You are Colonel Jack Shaw

You don't like him at first. He is too pale and weak, all the things your father never allowed you to be. He seems far too reluctant to believe that she is a brilliant and kind person at heart, though that is hard to see if you don't know to look for it. You saw it because it had to be there, anyone who wants to launch just to see the stars isn't as mean as she pretends to be. They claim to be old friends, yet he doesn't see who she really is.

You would down right hate him if she didn't like him so much.

At first, you aren't worried at all. He is the kind of nerd she likes to rip on with you as you train together, but as each hour passes on the mission, you are learning. He isn't as weak as you first thought--in fact he has incredible backbone to say the things he does to get a rise out of her.

The stories they tell explain everything to you in pieces. He wasn't just someone she went to high school with, but used to be her best friend, and you are pretty sure a girl separated them. You had been attracted to her for quiet some time, planned to wait until after this mission, see if her eyes still glittered when she talked about space travel; if they did then you were going to ask her out to dinner. Then he turned up.

You notice right off that she likes to call him "Freddie," and he needs only ask half a sentence about her mother and an entire thing passes between them in silence. After that, you stop planning on that dinner.

He stays up all night on your first night shift, working all alone. You think you see her watching from her Velcro strip in the back, but your glance shows her stuck there with her eyes closed. You hope it was a trick of the lights that made her eyelashes seem to flutter closed just in time.

He stays up all the next night working again. She will be taking the first watch. You fall asleep before any conversation starts between them. The alarm clock wakes you hours later. You drag your eyes open in time to see your co-pilot quickly move her face from his. You shut the ringing clock up as she laughs lightly in embarrassment and he looks lost.

She does an excellent job of pretending nothing had happened. It takes him a second but you see that he is just as good at fooling himself. By accident, you catch his eye and he clears his throat. You smile and wink. Way to go, you're thinking to him. Lucky bastard.

AN: I know, who cares about other characters? I sat down to write and this just came out...luckily it was short. lol