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It’s been around 30 days since they entered the ship, since they left earth, but Dan still wakes up every morning wondering why he isn’t in his own bedroom. He needs a few seconds to remember that he shares this bedroom with three other people in bunk beds.
Then, like every morning, he loosens the seat belt they attached to every bunk, even though the artificial gravity usually keeps them from floating around, but you’ll never know.
As always, Dan is the first one to wake up and he climbs out of his bunk with as little noise as possible. He has to spend the next two months with these people, until they arrive at their destination somewhere in the galaxy C’’24T (he doesn’t quite remember the name of their destination, but he is sure it’s somewhere behind the asteroid belt that circles the inner planets of that galaxy).
Being a pilot, Dan’s day begins earlier than the ones of his roommates, but it also ends earlier. Since they are in space the concept of days is liquified anyway, but the bridge insists on sticking to the 24-hour rhythm they know from home. Why, when they will have to adjust to a new schedule once they arrive in C’’24T, was a question no one could really answer. And honestly, Dan likes his job too much to jeopardise it over asking those questions too often.
He is 32 by now and while some people might say that’s on the older half of being a pilot Dan isn’t the oldest member of their mission. Even though most other crew members his age work at the bridge or as mechanics, not in the responsive and demanding role of a fighter pilot, there are some around even at the age of 40.
But Dan is 32 and has no intention of changing his profession soon. Not that’d he have the handiness skills or intelligence gathering to work in mechanics or communication anyway. But he also really likes the thrill of the speed, the feeling of the g-forces on his body when he pilots his own ship through space.
Not that he had too many opportunities to actually fly outside of earth's solar system. And even those were hardly more than sentinel missions to guard some cargo ships against bandits.
Leaving the solar system, going on a three-month journey, is new territory for almost all of them. Dan often hears the excited chatter in the cafeteria or the gym, the people wondering what awaits them and why they haven’t gotten any more information yet.
Frankly, Dan would wonder too, if he had anyone to talk to.
Now, that might sound sad or lonely but really, he is just not a people person, not someone for small talk. Not because he doesn’t like people, but he gets awkward and stumbles over his words and he doesn’t like doing that . And sadly, he had to leave all his friends back on earth. Sure, they write emails, keeping each other updated, but it’s just not the same.
Each day starts with a visit to the gym, running exercises designed to keep his body and mind fit (Dan hates it, mostly, but it’s necessary) and afterwards a two hour-run at the flight simulator, including gear and suit. They can’t fly real ships for exercise, not while travelling in this massive hub faster than the speed of light, so the simulator is really the next best thing.
Afterwards, and after a shower that is not allowed to take longer than 15 minutes, it’s time for Dan’s first meal of the day (the nutrition shake at the gym doesn’t count). He used to grumble about that time schedule, but really if you’re trying to fly neck breaking manoeuvres at the hyper realistic flight simulator it’s better to have an empty stomach.
The cafeteria is a big room at the bottom of the ship, it looks homely in comparison to the grey and white hallways the rest of the ship offers, but it also looks like it’s trying too hard.
The walls are dressed in fake greenery, every piece of furniture looks like it’s made from iron and wood which mixes oddly with the steel floor that every chair and table is screwed too. There are some decorative elements to it, like statues and paintings, but each of them looks sterilised and impersonal.
It’s about 13:30 board time now and big parts of the crew only start their day around now, so the room is rather empty when Dan steps in. There is no line in front of the vending machines, so Dan can scan his chipcard immediately, getting treated to lunch and a beverage of his choice.
The food is artificially crafted, but it’s usually pretty good, holding all the individual nutrition Dan needs for his life out here. On the touchpad he chooses a burger with fries and about seven different dips. If he can choose his own flavour and not even pay for it, why not go all out?
With his food stacked on a tray Dan navigates the lines of tables, looking for a free spot. He settles for a booth in one of the corners of the room with no people around. At least he won’t have to talk to anyone until his break is over, he thinks. But he barely took a bite from his burger as someone sits down opposite him.
A smile spreads, as Dan recognizes him. The platinum blond hair, freshly dyed right before take-off, now growing roots. The radiant smile, that honest demeanour.
Phil is what comes closest to a friend for Dan, on this ship. A pleasant surprise, they usually don’t see each other before their free time in the evening.
“Do you really need six different dips?” Phil asks, leaning forward to snatch one of the fries Dan hasn’t touched yet.
Dan swallows his bite before he rolls his eyes dramatically, saying: “It’s seven, and yes, I need all of them.” When Phil regards him with one raised eyebrow, he adds: “For my nutritional diversity.”
“I don’t think that’s a word that exists,” Phil quips.
“It does,” Dan says with a grin. “I just used it.”
Now it’s on Phil to roll his eyes.
He allows Dan a few more bites of food before he continues their conversation, stealing another fry. “How’s your day been so far?”
Dan shrugs, finishing his burger and taking a sip of his drink. “Nothing new,” he explains. “Got another perfect run in the simulator, they might upgrade me to the next difficulty soon.”
“Hey, that’s great!” Phil exclaims. The way he says it, the way his big blue eyes sparkle in excitement, almost makes Dan blush. Butterflies dance in his stomach, but he tries to push them down.
“Thank you,” he gets out, avoiding Phil’s gaze. “How about you, how’s your day been?”
“More interesting than usual,” Phil says after a small pause. His smile suddenly looks strained. He looks over his shoulder, checking if anyone might be eavesdropping, before he continues. He lowers his voice, and Dan has to lean closer to understand him as he continues. “The rest of the bridge crew is a little stressed today, we’ll pass an inhabited asteroid field in a few hours and there aren’t many records about it yet.” Phil checks their surroundings again, there’s no sign of a smile on his face anymore.
“Oh, the rest is a little stressed out ?” Dan asks, raising one eyebrow.
Phil looks down, bringing one hand up as if to hide a nervous smile. “Sorry,” he says. He grins in that stupid adorable way where he catches his tongue between his teeth and seeing it pulls the corners of Dan’s mouth into a smile.
But then he gets serious again, thinking about what Phil just told him, and the implications it brings. He asks: “So, why are you stressed? Inhabited areas aren’t anything new to us.”
“No, that’s not it,” Phil agrees. He fumbles with the paper napkin that Dan didn’t use. “It’s just-“ he looks around again. “Some of the records we found sounded weird. And I’m not supposed to even tell you, but, I mean, now you know so in case anything happens you can maybe be somewhere safe around the time we pass that area?”
Dan stares at him, his brain trying to catch up with their conversation.
He has known Phil for about a year now, but they never really talked until they both got assigned to this journey. Knowing Phil also isn’t really hard, since he graduated the academy a few years prior to Dan with top stats in communication and intelligence, doing everything from translation to codebreaking. Phil Lester is a name you can’t avoid if you’re trying to get into intergalactic travel, so it was a big surprise that he wasn’t more of a twat when Dan ran into him on the first day of their journey.
They figured out they both liked the same music, they both liked video games, and soon they met up every other evening in their free time. Their meetups were something Dan definitely looked forward to the last two weeks, maybe more than he allowed himself to admit.
But looking forward to playing some puzzle games with a co-worker and breaking protocol to warn them about something that isn’t even confirmed to be dangerous are two very different things.
Thinking that Phil regards him as a friend feels like wishful thinking. Afterall, he has enough friends, enough people that want to be his friend too. Enough people that want to be more.
Dan feels his heartbeat racing and he realises that Phil apparently waits for him to say something.
He opens his mouth, but no words come out. It’s as if his brain short circuited.
A buzzing sound makes Phil look at his watch.
“I have to go,” he says, looking back up. His eyes are searching for Dan’s, holding his gaze a few seconds. “We’ll pass them from six to eight board time, please stay safe.”
Dan stares after him as he leaves.
It takes a few more minutes for Dan to finish his meal and get up again. He puts the tray away and leaves the cafeteria for the library where he spends most of his afternoons. He usually finds something to look up and research, some new way to use engine fuel even more effectively or some theoretical approaches on flight manoeuvres but today he can’t focus on the words in front of him.
Some of the records we found sounded weird , Phil said. Now you know so in case anything happens you can be somewhere safe around the time we pass that area.
Dan checks his watch; it doesn’t only display the time but it’s also the main communication method on the ship. If anything happens it will be transmitted through that.
It’s 17:42 now.
Phil was really worried about him, huh? Dan can’t stop a smug smile from spreading over his face. Out of the about 150 people on this ship, Dan is the one he warned about a potentially dangerous area. Dan is the one he broke protocol for.
Again, his stomach feels like he didn’t have fries for lunch, but butterflies.
It’s stupid really. They barely know each other, and they are both on this mission to work, but still…
Dan lets out a giggle, shaking his head about himself and leaning forward to focus on this text again.
It’s 18:20 and he still hasn’t finished the paragraph. He sighs, leans back. There is really no use to try and focus anymore, but without Phil he doesn’t have anything to do for the evening either.
It’s 18:35 when he gets a message on his watch.
ALL CREW MEMBERS PLEASE REPORT TO THEIR ROOMS.
That’s odd.
While Dan is a pilot, he is still just a passenger until they arrive at their destination. He isn’t a guard or part of the bridge. All crew members implies a rather serious situation.
His mind jumps to the asteroid field Phil mentioned to him earlier, about how it was inhabited. Goosebumps creep over his arms and he gets up from the comfortable chair he was sitting in for the past few hours.
Technically Dan is supposed to go back to his room now, meet with his roommates and sit down around the little table they have in their room. He is supposed to go there and wait for further instructions.
But he had also always been a curious person, and the situation couldn’t be too bad if they only sent out a normal text message, right?
Dan thinks about it for a moment and then turns off his watch. If someone asks him, he’ll say his watch went out and he didn’t realise, didn’t see any messages.
Phil told him to be safe. Now, there isn’t a place safer than the bridge, Dan thinks as he leaves the library.
The hallways are strangely empty as Dan makes his way towards the bridge. He isn’t quite sure why he goes there, maybe because Phil will be there, and he hopes to overhear some information that isn’t supposed to be overheard.
The way from the library to the bridge is a rather long one, as the library is located deep within the ship, close to the core, while the bridge is located at the top. The ship itself is almost too big for all of the 200 passengers, Dan thinks, but he isn’t complaining. Mostly it’s nice that it doesn’t feel crowded.
He turns a corner as he spots a few guards, walking down the corridor, and his stomach drops. Now, meeting guards isn’t anything new, really. Like him they are mostly passengers that wear their uniform in daily life, but this group of guards not only walks in formation but also raises their weapons as they see Dan approach.
“Identify yourself!” one of them yells and Dan raises his hands in an effort to not get shot immediately.
“Dan Howell,” he says.
The guard in the front looks him up and down, searching for something Dan can’t name, and takes a look at the ID pinned to Dan’s overall.
“Go to your room and stay there until you further notice,” the guard says curtly. As Dan nods he continues his way and leads the group further down the corridor.
Lowering his hands Dan gulps, trying to calm his nerves.
That was a new experience and quite frankly one he didn’t need.
“What the fuck is going on…” he mumbles to himself, staring after the guards.
The situation does feel pretty severe, and for a moment Dan contemplates still trying to get to the bridge, then he turns around with a sigh to get back to his room. Sure, he could try and get into the bridge but if he doesn’t get stopped by some other guards, he’d probably get Phil into trouble for it.
He can still ask about all of this when they see each other tomorrow.
The elevator upwards is one corner away when Dan hears a voice that makes him stop in his tracks. He can’t quite put a finger on it, but it feels weird, uncanny even, it makes his stomach freeze, and his heart race.
On the tips of his toes Dan sneaks closer to the sound, away from the elevator, towards another crossing in the hallways.
Another voice speaks up and this time Dan’s heart does a flip. It’s Phil’s. Why would Phil be outside the bridge?
“-get to your room,” Phil says as Dan sneaks forward. “Dan, I swear it’s not safe here.”
Dan?
Dan stops.
Did Phil hear him? Does he know he is here, nosily overhearing his conversation?
But then the other person answers, and Dan feels his blood freeze right in his veins. Like an electric strike, leaving him breathless for a second.
“Dangerous?” someone says in Dan’s voice. It sounds playful, as if he’s laughing about a joke Phil just made.
Holding onto the wall Dan peeks around the corner.
And actually, there in the hallway, Phil talks to Dan. Or, to someone who looks like Dan. They stand right in the middle of the corridor, about one metre apart, neither of them facing the corner around which the real Dan hides.
Fake Dan grins, dimples and all, raising one eyebrow. “Seriously, what could be dangerous for us inside this ship? Don’t you trust the crew?”
Phil shifts from one foot to the other, looking for something in fake-Dan’s face. “Of course I trust them,” he manages. “But really you-“
“Oh, come on,” fake Dan all but purrs and takes a step towards Phil. The real Dan looks at him rather offended, he would never sound like that while talking to anyone . “You don’t want me to leave already, do you? While everyone else is busy we could, you know? Be busy too?”
Dan feels his ears heat up at the implications. He would never say something like this . What is going on?
Phil blushes, but he doesn’t take a step back.
“Dan,” he says. “We shouldn’t- This is not the right moment to-“
Something about his voice rings alarm bells in Dan’s head. The hair on his neck prickles. It almost sounds hazed, cloudy, as if Phil had a drink. But there is no way Phil did get a drink while still being on the bridge.
“Shouldn’t we?” fake Dan says breathily, taking another step. They are now right in front of each other, noses almost touching. Phil’s eyes dart down to his lips and something inside the real Dan snaps.
“Okay, what the actual fuck!” he yells, jumping into the hallway.
At the same time fake Dan jumps back, looking around frantically until he recognizes real Dan, and his face goes from confusion to disbelief to an expression of Oh fuck that Dan knows well enough.
Phil looks back and forth between them, face confused at first, but getting redder by the second.
For a moment no one moves.
Then fake Dan liquifies and disappears through an air vent.
Real Dan feels ready to throw up.
Phil, who is still a few metres away, clears his throat. His whole face is burning red, probably as much as Dan’s as well.
“Any chance you didn’t see that?” he asks sheepishly.
Dan isn’t sure what to answer, and luckily, he doesn’t get a chance to say anything as just this moment a deafening alarm starts around them, sirens blaring and cutting everything off he could have said. A bunch of guards round the corner behind him.
“Identify yourself!” one of them yells, yet again, and Dan raises his hands. He isn’t sure what he just witnessed.
After identifying them (which takes several minutes of DNA checks that Dan spends on the floor, held down by some guy in an armoured suit, not how he pictured his day to be honest) the guards escort them to another part of the ship. Dan has never been here since it’s off-limits for normal passengers, but he knows there are labs and containment areas around here.
“Where are we going?” he asks no one in particular. Phil is uncommonly quiet, avoiding anyone’s gaze, but one of the guards behind him answers: “You had contact with an unknown species so you will have to wait in a containment area until the situation is under control.”
“What situation?” Dan asks again.
“Classified,” the guard answers.
“Okay,” Dan says, trying to hide the tremble in his voice.
He feels ridiculous, but at the same time his knees feel like they are about to buckle and maybe containment isn’t that bad after all.
The guards lead them through a door and towards another room, waiting in front of it. “Someone will bring you other clothes, these will have to be decontaminated,” one of the guards explains, opening the door. “Until further notice, please remain here. The doors will be locked.”
With the feeling that they don’t have a choice Dan enters the room. Phil enters behind him and the door closes with a loud thud .
They stand around awkwardly, until Phil breaks the silence.
“How much did you see?” he asks, and by the way his voice is muffled Dan assumes he is hiding his face behind his hands. He turns around with a sigh, face burning red.
“I, uh,” he stammers. “Probably everything?”
“Oh god ,” Phil moans. Dan can only see the tip of his nose peeking out between his fingers, but even that is bright red. He takes a step back, letting his back fall against the wall and sliding down into a sitting position.
It’s almost comical.
Dan rubs his neck, trying to think of something to say. Slowly he walks over, sitting down next to Phil. The conversation seems easier when he doesn’t have to look at Phil, so he stares down at his own knees.
“It’s not that bad,” he tries to open the conversation.
“How,” Phil groans, face still in hands. “That could not have gone worse.”
Dan shrugs at that. “I mean, the Fake could have eaten you alive after you fell for it?” he offers. It’s a desperate try to bring their usual light heartedness to the conversation.
“I didn’t fall for it,” Phil huffs.
“Uh-huh,” Dan raises both eyebrows at him, giving Phil a telling look. “You seemed pretty head over heels to me.”
“Oh, shut up,” Phil shoves him with one of his hands, but a smile peeks through now. He lowers his hands, taking a deep breath. “Only a little. I mean have you seen your own smile?”
It almost feels like Phil shoved him again, taking all the air from his lungs.
Phil’s smile falters a little.
Have you seen your own smile?
Maybe this is not wishful thinking after all.
Dan thinks for a second, then he decides fuck it .
“Have you seen your eyes ?” he retorts with a grin.
Phil blushes again. “Shut up,” he says but he lets out a giggle. “Oh, this day is a nightmare.”
Dan scrunches his eyebrows. “What for?” he asks.
“First we don’t get to spend the evening playing video games because of that asteroid field and then I get seduced by some kind of space siren and you saw that,” Phil counts using his fingers. “And now I can’t tell if you’re trying to be nice and make it less awkward, or if you’re actually flirting with me?”
He sounds so confused that Dan can’t help but let out a laugh. “Alright,” he says. “That does sound bad if you say it like that. But might I offer a counter argument: I got to save you from that siren and I am definitely flirting with you.”
Phil grins again, sticking his tongue out a bit.
It’s so cute, Dan’s heart does a flip.
“Then maybe that’s worth it,” Phil says, slightly bumping his shoulder into Dan’s. He turns his head, so that they’re now eye to eye.
Dan smiles about the fact that they are the same height.
Their noses are almost touching.
“So,” Dan says with a grin. “Tell me, why exactly did you get seduced by a siren that looked like me ?”
“Don’t let that get to your head,” Phil laughs. “Maybe it just chose some pretty face and used some weird space magic trick.”
Dan raises an eyebrow. He did think about that, but the way Phil says it he wants to believe that’s not it.
Their eyes meet again, and his eyes slip down to Phil’s lips. He takes from the smile that Phil noticed.
“This time, you’re not a siren, right?” Phil whispers.
“Promise,” Dan whispers back, as he closes the gap between them.
Phil’s lips are soft against his, and he smiles into the kiss. He can’t believe this is happening.
Too soon they draw apart, only far enough to see each other, both giggling like teenagers.
“So that’s why,” Dan teases, giving Phil a wink.
Phil roles his eyes. “Oh, shut up you twat,” he says as he draws Dan closer again, into another kiss.