Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“You know, I don’t like that they call you that.”

Thirtytwo’s ears perked up and swiveled towards Alex, who had been sitting in the corner of the room and watching nem type away at their console. The Terran had seemed content to spend this work cycle just monitoring Thirtytwo in neir duties, and if ne hadn’t been used to this by now, it probably would have been more than a little anxiety-inducing to be watched by a predator species for so long. With those eerie, front-facing eyes, it was always pretty clear where he was staring.

Alex had been silent until now, just moments after Thirtytwo ended a call with one of the overseers.

“That they call me what?”

The Terran scowled, and Thirtytwo had repress the urge to shrink down against neir seat at the show of disapproval. “Drudge.”

Thirtytwo’s spines raised slightly in confusion, and ne turned in neir chair to fully face Alex. “That is… what I am, though.”

Alex huffed through his nose. “Yeah, but that’s not– you’re an individual, not just some faceless member of…” He seemed uncomfortable with stating the rest aloud. “You know.”

“The serving caste.” It didn’t bother Thirtytwo at all to be referred to by such; it was just a declaration of what ne had been born to do. It wasn’t quite clear to nem why this subject seemed to agitate Alex so much any time it came up.

“Yeah, that.” The words sounded flat and unhappy through Thirtytwo’s translator. “They won’t even let you have a real name.”

Now ne was really confused. “My designation is Vega-Bluelight-Drudge-32nd-Born-of-24th-Generation.”

“That’s not a name, that’s just what you are!"

Alex’s agitation was beginning to affect neir mood as well, triggering an extremely strong flight urge, and ne couldn’t help snapping back at him. “You aren’t making any sense! They’re the same thing!”

“Okay, okay, sorry. Look." He scrubbed a hand through the short, yellowish fur on the top of his head. "My name is Alex, right?”

Thirtytwo's ears flicked. "Alexander Marcus Sullivan Sol.” That had been on the crew briefing that was sent out before Alex had come on board for the first time. Pronouncing it was a little bit difficult, because neir translator didn't pick up those sounds as having translatable meaning. It always seemed odd to Thirtytwo that the Terrans name was just… gibberish.

“Right. Now, do all those words say what I am?”

Thirtytwo’s spines were beginning to soften out of their defense posture. “Sol means… you’re from the Sol system…”

“And the rest?”

“I don’t know.” They seemed to be nonsense words, but ne didn’t want to offend Alex by saying so. “They don’t translate.”

“Where I come from, names aren’t just… a label, so you can be sorted or ordered around. Names are a way to differentiate you from everyone else. They’re a word or combination of words that very specifically mean you.”

"So they're… descriptive words."

"Sort of. They can be. Most Terrans are named by their parents, or whomever raised them. Sometimes it's a traditional family name, or maybe the name of someone else they want to honor. Or sometimes, they pick it hoping that the kid will grow up to have the qualities of their name."

"So… what does your name mean?"

Alex paused for a moment, then shook his head. "Actually, hold on a minute." He picked up the datapad he'd brought in with him earlier and started tapping away-- probably accessing one of those databases only the higher castes had access to. "Alex is short for Alexander, meaning 'defender of men'," he read aloud.

"So… a warrior? That sounds like a caste assignment."

Alex shook his head. "That's just a coincidence. My dad was an agricultural laborer, Mom ran the transport for the company Dad worked for, and Tati stayed home and watched the kids. I was the only one that took military service, the others chose to work with Dad."

"And Marcus, what does that mean?"

"Eh…" Alex scrolled on his pad, was quiet a moment, then shifted a little in his seat. "It relates to an ancient god of war."

Thirtytwo gave him an unimpressed look. "You're not proving your point, here."

Chapter Text

It was several work-cycles before Alex brought up the topic of names again. The original discussion had ended when Alex finally seemed to sense Thirtytwo’s frustration with his insistence that ne needed an unique identifier– absolutely unheard of.

Thirtytwo just didn’t understand the point. Ne had a full designation already, one given to nem at birth, and a short-name for daily use– Thirtytwo. That’s who ne had always been, and had never known any reason for it to be different. Alex seemed to believe that the usage of different names for a single individual indicated different nuances that Thirtytwo just couldn’t grasp.

The cycle had started more or less normally. Alex wandered into Thirtytwo's work bay not very long after it began, and settled down to tinker with some simple item repairs that ne had given him when he asked for something to do. There was some concern on Thirtytwo's end that ne'd get in trouble for making their highly-paid Terran mercenary do drudge work, but, well. Alex had asked for it.

Thirtytwo jumped slightly when Alex started to speak. "You know," he said casually, "I was talking to some of the crew earlier."

"Ah… that's nice?" Thirtytwo said warily.

"Most of them still don't want to talk to me, but I learned something interesting."

Thirtytwo flicked an ear at him. "Yes?"

"They all had names."

Ne had to suppress the urge to flare neir spines in agitation. This again? "Of course they do. We all do."

Alex had stopped fiddling with the junk on the counter and fixed Thirtytwo with an unnerving direct stare. "Don't play dumb, I mean a name like I have. The captain's name is Tarrint and the guy who runs the mess is called Rillian."

Ne wasn't sure where this was going, but ne still didn't like it. "So? They're not drudges like me, so they get different short-names than I would."

That didn't seem to help Alex's apparent frustration. "That isn't right! You're just as important as they are, you should get one too!"

The thought of Thirtytwo being an equal to someone like neir own warren's prime was frankly hilarious, but ne kept nemself from expressing this to keep from upsetting the Terran further. In what universe would they be as important as each other? Thirtytwo was completely replaceable, but the other two had much more important roles to play for the warren– the crew. "Drudges don't–"

"Dammit, you–" Alex slapped his hand against his workstation's surface and Thirtytwo crouched closer to the floor in fear. "You are a person! You are important, too!"

For a moment Thirtytwo remained flat against the floor, listening to Alex's heavy breathing and increased heart rate. They hadn't known each other that long, but this was the first time ne had seen Alex get angry. It was terrifying.

"... Alex," ne said quietly, gaze towards the floor, "do you know much about my people? Not just, not just the general stuff, but. Where we come from."

Alex's heart was beginning to slow down a little. "The captain gave me a data packet when I came on board, but–"

"That probably didn't talk about it," ne interrupted. "It's something we don't… it's something people like us don't talk about. You're not supposed to talk about it." 

"... talk about what?"

Thirtytwo's ears pinned back miserably. He didn't know how offensive it was to even ask, how could he know? "I can't say. I'm not allowed to talk about… that. It's sad and scary." Ne crouched lower as Alex made a sound of concern and crossed the floor to hover near nem. The Terran looked like he wanted to reach out and touch Thirtytwo, but he didn't. Ne didn't know if that would have made things feel better or worse. 

"Look, I'm sorry," Alex said softly. "I really didn't mean to upset you. I like you, and it's just kind of frustrating to hear someone you like not valuing themselves."

Thirtytwo stilled and watched Alex out of one wide eye, head tilted to the side to look directly at him. "Why me?" ne asked, after a long pause.

Alex's mouth curved up slightly. "I mean, you're one of the only people on board who talks to me. But you're, I don't know. You're interesting, and you've got a little bit of fight in you that I like and wish you would let out more."

Setting aside the "fight" part– stars forbid someone ever think that of a drudge!-- nobody had ever said anything like that to nem before, ever. It was confusing, to say the least, but also– good? A small, shy, warm thing? It made nem want to– ne wasn't sure what.

Slowly, hesitantly, ne raised nemself from the floor and shuffled forward a little, close enough to lean against Alex's leg for a moment before backing away. It was scary, being close enough to a predator to touch, but something in Thirtytwo felt mixed up and strange. Alex, to his credit, remained completely still, even if he was still giving that weird direct stare.

"I'll ask the archivist if. If it's okay to tell you," ne mumbled. "I just don't want you to think…"

Think what? Ne realized ne didn't know why ne cared so much what Alex thought. Didn't want him to know about why drudges had a high mortality rate but so many of them were born compared to other castes, or why drudges were almost twice the size of the others. Why other species treated nem like dumb animals.

"Hey." The Terran's voice was quiet, calm. "Whatever it is? We're still friends."

The small warm thing brightened, and ne leaned forward to bump Alex's leg with neir head again. "Okay. Friends."