"You have a visitor," the artificial voice of my room's local computer system pulls me back to a responsive state. I am gasping for air, when the lights of my room seem to attack my eyes, every wall painfully over-exposed.
"Who– who is it?" I ask the voice, while trying to regain control of my breathing.
"Itai Mahanya, Tellus XII biochemist," she informs me, and I climb out of my bed, grunting, trying to fight the exhaustion that weighs down my every limb.
"Come in," I direct, and the door slides to the side on my command, revealing Itai in the hall, and I repeat, more softly, "Come in."
"Hey, we missed you at dinner" he says, as he awkwardly passes the threshold to my room. It's not really private though, I barely have anything personal except for Po, a stuffed polar bear, whom I quickly toss behind my bed.
"Right, I'm sure Sm–" I have to fight the urge to reveal my not-so-flattering nickname for my crewmate, "–Watson must have been devastated by my no-show."
"Why are you soaked?" Itai seems to briefly forget the purpose of his visit, when he notices the state, I am in.
"Uh," I swallow some viscous spit, my mouth extremely dry, "Intense workout."
"And, what is that noise?" I can easily read the perplexity on his face, "Gray, what is going on?"
"Sorry, it helps me focus," I hit the off-button on the plaque, relieved to be free of the sound that somehow put me in some kind of hallucinatory trance, and I bite my lip to hide the fact that it is quivering from my own bewilderment, "I needed to clear my mind after the training session earlier. I was particularly trying to forget a certain person who really messes with my sanity."
I meet him in the kitchenette that separates the sleeping area from the entrance, and he subtly smiles at me.
"Never mind them," he comforts me, "They just think less of us because our fields are not hard sciences."
"You mean him. Watson. And, you mean me. My field is a soft science. You're a biochemist," I reach for a glass that almost slips out of my hand on its way to the faucet, "I need some water – care for a drink?"
"N-No–" he stutters still hesitant to accept my trembling state of exertion, "Thank you."
"Anyway, I don't care how they think about me," I breath in between swigs of water, "I just care to get through the preparations."
"Come on," he looks at me, and before I know it, I roll my eyes at him. I don't mean to be so short with him. I'm just so done trying to prove myself and failing all the time, and I am definitely not asking for his sympathy, "GTT gets pretty ugly."
"You're not running off, vomiting your intestines out. I just hate it when they're side-eyeing me – don't deny it, I know they are – and that smug look on his face, ugh! I just wish I could wipe it right off." I wave my hand in the air. imagining the sound of his face meeting the palm of my hand. It feels pretty good.
"You will get there eventually, Aris," his hand settles on my upper arm, unaffected by the drying sweat, "I believe in you."
God, I really enjoy how he over-pronounces every sound. He makes my native language sound so charming, when every word is allowed its space, and the sentence isn't just smushed like it's just one long word.
"Eventually is not good enough. I need to get there by tomorrow," I look at him, then to his hand still on my arm, then back to his face, "I have an idea. And you, Mahanya, are going to help me."
I drag him out of my room, pulling at some hidden source of energy, I didn't know I still had in me. I am running down the halls and cross a closed bridge structure to get to the training facility, never letting go of his hand.
"Here," I don't know why I'm lowering my voice, because the second I wave my wrist before the access panel, the record will show that I was here.
"Are you sure we are allowed to do this by ourselves?" he whispers, as he follows me through the unlocked door.
"Yeah, why else would we have access?" I argue, steering for the control room, "Besides, we're certified astronauts; we know what we're doing, right?"
"I guess," he drops himself down in the chair in front of the control panel and looks through the glass to the darkened room of the centrifuge. The job of the supervisor is pretty straightforward. It is basically engaging and disengaging the simulation and making sure that no one suffocates in their own vomit along the way. I grab my pressure suit from the lockers in the back of the room, and Itai quickly gets up to help me secure the fasteners on my back.
"Thank you for doing this, Mahanya," I am already halfway through the door to the large, windowless room, when I turn around to look at him, "It'll be worth it, you'll see."
I am out before he can answer, door closed behind me, and I turn on the lights, the room seeming even bigger when it's just me here. But I am not alone.
"I know. You can do this," his soothing voice sounds from the speakers under the ceiling panels. I nod at him before entering the simulator, closing the hatch behind me. Once inside, I need to take a moment to breathe. It might be a long night, and I get settled in my seat, fastening the harness across my body, preparing myself for what could turn into an hour of GTT. Which is basically a legal form of torturing highly educated people. I signal my readiness on the console display before me.
"Okay, enabling artificial zero G," Itai announces through the coms in the simulator, "Enjoy the ride."
The screens come down, and the lack of gravity lifts me up in my seat until my harness catches me.
That night I had Itai run the simulation with me until I succeeded. It took me passing out once again and throwing up a couple times, before I finally managed to stay in control of my body through the twelve G.
My heartrate is through the roof, enhanced by the adrenaline rushing through my blood, when I push the hatch open and practically shoot out of the simulator. The centrifuge has come to a halt and I run across the room to rip open the door to the control room.
"Did you see that?" I exclaim when I burst through the door, and I have no control left in me to hide my excitement. I would have liked to play it cool, but instead I am hurling myself at Itai. He catches me and lets me throw my arms around his neck to pull him in.
I don't realize my error before I hear the resounding smack of his face hitting the glass of my protective helmet.
"Ah," he tries to hide his pain with laughter, while I hurriedly detach my headpiece and dump it on the control board.
"Ooh, sorry," I grimace while trying to estimate the damage I've done.
"It's fine," he insists, grabbing my hands, preventing them from being all over his face, "I'm fine."
I can't help it. Maybe it's the adrenaline, maybe it's the extreme exhaustion that I've put my body through today, or maybe I'm still affected by the hypnotizing hum of the mysterious recording. Whatever it is, it makes me unexplainedly rise to my toes, causing my lips to meet his. At first, he is reluctant, leaning back to investigate my face. But it must just have been the surprise, because he pulls the tight hood of my suit off my head, so he can weave his fingers into my hair and pull my lips back towards his. His skin is soft and warm, and he smells like the promise of cooling rain in the hot summer air. His lips are gentle but firm, and they work perfectly with mine. Moving like a dance, our kiss tells the story of a fight; of a forbidden act of desire and human weakness.
"Wow," I get dizzy, and I have to pause the kissing for a moment.
"Are you okay?" he asks me with his black irises pointed to me bearing a concerned look, and the darkness pulls me in; calms me down.
"Yeah," I exhale and smile without realizing it.
"We should not be doing this," he exhorts, his gaze intensely focused on me.
"I know, it won't happen again." It's not like I explode with laugher, but I start smiling, and a giggle escapes me. Yes, I actually giggle. Who am I?
"Aris, you need to see this," he says, stepping back so I can see the screen at the supervisor's table. There's something about the way he says my name that makes me not want to look away from his face. Arees.
"What?" I ask, before looking to the screen, "Holy shit, Mahanya."
The glass plate displays a list of names ranked according to score, followed by date and time of the simulation run. I have never seen my name amongst the top twenty-five, consisting of multiple scores belonging to Nadeau, Watson, and Pfeiffer. Mahanya and Moon both have a few slots with their names in them, and I have been the only one left out. Until now. Tonight, I actually managed to place myself high on the list, second only to Nadeau, with Smugface not far below me. My jaw drops open.
"I know, congratulations," he says, pulling me in to place another soft kiss on my lips, before looking to the clock on the screen, "It's late, we should go."
"You're right," I agree involuntarily, and he helps release me from my suit in a purely professional manner (and I'm not enjoying his fingers brushing against my body on purpose), "I can't wait to see the look on their faces tomorrow when they see the score charts."