by S. A. Lusher
“No, she’s away on a mission of her own. I think Hawkins mentioned hearing from her, that she’d had some kind of problem, just before you arrived, but he didn’t have time to wait for her, or for Jennifer and Genevieve. Um...how are you two doing?” she replied.
“Well, the last time I spoke to her, I told her I was leaving her to go try and hook back up with my ex, so...I have no idea. She probably hates me, but maybe she doesn’t. She said she understood why I was doing it.”
“Are you going to try to get back with her?” Callie asked. Greg stared at her for a moment, considering the question. “I’m sorry if that’s too personal...”
“No, it’s fine. Yeah, I am. I mean, she always said she didn’t want our relationship to be complicated. If she’ll take me back, I’ll be with her. It was working out really well. At least, I think it was working out well...” he trailed off again, thinking about all the times he hadn’t told Eve that he loved her, because they didn’t have that kind of relationship. Too much. There was just too fucking much going on.
Callie stood up suddenly. “I need a shower, badly. Will you join me?” she asked.
He looked up at her, stared at her for a moment, then slowly nodded. He got up and followed her through the ship, back to one of the two cabins. As they stepped into the bathroom and started undressing, Greg felt even more thoughts assaulting him. Worries, concerns, guilt. Should he be doing this? Technically, nothing had changed between them at all. They were both still in open relationships, (well, okay, he was actually single right now), but even if he wasn’t, Eve already knew about and consented to his sleeping with Callie. It just felt weird since they were going to rescue Allan and he’d just broken up with Eve…
Callie must have sensed his discomfort as they got into the shower. Standing there naked and wet before him, she wrapped him in a hug.
“Callie, are you sure-”
“Yes, Greg. We both need to stop thinking. We need to let go. For the next twelve hours, there’s not a whole lot we can do. If we’re going to do this right, we need to clear our heads. And having sex and getting some sleep usually really helps me, and I think it does you, too. So just...stop worrying and do this with me,” she said quietly, her lips by his ear.
“I...okay,” he murmured.
She was right. He needed stop thinking, even if only for a little while.
Beneath the artificial rain of the shower, he kissed her.
* * * * *
“Hey, how you holding up?”
Eric glanced up from his meal. Porter was coming into the galley. They’d punched in the coordinates and hit FLT flight not too long ago and he’d been starving, so he’d gone and made himself some frozen burritos.
“I’m okay,” he replied.
“Come on, don’t bullshit me,” Porter said, moving over to the fridge. “I can tell when you’re down, and you’ve been down and worried for the past few days.”
Eric sighed. It was weird having Porter talk to him like this, but he’d actually gotten to know her pretty well after Ash. Vetra hadn’t wanted the responsibility of doing the more complex maintenance and repair on Sierra, so he’d gone to Porter, who was glad to take the job over. They’d gotten to talking over the sessions of her checking on Sierra’s programming and physical storage, and they’d just started hanging out after that. Porter had kind of just taken to him, sliding into the role of friend almost imperceptibly.
“Luna’s still doing okay, right?” she asked when he’d taken too long to answer.
“Yes, Luna’s fine,” he replied, smiling at the thought. Then feeling a little guilty. He’d been so busy lately that he hadn’t had much time to see Luna or Sierra. He was still taking care of her every day, but beyond feeding her, watering her and cleaning up after her, and playing with her when he got the chance, he didn’t see as much of her as he’d like. Between the missions, training and his new relationship with Drake, he was simply too busy. Just this past week, Porter had taken to stopping by and spending some time with her every day. Which was important, since Eric knew that pets got lonely just like people.
“I’m just...a little worried. About my new relationship,” he replied hesitantly.
Porter was making something in the microwave now. “Why? What’s wrong with it? You two seem to be doing great.”
“We are. I mean...as far as I can tell.” He sighed. “I’m just a little worried because, well, Drake’s admitted that he’s never actually had a monogamous relationship before.”
“You don’t trust him to keep it exclusive?” Porter asked.
“No. I trust him. He’s got a pretty strong resolve and will. No, it’s more that, I’m...worried it might, I don’t know, damage him? To try and do this. I don’t want him to be miserable. I’ve always been a pretty firm believer that if you have to change yourself to make the relationship work, then...it might not be the best idea.”
“That’s not entirely true,” Porter replied, grabbing a can of soda and coming over to the table to sit across from him. “If you have shitty personality traits or habits and you change them to make a relationship work, then that’s a good thing. That relationship made you a better person. Of course being monogamous or poly are neither good nor bad. It’s just a choice based on what you want. Cheating, on the other hand, is bad. But that’s an entirely different category. As for your specific concerns...well, I’d say: first, talk to Drake.”
“I did,” he replied. “He said it’ll be fine.”
“And you don’t believe him.”
“I think he’s...not so sure himself, but he doesn’t want to worry me.”
“Fair enough. Well, my best advice is to continue the relationship and stay vigilant. Maintain consistent open lines of communication. And, obviously, don’t be too hyper-aware. Don’t try to dissect and talk about every little thing.” She laughed and shook her head. “A good relationship is a balancing act. At least, in the beginning. It gets easier with time. You get to know your partner. Get to know when you need to press them into telling you what’s wrong, when to just give them space and time, and when you’re just being paranoid. It gets easier. And they learn that stuff about you. Although there’s one thing I am curious about.”
“What’s that?”
“Have you ever tried being in an open relationship?”
He shook his head. “No, I haven’t.”
“Why not? Has it just not come up, or...”
“No, it has. A couple of times. I just...can’t do it.”
“Why can’t you do it?” she asked.
He sighed and looked down at the table, considering it. “I guess...the idea of someone else sleeping with my partner is just...it freaks me out. And, yeah, obviously makes me jealous. And afraid. I don’t think I could handle it.”
“That makes sense. That’s the natural reaction of a lot of people, I think. And like I said, it’s not for everyone. Nothing is for everyone. There is no one single standard or correct way to have a relationship. Now, answer me this. Why does it make you feel this way? What do you think will happen as a result of opening your relationship?”
He felt like she was leading him somewhere, but he wasn’t sure where. “Well...I mean, I guess my concern is that it will break up the relationship.”
“Exactly. Buried beneath the knee-jerk emotional reaction to someone else touching what’s yours, which is all jealousy is, is a logical worry: will my partner leave me if they meet someone better than me in the course of this open relationship?”
“...yeah. That.”
“But that’s the thing. If you trust your partner and you’re confident in your relationship, then you can get past it. Because a relationship isn’t just one thing. You aren’t in love with someone just because, I don’t know, they’re really good at sex or they’re really good at being funny or any single thing. I mean, maybe that’s why the relationship initially sparked, but a million different things make up a relationship. Eric, there’s going to be a lot of people out there that
are better than you at sex. And me too, and Drake. Pretty much everyone. And there’s funnier people, smarter people, stronger people. And there’s a chance that either one of you will encounter someone who’s better than the other at sex. Or something else.
“That’s the great thing about a strong relationship, you stop worrying so much that the other person is going to leave you. And you only build and then maintain a strong relationship by providing constant maintenance and upkeep to it. I think that’s where a lot of people go wrong with their relationships. Once they hit a certain point, they look at it kind of like, well, a mission that has been accomplished. ‘I have achieved the highest level of relationship status, I guess I can stop worrying about it now’, without realizing that you have to maintain your relationship status. It isn’t concrete. Relationships are in a constant state of flux. And, I guess, well, if I’m being grim, a constant state of decay. The stronger the relationship, the slower the decay, but it is still decaying. And you have to shore up the relationship on a daily basis.”
“Wow,” Eric said after a long while. “I think that’s the most I’ve ever heard you say at once.”
Porter snorted. “Gee thanks. Is any of this getting through?” she asked, rolling her eyes.
“Yes, it is. You’re making a lot of sense. And I hear you.” He paused, considering. “You seem to have a lot of specific advice. I take it you’ve been in an open relationship?”
“Technically, I’m in one right now,” Porter replied. “Although I’m not sure if what Greg and I have is a relationship, per say. But yes, I went through this same problem about fifteen years ago. I was very monogamous and insecure...and that wasn’t a shot. I’m not calling you insecure.”
“I definitely am,” Eric replied. “If we’re being painfully truthful.”
“Fair enough. I’m still insecure, too. Everyone is. Just not as much as I used to be. After two years of talking about it, I finally opened up my relationship with my boyfriend. And it was a lot of fun. I mean, it was kind of rocky at first, you know, getting used to having sex with someone else, with knowing my boyfriend was having sex with someone else. We kept it simple at first: we each found another partner we’d sleep with occasionally, friends of ours...the bottom line is that it worked out good for me. And I think it would, under the right conditions, work out for a lot of people. People want to fuck other people. Like, lots of other people. That’s our basic, natural drive. And I think a lot of people come to resent their partner for keeping them from fucking other people, even if most of the time it’s an unconscious resentment.”
She shrugged. “This fixes that problem.”
“Huh,” Eric replied.
“Feel any better?”
“I...think so.”
She laughed. “Good. Now go sleep or shower or train. I don’t know. Go do something that isn’t sitting here brooding by yourself. It’s never a good idea before a big mission.”
He sighed and stood up, popping his neck. “Yeah, you’re right. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
He headed out of the galley. Weller had taken over piloting duties and Drake had gone down to work out. Eric headed that way, hoping he was still there.
* * * * *
This time, Allan was thrown out of unconsciousness.
Unceremoniously, he was jettisoned out of the airlock of slumber and cast into the awful void of awake and aware.
He gasped, looking around, and realized that he could actually move this time. Although it did no good, given that he was still bolted down to a table. He was lying flat on his back and staring up at an antiseptically clean white-tiled ceiling overhead. It was practically polished. He could see himself in it. He was still naked, his skin pale and, in some places, bruised and scarred. Abruptly, the table he was on began to rise, smoothly bringing him into a position so that his feet were facing the floor and his head the ceiling.
A screen showing that same bizarre face as before, an elongated thing made of neon angles and strange colors, lowered in front of him.
“Allan! You’re awake. Good. I sometimes have difficulties mixing the chemicals just right. And there’s individual physiology and body chemistry to take into account as well. You humans are so...unpredictable. But you’re here! I had to take you off the paralytic for now. Too much of it can cause nerve damage, you know! Now-” abruptly, a wash of static moved across the screen and the face froze in place, then it snapped back, continuing as if nothing had happened, “-as I was saying before. You are special.
“All of you and your friends are unique and special. I want to adapt that. Distill it. I want to know why you are special. Why are some humans so capable of surviving when others aren’t? What is the survival instinct, physically speaking? Everything exists, Allan. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Thoughts exist. Emotions exist. And by exist, I mean they have a physical reality as much as atoms and photons do. Just because we haven’t found them yet doesn’t mean they are incorporeal. Now, you and your friends have made a career out of surviving the impossible. Why did you survive out of all the others? Don’t worry, I know you don’t have the answer. At least, you don’t know the answer. But your body does…
“And that’s what I’m going to be discerning here today, Allan.”
Allan felt cold, despairing terror roll slowly through him and prayed that somehow, someway, Callie would rescue him.
CHAPTER 04
–Submerged–
Greg came awake in the darkness.
For several moments, he simply laid there, trying to gather his thoughts, to determine where it was, exactly, that he’d ended up. His memories were a tangled, painful proliferation of confusion and anxiety. He couldn’t see almost anything. There was only the dim blue glow of a comms console mounted in the nearby wall in sleep mode and a small digital clock beside it. The clock told him it was six in the evening, but that was meaningless. Time had largely lost meaning to him. Really, it was all just T minus liftoff to the next mission.
That thought sparked and everything clicked home.
He could feel Callie against him, her bare breasts against his back, an arm over him. He didn’t want to move. There was a primal comfort in where he was now, warm and drowsy beneath soft blankets with a nude woman pressed up against him. After everything that had happened, the horror of facing down the reality that what he considered to be his only other viable option for happiness in life was a no-go, he didn’t want to deal with anything. He wanted comfort. He wanted not to think, not to hurt, not to dream.
Greg tried to hold on to the warm, lethargic happiness he was feeling. The meal and the shower had gone a long way towards soothing him, but it was the sex with Callie and sedate, mellow cuddling afterward that had really put out the fires in his brain. It still felt strange to get this kind of comfort not just from the woman he wasn’t dating, (were they dating? What was the exact nature of their relationship?), but from a woman who was actually dating someone else. But he’d surmised that it didn’t really matter.
In the moment, sex was its own universe, separate from all else.
But his mind was already working against him. Greg found himself calculating how long he’d been asleep, because he’d seen the time before he’d passed out. Eight hours. They had about three hours left to get ready, and there were things that needed to be done. With a sigh, Greg shifted and gently pulled Callie’s arm off of him.
But she was as light a sleeper as he was, and she woke almost immediately.
“What time is it?” she asked sleepily, rubbing her eyes.
“We’ve been asleep for eight hours,” he replied as he sat up and stretched, feeling several of his joints crack.
Callie sighed. “I don’t feel exactly recharged, but I guess that’s technically enough,” she replied, sitting up as well. “Want to go for another round in the shower and help me wake up?”
“Yeah,” he replied.
* * * * *
Greg stepped out of the quarters he’
d been occupying, zipping up his jumpsuit as he went. He made way for Callie, who was doing the same.
“Okay, I need to get to the bridge and double-check everything,” she said. “Then I’ll meet you in the armory and we can go over our gear.”
“I’ll be there,” he replied.
She gave him another kiss and headed off. Instead of heading for the armory, Greg began hunting around for Mertz. As he did, he thought that Callie had been right. Their session and the sleep had made him feel a lot better. He felt capable of thinking clearly again and the raging sea of emotions inside of him had settled down.
It also made him see other things more clearly.
Namely, he felt like a fucking asshole. He’d basically just up and left without saying goodbye to anyone but Eve and Hawkins. He tried to alleviate his guilt by acknowledging that he’d been spending a lot of time with most of his friends onboard the Dauntless over the past few weeks and that they all knew it was probably coming. But that didn’t help. If it had worked out, if Kyra had taken him back and he’d settled into a new life with her, then that basically would have been the end of the vast majority of his relationships.
And that was just a crappy thing to do.
To just walk out of someone’s life without even saying goodbye because you couldn’t face the pain of a goodbye.
Greg found Mertz in the small recreational room, laying on a couch, reading from an infopad. He set it aside as Greg came in.
“Hey,” he said, smiling. “We haven’t had a chance to catch up. Um...how you doing?” he asked.
“I’m...” Greg hesitated as he sat down in one of the other available seats. How was he? Well, no sense in bullshitting the man. “I’m lousy,” he replied.
“Yeah, I can understand that.”
Greg hesitated further, still feeling guilty as hell. Finally, he sighed. “I’m sorry that I left without saying anything to you. I just...with everything else going on and with how fucked up my head has been, and how painful it was to say goodbye to Eve, I just felt like I had to get the hell off of the ship and get away from everything.”
