Unfamiliar Idioms, Season 1

by KarasBroken

Vignettes and adventures between each episode of Season 1, examining John and Aeryn's growing relationship, and Aeryn's emergence from her Peacekeeper mindset, through the lens of language. Each chapter takes inspiration from an English idiom that John uses, and Aeryn struggles to understand.

8. Spin the Bottle

A/N: Spin the Bottle takes place between DNA Mad Scientist and They've Got a Secret..

---

"Hey Aeryn, how do you feel about a little ee vee ay today?"

The cheerful, unwelcome, call broke into her ruminations. She was standing outside the refresher cubicle, trying to convince herself she didn't need more cleansing. She'd been there long enough that her damp hair was now cold where it straggled across bare shoulders.

"I know you're not taking a nap…" John poked his head around the curtain, spotted her, and immediately yanked back. "Woah! Wow! Oh god! Sorry!" he yelped from behind the fabric. "Please don't kill me!"

That actually made her laugh. Nothing had felt amusing in weekens, but Crichton panicking over a glimpse of flesh—flesh that he had so recently seen scabrous and purpled—was an unexpected tonic. All the males on the ship, barring Pilot, seemed uncomfortable with nudity, a rare common ground, while the females—or at least she and Zhaan—found their squeamishness equally ridiculous. Aeryn didn't know Moya's opinion.

While Sun didn't have the Delvian's preference for being naked, there was no room for taboos about clothing in a Peacekeeper changing chamber. And no patience for anyone who allowed their eyes, hands, or minds to wander because of it.

"What do you want, John?" Aeryn called, trying not to sound irritated. She reluctantly pulled on her underclothes, unconvinced that her skin was only damp, not slimy.

"I can come back…."

She grabbed the first clean pair of pants she could find. "Just tell me!" As she yanked them on, Aeryn winced at the squeaks and the sticky cling of the leather. Her hypersensitivity was fading— she thought it was fading— but not nearly quickly enough. She rubbed at her thighs, trying to erase the feeling.

"Pilot says the propulsors Moya has been growing are ready. I need to get onto her hull to… I don't know, is 'harvest' the right word? And I'd feel better if you went with me for backup."

Aeryn groaned internally. She thought attaching biomechanoid technology to his primitive spacecraft was doomed to failure. But there was no stopping the stubborn human when he had a 'plan'. And John had been brooding for solar days. If this project had him back to his former optimism, she could indulge it.

"Come in, and tell me what this will involve." She walked over to the door and pulled the curtain aside. John flinched, then took a cautious look at her. Aeryn couldn't help watching his expression, for some hint of the revulsion that had to be there. His command of his features was too good this time, though. His gaze lingered on the reddened, irritated skin beneath her bandeau, where her extra limbs had sprouted, but only betrayed concern.

"Are you doing ok? That genetic serum-stuff was supposed to get rid of all that Pilot DNA, but if it missed something, and it starts to rebound, or whatever, you wouldn't hide that, right?" He stared at her until she had to look away from the softness, the pity, in those blue eyes. "Right?" John shifted closer, and reached for her hand, but Aeryn stepped away before he could touch her.

"I'm fine, John. My genes seem… stable. What do you need to do outside?" She went to rummage her shelves, coming up with a long-sleeved compression shirt, and pulling that on, so he'd have less to study. If they were going into vacuum, it would be more comfortable, anyway. Aeryn wasn't even lying. She wasn't worried that whatever had happened to her on the research asteroid would re-occur, only certain that she would never be the same. One more irreversible contamination. What would Peacekeeper biotechs discover if she were ever in a med-facility again?

"...after that we have to pry four propulsors off her hamman-side limb, two top, two bottom and then go all the way across to treblin side to get the other set. What do you think? Fly me around in your Prowler, or go on foot?" John had kept talking, and Aeryn had to focus for a moment, replaying all that he'd said while she was contemplating her corruption. Aeryn used to be able to ignore Crichton more completely, but some remnant of Pilot's multi-tasking perception now paid attention constantly, whether she wished it or not.

"I could do that, but close proximity maneuvers are never without risk." She took a microt to think through options. She'd rarely been involved in repair duties as a Peacekeeper, but hull penetration was a fairly common—and extremely dangerous—tactic in space-based assaults. "We should have Moya come to a full stop, activate an inertial field, and do the retrieval on foot. Less risk, and saves cesium." She ran through possibilities again, and nodded to herself. "It will be a long outing, Moya isn't small. But we can take a few DRDs with us, and perform an exterior hull check while we're crossing."

"That's a good idea. Maybe the others won't bitch as much. They hate stopping." He came over, sitting down on her bed. "How long will we be out there? Do I need to worry about radiation?"

It was a good question. Aeryn never used to concern herself with minor problems like that. Between better technology and better med facilities, radiation exposure during unprotected hard vacuum missions, even plasma burns and damage from debris impact, were all generally solvable. And if not, she wouldn't have been left to linger, suffering.

On Moya, a simple sprained ligament had meant weekens of rest and re-conditioning. "You should ask Pilot. We're interstellar, which generally means minimal radiation and nothing larger than space dust. We should be safe within Moya's envelope, but he will know for certain. I'll wear my crash suit, but you won't be as protected. It will take at least an arn if we're being careful. Longer if we're being thorough. But I can get you back to a hangar in microns if something happens."

"I am not sure I'll ever get used to walking around space in a trash bag," he complained, then lapsed into silence, probably worrying about the eveeyay. Crichton was paranoid about hard vacuum. Aeryn ran a comb through her wet hair, and started putting it back in a tight braid.

"You never wear your hair like that anymore."

Aeryn hesitated, then kept working at her hair. It was a strange comment. "Oh?"

"Yeah, you've mostly been leaving it loose."

Aeryn couldn't imagine why John would care or even notice. But he did have a strange obsession with hair, if his dwelling on the blonde locks of his recreational partners was any indication. As always, when Crichton did baffling things, Aeryn wondered whether this peculiarity was part of human culture or specific to John.

The last time anyone had commented on her hair was during cadet training. Whether to style it neat and short or in a long, bound queue was one of the few facets of appearance a young Peacekeeper could control. So, like all silly adolescents, there had been a time when her cohort debated the matter fiercely. Aeryn had decided on long, both because of her hair's tendency to curl uncontrollably when short, and because it would be more practical on long assignments. Special commandos could be away on missions for monens, sometimes in difficult conditions. Long hair was less maintenance.

"I thought maybe it was symbolic," he said into her silence.

It took her a moment to grasp his meaning, but when she did, Aeryn scoffed. "Of what? Throwing off ties to my Peacekeeper past?"

"Something like that. Maybe." He stood up again and walked closer. "Stupid, huh?"

"Yes, very." The mirror let her see him hovering behind her, but she couldn't make out his face. She finished the braid, and turned around. "I get headaches, John. Since the Drak." It was humiliating to admit that her body had still not quite fully recovered from heat delirium. But less embarrassing than John thinking her hairstyle was a political statement.

"Really? It's been months— monens, did you ask Zhaan about it?" His eyebrows dipped together in concern.

"They aren't that severe. But it helps to not put my hair back."

"Right. Makes sense." He continued to frown for a moment, then shrugged. "Well I like it."

A confusing statement for multiple reasons. "Like it loose, or like it pulled back?" Aeryn didn't know why she asked, or why her heart started pumping a little faster as she waited for his answer.

John studied her with more than his usual intensity. "The braid suits you. But I like it loose too. It's fluffy." His lips tightened into a pursed little smile.

He was acting flirtatious, but Aeryn knew Crichton wasn't serious. Her misadventure with Namtar had given him the chance to play hero. Even since he had been trailing her around the ship like an underworked DRD, looking for something else about her to fix. Today it seemed he thought she needed to feel attractive.

Aeryn moved past the man, giving him a hard knock with her shoulder as she passed to communicate her impatience with his coddling. "If we're going to do this, you need to stop talking about my hair and go get ready. I'll talk with Pilot about the plan and meet you in the hamman-side hangar in an arn or so.

---

It actually took more than two arns to get Pilot, Moya, and everyone else into agreement about stopping dead in the middle of nowhere so John could get new toys for his module. By the time he and Aeryn were exiting, through a dorsal hatch instead of a hangar, her patience was almost expended, though mostly with her other shipmates.

In the time before Crichton, Aeryn would have described herself as extremely calm. She had learned this from her caretakers, who first excised her infant tendency to cry in frustration, then taught her to restrain most other expressions. Cadets controlled by their feelings were at a severe disadvantage for the best assignments. In fully commissioned officers some passion was accepted. And anger was commonplace in a society of warriors, particularly when there was no external enemy to test against. But open emotion was always seen by many as a weakness, which her ambition couldn't afford. As decades flew past, perspective and loss had given Aeryn additional, enviably icy restraint, at least to the eyes of others.

As an outcast, however, surrounded by aliens who practically embodied emotions, and who criticized Aeryn for her apparent lack of them, that control had frayed. At times it felt good, righteous, to shoot scathing remarks, or shout, or even strike out with all the anger and frustration that constantly lived just under her skin. Other times, like now, she only felt tired and petty. Unfocused.

"This will never get old. Look at that." John's voice cooed into her ear. She glanced behind her, to where the human was just standing a few motras away. His legs and arms splayed for balance, as he stared down Moya's spine into the emptiness of space.

"Look at what, John? There's nothing there."

"Yeah, but there's so much of it.… " She could hear that smile, he was trying to be funny. She didn't give him the satisfaction of responding, even when he moved up, shoulder to shoulder, and waved an arm in a wide gesture. "No seriously, Aeryn, isn't that view amazing?"

Aeryn scanned the direction he was pointing, seeing little of interest. "It's just stars, John."

"'Just stars.' I will never understand you." He started to carefully stomp away to the hamman side.

She felt that pricking again, that sense of unease turning to frustration that he was constantly finding her inadequate. "Are you going to call me soulless again?"

"What?" Crichton's pace increased as he became more confident of his footing. Suit magnetics were ineffective because of the organic compounds in Moya's skin. But the inertial field was keeping them attached to her hull, and he must have realized that he had little chance of accidentally drifting off into space so long as he was careful.

"Forget it." He evidently already had forgotten the incident with the trihble. Aeryn followed behind him, taking fewer, longer strides. Her crash suit had its own propulsion system, and she could have gone ahead to the first work site, but she didn't know what to do, or even exactly what she was looking for, so she hung back, observing the undulations of Moya's hull instead. She'd only been on the outside of a Leviathan a handful of times over her long career, and she had to refamiliarize herself with the terrain.

The DRDs began exploring in a radius around them, looking at anomalies, perhaps, or identifying future issues. Occasionally they stopped to apply fluid patches or make other small repairs, and within a few microns she and Crichton had outpaced the little robots.

"There they are!" Crichton shouted in excitement, after a quarter arn of hiking along Moya's flank, moving back and forth in a modified search pattern. He picked up the pace, heading for a pair of wart-like protrusions on Moya's skin. He was still being careful to maintain at least one point of contact at all times, but Aeryn stayed on alert until he came to a stop in front of the two bulbs, each smaller in size than a flattened DRD.

"That's it?" Aeryn crouched down to poke at one of the growths. What seemed to be its exhaust was barely larger than her clenched fist. "Are you sure they're ready? They're very small."

"Figures you'd be a size queen," he muttered. "It's not how big they are, Aeryn. It's how they're used. Pilot says they're done. My module is a lot smaller and lighter than a Prowler, and these are just for local travel. Not sure I can even get to FTL in the Far-scayp, and I didn't want to be too ambitious on my first try."

"Farscaype? Is that the name of your ship's design?" Aeryn stepped back to take up a guard position, out of the way of his work. The man moved in, setting down the toolkit and leaning close to carefully examine the propulsor's housing. Aeryn couldn't see precisely where it ended and Moya's regular hull began, but she didn't need to understand the extraction process. She was only here to grab Crichton if he came adrift and watch for space debris too small for Moya's senses, but large enough to cause a problem.

"The whole project, actually. My module is called the Farscayp One." John pulled out a small laser saw, and spent a few microts checking settings. "I guess it's possible there's a Farscayp Two being built right now. I don't know what they think happened though, and whether they'd try it again. Could be the whole mission is dead. Ayahsah doesn't have much room for expensive failures."

Aeryn thought this over while John waited for their companion DRDs to scuttle across the hull to meet them. "You were flying the very first ship of its design?" Despite herself, Aeryn was impressed. She'd never flown NewTech as a pilot herself. Not that she wouldn't have been willing, but it was a dangerous duty, generally only given to pilots attached to a Gammak base or other research facility. "Why do you call it a failure? You survived."

"Of my design," he clarified. "But, well, the mission wasn't to create a wormhole, it was to prove a theory about acceleration boosting using refraction in a planetary gravity well. For all I know, it just looks like I exploded from atmospheric friction or collision with space junk or something." The DRDs scurried up, and took positions near the first tiny propulsor. There was a bright pinpoint light as he activated the saw. "Everyone probably thinks I'm dead." As Aeryn was still trying to decipher the translation's meaning, John knelt down, aiming the light at the edge of the protrusion. "Hey., Pilot?"

"Yes, Commander?"

"We're at the first engines. I'm going to start cutting, all right?" Once Pilot gave his approval, John began to work. Embers, loose flakes of superheated skin, sparked up in a line as he cut slowly, but steadily, with no wavering. A few microts later, flame sprang out as well, causing them both to startle, though his hands barely shook.

"That's air." Crichton paused, turning the laser off. Aeryn kept quiet, not wanting to cause a distraction, and watched as he tested the area with gloved hands, the propulsor rattling slightly from the force of escaping gasses. "Can you be ready to catch this? I think when I finish the cut it's going to go flying, and I'd hate to lose an engine after Moya was kind enough to grow it for me."

"Of course." Aeryn took a couple steps closer and prepared to jump, if needed. "Ready."

Crichton bent over and resumed his work, moving the saw a little more quickly. The DRDs also crept a few denches nearer, and as soon as the propulsor came loose, began shooting a stream of sealant at the wound in Moya's hull. The engine did lift up from Moya's hull on its own, but it wasn't actually propelled with much force, and was trivial to catch and secure. Aeryn handed it back to John, who turned it over and over in his hands, clearly marveling. "One down, seven to go. Plus the fins." He attached a tie to keep the component close by, then moved a motra down to where the second propulsor was waiting.

By the next pair of engines, a few monens walk away, they had the harvesting procedure settled, working together, and with the DRDs, to quickly extract each propulsor with minimal hull damage or atmosphere loss. While Aeryn still had doubts about the wisdom of meddling with Leviathan technology, the work itself was satisfying. She had missed the comfort of being part of a team, executing a clear and defined task efficiently and without errors.

Aeryn had always assumed that techs found meaning in their assignments. Those she had known had appeared content, even frequently obsessed with the challenges of their particular field. But tech work had always seemed an odd mixture of complicated and tedious, unimportant and boring when compared to combat duty or even standard training and patrol.

This outing, however, was almost fun. Perhaps because for the first time since Namtar, John was clearly, unequivocally happy. The longer they worked, the more components they added to their collection, successfully, without incident, the better the man's mood. She could see him relaxing into the pattern of the work, chattering stories, smiling, even finally becoming less paranoid about the surrounding vacuum, without dipping into carelessness. Crichton was truthfully quite a good partner. Attentive, hard working, more conscientious than many past teammates. It was only when he was bored, or at loose ends, without enough to do, that he became difficult.

Aeryn could admit she was unsettled and fractious without work to do as well. So she was almost disappointed when over an arn later they pried loose the final component, a second spindly propulsion fin, bi-conal and crystal-tipped, found jutting out from a seam near Moya's prow. She helped Crichton secure everything in his oversized pack, then checked on his suit's readings.

"Your scrubbers are losing efficiency. I should jet us back to the closest airlock rather than going back on foot."

"You don't have to ask me twice. I've been wondering what your suit can do." His expression was as eager as his words.

"Pilot, we're coming in, ready the anterior airlock on Tier Fourteen?" When she had agreement, she warned Crichton, "Hold tight to me." It would have been less awkward to hold onto him from behind, but selfishly, she wanted to see his face. So Aeryn guided his arms to wrap around her waist, making sure he was hugging close. Then she gripped his shoulders and shoved free of Moya, breaking the pull of the inertial field and spinning them into free space.

It had been monens since she'd flown any real distance in only her suit. In general, she preferred being in her Prowler, or another vehicle, both for the added protection and exponentially greater speed. Her most recent assignments hadn't required much eeveeyay, as Crichton would know it. But she'd done a lot of specialized training in extra-vehicular assault and retrieval while preparing for commando qualifiers and hadn't forgotten a few tricks.

Her crash suit responded to small movements in her hands and feet, which paired with ocular guidance, let her release precisely controlled squirts of waste gas, providing excellent maneuverability. Even with Crichton's added bulk she was easily able to send them twirling along in a smooth spiral, a few motras above Moya's hull. Not too quick a rotation, she didn't want to give her passenger nausea, but enough that Crichton could enjoy the alternating view of distant stars and the Leviathan's intricate surface.

Generally Aeryn was annoyed when things so thoroughly ordinary as stellar phenomena or standard-issue tech reduced Crichton to childlike wonder. And not a Peacekeeper child, either. No cycle-ten cadet would look so obviously stunned, no matter how thrilling the offered treat or experience. It just reminded her that he was an alien, and a primitive one at that.

But John's good temper had been buoying her all shift. Their work had held back the dread that for solar days had kept crawling up to choke her, to ambush her when she bathed or ate or tried to sleep in a ship that had become far too loud. The suit responded to her body effortlessly, the way she remembered, no jerk of phantom limbs or extraneous sensations. Aeryn almost felt herself again here, floating free with nothing in her ears but their exhalations.

Besides, the maneuver she was pulling was far from trivial. She was combining ten different jets with the slight pull from the Leviathan's inertial field into a twisting helix calculated to match the curve of Moya's hull, so that they evenly skimmed the surface as they spun. Ordinarily, zero gravity movement was rough and inelegant. Soldiers and repair techs seldom had her training and even less often the luxury of time and air enough to show off. So Crichton was allowed to be impressed by the glorious, dizzying view she was providing.

"Breathe, John," she almost chuckled into the comms, noticing that the ambient sound of air moving past his speaker had gone silent. His lips were parted, and his eyes wide as he craned his head back and forth, seeing everything he could around the barrier of her own, bulkier, suit and helmet.

At her voice in his ear, he obediently drew in a breath, then held it again as she took them rushing down the slope of Moya's upper tiers. "Do we have to go right back to the airlock?" he finally asked as she straightened them out of the spin, in preparation for landing.

Every microt in space carried risks. Yes, they had minimized those dangers by setting Moya stationary, with her belly toward the only likely source of micro-asteroids larger than dust specks. However, equipment could still fail, or a piece of debris break off Moya herself, or Aeryn could misjudge a jet and send them off on an uncontrolled trajectory. Crichton didn't have long before his air started to truly degrade, since he needed more oxygen than a Sebacean.

But the darkness of space had blown his pupils until the blue was just a pale ring, and in the helmet's reflection John's pleading eyes looked full of stars.

A few more microns wouldn't hurt. "I suppose we might as well do a quick visual inspection of Moya's hull. Since we're out here."

"For safety's sake," he instantly agreed.

"Exactly." She was glad John couldn't see what she knew was a foolish smile bending her own lips at the mock seriousness of his expression. "Let go of my suit, and hold onto my hands instead, I'm going to change positions." That startled him, and he frowned as his gaze tried and failed to penetrate the dark shielding of her helmet.

"Uh… are we going to stop first?" He glanced down at the bronze hull still flying by at several motras per microt.

"No need. You're not in any danger. I have you."

He smiled at that, just a small pursing of his lips. "I know."

Aeryn brought her hands down to where his still gripped the waist of her crash suit, and wedged inside that grasp until he transferred his hold to her fingers. He didn't clutch or flail, just returned to watching Moya rushing underneath them. His trust made the maneuver simple. Letting go of one hand she yanked on the other to spin him around beneath her, until she could wrap herself against the bulk of his backpack, arms snaking under armpits to grab at his shoulders. Her legs captured his as well, nudging him until they were aligned, and the crash suit jets could move them more completely as one.

From there, taking a tour of Moya's bulk was simple. She gave Pilot a warning, ignoring the hesitation in his acknowledgment as she informed the ship of their revised flight plan, then sent them streaking low along the treblin-side limb, toward the far end, where in conjunction starbursts were formed.

She'd never been so close, from quite this perspective, on a Leviathan. In a Prowler, she tended to approach from the side to access the hangars. Even though most Leviathans she had been on were controlled with a collar that prevented starburst, it was still instinct to avoid any danger of being caught in that explosion of force capable of rending space itself.

So she found it quite interesting to observe the narrowing limb, at its tip scarcely larger than a transport pod, and wonder at the internal construction. She'd never climbed that far down in Moya's tiers. There were so many corners of the Leviathan she still hadn't explored, even with all the idle time between systems over the last few monens. Aeryn made a silent resolution to amend that, even as she shot them to the limb's end and down past its gaping exhaust port. It bore almost no resemblance to the squashed little ovoid of the propulsors they had been harvesting for the last arn. Pointless questions about how Moya was able to grow new engines, and what they were powered by tried to rise up and distract her, but then the man she was holding finally broke his silence with a whooping "Holy mother!" and she startled, looking around to see if she'd missed something.

"What, John? Are you all right?" Aeryn realized that there was nothing in front of him now but aeons of empty space. Without Moya as a landmark, he might have become disoriented or even scared. Fear of deep vacuum was more common than might be expected, even among carrier-born Peacemakers. Every young cadet was given a dead space observation prior to their branch assignment; bundled into a decompression suit then taken outside and left without propulsion or comms for a number of arns to see if they panicked. Infantry cadets who passed were regularly re-tested under increasingly arduous conditions. The middle of their first vacuum assault was not the time for a soldier to discover a terror of the void.

"All right?" John started laughing, sounding to Aeryn's ears a little hysterical. "Yeah, that was amazing. Like skydiving off a mile-long skyscraper!"

Just to be safe, Aeryn pulled them into a quick spin to redirect momentum, and sent them jetting back toward Moya's hamman side. She shouldn't be able to feel him through the layers of suiting, but her mind insisted that her arms where she clasped his were warm, and she could sense the flutter of a rapidly beating heart.

"I mean, she's just so… big! And beautiful. I mean, I knew Moya was big, but it's just different seeing her this way, and really feeling how damn long she is. Those power conduits... they look different from a transport pod, just little lines. But they're wider than both of us put together!"

They had started back up the other side, less quickly than they had descended. Moya was far smaller than a command carrier, but still roughly a metra in length. Aeryn wanted to get them safely inside before too much longer. But bound together with Crichton like this, she could sense his impulse to explore, to investigate mottled growths on Moya's skin or view the work of DRDs occasionally spotted crawling across her hull.

As much as she could, Aeryn indulged him, veering the directions he leaned, and slowing where he took interest. She found Leviathans a curiosity herself, having been both drawn to and repelled by them for several cycles now. Their organic, emotional, mercurial contruction was so different from the fixed, angular, purely mechanical ships she had lived in almost the entirety of her life. She had sometimes wondered if those who spent too long aboard them took on their changeable, passionate, unreliable nature. She supposed she might be finding out.

Too quickly for Crichton, and not soon enough for her, Aeryn set them down near the airlock. Yet she let go of John almost reluctantly, while he was eager enough to get moving under his own power again, striding quickly to cycle the door as soon as he was sure of his footing.

"That was amazing, Aeryn. Thank you. I owe you a cold one."

A cold what? Aeryn waited impatiently for the air to fiill, so she could detach her helmet. "It's fine, John," she shrugged, suddenly too weary to care. "Pilot? We're aboard with all components. Moya can get back underway."

"Thank Moya for me again, Pilot. I'm heading up to see you right now!" The human was almost tapping his feet waiting for the inner door to unseal, but he did turn back to her as soon as he popped his own helmet off. "Hey Aeryn, I still have a flask of reslik tucked away. Meet me at alter shift in the center chamber? We can celebrate!"

"Raz'lak." Aeryn corrected. Crichton had acquired a real taste for the intoxicant on Namtar's rock. "All right." She didn't really feel celebratory, but he was liable to poison himself if she didn't help him empty the canister.

He flashed her one of his widest grins, then literally ran for the ramp to the next tier. "Later!"

---

Aeryn spent the remainder of main shift servicing her and Crichton's suits. Then, since she was already doing Drone work, she made her way to the pool that acted as their laundry, and struggled through washing her clothing. It had always been the least tolerable of her new Moyan chores; even as an infantry cadet she had left the care of her clothing to servitors.

This time, the feel of the overly slick amnexis fluids on her skin was almost unbearable. Aeryn rushed through the laundering so quickly that while hanging it all up to dry in her cell she discovered she'd come back with an item which wasn't hers. White shorts that could only be Crichton's must have been lost at the bottom of the pool, then mingled with her own clothing. Aeryn decided that his carelessness deserved confiscation. Besides, they looked comfortable, and her own small wardrobe was quickly becoming worn and dingy.

All the chores made her very late for evening meal, but despite their agreement, Crichton didn't show up at all. It was probably just as well, since Rigel and D'Argo spent most of it complaining about the intolerable two-arn delay and how unfair the human was being to them and to Moya, just to prolong the service life of his useless little craft. While Aeryn didn't disagree that Crichton's Leviathan tech experiments were selfish, from her perspective it was a common trait among all of Moya's passengers. Crichton at least rarely argued over ship duties and never objected to diverting to every commerce station Rigel had coordinates for, whether they needed supplies or not.

It was a relief when the others drifted off to their own amusements, but that left Aeryn at loose ends. The hours before rest were always the hardest. She used to have friends to spend time with on alt shift. There had always been games to play, sports leagues to compete in. Partners for conditioning practice or to help her study for the next qualification test. Or for recreation.

On Moya the arns were empty. As lonely as this cavernous ship, that drifted aimlessly across the Uncharted Territories, as devoid of purpose as she was.

Aeryn forced herself into motion, clearing her dish. "Pilot, is Crichton with you still?"

"No, Officer Sun. The commander is in the maintenance bay. I believe he is scanning the propulsors to determine how best to integrate them with his ship's systems. I can connect you…"

"No, Pilot!" Aeryn said hurriedly. "I was just wondering. Thank you." She considered going down to see him, but the human would be bursting with scientific theories she couldn't follow and technical questions she couldn't answer.

Their work outside had been arduous enough in its own way that additional exercise held no appeal. She itched to bathe again, but knew that the feeling of grime was illusory. She didn't know where Crichton had taken the box of vid disks or the projector that ran them, and she'd read everything on her data pad several times over. There was nothing to patrol, and walking metras of empty corridors didn't seem likely to improve her mood. No, John's first idea was sounding perfect.

She slipped down to the cargo bay to rummage through the remaining bottles of intoxicants. Technically these were trade goods, but the most valuable drinks had been sold off weekens ago. What was left was mostly vile or poisonous, but Aeryn managed to locate a second bottle of that sickly sweet liquid she and Crichton had sampled, after the Hinzoid salvage, what felt like monens ago. It tasted terrible, but as she recalled, it hit hard.

Drinking alone in her quarters seemed qualitatively more pathetic than drinking anywhere else. So she went back up to the central chamber, but it was still dark and empty. Her almost seventy cycles gave Aeryn the wisdom to snag a large jug of water, and a handful of bland fiber wafers, before taking herself and her supplies to the equally empty terrace.

Aeryn didn't come here often. The domed space was too open, and too purposeless to be comfortable. There was nothing to do there but observe the surroundings, something done more efficiently and effectively from command. But sometimes, especially when there had been no recent excuse to take out the Prowler or a transport pod, she ventured up here just to visit the sensation of space. John's precious stars would do for company.

---

"Hey."

Aeryn mouthed the word before he said it. She had felt John approach, known it was him before the door slid open. She was laying in the center of the terrace, arms wide, hands and bare feet pressed into the floor and she could sense the whole ship, like a spy in a network.

"Looks like you got started without me." He plopped his eema down nearby.

"Alt shift started arns ago."

"I know, I know. It was an exciting day, I lost track of time. So apply for retributions from me using the legal system." There was a metallic clink as he set down the promised rez'lak flask. "What have you been drinking?"

He hadn't even begun and already made no sense. "There is no judiciary on this ship, but if there was, you'd be facing disciplinary action. Alt shift started four arns and twenty-seven microns ago." Perhaps he would understand his offense if she was more precise.

"Oh no. You're flaunting your Peacekeeper timee whymee sense at me. I must be in trouble." Crichton had the audacity to pick up her bottle and slosh it around. "Have you been drinking the whole time?"

"No. Only two arns," she attempted an accurate assessment though she had not exactly noted when she opened the bottle. "And ninety-six microns."

"That's good, you were pacing yourself." She heard the liquor swish again, then he put the bottle down. "Guess I better catch up." She heard him uncap the raz'lak, The acrid scent hit a microt later, then the sound of pouring.

Sun wanted some. The clean, sharp taste was infinitely better than the cloying syrup still coating her mouth. And she remembered that John liked raz'lak too much, and she had to save him from alcohol poisoning. She might not be a Peacekeeper any more, but that was no excuse for shirking her duties.

Aeryn dragged herself upright, tucking her feet under her. John wrapped his arm around, helping her up. She didn't need it, and he was warmer than the floor, but he smelled like engines, so she allowed the limb to remain.

It was dark, though, and she didn't like being alone in the dark with him. That felt unsafe. So Aeryn opened her eyes.

John was smiling at her, still in his good mood. Not at all concerned that she might be angry to be forgotten for almost five arns because of an engine design. Techs. He did let go, though, and picking up his cup, thrust it up toward the dome. "To science!" he saluted, then tossed the contents back in one large gulp.

Crichton immediately poured a second measure, before recapping the canister. "It's going to work," he said, instead of another toast. "It might take me a while. Pilot and I are still working out some details, and the DRDs need to make me some extra components, but it's going to work."

Aeryn wanted to be pleased on his behalf. She knew the frustration of being grounded. "That's good. Now you can fly away home." The raz'lak flask was on the other side of him. She denched a little closer and tried to reach around him.

"Eventually, maybe. It gives me a chance at least," John said evenly, those pale blue eyes boring into hers from an uncomfortable distance. "I don't know if I need the module to make a wormhole. I don't even know if I can make another one. But with her running, it will be easier to try." Her fingertips had reached the raz'lak, but not before he put his hand on top of it. "Haven't you had enough?" She could smell the alcohol on his breath.

"I haven't had any," she pointed out, prying up one of Crichton's fingers and trying to start on the next, a task made more difficult by not being able to look away from him. He was too close.

"Fair enough. One drink, then I'm cutting you off." He let go of the canister and Aerun claimed her prize with a little lurch. The warm hand was back, steadying her. But she did not need his help to sit upright, so she twisted away, leaning so far back to avoid him, her shoulders met the lesser warmth of Moya's deck.

"That doesn't look comfortable."

Aeryn didn't know what he meant. Laying this way, with her legs bent under her, was completely painless. Though it would make opening the flask harder and drinking would be impossible. Reluctantly, she pulled herself upright again, concentrating on not swaying. "Humans are a remarkably inflexible species."

"You wouldn't say that if you'd ever seen marey loo rehton, but girls do tend to be more flexible than guys." Aeryn had shed her shirt and vest at some point, and John was staring at her stomach, exposed between waistband and bandeau. When he noticed her noticing, he looked away and took another long drink, finishing off what was in his cup.

Aeryn curled her arms around the area, resisting the urge to scratch at her skin again, and looked around for her clothes. The shirt was farther off, but her vest was laying near the intoxicant bottle, so she picked both up, and in the spirit of fairness, and to keep John from reclaiming the raz'lak, thrust the bottle out at him.

"Ugh, this stuff is like cough syrup," John complained as he took it. "And there's hardly any left." He shook it again for emphasis.

"More than enough to leave you dren-faced." Aeryn shrugged into her vest and fastened it up completely, then uncapped the raz'lak and took a hit straight from the canister. The sharp bite cut right through the terrible aftertaste she'd been enduring for arns now.

"Hey, I know what that means. I assume this was full when you started? Are you trying to say Sebaceans hold their liquor better than humans?" John started to pour a shot into his cup, then seemed to think better of contaminating it, and with a wince, drank straight from the bottle himself.

Aeryn didn't know what that meant, but she snorted anyway. "Obviously. We do everything better than humans." How hard was it to hold a bottle?

"That's not true. You would be terrible at mad-libbs, don't know how to do your taxes, and you certainly can't out drink me. I'm not just human, I'm Southern." John capped this nonsense by taking an unnecessarily large second swig from the bottle.

He made such a face, Aeryn took pity on him, and pushed the half-empty jug of water closer. "Don't make yourself sick. Did you eat anything?" She shoved the packet of fiber wafers closer too. "Or were you in too big a hurry to leave?"

John drank some water, swishing it around his mouth, before he answered. "I had a couple food cubes before I went looking for you. But yeah, I'm a little amped." He took another, more cautious sip from the bottle. "Aren't you ready to get rid of me? I guess all of you will be packing my bags, first chance you get."

Aeryn didn't want to think about that. About being almost alone on the Leviathan, unwanted and unneeded. No purpose, no duties, no one left with any interest in sharing a bottle with her, even. "No." She took another sip from the canister.

Crichton scooted a little closer, "You can still come with me, you know, if I figure it out." He was reaching out for the raz'lak, but Aeryn wasn't ready to give it up.

"No!"

"Fine." He stopped and sat back again. "Just admit you'll miss me when I'm gone."

"Yes," she said without thinking. Of course. "But only for a little while." It was no good to get attached. Everyone left. Reassignment, retirement, death. Wormholes to the other side of the galaxy.

"Ouch, Aeryn!" John said, mimicking a blow to his chest. He muttered a saying that must be idiom, because it made little sense. It didn't even sound like his normal English. Then he took another drink of cough syrup. He even coughed afterward.

"In fruit-fermented intoxicants is truth?" Aeryn repeated.

"No listen. Ihn veenoh veritahss." John spoke slowly and with careful enunciation so that she could catch the sounds of it. "It's Latihn, that's a different language, an old one. Humans use it when they want to sound fancy."

"Humans have a lot of languages for one single world." She tried to copy him. "In veheenoe berihtass." There was a pleasing rhythm to the repetitive sounds. " In veenoh berihtass. Veeno beeno beritas."

"In Veeno Veritas." John said again, emphasizing the starting sounds.

"In veeno veritas," she said with him, watching his mouth. Ah. It was teeth against lips, rather than plosive. His language was full of softness, just like John. He had a lovely mouth, too expressive. It looked soft too.

"It means drunk people say the things they would never say sober."

"I am not drunk," Aeryn clarified, "I'm intoxicated. And I would say the same, if I weren't."

"Right, right. I remember. This cough syrup has some other compounds, not just alcohol. It does sensory stuff." He took another long drink— of water instead of the bottle. "How you doing with that? You feel ok?"

John would never catch up that way. She was winning. "I feel fine, John. I feel everything." Reminded, she laid back down, feet braced on the floor, tucking the raz'lak between her legs where he wouldn't dare retrieve it, and spreading her hands against the terrace deck. There were a lot of stars above. Just stars. But the whole ship was below her, quiet, yet full of small movements. The oscillation of fluids, scuttling of DRDs, the vibration that represented Zhaan and D'Argo moving in their cells. Perhaps it would not be too lonely when Crichton was gone.

"Okaaaay… no more of this dren for you." Aeryn heard him take another drink from the bottle.

The silence went heavy again. She didn't mean to ask, but her lips were saying, "Will you miss us? Miss this?" Miss me?

He only hesitated briefly. "Of course I will. It's been a wild ride, but the parts where I didn't think I was about to die have been amazing." John shifted around, and unexpectedly settled against her legs, using them as a backrest for staring up at the dome. "I'm going to miss this view."

"It's just stars, John."

"But it's always been about the stars for me, Aeryn. And once I'm home, it's going to be a lot harder to see them." He snagged the bottle and took another sip. "I'm ready though. It's… cold here."

Aeryn felt cocooned in warmth. The slight heat coming up through her palms and feet, and the greater sensation of Crichton, pressed against her legs. "What do you mean?"

"You know. The others. Pilot. I just… don't understand, especially Zhaan."

He was talking about the assault. About Namtar's price, and the rest of the crew's' willingness to pay it. "Are you so sure you wouldn't do the same?"

"Of course not!" John said, instantly, sitting up to look at her over his shoulder. "You wouldn't. Right? You're with me on this?"

It was an uncomfortable question. "'Any can claim victory before the battle,'" she quoted. Sebacean had old dialects for being 'fancy' too.

He seemed confused, mouthing words silently. "Is that Peacekeeper wisdom?"

"It's an axiom, yes." She leaned up to grab the collar of Crichton's gray shirt and tugged him back into rest against her legs before explaining. "Maybe I would have found a different way. But I didn't have a choice to make, and neither did you. They did. What did you really expect?"

"Better." This was accompanied by another slug from the bottle. He was catching up fast now.

Aeryn sighed. "The Hynerion is powered by greed. D'Argo is Luxan; they're little more than barbarians. And Zhaan has not been the same since Maldis. What they did was awful. But they were desperate. At least Pilot will recover."

"I guess. I just don't know how to forget it happened. How to sit down and eat food together and tell jokes like they didn't just chop someone's arm off for the chance to go home."

Aeryn didn't understand why Crichton was struggling with this. "You don't forget. We're not family, John, not a unit. We're not even friends, and we never will be. Temporary comrades at best. You should remember that, when it's your turn to be selfish. And always watch your back."

"Is that what you're doing?"

Aeryn was learning. With no unit behind her anymore, she had to. She pressed her palms into the decking, into the stillness of the great ship. "My back is very well-protected at the moment."

"What about mine?"

John felt good against her legs, his weight pinning her feet, grounding her. It wasn't the loyalty of a fellow soldier, but when the others had been fighting each other, he had been fighting for her. Not for the first time. He would be leaving, but he wasn't gone yet.

"I have you, for now."

Some of the tension went out of John, the pressure of him increasing. He went silent for a micron, before tipping the intoxicant up to his lips a final time. "This bottle is empty, can I have the raz'lak back?"

Aeryn sat upright again, still trapped but able to retrieve the jug which she offered over his shoulder instead. "Water first."

"Okay, maternal sire," Crichton said, as he grabbed and swigged.

John had used the shorter human word, the less formal one. Mahm. To pay him back for calling her old again, Aeryn uncapped the raz'lak and took an inadvisably large gulp, before trading him containers.

They sat like that for a quarter-arn. Crichton sipping from his refilled cup, looking up at the stars, head against her knees. Aeryn letting her fingers discover the texture of his hair. It felt like that of other men, nothing remarkable to explain his interest in hers. But he seemed to enjoy the sensation of her hands rubbing back and forth through the softness, down to where it was starting to grow in at the nape of his neck. The muscles there were still tight with stress, or perhaps that was just how humans were built. She deepened her grip, and started to explore.

Just as Aeryn thought she had discovered all the pressure points along the human's shoulders, John captured one of her hands, bringing it to his forehead. It was a strange gesture, and she didn't know what it meant, so she stilled, letting him keep her fingers pressed to his fever-warm skin.

"Thank you. But I'm going to… fall asleep or something if you keep that up."

"Go to bed then, it's late." Aeryn poked his ribs.

"But, mahm, I don't want to." He let go and squirmed away from her assault, finally freeing her feet, and knocking over the empty glass bottle in the process. "Oops. How late is it, anyway?"

Aeryn flexed her toes, which were tingling from the renewed blood flow. "Five and a half arns into alt shift," she told him.

"That's not very precise." He moved to sit cross-legged, toying with the bottle, spinning it so the ends whipped in a circle.

"Five arns, forty-two microns, and thirty-seven microts," she snapped, inventing a time because between the drink, the hour, and the relaxing warmth of his company, Aeryn had lost track.

Crichton had the nerve to look suspicious as he twirled the container again. "Do Peacekeeper adolescents play spin the bottle?"

"What is that? A game? It doesn't look very challenging." She reached out to stop the movement, then twisted it sharply until it flew into a hard spin.

"Sort of. A game of chance, I guess. There's a lot of variations. But you get a group of kids together, drinking, and you take turns spinning, to see who goes next."

"Next at what, a drink?"

"It depends on the group. Sometimes it's pretty innocent. Truth or dare. Or you have to kiss the person the bottle points to. For rowdy crowds, or really drunk ones, it might be something like seven minits of glorious afterlife."

Aeryn stopped the container and stared at John. "That could not have translated right. What kind of game is it?"

He chuckled. "I didn't think it would. Two people get locked in a closet or a dark room together for seven minits."

"Why?" Aeryn was trying and failing to imagine what this had to do with death. "Do they fight in there?"

"Fight? No! I mean, they could… I guess. People can do whatever they want in the closet. But most people either talk or make out."

"Make out what?" Aeryn was starting to get irritated at John's inability to use normal words for anything. For his part, Crichton was beginning to look sorry he'd brought any of this up.

"Uh… I'm pretty sure the concept of bases isn't going to translate either…."

Aeryn thought his skin was getting a little red. "I know what a base is, Crichton."

"Yeah, yeah, of course. But when it comes to making out, bases are like goals. First base is just kissing, second base is touching anywhere up here." John gestured to his torso. " Third base is touching below the belt," another gesture, at his crotch. "And a home run is the full deal." Yes, his face was distinctly flushed.

Aeryn knew the intoxicant was slowing her thoughts, because it took her several microts to understand him. "What deal? You mean sex?"

"Yeah. Most people don't get that far, but it's on the table." John took another drink from his cup.

She thought through this whole confusing tangent. Human sex seemed very regulated, with the unnecessary ritual of touching each base before beginning, and the potentially uncomfortable use of tables. "Seven minits? Your minit is approximately a micron?" Aeryn considered past encounters, most of which had involved touching all those areas, not necessarily in that order, and several had even involved tables. "That seems an adequate amount of time, unless the male is very intoxicated. Perhaps not ideal, but quite doable."

John almost choked on his raz'lak. "Adequate? I don't want to know what Peacekeeper sex is like, do I?"

"Do you?" Aeryn could feel her own heartrate increasing. Was spinning a bottle how humans made an offer to recreate? That reminded her of something from her first carrier, and she unclipped her pulse pistol from her thigh.

"No! No, apparently I do not. Really!" John had thrown his hands up, and Aeryn realized he thought she was threatening him.

"It's okay," she popped the chakkan out, and dry-fired at the floor to be certain, then set the gun down. "Cadets play a game just like this. Only we don't have bottles like that, so we use knives, or pulse pistols." She had John's full attention as she spun the pistol with a quick twist, the barrel tip spinning around. She was very out of practice, and it ended the spin facing neither of them. "Frell-or-fight."

"Wait, what? Right now? Why?"

She wasn't sure if John's panic was more amusing or insulting. "That's what it's called. Just like your game. Everyone in a circle, one person spins, and then they fight whoever it points to." She tried the spin again, this time it stopped pointing just to the side of him. "With older cadets, the other option is added." She shrugged and picked the pistol up. John looked relieved, and that stung enough that she reinserted the oil cartridge with unnecessary force.

"Right. Got it. Sexually aroused adolescents must be one of those universal constants. Giving them deadly weapons while drunk is that added Peacekeeper twist. Spin the bottle is a lot safer."

Not just adolescents. It had been an occasional pastime on every ship she'd joined. While most of Aeryn's encounters had been unimpressive, a few of those frell-or-fight bouts were quite memorable. What if this really was John's awkward way of making an offer? Should she accept, now that any concept of contamination was meaningless? How intoxicated was he?

"Did you want to play, John?" Did she? "We've already been alone in a dark room for far longer than seven microns."

"N-not seven minits of… no, but, um," the human was clearly trying to think of an alternative that wouldn't offend her. "We could play a few rounds of truth or dare, if you want?"

Not interested in recreating, then. She had misunderstood. Aeryn felt her stomach churn. Of course it was ridiculous to think the man who held her while she dissolved into slime and deformity could ever want to frell her. But John was being polite, very kind in his rejection. She should at least attempt his human game.

Aeryn rummaged for a fiber wafer to settle her nausea, then shifted around so that she was squarely facing him, mimicking his cross-legged position. "How does it work with only two of us?"

"Let's see." John thought for a microt, setting the bottle between them. "How about… if the spout tip points to the other person, the spinner asks a question and gets an honest answer. If the end is pointing towards the other person, the spinner poses a dare. An action like 'I dare you to stand on one foot, touch your nose and hop around the room without falling'."

Aeryn immediately spotted several loopholes. "What if the bottle doesn't clearly point to the other person? And what if the challenge is attempted, but fails? And what can be the dares?"

"Re-spin if it's not clear. And let's just keep this friendly, okay? Nothing dangerous, if you're uncomfortable, just say. As far as a penalty… the person has to answer a question anyway. Sound fair?"

"It sounds stupid, but I will play." She reached out for the bottle, testing for its balance point.

"Don't do me any favors. Just a few rounds, then I probably really should go to bed."

"I wasn't planning to do you a favor." Aeryn spun the container, not trying for a particular outcome yet. It came to rest with the end mostly aimed in his direction.

"Great. A dare. Go gentle on me."

Aeryn couldn't decide if he was genuinely nervous or just playing a role. She had no intention of making it easy for him though. "I dare you… " she had already come up with a dare, but paused to find the right wording, "To do a push-up. The Peacekeeper way. Without falling."

"I've been drinking, woman!" But he immediately got up on his knees, despite the protest. He took long enough stretching and making a show of preparation that she almost called a forfeit. Once he started though, John was able to execute the exercise quite handily. Lowering down on one hand almost to the floor, then up again, getting through the tricky part without wobbling, arching all the way back to touch the ground, and managing a controlled return to finish the movement, then switching hands to do the same on the other side.

"You've been practicing." She was too surprised to be bitter.

"I have." John looked smug as he took his turn, the bottle spout coming to a stop in her direction. "Truth! Are you just buhl-shitting me, or can you really tell what time it is down to the microt, whenever you want?"

Dren. "Not to the microt unless I'm paying close attention and have a recent reference point," she admitted. "Sensing how much time has passed is easier than knowing an arbitrary time. Especially right after I wake up. There are always clues on Moya, though, so usually I can guess to within a micron or two."

"So you don't know exactly what time it is, right now?"

Aeryn put her hands on the terrace deck. It felt both right and wrong to be connected like this. It was only a faint echo of the constant noise and stimulation she'd experienced when Pilot's DNA had fully infected her system, easy to ignore when Aeryn wasn't drunk, silent, and still. But she was, and Moya was, and there was a ticking rhythm to the ship. "Five arns, forty-four microns and thirty microts, roughly."

"You said forty-two microns before, and that was at least five microns ago."

Aeryn shrugged. "I was lying then. You were being annoying."

"Why did you put your hands down? I thought this was a Peacekeeper thing, but you're acting like it's a Pilot thing…."

"Many species have good chronoception, John. Just not humans."

"You're not answering the question."

"I answered your question. Unless I don't understand the rules, I'm not obligated to keep answering."

"Fine. Your turn."

She spun just a little too lightly, and had to re-spin. Her second attempt was too hard, and ended with the spout pointing at John. "Truth."

He looked relieved. "What have you always wanted to know?"

Aeryn had to think about that. There was so much about the man that was confusing. She should choose something tactical. "What are you most afraid of?"

John rolled his eyes at her. "Boring! And very obvious. I'm terrified that I'll never make it home." He said it without shame. Then he felt around for his cup, but it was empty, so he uncapped the raz'lak to refill it. "Bonus answer. I'm starting to be more afraid of becoming the kind of person who would chop someone's arm off for the chance to go home."

He was right, it wasn't a surprising response. She'd been hoping for something more useful, like oxygen fires or parasitic worms. "Your turn."

He took a drink before spinning again. "Truth."

"Again?" Aeryn wondered if John already knew how to rig the spins.

"Just my luck, let's see…." She watched him think. "Are you more afraid of being alone or being changed?"

Aeryn took a microt to process the question. "This isn't a very fun game."

"Maybe we're just not very fun people. Are you going to answer?"

"I don't understand what you mean, it's vague." Aeryn was worried she was already losing.

John snorted. "You know exactly what I mean. But answer it however you want. Just be honest."

Aeryn grabbed the raz'lak and took a quick sip.

"You're stalling," he reached over to steal the canister back, putting his hand over hers until she let go and let him have it.

Aeryn glanced up at him then, but John was looking at her too intently, so she looked down at the floor again. "Change is inevitable. I just don't want to change into something that has no place in the universe."

"So you're more afraid of being alone?"

"Yes."

"But if you didn't have to change, if you could go back to the way things were, would you?"

"I already answered you." She snatched up the empty bottle. "And you're being boring. I've told you many times that I wish I could go back to being a Peacekeeper, but I can't."

"I know." He seemed oblivious to her anger, deep in his own thoughts. "I just keep hoping you'll give me a different answer."

She was so frustrated the bottle spun several full rotations before stopping. "Dare."

Crichton immediately began to mockingly limber up. Aeryn cast about for some clever challenge, but nothing amusing for either of them, came to mind. He was looking at her expectantly when a thought from earlier in the day saved her.

"I dare you to not breathe for one hundred and fifty microts. Without holding your breath."

She watched John do calculations before he asked, "Can you do that?"

"Easily." She assumed. Aeryn hadn't tried it in several cycles.

"Without holding my breath?"

She nodded, and the realization hit his eyes.

"This is a hard vacuum test! Oxygenate the blood, then exhale completely so my lungs don't explode, and see how long I can make it before blacking out."

"It's easier than a real test. Can you do it?"

"Probably not. Not without practice at least. Let me guess, Sebacean lungs are also superior to human ones?"

Aeryn couldn't help grinning. "Not all Sebaceans, just the carrier-borne. We can't match the Luxans, but we have modifications that help. Hull breaches and suit ruptures are both common enough. Soldiers who can't last a couple microns without air aren't worth training."

"Great. Well how about I try for one micron? Good enough?"

Aeryn conceded to human weakness. "I'll count."

"Of course you will." John started taking deeper breaths, filling and emptying his lungs completely. Aeryn did the same, finding herself matching his pattern without meaning to. After almost a micron of this, he took a final inhalation, and meeting her eyes, exhaled slowly.

Aeryn followed suit, and as they both finished, held up a closed fist. Every ten microts she held up another finger. It was distractingly intimate to just sit there in silence, staring into his pale eyes, lips parted, motionless. At least her body cooperated, letting her push aside the mind's instinct to panic and draw breath. Doing this in atmosphere was more a question of willpower than stamina. In some ways, it would have been easier in vacuum.

John was struggling after 50 microts, his face getting more tense as he fought the increasing desire to just inhale. He was a helpful distraction from the growing pressure in her own lungs, as the microts passed. 60. 70. 80. His face was quite red. 90. He gritted his teeth, his eyes glaring into hers, and almost made it. At ninety-six microts he broke, gasping. "Damn it!"

Aeryn had intended to keep going, but found herself breathing when he did instead. It felt good, almost dizzying, aside from the headache that sprang into existence as soon as she relaxed. She laughed at his irritated expression. "You almost made it. You just need practice."

"I'll try it again when I'm not tipsy. And you're not distracting me."

"How was I distracting you?" Just like John to blame her for his inadequacies.

"You're always distracting."

Aeryn didn't know what to make of that. "Well, you owe me a question."

"I do. " John grabbed the water jug and took a quick drink. "Go for it."

"What do you miss most about Earth?"

He frowned, putting the water back down. "You mean other than the obvious, like my family? And friends?"

"Is it obvious?" It should have been, yes. His stories were full of names. "Then yes, aside from that, unless there is a specific person?" He had told Zhaan about a woman once.

John thought about it while he refilled his cup. Despite the tipsy claim, his hand didn't shake. "Not any one person, no. Huh." Something in his thoughts seemed to surprise him. He shook his head at himself before continuing.

"What I miss most about Earth is that I wasn't always looking over my shoulder, waiting for the next... the next fight. The next disaster. They seemed big at the time, but I had small problems. Would my project get funding. Did that lady like me back." He shrugged and took a drink. "I miss feeling safe." He snagged the bottle. "My turn."

It was a strange concept, safety. Aeryn knew the word, of course. But he seemed to mean something by it that she had never felt. There had always been danger in her life, from her earliest memories. These monens on Moya had been the quietest she'd had since gaining her commission.

"Finally! Dare."

Aeryn looked up, feeling her heart rate increase. "Well?"

John was smiling, clearly already having a task in mind. "I dare you to dance for me."

It was so unexpected, Aeryn thought she hadn't heard him properly. "Dance?"

"Yep!" He was far too pleased with himself. "Wait, do Peacekeepers even know how to dance?"

Aeryn could feel herself scowling, but sometimes his assumptions about what her people were like grew tiresome. "We don't get training on it, if that's what you mean. People learn if they want to. It's just not a very popular pastime, at least not on the ships I've been assigned to."

"Some Peacekeepers have hobbies other than working out and target practice?" He acted shocked. "But you've never been dancing?"

Aeryn shrugged, still rankled by his attitude. "I have. On leave. It's just not all that fun." It had only seemed like a precursor to other forms of recreation, and Aeryn didn't see the point, really.

"So what you're saying is you're a bad dancer."

She didn't know how that was judged, but her partners had never complained. "That is not what I am saying," Aeryn corrected him.

"Well, show me then." John gestured at the space toward the front of the terrace.

"We don't have any music," Aeryn protested.

"You listen to music right? Just dance to whatever is in your head. I'll figure it out."

Music was another one of those things, like video fictions, that good Peacekeepers found frivolous. It wasn't forbidden, so long as it wasn't a distraction on duty, or a noise violation in crew quarters. But Aeryn had never bothered to spend her stipend on a personal player, or had much interest in following the popular musicians or musical styles. Some soldiers could barely function without it, so she'd heard a lot of recordings over the years. Tauvo, in fact, had liked to play music while they recreated. He said it was to cover up the sound of their activities, but she always suspected he used it to keep track of the rhythm.

"Do you give up?"

"No!" Aeryn hastily got to her feet, a little alarmed at how unsteady she felt. Her balance was dren.

"Well you're off to a great start already."

She didn't need John being sarcastic. "How long do I have to dance for?"

"At least a micron, unless you're really bad at it. I'll tell you."

"Wonderful." It had been a lot of cycles since drinking and dancing with civilians —and frelling them in the facilities— had seemed an exciting way to spend her limited leave. As with everything she decided to do, however, Aeryn had taken it seriously at the time, and studied and practiced the key skills. She could still remember Tauvo's favorite disc, so this was the music she called up in her memory. Not wanting the distraction of John's reaction, she closed her eyes and started to dance.

Her body felt wrong. Slow, uncoordinated, with limbs not entirely in her control. She'd had too much intoxicant, but this was beyond that. The way her leather moved against her flesh felt uncomfortably like the sloughing of skin and scale in the wake of her DNA restoration. Aeryn unfastened her vest, trying for sensual, but just needing the sensation to end. The headache had grown as soon as she stood up, so she pulled the band off her braid end, and turned the act of freeing her hair into part of the dance as well. Civilians always liked her hair loose, and it was reassuring to wrap her own fingers in the regrown strands.

One part of her mind, an additional focal point that never quite disappeared, kept track of the passing microts, while the rest of her tried to twist and sway, and stomp to the remembered beat. Only sixty more microts to stay upright. Forty more to only move the four limbs she actually possessed. Twenty more, but she would not fall over, no matter whether it was she or the ship spinning—

Crichton said, "Stop!" fourteen microts too soon. He was right in front of her, reaching out to steady her, but she didn't need his help, and jerked away. The floor wanted to grab her, but Aeryn knelt instead, and braced a hand on the deck until the dizziness passed.

"That wasn't a micron." All she could think was that somehow she'd failed the dare.

"I didn't realize how truly tanked you are. Maybe the translator microbes don't pass along the slurring." John sat back down, a bit heavily, perhaps not entirely steady himself.

Aeryn didn't take his meaning at first, more of those words that he insisted on using wrongly. Then she understood the accusation. "I'm not slurring, and I'm not drunk. I'm intoxicated."

"Ok, Miss I-can-hold-my-liquor. You were going to intoxicate yourself onto your eema. But don't worry, I won't make you pay a forfeit. You did dance for me."

Aeryn sat all the way down on her rear again. "Badly." She shouldn't be offended. Who knows what humans thought dancing should look like.

"I didn't say that." She made herself look up at him. His expression meant nothing, he just looked amused, with soft eyes and a soft mouth.

She reached out and spun the bottle again, ready for John to be the uncomfortable one again. The spout ended up vaguely in his direction. "Truth."

John found his cup again, and took a sip. "Hit me."

She had spent enough time with the man to know he didn't mean it literally, but some unworthy, embarrassed part of her went searching for a question that would qualify. "What is…" the worst thing that has ever happened to you? But no, that would be boring and obvious. "What is your…" biggest regret? That would be a variation on the same answer. Going on the mission that led to him being thrown across the galaxy. To meeting her. To ruining her life. No, that was her biggest regret.

Aeryn wasn't sure she wanted to play this game anymore, and settled on something easy and boring. "What is your favorite part of being here?"

His brows came together again. She'd surprised him. "Here on Moya?"

Aeryn shrugged, not wanting to lead his answer.

"Moya is my favorite part. I've been into syfy my whole life, I've seen everything there is on tee vee, read a hundred books, and literally studied space for the last fifteen years—cycles, and I've never even thought of a ship like her, a living ship. We zoom around space in a giant space wayl that can rupture the fabric of the universe!" John was making wide gestures, his face lighting up in excitement.

"I will never understand even a fraction of the science that explains how she is possible. But while I'm here, I'm going to try." John was looking down at the terrace floor now, his hands rubbing almost reverently against the bronze panels.

Aeryn was reminded, with a painful squeeze of nausea, of another man who had looked at Leviathans that way. She flicked the bottle closer to him hard enough that Crichton had to lunge to grab it. "Your turn."

He looked at her quizzically, then made a show of setting the bottle in front of him and setting it spinning. Aeryn found the packet of fiber wafers, and choked one down to quiet her stomach.

"That looks like… truth." It was close enough that Aeryn could have asked for a re-spin, but she wasn't sure she was willing to attempt whatever dare John came up with next.

"So what's my question?" While John was distracted thinking of his challenge, Aeryn reclaimed the canister and took a medicinal sip of raz'lak.

"Hey, no, you have definitely had enough." John lunged at her, trying to grab the raz'lak back. "You're going to feel terrible tomorrow as it is. Or don't Peacekeepers get hangovers?"

"Ok, fahm." She let him have it, since to be fair, despite his attempts to catch up she'd drunk almost twice as much as John had. Between the intoxicant and the raz'lak, she was definitely going to feel it after she slept.

John seemed puzzled. "What's a fahm? How insulted should I be?"

"Fahm. It's your word. Isn't that right? You call your maternal sires 'mahm', or something else that is longer, with a m- m—," Aeryn emphasized the sound, lips pressed together. But for your paternal sires the word starts with a f—" she demonstrated, "against your teeth. Faum."

He stared at her without saying anything. She suspected his brain was starting to become as cloudy as her own. "Oh!" He suddenly laughed. "You're trying to say paternal sire!" The word he used was short, like mahm , but didn't otherwise sound like it. "Daadh ," he repeated, slowly so she could hear it better. " Maternal sire and paternal sire, mahm and daadh."

"Daadh," she repeated. The longer words for his sires were very similar, but the short versions were not. A very confusing language.

"But you're not allowed to call me that when you're twice as old as me."

John was never going to get over that. "Do you have a question for me, or not?"

"Right, I did." He frowned trying to recall it. "Oh, right! What was the best part of having Pilot DNA?"

It was Aeryn's turn to stare blankly, feeling like he had hit her. "There was no good part, it was completely horrifying."

John shook his head. "I know it was awful. I can't even imagine what that felt like. But it was also a wholly different way of being. New senses, new abilities… there had to be…. had to be something about it that you didn't hate."

"I was a disgusting monster, John. My hands fused into claws." Her fingers twitched with the memory of it. "My nose melted away, and I had—," she couldn't help scratching at her ribs, "had useless new arms poking out of my chest—" Just thinking about it made everything ache, "It was so loud, and I couldn't think, and I wasn't even me anymore! I was feeling and perceiving and realizing things that I would never—"

John grabbed ahold of her hands, pulling them away from where they were clawing. "Hey!" He shook her. "Aeryn? I get that it was probably the worst thing that ever happened to you… other than meeting me." The smile he was giving her wasn't self-deprecating, it was just sad. Pitying. "But it doesn't have to be. Please tell me something good about it. Think. It can be small, or stupid, but there must have been one thing you can latch on to, that didn't totally suck."

Aeryn thought with some less hysterical part of her mind, a mind that never used to have so many sections, that it was curious how a non-space-faring species would use vacuum as a metaphor for bad. Another segment of her attention was focused on the warmth of John's hands, and the way his fingers had become intertwined with hers because she had fingers, she did, and that was blood not slime trickling down her side, stinging where her nails had broken the skin. Reluctantly her brain was also sorting through and discarding answers to John's questions, a mental scrabble for some reply that would satisfy whatever he needed from her. Something true.

"I could feel Moya. Not just her systems. Her occupants. But Moya herself. Another presence larger and…" it was hard to explain, and the distance provided by the intoxicant scattered the words she wanted to use. "...more diffuse, hovering in my mind. Gentle." Aeryn squeezed John's fingers in hers, hard enough to hurt them both, but he didn't make a sound. "And she could feel me, Moya noticed me. Knew me, or whatever I was becoming at least."

He waited a few microts to see if she was done talking. "Thank you." His voice was soft. "That really does sound amazing. Do you miss h—" John cut himself off before finishing. "Never mind, I know, I know, you already answered my question."

Aeryn thought John would let her go, then, but instead he used his grip to pull her closer, until their noses were almost touching and his pale, reddened eyes were unavoidable. His warm breath smelled like raz'lak. "By the way… you were kyute. Like a wahmbat mixed with the sid-knee oprah house. Not a monster. Even your little chikken wing was kyute." John finally let go of her hands, and brushed a stray lock of her hair off her face before sitting back. "Though I do like you better in the original Sebacean." He smiled, just a little twist of his lips, and took up his cup again.

Aeryn wasn't comforted by his attempt to soothe her self-disgust. She knew even her normal hair was the wrong color for him. How much worse she must have looked without any hair at all. "I don't know any of those words, but don't tell me purple and four arms with pincers is your type, because I know it's not." She stole his cup and she knew John must be feeling sorry for her because he let her take a drink, the fumes biting at her nose, before he reached for it back.

"Well, maybe I'm not normally into extra limbs." He pulled the cup down out of her grip. "But I have a good imagination, and if there's one thing life in the Uncharted Territories has taught me, it's that I'm pretty flexible about what gets me hot." This seemed to require a toast and another gulp of raz'lak.

He really was making no sense. "You're always hot," Aeryn pointed out.

"Hey, I may be a male, but I'm not always… wait…. " He squinted at her speculatively, "Was that a compliment? Thanks."

Aeryn was thoroughly confused and she didn't think it was entirely the intoxicant's fault. "It's just a fact. You are at least two klances warmer than normal, all the time."

"Oh." This simple explanation seemed to momentarily disappoint him, but then he broke out in a stupid grin. "Well then, I would say that you are a pretty cool avian hatchling." This was apparently a joke because he started laughing.

Aeryn took away his cup and uncapped the raz'lak container while he was cackling. "You've had enough now, too." The flask only had a few swallows left anyway, judging by the sloshing. She poured what was in the cup back in, only spilling half of it, then re-capped and rolled the canister safely out of reach for both of them.

"Oh come on, baby, that was funny."

"My turn." She pulled the empty bottle close, pressing down hard because it wanted to slip and skitter away.

"OK, but if we're done drinking, then this is the last round."

That gave an added weight to watching the spin she finally got going. It ended with the butt of the bottle pointing squarely at John. "Dare."

He groaned, "Be merciful." John clasped his hands together, looking at her with that peculiar, big-eyed pleading that always simultaneously irritated and softened her. It was the manipulation of a child, but he was not a child.

"If you think me being a monster was so kyute, I dare you to kiss me." She hadn't thought before she said it, so Aeryn watched John's expression, steeling herself. At first he looked confused, then nervous.

"Are you sure?"

"You said it was traditional, with spin the bottle," she said stubbornly, "unless it makes you too uncomfortable." Aeryn mustered all the indifference she could pretend.

"I didn't say that at all. Just…. don't… shoot me or anything." John came up onto his knees and crawled closer, eyeing her like a tactical problem to be solved.

Aeryn pulled her pulse pistol again, enjoying his little jerk of alarm, and hit the cartridge release, letting the chakkan oil clatter to the ground. "Are you that bad at it?" She settled, sitting on her feet, watching him approach.

John reached out carefully, brushing his fingers through her hair and bringing it off her face, tangling his fingers in to hold her in place. "I'm out of practice."

He hesitated, staring into her eyes with too much tension. She almost told him to stop, but then his mouth descended, and his lips brushed down, not to her mouth, but against her forehead, gently. Then again, trailing just over her eyebrow, a funny, tickling feeling. He lingered there, first closed, then open mouthed.

As strange as this was, the warmth and intensity still sparked an answer deep in her groin. But that sensation was all mixed up with her headache and her nausea, and dueling perceptions. She was there, her eyebrow being suckled by this daft, enticing, human who smelled of engines and raz'lak and his own spice. And she was also watching them together, John holding, hovering, eyes closed, mouth mobile, and Aeryn pinned, pressed, motionless, eyes open, uncertain. Until he finally finished, pulled away, and snapped her back into a singular body.

"What was that?" She hissed, trying to shake him off. "You could have just said you didn't want to."

John let go abruptly, though trying not to yank her hair. "Did I do it wrong?"

"Your aim is dren! Sebaceans kiss on their lips, John, I know you know how, I've seen you do it. How drunk are you? Or is this how humans kiss?"

"No! We kiss lip-to-lip too, but I thought…. I mean, that's what Gilina did the first—"

John realized that was the wrong thing to say, and didn't finish, but Aeryn was already pushing him away, not roughly just firmly, unwilling to be compared to the lovely, brilliant, blonde woman who apparently never left John's thoughts.

He let her shove him down."Sorry, um…. maybe it was a Tech thing?"

The only recreational difference Aeryn had ever noted between Infantry and Techs is that the techs were a little more patient and there was a lot less fighting over who was controlling the encounter. There had been some partners in both branches she'd never bothered to kiss at all, but sucking on eyebrows had not been offered as a replacement. Then Aeryn's slowed memory finally made the connection. "No. It's from a fiction."

It had made the rounds of the carrier a couple cycles ago, the exploits of a special operative, an assassin from a genetically modified cousin-species, sent to seduce and kill the daughter of a rogue colonial governor. It had been so popular among the younger and sillier crew that even Aeryn had joined in curiosity when her commando training team took over a break room to watch, and mock, it together.

The combat scenes had been well done, aside from a few microts where unnecessary flourishes would have gotten the protagonist killed. But the reason for the popularity was a sharply debated erotic between the operative and his target. In a moment of weakness, the assassin, having convinced the governor's daughter to recreate with him, kissed only her brow, rather than possessing her lips and tongue. The poison in his modified saliva would have killed her. If he had obeyed his orders, she should have died.

The twist in the plot was that though he didn't know it during their first frell, his orders had actually come from an enemy spy who had corrupted the mission transmission, hoping to start a war. If Aeryn remembered the ending correctly, it concluded with the assassin defending his former target from a unit of back-up assassins, and the grateful colonial returning the eyebrow kiss, at great length and with a fair amount of her own, non-deadly spit, as a sensual gesture of farewell.

"Really? Well, yeah, Gilina was into those. Action vids." John picked up her oil cartridge, and handed it over. "So I guess you didn't like it?"

Aeryn rubbed the back of her other hand against her face, trying to suppress the shudder at the slight slimy residue. "It felt weird." She still tingled a bit in other places, which was almost more disturbing.

"Maybe I am just bad at it, cause I thought it was kinda hot."

Aeryn grimaced, "Well practice on someone else." She re-enabled her pulse pistol and holstered it.

John raised his own eyebrows, and puckered his lips at her. "Did you want me to kiss you again, the right way?" Was he actually trying not to laugh at her?

"No!" Aeryn almost threw the bottle at him. "Your turn."

"Well I guess I know what my dare is going to be…." John set the bottle spinning, but either he didn't actually want her to kiss him back, or he didn't have the skill to rig the game after all, because it ended with the spout in her direction, not the end. "Damn. Truth."

The sense of physical unwellness was only growing, and Aeryn was ready to be done with this game. Thankfully, John only debated for a microt.

"So apparently I'm terrible at kissing. Why don't you tell me about the best man you ever kissed?"

"No!" Aeryn answered before she thought, before she even realized why the question upset her. It shouldn't have. There had been a lot of men, a lot of kisses. Women too. Hard, deep, tentative, stolen, teeth clashing and lips whispering. She could have picked any memorable moment from the last fifty cycles. "There's no one who— "

It was being here, on another Leviathan, that made him so present. The twisting corridors in the same mottled bronzes, the rooms that looked too familiar. Aeryn had never let herself dwell on the man since her return to Icarian company. What was done, was done. But on Moya, thoughts of Velorek came to her often, called out by sitting in Pilot's den or watching the reverent way John examined a tiny propulsor engine. "I don't think about—"

Perhaps it was just being here with John, a bright, baffling, lighthearted version of Velorek's dark passion for science, for Leviathans, for change. A man who refused to see the monster the other had discovered she already was. "No. I don't want to do that. Some things are private." Unthinking, she threw the bottle in her hand, glass shattering and skittering. "You win." The sound snapped her out of the past, out of her head, to realize she was on her feet, swaying, with stars above and below now, from the bright shards sprinkled halfway across the terrace.

John was staring up at her, sobered and stricken. "I wasn't trying to win, Aeryn. I just… wanted to understand you better."

"Well you know everything you need to, don't you?" She gesticulated with her only two arms and tried to remember how to walk. "I can hold my breath for microns but I don't dance and I don't want to be here, but I am, and you won't be, and nothing can ever be right, not even kissing—" Her face was slimy again, oozing, and she scrubbed and scrubbed at it until he captured her hands, holding both in one of his, and the other hand pulling her close and patting against her back as she struggled to breathe.

"Now I know why you don't get drunk," he whispered, rez'lak and unused kisses on his breath. "You're a mess in there. But it's ok. I have you."

"I'm not drunk. I'm intoxicated." He shouldn't be like this. Warm, and strong, and ignoring the shameful tears that spilled down stinging cheeks and the way she couldn't stand straight, and how her hair was black as space, not bright like the sun. He needed the sun, and instead he was stuck here with her in the dark. Until he wasn't. "It's different."

"I know, I know. Let's get you to bed."

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