Chapter Perspective: Sullivan

“Okay, we made up for our objectively Groundie level showing in the first trial and kicked some serious butt, not to mention we got solid pats on the back from the Commander too, so how in hell are we gonna celebrate?” Ty asked as she wiped the corners of her mouth, the last remnants of the burger she had devoured gone in that last act.

“Um… I mean, I don’t really know… We’ve been going since we got up here, I hadn’t really stopped to think about what we would do when we did have a moment to breathe,” Curtis replied, a fork pushing around the last remnants of some green, leafy looking food that looked oddly slimey that had accompanied the fried chicken he had selected for dinner.

“Why not throw a party or something? I mean, the other flights probably gotta have some downtime too by now right and like, isn’t it about time the lot of us gets together and has a little bit of fun?” Julio asked, leaning back into his chair and resting his head into his hands. “Then again, Kara hasn’t made eye contact with me since we got in here though…”

“Uh oh, trouble on lovers lane,” Ty said with a laugh as she shoved him, nearly causing him to fall out of his relaxed position.

“Ay ay ay, no need for that,” Julio complained as he righted himself and sat back up, adjusting his jacket. “She’s competitive, I like that about her.”

“Please Julio, you only like it cause we won, otherwise you’d be moping knowing she’d rub it in your face,” I said, raising a brow at my friend. “Besides, the Commander lives in our berthing with us, how the heck do you think we’d get away with a party?”

“A shipload of distractions?” He offered back with a shrug, “Kill, hermano, you worry too much about the details bud, just go with the flow.”

“I’m with Killian,” Sera said from the seat next to me and Julio made a show of visibly rolling his eyes.

“Dios Mio, of course you are,” he scoffed.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Sera asked with a huff and he shot her a pointed look.

“Back to the topic at hand,” Curtis interrupted. I wasn’t exactly sure what his deal was, especially given his rule on fraternization, but all the same I knew how quickly Julio could drill into a joke and make the obvious tension between Sera and myself uncomfortable. “A party isn’t necessarily off the table, as long as we tell the Commander we are going to have one. As Doc has pointed out numerous times, this is still a college, I’d be hard-pressed to believe we were the first ship to want to throw a party after a big success.”

“Yeah, but do you really think the other ships would show up? Doc just said himself that Stevens wasn’t even really looking at him, and why would the other ships want to come over to the ship that had the highest score? I mean, if I was in their shoes, I wouldn’t want the “big winners” to rub my nose in it,” Novarod asked curiously, though the way he said it, and the last two weeks of experience dealing with him, led me to believe he just wasn’t interested in a party.

“Not to mention, how would we even throw a party? Do we raid the canteen and give everybody some pop and chips while we blare music? I mean… college parties are supposed to have booze aren’t they?” Ty offered. “Shit… can you imagine getting a little drunk and floating in the arena? God that would be great…”

“I’ve never tried any booze before…”

“Of course you haven’t Nova, you spent all your free time in the flight sims, you sure as heck can’t be hung over and looking at those screens for hours at a time,” Vicky laughed. “But even so, I don’t necessarily think that’s a good idea up here… even if there’s a way to get it.”

“Please, with the amount of workers who live up here, you’d have to think there’s some sort of booze that is in the station store, right?” Julio said, rubbing his hands together as he gave Ty a conspiratorial glance. “Wanna do some investigating?”

“I’d be willing to bet there’s something we can learn,” She said, returning his look. The two were already starting to rise when Curtis put a hand up to stop them.

“Just… don’t do anything stupid… The last thing we need is to get in trouble after such a good showing,” he said with a resigned sigh.

“Aye aye sir,” Julio said with a half-assed salute before the two grabbed their trays and were off.

“You’re not going to stop them?” I asked curiously and Curtis just shook his head.

“Honestly, the way I see it them going to look has three possible outcomes. First, and most likely, they discover there’s no booze up here because that just sounds dangerous as all hell given, well… everything,” he started, taking another bite of his food finally and swallowing it in seconds. “The second is that there is booze but there’s no way for them to get it,” he added before grabbing his glass of cola and taking a long drink.

“Knowing my luck it’s going to be the third option… isn’t it,” Novarod said and I gave him a curious look. I had my own assumption as to what the third option would be of course, but I was interested to hear his thoughts. “Curtis said it himself, it’s unlikely we are the first ship to ever think this way, so what the hell are the odds that two motivated students are able to figure out a way to get drunk up here?”

“When one of those students is Julio… damn, I see your point,” I replied, feeling the need to rub my temples. I had seen Julio pull off some crazy stuff, least of all being his sudden foray into actual decent piloting after the trainwreck performances I had seen from him in ground school, so I couldn’t necessarily put it past him to find whatever alcoholic substance was available on this station and bring it our way.

“So… I guess we should start planning a party then?” Sera offered and Curtis let out a slow, resigned chuckle.

“Guess I’ll go alert the Commander, Vicky, want to come with me and see what kind of music and movies we can throw on?” Curtis asked and Vicky nodded as she quickly scooped up her tray to follow.

“Should we really start preparing before they even get the stuff though?” I asked and to my surprise it was Novarod who heaved a big shrug and let out his own sigh of resignation.

“Honestly, even if they don’t get anything, do you really think that would stop them from wanting to be loud and hang out in a party like setting? I guess at this point, I’d rather just mentally prepare myself to have it now while I’m still high on the adrenaline rush from the trial than to have them try to foist a party on us tomorrow or Sunday,” he explained.

“The man makes a point,” Vicky said with a nod, “So why don’t you guys go and invite the other flights. Novarod, go find McCormick and see if she can let the rest of the MEGALODON know, tell them to grab some chips and snacks from their canteen too if possible.”

“Which leaves the DRAKE to us,” Sera said as she looked over to me. “Think we should approach Stevens or do you have an in with the Science person on their ship cause I have not gotten on very well with Dickson in our Engineering class, and given that he apparently messed up he might just be a little too far on the frustrated side to want to give his ship a party invite...”

“Seeing that they all bailed from their table already, we might be able to catch Layla in the Quad, she’s nice enough and I’d be willing to bet she would pass the message along,” I said, thinking back to the few interactions I had had with the other scientists.

“Then ship dismissed, we got a party to get ready for,” Curtis said.

“Aye Captain,” I said rising from my seat and, though I wouldn’t be the one to tell him, I copied Julio’s half-assed salute.