistic bastard and she's always attracted him. Moths to flames and all that. And say what you will about self-destructive tendencies - Sirius, not to mention his old therapist, back when he still lived with his parents, has said it all before - but he's never felt more awake than when he's with her, not in twenty-four years of living.
"'Lo, Evans," he greets, the moment she steps out of the SCOTT. Sirius, Remus, and Peter flank him, unsmiling but not unwelcoming, and he lets a lazy smirk spread across his face, knowing it will infuriate her. "Shame about your ship. Good thing we were here, eh?"
Her smile is all sharp corners. "Potter."
The teleporter glows, and Mary steps out, lugging a large crate. "Fuck's sake, Lily, couldn't you take this with you?" She glances up. "Oh. Hello. Remus!"
"Mary?" Incredulous, Remus strides over, enveloping the brunette in a hug.
"How are you?"
James glances at Sirius, whose stoic demeanour breaks down for a fleeting second, long enough to look amused.
The small light on the top of the SCOTT glows green once more, and a blonde woman steps out of the seemingly empty space below it. Brushing her hair from her face, she comes to stand by Lily, raising an inquisitive eyebrow and tilting her head at James and his crew.
Lily sighs. "Marlene, this is James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew. This is Marlene McKinnon."
"Pleased to meet you." She smiles sunnily, and then turns to Lily. "Frank and Alice are on their way."
"Alice of the serial-killing ways?" enquires James.
"Yes, that's the one," replies Lily, right off the bat with another cool smile.
"Have you got any more things?" asks Peter quickly.
"Yes, but it's all coming through with Frank and Alice." Marlene grimaces. "Don't suppose you've got a room where you can control temperature and humidity?"
James shrugs. "We've barely got room for you. You'll have to double up. Any work you do, do it in the kitchen."
The three scientists look faintly horrified.
"Isn't there - just any spare room?" Lily looks like the question scrapes at her throat on its way out.
"Tell me if you find one. Kitchen does for us, when we want patching up."
"Your cuts and bruises hardly compare to our incredibly sensitive research," she snaps.
James laughs, a short bark of a sound, suddenly irritated. Remus and Mary have stopped their conversation, and Marlene is watching them, eyes narrowed.
"Do you even listen to yourself, Evans? Or is your head so far up your arsethat you can't hear?" Peter gasps audibly, and James almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all. "Look, this is what you've got. It's worked for us, it'll work for you. If you want, we can always beam you back up to your ship. You're acting like we're bloody villains, Evans."
"You're not exactly a hero for doing - what? You're rescuing us? But we have to pay, and it might all be pointless anyway because you won't let us work." She counts off her points on her finger, other hand clenched in a fist at her side and face slowly reddening. "You're not doing us any favours, here. What, did you want a gold star? You're barely acting like a decent human being, right now. But then, I suppose that's nothing new, is it?"
James scowls."Oh, fuck off, Evans. You're so self-righteous. You're so much better than me, are you? Because you went to uni, and you got couple of fancy letters behind your name. You have no clue - this is your first time out here, in the universe, and you're dictating to me? Because Miss Priss always knows better than James fucking Potter, doesn't she, she's so smart and good and everything she says is always right. You - I can't believe you, sometimes, Evans."
"Now who's being self-righteous? You can't exactly claim the moral upper ground here, Potter, it was you or bloody death, and believe me, it was not the easiest choice in the - "
"Oh, shut up, and don't be so melodramatic. Like you'd rather have died than share a ship with me - you know you'd choose me, every time."
"Fuck you," she grits out, face properly red now. The others wear a range of different expressions - from horrified fascination (Peter) to concern (Remus and Mary) to inscrutably blank (Sirius) to confused intrigue (Marlene). Lily draws a breath, gathering strength, but James cuts her off.
"It's not as if it's the first time, either. Let's hope these friends of yours are better than - "
Before he can finish, her fist comes up and he stumbles back with the force of her punch. Wincing, he rights himself.
"Potter - " She hesitates, an internal struggle playing out within her, but when she speaks, her voice is calm. "You're nothing but a spoiled, daddy's boy, playing adventure with his friends. You act like you're so edgy, you talk like you're something the world has never seen before but truth is, arseholes like you are two a penny. And I don't have to enjoy spending one bloody second with you, and I won't. Because at the end of the day? You're pathetic. You're a small man in big clothes, a kid at the helm of a grown-up's ship, and you're still that small fry bully from all those years ago. And I see you."
There is one eternal, charged moment, where it feels as if all of the inhabitants of the room are holding their breath.
Before James can reply, the SCOTT glows once more, and a petite woman with a large suitcase steps out, beaming. Following her immediately is a rather taller man with a similarly amiable expression.
"Hello! I'm Alice!" She looks around the room. "What did we miss?"
Dinner is an understandably subdued affair. Peter stares pitifully around the room when James suggests that he start to get it ready, prompting Frank - whose friendly expression has yet to fade despite the tense atmosphere, to James' personal astonishment - to offer to cook. Turns out his lasagne is pretty good, and he breaks the seals on the vacuum packed boxes of supplies without even trying, a feat that has never before been accomplished in the Marauder, so an unofficial accord is reached between the members of James' crew that yeah, he's alright, is Frank.
Similarly, the other members of the Phoenix prove to be wholly likeable. Mary, of course, fits right in, nattering on excitedly with Remus about some new mathematical proof as if they'd just seen each other yesterday, and Marlene shadows her for a while until she catches Sirius messing around with the make-do football they own and joins in enthusiastically, playing goalie, until the whole situation somehow degenerates into a bastardised, particularly violent game of bulldog. Alice is lovely, as James suspected she would be, and somehow manages to make even the most mundane conversations seem fascinating.
Even Sirius warms up by the end of the evening, and slowly the constrained atmosphere melts away into something resembling the seeds of friendship.
Really, when James thinks about it, it's just him. He makes conversation, plays the perfect host - his mum ingrained a sense of etiquette into him when he was young and although it's faded enough that he has no qualms about piracy, he behaves right with strangers he's not planning to steal from - but his heart's not in it. There's a heaviness settled somewhere in his stomach and he can't shake the feeling that he crossed a line and ought to apologise. It's a familiar feeling, to be honest; isn't that always the way he feels when he and Lily interact? It's the same story, every time, after all. They meet, they fight, he feels bad.
To tell the truth, the pattern is getting a little tired. Because - yeah, when he's fighting with her, it doesn't feel awful. The exhilaration, the adrenaline, that feeling that he can push as hard as he wants because he knows she'll match him, blow for blow, that's really something. It's just afterwards, that he starts to feel the shittiest he's ever felt. And he can't help but think that maybe it's not worth it.
But of course, he doesn't just feel guilty. It's real honest hurt, as well, because Lily Evans has an uncanny talent for hitting all his weak points in succession, and he hates her a little for that. He's never liked feeling helpless.
He calls curfew a little bit later than normal, unwilling to stop his friends having fun. It's been a long time since it was more than just the four of them, and although they're brothers in everything but name, it's easy to get a little stir-crazy, seeing the same faces day after day, especially when you're in the middle of deep space.
But they do actually have to get some sleep, especially because tomorrow their flight path should take them through an asteroid belt, which will require some actual piloting. And anyway, he really fucking wants to not interact with anyone anymore.
They've all been forced to double up apart from Marlene, who drew the short straw. James is desperately envious. He's sharing with Sirius, who does not just snore, but also likes to have meaningful conversations in the dead of night, miserable pretentious bastard that he is.
He does not disappoint tonight: when James gets back to his room, he finds his friend waiting to accost him.
"Oh, bugger off," he gripes pre-emptively.
"I haven't even said anything yet," argues Sirius, following him inside and flopping down on the floor, where it has been agreed that they will trade nights.
"You're thinking it," says James, pulling off his socks. "I know you are."
"You've got to hear it from someone," he replies reasonably, which James thinks is pretty rich, coming from the man who has sulked completely unreasonably ever since James gave the go-ahead to Lily and her crew.
He says as much.
"I may have been a bit unjustified there," admits Sirius. "But what else could you expect, James, Lily Evans is the biggest prude I've ever met, and we're bloody pirates. It didn't seem like a good combination. But the rest of them, they're okay."
"She's not a prude," mutters James, at a loss for anything else to say.
Sirius stares at him, and then laughs, big and barking. "God, you're stupid over her, aren't you? I've got to tell you, Prongs, I don't get it."
"I don't care about her!" he snaps. "I just think she's not as bad as - you know she's - do you not even remember?"
The smile on Sirius' face stills and fades. "You know I do."
They fall into silence for a few minutes before James speaks up.
"Sorry."
"S'alright."
"I didn't mean it like that."
"I know." He shakes his head. "Never mind about that. Maybe you're right about her. I don't know. But you care about - don't look at me like that, I know you do - you care about her, for whatever reason, so you should go and. Whatever. Kiss and make up. You'll be miserable otherwise."
James opens his mouth, then hesitates. "You - er, you reckon so?"
"There's only space for one person's issues in this room," says Sirius decisively, "and I've called dibs."
James hovers for a few moments outside Remus' room, where he knows Lily and Mary are bunking, before turning abruptly on his heel and heading to the bridge to get his thoughts in order.
Which, as it turns out, makes him the second person to do so that night.
He hesitates, equal measures of frustration and reluctant relief coursing through him. Briefly, he pictures Sirius, looking at him but not looking at him, and takes a resolute step forwards.
Lily doesn't look up as he sits on the floor next to her, staring out through the window in front of them at the vast expanse of stars there.
"I'm sorry about earlier," he tries.
She doesn't say anything for so long that he's almost decided to just go, but then with a heavy exhale she lifts one shoulder up. "Me too."
"I was a bit of a dick."
"We both were."
"I shouldn't have made it a big thing."
"I didn't exactly stop you."
They fall into silence once more, and James pushes himself up and heads to the door, feeling like the conversation is over.
"No, stop."
He pauses with a hand on the doorknob.
"We - " she pauses. "I can't keep going down this path anymore, Potter."
He turns, and leans against the door, sliding down until he's sitting, and closes his eyes. "Me either."
"I didn't want to remember about - about that time, but I was wrong. We ought to have stopped all this after that."
"Yeah."
"I don't - like, I'm not going to be your best friend."
"Alright."
"But. I don't want to hate you anymore."
"I don't hate you"
"But you haven't been. Well, you know."
"Yeah, I do." He opens his eyes, and sees that she's turned around, torso twisted and eyes intent.
He feels - almost trapped, really, by her gaze, and he doesn't know what she's seeing there, but after a few eternal moments she nods briefly and he figures that they've come to some kind of an accord.
It's not fixed, of course. James still smarts, and he's willing to bet that she does, too.
But he smiles, cautiously, and she smiles back.
A/N: Hello, darlings!
It's been a while, hasn't it? Sorry about that.
Well, this is chapter 2. I'm not thrilled with it, mind you - the tone and pacing are a bit weird. Also there is very little piracy.
But I have Things Planned for Chapter 3, if I ever get round there!
I'm not very good at this, still. So any constructive criticism would be absolutely welcome :)
Love to all,
Sriya xxx