Chapter Text
You open your eyes with your throat closed in on a scream, sore and raw. Your hand flies to your face, fingertips skimming over the expanse of your forehead. Nothing.
This isn’t how it ended.
In front of you is the cockpit. The screens display a mild green. The monitor alerts the need for a course correction.
This must be purgatory, you reason wildly. Scanning the room, you expect to see some demon with a pitchfork or a vengeful ghost of the Tulpar crew.
It’s silent bar the lazy beeping of the course correction AI warning of imminent collision.
Oh, God.
Bile soars up your esophagus, choking you. It tastes like raw, infected meat. The floor falls out from beneath you and you’re crashing down to meet it. The cockpit door swings open and Curly’s eyes, ever damning, catch on you.
You snarl at him but no sound comes out, like a frightened dog.
“What—,” his eyes flick upwards to the warning screens, “Jimmy!”
He pushes past you and you glare up at him as he grabs at the yoke, steering away from the collision course. He looks pale and you think you liked it better when he could only cry. You imagine what it would be like to overpower him, take the yoke back. This time do the job right.
Take responsibility.
“-kill us all!”
You stare blankly at him. He’s flushed red and trembling, fingers tight where he’s gripping onto the co-pilot’s seat. You can almost imagine those fingers digging into your shoulders, crescent shaped sparks of pain.
Saint Curly has done it again, you muse. It’s as disgusting as the taste in your mouth and you spit up blood; you lacerated your tongue with your teeth like a cannibalized dog.
Curly gets on your level at the nonresponse. His face has shifted from looking like a Pompeii statue to something earnest and concerned.
You bark out a laugh that has him reeling back with a frown.
Seriously? You nearly crash the goddamn thing and still Curly worries for you?
Curly’s hand on your shoulder is burning hot and it only makes you laugh harder.
“What’s gotten into you?” He asks you, horrified. He should be, oh Lord he should be.
You press your hand to your mouth, the sticky hot blood making your fingers and palm tacky.
“Jesus, are you bleeding? I need to get Anya—”
“Curly.”
He obeys and his body grinds to a sharp halt like a well trained dog and it’s really no surprise the Tulpar crashed the first time. You reach out your bloody hand, grasping the wrist of the hand Curly offers you.
The mere thought of Anya sickens you. You shouldn’t have fucked the bitch in the first place. She was more trouble than the cheap fuck she was worth. And shit, she’s pregnant now. How are you going to get around that? Maybe this is purgatory.
“Christ Jimmy, what were you thinking?” Curly is batting his long blonde eyelashes at you like a concerned high school guidance counselor. You bet his psyche eval is perfect. Yeah, it probably has a giant A+ for the wonderful Captain Curly.
“Like hell you’d understand,” you snipe, aiming to shut him up as fast as possible. The more he talks the more you want to throttle him to death. Your voice comes out more raspy than you expected, as if you were the bright star that burned up in the Tulpar crash.
“Try me,” Curly presses because he’s so certain he can fix everything.
“Oh, please,” you scoff.
You think that the truth is you have tasted people before you ever ate that part of Curly. Even now you’re taking bits and bites from them. You stare at his serious face and remember the feel of the inside of his throat around your fingers. You think you also know what it’s like to taste yourself and choke.
“You know,” you whirl on him because God if he isn’t the perfect victim, “if you had just minded your business we wouldn’t have nearly crashed!”
“Jimmy, come on,” Curly begins, affronted.
“No, no, no.” You push a finger into his chest. Curly’s hands fly up to frame his chest, palms open.
“Hold on, Jimmy,” he protests, nervously negotiating.
You gnash your teeth like a scolded dog, pushing at him. You’re closing in on him as he’s taking submissive steps back. You send a sideways punch to the Cockpit door as you back Curly up to the staircase.
It slams with a solid thud against the wall, sending the metal around you shivering. You clench your fists to the rhythm of the oscillations, teeth set into a grind.
“Captain Curly, Mr. Perfect, right?” Curly’s heel bumps into the bottom step and his face lights up with anxiety.
“Jimmy, stop.” He demands, but when has Jimmy ever listened to anyone? He’s not about to start now, especially in front of the spineless coward who can’t even stand up to the person spitting in his face.
“Make me, Curly.”
The blonde’s expression flickers from uncertainty to disturbed determination and you only have a second to gather your wits as he surges towards you. You dodge his first lunge narrowly, the reverberation from Curly’s fist against empty wall not failing to send a message.
He’s actually going to beat your ass. Holy shit. You scramble back into the cockpit, putting the pilot’s chair between you and Curly. That doesn’t stop him from spinning it violently on its axis, a grim resolve clouding his eyes.
You recoil back from the chair, hands bracing on the console behind you.
“I don’t want to hurt you Jimmy,” Curly breaths, brows furrowed angrily.
“Of course you don’t! I could kill us all and all you’d do is let me!” You cry, hands finding purchase on the yoke. Curly’s eyes flick to your hands then back to your face, fear alight in his eyes.
“You wouldn’t—”
“You didn’t stop me the first time.” You say bleakly, the full ramifications of that hitting you. Surely there are some things even people like Curly can’t take responsibility for.
“The first… time?”
This time you smile, eyes dark.
“Yeah, Captain.”
You swing the yoke violently to the left but there’s nothing there for the Tulpar to hit. It only manages to sweep Curly off of his feet and colliding into the stairway behind him. You’re lifted up by the arc of the ship too but your grip on the yoke grounds you as your feet try to float off of the ground.
An angry red screen flickers across the cockpit and the AI guidance system rights the ship near instantaneously, announcing the dock on the crew’s pay for the failure. The inertia of the pendulum swing left you braced against the pilot’s chair, panting.
You suppose the pay dock doesn’t even matter, not when you’ll all be terminated once the ship docks. And the ship will dock now, because there’s nothing to crash the damn thing into.
“See, Curly? You win, again. You’re the hero who gets to put me into cuffs for the mutiny. I hope you’re happy…”
You trail off, unable to look away from Curly’s collapsed body by the stairway. Your heart sets off into a gallop, thudding hard in your chest. You didn’t. You couldn’t have.
“Curly?”
You get closer on trembling legs. Oh my God. It’s a mess of blood splattering up the stairs and leaking into the cockpit. You feel your stomach rush up your throat again. Not again, you think deliriously.
“Come on man! You’re better than this! You’ve gone through worse, trust me.” You agitatedly cajole, voice breaking.
The smell of hot iron hits you and all of sudden you’re over Daisuke and Swansea’s bringing down the axe and goddamnit if they only let you have the time to fucking think!
Breathing through your mouth you crouch down, the knees of your jumper soaking up the blood (say his name, his blood). His blonde curls are matted with it and you hesitantly bring a hand up to untangle a section of his bangs.
“Why didn’t you stop me?” You hiss, tugging hard at the section of hair your holding. Curly’s head lolls to the side, his eyelids three-fourths of the way closed like those baby dolls with the opening and closing eyelids.
You rattle his head and watch his eyelids do the same: open, close, flashes of glazed over accusatory blue.
“You should have known I was going for the yoke. I guess you don’t know me as well as I thought.”
Rapid footsteps echo down the metal stairway and you look up to see the whole Tulpar crew. Daisuke’s arm is slung over Swansea’s shoulder, a bone bulging grotesquely from his shin, he looks faint and half-way lucid. Swansea, for his part, is mostly unrattled other than a deeper set of frown lines. Anya is on edge, on the other hand, and the minute her eyes land on Curly her affliction of nerves worsens twice over.
“Curly!” She exclaims, rushing down the stairs. She barely spares you a glance, leaving a heavy pit of frustration to build in your chest.
“What happened?” She gasps, hands flinging to Curly’s pulse.
You watch Swansea haul Daisuke to God knows where, fuck if you cared.
“Is he dead?” You ask instead of answering. Anya goes silent for a minute and you almost snap at her to give you the answer already, goddamn, until she speaks again.
“Yes,” she breaths out, “I think he’s comatose.”
A flint of excitement sparks hope inside of your chest. The situation was salvageable. You could fix this.
“I went down for my shift and there’s Captain Curly and h-he was crying.” You stammer out and you only hope your performance is convincing. It shouldn’t be that difficult, considering the fucking idiots believed you the first time.
“What?” Anya’s eyes widen, her mouth dropping open.
“You aren’t saying…”
You nod solemnly.
“I don’t think I understand.” She pleads, her eyes big like a kicked puppy’s.
Oh, believe me, you think mirthlessly, you don’t.
“I think he was trying to crash the ship Anya.” You strain your voice, a distorted mimic of Curly’s cries after the crash of the Tulpar.
“No… he wouldn’t!” Inwardly you roll your eyes. How can someone be so gullible and yet such a pain in the ass at the same time? How can a different situation follow the same script?
“Anya, he must have snapped because of the termination from corporate. He just couldn’t handle it.” You murmur, resting a hand on her shoulder.
Anya shrinks under your touch like a repelled magnet. It was offensive but not your main problem right now. It only takes Anya to believe the lie.
She gently cradles Curly’s head in her hands then looks imploringly at you, tears building in her wet eyes. It’s pathetic but in a funny way. You suppress a manic laugh, covering it up with a mock sob.
“Let’s get him to medical,” Anya susurrates, resting a cool, comforting hand on the one you laid on her shoulder. Behind your hand you smile sharply.
“I still can’t believe it, it’s so unlike him to…” Daisuke drops the sentence, unable to mouth the words.
His leg is propped up with a cushion and he’s sat on the sofa. His face looks waxen, whether from the crash or the broken bone you can’t discern. A shame, you think. It was unfortunate Daisuke was killed the first time, he was the only one the Tulpar you could somewhat tolerate.
“Believe it.” You grunt, arms crossed. In one hand is the captain’s scanner. Swansea follows it with his gaze as you pace your way closer to the couch.
“Since Curly—”
“Captain.” Swansea interrupts.
You nearly gape at the actual audacity but by some act of divine will you manage to shut your jaw with a stubborn click. Swansea’s face betrays no other expression than his usual ‘old cantankerous ass’ bit.
“I’m the acting Captain now, Swansea. He’s not captain anymore.” You say through gritted teeth. Swansea lumbers closer to you, an arm’s length away. He doesn’t scare you, not when you’ve killed him once already.
“You’re Captain until Cap— I mean, Curly wakes up. Because he will wake up, right?” Daisuke’s voice is so hopeful it nearly makes you feel bad that you’ll probably have to kill Curly if Anya’s shitty nursing doesn’t do him in first. Daisuke isn’t looking at you, though, which is ridiculous since you’re the acting Captain now.
“Right.” Swansea agrees begrudgingly. It doesn’t do much for the mood and you can see Daisuke blinking back tears.
“Right,” he echoes quietly.
A silence descends over the group and the ambient hum of the Tulpar seems ten times louder. It makes you want to do anything to shut it off, even though its loud, wheezing rattles are probably what’s keeping everyone alive.
The screen’s pixels are fading into sunset and your eyes catch on the dead pixel in the corner. You are a lot like the dead pixel. Most people don’t even notice you’re there. That’s usually their mistake.
You hear soft footsteps and turn to see Aya’s come out of medical. Her eyes briefly land on yours before flitting away, as if under intense scrutiny. You can’t exactly blame her. After all, being Captain means you have the responsibility to monitor crew.
Your chest swells. The title of Captain seems to fit just right this time. Last time was really a trial run, a prototype. You were given a second chance, another chance to be Captain, and you won’t spoil it messing with idiocrasy of the rest of the crew.
“How’s he?” Swansea asks roughly. You should be the one asking the questions but for the sake of being a peace keeper, you let it slide.
“He’s definitely in a coma,” Anya explains, scratching at the back of her hand. “If he even wakes up I don’t know the full extent of the damage will be. He could have a TBI.”
“A traumatic brain injury?” Daisuke pipes up, pushing himself up by his hands. He lets out a whimper of pain and sinks back into the cushions with a grimace. Swansea claps a hand on Daisuke’s shoulder, giving him a meaningful look.
“He probably won’t remember trying to— he probably won’t remember the incident.” Anya describes. Swansea grouses at that.
“Let’s not skirt around the issue. He tried to kill ‘imself and was gonna take us all down with ‘im.”
It must be the end of the world because you find yourself agreeing with Swansea. It was beginning to irk you how the crew was tiptoeing around what Curly did.
“Swansea’s right; because of him we’re down a co-pilot.”
Anya shifts nervously on the balls of her heels, like a toddler who needs to be monitored in the toy section of Walmart. Your eyes snap to her irritably.
“What?” You nearly snarl. Anya reels back a bit, pale skin gone clammy. You’re not sure why Daisuke and Swansea are looking at you like that. Anya was the disaster, you were just trying to keep the remaining shreds of sanity here on the Tulpar.
“N-nothing…,” she mumbles halfheartedly, hands pulled up to her chest.
“Whatever. Why speak if you have nothing to say?” You say, shaking your head.
“But-“ Daisuke begins. God, what was with the people here and interrupting you?
“Listen,” you shoot a severe look to Daisuke who looks back at you with startled betrayal, “since no one else is capable of co-piloting, I expect everyone else to pull their weight while I handle the cockpit.”
Your eyes flick to Swansea. Got that? The older man just crosses his arms, expression overcast. It’s pathetic how the whole crew seems to retreat back like a kicked puppy when you get upset, as if you’re a threat. Is it so hard for them to understand you’re trying to help? If they’d just let you help!
“Ji- Captain, what am I supposed to do?”
Of course. You forgot you were stuck with the crippled Daisuke. If he wasn’t of much use to start with, then he’s double the waste of space now. Why the hell would have Pony Express hire an intern who couldn’t even navigate a damn vent properly? The incompetence was astounding.
He looks so earnest, too, like he doesn’t realize what a real inconvenience he was. Your teeth lock together and you can feel the throbbing in your tongue from where you had bit it. It’s fire hot and when you press it to your teeth it sends small fireworks off at the edge of your vision.
Swansea stops whatever liquid fire that was about to spill from your throat.
“He can still help me with the busted leg,” Swansea barters, looking exasperated. You sincerely hope he’s not annoyed at you, because there’s not much he can do about it now that you’re in charge. Actually, you might like it better if he was annoyed at you. He’s probably more annoyed he has to babysit a cripple for the next seven months. You can’t blame him much there.
“Really, how—”
“If ya know what’s good fer ya, please shuddup,” Swansea speaks over Daisuke. The kid’s face falls and you feel a smirk play on your lips. Jesus, about time someone told him to shut up.
You sigh, pinching the bridge of your nose. You genuinely weren’t sure what to do without Curly. As co-pilot you did half of the work. Sure, you could be a better Captain than Curly by far, but that still didn’t diminish the need for sleep.
“I’m going to check on Curly,” you groan out, not that you owe them an explanation.
You feel Swansea’s eyes on you as you leave, burning holes in the back of your head— or maybe that was the phantom sensation of the bullet ripping through your skull, sending bone fragments scattering like frightened mice.
Right. You can’t forget what you’ve been given a second chance to do. Maybe having a nice one-sided chat with Curly like good old times is just what you need to clear your head. It certainly cleared my head last time, you think sardonically.
You run a hand through your hair. It’s greasy and flops off to the side when you retract your fingers. If you hadn’t been so busy saving Curly’s ass as co-pilot before the Tulpar crash you might have had some extra time to shower.
God, what were you going to do about the pregnancy? You could kill her, but you doubt that’d solve much. If you killed her, you’d have to make it look like an accident… or a suicide. You mentally pause, a metaphorical light bulb popping up above your head.
It’s possible, you contemplate. If she could be pressured enough the first time to kill herself, there’s nothing saying you can’t give her a helping hand to do it again. You feel your heart race in your chest, excitement building like plaque. That could just work.
“Hello, dearest Captain,” you greet cheerfully as you enter the medical room.
The doors swish open without you needing to use any sort of key. You roll your eyes, classic Anya and leaving doors unlocked. It’s a good thing she wasn’t co-pilot, else she’d probably leave the cockpit door wide open. Or worse, she’d accidentally manage to lock everyone out.
Curly is unconscious on the cot and you feel your chest clench with some warbling emotion between affection and disgust. Anya had taken the painstaking effort to wipe clean his golden curls of the blood, nothing he deserved, honestly.
You step closer, noticing dried blood flaking off a small patch of neck. You lean in closer and you can feel the heat radiate off of his body and the crook of his neck smells like his shampoo, surprising lavender and fresh laundry.
Your nose crinkles up in revulsion. Even now he manages to look like an angel stuck in sleep. You liked it better when he was covered in his own filth and smelled like a decomposing body of which he was.
At least, you try to convince yourself that. There’s not much you can do to justify how your press your nose against the hook of his jawline, lips inches away from his perfect skin. You imagine tearing into his throat like a wild animal, blood stained canines.
Get a hold of yourself, you berate, pulling back from Curly as if burned. Your hand finds its way to Curly’s neck, your pinkie sliding over his adam’s apple. Reflexively Curly swallows, his eyelids flickering.
“I know I fucked up last time,” you admit softly, eyes tracing his features. Curly exhales gently as if in response and you bet it smells like mint.
“Yeah, I know. You’re perfect and I have no hope to possibly measure up, right?” The muscular man makes a choked noise as you tighten your grip on his neck.
“Well guess what? You may have been right the first time.” God that tastes bitter on your tongue. You spit it out like cheap liquor (but when have you ever turned down a chance to get drunk out of your skull).
You let your nails dig white crescents into his tanned unblemished skin. How the hell was he even tan? You were in space for God’s sake!
“Not this time though. I’ll fix everything this time: the pregnancy, the ship, you.”
You let him go a little lamentably. The screen transformed from the terrible bright red-orange sunset to the cool serenity of the night sky. The virtual moon cast sharp shadows on his handsome face and illuminated the fine blonde hair covering his body.
It feels like a marker of a new time. It feels like it’s the universe’s way of telling you that you’ve made it— the next right step.