Work Text:
The first thing he notices when he opens his eyes is the beep. It’s loud, with a uniform length between chirps, like a slightly more urgent low-battery signal on an old fire alarm. It’s also slightly more irritating and Nick wishes that whoever’s in charge of alarm maintenance would shut the damn thing up already. This ship has a maintenance worker for literally every conceivable nut, bolt, screw and device on board, so how is it that no one has thought to check the rota?
Nick bets that it’s Harry's job. He always was a lazy arsehole. If it weren’t for the fact that Nick detests his bunk-mate with a fiery passion, he’d probably have dedicated more time to hating Harry Greene.
Fortunately for Harry, Nick had been paired up with the biggest stick-in-the-mud this side of the Milky Way. The past six months have been solely and deliberately focussed on plotting revenge on Charlie Spring. Nick can’t even remember how it started. Was it the time he got back from a long day and found that Charlie had put his favourite blanket in the wash, thus dooming him to a night of shivering underneath the standard issue bedding? Maybe. Or maybe it was the time Nick tripped over in the canteen and looked up to see his bunk-mate covering his laugh with his hand.
Admittedly, it doesn’t help that Nick also fancies the man with the passion of a thousand suns while Charlie wouldn’t even give him a passing glance, but that’s irrelevant. It’s all about the blanket.
Speaking of which, when Nick rolls over in his bed, his mattress hugs his hips in a strange way and his blanket is noticeably absent. If Charlie has stolen it again Nick may just suffocate the man.
And still, that alarm keeps beeping.
“Would somebod—”
His forehead hits glass as he sits up. The entire panel clangs sarcastically as he flops back down.
Ah, now he remembers.
Three months in stasis – punishment for something that was blown completely out of proportion. No pay, no privileges, nothing. Just three months where his credits won’t accrue and the snacks in his bunk cabinet go stale because Charlie fucking Spring can’t take a joke.
Okay, not a joke as such. More a chunk of air-roasted potato thrown at speed at the back of his head, but it’s not like Nick started it.
Well, maybe he did. But he was definitely provoked.
Okay, not provoked, as such, but Charlie was definitely asking for it with the way he rolled his eyes when Nick asked him if he had a credit spare because he’d left his holo-wallet in their cabin. Without it, the only thing on offer was the regulation potatoes and a side of what Nick optimistically hoped was re-hydrated beef.
Whatever it was, it made a satisfying slap against Nick’s cheek when Charlie turned around and lobbed it at him after the initial potato assault. Which, in turn, seemed to feed a frenzy of ridiculous behaviour amongst the crew in the canteen. By the time the captain arrived with his team of frowning superior officers to work out what was going on, the entire canteen was covered in a thin layer of what appeared to be custard and watery curry. It was a shame, Nick would have loved to have tried Curry Wednesdays.
Instead, he and Charlie had been marched to the brig, once the inevitable finger-pointing and blame attributing had finished. It was remarkable, really, how quickly the collective brain remembered who’d started it.
Nick contemplates the cocktail sausages he left on his bedside table. Those’ll really piss Charlie off when they get back to their cabin later. By now they should have a nice fuzzy layer of mould growing on top.
He presses a palm to the glass panel above him. It swings open without much resistance. Officer Lange should be greeting him any moment now; presumably, with his patented frown and clipboard combination that Nick has grown to love so dearly.
Instead, there’s quiet.
Nick waits a few moments longer before sitting up and peering around. The brig is empty.
So, as he discovers a few minutes later when he hobbles down the corridor, is the entire bridge. The big, complicated network of keyboards, panels and screens blinks and flashes in its usual way, but there’s no one manning the place.
Perhaps it’s someone’s birthday. He’ll have to check his calendar.
He flops down onto one of the comfy leather chairs and waits for his cryo-legs to come back to life properly. As he does so, he dislodges a large pile of dust from the Chief Officer’s console.
Something’s not quite right.
The ship’s Intuitive Solution Semi-Automatic Computing Unit whirs to life when Nick flicks a switch next to the control seat.
“Issac?”
He appears on the screen; a disembodied head on a black background. A lot of the crew find him to be a fairly creepy addition to their lives – Nick has lost count of the amount of times that one of the other maintenance crew-members has complained that he’s appeared at a particularly embarrassing time on the screens in their cabins. Nick has a theory that he gets bored enough and just waits for people to get… personally intimate with themselves before appearing to ruin the mood.
Nick has always liked him.
Although, he looks a bit more… frazzled than usual when Nick leans in closer. There’s something a bit off that Nick can’t quite put his finger on. For a start, he appears to suddenly be sporting a mullet. Not one of the regulation hairstyles allowed on the ship.
That being said, neither are Charlie Spring’s curls, but that doesn’t stop them bouncing around as he walks.
“W’sup, Nelson?”
“Er… where is everyone, Issac?”
Issac has the good grace to look embarrassed at their apparent lack of supervision. Eventually, he flashes an unnatural grin at Nick.
“Everybody’s dead, Nick.”
Behind him, a throat clears conspicuously.
“Well… not everybody.”