(I'll Be) The Only Thing Between You and the Stars at Night 5/9

[moku_youbi]

Ξ

Ryan wasn’t an idiot. He knew what Jon was doing, and it was presumptuous and potentially offensive, and oddly, it didn’t bother him as much as it might have a week ago. He knew Jon meant well by it, but liking Brendon was one thing; it didn’t mean he had to like other members of the Federation. Especially not Dax.

He’d never liked Dax. Of course, he didn’t know her personally, but she was close friends with Sisko and Quark and Kira, so she was always at the bar and station events and she was loud and crass and forward, so even without knowing her, he knew her.

Still, if he were going to be objective, he would say that his dislike for her stemmed more from her behaviour than her role as a Starfleet officer. In fact, that could be said about his dislike for a lot of Starfleet officers. And while she wasn’t being any less obnoxious than usual, she was being funny about it, and it took some of the edge off his anxiety to listen to her talk about unimportant things.

The crew of the Helena were neat in ways entirely different from the crew of The Academy. For one thing, they weren’t the partiers that Bill’s crew were. It didn’t mean they were any quieter or less chaotic.

Frank was the loudest of them, bouncing all around the place holding simultaneous conversations with Jon, Spencer, Ryan and Dax about themselves while spilling shockingly intimate secrets about his crew. Being Wadi, he was very eager to discuss games unique to Bajorans, Risians and Trill and to engage his guests in some games on the holodeck, but Gerard managed to convince him to wait until after dinner.

Gerard and Mikey looked a lot alike, but they were startlingly different in personality. Gerard was animated and gestured a lot with his hands and smiled so beautifully Ryan thought it was a crime he didn’t just smile all the time. He filled in the places when Frank jumped from one conversation to another, his topics of discussion less intimate but no less interesting, ranging from history to politics to the arts.

Alicia joined in a lot; sometimes she was crude but not in the way Dax could be. Her humour was less threatening, easier to appreciate. Her features were made severe by the facial structure of her species, but being only half-Romulan softened them a little, as did the long fall of silky black hair that framed her face. She was much pleasanter than any Romulan Ryan had ever met.

Mikey was taller than everyone, but he curled up between Gerard and Alicia and seemed small. Mostly he just watched everyone talking with a blank, almost bored expression, though sometimes he’d smile at something his brother or wife said, a tiny quirk of his lips very unlike the dazzling intensity of his brother. Mikey wasn’t really mean or nice, but he was honest. He spoke little, but when he did, it always managed to shock a laugh out of Ryan.

Ray liked music and he liked to talk about it and he and Ryan had a great discussion over dinner. Perhaps the crew was just made of contradictions, because Ray was probably one of the nicest people he’d ever met. He supposed it had to do with his Betazoid upbringing, or something, but it was still disconcerting to hear the eager chatter and weirdly high-pitched laughter coming from a Klingon.

“Klingon and Betazoid…how did that happen?” Spencer asked him while they were awaiting dinner.

Gerard and Ray shared a look and laughed. “Get that question a lot. It isn’t as strange as you think. I know a lot of Klingon/Betazoids couples. Most of them don’t try to have children, because it takes a lot of effort-they aren’t really compatible for mating, you know? But my mother-she’s the Klingon half of me-she was stubborn and insistent, so, twenty doctors later, here I am.”

“Thank goodness your mother was so tenacious,” Gerard said. He threw an arm around Ray’s shoulder and squeezed him quickly.

“But, seriously, and I don’t mean to be offensive, but how did you manage to put this crew together?” Jon asked. “Klingons, Romulans, and…” he looked a Gerard questioningly. Ryan had to admit he was curious, too.

Gerard laughed, perhaps a little self-consciously and swept the hair from his face up and back, exposing sharp brows, and tucked it behind is ear. His sculpted, pointed ears. He was blushing slightly, green blood spreading over pale skin.

“Vulcans?” Spencer sputtered in disbelief. “You and Mikey are Vulcans?”

Alicia and Mikey were cuddling together having their own conversation in low whispers, matching, sickeningly sweet expressions on their faces. Ryan stared at them for a long moment, then at Gerard. Two related species known for their mutual enmity, sharing one sofa like a big lovefest. Not to mention the way Gerard freely gave smiles and laughter and had this amazingly expressive way about him that was entirely contradictory to the nature of his people.

“How is…what?” was all Ryan could manage. Ray and Gerard laughed.

Jon shook his head, looked amazed. “Okay, now I’m even more curious, because I’ve seen a lot of strange crews in my travels, but yours really takes the cake.”

“Me and Mikey grew up on Betazed. Our mother is the Vulcan ambassador to the Betazoids. That’s where we met Ray. We all grew up together, but when I reached adulthood, my parents feared I was becoming too emotional, and I was sent back to Vulcan to meditate.

“I stuck it out for a couple years, but I missed Mikey, and anyway, I was never meant to be all cool and logical and stoic.” Gerard made a face that said just what he thought of that. “So, after I got into yet another fight with my instructors, I stole a ship and decided that my limited experience piloting ships in simulations was enough to get me back to Betazed.”

Bob chuckled a little from the stove, which made Ryan jump, because the guy had barely spoken and Ryan hadn’t even realised he was paying attention to them. “Yeah, fuck off,” Gerard said amicably to Bob. “Anyway, I ran into a little trouble with the navigation system, and then, when I accidentally crossed into the Romulan Star Empire, well, I learned that piloting while simultaneously firing lasers and fortifying the ships shields was…well…”

“A really fucking stupid idea?” Mikey said blandly.

“I didn’t mean to cross into Romulan space,” Gerard insisted. Mikey rolled his eyes. “Anyway, that’s when I met Bob. We shared a holding cell on the Romulan ship. He was in there for treason. He’d helped a Starfleet officer escape and, well, it didn’t look good for either one of us-the Romulans aren’t known for their forgiveness towards traitors or their sympathy towards outsides.”

“So, how’d you get out?” Ryan asked, hanging on every word.

Mikey flashed them an enigmatic grin. “Pete,” was all he said.

“Mikey and Ray, completely oblivious to my suffering on Vulcan, had taken a holiday to Risa that ended up lasting, like, six months, and during that time, they met Pete and his crew.”

“Yeah,” Ray interrupted, “guy was crazy, right, but he was really entertaining. Anyway, everything was cool, and then one day Pete just walks up to us at the pool says, ‘We gotta go. Gerard needs us.’ And I was like, “Did you get a wave from him or something?’ and Pete said no, and I looked at Mikey and Mikey was all up Pete’s ass at that point,” Mikey flashed a rude gesture in Ray’s general direction, not turning away from where his face was pressed into Alicia’s throat.

“So we went with them, right, and their ship, it was insane. Like, you know what, I can’t even describe it and do it justice, you’ll just have to see yourself. But we travelled with them to the Romulan border and sure enough, Gerard needed our help,” Ray said.

“How did he know?” Spencer asked. He sounded suspicious. Ryan was glad for it. He was generally suspicious of everyone without good reason, because he sucked at being able to tell about another person’s character and default suspicion was the best way to go to avoid getting screwed over (some part of his brain piped and said ‘yeah, like how you were totally unsuspicious about Brendon, and he turned out to be Starfleet for prophet’s sake).

But Spencer was really, really good at reading people, and apparently Brendon going missing had something to do with this Pete person and Spencer was on it. It made all the anxiety swirling in Ryan’s stomach sit down and shut up for a minute.

“Pete’s…” Ray said and looked at Gerard, at a loss, apparently, for how to explain it. Gerard did his hand-wavy thing of his and Mikey shrugged.

“Pete’s awesome,” Frank exclaimed. “You’ll see, you’ll meet him.”

“So, Pete busted us out,” Gerard said. “And when we crossed back into Vulcan space we received a wave from my mother ordering me and Mikey to Vulcan. We didn’t know what we wanted to do, but that sure as hell wasn’t it. So Pete let us all stay with them for a while.

“We were on the ship when Wolf 359 happened.” Ryan always felt a tingle of horror down his spine when anyone mentioned Wolf 359. He had no love for the Federation, that was for sure, but the Borg were probably the most terrifying thing in the galaxy. Besides, no matter how much he disliked the Federation, he couldn’t wish that level of death and destruction on anyone.

“Eleven thousand people gone in minutes, like that,” Gerard said, and snapped his fingers. “It was bad. Ray felt it, you know? And I…I sorta gave into some of the darker impulses of my people. When we heard about the Klingon civil war and the attack on Gowron’s ship, Ray wanted to go and help.

“So Pete gave us a ship.” Gerard laughed a little, like he was still amazed by how simple it had been. Ryan had to admit, if Pete was anything like what they made him out to be, he was probably a pretty awesome guy. “He just gave it to us and didn’t ask for anything in return. He said it was like forming an armada.

“Bob decided to come with us, because he couldn’t go back to his own people and besides, we all wanted the same thing. We had to help somehow. So we fought in the Klingon civil war, and then we fought in a few skirmishes on the outer worlds, which is where we met Alicia and then we heard about the Battle of New Bajor and we knew, then, that we had to help the Federation against the Dominion.

“You work for the Federation?” Ryan asked, dubious. True, he didn’t know a whole lot about them, but just from what he’d seen they didn’t seem like the sort who really meshed well with the Federation. Especially since the skirmishes on the outer world had probably been considered acts of terrorism by Starfleet.

“Not for, so much as…in concurrence with,” Ray temporised.

“I mean, we all want the same thing,” Gerard said. “No more massacres, period, like the one of New Bajor. Pete took us to the Gamma Quadrant; we saw the effect the Dominion had on the planets there, the civilisations that had been destroyed.”

“And that’s where they found me,” Frank said happily. “And I got to be captain because I totally owned Gerard’s ass at a game of Chula.”

“Yeah, you totally cheated at a game of Chula, you mean,” Gerard muttered. “So, we’ve been in the Gamma Quadrant pretty much ever since, collecting information on the Dominion and transmitting it to DS9.”

“It helps that we’ve got a Changeling and a Vorta on our side,” Bob said mildly. He came over balancing several dishes on his arms and the rest of the crew hurried to help him lay out the plates on the table. He’d mixed cuisines from several of the planets represented by the crew and even made a Bajoran dish in honour of his guests.

“You’ve got a Changeling on your side?” Spencer asked. He arched a brow. “Are you sure?”

Ryan knew Spencer trusted Odo with his life, but the fact that he was a Changeling made a lot of people uneasy now that the Dominion had begun their cold war with the Federation. The Changelings were sending the Vorta and the Jem’Hadar on more daring attacks and raids as of late.

“Pretty sure,” Gerard said drolly. None of the crew volunteered any more information on that subject, though. Frank started bragging about the game of Chula he’d won against Gerard, which was a funny story and had the added benefit of making Gerard sputter indignantly and make all sorts of protestations.

Ryan enjoyed himself, he did, enough that he even willingly engaged in conversation with Dax. But every few minutes he was taken over again with a wave of anxiety when he thought about Brendon, and how much Brendon would like Gerard’s artwork and how much Brendon would enjoy playing games with Frank.

Frank did distract them for a long while with his games. He wanted to play Chula but none of his crew were very eager about it and without them there weren’t enough players. “When we get Brendon back, we’ll play,” Jon said in a very matter-of-fact way, like it wasn’t even a question they’d get Brendon back.

Instead, they ended up playing several strategy games. Jon and Ryan, it turned out, sucked at strategy and began just randomly making moves to screw with everyone else. Spencer and Dax were actually really good at it. Good enough that Frank was even impressed by them.

Eventually most of the rest of the crew began to head off to bed and as the hour grew late, Gerard kept suggesting that Frank call it a night and Frank kept ignoring him until Gerard whispered something in his ear that made Frank colour red and bid them a quick goodnight, and the two hurried off together.

Mikey took them on a tour and all the ship had the same eclectic feel as the mess. Gerard’s paintings decorated the walls, along with pictures of the crew on dozens of planets, engaging in various activities. Ryan hadn’t ever had a place he thought of as his own, but if he someday had a home, he wished it would feel like the Helena did-warm and inviting.

Mikey explained that there were only two free rooms and while Dax offered to share hers with one of the men, they all decided that they could find a way to share the other room. It was small, but cosy and the sight of the bed made Ryan smile. It might fit two comfortably, but for the three of them to manage they would have to lie close and tight together. It was only too bad that there wasn’t a fourth to share the space with them.

“You can replicate pjs and like, extra pillows and shit,” Mikey said with a wave of his hand toward the replicator. It was the most he’d said all at once the entire night.

“How long will it take, do you think, to catch up with them?” Ryan asked.

Mikey shrugged. “It’s hard to say.”

“But, I mean, the Cobra just left the station last night. They can’t be too far ahead, can they?” Ryan felt woefully uneducated about all things having to do with space travel. He didn’t know about tracking ships or how fast warp speed was, or what any of it meant.

“Well, yeah, but we’re tracking The Academy,” Mikey said, like that made any difference. “And Gabe can be kinda unpredictable.”

They replicated the most basic sleepwear in the computer, lightweight drawstring pants and tight tank tops. The computer seemed to have a personality all of its own, making soft blue ones for Spencer, green ones for Ryan and yellow for Jon, even though they hadn’t requested colours.

They took turns changing and getting ready for bed in the small refresher room off the main quarters. When Ryan came out, the other two were sitting on the bed and he joined them, knees knocking against theirs as he settled into place. It really was a bed too small for three people.

Spencer was tense. Ryan could see it in his face, feel it in the set of Spencer’s body next to his. Ryan was glad to know he wasn’t the only one, but Jon seemed as mellow as ever.

“I can’t stop thinking about it. Bill and Sisky kept saying how dangerous the Cobra was,” Spencer muttered. “But these guys say Gabe isn’t. And apparently they both know Pete? I mean, Gerard and Frank and Ray all seem like really nice people, but what if…what if they’re working with Gabe, or something?”

“What other choice do we have, Spence?” Ryan asked. It wasn’t like he didn’t have the same concerns running through his head, over and over again on repeat. “Maybe they are working with him, but even if they are, no one else had any clue as to where Brendon was, and right now we just have to get him back. We can worry about them turning on us if and when it happens.”

“Hey,” Jon said. He laid a hand on each of their knees. “It’s gonna be alright.” His touch was warm through the thin fabric of Ryan’s pyjama pants. It made Ryan’s heart race faster. But then his heart rate seemed to triple when Jon leaned closer and didn’t stop leaning, tilted his head.

Ryan closed his eyes right before Jon’s lips met his own. He heard the sharp intake of breath from Spencer and fumbled blindly to touch Spencer, too. The kiss was light and fleeting. Jon pulled away before Ryan had a chance to really appreciate how it felt. But Jon didn’t move very far, just turned his head a little and leaned into Spencer, pressing a kiss to his slightly parted lips.

A day ago, Ryan might have been jealous to watch Spencer and Jon kiss, but now it just made something go hot and thrill high in his chest to see it. Without thinking, he leaned into them both, kissing the place where their lips met. Spencer turned his head and caught his mouth more fully and Jon sat back…but now that Ryan was kissing Spencer, he didn’t want to stop.

“This is okay,” he murmured into Spencer’s mouth, and he wasn’t sure if it was a question or reassurance, but Spencer nodded and said, breathlessly, “so okay, so okay.”

He’d never let himself think about doing it, because it was Spencer and he couldn’t mess that up. But Spencer’s lips were soft and he made a surprised sound in his throat when Ryan deepened the kiss and their hands met, clinging. Jon nuzzled at Ryan’s throat, sending tingles of excitement all along Ryan’s scalp.

The feeling of wrongness caught up with Ryan after a few seconds and he tried to push it aside but it took him with so much force he thought he might get sick. All he could think was that Brendon should be here, too. He jerked away, but Jon was smiling softly at them.

“Just so you know, I’m going to do that,” Jon said. “To both of you. A lot. And when we get Brendon back, I’m going to do it to him, too.”

Spencer licked his lips and after a second, he nodded. He was breathing fast and despite the fact that this complicated things so much, Ryan was really turned on by the sound of it. He was hyperaware of Spencer’s hand in his, the way Spencer kept swiping his thumb over the sensitive skin between Ryan’s index finger and thumb and the weight of Jon’s hand on his knee and Jon being so close that his breath stirred Ryan’s hair when he exhaled.

“O-okay,” Ryan agreed shakily and it earned him a quick smile and another, slower kiss from Jon that made everything around him go quiet and made him feel calmer.

“Hey,” Jon said, “no worries.”

Jon didn’t try to take it any further, which made Ryan extremely grateful. Kissing without Brendon already made him feel like they were cheating on him. Anything else would have been too much. All the same, it was really difficult trying to sleep, lying in bed pressed between Spencer and Jon.

Spencer curled up to Ryan’s back with an arm around his waist, holding him close and Jon lay on his facing Ryan. He kissed Ryan again, sweet and sincere, just like Jon himself, and Spencer’s lips were warm when they brushed the back of Ryan’s neck, and maybe falling asleep like this wouldn’t be so difficult, after all.

O

The second full day on the Cobra three things happened. Gabe caught
Brendon went on the bridge when he heard that they were closing in on The Academy, hoping against hope that maybe William would somehow outrun the Cobra, or that he’d beat them and rescue Brendon, or something. But after staring at the empty space before them for a long time, Gabe suddenly gave out coordinates and Victoria fired and as easy as that, the invisibility cloak of The Academy failed.

The Academy was really small compared to the Cobra; they didn’t even put up a fight. Alex got it in a tractor beam and towed it along. Victoria and Nate went to board the ship. There wasn’t a brig or any holding cells on the Cobra, so the crew of The Academy were bound and were being held in one of the storage spaces on the fourth deck. Their ship was put in the larger of the hangers. Gabe had been rather magnanimous, telling Brendon he could visit the crew if he wished.

Tony wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Carden and Chiz were handcuffed together around a support beam and the Butcher and Sisky around another, but William was just cuffed at his wrists, not bound to anything. It took Brendon a second to recognise him, because his hair was short and dark brown and he had ridges over the bridge of his nose like a Bajoran. He was leaning against the wall, knees drawn up to his chest, head tossed back, and he looked remarkably unconcerned with being held captive.

Brendon had a lot of questions, but at the moment, all that came out was, “I thought you were Catullan.”

William raised his head and opened his eyes. “I was. But I thought it was time for a change. And little Ryan just looked so adorable, I thought I’d give the Bajoran look a spin. Why? Isn’t it flattering?” He crossed his eyes in an attempt to look at his own nose. He sighed and before Brendon’s eyes his hair grew out long again, falling over his shoulders in ripples. The ridges on his nose smoothed out.

“You’re a Changeling?” Brendon asked, mixed awe, confusion and apprehension.

“Uh. Duh,” William said, making a face.

“But, but,” Brendon looked around at the rest of the crew, but none of them seemed fazed by this knowledge. Of course, they wouldn’t be, if William was going around changing his look on a weekly basis. Come to think of it, had Jon known? “But, can’t you just, you know…” Brendon held up his hands together at the wrists like they were bound together and then pulled them apart again. “Just, like, turn your hands all liquid and pull them out of the cuffs?”

William looked at him disdainfully. “Uh, that would be cheating,” he said, as if it was the most obvious thing ever.

“Gabe’s Vorta,” Brendon said. “How did he, I mean, okay.” Brendon had to take a deep breath because there were too many thoughts running around in his head and he couldn’t keep them all straight. “Okay. What are you doing out here, on a ship? Are you with the Dominion?”

“Ew, no,” William said. He sighed again, then began speaking as if reciting something he’d said a thousand times before. “I am one of the One Hundred. I was sent out by the Changelings into the far reaches of the Delta Quadrant in order to gather information on the species there. Only, yeah, I guess it didn’t work out how they planned, ‘cause I’m not a big fan of this ‘ole universe conquest thing. Where’s the fun in that?”

“But, then, if you’re not with the other Changelings, is that why Gabe’s after you? I mean, I thought the Vorta were bred to be faithful servants of the Changelings,” Brendon persisted. “Did the Dominion send him after you because you didn’t come back to them?”

“The Dominion don’t know I’m not with them,” William said. “And Gabe isn’t an original Vorta. He was cloned when his predecessor was dying. And he didn’t turn out quite how my people planned. He didn’t swear fealty to them. They were going to have him put down, but Pete got to him, first.”

Brendon was really curious, but before he could ask more questions, the hiss of the doors sounded behind him. Ryland came into the room. William’s eyes narrowed when he saw him. “Ryland,” he said, like greeting an old, familiar foe.

Ryland grinned, all sharp edges. “Bill,” he said. They had this weird stare down for a really long time and Brendon saw the Butcher and Sisky share an exasperated look and roll their eyes.

“Please excuse us, Brendon, I have a few questions for our visitors.” Ryland’s tone was dismissive so Brendon went. He could always come back later. If there was a later. He had no idea what Gabe planned to do with The Academy, now that he’d caught them. But Brendon was already formulating plans of his own. If he could spring them from captivity, it could be his ticket off the Cobra. He just had to be smart about it.

Brendon planned on going back to his quarters and seeing if he could find some information in the ships computers about how to get The Academy out of the hanger without alerting the crew of the Cobra. Only, when he opened the door to his borrowed rooms, he ran into Pete.

He knew it was Pete when he saw him. For one thing, it was someone he’d never seen before-neither a member of the Cobra nor The Academy. For another, he was wearing a Starfleet uniform, only with a few modifications. It was tighter than usual, cut to be more flattering than most. The strip of colour signifying his speciality was bright blue and there were pink and yellow bat shapes with black hearts in their centres. A matching hood was sewn into the back neck of the uniform, which Pete had pulled up over his spiky dark hair.

“Um,” Brendon said.

Pete grinned. He didn’t look like an admiral. Well, he had the pips of an admiral on his collar, but he was tiny, and he didn’t look like he was much older than Brendon, and his general appearance didn’t, like, command awe or respect or anything.

“How’d you get here?” Brendon asked. “Were you on The Academy? There aren’t even any other ships around, or anything.”

“Are you sure?” Pete asked, smiling enigmatically. He shrugged and looked over his shoulder. Brendon followed his gaze and sure enough, outside the window there was a ship.

Only, it wasn’t like any starship he’d ever seen before. In fact, it looked rather more like a sea ship. A pirate ship, complete with billowing sails sporting the same symbol on Pete’s uniform. The whole thing was encased in a giant glass bottle. It was probably the strangest thing Brendon had ever seen. Also, it totally hadn’t been there ten seconds before.

Brendon looked at Pete suspiciously, but Pete had the innocent puppy dog look down. “That’s.” He pointed out the window, choosing his words carefully. “That’s not possible.”

“Anything is possible,” Pete corrected. “You’ve just let the Federation limit your view.”

“You’re the one wearing our uniform,” Brendon threw back. “Sort of.”

“It’s tradition,” Pete said. He didn’t offer any more of an explanation and Brendon wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of asking for more details. He just stared at him. Pete sighed after a minute and waved his hands. “You’re no fun.”

“What do you want with me?” Brendon asked.

“All in good time,” Pete said and had the audacity to pat Brendon on the head.

“Pete, stop annoying the kid,” said another man, who came in from the adjoining bedroom. He was even shorter than Pete, which did great things for Brendon’s ego, because he was used to being shorter than everyone else. Especially with all the giants on the Cobra and The Academy.

Pete made a pouty face, which apparently had no affect on the other guy. “Hey, look, kid,” the guy said to Brendon. He looked exasperated and fond at the same time, watching Pete out of the corner of his eye. “No one’s going to do anything to you.”

“But,” Pete began and fell silent at the look the guy gave him.

“We just came by for this,” he continued, and waved a book in Brendon’s general direction. “We’ll get out of your hair now. Right, Pete?” Another pointed look. Pete nodded reluctantly, looking every bit like a little kid who’d just had all his favourite toys taken away and been told he was grounded.

“See you at the luau,” Pete said as a goodbye to Brendon, before the door closed.

“Luau?” Brendon echoed, suddenly by himself.

It didn’t last long. Gabe popped up next. “Just gotta,” he said, and disappeared into the bedroom. There were some strange rustling sounds and a suspicious thumping sound, then Gabe appeared again, arms full of some weird gauzy, see-through fabric. “Yo, get ready for the luau, bro,” he said, and then disappeared out of the room again.

Brendon had to wonder what the XO would have thought of all these people coming and going through his quarters, taking his stuff.

Nate was, predictably, in the engine room, though he was dressed in a Hawaiian print button down and khaki shorts. Brendon liked Nate because he was pretty mellow, and also, Brendon was 90% sure that Nate didn’t even realise there was a new person on the ship, and even if he did, he didn’t realise that Gabe had kidnapped Brendon. Nate seemed sort of oblivious of everything that didn’t involve his warp core. Filled with Ramen. What the hell?

“There’s a luau?” Brendon asked.

“What?” Nate asked, looking up from his console. Brendon wondered if Nate even knew his name. “Oh, yeah. In celebration of getting back Bill, or something.” He made a vague gesture and turned back to his computer.

“So, uh, Gabe said get ready?”

“Just replicate something, man,” Nate said. He looked at Brendon over his shoulder. “You’re from Earth, right? I mean, you know what a luau is?” Brendon nodded. “Good. I gotta go check on dinner.”

Brendon headed back towards his borrowed quarters, pondering what to wear, when Nate’s word’s finally registered. Getting back Bill. What was that supposed to mean? Had they caught William before? Or had William done something to Gabe first to earn his wrath? Brendon had known William first and Gabe had kidnapped him, so he’d just assumed that Gabe was the bad guy in the picture, but what if William had done something awful?

He took a slight detour back to the storage space/holding cell, but when he arrived, it was empty. Maybe they were already being taken to the luau. Brendon wasn’t an expert on how these things worked, but he thought it was a little strange that the captives might be invited to a party…Of course, he had been, twice now, so he should have known better than to expect Gabe to do anything normally.

Out of curiosity, Brendon went through the closet, but there wasn’t anything really luau-y. Mostly there were a lot of blazers, fancy button down shirts, random t-shirts and jeans in every wash imaginable, as well as an impressive collection of scarves and bandanas that would make Ryan jealous. Thinking of Ryan made Brendon’s chest feel tight, so he pushed those thoughts aside.

Eventually he just replicated a pair of Hawaiian print swimming trunks and borrowed one of the less fancy, short-sleeved white button downs from the closet and a pair of sandals that fit.

Ryland greeted him when he entered the holodeck, hanging a sweet-smelling lei around his neck and making a show of pretentiously kissing him on the cheek. Brendon rolled his eyes, pushing him away. The rest of the crew was dressed like Brendon and Nate, except Victoria who looked lovely with her hair pinned back, a flower tucked behind her ear and who was wearing a brightly coloured wrap tied around one shoulder leaving a lot of bare skin and offering a glimpse of bare thigh when she moved.

The holodeck was programmed like a beach just after sunset, a strip of orange still hovering on the horizon. The night was purple and full of stars. Lights were strung through the high branches of the palm trees and the noise of the waves against the shore provided a counterpoint for the tropically themed music that was coming from seemingly nowhere.

“Hi again,” said the guy from earlier, who’d dragged Pete away. He wasn’t really into the theme of the thing in jeans, tennis shoes and a brown t-shirt, but his hat, pulled low on his head, had a hibiscus bloom on it. “I’m Patrick, by the way. This is Andy,” a shirtless Trill whose spots were lost amid the colourful tattoos covering his arms and torso, “and Joe,” who at first glance seemed nondescript, but then Brendon noticed his black eyes, marking him as Betazoid.

“And the guy over there dancing with Pete and Gabe,” Patrick pointed and Brendon followed his finger, though the three of them were impossible to miss-Gabe, tall and sinuous, Pete tiny and full of energy, and the third, as tall as Gabe, with dark skin and a wild head of curls, the three of them writhing together in a really dirty sort of way and if Gabe’s pants got any lower, it was going to go from vaguely indecent to oh my god Gabe!dick. Brendon wasn’t entirely sure he’d mind that. “That’s Travis,” Patrick said. “Sashi, Matt and Eric are around here somewhere.”

It turned out they were the crew of Infinity on High, the flagship of Pete’s armada and they were really cool. Brendon was still nervous about this whole ‘being kidnapped for Pete’ thing, but Patrick assured him it was alright, and Patrick seemed like a pretty decent kind of guy, so Brendon tried to relax.

Shortly after Brendon arrived, so did another flood of people. Brendon was having trouble keeping everyone straight because there were, like, three different guys named Alex, but it was easy to remember the name Cash, and the girl with the long blonde hair was Greta and the insanely hot guy from her crew was Darren, and he was pretty sure one of the other girls was Krystal and Kristina or something, but everyone else was a blur.

They were the crews of The Hush and the Cab, and they were, despite having too many names, really amazingly fun and awesome. Almost all of them were Humans from Earth, and Brendon spent over an hour talking about fashion with Greta, one of the Alexes, and Pete, and it was incredible.

Then Cash, another Alex and Darren explained how their crews didn’t really have so much of a hierarchy (no matter how many times Greta declared herself captain of The Hush, and no, no one paid so much attention when the Alex also known as Singer put on a sea captain’s hat and said he was the boss of everyone), and that everyone pretty much did whatever, and somehow it worked. Brendon wasn’t sure how it worked, but he thought it was a neat idea. Though, apparently no one on The Hush actually knew how a warp core functioned, which meant more often than not someone from one of the other ships in the armada had to come help them out.

Other than the tropical theme, this party wasn’t much different from the one the night before. There were a lot more mixed drinks flavoured like bananas and pineapples and oranges and stuff, but Brendon wasn’t complaining. Dancing was more fun with real people than with holograms, so the added presence of the three new crews made things fun.

By the time Nate said dinner was almost ready, Brendon was feeling fuzzy from the amount of drinks he’d had, and that was when Gabe got up on the little makeshift podium/gazebo thing where Travis had set up a DJ booth. “Bring in the prisoners,” he bellowed.

The Academy was brought in. William was still handcuffed, head held high and proud, walking toward Gabe without being led. Tony was right behind him, not bound at all, but the rest of the crew had been tied together with a length of twine, like a chain gang. They didn’t look worried about their fate. In fact, they were mostly (awkwardly because of being tied together) waving at faces in the crowd or slapping hands in greeting as they followed their captain.

Short of painting William green, everything had been done to make him appear like an Orion slave girl. And, okay, so Brendon had appreciated how ridiculously skinny William was, and how long his legs were, only he really hadn’t until he saw him like this. Gabe’s sudden expedition into his XO’s quarters became apparent, the same gauzy, sparkly, semi-transparent scraps of fabric draped strategically over William’s frame.

The gauze was twisted into a thick band around his neck, a long expanse left by which one could lead him. It went over one shoulder, then down his waist and around his back, doing little more than decorating his skin. The hollow of his stomach and the fine arch of his ribs were bare to see. His back was even nicer, his spine a sensuous curve, all skin flawless. The wrap continued around his hips low enough to make Brendon worry for William’s modesty, and it was only opaque ‘til mid thigh from where the gauze falls in jagged layers to the ground, showing lots of long, smooth leg.

William and Tony stepped onto the gazebo with Gabe but the rest of the crew remained below, watching. Gabe went up to Tony, leaning into his space. “Do you concede that we caught you fair and square?” Gabe asked.

“Ah shit, there wasn’t nuthin’ fair about it,” the Butcher exclaimed.

“For real,” Sisky added. “You two,” he said, jabbing his finger at William then at Gabe, “were doing your weird slave/master mind thing.”

Travis wiggled his eyebrows at William, who looked like he was trying not to laugh and hid his face in his shoulder. There were lots of snickers from the crowd. Gabe regarded Sisky and the Butcher like they were something small and insignificant. “Tony?” he asked.

Tony shrugged. “Whatever. All his whining was starting to get on our nerves anyway,” he said.

Brendon didn’t know what that meant and he was really at a loss for what the hell was going on, but at Tony’s words Gabe smiled and William made this impressively high-pitched squealing noise. He sort of threw himself at Gabe, bound wrists going around Gabe’s neck, and kissed him. A lot. Very passionately, with lots of visible tongue and grinding, and Gabe’s hands down the back of William’s wrap thing and…

“What the fuck?” Brendon asked.

“Well, I still think it’s cheating,” Cash complained. “Using his weird ‘you only see what I want you to see thing’ to get Brendon and using his weird Vorta/Changeling connection to get The Academy.”

“Whatever,” Pete said, and rolled his eyes. “Tell me you wouldn’t do the same thing if you didn’t have his advantage.”

“Besides,” Andy said, “the Helena has managed to do pretty well and they didn’t use any tricks.”

“Whatever,” Cash parroted Pete pissily, “you just have some big gay man-crush on Ray.” Andy looked serenely, supremely unbothered by everything Cash said.

Still, no one answered Brendon’s question. He turned to his other side and asked plaintively of Victoria and Alex, “Seriously, what the fuck?”

“Pete always likes to put at least one one of a kind items on the list, you know, he says it makes for healthy competition,” Victoria explained. “And this time, that one of a kind item was The Academy. So if they had gotten to base uncaptured, they would have gotten to claim themselves.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Brendon said, and threw up a hand. Victoria regarded it, amused. “You’re telling me that The Academy was part of this game, too?”

“Well, yeah,” Victoria said.

“Then why are they all tied up?” Brendon asked.

Alex rolled his eyes. “Gabe is big on ceremony.” Even as they spoke Ryland was untying the crew, though William seemed utterly unconcerned with his cuffs. Gabe had him pinned up against one of the pillars of the gazebo, and apparently, for the two of them, frottage was something you did on a big stage in front of all your friends.

“I still don’t understand,” Brendon complained.

“Okay, thirty second version. Pete picked up Gabe on a planet in the Gamma quadrant, and then he picked up William in the Delta quadrant. The two of them, with Travis, Disashi, Matt and Eric took the Cobra. They picked up me, the Butcher, Tony, Vicky, Ryland and Nate. Then Sashi, Matt, Eric and Travis went back to the Infinity, and we kept going until we met Sisky, Carden and Chiz. Then Pete gave William The Academy and we separated into two crews. Only William and Gabe don’t so much like being apart for a long time, so most of the time we just travel together. Or, when Pete issues challenges, Tony will work as acting captain for The Academy and William keeps his place here as our XO.”

“William is your missing XO? It’s William’s room I’m sleeping in?” Brendon asked.

Victoria patted his chest reassuringly. “He won’t mind. He’s not going to be sleeping there any time soon.” They all glanced over to William and Gabe, only they were untangling themselves, finally, and Gabe led William through the crowd to the door. There were whistles and catcalls following them.

Brendon felt betrayed. The Academy had warned them about the dangers of the Cobra, only, apparently, they were all good friends and that left Brendon entirely without a single person on the ship with which to identify. Not even Travis’ great DJ skills or Pete’s silly faces, or the part where Cash and Joe picked up Greta and used her as a limbo pole cheered Brendon up. Well, maybe a little bit. But only because Greta looked cute sideways and limbo was fun because Brendon was really flexible. But still.

At some point, most everyone began to split off in twos or threes; he’d known about Alex and Victoria, but apparently Nate was also a participant in that particular relationship. He figured he couldn’t be blamed for not noticing that aspect, because Nate spent more time with his warp core than away from it, and then he started wondering if maybe the three of them had sex in the engine room a lot and vowed not to walk in unannounced ever again.

On the beach, Sisky and the Butcher were seriously making time and while they still had on their swim suits, there were hands inside of clothing and awkward movements that made it very clear just what was happening. And did these people have no shame?

Darren and Monika cuddled up with Chris on a big couch, and Kristine, Greta and Bob were putting on quite a show at the opposite end, which made Brendon wonder if maybe the whole crew wasn’t just one big orgy. But perhaps the most surprising he saw was Pete, almost sort of giving Patrick a lap dance, swivelling his hips and lifting his shirt up a little bit at a time to show off tanned, tattooed skin until Patrick finally grabbed him around the waist and hauled him down for a kiss.

It was a little much for Brendon to take, seeing all these couples and…well, whatever you called relationships that involved more than two people. For one thing, it was making him uncomfortably horny and there wasn’t anything he could do about that, because while there seemed to be quite a few unclaimed people in the room, he didn’t want that. Seeing all these people made him want Spencer and Jon and Ryan, even if it was only the hugs Jon gave and the sweet, unassuming touches from Spencer and the hesitant, rare touches from Ryan. Even if it was never anything else.

He had a hard time falling asleep that night. By the time he’d got back to his room he hadn’t even felt drunk anymore. He just sat on the bed, arm braced over the headboard, and stared out at the black beyond the windowpane. He didn’t usually give in to melancholy, but it was hard not to, right now. He just wanted to be home, and failing that, he wanted his friends.

Next Part:
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