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Vespa knew Steel was up to something.
She didn’t know how she knew (yes she did. It was her shitty brain that sent all the wrong signals at all the wrong times), but she knew. He’d been acting strangely for days now, opening his mouth like he had something to say every time they sat down for a family meal.
Rule of the ship was that everyone needed to eat together, but whatever you ate was up to you. No one used the kitchen for anything other than a place to sit down except Vespa and Sikuliaq. Everyone else was living off of energy bars and microwave meals as far as she could tell.
Ransom had weird eating habits, usually squirreling away whatever food he could get his hands on and eating it at...some point, Vespa assumed. She didn’t think she’d ever seen him take a bite of anything when they were all sitting at the kitchen table. Rita loaded the cargo hold with boxes and boxes of shitty processed food that Vespa didn’t think she should be eating so much of as the resident doctor, but she doubted she could convince her to stop. Sikuliaq cooked pretty regularly, although she’d never seen him make anything more complicated than what she cooked for herself. Buddy didn’t eat anymore, of course. And Steel....
Steel was acting weird. He had the same shitty processed food as Rita, but he ate it like it held some sort of answer to a problem he wasn’t keen on sharing.Every time the microwave beeped, she could hear his over dramatic sigh. And, of course, there was the expression like a frog was caught in his throat and he wouldn’t be happy until it jumped out onto the kitchen table, ready to interrupt whatever conversation they were trying to have.
Vespa didn’t know what to make of it. It rang every alarm bell in her head and set off sirens in her heart. Until he actually came out and said what had him staring forlornly at his macaroni like it killed his grandmother, Vespa wasn’t sure what she could do besides prepare for the worst (like always.)
Then, finally, it ate away at enough of Steel’s nerves that he opened his mouth and real words came out instead of the wistful breath he always held at dinner. “I know how to cook,” he said, almost strangled.
The activity in the kitchen paused. Vespa was glad she wasn’t the only one that didn’t seem to know what to make of that.
Buddy broke the silence first. She raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow and said, “Good for you, darling. Does this, perhaps, have anything to do with whatever thought has so obviously plagued you at every family meal?”
“It’s not—” Juno started indignantly, but he cut himself off, “Fine, whatever. Yeah, I guess. I just wanted to say that I can cook so, you know, maybe I could cook—for everyone. On fam—during meal times. Because I know how.”
If the activity had briefly paused before, it came to a dead stop at those words. The silence stretched on for a few seconds before Rita opened her mouth and shouted, “Mistah Steel! You’re gonna cook for us? Oh, that one time you made that pasta with the red sauce for me was so good! I remember thinking, ‘Wow, I didn’t know the boss could cook’ but you could and it didn’t taste like garbage—which, let’s be real, I expected a little bit because you ain’t exactly always taken good care of yourself but—”
Juno grunted, cutting her off, “Yeah, Rita, I wanna cook. Official Carte Blanche chef, or whatever.”
Buddy’s eyes twinkled, Vespa couldn’t tell why.
“Well, that sounds lovely, Juno. It’d be nice for those of our crew who eat to have meals to look forward to.”
“Listen I know I don’t—wait, did you say yes?”
“Yes,” Buddy laughed, “You can start by making dinner tomorrow. Vespa and I will even do a grocery run in the morning while we’re docked. Just write up a list.” She squeezed Vespa’s hand as she said it, and Vespa knew what she was doing. Buddy was finding an excuse for them to have some alone time exploring planetside before they would be stuck on a ship for the next two weeks while they travel. She felt the objections she might’ve had (but why would she object in the first place?) die in her throat. Alone time with Buddy sounded good.
Steel cooking their meals from now on, though...something about that didn’t sit right with her.
The conversation carried on. Ransom said something about introducing a request system and Steel started listing what he actually knew how to cook in the first place. Vespa tuned it out. She tried to keep herself focused on Buddy’s hand in hers, grounding her. A few voices drifted through the kitchen, but she ignored them. Buddy’s fingers were smooth and short, with square-tipped nails that were gently massaging into her palm.
Touching Buddy, being touched by Buddy meant she didn’t have to think about the pit of acidic anxiety swirling around in her gut at the thought of Juno Steel making all of their food. It wasn’t a big deal. It didn’t actually matter. Bud thought it was a good idea and Vespa trusted her. But something about the situation sat about as easy on her mind as a caffeinated mosquito. Her thoughts were trying to jump to twelve different conclusions that all ended with Buddy and her dead in two day’s time, but she wouldn’t let it. She refused to let it.
Paranoia pays sometimes, but not like this. Not when she couldn’t think of any real reason Steel would have to pull a stunt that left the crew dead when he, Rita, and Ransom would all be eating his food too. It didn’t make sense and when things didn’t make sense, Vespa had two options: trust the gut that got her thrown off a highscraper fifteen years ago—the gut that was so twisted up in shit that it made up new sensations for her to be scared about—or trust the quiet, logical voice in her mind that sounded suspiciously like Buddy Aurinko, telling her that things were going to be alright.
So Vespa swallowed the lump in her throat and ran her free hand through her hair. She tugged lightly at the locks to lock her body into the feeling. She was fine. This was fine. Everything was going to be fine.
Yeah, like she believed that.
—
It was fine, for a little bit.
Steel made dinner every night, and every morning Vespa and Buddy woke up alive. He didn’t give any more indication of acting weird, probably because he’d finally gotten what he wanted. Vespa just couldn’t figure out why he’d wanted it. Every time she lifted her fork her mind tried to puzzle out a motivation that didn’t involve a murderous streak he was hiding.
But at the same time, even when him trying to poison the entire crew felt like a foregone conclusion, she couldn’t figure out why. Why go through the trouble of lulling them into a false sense of security with fresh meals if he was planning on taking everyone out? If it was an assasination attempt, it was a sloppy one. He’d have to get them all at once, which meant whatever poison he used needed to act faster than Vespa could feasibly treat. A tall order, considering how prepared she was for the possibility. And then what? Steel couldn’t even fly the ship, what was his plan from there?
He could be working with someone, her brain supplied, You thought it was Ransom, but maybe that relationship is just a cover. The words sounded tempting, and that’s how Vespa knew she was in deep. Buddy had told her before that even with Ransom being suspicious as all hell, it was obvious his feelings for Steel—and Steel’s feelings for him—were real. Their relationship wasn’t something she needed to call into question.
That’s what she tried to tell herself at least. It wasn’t going well. Because she couldn’t convince herself of any other possibility besides Steel’s complete betrayal of everyone’s trus, including the thief. It wasn’t even the most viable option. It was much more likely that he’d poison Vespa, Buddy, and Jet and run off with Rita and Ransom (who, she assumed, could actually make a getaway). After all, he clung to those two like a barnacle. Even on the rare thought spiral that she was able to accept that he was faking things with Ransom, Rita was an entirely new factor. She couldn’t think of a logical reason why Steel would ever betray the hacker.
But that’s the thing, huh. Her brain didn’t need a logical reason. Her mind didn’t concern itself with motive or sense. The only thing that mattered was conviction, and Vespa was completely convinced of Steel’s plan. He was going to poison the crew and probably throw their bodies out the airlock so no one would ever find them.
He’d get away with it too. There was no one left to mourn a single person on the Carte Blanche besides each other. Or, if there was, Vespa had never heard about them. She knew Ransom didn’t do personal attachments, Sikuliaq had Buddy and Buddy had Vespa and Sikuliaq. Rita was a mystery, but Vespa figured if Rita had someone out there besides Steel then she never would’ve shut up about them by now. They were a lonely bunch, and Steel was planning to take advantage of that, she was sure of it.
She didn’t share her suspicions with anyone, not even Buddy. The idea of Steel overhearing somehow and deciding to make his move terrified her more than eating his food in the first place. Family dinners continued as scheduled and Vespa held back a wince and a shout every time someone shoveled a fork into their mouth.
A part of her, unrelated to the turmoil going on in her head, knew that she was being ridiculous and unfair. The logical Buddy Aurinko that lived in her thoughts told her that her worries were unfounded and would continue to be the longer Steel cooked and no one died. The only reason she hadn’t flipped the kitchen table or dumped a pot of his soup down the drain was because of that voice. The rest of her wasn’t helping, though. Exactly the opposite actually.
She’d hear Steel talking about his plans in the halls, but when she’d turn the corner, no one would be there. She’d catch his stupid fucking laugh in her head every time Buddy’s throat bobbed in a swallow, but no one else reacted to it so she assumed that wasn’t real either. It was confusing. Her gut kept pointing to all this evidence of whatever he was trying to do, but she kept trying to convince herself out of believing any of it. It made her head ache and her sleep schedule nonexistent.
Worst of all, Buddy was starting to notice that something was wrong. It took her a few days, but Vespa couldn’t hide the fact that she wasn’t doing good forever. They slept in the same bed, after all, it didn’t take a genius to figure out that Vespa wasn’t catching a wink.
Buddy kept trying to...talk to her about it. And Vespa kept almost saying something before that fear clutched her heart and made her consider all the ways Steel could be listening in. No, she couldn’t confess what her brain was doing, because she couldn’t risk Buddy’s life like that.
Keeping her mouth shut didn’t exactly end up going as planned, however.
It all came to a head a week after Steel had requested to cook for everyone. Tonight’s meal was spaghetti, which Rita had specifically asked for. The minute Vespa had entered the kitchen, she was on edge. The huge pot of noodles squirmed like worms and the sauce looked too much like blood for her liking. Tonight, her mind said, whatever he’s trying to do, he’s going to do it tonight.
Like everything, it didn’t make sense. Why tonight? There was nothing special about this particular Saturday. Still, she couldn’t let the conviction go. The voices that usually drifted in and out of earshot while she ate all seemed to be detailing the ways she was going to die soon. Even Buddy’s voice—fake Buddy, hallucination Buddy, she reminded herself—got graphic about the effects of a poison Vespa had used on three of her previous targets.
With the conversation continuing around the dinner table while she heard descriptions of every way her organs could fail, it all became too much. Ten minutes into the meal, a voice she’d never heard before said, “You aren’t ready for Buddy’s death, Vespa.” And she knew they were right.
She stood suddenly, unable to control her shaking legs. Voices started overlapping unpleasantly. Someone was asking if she was okay, but she couldn’t tell if it was real or not. The pot of noodles continued to writhe and twist as if it were alive and suddenly the sauce didn’t just look like blood—it was blood. A huge vat of it shining with whatever shit Steel had decided to stuff into it. She couldn’t take it anymore.
Vespa growled low in her throat, bringing a hand to cover her left ear and grabbing the edge of the table with her right. She tipped it so that the noodles and the sauce pots went flying to the floor, spilling all over the ground of the kitchen and bubbling like acid. For a second, everyone’s voices were too jumbled up with the ones playing in her head, but after a few moments they came back into clarity.
Buddy was holding her hand, she realized as she tried to bring it up to cover her other ear.
“Vespa? Vespa, dear, are you alright? Can you hear me?”
The rest of the crew were talking too, but their voices didn’t matter. Not when Buddy Aurinko sounded so worried in her right ear. She took her left hand away so that she could hear properly. She needed to say something but she wasn’t sure how to explain Steel’s plan when she was so fuzzy on the details herself.
“He was gonna kill you, Bud,” she said. It came out raspy and quiet but the words fell from her lips like a bomb. “He was gonna kill all of us.”
“Who?” Buddy asked. She didn’t sound angry, just confused. Everyone else had finally shut up.
Vespa growled with a ferocity that had been bubbling inside her for days.
“Steel. He’s been planning something, I know it! Just biding his time before he feeds us all our deaths.” She looked away from Buddy and turned her most seething glare on Steel, who was doing a good job of playing the confused idiot. “Well, you can’t fool me. I knew it all along and I won’t let you hurt Buddy, or—or anyone on this ship.”
Steel’s expression gaped. He was a better actor than she’d thought.
“Wh—Vespa, what the hell are you talking about?”
Buddy squeezed her palm lightly. The pressure only made her flinch.
“I’m inclined to agree, darling. What’s going on?”
“I just said. Steel’s been planning on poisoning our food for a week and tonight he finally did it. I’m gonna need everyone to puke it up before it’s too late. I think I’ve got equipment to pump stomachs if we need it, but I’d rather not have to use it. We can’t let him win, god damn it!”
“Vespa, I’m not—”
“Can it, Steel,” she growled again, “I don’t wanna hear it. I haven’t figured you out yet, but that doesn’t mean I’m gonna let you get away with this.”
Buddy’s other hand came to rest on her shoulder and all at once, the world seemed to skip a frame before settling back into clarity. Vespa felt the tension start to leech from her body. No one had moved to apprehend Steel or start throwing their dinner up. Actually, no one even looked sick. There weren't any outward signs of any of them being poisoned.
“Vespa,” Buddy said, concern crackling through her voice, “I think you might be...misled.”
“No,” she shook her head, “No, no, I know it’s happening. You gotta believe me, Bud.”
But Buddy simply lifted her hand to brush at Vespa’s hair. She pushed a stray piece behind Vespa’s ear with a soft breath.
“ How do you know, Vespa? What evidence do you have?” Her voice was as gentle and placid as the lakes Vespa never got to see growing up. Where she was from, the only bodies of water were the swamps that never seemed to quiet down. Placid, maybe, but never gentle. Not when you didn’t know what could be lurking in the water to pull you in if you weren’t careful.
“I—” Vespa cut herself off, “I don’t—it’s just a feeling, but—but—” She stopped. The entire crew was staring at her, all with the expression she’d gotten to know well in the past few years. A mix of pity and confusion and horror at what the crazy person was up to now. What silly thought could she not get out of her head this time?
Vespa breathed. She felt her shoulders hike up to her ears. She let go of Buddy’s hand. Her palm felt cold against the stiff, recycled air of the ship.
“Private time,” she said, voice harsh. “I need private time.” And then she stormed off.
She didn’t hear any footsteps following her.
—
Vespa sat in the shower with her knees against her chest for who knew how long. She was still fully dressed and the water wasn’t running, but it’d seemed like the best place to go to sort out the thoughts echoing in her brain. Her and Buddy’s room was filled with too many things that reminded Vespa of, well, her and Buddy. She needed to be completely alone right now, with not even the memory of a person fighting for her attention. And as annoying as some of her crewmates were, she knew that none of them would barge into the bathroom if the door was locked and the light was on.
She didn’t cry, although at one point she did dry-heave into the toilet for a few minutes and her eyes watered badly enough that she had to scrub them thoroughly with some toilet paper. A few bugs crawled under her skin while she sat under the dry shower head, but she dismissed them as the usual fare. The voices she heard were pleasantly silent. She really was alone.
Steel probably hadn’t been trying to poison them, she knew. She’d known it all along. She’d spent the past week trying to convince herself of it, for god’s sake. If only she’d been able to.
After that outburst, Vespa doubted she’d be allowed to work with the crew. Maybe they’d let her live on the ship still, but it was obvious she was a liability. Vespa Ilkay, who’s so fucked up she can’t even accept that someone is doing a nice thing because they want to. No, it’s gotta be poison and death and destruction because that’s all Vespa was. Different shades of the same shitty blood red.
Even now, even after all of that, Vespa still felt that conviction of Steel’s guilt tug at her heart. She half expected to hear the thump of bodies hitting the floor from the kitchen. Now’d be the perfect time for him to get everyone and run before Vespa had a chance of following him. He could probably make it to the escape pod before her.
But no bodies dropped and the only sound Vespa let herself be hyper aware of was the drops of water dripping from the sink one by one. Leaky faucet definitely needed to be fixed, especially when they were in space and had limited water supply. Sikuliaq could probably do it, maybe Buddy, she was always handy with a wrench.
Vespa didn’t want to think about Buddy right then. Vespa didn’t want to think about anything. Vespa didn’t want to exist right then. She wished she could dissolve into the grimy white tiles of the bathroom, just some more dirt rubbed into the grout. Maybe then, her stupid broken mind would shut up. She wished that she could shove it in a closet, lock the door, and never let it out. Chain it shut for good measure.
None of that was possible, though, so there Vespa sat.
Eventually, someone knocked on the door. Vespa let out an involuntary grumble, but cleared her throat and said gently, “Private time, Bud, I don’t wanna talk right now.”
Steel’s voice came muffled through the door. She tried not to jump, even though no one could see her. He sounded more hesitant than usual when he said, “Uh—it’s Juno.”
“What do you want?” She tried to sound angry, but even to her she sounded exhausted. Figures, he’d catch her at her weakest. Probably here to gloat. Maybe they’d sent him to break the news of her departure from the crew. Ugh. She didn’t want to hear his smug voice tell her anything, least of all that she was out of a job.
“I think—Well, Buddy thinks we should talk. About the whole...poison thing. To tell you the truth, I don’t really know what she wants either of us to say, and, frankly, talking about this kind of thing always feels like it gives me hives, but she’s the captain so I couldn’t exactly tell her no—I mean, that didn’t stop me, but she didn’t listen, and I’m trying to get better about...authority, so I figured—”
“I don’t care,” she cut him off, “go away. I’ll tell Buddy we talked tonight so she doesn’t hound me about it.”
“But—”
Vespa felt her voice grow more cold than weary. This conversation wasn’t going to go anywhere if she could help it.
“Steel. I don’t wanna hear it. Just leave.”
There was a long silence. She almost thought he’d managed to walk away without stomping down the hall in those boots of his when she heard the sound of the muffled thump of his back hitting the door and he said, “No.”
“What?”
“I know you’ve got your own stuff going on, but you accused me of trying to kill the entire crew and then ruined my spaghetti. I think maybe Buddy is onto something about us needing to talk.”
“My own stuff—” she repeated with a hollow laugh, “Look, do you want me to apologize? Because I’m not going to. Chalk it up to another shitty brain thing and let’s move on. I don’t see what there is to talk about.”
Steel’s voice was petulant when he said, “For starters, I worked hard on that spaghetti.”
“I don’t care about your stupid spaghetti—”
“But also—I don’t know—ways to stop you from thinking I’m trying to kill the crew, maybe? Something I can say so you don’t do the same thing to my jambalaya tomorrow, because that stuff’s too good to waste. Mick used to—” He cut himself off, “Whatever, the point is, I’d rather this...situation not happen again.” She heard him exhale through his teeth through the door, “Jesus, you know what I mean.”
Situation. Vespa was always a situation, huh? No matter what she did, it felt like she always ended up someone else’s problem. Maybe it would’ve been better if Steel had showed up to kick her out the airlock. At least then she wouldn’t have to worry about fucking up again.
“Yeah…” She rasped. Any fight she had left had sunk down the shower drain. She didn’t even know what she wanted anymore. “I know what you mean.”
Steel didn’t say anything to that. She heard him shuffling against the door a bit, and she heard him give another long sigh. A silence blanketed their corner of the Carte Blanche. Vespa could almost believe she was alone again, if the shadow of the sink hadn’t started morphing into a distinctly person-like shape. Great. She’d hoped her mind would show her some mercy, but it looked like her hallucinations didn’t want to leave her alone anymore. Just what she needed.
When the shadow person’s hand started forming into a knife, Steel’s voice came through the door again.
“Well?” He asked.
Vespa shook her head once, twice, three times. The shadow was a regular shadow again.
“Well, what?” She replied.
“How do we...stop this. From happening again.”
“I don’t know, Steel!” she exclaimed. Then, quieter, “I don’t fucking know. You think it would’ve happened in the first place if I knew how to stop it? Sometimes my brain just makes thoughts and I can’t shake them—even if they don’t make sense, I can’t listen to the reasons why. They make me do things, like it’s controlling me or something. I don’t know.” She snapped her mouth shut, realizing how much she’d said, how much ammo she’d given him.
But Steel’s voice didn’t sound any more cruel when he said, “Something putting thoughts in your head and controlling you, huh? I think I get what that’s like.”
She let out a laugh, high and reedy, “Yeah, right. What would you know about my...situation?”
“It’s not the same, but I—I had a run in with something like that. Controlled people, made them believe things and blocked out anything that contradicted it.” His voice was strangled, like he was forcing the words out of his throat. Vespa wasn’t sure why he was telling her this. Steel didn’t exactly seem like the sharing type. But he continued, “It—was awful. It hurt me and a lot of people. I’m—I’m sorry you have to deal with that.”
She didn’t know how to respond.
“Whatever,” she grumbled. “Doesn’t matter. There’s nothing to do to stop it. I’ve been trying to shut my mind up all week and look where that got us.”
“What if—” Steel started, his voice cracking a bit. He cleared his throat, “What if we make a system.”
“A system.” She said flatly.
“Yeah, like, I list all the ingredients in the stuff I cook somewhere. I’ll put it on the fridge or something. And you can buy all the groceries to make sure I don’t secretly get arsenic or whatever.”
“It sounds like you’re just trying to give me more chores, Steel.”
“No, that’s not—look, maybe it’ll help? I don’t wanna stop cooking, but I also don’t want you to think I’m gonna murder everyone again, so that’s the best I could think of, okay?” His voice took on a petulant tone once again. Vespa rolled her eyes, but the action felt unmistakably fond and she was glad he couldn’t see her right now.
After a moment, she said, “Fine.”
“Listen, I know it’s dumb but—wait, did you say fine?”
“Yeah,” she grunted, “Fine. We’ll do your dumb idea. See if it’ll help.”
She heard the thunk of his head hitting the door, like he’d let it drop behind him.
“Cool,” he said, “Let’s do that.”
More silence. A scream rang out from the other side of the far wall, but Vespa knew that all that was behind the bathroom was space, so she didn’t bother worrying about it. Slowly, she released the grip she had on her knees wrapped up to her chest. She let her legs bend forward as far as they could go in the small shower space. Steel was tapping his fingers on the door or something, or maybe the rhythmic thump s were just her mind playing tricks on her.
It felt like they were both waiting for the other to talk first, but she had no idea what she could say. Frankly, all she wanted right then was to curl up in bed and wait for Buddy to join her. She could almost feel Buddy’s arms around her, and she bit back a soft sigh at the thought of falling asleep wrapped in her embrace.
“Steel,” she said after a while, “Thanks.” The word almost got caught in her throat, but she forced it out.
Steel spluttered a little bit, “Uh-buh—Huh?” He cleared his throat, “You’re...welcome.”
“Now move your ass.”
“Yeah that’s more like it,” he sighed. “Private time?”
Vespa shook her head, even though he couldn’t see her.
“No, I’m going the fuck to sleep. I need you to stop blocking the door.” Pushing herself up to a standing position, she started shaking out her cramped legs.
“Oh! Yeah, I’ll—yeah.”
Steel stomped away from the door, so she reached out and hit the panel on the wall. It opened with a whoosh . Steel was still standing outside, looking at her with the most awkward expression she’d ever seen. With a scowl, Vespa asked, “Yes?”
“Goodnight,” he rubbed at the back of his neck, “Uh—sweet dreams.”
She nodded her head, unsure, “Yeah...goodnight.” And she started walking off towards her and Buddy’s quarters without another word.
Later that night, Buddy did join her, and she did hold her gently while Vespa breathed out the plan Steel had come up with to help stop her paranoia from getting the best of her again. She took it well, didn’t have any objections even though Vespa knew always assigning her grocery duty might become a pain in the ass in the future. They talked a bit more after that, not about anything more serious than the cafe they wanted to visit when they touched down on Callisto the next day.
Eventually, Buddy’s voice grew slow and sleepy, her words trailing off with one last yawn before Vespa could hear her snoring softly. Vespa smiled at the sound. What an incredible thing, to be able to fall asleep next to Buddy Aurinko every night.
That was Vespa’s last thought as she finally closed her eyes. Not the fact that she’d completely embarrassed herself, or that Steel might still be up to something, just how lucky she was that she still got to hear the sound of Buddy snoring at her side.