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"Truth or dare?"
"Are we really doing this now?" Janelle sighed, rolling her eyes.
"Yes! Don't be a spoilsport - choose!" Esk responded, winking at Anna from where they sprawled on the floor under the viewing port in the forward observation lounge.
Janelle narrowed her eyes as she intercepted Anna's answering smirk, and deliberately twitched her right foot where Anna could see it. The smirk was immediately replaced with a look of unease as Anna rubbed her ankle in unconscious memory of that foot connecting with it. This time it was Janelle's turn to smirk, and she did so brazenly.
Rostov's arm tightened around her shoulders and she looked up at him and smiled, squeezing his hand in response, before returning her attention to Esk. "Fine. I don't trust your dares, so - truth."
"How long did it take for you to decide that Rostov wasn't quite the jackass you'd pegged him as from the start?" Esk contrived to look innocent as they dumped the loaded question in Janelle's lap and left her to deal with the consequences.
"Hey! What the hell, Esk?"
"You thought I was a jackass?" Rostov queried, and for a moment she glared at Esk before registering the amusement in his voice.
Glancing up into those soft brown eyes, Janelle couldn't help smiling. "I did, yes," she acknowledged. "You're big, and you take up a lot of room, and every time I tried to get anywhere, it felt like you were in front of me, or where I needed to be. So I had to keep finding ways to get around you or move fast enough to get in front of you before my path was blocked. And for a while there, it felt like you were doing it deliberately, so - jackass."
Rostov chuckled. "Well, I'm glad your opinion about me changed," he teased.
"That, or I learned to appreciate the view when I was stuck behind you. I'll never tell which," she said, waggling her eyebrows significantly. As the others burst out laughing, she took the opportunity to throw her cushion unerringly right between Esk's eyes.
"HEY!"
"How'd you get so accurate with a pillow, Janelle?" Hoshi snickered.
Janelle shrugged nonchalantly. "I'm an engineer; physics is what I do."