Chapter Text
The pills in her shaking hands rattle.
"You don't mind me taking some of your pills, do you Captain?
Curly wheezes.
Daisuke bangs on the door.
Jimmy's yelling.
It's been 5 months. Rescue isn't coming. She should have known otherwise than to foolishly hold onto naive hope. Maybe she did, deep down. She knew how Pony Express worked after all, and what was stopping the dead company now? They have no obligation when the crew aren't employed anymore.
"You can't just break down, at every little thing!”
She has been holding it together. She's the one who carried the consequences of his actions.
The baby is dying. There's no way it could have survived in these conditions. She's bled into her underwear a lot. She’s suffered bouts of cramps, she knows what’s coming. The lack of food, the rationing of what's left for a tomorrow that yields nothing—it was bound to happen.
She's… relieved. A little. Maybe she should be horrified, guilty. Maybe she should be ashamed.
But it was never hers. It was never her choice. It was never her future.
She wanted to be a doctor one day.
8 attempts. 8 fails. Years and years into a pipe dream no one believed in anymore.
Her mother hadn't even said bye before Anya departed, for what would be the last time now. She'd never get to try and make her proud. She'd never get to proudly show off her pass into med school, or apologise for wasting her short life.
She'd never hug her again.
She'll miss her, but her mother will miss her more. She hopes.
That last, disappointed glance makes her think otherwise.
Curly wheezes again, the sound just short of a cry. He probably doesn't have enough of a tongue to cry anymore.
She approaches him, crouched to meet him face to face. Her face twists sadly, “I'm sorry Captain. I just can't anymore. I know we're going to die out here. Swansea is keeping the last cryopod for Daisuke. Jimmy will probably kill me."
A hoarse breath. Bloody stumps reaching for her. One wide, bloodshot blue iris, trained on her. It looks full of tears, despite the lack of functioning tear ducts. He can't cry anymore.
But he's crying for her. She knows.
She stares at her hands, full of his pills. They don't do much for him. They're more of a placebo, since they had nothing else. She didn't want him to keep suffering. She hadn't wanted him to die.
He might, with her gone.
He probably was going to die when it dawned on them that Pony Express wasn't coming.
Is it selfish of her to leave him here?
She's his nurse, he's her patient. He was once her Captain, her Captain that failed her, her Captain that chose his best friend over her.
She's thought of ending it for him. Maybe he'd see the mercy, maybe he'd resent her. She doesn't know. She doesn't know what he wants anymore, she doesn't know if he wants what she's given him all these months. All she knew was that he was in pain all around the clock without painkillers.
She can barely remember his smile, replaced by a gory perpetual grimace.
“I'm sorry Captain, but you can't stop me. Nothing can anymore. I have no other options left."
He's still reaching for her. It must hurt to stretch his exposed muscles. Still, he doesn't stop.
She steps away, a part of her soaking in guilt, "I'm sorry I won't be here to take care of you. But, you understand, don't you? He's going to kill me before anything else.”
The yelling outside medbay had died down. She doesn't have time to consider why. She has minutes before her will fades, before her determination dissipates.
She looks at Curly, whose arms quiver as they reach, “I don't think I can forgive you for standing by him. I don't think I'll ever understand why you did it. But, I don't think I resent you either. I don't want to do that. This isn't me punishing you, Curly, I promise."
He makes a sound, a choked whimper.
She smiles, "It'll be okay. Everything will be okay,” with a deep breath, she pops the lids open.
The pills look so innocent. It’s weird to think they’ll be her killers soon.
“I'm taking my agency back."
She downs them all.
-
Anya looks up from her desk for the seventh time. She'd wanted to work but her concern for the Captain lived in the forefront of her mind before anything else.
It doesn’t help that - despite it being her workplace and most familiar space of the Tulpar - Medbay had been shifting in hues recently, specifically dipping into an eering, sunset red. It left her uneasy, like the brief flashes of a foamed Tulpar.
Anya shakes the thoughts away.
She finds herself staring at Curly, unable to look away from the bandages she'd delicately wrapped around his arms just two hours ago.
He'd come in—or rather had been carried by Swansea and Jimmy on trembling steps, then on no feet as they dragged him to the cot, all while he quietly protested, mumbles so slurred they were practically intelligible.
Anya has been worried about Curly for weeks, maybe months. Since that morning he was late to breakfast, the morning he'd asked about nightmares being real…
The way he shook, eyes telling unspeakable horrors she could never imagine.
She thought it was just a nightmare. That he'd get over it, and everything would be normal again. Maybe he'd finally open up to her, like she had hoped for some time now. As the nurse, the crew's mental wellbeing was her duty as much as their physical wellbeing. She knew Pony Express was simply throwing another necessary job at her for the sake of ticking a check list of “good employers." The psyche evals didn't go anywhere, they didn't assess for anything more than productivity as an employee, and they were only her task because she was the closest to being qualified for it. Even then, she really had no job being the crew's evaluator, but she took that role seriously.
She studied psychology in her free time, mostly for herself, but she'd hoped the knowledge would find its time in the spotlight one day.
Maybe now was that time.
Anya had watched in dismay as the Captain deteriorated by himself. She watched the eyes bags under his eyes become bruising blemishes on skin whose pallor paled to that akin of a ghost. She watched his tired smile dim into nothing. She'd watch him distance himself from them, all the while powerless to stop it all.
She did try, she wanted to help.
But Curly was good at avoiding. He avoided himself while suddenly focusing on her. He'd avoided her every psyche eval, and she didn't want to push his boundaries.
Maybe she should have.
Looking over at the Captain on the cot, chest rising slowly, completely still, face lightly scrunched into discomfort, she definitely thinks she should have.
Anya wonders what it is that haunts him. There is no prior precedent of this on his records, nor within her memory of knowing Curly all these years. The only correlation she can make is the nightmare he had months ago, or rather the recurring nightmare he’s seemingly still having.
She thinks it might have been more than a nightmare. Only because things had physically changed for Curly. She had noticed his switch from any Pony Express meal to the vegetarian ones. She has noticed he spends a lot of the time in the cockpit, and if he’s not in there then he’s either on the couch avoiding the table or simply nowhere to be found.
More than anything, she had noticed the switch around Jimmy.
Previously, Curly hung around his best friend a lot. It was expected, given they had a long history and chemistry together. They’d pilot together, eat together, she’d hear them horse around.
Anya had no problem with Jimmy for the few years they knew each other until he started to get uncomfortably close around the end of their last trip. Then it had slowly escalated in a way she knew intimately was wrong but hard to word to anyone else. And with Pony Express’s rules, it was almost impossible to say anything, not without getting docked.
And getting docked was the last thing Anya could afford, what with her meagre savings and her distant dream.
She’d thought Curly would never see it. She’d try to hint with subtle words, disguising them through jokes or minor concerns, all thinly veiled but he never got it—never saw through that almost transparent cover over her words. A part of her had come to believe deep down maybe he’d turn on her for Jimmy. She didn’t want to believe it but they were close, and he never seemed to get it.
(They were close, except for the few arguments she’s heard. The ones where Jimmy yelled and Curly was silent.
The ones that didn’t really seem like arguments, but Jimmy was explosive with everyone sometimes. Especially towards her.)
But now, all so suddenly, he hears the weeks old concerns she quietly said to him. He heard them and acted on her behalf.
She’d been so relieved inthe midst of her concern for him.
Yet there was something else that grated at her.
Curly and Jimmy have been friends since high school. That was what Curly had said, and Jimmy never corrected him. They’d known each other for ages.
She didn’t think it was so normal for Curly to flinch just at Jimmy entering. She didn’t think it was casual for Curly to freeze or dissociate so much around him. She didn’t think it was friendly that Jimmy kept ribbing at his best friend while he threw up.
There’s something between them she hasn’t noticed until now. She still doesn’t fully get it, but she knows there is something. Something that makes her gut churn.
Anya worries that Jimmy might have hurt Curly. Either that, or Curly’s ‘nightmares’ involved Jimmy hurting him, and that Jimmy had acted in a way that triggered such a dream. She worries that his nightmare might have been a psychotic episode that haunted him since. She can’t say much, she’s no psychologist, she has no credentials in this area and Curly has no precedent of this so it’s even harder to say.
All she can say is she’s worried. Deeply worried.
Her concern spikes when she hears a mumble. Curly starts twitching in his sleep, slurred cries slipping from his slip. His face scrunches into a grimace. She’s by his side the moment a tear squeezes past his eyelids, “Curly?” She tries quietly.
No response. A nightmare then. Anya sighs sadly. She takes on his sweaty hand in hers to gently squeeze, “It’s okay, you’re okay Curly… You’re okay,” he still cries so silently, teeth gritted like he bites back the sobs. She cards a hand through his messy blonde curls. It used to be so vibrants a couple months ago…
It scares her that this has already happened twice. He’d woken up the first time, eyes bloodshot and frantic, searching in a frenzy, gurgled words at the tip of his tongue. He’d looked through her then horrified at her, and he’d cried without noise, teeth gnawing at his lips.
She’d soothed him, closed his eyes for him until his breathing deepened again.
The second time, she was up before his eyes opened. Still, she couldn’t understand the mess of jumbled words escaping his lips. He’d thrashed under her grip—she held him too hard, too suddenly. He cried out and then apologised and then had gone silent, holding back cries again, tears streaming down his face.
Anya had understood then why the bags under his eyes were so deep. It was much, much worse than she had ever anticipated. Really, she realised the moment her stomach dropped when she’d pulled his sleeves down.
There were a plethora of fresh and old scratches, scabs on pale skin, angry red cuts littering his arms. Based on their depths and colour, some of them were reopened a few times. Some of the scabs had been scratched off a few times.
Anya wants to assume the best and that it was all an accident.
It’s hard to really believe so, having seen tiny flakes of dry blood under Curly's nails.
Still, she withholds judgement. She’d briefly considered going to Swansea given the mechanic knew Curly longer than she did and they were on amicable terms… but she knows Swansea would be much quicker to judge, and despite all their years together… she doesn’t think they’re that close. Working at Pony Express was like that. Every man for themself.
It would break patient confidentiality, and while Anya isn't technically a real nurse, she does take her job seriously.
Besides, she wants to know from Curly when he’s more coherent. There’s a lot she needs to know.
Like how Jimmy treats him, and how long it’s been going on.
Because the way he reacts is more than concerning. Even if it is all a byproduct of his nightmares, she’s been seeing with clearer eyes recently.
Jimmy isn’t just weird around her. He gets harsh around Curly. He’s impatient, he’s sharp with his words, he cuts into him mercilessly.
Curly always takes it so silently. These days he freezes or even dissociates.
She used to think Curly simply knew how to exist around Jimmy’s brash nature, how to soothe his jagged edges that always pushed into her uncomfortably. She used to think Jimmy wasn't as rough around him, since they were best friends.
But now she thinks he’s just really good at avoiding them, or maybe he’s used to sitting in the vicinity of them, sitting through the discomfort.
She thinks the nightmare has thrown him off and helped Anya see it too. She thinks that nightmare might have been a combination of what Curly has told her and what he hasn’t: his sleep deprivation and Jimmy’s behaviour.
Part of her broils in shame. Shouldn’t she have seen this? Another part steeps in guilt. She harboured resentment and let it blind her.
The quietest and biggest part marks this as another failure, another hundred miles from her dream. It gets hard to fight it some days, especially with her past eight failures.
Anya snaps out of her own head when she feels a pair of eyes on her. Unfocused, hazy blue stare up. She almost startles, “Curly?”
His lips move slowly, “... Anya?”
She sighs in relief, “Everything’s okay Curly. Just go to sleep, alright? Everything’s good.”
Tears start flowing earnestly, “I’m sorry… I’m so sorry Anya…” the cries spill in tiny sobs. His shoulders shakes with each one, repeated over and over, a slur tying each apology.
Her heart hurts just watching him, “For what Curly?” He sounds genuinely distraught, the cadence in his hoarse cries rings sorrowfully.
“I failed you… I failed you so bad… and I never even got to say sorry…”
Is he talking about Jimmy’s harassment?
“It’s okay Curly, you listened to me in the end, and you tried to help me. I forgive you for that.” She strokes some matted hair from his face, brushing away some stray tears.
He shakes his head, “No… you don’t forgive me… I don’t deserve it… I’m sorry," his whisper breaks off into a cry.
Anya wonders if he’s dreaming awake, if he’s hallucinating again, or if he’s asleep with his eyes open. Soon enough, they close on their own, Curly’s hiccups fading to deeper, uneasy breaths.
She waits a few moments to make sure he’s asleep again before sitting back down at her desk.
Anya sighs deeply. She’s missing a lot of pieces. The few she has are too scattered to make sense of anything. At this rate, she won’t be able to help the Captain through whatever it is he’s going through, and if she can’t then she’s a failure of a nurse.
She’ll be no better than what Jimmy thinks of her, than what her mother believes, and what Anya hearself is slowly being convinced…
A hand comes up to grip her arm, nails digging through her uniform.
Looking at Curly again, at the bandages on his arms, Anya bites her lip.
‘No,’ She thinks firmly. She won’t let any of them be right. She isn’t a failure of a nurse, and she will become a doctor one day. That’s been her dream since childhood. She’s going to fulfill that little girl's wish and make her proud.
It starts with working through the few pieces she has now. She takes out a notebook and jots it all down.
She’ll figure something out, for the Captain’s sake, for all of their sake.
-
Someone knocks on medbay’s door. Anya startles from her intense ruminating on her notes. She recognises who it is, “Come in, Swansea.”
Silence. Then, “Can't come in when the door's locked, can I?"
Anya shoots to her feet, spilling a flustered, “Sorry!" She pushes the latch down, her shoulders a little hunched, watching the locked sign vanish.
Normally she didn't have medbay locked so anyone could enter at any time, but recently…
Anya shakes her head.
Swansea greets her, face scrunched as usual. “So how is he?" He gestures with his chin to the Captain.
Anya sighs, "He's… he's been getting sleep for the past couple of hours, but it keeps getting disturbed by nightmares…” She throws a glance to make sures he's still sound asleep. To her relief, his eyes haven't opened; he's still, except for the movement of his chest.
"Nightmares? Since when were they a thing?" Swansea's frown grows deeper.
She knows since when, but she shouldn't delve without Curly's permission. But… the Captain wasn't entirely stable, and she does think someone else knowing some of the situation would be helpful just in case….
“I'm not entirely sure. He didn't mention them in the Psyche eval, but he had a few between you bringing him in and now," she decides she'll wait. Once he's more coherent, Anya will ask more to determine the situation at hand.
Curly was already difficult to open up. The last thing she needed was for him to completely retreat.
“How's everyone else? Daisuke isn't too worried, is he?” Anya asks curiously, "I guess this isn't the intern experience he probably expected,” she tries to chuckle, but it comes out hollow.
“He ain't workin’ himself up or being a problem at least,” Swansea's derisive tone points to the one person that elicits it more than anyone else, and Anya feels her mouth sour.
“... Is Jimmy really worried?” Part of her expects so, and she expects him to be more irritated because of it. That seemed to be a thing with Jimmy; any emotion he felt seemed to lead right back to anger and the irritation tied to it, the annoyance that surged before anything else like a warning light.
"Pah! If only, then he'd finally stop chewing my ear off ol’ Curly going off the handles or how he'd need to spend a few nights without some beauty sleep thanks to Cap over there," Swansea spits the words like a particularly distasteful swig of mouthwash, “Only other time he's talkin’ is to yap about being Captain if Curly doesn't recover. Would it really kill ‘im to show some concern?"
Anya rubs at her arm, frowning. Another part of her saw this coming, because Jimmy hadn't shown much concern when Curly first started deteriorating, not since the first night. Since then she hasn't seen much of them together, but any time the Captain and copilot did stand side by side there was a subtle, shifted weight towards Jimmy, a very obvious fear in Curly's locked shoulders.
Swansea mutters more derisive, very colourful words towards Jimmy. Then his brow raises, "What's with the bandages?” a hint of real concern finally surfaces through the mechanic's gruff tone. Anya knows Swansea isn't fond of outright declaring his worry the way she, Daisuke and Curly did, so she's aware that it's really not a good sign for Swansea of all people to outwardly show that concern.
Anya feels her shoulders tense a little, her expression dropping into sombre contemplation. "I don't know where they came from, but there were some scratches on his arms,” ‘some’ was an understatement, “I'm hoping he fell and just forgot to tell me.”
The mechanic clicks his tongue, "The Tulpar ain't exactly the newest model in a long line of ships, she's old and her walls might as well be paper thin. One of us woulda heard a nasty tumble,” the dip into a grumble tells Anya Swansea is headed exactly for what she assumed.
“We don't know anything yet," Anya quickly reassures, “It could have happened at night while we were all asleep—you know the Captain's been up more often than not, and that could have caused him to be careless.”
She hopes she's right. She can only hope but Curly's deteriorating mental state points her towards Swansea's line of thinking.
Still, Anya will wait until she knows more. Slow and steady wins the race, was the saying wasn't it? She just needs to be patient, offer the Captain a place to exist, one he can learn to trust. That's her job as a nurse.
And she won't fail.
A sigh takes her attention back to Swansea, "Still the same Captain, huh? Bottling it all up as if we can't see a darn thing.”
Anya finds herself smiling sadly, giving their Captain a once over, “Isn't that right…"
Swansea rubs his forehead while Anya sits in the silence of their mutual worry.
-
He's still missing hands and feet. He's still missing skin and his hair.
He's still a burnt corpse outliving his expectancy. He's still clinging to a dreadful, pain filled life against his will.
He's still alive and in so, so much pain.
He's still in medbay, going insane over the sunset that burns his eye, slowly forgetting the colours of the walls before that ugly red permanently stained everything.
He's still trapped.
And he's still unwanted, forgotten, no longer a person in anyone's eyes.
Anya barely looks at him anymore. It's been months, at least he thinks. It's not like anyone kept him up to date now, and it's not like his ears were as sharp as they used to be. Maybe he should have expected this earlier, should have appreciated the miracle that was Anya still talking and looking at him almost every day, despite it all.
He blinks awake to a ceiling, blue light by his side, so sleep-addled Curly doesn't even realise he shouldn't be able to blink.
Except he can, and he has hands and bandaged arms, and feet clad in his favourite boots, and skin and hair curling around his face.
Curly blinks again. The walls of medbay are a dull beige. That was their colour, right? Just a plain stone beige… or a red tinted beige that couldn't be traced to its original colour. Maybe he's making it up. He'd only seen red for so long, any other colour had lost meaning without a bloody hue.
His eyes are heavy. It's hard to keep them open. Through his lashes, the walls look dampened in crimson. Maybe they don't. Can he even trust his eyes? He hadn't blinked in so long, everything had started to blur when eyedrops ran out.
His eyes flit to the screen. It's blue. Blue skies, fluffy white clouds, so obviously pixelated it was a mockery of what day looked like back home.
It's blue, not red, not a bleeding sunset. He has hands. He has feet. He has eyelids. He can blink.
He's in medbay. And a shadow looks over him.
The panic surges like a great tidal wave drowning him.
His mouth moves before his brain, a cry escaping the tip of his tongue. The panic only festers, coiling around his organs with tiny little thorns pricking him numb.
Curly throws an arm up at the shadow. He does it before he can think. He can move, so he does.
Ignoring the light pull on his right arm, Curly rolls off the strangely dry cot (it was always marinating in his blood) to the floor. He falls with a nasty impact that travels from his jaw to his skull, reverberating through his body in aches. The prick on his arm leaks warmth.
Curly ignores it all, ignores the livid calls for him as he reaches for the door. He bangs on it, cries locked behind his clenched jaw. Tears stream down his face as he bangs on metal and begs for escape, for safety away from Jimmy, for a single moment to breathe peacefully—
“Curly!!" Hands manage to catch him moving arms. He thrashes in Jimmy's grip to no avail. He's stronger than Jimmy but his body falls flack like it knows his fate, knows down to his core there's no fighting back. He tenses on instinct.
Nothing comes. Just his own laboured breathing, his quiet cries.
Jimmy grip slackens to hold his hands instead of his burning wrists, "It's okay, Curly, you're okay,” he says soothingly, so mockingly soft as he prepares to put Curly through agony just for existing, for reasons he'll never be able to understand.
"You're okay, it's just me, Anya.” Curly peeks through his shut eyelids. The silhouette had longer hair than Jimmy. It's as tall as him but shaped differently, and her eyes are much kinder than Jimmy's and her hands… her hands squeeze softly, not razor sharp pain on his skin but a strong presence he slowly feels more and more, breaking through his body's panic.
“... Anya?" Her name slips as a slurred mumble. Exhaustion hits him like a truck. He leans almost all his weight on the door, breathing like he's ran a marathon.
Anya nods encouragingly, “Yes, it's me, you're okay, you're safe now."
Curly blinks his tears away. His breathing slows to quiet sniffling. Bit by bit, his body returns to him: hands in Anya's, feet on the floor, hair on his scalp, eyelids over his watery eyes.
Right, another nightmare. All just a nightmare, always the nightmare.
Except this is the first time he's woken up in medbay. The thought leaves an anxious stinging threatening to raise his heart rate. Why is he in medbay?!
"Are you okay? Do you need some space?”
Curly shakes his head. It's selfish but he needs her grip now. He needs her to ground him, or maybe he'll start zoning out, and he doesn't really want that.
"Okay.” Anya's hand comes up to rub circles on his back, at a rhythm his breathing falls in line with.
Curly rubs away the remaining tears from his face, “Sorry…” he mumbles, pathetically small. A rush of shame fills him. He just had a nightmare in front of Anya, and he'd panicked like she was Jimmy, even then it wasn't like Jimmy would have done anything…
“It's okay," the nurse reassures, “You don't have to apologise.”
Curly shakes his head. She's always too kind to him.
"Should we move to the desk?”
Curly shakes his head again. His legs don't feel stable enough to carry his own weight. He barely managed on a good day without stumbling around.
“Okay, we'll stay here, but I need to treat your arms, alright? The i.v came off when you fell," she holds up his bandaged—bandaged?
Curly stares at his forearms covered in white. The bandages wrapped around them bite his skin constantly. Their rough texture grates, peeling his skin off, and it makes his heart constrict. He has flesh and skin but the bandages soak in his blood, and he hates it hates it hates it hates it—
"Curly? What's wrong?” he barely registers her words. All he thinks about is scratching them off, ripping the bandages from his skin.
He does just that.
“Curly! Sto—” Anya grabs his hands mid action. He flinches, arms up before she even moves. His heart races in the silence between them.
Through his arms, Anya's face crumbles a little, "I'm sorry Curly, I didn't mean to scare you…” her voice fades as she retreats from him.
Guilt twists viciously. Curly gnaws on his lip, “No, I–I’m the one who should be sorry!” He keeps reacting like it's all real and his body keeps remembering when he denied it and he doesn't know why!
(He does know… he does know.
"You can't deny it much longer, can you?”)
“It's okay, you don't have to apologise." she's always reassuring him while he crumbles over nothing. What kind of Captain is he?
"I'm… I don't know what's wrong with me…” spills from his gut with a tiny sob, “I don't…” tears start pressing behind his eyes. He's had enough of crying, but still his shoulders shake.
Anya doesn't say anything, just leans in a little to rub his back again, next to him on the door.
The space to cry makes his quiet whimpers deafening. Curly tries desperately to bite them back. They're too loud in the silence: maybe Jimmy will hear them and—
Curly shakes his head. Just a nightmare. Jimmy wouldn't do that. He wouldn't… All. Just. A. Nightmare.
"We don't have to talk yet," Anya begins once his muddled sobs died down into sniffles, “But can I at least treat your arms?"
Curly nods absently. He finds himself rocking a bit, hoping the rhythmic swaying can calm the racing of his heart.
When Anya takes his arm into her hands, unwrapping the bandages, the horror dawns on him very abruptly, so visceral he snatches his arms, "Anya–it’s, I can—I can explain! This isn't—it’s—” he chokes on each attempt to explain, stuck words forming a lump in his throat.
“It's okay, Curly. I just want to treat the cut the i.v left. You can explain after, okay?" She holds her hands out placatingly. Her eyes don't hold a single hint of disdain. Curly keeps searching just in case, but all that greets him is confidence born from professionalism.
Anya's an amazing nurse, he thinks tearfully, she'll make a great doctor. He's not sure why it overwhelms him.
(He does know… he does…)
Hesitantly, he extends the arm with tiny rivulets of blood.
Anya works quietly and efficiently. She wipes the blood off and cleans the cut, one among many others, sharper than the rest. Curly barely flinches, letting the stings wash over his arm numbly. The nurse’s eyes are trained on him from the corner of her gaze. She unwraps the other to do the same. He still barely reacts, barely feels the pain of each scratch.
She's about to rewrap them when Curly retracts his arms, “What's wrong?"
Curly's lips quiver. “N-no bandages. Please," he manages, shaking his head.
“Why not?" Anya asks gently. The white rolls in her hands look innocent.
His skin prickles.
Curly wordlessly shakes his head, eyes clenched shut, a few tears escaping, "Can't… don't want bandages…” if he says the reason out loud he'll crumble, so he shuts it in the back of his mind with the nightmare.
Anya relents to his request. “Okay, can we do plasters instead? Only on the ones that look fresh. I don't want to risk them getting worse," she rummages for those plasters somewhere to his right.
Curly contemplates whether the tiny things will be any better. His skin is both strangely sensitive and numb at times. He doesn't want anything, really. But he doesn't want to freak out Anya anymore. He doesn't even know what he's supposed to say when she finally asks, “... Okay," he offers the small, meagre agreement as a fading whisper.
Anya catches it, smiling, “Thank you,” she takes two boxes, her lips quirking into a more wry grin, “Want Pony Express's exclusive Poelle plasters or the regular ones?”
That managed to ease the tight coil around his chest, dragging out a small laugh, “I'll take the regular ones. Save the Poelle ones for Daisuke, heard he's a fan."
“He does prefer them, ‘The others are just so boring’ he always says,” putting in her best Daisuke impression, Anya exaggeratedly waves the regular ‘boring’ plasters around. Curly laughs again, shoulders falling slack. She crouches down by his side again. The bandages have all but fallen from his arms in lightly red tinted heaps.
She applies them gently, smoothing each one until a patchwork of plasters cover his arms. Curly quickly slides them into his sleeve, no matter how suffocating the way the denim grated over his skin was, zipping it to just under his collarbone where it always sits.
She keeps giving him silence. It's patience, and yet it prompts him to fill, lest they sit in such a tense atmosphere that Curly can barely breathe in.
A cold bead of sweat drips down his face.
“I'm…” Curly starts, the word faint, lungs almost empty, "It wasn't on purpose…"
Anya nods.
“I keep having this nightmare… where I don't have hands and legs,” and every time he woke up, it was still the same, "When I open my eyes I have them, but I can't feel them, and I start scratching out of panic, until I can feel them again. It always takes pain… I didn't—I didn't want to worry you, and it wasn't that bad anyways…" It wasn't that bad because his body barely reacts to pain, but Curly doesn't think about why anymore.
Anya's face twists, “Oh Curly… worrying is my job. I would have bandaged them even if you didn't want to tell me,” her tone takes a pitiful turn.
He curls into a ball, "I know, I know you would. But I—" ‘I don't deserve it.’
(Why?)
“Please," he whispers, finally meeting her sorrowful gaze with his own desperate one, "Please don't tell anyone. I don't want them worrying.”
He doesn't want Jimmy thinking he's crazier than he already is. He can barely stand to be near his friend, let alone when all his sharply edged jokes always cut into him, and Curly would have to laugh it off like it was nothing but he bled and bled and bled.
“Okay," Anya promises, “I won't. But please come to me if it gets worse, okay? It was lucky you didn't get infected. That's something Pony Express barely accounted for, and the last thing we need is our Captain out of commission,” she gives him a half hearted smile that he tries to return.
His face always feels stretched taut when he smiles. It drops a second later.
"Curly…” Anya starts low, like she knows it'll be something he wants to avoid.
The hairs on his skin prickle.
"You said you've been having nightmares.”
He nods slowly.
"Would you still rather not talk about them?”
Curly sighs, "I… I know you're worried.”
"Incredibly so," Anya echoes, her tone light but worried, “All I want is to help. You were hallucinating in the cockpit and you've been out for almost 3 days from the lack of sleep."
Curly's eyes widen, “3 days?!” It sort of makes sense why he feels more rested than ever, but even then exhaustion still clings bone deep.
"And I'm worried about your eating too. Since that night, things have been different and I'm worried. We all are. I just want to help,”
His gut twists, a bundle of nerves alighting in his chest.
"Is there anything I can do? At all?” her tone is firm but she pleads nonetheless. Her gaze shines earnestly.
He looks into glimmering dark orbs and almost crumbles, the words on the tip of his tongue. He wants her help. He wants to confess it all, the urge to apologise overwhelming him in a great tidal surge, no real reason behind unless he stopped deluding himself.
But he can't. He doesn't want to acknowledge it, and even if he ever did - even if there ever was undeniable evidence - he wouldn't have the right anyway. Not when he failed the crew so miserably.
Curly shakes his head, "I'm okay. I just–" what did he need? What could ever fix this? “–need time. I–I’m all rested yeah? Then I'm gonna go back to the cockpit,” he gets up on unsteady legs, feeling for the latch and swinging it up. He leaves hurriedly, without a glance back.
But Anya's words lance through him anyway, "Curly… please open up to me. I'm here for you, that's what friends are for…" the plea in her voice resonates deeply.
Friends… friends are there for each other. Friends listen without judgement. They're kind and patient. They're fun to be around. They're nice. They're loving.
They're all the things Anya always is.
(“You don't deserve her," the shadows of his nightmare says.)
They're all things Jimmy dangled above his head unless he was good enough.
("He's all I have…” the voice of his past says, alone in his apartment.)
Curly shuts the medbay door, heart constricting at the crestfallen expression on Anya's face.
-
He rushes to the cockpit on wobbly steps. He's been horizontal for almost 3 days and he's really feeling it.
He almost breaks into a run. His heart pumps fear instead of exertion. He dreads what Jimmy will say, or his building irritation if he rests any longer. He's already made Jimmy work 3 days with no support. Any longer and he'd be a bad Captain.
Curly almost rips the door open when he throws it open.
It's all green. He'd expected that. He hasn't seen red or felt like the ship was rocking in heavy turbulence, or anything of the sort.
Everything is fine, see?
“Jim," Curly swallows, a bead of sweat trailing down his face.
Jimmy turns back slowly, deep eye bags under his eyes, “Well, looks who's finally up? You finally get enough sleep, sleeping beauty?"
Curly's mouth dries almost instantly, “Uh…” he licks his lips as he searches for the words.
Jimmy continues for him, “Was this some kind of “get out of work” ploy? Cuz if so, your acting’s impeccable. Had me thinking you were insane.” He barks a laugh that rings in Curly's ears.
“No, I… I really was exhausted. Can't barely sleep at night. Just stare at the night time screen,” Curly voice dies down the more Jimmy's smirk dims. His hands grip the doorframe, almost holding himself up on it.
Jimmy raises an eyebrow, "You're serious? You really did hallucinate the nurse? That's comedy! You sure you don't like her?"
“Yes, I'm sure," Curly firmly manages. Anya is his friend (he doesn't deserve), "I'm here… you can, you can go rest now. I know it's been a while, “ he swallows, "Sorry…"
Jimmy stretches in his chair, “Yeah, guess I am exhausted. I'm only getting 2 and a half hours since I'm covering your shifts too. Welp,” he gets up slowly like he's heaving his own weight. Curly thinks 2 and a half hours is a gift and a miracle, because if he ever sleeps that long he's always graced with a nightmare.
On the way out, Jimmy pats his shoulder, "Get yourself together, will you? The crews relying on you.”
Coming from Jimmy's mouth, it's the closest he'll ever get to "Are you okay?” And somehow, it still doesn't sound like it.
Curly forces a smile, “Yeah, don't worry about me."
“Kinda hard to when all you do is freak everyone out these days," Jimmy retorts carelessly. Curly's smile cracks. “Well, I'm off."
“Bye" is stuck in his throat, locked behind his grinding teeth.
Curly shuts the door the moment Jimmy is out of his vicinity. He leans on it for support, legs shaking and heart racing.
The cockpit lights are green. The ship is on course. Everything is safe. There's no reason to doubt Jimmy.
Everything's fine.
(Somehow, he doubts that more than ever.)
-
“Hey cap, I've been meaning to ask," it's the first time in a while he's sat at the table with them. The couch is easier to deal with but Anya had beckoned him over after hours in the cockpit and he couldn't find it in himself to say no, “You okay?”
Curly smiles at Daisuke reassuringly, or at least he hopes he does, "Yeah, I'm alright, don't worry about me. Got enough sleep for a week at least, “He winks at the intern while adjusting his sleeves more comfortably to eat. The plasters itched.
"Oh, good to know! Last time I saw you you looked like a zombie."
“Yeah, a zombie with Cap’s perfect hair,” Anya chuckles, and Curly feels the weight of every gaze loosen a little, "How do you do it? And if you say just a bar of soap–”
"What else can I say Anya? That an alien does my hair for me? I really do use whatever’s there," he smiles innocently at her jokingly strained smile.
No one needs to know how much time he spent at shops reading each and every label of shampoo and conditioner bottles. His hair took effort to maintain, not that he'd been doing a good job recently…
Curly absent-mindedly twirls a blond curl through his fingers.
"Yeah?” Jimmy's voice immediately burns away any jovial atmosphere at the table, "What's with the plasters on your arms?"
His heartbeat pulses in his ears like a gong, "... What?"
Jimmy gestures with his chin, “Those." His eyes latch onto the dull plasters clamped around his arms, faint traces of red and scratches peeking through.
Curly yanks his sleeves down. His breath catches behind the lump in his throat, eyes darting around to gauge their expressions.
Jimmy's patiently waiting for an answer to jump on; Swansea's concerned, as concerned as his grouchy face ever showed; Daisuke's worried; Anya's calculating, face deep in thought.
"Uh…” is all he manages, which is a Stella explanation, surely Jimmy will buy that and leave him be instead of prodding until Curly gives like putty, and then later regrets his honesty that's twisted for the copilot's convenience, “I uh…"
The real answer sits on his tongue like a hot lump of coal, ash-y and burning.
“Oh! That,” Anya enunciates very casually, a practised smile plastered on, “That was a few nights ago, Cap tumbled down the stairs to the cockpit and utility, and he waited until a few days ago to tell," she fives him an exaggerated eye roll that really begs him to play along.
Curly nods along quickly, "Y-yeah! I was tired and missed a step at the top, and ha!" He forced a laugh that grates his throat like rock, “Took a nasty fall. Got some bruises everywhere." He hopes the anxious pounding in his chest doesn't translate to his voice.
Daisuke blinks cluelessly, “Really? I mean the Tulpar's kinda old, you'd think we'd hea—uh! Yeah! I remember hearing it!” The intern rushes to amend at Anya's harsh elbow digging right into his ribs, “Damn cap, you gotta be more careful! Haha!"
Curly keeps nodding, his face stretching tighter every second a pair of distrusting eyes scrutinise him, “Yep."
Swansea eyes them all warily before adding, “Gotta nicer to the ol’ Tulpar than that, Curls. She's much older than you, and she can't recover like you can."
A rush of relief floods him, "Yeah, you're right. But the Tulpar's pretty resilient herself,” he hasn't piloted her for 10 years but he'd been on this awfully long ride with her all this time, doing all sorts of jobs before finally sitting in that cockpit chair. She's tough, despite being an older model.
(‘Surviving even a crash’ comes the macabre thought. Curly erases it immediately.)
"... I see,” Jimmy finally says. Curly can tell the way his jaw clenches means he has more to say. He plays that for once, for once Jimmy will keep it to himself, will scratch away at Curly later when he might have the energy.
And for once, his prayers are answered.
It feels like a miracle.
(A miracle to offset the real horror about to drown him…)
-
Day 140 of 382.
It would usually be Curly and Jimmy piloting, watching over their steady course, but Jimmy's still recovering from his impromptu stint as solo pilot.
So Curly sits alone when he receives a message. As he should be anyways, for such an urgent one.
(Something feels off… the words on the screen - all green and safe - read like an omen to him.)
The fax prints it out.
Curly stares, a single bead of sweat paving an icy path down his cheek. The air feels thinner.
(Something's not right…)
He turns in his chair to get it. He just needs to get up, pick it up in strangely sweaty hands and read each ink-dtted word.
(“You've known this has been coming for a while, haven't you?" She whispers in his ears, her shadow on the wall.)
Curly gets up slowly. He swallows, hand reaching, wading through thick, tense air suffused with his silent, growing panic.
(The date is 140 of 382 days… the crash occurred on day 147… and a week before, they all got…)
"We are very sorry to inform you that, due to the company shutting down, you have all effectively been fired. As Captain, you are expected to–”
Curly doesn't bother reading anymore.
He stands there, shaking, gasping, dripping cold sweat, suddenly accosted by his ‘nightmare’, reliving it all.
Hot white engulfing him—
His skinless stubs, always in pain, all around the clock—
Her soft, melancholic voice digging through his ravaged eardrums just to reach him—
His hands on his skin like razor blades—
His blood trailing after his slow, painfully crawl—
In his arms, on the table, surrounded by dead crewmates as he talked and talked and talked—
The knife in his leg—
Ice on his limbs, the cryopod fogging…
“I warned you, Captain," she says, just a shadow sat on the copilot seat.
Curly clutches his head, screaming.
It was all real.