Character Perspective: Waverly

“Where do you think you’re going?” I asked, catching the fire haired scientist as he tried to slip away down the hall toward his lab and his green eyes widened in surprise.

“Sheesh Sera, you scared the hell out of me,” Sullivan replied as he ran a hand through his still wet hair. “I was just going to go-“

“I think Dip has whatever you’re doing under control, you’ve been working nonstop since we got here, let’s go out to the quad for a bit and watch the Earth whip by,” I offered before he could give me a half-hearted excuse as to why he was going to squirrel himself away within the lab once again.

After the excitement of floating around in zero gravity, the rest of the day and dinner had been hugely uneventful and while Curtis, Vicky and Ty all wanted to just hang out in the common area, Doc had only taken the time to change before heading out the front door on his own and Novarod basically disappeared down the hall to the boys rooms. Sullivan on the other hand went right into the showers and I was positive I heard him muttering to himself about lab work he needed to get done as he headed that way with a towel draped over his shoulders. In truth I wasn’t sure why I wanted to keep him from isolating himself, but I liked to think it was because I knew how easy it was to just go overboard with it.

Briefly, Sullivan looked back down the hall before his eyes returned to mine, “I mean, I guess I could go for a walk… though I do still have to do some evening checks at some point…. It’s just a part of the job y’know.”

“And if you burn yourself out before the end of the first week, you’re no good to anyone,” I countered, and Sullivan finally deflated just a bit.

“One night then, I’ll get up early before classes and make sure those two haven’t blown anything up, that work?” He asked as if me giving permission really was the make or break factor.

I nodded and led him out past the others, all invested in whatever cartoon they had going at the time and out the front doors of our dwelling. It was hard to really call it a home, at least so far, but I could see in time that feeling starting to come on. At least until we made our ship into an actual home itself, though who knew when the hell that would be.

“So get to do anything fun in your classes?” Sullivan asked as we left the bunker like building behind us. Well maybe bunker was a bit harsh, I guess utilitarian would be a better way to describe the Kirk building.

“Nooooope, paperwork paperwork paperwork. You’d’ve thought they would have had us get all that out of the way back in ground control but nooooo, make us waste a whole damn day filling it out,” I sighed, and I could see as Sullivan turned his head just a bit to slow for me to miss the humored grinned that had spread over his face. “Something funny?” I cocked a brow at him and crossed my arms.

“Nothing, nothing,” he said quickly, turning onto the giant circle that led around the main field.

“What about you huh? How do they expand your science knowledge up here?” I probed, letting him slide past the laugh.

“They pose various shipboard scenarios and task us with coming up with a solution, just outside of the “high stakes” environment that come with the trials,” he replied with a shrug. “My first one is to come up with a new possible solution for hull leaks,” he said as if he had predicted my next question.

“Ooo that is pretty neat, whatcha gonna go with? Some sort of expandable glue or a rapid release patch?” I burst out, my own mind racing with ideas.

“See this is why I want to bring science and engineering closer together, those are some killer ideas,” Sullivan laughed as he looked over to me. The earth was, as it always was, hanging over us and the artificial lightning of the European Union was a spectacle to behold, yet even so Sullivan hadn’t even looked up once.

“Well feel free to use them, I certainly don’t know the hows to making anything like that. Give me circuitry or a busted hull and I’m all over it,” I replied with my own laugh. “But I am totally open to learning,” I hinted.

While I expected a Sullivan to respond, instead he stopped in his tracks, his gaze trained across the now open field we had approached.

“What the hell is Julio doing?” He murmured and I followed his attention over to see Doc standing on his hands and walking as a vaguely familiar looking girl laughed.

“Sheesh he moves quick, guess he was serious when he asked the Captain if he cared about fraternization off ship,” I said as I tried to place the girl. “Is that the Captain of the DRAKE?” I asked, squinting slightly as I leaned forward.

“Oooh that’s where I recognized her from, she stood up during that first trial and asked the Dean a question along with the purple captain too,” he replied and scratched the side of his head. “Should we cramp his style or let him keep doing…. Whatever that is?”

“Ehhh, how about we just keep walking so we don’t have to hear him complain about how we barged in on him “making moves” because that totally seems like something he would complain about,” I laughed and started to walk forward.

At that Sullivan let out an actual guffaw that he stifled behind a hand, “Julio really is pretty easy to read, ain’t he? You should have seen him back when we were in Ground School, he liked to think himself a “ladies man” but he’d probably deny just how many times he got smacked for a stupid line.”

“I bet, I’m sure he was probably joking about it but he definitely did try and use a line on me last night, but Ty and I were both pretty quick to rag on him and then Captain came in with his rules on bridge fraternization,” I said with a shrug. “So that shut him down pretty quickly, though again, he doesn’t seem too upset about it,” I added and gestured over as Doc fell down and the laugh that came from him echoed over to us.

“Kinda a sucky rule though, I mean, I get it of course just…” he said and seemed to trail off as I found him looking up toward the Earth. “Julio is one thing but it’s not like you see a bunch of people out and trying to get to know the other crews,” he seemed to change the subject as soon as he noticed me peering up at him.

He really did have nice eyes and I- nope, definitely had to shake that thought from my head, at least for now. “I get what you mean,” I said as I looked to the ground to hide my rapidly heating cheeks. “Guess we just all gotta become really close friends then, eh?”

“Yeah,” Sullivan said as a wide grin spread, his strikingly white teeth breaking with the freckles across his cheeks. “Sounds good to me.”

Damnit.