Chapter Two

The first thing Thomas noticed upon walking onto the bridge was that Antoine and Khurshed were arguing. No surprises there. What did surprise him was what they were arguing about. Having known them both for years, he’d come to recognize a certain pattern. Whenever a polarizing issue arose, the captain would be the one advocating caution, restraint, and safety, while Antoine would come down on the side of action, exploration, and investigation. The arguments they put forward wouldn’t always reflect their true feelings towards the matter; Khurshed wasn’t a fretful mother hen and Antoine wasn’t a reckless hothead. In trying to win the debate, they pushed one another to extremes that they wouldn’t have contemplated otherwise.

Today, the pattern had been disrupted.

“It’s too dangerous,” Antoine said, his arms folded. “I can’t believe you’re even considering it, Captain.”

“How can you be content to sit there and do nothing?” Khurshed demanded. “We have a responsibility. To ignore it would be indefensible.”

“What flavour of crap’s on the menu today?” Thomas whispered to Zachery, who was watching the two of them with obvious amusement.

The engineer pointed to the nearest console. “We’ve got mail.”

“We’ve what?”

“Is everyone here?” called Khurshed, breaking off his argument with his first officer.

“Where’s Rux?”

“Echo’s got him,” said Irene. Looking Echo’s way, Thomas saw a big green bird of prey perched on his shoulder.

“Good. I have an announcement to make. As you are all aware, for the last four years we have been trying to make contact with any human ships that may also have been teleported into this galaxy by the enemy. We have been unsuccessful. An hour ago, however, we received a message—not from another ship, but from Yusra’s neighbouring planet.”

“Yusra” was the name they’d given their new home. Khurshed and Antoine had bickered about that too, the former insisting that it was presumptuous of them to assign a new name to a planet that had been formerly inhabited. Eventually, he’d accepted Antoine’s argument that the planet’s original name, given to them by Rux, was impossible for human vocal cords to pronounce. The crew had been invited to propose alternatives, and eventually they’d agreed upon the name of the captain’s younger sister.

“Someone’s talking to us?” Thomas said, his eyes wide. “Who is it?”

“We don’t know. The message is short and fragmented. However, Rux says he recognizes the language as belonging to the species that created him—this planet’s original inhabitants.”

“Wait, I thought they were all extinct.”

“You will recall Rux mentioning that a handful tried to escape the plague by departing for another planet. He believes this message has been sent by those survivors.”

“What do they want?” asked Zachery.

“Our help. The message is a distress call. Whoever is currently on that planet is in trouble.”

“Or is pretending to be,” Antoine chimed in. “Perhaps to lure us there so they can steal our ship. Captain, Rux told us that the ship his people took was experimental—‘cobbled together’, he said. They may well have crash landed on the nearest planet and have been living there all this time with no way of getting off it. Who’s to say they won’t try to steal The Prayer if we get too close?”

While the argument booted up again, Rick turned to Thomas, beaming. “We’re not alone. There’s other people out there.”

Thomas knew how he felt. The one disappointment Yusra had given them—and really, they had no right to complain because so far she’d been fucking great in all other respects—was that she only had one sentient inhabitant. From the moment they’d learned that the planet had the ability to sustain life, they’d all secretly hoped that they might find something that resembled civilization, even though they’d known how unlikely it was. It was pretty bleak to believe that they, the twelve men and women who crewed The Prayer, were the only community they were ever going to engage with again.

“We’ve just got here!” Antoine was saying. “We’ve just found a safe harbour. Now you want us to endanger our hard-won safety by launching ourselves into the abyss once more and flying into what may well be a trap? Captain, you’re being unreasonable.”

Rick held up a hand. “Wait, wait. Ant, back when you were researching this system, didn’t you say that planet was an ice ball? How could anyone live there?”

“A very good question.” Antoine pressed some buttons on the nearest console. In the centre of the room, a holographic image of the planet in question appeared. “Here’s what we know. Its structure is similar to that of Europa. Smooth ice covers the entirety of its surface, underneath which lies a liquid ocean. It’s about half the size of Earth. Sparsely cratered, geologically active, extremely thin oxygen atmosphere, maximum surface temperature of minus two hundred and sixty degrees Fahrenheit. On the whole it’s far less welcoming than our new home.”

“That said, given what Rux has told us about his people’s astonishing physical resilience, it’s within the realm of possibility that they’ve managed to survive there for the past two millennia,” said Khurshed.

“So, when do we leave?” said Zachery.

Khurshed had settled into his chair and was staring at his hands. “This is not a decision I will make unilaterally. This isn’t a military vessel. I’m your employer, not your commanding officer. And the fact is that we have one ship. If I took only a handful of volunteers to investigate the signal, whoever was left behind would have to camp out on Yusra for at least three weeks—possibly much longer depending on how much time we spend investigating—without access to the medical pod, any mode of transport besides walking, and the many basic comforts the ship affords us. That is simply too dangerous to countenance. So either all of us go, or none of us. I considered proposing a vote, but I don’t want to engineer a situation in which even one of us is forced to abandon safe harbour unwillingly. If we’re going, we need to all be in agreement. I’m going to give you twenty-four hours to think it over and communicate your decision to me—in private, if you prefer. If any of you are unwilling we won’t go.”

“Antoine’s unwilling, isn’t he?” said Irene.

“He thinks he can persuade me,” said Antoine, snorting derisively.

After that, Antoine dragged Khurshed into his office so they could continue their argument in private. They kept it up for the rest of the day, pausing only once to join the crew for dinner before secluding themselves again. When Khurshed finally staggered into his quarters late that night, he looked dog-tired and barely acknowledged Rick, Thomas, and Zachery perched on his bed engaged in lively conversation.

“This is so cool,” said Rick as Khurshed collapsed beside him, burying his face in the pillow. “All this time, they’ve been up there watching us.”

“Freaks me out,” said Zachery, hogging the blankets as per usual, his hand resting on Thomas’s rear. “That’s like… Tommy, what’s that big word you like?”

“Voyeurism.”

“That’s the one,” said Zachery, giving his left ass cheek a proud squeeze. “But hey, if they’re all as tasty as Rux, I’m down for it.”

“I don’t know,” said Thomas. “I mean…you remember those robots they built, right? Those fuckers were scary. And it wasn’t even a military facility we found them in. What sort of people build shit like that to guard test tubes and empty rooms?”

“Quit being chicken,” said Rick, tickling him.

“No, I’m serious. Maybe this is a risk we shouldn’t take. You know, just because we’ve had a lot of lucky breaks doesn’t mean we’re invulnerable. We start pushing our luck, who knows what’ll happen?”

He hadn’t meant to glance at Rick’s eyepatch but he did, and he knew right away that Rick had noticed.

“Oh, no,” Rick muttered, rolling him over and moving to sit on his chest, the better to glare at him. “Don’t do that. You don’t want to go, fine, whatever. Don’t use me as your excuse.”

“Yeah, grow a pair,” said Zachery. “Why do you get to be the overprotective one, anyway? I’m the guy who blew Rick up. You don’t see me being a bitch about it. Now, in more interesting news… Did I see someone taking a second helping of dessert this evening, Meléndez? Or should I say being given a second helping of dessert by Echo?”

“Oooh,” said Rick. “Now that’s interesting. Because Echo’s usually kind of stingy with dessert.”

Zachery nodded. “The only other person I’ve ever seen him give a second helping to is the captain. I guess our boy here’s found his way into Echo’s creepy little heart.”

“Halberstam, you call him creepy again and I’ll spend the rest of my life treating your dick as though it’s covered in anthrax,” Thomas growled, elbowing him hard in the side.

“Sorry, shrimp. I didn’t mean it. Your thing with Echo— I’ll admit, it’s kind of cute.” Zachery kissed his elbow contritely.

“Say, you know what I noticed at dinner?” Rick interjected. “Zach spent a lot of time staring at Antoine.”

“Holy shit, really?” said Thomas, staring at Zachery. “That is actually a bigger shock than the aliens. Antoine? Damn, you be careful, Zach. Antoine probably likes it preying-mantis style; as soon as you come, he bites off your head.”

“I’m not fucking Antoine, and I’m not going to be fucking Antoine,” Zachery told them both curtly. “I was looking; that’s all.”

“If you don’t all stop talking, I’m going to have you neutered,” growled the captain, who had been trying to sleep.

The three of them exchanged looks before pouncing on him.

“Aww, the captain’s jealous,” Zachery said, dragging Khurshed’s inert body up to lie against his chest.

Thomas took hold of his cock while Rick cupped his balls, adding, “Yeah, he thinks he’s not our favourite anymore.”

“Right, come here,” Khurshed snarled, seizing the nearest of them—Thomas—and kissing him hard.

Of all of them, Khurshed had the most stamina. When Rick and Zachery were lying prone, drained and barely conscious, he was still able to push Thomas onto his back and ride his cock so hard Thomas saw stars.

“Beautiful man,” Khurshed rumbled. He was always sappy when he was tired. His hand found Thomas’s, and he laced their fingers together.

“Love you too,” Thomas said, closing his eyes.