Vani was sitting in the back of the bug, clenching and unclenching his jaw while his fingers tapped out a nervous rhythm on his knees. His eyes closed now instead of boring holes into the back of the captain’s head. Lucan could almost feel steam coming off of him. He tried not to notice, but when he radioed Quinn to prepare for a trip to Deadela, Vani’s head snapped forward, eyes flying open. Lucan was glad that the bug required him to wear a headset to listen to the frigate above and so Vani held his tongue. He had a feeling that a tirade was building. He chuckled a bit, making sure the other man couldn’t see from where he was sitting. He was just so…Lucan couldn’t think of a word to describe Vani for a minute. Petulant? No, that’s not quite it…Indignant? Better, still not right though…Righteous! That was it, this was a person full of righteous anger. He put a knuckle between his teeth to keep from laughing. He was sure that it was not going to be funny as soon as they landed, but he sort of thought that this is how the Gods must behave in Sighhraam. If he believed in that sort of thing.
*****
The captain nearly sprinted from the bug. He had already called to him a couple of times, but Lucan pretended he had not heard and kept going. Truth is, if they were going to have a huge blowout, he preferred to not have it in the middle of the docking bay. “Captain! I need a word with you!” Vani shouted, chasing after him.
Lucan was finally at the door to his own quarters, but it had slowed him for a moment, Vani caught his shoulder and spun him around. “Captain!” He was fuming.
As he turned, the captain brushed the blaster he had given Vani. Lucan stared down at the weapon at his side as if transfixed, in an overly calm voice that contradicted the eyes strangling down at the gun, “I will be in my quarters for the next 45 minutes. Once you secure your weapon elsewhere, you may come speak to me.”
Vani pulled back, aghast, “I-I’m not going to shoot you.”
Lucan shook his head, still not meeting Vani’s eye, “No weapons in the quarters, house rules.” The captain pulled his own out and locked it into a cabinet outside that Vani had not noticed. He was still standing agape as Lucan slid through his door and shut it between them.
Vani turned on his heel, and marching to his own quarters, noting how there was no cabinet on his. He looked at some of the other doors and saw none on any of them. He wandered into the kitchen and saw Teagan. “Where should I stow my weapon?” he asked.
She looked up from the mug of coffee, “Uh, your weapons locker in your room?”
“I don’t understand?”
“Big metal cabinet, made for storing weapons, should be inside the closet.”
“No...I was just with the captain and he said no weapons in the quarters?”
She set the mug down on the counter, “Oh,” she took a step closer to him, as if telling a secret. “No weapons in his quarters.” Vani cocked his head at her trying to understand, but she just gave a little half smile and shrugged. “Don’t say you heard it from me.” She walked out of the room with her mug.
“Okay…” Vani was becoming convinced that all these people were stark, raving mad. He returned to his own quarters and found there was a locker in his closet. Securing his blaster, he went to speak to the captain, although most of his anger had dissipated, replaced with confusion.
*****
The captain waited quietly for Vani to return, he sensed that it was going to go badly, and began pacing the small room. A tentative knock sounded on the door. Then silence as Lucan stared at it, unable to respond. He knocked again and finally Lucan crossed the room and opened the door to invite him in. His voice clipped, “You have something you wish to say?”
“Yes,” Vani sat down on a chair opposite the captain on the edge of his bed. “Why no weapons in the quarters?” blurted out instead of the argument he had planned.
“That’s not what you wanted to talk about.” Lucan tilted his chin up as he talked, egging on a confrontation.
“No, but it seems curious. Especially since I found my weapons locker inside my closet, not outside my door like you have here.” He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back into the chair, he could not get a solid picture of the captain in his head.
Lucan pinched the bridge of his nose. “That’s none of your business. But if you like, you may use the locker in your closet. There will be no weapons in this room.” Lucan now looked at Vani as if to say the matter was closed.
“I see.”
“Good, now what did you want to talk to me about?”
“This job.”
“Yes.”
“You do realize it’s a suicide mission.”
“The thought had occurred to me.” Lucan looked at Vani mirroring his position with his own arms.
“And you still took the job?” Once again, Vani looking shocked at Lucan.
“And I still took the job.”
“That day you brought my brother and me aboard, you said that you were not a murderer.”
Lucan refused to be baited, but could feel the anger rising to dangerous levels. “I am not a murderer. Every single member of the crew knows the risks of every job, they can participate or not. I do not force anyone to do anything!” His voice becoming raised, he could feel the shaking in his hands.
“Captain, every single member of this crew would willingly follow you into hell! Don’t tell me you’re giving them a choice!”
“I don’t know if you realize this, but we are criminals, this is what we do. The higher the stakes, the higher the pay. And we are good at it.”
Vani rubbed his hands down his face, frustration bleeding from his pores. “If you’re trying to kill yourself, fine. I get it, I do. But don’t take the crew with you.”
Lucan was up and in Vani’s face, “You get it? Really, do you? You call me suicidal, yet you can’t understand why I don’t keep a weapon in my room? It’s because I am. I sit on that bed nearly every day and I can feel the gun in my hands when it’s not there. I can feel its weight, every groove, and I sit there wanting to get up and go to it. That today is going to be the day that I finally, I finally do it. Just end all this crap, I’m so tired. But I don’t. Why? Because, all these people, these people that you think I want to lead to certain death, they depend on me. I keep them here as a family, so maybe if you think I am capable of that, then you need to leave the ship when we dock at Deadala.” Lucan backed up and turned his back on Vani, too stunned to respond. “I think you need to leave now, I have work to do.” Lucan dismissed Vani with a flick of his hand, without turning around.
Vani closed his mouth that had fallen open without his notice, “Of course, Captain. My apologies for taking so much of your time.” With a bow of his head, he left the room as quietly as he could. Meanwhile, as soon as the door clicked shut, Lucan ran to the bathroom. He shook, clammy with cold sweats for several minutes before stripping down and stepping into the sonic. He let out a short cry in the chamber, at the tiled walls that never judged him, never pitied him.
*****
Vani was unsure what to do now. He stood outside Lucan’s door for several minutes before numbly trudging to the room where his brother and Trini were. In some ways, she was like her brother Lucan. They were both tall with the same golden honey colored hair, and strong Frendelan features. But while Trini’s eyes were a hazel and full of smiles through her sickness, Lucan’s were green and did not sparkle. In fact, Vani had never seen him smile, not one that went all the way to the eyes. Light and dark, if only he had not glimpsed how dark it was.
Dami was flicking through screens on the computer trying to find something to entertain them, when he looked up to see Vani. “Sparky!”
“Hi Dami. Hello Trini,” Vani saw how she lit up when someone talked to her, although she dimmed a bit when she saw his face.
“What’s the matter with you?” Damiano asked. “You’re like a wet blanket on the whole room.”
“And you’re an absolute joy.” Vani snapped. He loved his brother, but sometimes, he was an ass. Vani sat on the side of the bed. “I don’t know, I just think that maybe I should go when we dock.”
“And leave me with these heathens!” Damiano looked at Trini with a bit of a crooked smile, “Present company excluded, of course. Why would you want to do that?”
“I don’t think this is where I’m supposed to be. What do you think, Dam?” Vani knew they shouldn’t be talking about his brother’s visions in front of others, but current need pressed him forward.
“You already know what I think, and that is that you are being stupid.”
“I can always count on you for moral support.”
“I’m serious, boss. You are freaking out because you are finally reaching out to people and maybe making friends. Well guess what, sometimes having friends suck. They will hurt you and you will hurt them. But real friends are the ones who come back and have your back when you need it. I’ve seen you here, you are nothing like who you were in school or at home. You kind of have a personality now.”
Trini could not help but watch and listen to them. She wished that Lucan would come out of whatever dark hole he had crawled into over the last couple of years. She missed having this kind of playfulness around him. Maybe that’s what had gotten Vani so irritated, the Nines knew that her brother had the capability to annoy like no one else. “Is it Luka?”
Vani didn’t look at her when he answered, after all, he didn’t know if what Lucan said to him was common knowledge. He knew it wasn’t his place to share secrets though. “Yeah, there’s a job. We disagreed about whether or not it’s a good idea.” He let it go at that.
“I know my brother is as stubborn as an ox, but he’s a good person and he’s always looking out for us.”
“Yes, stubborn is an apt way of describing him.” He let out a deep sigh. The burden of the knowledge of Lucan’s darkness troubled him and Dami gave him a curious look. “Would you mind if I borrow my brother for a moment?”
“Of course not, what am I going to do, run away?”
Dam followed his brother out of Trini’s room. When the door clicked shut, “All right, spill.”
“I’m worried Lucan is going to get the crew killed on this job, it’s dangerous. Suicidal even.”
“That’s never good.”
“What do your visions say?”
“I told you, I can’t just point it at something and get a picture. Sometimes, things come to me clear, sometimes hazy, others it’s just a feeling.”
“I’ll take a feeling!” Vani was pacing now. He had seen the look in the other man’s eyes. Lucan’s eyes looked like they were already dead.
“I just don’t feel like it’s going to go all toes up. Okay.”
Vani nodded somewhat relieved, but not much. “If you happen to get a vision, any at all about this, you’ll let me know?”
“Of course.” Dami felt guilty for lying to his brother, but he smiled weakly.
Lucan was already in the cockpit when Vani arrived. He stiffened when the other man sat in the chair next to him. “I will need to know if you intend to stay aboard. Deadela is a good place to pick up crew, if I need to find a temporary quartermaster, I’ll need a few days to get the word out.”
Vani stared at the captain, but Lucan refused to look at him, “What would you like me to do?”
“If you cannot accept my decisions as captain, I’m afraid there won’t be much choice.” The words seemed strained as he said them, still he did not look over.
“I understand, Captain. I would like to say that my outburst earlier was out of line, I should not have spoken out the way that I did. I do, however stand by what I said. You will have my decision in the morning.” And with that, Vani stood and retreated out of the room, closing the cockpit door. Once outside, he collapsed to a crouch, his hands on his knees and muttering, “Fuck!”
*****
Well, that was that, thought Lucan. Better start writing up a spec to broadcast to the planet. He would already be looking for supplies and extra munitions for the mission, why not a quartermaster until Tree gets better? He spent much of the evening drafting the notice he would have Quinn send out in the morning as soon as Vani told him the inevitable. He was tempted to have her send it now, but he decided to be respectful to wait until then. Of course he would not be able to stay on, even from what little time they had known each other, Vani had never been one to not speak his mind. Thank the Nines that he would wait until they had a moment of privacy, since he seemed to find those prickly spots that made Lucan lash out like a wounded animal. Of course, that’s just what he was.