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greenninjagal-blog · 1 year

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Space Time Equations

Hello its a lovely day and I’m here to make it lovelier with a new installment of the Space and Everything In It series (aka my Alien au staring human Virgil and Janus)

Summary: As the two resident Deathworlders on the ship, Virgil and Janus have to make a decision. Although its not much of one at all. Both of them seem to be on the same page about what they want to their future to be like.... right?

Word Count: 9364

Quick Taglist: @chelsvans @coyboi300 @dwbh888 @glitchybina @faithfulcat111 @felicianoromano @holliberries @jemthebookworm @killerfangirl3 @musical-nerd18 @nonasficcollection @stricken-with-clairvoyancy @the-sunshine-dims @themagicheartmailman @thenaiads @treasureofpriam @vianadraws

Read on Ao3 || My General Writing Masterlist

“Erso.”

“No.”

“Amidala.”

“No.”

“Skywalker?”

“Virgil,” Janus said without even bothering to open his eyes. “So help me, if you say one more word I am going to smother you with this pillow.”

Virgil gently dragged his fingers through Janus’s blond curls for another moment, humming softly to himself as he had been doing for a good portion of the phisannu that they had been laying here together. Janus smelled like lavender, soft and calming and Virgil breathed in the scent, with every inhale, feeling hazy and soft in a way that he couldn’t remember being before.

“Organa?”

And Janus, who was not a liar, who did not joke about this sort of thing, who did not pull punches or know the meaning of the word mercy, jerked around and slammed the heaviest, thickest pillow they had into Virigl’s face as hard as he could.

Admittedly, it did hurt. Just a little. He hadn’t quite gotten around to asking which of the numerous thousands of alien animals out there went into creating a pillow like the ones one the Mindscape, but their fur-feathers-fluff-whatever could get dense when it was packed together, which is how Janus liked his pillows for some reason, even back on Earth: weaponizable.

Virgil has found that the longer he spent around Janus, the more he remembered these little memories too: laying on Janus’s bed staring up at the ceiling because he was on the softest bed in the world, with a rock hard pillow under his head, and his brain wouldn’t stop whispering about how there was really only a handful of inches between them, that if he really wanted to he could roll over and drape himself over Janus’s arm and if Janus freaked out he could pretend he was asleep and hadn’t realized what he was doing, that if he was lucky, Janus wouldn’t wake up and Virgil would get to spend a few hours listening to his heartbeat and imagining they lived in a world where Virgil was a little braver and capable of actually asking Janus out and not scared to death of what would happen if he said "yes".

Of course, Virgil wouldn’t dare admit that he had these thoughts to Janus now, but he held onto those memories that kept coming back like they were life preservers in the middle of the ocean that he somehow found himself drowning in. Patton, Logan, and Roman had done so well holding him afloat for so long, but now he could roll over and stare at Janus and he could thread the waves himself--

The pillow missed his head by a scant few inches.

“Solo?” Virgil gasped out ducking as another pillow reared back again.

“Go! To! Sleep!” Janus said, punctuating each word with a hit from his pillow shaped boulder. “Asshole!”

Or at least that was what Virgil assumed he was saying. Virgil really was laughing too hard to make it out. He blocked a hit of the pillow with his left arm, and quickly flung another pillow into Janus’s stomach while he was distracted.

Janus’s laughter reminded Virgil of the sunlight streaming in through the windows of Janus’s room back on earth, of the surprising warmth of the pool water after Janus pushed him in at two thirty eight in the morning, of the electrifying feel of Janus’s hand over his mouth as Janus’s mother walked by the closet they were hiding in on her way to deal with some important emergency at her rich person job, unaware that Janus and Virgil just finished cleaning the dishes from the cookies they baked that were all wrapped in napkins and stuffed in Virgil’s pockets, nearly burning his hands--

Virgil’s own lips curled up at the sound, feeling his own (much more dumb sounding) laugh bubbling up his throat in the most disgusting display of absolute smitteness. It would be embarrassing; Virgil was embarrassed about it. Janus could be shoving a knife into his ribcage and Virgil would be entirely okay with it so long as he continued to look at Virgil the way that he was doing it right now. He couldn’t even imagine what type of grief Roman would give him if he knew that Virgil was capable of such smittenness. Logan had already made his concerns very well known, and look how well that had gone!

Janus snatched Virgil’s sole pillow away and tossed it somewhere behind him in the nest of blankets the two of them had made in the common area and waved his own threateningly in the air over Virgil’s prone body.

“I’m armed and dangerous! Surrender!” he commanded, panting slightly as he fixed his golden hair back into a semi presentable state, trying to press away his smile by sheer force of will.

“Has anyone ever told you you're a complete bully?” Virgil asked with a teasing smile, even when Janus smacked him again in the face. “This is a breach of my human rights! Freedom of speech!”

“We’re in SPACE!”

“I’m still a human!”

“You’re going to be a corpse if you don’t shut up!”

“I love when you threaten me,” Virgil said and watched the glorious red blush take over Janus’s face from behind the pillow being smacked into his face again. “I love you.”

“Shut Up,” Janus said back, and Virgil almost thought he might be begging, if begging was ever a thing that those pesky Ekans were taught.

Without giving Janus much more than a second to prepare himself, Virgil sat up and snatched the pillow from Janus's already distracted hands. Janus let it go without too much of a struggle, content to catch his breath as Virgil reached through the infinite inches between them and cupped the side of Janus's face, as gently as he would hold a thunderstorm in a glass ornament. His fingers had memorized Janus’s cheek, his strangely cool skin, the way that a single touch sent electric shivers through Virgil, but there was always something invigorating about doing it, about Janus allowing him to do it, about how at least one of young-Virgil’s dreams had come true.

The faint scar lines on his cheek were barely visible now, far more distant than the actual memories of the Pol’tur ship and Janus’s previous crew. In certain lights, Virgil had noted that it looked almost like golden cracks on his seamless skin, like elaborate stage makeup that could be brushed away to reveal that picture perfect memory of that boy that had been Virgil’s entire world, as if with a careless movement Virgil would erase everything that had happened between Earth and now.

Something in his chest twisted and Virgil shoved it down as hard and sharply as he could.

Janus had missed a few wisps of hair that floated lightly in an invisible wind out of his tidy hair cut, and his breaths came out in undignified huffs that would have been unbecoming and unthinkable if they were still back on Earth. He was wearing another one of Virgil's Quitan-cut shirts that promotes some…retail resort or something in Quintarian, something so cheap that the dye was likely to bleed onto his skin. He's staring at Virgil with a lightness in those eyes of his that he couldn't have learned from his parents, his friends, Earth itself.

He wasn’t the same as he was back then. Virgil wasn’t the same and he didn’t want either of them to be.

Janus’s lips were soft pink, like sparkling rosé wine, a hint of his tongue as he licked to wet them in a suddenly shy manner. Virgil suddenly couldn’t look away from them, from the curve of Janus’s jaw and the soft skin of his neck that Virgil suddenly had a very stupid thought to start kissing.

Super stupid. The most stupid.

So extremely stupid, in fact that Janus leaned forward, muscles rolling until he was in Virgil's lap, and each and every one of their atoms were singing about it and Virgil still almost thought that he had slipped into dreamland and started hallucinating this whole thigh.

Thing. Not thigh. Though that was 100% Janus’s thigh right there.

"This okay?" Janus whispered cautiously, as if a single hitch if Virgil’s breath would be enough to scare him to the other side of the room, straight through the walls and into the void around them.

There could be galaxies exploding around them, and Virgil wouldn't have even noticed.

“More than,” he whispered back, his lungs traitorously out of breath, mouth strangely dry, the urge to say so many stupid things-- “You… you are very pretty.”

“So I’ve been told,” Janus said, half teasing. His arms snaked around Virgil’s torso, coming to a rest on the waistband of Virgil’s pajamas. The whole world breathed for an eternity, in and out, in and out and in and--

“You’re not so bad looking yourself,” Janus hummed, barely a hair’s breadth away from Virgil’s lips himself. Virgil could turn his head and kiss him and Janus would probably be really into that.

“I think we were supposed to be sleeping,” and why did he say that.

Janus laughed, warm and flattering and it does not make Virgil’s brain do anything other than short circuit like one of his dumb robots.

“I seem to recall,” Janus said. “That I was sleeping, and that there was someone else here who was not sleeping.”

“Sounds like a dumbass.” please someone just shoot him with a blaster right now.

“I still like him,” Janus said. His fingers tapped on his waist, slowly and methodically and very dangerously. Virgil’s chest froze, his heart beating so rapidly that he was pretty sure that Janus could hear it, based on that smirk that followed. Avenged Sevenfold could probably make a bomb ass song with just his heartbeat as the drums.

“Do you?”

He didn’t even realize he’d spoken until Janus’s eyes narrowed, and suddenly Virgil wanted to melt into a puddle of Deathworlder goo and pretend he didn’t exist at all. It was pathetic, his voice breaking without warning like he really cared all that much about Janus liking him. He did care. He cared so much.

Being the center of Janus’s care, being the object of his affection was something that younger-Virgil would have scoffed about, but now that he had it, now that he was it, Virgil could see exactly why so many people let the Ekans family stomp over them for it.

((“Don’t you have somewhere to be little Cikery? Go back to sleep. In your bed or Janus’s. I don’t care.”

“Something tells me you actually do.”))

Why so many people lost their fucking minds over Janus’s addictive attention.

“I do,” Janus said in that tone of his that spoke laws of physics into the world, that made people stop to listen, that made Virgil almost believe him all the time. “Nothing he can do can really make me stop liking him. Not even him disrupting the best chance of sleep that I’ve had since Remus knocked me out with his toxin, oh when was that? Three days ago? Speaking of, are you going to tell me what the two of you talked about?”

((“You just turn right around, get into that escape pod, and eject yourself into space.”))

“What?” Virgil stuttered, blinking away the sudden onslaught of Remus’s stupid face peering out from the darkness. “I didn’t-- we didn’t--”

“Virgil.”

“Just a totally friendly conversation!” Virgil said. “I don’t even remember what we talked about!”

It wasn’t entirely a lie and Virgil wasn’t entirely a coward; Remus was several layers of conversation stacked on each other with a knife shaped core that cut anything that got close and every time Virgil thought about their late night rendezvous he got a worse feeling in his chest about it.

After Remus had gone to bed, Virgil had somehow stumbled back to his own room and spent the rest of the night staring at the little lights of his glowing plants and thinking far too much about nothing at all. He thought that when the morning broke, he would tell everyone that Remus was… and that was as far as he had gotten because he wasn’t sure what Remus was at all.

He was insane, except not really. He was dangerous, except not exactly? He was a captain, except not anymore.

So in the end… Virgil hadn’t said anything about Remus nearly killing him and Remus hadn’t said anything about Virgil almost killing him in turn, and Roman had complained something terrible about a hangover at breakfast and everyone else had acted as if they hadn’t noticed anything unusual. To Virgil’s knowledge no one had been into the Transporter Room since then and no one had asked after things that were mysteriously missing from around the ship, and no one had pointed out that Virgil had some form of PTSD that was diagnosable by alien standards.

But Janus was staring at him like he could see the bruising around Virgil’s neck that he had been religiously using a skrad healing pad to get rid of since the other night.

“Remus doesn’t do “friendly” conversations,” Janus said, like someone with a very long list of examples in his back pocket.

“Exactly!” Virgil said. “He was looking for tips on how to do it! And asked me. The expert on friendly, completely normal, non-fighting conversations that do not involve nearly killing each other at all.”

Janus was silent for a whole minute, letting Virgil come to terms with every word that he just spewed into the air. Virgil almost thought that maybe he would let him get away with it too, just for the sheer audacity of the attempt; the same way that some of Virgil’s teacher’s used to let him get away with doing only a fourth of their homework for the full completion grade just so he wouldn’t be completely failing their classes.

“You are a terrible liar,” Janus’s lips pressed together in that way that read as both amusement and annoyance and Virgil offered his best approximation of mental regret and apologies via telepathy that he doesn’t have.

“Can we get back to kissing?”

Janus leaned forward just enough to peck his cheek, short, sharp, and definitely too quick for Virgil to catch with his own lips. It was horribly unfair that Janus could use such a tactic with the ease of a master magician, and yet Virgil somehow always ended up the fool for him.

“You’ll get more when you tell me what’s up with you and Remus.”

As far as cruel and unusual punishments, Virgil thought that this might have been the cruelest. Of course, Janus wouldn’t know anything about that though, tap, tap, tapping his fingers on Virgil’s waist teasingly, and lording the scent of lavender over Virgil’s head. He was used to how his own silva tasted and didn’t know that Virgil was finding himself with a horrible, terrible shortage of Janus silva in his mouth.

Jesus Christ what is wrong with him; what was that fucking sentence--?

“How did you even know we talked?” Virgil whined.

Janus huffed another laugh, running one of his fingers in a circle on Virgil’s hip. “Well, first of all, I have eyes, Virgil.”

Okay, so what? He probably noticed that Virgil had been very quick to evacuate locations where Remus suddenly appeared. That wasn’t totally unusual; before the other night Virgil’s run-ins with Remus had been non-existent and neither of them had even been trying to avoid one another.

Or well Virgil hadn’t been trying to avoid Remus. He wasn’t sure if Remus had been avoiding him, avoiding what he represented, avoiding the urge to rip out Virgil’s spine and sell it to his Black Market Alien Friends Who Might Not Have Actually Been Friends Because Remus Wasn’t Actually All That Bad And Now Remus Was Crewless And Virgil Is Intimately Aware Of How Horrible It Can Be To Be Alone.

Fuck.

“Can we talk about something else? Please. Or even go back to not talking at all! I won’t say anything and you can sleep.”

Janus hummed in that way that sounded exactly like his mother and Virgil (remembered the Robotics Competition, the Police Investigation, the TV Interviews--) used all his will power to suppress his flinch.

“Virgil,” Janus said.

“It wasn’t important. Just a talk between two guys! Nothing’s going to come of it. You can trust me about that, right?”

Janus hesitated, and Virgil felt very much like he had taken a cheap shot on him, even though trust hadn’t really ever been a question between them. Their relationship had started with Janus trusting Virgil with the most dangerous secret he had, and Virgil had taken it right to Janus’s grave with him, lips sealed even when Janus’s parents had painted him into the monster that suited their needs.

Not that Janus knew that. Not that Janus had any reason to suspect that Virgil had been the sole inheritor of blame for every bad thing on Earth. Not that Virgil was ever going to tell Janus if he could help it.

Virgil was a coward by nature, born and bred, and running away from conversations was just something wired into him intuitively.

“Okay,” Janus said finally, voice low and rumbling and still somehow clearly enunciated. He rolled his tongue over the Common Word, as if it left a bad taste in his mouth when he said it. “Okay, Virgil, I trust you.”

Virgil delicately brings his hand back up to Janus’s face, rubbing his thumb over the corner of his lips. Janus let a smile flick over himself at the touch, showing off the hints of teeth under those pretty kissable pink lips. Virgil tilted his head up slightly as if he could entice Janus to let the conversation fall out of his mind entirely.

Janus surged forward in the next breath and their lips collided, bringing with him a tidal wave of warmth, warmth, warmth. Virgil breathed in lavender, and breathed out a series of nonsensical delighted noises that his younger self would have been utterly horrified to hear him making about Janus Ekans.

Virgil hadn’t exactly ever felt like a soft person: his parents had molded him into something with jagged edges and a distrust of everyone and everything; Mr. and Mrs. Ekans had sharpened those edges into something that looked like they could cut, even though Virgil had never hurt someone before. When he was on the Weslor Fighting Rings, he had forced those blades into reality to keep himself alive, to survive, to continue breathing even when he couldn’t think of a reason to want to.

And even though those blades had shattered against Logan’s rock exterior, dulled to something less effective, less dangerous, less… less under the buzzing, welcoming, all accepting blanket that was the Mindscape, they were still there and Virgil’s habit of grabbing for them when he stressed was hard to unlearn. He’d let himself loosen his hold on those jagged edges, although they still fit in his hands, although his mind still remembered how to hold them, although he felt like he needed to look over his shoulder a lot of the time. He could stop being Virgil Storm, but he would have to be Virgil the Deathworlder for the rest of his life, and there wasn’t a single alien that would look at a Deathworlder and not attack first.

So he didn’t consider himself soft, but under Janus’s hands he became malleable to whatever his golden haired half desired. He didn’t think about losing the steel plated spine he’d grown that had helped him stand when the whole world was against him, but Janus’s body warmth made it melt into the pillows around them. He wasn’t squishy, he wasn’t kind; he was barely even polite.

But Janus’s tongue made him want to practice his pleases and thank yous.

Janus pulled back, and Virgil wondered what type of will power one had to have to get that much strength. Virgil’s lungs gasped and panted, baying for air, and Janus was smiling at him in that stupid, very kissable way of his that should have been illegal. He was a menace, a Problem with a capital P, a warning sign that was one day going to be the death of Virgil.

And Virgil wouldn’t look away for the ending of the universe, his mind a strangely static version of calmness that only comes from having one single thought on repeat:

“So… what are we doing now?”

“Depends,” Janus said dangerously. “Are you going to be a good boy for me?”

And if Virgil were in any other state of mind, he might have been embarrassed by how fast and fervently he replied, “Yes.”

Janus ghosted a kiss over Virgil’s lips and Virgil would chase him if there weren't those hands on his waist reminding him to stay still. Janus smiled at him, so pretty and amazing and wonderful and he leaned in close to Virgil cheek, pressing light soft imprints up his cheek bone and back towards his ear. Virgil’s chest hummed in the charged silence, his heart thumping with a giddy hope, absolutely ready for whatever Janus wanted him to do.

There was a breath. Janus hovered just to the left of his face, pressing a kiss to the tip of Virgil’s ear.

And then.

“Apologize for keeping me awake,” Janus whispered about as delicately as a fucking moon crashing into their spaceship.

“Are you kidding me?!” Virgil moaned. “Are you fucking serious?”

“I’m waiting….”

Virgil threatened to wriggle but Janus’s hands were a very strong reminder of why he didn’t want to, of the things he was going to get if he just did it, of how much he was in love with Janus.

“You are actually an asshole,” Virgil said, tilting his head up. “Such an asshole. I’m sorry for talking. I’m sorry that I interrupted your sleep. I’m sorry that your stupid face likes mine. Now please kiss me again, you fucker.”

Janus laughed and all at once pushed forward. Their lips matched up, like puzzle pieces, like perfectly cut metal plates, like missing pieces of code that suddenly made the incredibly sappy part of his brain start to function all over again. Virgil’s back grinded into the floor; one of their bunched up blankets was tangled under his spine like a knot that definitely was going to hurt later but Virgil couldn’t find it in himself to care as Janus helped himself to laying completely on top of him. There were sparks in Virgil’s mind, lighting up his whole existence brighter than any light that Logan might have been able to produce.

Janus kissed deep and fierce, his hands glided up under Virgil’s shirt tracing whatever muscles that he could find and everything in Virgil was at risk to actually, physically explode. He tasted like that sweet tea that Patton liked, and Virgil grinned at the thought of him slipping the tea bags into one of the mugs that Patton had once bought for Virgil when Logan had explained that Virgil would be staying (with them, on their ship, in Space That Was As Far From Earth As He Could Get).

Virgil’s fingers threaded through Janus’s hair, ruffling it the way that Mrs. Ekans would have hated with a passion. Virgil kissed her son the way that she would have hated too: messy and sweet and imperfect. Their teeth knocked, their noses seem to suddenly be in the wrong position on their faces, the fact that they have to breathe through their faces seems to be an epic design flaw that Virgil needs to talk to some godly entity about--

“Fuck--” Virgil gasped.

“That’s the idea,” Janus heaved, far too pleased with himself.

“Did you put a sock on the door?”

“Remus takes that as an invitation to come in. But if you’re nice and quiet we don’t have to worry about--”

“THAT’S FUNDAMENTALLY FLAWED!” A voice yelled from the doorway, and all at once Virgil remembered that there are four other aliens on the ship and there aren’t actually doors to the living room area that they all come to hang out in when they finish their duties around the ship.

Janus jumped off him, practically to the other side of the room, face so red that he could have been mistaken for Roman if he had a bit more spikes. Virgil, himself, wasn’t sure he was any better: his lungs were still recovering and his brain was screeching with a sudden emptiness that made focusing on damage control nearly impossible. His heart was beating in his throat strangling all the oxygen molecules that might possibly come through.

"Oh, hey… Pat…Lo," Virgil said. "It's… uh…not what it looks like?"

Neither Patton nor Logan look like they believed that, but to be fair Virgil guessed that if he walked in on two of the deadliest creatures in existence tossing around on the floor, with those words coming from them, he also wouldn't believe that they were being Family Friendly and Safe for Work. Logan had his upper two arms covering Patton’s very large, emotion-radar eyes as if he could block out the most-likely very bright silhouettes that were Virgil and Janus. Patton himself was flushed, hanging upside down from the rafters of the ship per his usual method of traveling around and despite him being the oldest being Virgil knows, he was seeming to try to look anywhere else other than at them.

“Virgil,” Logan said clinically. “I respect that you both are consenting creatures and while I am extremely curious about Deathworlder biology and mating rituals--”

“I already regret this more than you could possibly know,” Virgil yelped out. “Please just kill me.”

“It was a joke! We were not actually going…to….” Janus said at the same time. “That would be… completely disrespectful to the hospitality you have already provided me--”

“Totally disrespectful!” Virgil agreed. “We would never!”

“And honestly the fact that you think we would!” Janus added. “What sort of Cikeriy do you take us for? In fact, I think I am insulted by the insinuation!”

Virgil frowned, squinting. “Wait, what is a Cikeriy?”

Janus shook his head in a way that means he’ll explain later, although just from the context Virgil got the impression that he owed Remus some massive dental work.

"Do you kiddos have a moment?" Patton asked carefully.

And it was then that Virgil clocked how…nervous Patton looked. Immediately he felt his shoulders tense, glancing beyond the Reytin and Tenekarie towards the door as if he would spy some secret alien stow away pointing a blaster at their backs. But the doorway was empty and Janus tapped two fingers onto Virgil's side without a trace of his previous amusement in those pretty brown eyes.

“Yeah, uh, yeah we do,” Virgil said.

“Not a lot of time,” Janus said, still not looking anywhere in their direction. “We were quite busy. Being respectful guests on your ship and nothing else, of course.”

Of course, he said. Of course nothing else, especially not when Janus was fluttering his eyes, making them look large and wet and arguably innocent, because he was an actor long before he was Virgil’s crush and his favorite pastime was seeing what sort of trouble he could get Virgil in.

“Oh-kay,” Patton said, flipping around and hanging with his legs from the rafter, so he was a bit closer to their heights. It didn’t help with how nervous he looked, although Virgil wouldn’t exactly describe any of his mannerisms as nervous if he hadn’t been basically family with the guy: there was something about his aura that was a little to the left, the chittering noise that he usually added to the end of his sentences was diluted, nearly non existent (Virgil assumed it was left over from the Reytin language, like when someone continued to roll their “r’s” in English, but Virgil hadn’t really heard any Reytin at all; Patton didn’t like talking in it.) There was a seriousness to him, to his expression, to how he very obviously wanted Logan in there for this conversation that made Virgil’s own hackles rise with impending panic.

((“Oh kiddo,” Patton said, between cracked and drying lips and taking a step back from him. “What did you do?”))

“There’s not really an easy way to talk about this,” Patton--real, actual, alive-and-not-dying Patton from a dream that meant absolutely nothing to Virgil’s mental state-- said, wringing his three-fingered hands together, kneading his knuckles in a self-soothing motion and Virgil didn’t exactly bite his tongue hard enough to bleed, but the pain forced him to focus. “Uhm, Logie and I were talking and we think that you both might need to, uhm…”

Patton glanced towards Logan for help in his wording and Virgil’s lungs shrivel up and die in his chest because this is it, Virgil’s finally outstayed his welcome, they don’t have the supplies to keep hosting Virgil and Janus, and their means of getting money are exponentially higher when they don’t have to worry about their clients freaking out about there being a Deathworlder, not to mention two of them involved in the action, honestly Virgil should just be happy they dealt with him for this long, he has always been nothing but a murde--

“What Patton means,” Logan cut in, a variety of purple lights trailing down his arms. “Is that we are unsure of how advanced Deathworlder education is about Space.”

“Pardon?” Janus said.

“Rationally speaking, and with no attempted insult here,” Logan said with a tone that usually suggested he was about to be horribly insulting in the way that only Tenekarie can be. “It’s a known fact that Deathworlders aren’t the most tech savvy. Despite theoretically having the resources, the advancements of space travel for your kind is extremely lacking. Coupled with our own experiences in how truly infantile Virgil’s knowledge about the basics of ship navigation and survival on different planets-- both of which are taught before any proper school for my and Patton’s races, and left us rather horrified to acknowledge that you were practically an unfortunately tall toddler--”

“I’m beginning to feel very insulted,” Virgil muttered.

“--It has been brought to our collective attention that the two of you might be completely unaware of Space Time,” Logan finished. The lights around his wrists pulsed a worried tempo of blue yellow and purple. Patton fidgeted at his post, his usual pleasant expression giving way to a more upset one when Virgil and Janus didn’t immediately jump up to reassure them that the words “Space” and “Time” meant something more than what they meant individually.

Janus shifted, uncomfortable in both his skin and in the idea that he might not know everything there is to know in the universe. “What is… Space Time?”

“I attempted to explain this to you, Virgil, but I had the feeling that your Common wasn’t advanced yet for you to grasp the whole meaning,” Logan said. “I will attempt again with small words. Essentially, on the planet TS-001 in the year of Emperor Xiso, there was a Slewcuriz, who discovered that Xiyl based components could be run through a Joznu reduction and then mixed with Lerak, in a one to three Vogin, and Santel in a--”

“I can already tell you that if we had this conversation before I did not understand it,” Virgil said, blandly. “I don’t understand it now.”

“Just the basics,” Janus suggested. “I would love to listen to the full history lesson at a later point, but it seems your Reytin is about to flee into the vents from nerves.”

Patton let out a chittering squeak when both Virgil and Logan glance towards him. “I’m fine! Really! It’s just….” He sighed, drooping. “Reytins explained Space Time as the concept that Distance is unavoidably linked to Time. Because of this, objects in motion feel time at a slower rate than those that are standing still.”

“What?” Janus asked because he only won a Robotics Competition because his parents paid for the trophy to be handed to him, much like all his other science related achievements.

Virgil, who actually won a Robotics Competition, tilted his head and nodded. “No wait, uh I do know about that. It’s a physics thing; uh… specific relativity? No that’s not right… Special Relativity?” He hummed for a moment before noticing that Janus still looked confused. “It’s like… time travel, kinda. How do I explain this to a non-science person….okay imagine you are on a train, alright? I’m outside the train, by the train tracks, perfectly distanced between two trees. Your train is moving at the speed of light, but at the moment that your train passes by me lightning strikes both trees.”

Virgil mimicked the trees being blown up and Logan looked oddly fascinated by the explanation, as if he were listening to a child's attempt at explaining brain surgery.

“Okay?” Janus said warily.

“Okay, so I am outside the tracks. I would observe the trees both going up in flames at the same time. Simultaneously. But you, on your totally-real, not-a-safety-hazard train would be moving at light speed towards one tree and away from the other; as a result you would see lightning striking the tree ahead of you first and the one behind you second, with a noticeable difference in time.”

“W-why would that--?”

“Because time is relative, but the speed of light is always the same,” Virgil said.

“That makes no sense to me,” Janus said. “It’s happening at the same time.”

“For me it would. But you would be moving, and therefore your perception of time is super out of whack.”

Janus crossed his arms. “If this is such a big thing why don’t I observe it when I wave to you from down the street? Or when I’m driving a car?”

“The time dilation has to be at literal light speed. I don’t know about you but people who don’t have a silver spoon up their ass usually don’t have cars that go at light speeds.”

Janus’s expression slipped into something far less amused and he pursed his lips.

“That’s not all there is to it,” Logan cut in before Janus could retort. “But at the very basic level I would assume that is close enough to Space Time. What had Patton and I concerned, is the manner of aging that comes associated with space travel.”

He straightened his spine and stood slightly taller, like a teacher about to give a lecture. His lower two hands folded behind himself and the upper two brightly flashed yellow and purple twice as if intoning Look at me! Pay attention! There might be a Pop Quiz on this Tomorrow!

“As you might have figured, part of traveling the vacuum of space is that our ships maintain a speed parallel to that of light. I believe you called it light speed? As such we are on a constant motion that largely outperforms that of any habitable planet. Because of this, we on this ship will experience time at the same rate, but we will be completely isolated from how anyone outside of this ship experiences time.” Logan gave them both a look. “Objects in motion experience time slower than those at a stand still.”

Janus squinted at him. “I feel like you are trying to tell me something.”

“We experience time much slower than those on any planet.”

Janus turned to Virgil, hands raised in a question. Virgil wondered for a moment if this was how Janus always felt when Virgil was asking him to play translator for their notes in Spanish II back before everything ended. Perhaps he should have been paying Janus for his services as both a tutor and the sole reason Virgil didn’t flunk out of his language courses before his junior year with something more than the promise to hold on to a secret and longing dreams he never told anyone about.

“One more time, Lo,” Virgil asked.

Logan frowned and opened his mouth again, but instead of answering, Patton flipped down from the rafters and landed just a foot away from Virgil.

“Time passing for the people on your planet will stay the same, Virgil,” Patton said. “But you aren’t there anymore. The time that you and Janus have spent in space, planet hopping at light speed, you think it’s been, like two of your Earth kliansannu, right?”

“Years?” Janus echoed in English.

“Three, actually,” Virgil said, very much not liking where this was headed.

“Three?” Janus said.

“For all we know of your Earth, it could have already been sixteen kliansannu,” Logan explained. “Or larger. Twenty eight? Thirty Two?”

Virgil didn’t know where the sudden sick feeling in his chest came from but he became aware suddenly that it had settled in the hollow of his throat, bloated and twisted and gnarled around his vocal chords. Flashes of Earth flicked in his head: of his parents, of the town, of Earth as he knew it. It hadn’t taken more than a year for the community council to agree to tear down the park playground he liked to hang out at night when he was fifteen; in sixteen years what would be left of the place he knew? Who would be left?

“We can’t possibly have been that lucky,” Janus said, bulldozing straight through the tangled web of realization that caught Virgil with his politician’s son voice. He stood his ground, glaring at Logan as if daring him to fight on this. “You truly believe that so much time has passed on Earth? We were already experimenting with deep space travel before I was abducted; they would have definitely branched out far enough to come in contact with a legitimate alien race by now.”

Logan frowned. “Legitimate?”

“We aren’t bringing this up to start a fight about Deathworlders!” Patton interrupted. “Or to freak either of you out! It’s just…I… didn’t get this option. To go back.” He squeezed his hands into fists. “I wanted to make sure you both have it.”

((Virgil has three plants in his room that glow in the dark, plants that Patton once gave him, plants that make Patton teary-eyed and quiet because they came from a planet that no longer existed.))

“TS-517 got blown up,” Patton said. “I was in a bar with Logan and Roman celebrating one of our first jobs together. I had lost track of Space Time; it was my mother’s birthday and she was waiting for me to come home and I was in a bar thinking I still had three more disannu.” Patton took a deep breath, horribly pained and hurting and telling.

“My entire race, my planet, my home disappeared in an instant. If there is anything,” the Reytin stressed, “that you can think of that you wouldn’t be able to live without ever seeing again…then believe me that’s reason enough to go back to Earth.”

“I have everything I need right here,” Janus said resolutely, confidently, proudly. He took their hands and intertwined their fingers like he was making a promise and Virgil’s inner organs should not have been turning to mush at something so small.

“I’m sorry for your loss, Patton,” Janus said. “I’m sorry that you had to go through that, and that you have to carry that with you now. But there is nothing on the Deathworld that is worth going back for, much less worth having you break the interstellar space codes for.”

“Virgil?” Logan said, with a curiously blank tone that made Virgil feel like both of them just failed a test they hadn’t known they were taking. His lower left hand rested on his belt where his interstellar nook was placed, ready for the next time he needed to do a SpaceGoogle search to figure out what laws they were breaking and figure out how to explain it away to possible Space Cops.

Virgil squeezed Janus’s fingers in his own hand.

“I mean,” Virgil said, with a shrug. “I’m sure there’s a version of Roman’s Shishdouble that tastes like a Wendy’s chicken sandwich if I’m in denial enough?”

That at least got a part of a laugh out of Patton, something sad and a little twisted and mourning people that Virgil would never get to know. Logan was still looking at him, though, his expression a flat slate that made him look more rock-like than normal. The visor over his eyes blocked most of the expression on his face, but Virgil still wasn’t sure what he was searching for.

“I don’t want to go back to Earth,” Virgil said. “Neither of us want to go back to Earth.”

Logan waited another moment, lips pressed together, before he nodded. Whatever decision he had come to, it settled his lights as well, letting them flutter once again with the steady pulsing beat and he let his arm drop away from his nook. “Well, of course, it was just a concern from your crewmates. I had a theory that neither of you were particularly inclined to return, nor did I particularly want to say a definitive goodbye at some point to people who are family to me. Thank you for taking the time to assuage our fears.”

“Aw,” Janus said. “He likes us!”

“You are not hard to like,” Logan said good naturedly. “I look forward to our conversations about Deathworlder culture. They are very enlightening.”

And if that wasn’t a concerning thing to hear, Virgil wasn’t sure what was. He knew Janus well enough to know that he could very maliciously be pixie-leading Logan down the worst pieces of humanity.

But Patton was still uncharacteristically quiet, so Virgil let go of Janus’s hand and knelt down to his height, offering a folded fist, palm up in the familiar motion that Roman often gave Patton.

“Thanks for looking out for us, Pat,” Virgil said. “But if you dropped us off on Earth again, I wouldn’t be able to see you again, and that is something I wouldn’t be able to live without.”

Patton’s large bulging eyes blinked, tearing up slightly and he lunged forward into a hug. Virgil wobbled to keep his balance, but accepted the hug gratefully.

Sixteen years, twenty eight, thirty two… what did it really matter to him when he had his family right there? Janus was right. There was no reason to go back, there was no reason to want to go back.

If they magically showed back up on Earth, Virgil would still have to fight the accusation that he murdered someone, Janus would have to face the fact that his own parents buried him. Even if they were dropped in like… Turkey or Libya or Nigeria or something, and all they had were each other and the will to start over, Virgil didn’t think he could look up to the sky and not ache to see the warp core of the Mindscape’s engines, the weird fauna on hundreds of different planets, the way a planet with seven moons or three suns looks from the surface.

Patton squeezed him gently again, and Virgil was careful that he kept his Deathworlder strength in check for the return. Patton stepped back, making another chittering noise that sounded much more like him.

“Well!” He said far brighter and much more like himself. “I’m glad you kiddos have everything figured out! I didn’t have nearly the same focus when I was first starting out on my journey!”

“Deathworlder perks,” Janus said, with a smile even though that was not even remotely true and by the look on Logan’s face he knew that as well and was baffled by his Deathworlder expert blatantly lying.

“So….if that’s all figured out,” Virgil said, innocently, running the edge of a half bitten nail against his other finger. He turned towards Janus again, half of a crooked grin on his face.

"Kenobi?"

And faster than any space storm, than any meteorite crashing into earth, any star exploding, or blackhole imploding, Janus's face twisted into one of rage and he snatched a pillow from the ground and threw it at Virgil.

It was a matter of mere luck that Virgil managed to duck in time; the force of it alone as it tore past Virgil told him that he would have been sporting bruises for at least a solid day. Patton on the other hand yelped and jumped up, clearing easily overwhere the pillow landed at his feet, and clung upside down to the rafters.

"Patton!" Janus snapped. "Be a dear and shove that down his throat will you?"

"HEY, whoa!" Virgil said, backing up. "That's two against one and that's not fair!"

"Were you not the one who called me a bully? Since when do bullies fight fair?"

"Did someone say fair fight?" Roman asked in what is possibly the best timing the Erefren has ever had. He appeared in the doorway from the main hall, hair still wet from the shower he’d been taking, but otherwise looking pleased to see them all. "Who are we fighting?"

"Virgil!"

"Janus!"

Roman grinned in a way that Virgil suspected he picked up solely from hanging around Virgil too much-- curved and pleasant where Erefren customs were mostly teeth barring-- and Virgil knew that he was in trouble. The red spiky tail curled around the pillow and tossed it into his hands and Roman stared down Virgil with all the vengeance of a pissed off stegosaurus.

"For my shishbouble!" He said.

Virgil yelped, scooting out of the way of Roman's attack just to be brained by Janus's. His fingers wrapped around the pillow before Janus could yank it back again and with a sharp tug he freed it from its commander and held it up to block the shot from Patton.

“This is in no way fair!” Virgil cried out. “Logan!”

“Do not involve me in this,” Logan suggested. “I believe this is the figurative “reaping of what you’ve sown”. Janus, did I use that phrase correctly?”

“Perfectly!” Janus said right before he slammed another pillow at Virgil’s face.

“Fucking Disney,” another voice called from the doorway. “You fucks better be actually killing each other with all this fucking noise!”

The battle slowed for a moment, enough that Virgil was able to actually form a single coherent thought in the space between where Janus had aborted his attack and Roman had ditched his plan to swipe Virgil’s feet from under him and put him in a blanket coated, pillow shaped coffin.

Remus stood in the doorway, looking very much like he’d been through every other room in the ship searching for alcohol and been unsuccessful. His hair was a mess in the way that suggested he did not care about it at all, his outfit ruffled from being the only thing he’s been seen wearing since he arrived on this ship (despite Roman having offered him other clothes). The dark circle under his eyes spoke in volumes to the amount of sleep that he’d had recently which Virgil has the sneaking suspicion was equal to the amount that Virgil has had since their “talk” in the Transporter Room.

“Remus is on my team!” Virgil yelled out and he slammed a pillow into Roman’s spluttering surprised face.

“He is?” Roman asked.

“I am?” Remus echoed possibly more confused than he should have been.

But Janus shrugged and took a swing at Remus with his pillow and the next moment was a flurry of pillows flying around the room. Patton swung up to the rafters again and dropped his pillows like bombs from the sky, and Virgil managed to get Roman tangled in a blanket, but it left him open for Janus knocking him on the back of the head. Remus laughed when Virgil hit the ground, dazed and confused and unsure what day of the alien week it was, but the Erefren did at least throw a pillow at Janus’s stomach.

Remus and Janus exchanged blows like a complicated dance until Virgil tossed Roman’s pillow at Janus’s feet to trip him up and he ended up caught directly in Remus’s arms.

“Hostage!” Remus declared, swinging Janus in front of him like a human shield against Patton and Roman. Virgil took the opening as an invitation and skidded behind Remus and his very beautiful meat shield. “You wouldn’t hit your teammate!”

Roman looked righteously scandalized by the suggestion. “You bastard! He’s just a child!”

“Coward!” Janus called. “Also I’m eighteen!”

“Is that not a child for Deathworlders?” Logan asked pleasantly, from his spot on the couch, unbothered by the mess they had created in the warzone around him.

"Technically it's an adult," Virgil said.

"A baby!" Roman said again, distressed in the way that came only from being aware of the type of shit Virgil would get into if left to his own devices in his lab for too long. Virgil suspected that they drew straws every time one of them needed to come remind him that he needed to eat, considering that the last time he’d gotten involved in a project he’d nearly shish-kabobed Logan coming into the room at the wrong moment.

Remus rolled his eyes. "We are barely older than him! Even Happy Pappy Pancake over there is basically the same age in Reytin klainsannu!"

Virgil sat up suddenly turning towards Logan with a dawning realization in his mind. "Wait, wait-- you guys are like barely teenagers?"

"He means teenagers," Janus cut in.

Virgil frowned. "That's what I said."

Janus gave him a look that sends Virgil directly back in time to Spanish II, without passing go or collecting the 200 apologies from various parties that he's owed because Janus is alive and well and still an asshole and Virgil is very much in love with him and still can't pronounce things correctly. Apparently.

Logan pondered the question for another moment. "I suppose…yes I believe that is accurate. For all our species we are considered the hypothetical ages between being a child that needs a guardian to look after them and being a guardian capable of looking after themselves. Although Patton undoubtedly has been alive for more kliansannu than all of us put together."

"And we're just…. roaming around the galaxies?" Virgil said.

Patton laughed with his eyes glowing as if he hadn’t almost been in tears just a little bit ago. He flipped from a rafter to Roman’s back, and the Erefren caught him easily before he impaled himself on the spikes. It never failed to amaze Virgil at how well they knew each other’s movements; Roman didn’t even so much as have to shift his weight at the sudden frog-like creature clinging to him.

"Okay hear me out: We are essentially a bunch of kids on a road trip across the country," Virgil started and Janus groaned so loudly Remus loosened his hold slightly.

“Do not start on that!”

“This is a Coming Of Age story, gross! We swore we were not going to do that--”

“I do not understand the nuance here,” Logan commented, ever curious and his two lower hands reaching for his nook to document this new information. “Is this a Deathworlder cultural rite?”

“Who cares,” Remus cut in boredly. “Are we fighting or not? I have things to do!”

Roman huffed. “What do you have to do? You’re a guest on my ship!”

Remus rolled his eyes. “Not forever, bitch. I’m off when we touch down on TS-625. I’ve got business with some… people in the city.”

((“They-- They trusted me and… I got my entire fucking crew killed brutually and I have to find and inform their families that they won’t be returning. Ever.”))

Virgil didn’t exactly drop like a solid bowling ball had slammed into him obliterating at least three of his internal organs, but it was a near thing. Remus’s expression didn’t betray a single bit of what his business with people in the city might be, or how terrible it was going to be to be alone again. Virgil didn’t doubt that Remus had dipped his hands into the worst things that could be done out in Space, that Remus hadn’t perpetuated half of the terrible things that left most other races terrified of Erefrens, but for all his resources, all his brutal fighting, all his ship maintenance knowledge, Virgil was struck by the sudden feeling that if Remus walked off this ship when they landed alone, none of them would ever see him again.

Oath of Brothers or not, Remus would not call out again if he needed help. Past crewmate or not, Remus would not ask Janus to join him. Hatred for Virgil or not, Remus would not come back to haunt them like a vengeful ghoul.

He’d disappear entirely, without even a goodbye.

Virgil wasn’t sure why that thought suddenly made him feel so incredibly wrong.

“The offer still stands,” Virgil blurted out, and Remus blinked as if he had forgotten Virgil was next to him.

“Offer?” Patton asked, tilting his head and blinking his bug eyes. Virgil wasn’t sure what emotions exactly Patton would be seeing off the two of them, or if Patton could see any with Janus blocking most of Remus’s body. He was sure they would probably be concerning at the very least; Virgil’s could be chalked up to something like badbadbadreallybad and Remus was…. Remus.

The Erefren looked at him, up and down, as if mentally trying to calculate how much money he could get for Virgil’s corpse on the Black Market. “I don’t need your help, Viagra.”

“I didn’t teach him that one!” Janus said, but honestly….Virgil had been called worse before by people he respected far more.

“I know you don’t need it,” Virgil shrugged. “That doesn’t mean it couldn’t help to have help anyway.”

(He pretended like he didn’t see Logan, Roman, and Patton exchange a very obvious, very flabbergasted look between the three of them.)

“Alright,” Remus said, part of his lips curling into a begrudging sharpened grin and his tail swaying dangerously close to where Virgil was hovering, ever a threat. “Your funeral, Deathworlder.”

“I’m so happy for both of you making friends,” Janus said in that tone of voice of his that usually meant he was about to remind the teacher of the homework that they were supposed to do the night before, that only he actually completed. Remus’s face flickered with panic, but he was a second too late reacting to it before Janus drove his heel directly into the Erefren’s shin hard enough to cause him to lose what remained of his grip on his hostage.

Remus cursed in at least three languages and drowned out Patton’s responding chastisement with a particularly loud shout of where Patton could shove his manners. Janus laughed, grabbing a pillow from next to Logan while Roman declared his brother free Pillow Beatdown Real Estate.

Virgil yelped when Janus locked his eyes on him with a vicious gaze. He raised a blanket as a shield to block the pillow, but Janus just tackled him to the ground instead. They twisted around for a minsannu before Virgil found himself pinned right under Janus with no escape.

“I win,” Janus declared and the two of them paused to catch their breath as they watched Remus flatten Roman’s face with his own pillow that was concerningly close to an actual smothering attempt. Logan attempted to break it up, only to have both the Erefrens smack him with their pillows at the same time, hard enough to knock him back onto the couch, dazed. Patton swung down from the rafters and knocked Remus actually onto the ground with a pillow to the stomach, and his string of apologies was lost under the sound of Roman’s laughter.

“So,” Janus said quietly, almost lost under the chaos of all the noise if he wasn’t curled up right on top of Virgil. “You guys didn’t talk about anything important at all?”

“Friendly conversation, between friendly people,” Virgil repeated. “Besides, it’s just TS-625. What’s the worst that could happen?”