It's the loopy, dislocated feeling of post-workout exhilaration that drives him to pull up his screens as he wanders back toward his berth and the IST washroom. He watches the video of himself lifting the biggest weights in the gym, then minimizes it, feeling strangely bashful, and opens up the other one instead. That one is also embarrassing, seeing himself goofing around like a kid, but it also makes him smile, and...it would probably make Liam smile too, he thinks.

Rich pulls up a message screen for Liam, attaches the video, types "thinking of you!" and then gets totally stuck on how many winking faces he should put on it. One seems like not enough, but more feels like too many. In the end he has to covertly scroll back to the picture Liam sent him, which has three, okay, wow. That's blatant.

Rich puts three winking faces on his message, feeling daring, and then sends it before he can regret it—and then regrets it immediately afterward, but it's too late.

He's still standing there in the passageway, trying to think of some way to follow that up that doesn't seem embarrassing or desperate or insulting, when his comm lights up because Liam is calling him.

Rich scrambles to straighten himself up, tugging at his rumpled shirts, running a hand through his damp hair, trying desperately to look less sweaty and taken off guard than he is...then catches his breath, gives up trying to achieve the impossible, and just hits accept.

Liam is in what looks like an orchard, heavy red and gold apples hanging all around him against the lacy green of leaves against sky. He's wearing a broad-brimmed straw sunhat, sturdy olive and black ag-worker gear, and a dazzling grin.

"Rich!" he says, and beams that shockingly beautiful smile up through the screen. "You look...well! Very healthy. Good morning!" And then before Rich has a chance to even respond to that, he claps his gloves together and goes, "Oh my god, hon, are those earrings?!"

"Oh!" says Rich, and turns his head, smiling shyly. "Yeah, uh...I got them a couple days ago, at the Mall."

"Oh my god I love them," Liam says, with absolute conviction. "Fuck, I am going to put my mouth all over those sometime soon." He sighs wistfully. "...Someday. I couldn't see those in the video! Which was very cute, by the way, although I can't imagine what you were implying about me." He shoots Rich a grin so bright that Rich knows he's not actually annoyed, and Rich can't resist the urge to smile back, cheeks warming.

"There was another one," Rich admits, "a video, I mean. But I didn't know if it was too, uh…" Too what, too braggy or too vain, trying too hard to be hot, he's not even sure. "...Too much."

Liam's eyebrows rise dramatically up toward his hairline. "Well," he says, "I'll be the judge of that. You've got to show me now that you've mentioned it, you know that, right?"

"I didn't mean—"

"C'mon," Liam coaxes, light and cute and charming, and Rich's face heats even further. "Share! Share! Share—!"

"Okay, okay!" Rich says, surrendering, and pulls up the other video instead, face burning. He doesn't put any winks on this one, just sends it Liam's way and then tries hard to avoid meeting his eyes.

He has to look up a couple seconds later, when Liam makes a quiet little breathless groaning noise, and he's just in time to see Liam's pupils expand, like a cat that just saw something scurrying across the deck.

"Fuck, hon," Liam says quietly, and taps his screen again—replaying the video, presumably. His cheeks are flushed and his eyes are very dark now, staring intently. "How much weight is that?"

"Four hundred pounds," Rich says, shy and uncertain, and Liam groans again, low and breathy and sexy and hits replay for the third time. Rich says, "Uh, I probably could've done more, but we ran out of weights."

"Ahh, fuck me," Liam says, and when he says it like that it doesn't sound like just something to say. "Rich."

"...Yeah?" says Rich, and Liam looks up at him and licks his lips, like Rich is something delicious that he wants to get his mouth on.

"How close are you to your bunk, sweetheart?" Liam asks, and one of his own hands slowly comes up to trail along the narrow stretch of his throat. The fingertips of his work glove leave a dark smudge along his fine golden-tan skin, and he doesn't seem to even notice.

"I, ah—I mean, you're at work, aren't you?" Rich asks, breathless now. The heat of embarrassment is rapidly settling into a deeper and much stupider warmth.

"It's the Dan Petro, there's plenty of spaces to take a break," Liam says. He smiles, wicked and beautiful, and purrs, "You look like you could use a break too, hon. Relax, sit back, make yourself feel good after all that hard work you put in today, huh? Let me see you enjoying yourself, you look so good when you unwind, Rich, c'mon."

"I mean—okay," Rich manages, "okay, fine, that's, yeah," and makes it back to his bunk in record time. He's still all sweaty, so he settles into his work chair, fumbling one-handed below the screen's view to get his pants unzipped. Maybe that's not where this is going, in which case Liam doesn't have to know, but he can't just sit here and talk to Liam and be looked at like that, with the crease of his jeans starting to cut into his increasingly excited dick.

"Pan down," Liam says, immediately. "C'mon, lemme see, I wanna see all of you, show me! Are you getting hot for me, hon?"

"I, um, I'm," Rich says, and feels himself flushing worse than ever. "I just finished working out, I'm all—"

"Flushed and sweaty and cute enough to eat, yes, I noticed," Liam says, with eager impatience, and ducks through a doorway into somewhere darker. The light from the screen glows off his hair, glitters off of his eyes and brings the shadow of his dimples into sharper relief. "C'mon, Rich, don't make me beg. I wanna see all of you."

Rich holds out for another minute, self-doubt and embarrassment warring with rising heat, and then he gives in and pans his screen down, lets Liam see his hand lingering at his open fly, his dick straining up against his underwear. Liam gives a long, low whistle that trails off into a sweet little giggle.

"Fuck, babe, I forgot how big you are," he murmurs, and closes a door behind him, pulls off his white engineer's coat and drapes it over something out of view, settling back to sit on something. "I can't wait till I've got time to see you again, I'm going to have you fucking bench press me. You look so good…"

Rich grins, flustered and overwhelmed, and squeezes his pulsing dick through his boxers, feeling the heat rising all through him.

"Liam, you're cute as hell, okay, but you're a little light for the bench press," he dares to tease. "I'd use you for bicep curls."

Liam throws his head back and laughs, full-throated and unashamed. "God, it's a date, hon," he says. "C'mon, unwrap that big, gorgeous dick already for me, I wanna see you. Don't be such a tease."

"You first," Rich tries. Liam wrinkles his nose up at the screen, theatrically impatient, then zooms his screen out, pans it down so Rich can see the rise and fall of his narrow chest. He's got one leg pulled up so he can rub himself lazily through the dark, dirt-stained olive green denim of his work jeans, while he's working at the laces of his muddy boots with the other glove. Then he strips his work gloves off with quick, efficient motions, folding them together and setting them aside, to touch himself all over again with bare hands that seem all the more sweetly vulnerable now for having been covered up before. The contrast between his slim, delicate fingers and the roughness of his sturdy, dirty ag-worker's gear is dizzying, gorgeous: he should be too small and sweet to function but somehow he still does and that just makes him even better to look at, somehow. Even more exciting to get to know.

"Good?" Liam says, a slice of white teeth and dimples at the top of the screen, and he flicks his fly open, teases his pretty little dick out and shows it off for the viewscreen, already dark and shining-slick at the tip. He strips his jeans all the way off, then his boxers with a showy roll of his hips that makes his dick bounce and glitter deliciously, and Rich's own dick throbs with heat.

Liam reaches back into the pocket of his discarded jeans, casually pulls a small tube of something that's marked 'hand lotion' but is probably—yeah, that's lube, Liam gets enough play that he just carries lube with him—and flops back down in a beautifully inviting sprawl, spreading his thighs and angling the screen just so to focus on the way his hard dick falls back against the dark hair under his navel, the glitter of precome and the shine of his piercings.

"Gimme some feedback, hon," Liam murmurs, and uncaps the lube.

"You're—yeah, good, wow," Rich manages, "so good, Liam, you're amazing." He swallows hard as he watches Liam's beautiful hands play with himself, stroking the lube up and down his shaft until it glistens in the screen light, highlights his beautiful slim fingers, his narrow thighs.

"Good," Liam repeats, with a soft moan on the back of the word. And then, sharper and more wicked, "Now, show me yours. Lemme see what I'm doing to you, babe, lemme see you all hot and bothered and naked for me, show me everything I'm gonna get my hands all over. I wanna see you so bad, Rich, c'mon!"

Rich huffs and squirms in his seat, feeling ridiculously shy. He's having screen sex with someone, that's what's going on here, Liam wants to see him, it's fine, he can stop being embarrassed any minute now, but there's a whole lot of difference between resolving not to feel stupid and actually not being stupid, and he's stuck right in the gap.

He takes his shirts off first, stalling for time, and because they're tight and clinging and gross with sweat. First he strips off his overshirt, shrugging carefully out so he doesn't break the shoulder seams, and then carefully glances up at Liam, checking to see if he's bored, impatient—Liam just grins and gestures for him to go on, so he strips his t-shirt off too, and Liam gives an encouraging little "Woo!" that has him laughing despite himself.

"Pants, hon, please, I'm dying over here," Liam says. "You've built up the suspense enough!" He's stroking himself steadily, running his thumb around the wet head of his dick, his free hand kneading absently at one of his nipples through his shirt, twisting and rubbing at the stud. Rich's own dick gives an emphatic twitch at the sight, enough that Rich can finally get over himself and slide his jeans all the way down past his knees. He paws clumsily at his boot laces, then strip his boxers and jeans and boots all off together in one brave, awkward rush.

"There," he says, sitting back, breathless and agonizingly naked and horribly certain that Liam's going to take one real look at him and call it all off.

But Liam looks at him and goes "...Wow," soft and amazed, like he's looking at something beautiful and awe-inspiring instead of just Rich and Rich's dick and Rich's stupid, full-body blush.

"Worth the wait," Liam says, and Rich blurts out a stupid little laugh and shifts, fighting the urge to cover up somehow. "Fuck, babe, if I could make it over there I'd already have my hands on you." He gives his dick a long, slow stroke at that, like he's savoring the thought. "Can you touch yourself for me?"

Right, yes, obviously, everybody knows that's what you're supposed to do for screen sex. Rich shoves a hand down, grabs his dick, then winces abruptly and goes for his own lube, pulling it hastily out of his desktop drawer. The second time he tries, it feels good enough he makes a stupid, hiccupy noise and has to press the back of one wrist over his mouth, abruptly self-conscious.

"No, it's okay," Liam says, soft and coaxing and hungry, voice hitching in little jerks and gasps. "That was—good, you sound really, mmn, so good, Rich, you don't have to stop. Make some noise for me, hon, please, you're so cute..."

Rich moans, feeling his face heat further, his dick twitching in his hand. "God, look who's talking," he gasps. "You're so hot, Liam, fuck."

Liam makes a smug purr and lounges back on one arm, displaying himself. "Yeah?" he says encouragingly, trailing his slick hand up his stomach, pulling his shirt up, tweaking one of his bared nipples so the stud glitters in the light. "A guy likes to hear that kind of thing, you know."

"You are, of course you—you know you are," Rich says, laughing a little. "Look at you, you're, you're like insanely beautiful, you could get any guy in the Fleet, you're amazing. I can't fucking believe I got a chance at you, shit! Look at you."

"Don't sell yourself short," Liam says, breathless, and—oh, slides his other hand down, fingers gleaming and slick. He pulls his leg up further and arches his back, slides his fingers up behind his balls and rocks onto them as he watches Rich touch himself. "You've got—nnf. You're—fuck, babe, why do you think it took me about thirty seconds to lure you back to the Genesis and have my wicked way with you? Fuck."

He drops his head back against the bulkhead, and for a moment the only things in the frame are his hands as he touches himself, the heave of his bared chest, the delicate arch of his throat with its dark smudge of dirt over the faint flutter of his pulse. He's so flexible, so light and pretty and shining in the screen light, fucking himself hard onto three fingers, pulling at his nipples while his dick bobs and glitters and drips untouched. He knows how to look so goddamn good for anyone watching, and he's letting Rich have a look at him, god, Rich is so lucky.

"I'm going to come, mmh, c-come find you, sometime soon," Liam says, low and throaty and promising. "I'm gonna come find you and in the meantime, hah, for now I'm gonna watch this video over and over and think about you picking me up and pounding me flat against every ffffuck, ahh, every fucking flat surface I walk past, Rich, god."

Rich makes a strangled whining noise and starts pumping himself a lot faster. "Liam," he gasps, astonished and pleased and so lethally turned on it feels like his heart's about to beat right through his ribs.

"Fuck, I'd listen to you—say my name like—like that, just, fucking forever," Liam murmurs, and arches into his hands again, his narrow hips jerking sharp and hard and steady back and forth. He's getting noisier now, gasping and moaning between words. "Does that big—gorgeous dick feel as, as, hah, as god as good as it looks, hha, hon?"

Rich pants out a laugh. "Dunno," he gasps, "it'd have to look pretty damn good, 'n I'm not, I don't think I can manage that right now." He's not going to think about how he probably looks, all sweaty and stupid, dripping sweat and flushed pink and dazed with watching Liam fuck himself on screen, he's just going to focus on the rising pleasure and the way Liam looks, one hand rocking between his legs, where Rich wishes he was, the other playing across that beautiful little body that Rich wants to touch so badly. God he wishes Liam was here. Rich would kiss him everywhere he could, kiss him so hard he'd come just like that.

"Are you gonna come for me?" Liam asks, soft and hungry like that's something he can just say, touching himself and watching Rich touch himself. "I wanna see how good you can feel, I wanna to get my hands on you and make it happen m-myself, actually—hhn, but I'll take what I can get, ha. I wanna see you fall apart, hear you scream my name, god, hon, c'mon, lemme have you, please?"

"Fuck," Rich gasps, "yeah, I fuck, god, yeah, Liam, wish you were here, I wanna touch you, mmh, make you feel good, make you come too—fuck, Liam, please—" His eyes squeeze shut against his will and then he's shaking, hand pumping fast and tight and perfect on his dick as he comes so hard it feels like his brain turns inside-out. He's distantly aware of Liam murmuring something shakily, yeah, that's right, that's it, that's so good, so pretty you're so good...but then the words get rougher and breathier and then break into a high, muffled whimper. When Rich gets his eyes open again, Liam is curled up into a shuddering ball around his hands, legs twitching and shivering, bare toes curling as he comes.

Rich watches, breathing hard, because he can't touch Liam, can't kiss his neck or hold him as he comes down, but he can sure enjoy how gorgeous he is all shivery and dazed with pleasure. Rich is feeling pretty stunned himself, slack-limbed and languid. God, Liam's gorgeous, Rich is so lucky to have met him.

"So, how's that new food allowance treating you?" Liam says, when he's come back down and caught his breath again. He grins at Rich, pulls some wipes out of his bag and starts cleaning up fastidiously, pulling the screen back up to his face. "Pretty good, it seems like—you look better already, hon. I knew that was probably possible, but may I just say: damn."

"I—guess you can, yeah?" Rich says, face going hot all over again. He looks away from the screen, rummaging in his desk for his own wipes before remembering that he gave them to Basil, right. He's gotta get a new pack. For now he zooms his screen back in on his upper half and leans down to grab his boxers, wipe himself off with them, wincing at the damp, gross feeling of come smearing against sweaty fabric. Now he really needs a shower.

"It's, I've got enough to eat now, like, all the time, it's really nice. So. Thanks," he finishes shyly. "I feel so much better lately. I really do owe you big."

Liam clicks his tongue and goes, "Ah, hon, no you don't, it's very literally my pleasure." He gives a showy wink at the screen, then bends down and starts rustling around below the screen, presumably dragging his pants back up and his work boots back on. "Keep on eating as much as you're supposed to and lifting weights like that and soon you'll have to be careful you don't roll over while we're cuddling and pitch me clear overboard."

He straightens back up again, swings on his white coat and pulls his dirty gloves back on, and when he straightens back up he's an agricultural engineer again, sunhat perched firmly back on top of his head.

"I, meanwhile, have to go decide which of my babies deserve to make me a granddaddy, and which get mulched." He sighs tragically and hops off of whatever he was sitting on. "Worst week of the year."

"Aww," Rich says, "you gotta kill some plants? That sucks, man. Anything I can do to help?"

"Unless you feel like cramming sixty fruit trees in your berth somehow, I doubt it," Liam smiles. "But thanks for the offer, hon, you're a sweetheart and you really don't need to be worrying about it. Pruning is just what happens when you're in charge of experimental new botanicals. You win some, you lose some." He shrugs. "I'll have some last harvests of new experimental produce, if you wanna try some crazy fruit. The Dan Petro's crew will just dice up whatever we can't feed to citizens and dump it into the nearest fish tanks. Shrimp aren't picky."

"I'm not picky either!" Rich says hastily. "I'll take as much fruit as you wanna send me!"

Liam laughs, looking pleased. "We're gonna get you fat and happy in no time, you beautiful boy," he says. "Ahh, god, Rich. You're such a sweetheart."

Rich has no actual way to respond to that, so he blushes like a moron instead.

Liam ducks out into the sunshine, stretches hugely, and gives Rich a soft, warm smile. "I'm so glad you're doing well," he says, and he sounds utterly, staggeringly genuine about it. "Definitely send me any more workout videos you might happen to have on hand. As a genetic engineer it's practically my duty to monitor any interesting mods I might happen to encounter in the wild, you know. I'd love to keep a close eye on your case." He gives another of those showy, flirty winks.

Rich snickers, cheeks flushing even hotter at this. "Right, obviously. I'll keep your scientific purposes in mind, don't worry."

"Make sure you get lots of very scientific shots of your muscles flexing a whole lot," Liam says, and grins at Rich from under the brim of his hat, wild blue curls blowing across his face in a gentle breeze off the lake. "In the meantime, I gotta get back to work—you should go get cleaned up and get some rest, hon. Thanks for calling."

"Yeah, I, sure, thanks for—you too!" Rich says, and gives a dumb little wave before Liam closes the line and the screen blinks out.

He definitely needs a shower now.

-

The morning of Rich's third check-in with Ms Travis, he wakes up at the usual hour, with just enough time to get showered and dressed and grab breakfast before he starts work. Instead of doing any of that, he raises a screen, eyes the little glowing numbers saying 0533, rolls over and goes back to sleep. He'll take third shift today.

He wakes up two hours later, and then again two after that, and lies in bed a while feeling deliciously decadent and waterlogged with sleep. When he finally hauls himself out of bed it's nearly 1000, and he has to quell the flicker of automatic panic by reminding himself that Ben ordered him to stop working double shifts. He's not getting demerits, he won't have his pay docked for sleeping in, everything's fine.

He doesn't feel like being social quite yet, so once he finishes showering and shaving and the rest of his morning routine, he grabs a couple food blocks from his box and a snack carton of fried frogs to tide him over until lunch. Then he watches Family Fleet episodes to keep his mind occupied until Ms Travis calls.

"Good afternoon," she says with a smile when he answers the call. "I heard you fixed some major issues with the Mall this week—that's wonderful! Really excellent work, Rich!"

"I, oh," Rich says, completely taken off-guard. "I mean, uh. Thanks? Thank you. Ma'am." God, he sounds like an idiot and now he's blushing.

"Not at all," she says warmly. "You've given us a real success story, being such a credit to Admiral Clearwater's new prosocial reassignment initiative. How has this week been for you?"

"Good, ma'am," Rich says, still blushing. "It's, it was really good. I hung out with some guys, we had fun. I, um, I took a day off." He pauses, stomach clenching up in expectation of disapproval, however masked, but she just smiles and looks perfectly pleased.

"Excellent! Was that your first day off since you came to the Reliant?" She's still smiling, but it's that careful, thoughtful smile he's coming to recognize.

"Yeah," Rich admits, and adds hastily, "but Ben, uh, my department head, he told me I need to take them more often, so. I'm gonna. And, uh, he told me to stop taking double shifts too." He says that mostly to test her reaction, to see if she agrees with Ben on this too.

She's not smiling anymore. "Stop taking—how frequently were you taking double shifts? You mean twelve continuous hours? Of implant work?"

"Uh, like…half the days. Maybe a little more?"

"Oh, dear," she murmurs, looking down to make a note. "Have you been having any headaches, difficulty speaking or moving, any out of character behavior or inexplicable mood swings…?"

"No, ma'am, it's been totally fine! Actually, I've had so much less work here than on the Sympatico, I kind of felt like I might be slacking off. I haven't gotten even a lick of burnout, I swear."

Ms Travis blinks at him. "I see. Well, that's…certainly something. I'm glad your supervisor has clarified the situation for you. So, have you stopped overworking, since you took your rest day?"

"Yes, ma'am," he says meekly, somewhat stunned. Overworking. Ben was one thing, but Rich had assumed he was just an easy-going supervisor on a well-run boat. If Ms Travis agrees, not just about days off, but about double shifts, too, then it's more likely this is just one more thing Rich learned wrong. That's something to get his head around, that it's not just Ben or the Reliant but the rest of the entire Fleet that thinks free time is a necessary thing Rich has a right to.

"Good," Ms Travis says, smiling once more. "I'm glad to hear it. So, did you do anything fun with your day off?"

Rich tells her about hoverboarding, cautiously at first and then with increasing enthusiasm as she keeps seeming pleased and interested.

"That's excellent, Rich!" she says when he finishes. "I'm so glad to hear you're taking up your old hobby like that. It's so important for citizens with more cerebral jobs to spend time reconnecting with their bodies, and getting out in the fresh air and sunshine. And it's wonderful to hear you're continuing to make new friends who'll spend that kind of quality time with you." She pauses, studying her notes, and tilts her head at him. "There's only one thing I'm a bit concerned about, which is your answers to the new questions you were assigned, the ones on physical intimacy."

Rich's jaw sets and he doesn't say anything. Ms Travis watches him for a long, stressful moment, and then nods.

"You certainly don't have to talk to me about it," she says, "but after having experiences like yours, people often suffer lingering effects, even if they don't recognize the ways that they're suffering. I'd like you to keep in mind that many Physical Relief Technicians are trained to do sexual therapy, which can help a lot in these situations. I believe you'd benefit from having professional help in processing and moving past some of your issues. You don't have to commit to anything any time soon," she adds, maybe in response to Rich's horrified look, "just keep it in mind."

"Okay, got it," Rich says in a slightly strangled voice. "I'll do that, thank you, ma'am." God, if he never has to hear her say the word 'sexual' again it'll be too soon. He has no idea what the hell sexual therapy might involve, or how it'd help him with anything whatsoever, but he's sure not asking her.

He…might look it up, see what the PRTs' public information database has to say about it. Just so he knows what his options are. It's not like he has problems with sex, his dick still works fine and everything, so he probably doesn't need whatever help they offer, but it won't do any harm to do some research so he knows what's available.

Ms Travis sort of pinches her mouth at the corners and looks hastily down, but she doesn't look disapproving, and she controls the expression too fast for Rich to be sure what it was.

"Alright, good," she says, and she's smiling normally again when she looks up. "Do you have any questions or concerns I can help with?"

"No, ma'am," Rich says firmly.

"Alright," she says again. "I really want you to be clear that you're making remarkable progress in a very short amount of time, Rich. It's difficult to adjust to a situation that's so different from what you're used to, and you're doing an excellent job. I hope you realize that."

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Taken completely aback, Rich takes a second to find words through the startled, expanding warmth in his chest. "I—thank you, ma'am. I, um, I'm doing my best."

She nods to him. "You certainly are, and you should be proud."

He can't even answer that, too busy not meeting her eyes while his ears try to burn off. He manages to say goodbye like a reasonable adult, agrees to make sure to take another day off this coming week, and flops back on his bed feeling giddy after she signs off. Even if his caseworker still thinks he's sad and damaged and has sex problems, she said he's making remarkable process, wow. He's a success story and he should be proud, holy shit.

He can definitely deal with that.

-

After that, Rich is in the best goddamn mood. Even finding James is sharing third shift, and is already in the kitten room when Rich gets there, can't bring him down. When a job rolls up on the queue it's mostly debugging and systems-streamlining, stuff Rich can do pretty easily, but not easy enough to be boring. He gets more than halfway through the shift without having to say more than about ten words to James, which is how he likes his shifts, thank you very much.

He's sitting on the other end of the room from James, cuddling a couple purring furballs and working through an issue a dry-rack storage ship called the Mobius Trip has been having with its reservation protocols. It's apparently resulted in a whole lot of leisure pontoons getting stacked on top of each other, while the citizens who wanted to check them out for lunch dates and fishing trips and whatever have found themselves either double-booked or assigned timeslots twelve hours later or earlier than they'd meant to. It's an interesting technical challenge.

And then a voice says, "Oh! Rich, hey, there you are!" and Rich is instantly distracted. Basil is standing at the door, looking windswept and half-soaked, with his coveralls knotted around his waist and his mechanical arm covered up to the elbow in a bright yellow waterproof sanitation glove, secured with rubber-bands. There's a faded mark still visible on his neck that Rich put there a few days ago, and his hair is loose in a damp halo around his head, and he looks adorable.

"Basil!" says Rich, and catches himself grinning like a dumbass a second too late. He can feel James watching him, looking grumpy and intrigued in equal measures, which is never a good combination on the face of an asshole. Rich tempers his expression to something more reasonable. "Hey. You're working pretty fucking late, did Ben want you for something tricky again?"

"Oh, nah," Basil says, and hastily looks down, paying unnecessarily close attention as he kicks his boots off at the door. "I just thought I'd, y'know, try second shift for a while, and then got hauled off into half of third when Nate needed some backup." He shrugs, cheeks flushing faintly.

Rich can't help perking up, because—well. There are plenty of reasons Basil might want to change shifts, but there's a non-zero chance that Rich might be one of them. Basil might like sex with Rich enough that he's changing his preferred work shift so it can happen more often. It'd be so great if that was even part of the reason why.

Rich ends up smiling all shy and hopeful as Basil pads over in soggy sock-feet, and Basil smiles back, eyes crinkling, until Rich gets hold of himself.

"Well, cool," he says, trying to sound casual. "So, long shift?"

Basil drops onto the couch next to Rich to start peeling his waterproof glove off. "Not too much going on early this morning, but then we went and did tune-ups for the Tempestuous. Y'know, the meteorology boat? Kinda early for the big storms, but this season's gonna be weird, I guess, so me and Nate were…" he grimaces. "Up. Like, way up, on the top of the freakin' boat, checking on their Doppler system. Apparently both their techies are out getting married this week, and those ladies have got great timing for when to fuck off. It was bucketing rain today." He plucks demonstratively at his shirt; there's a long soaked strip along the front where rain must have come down his neck and through the collar of his coveralls. Rich can vividly imagine the rainwater trickling down the curve of Basil's jaw and down his throat to stick his shirt to his skin, and it's stupidly distracting.

"So there Nate is," Basil goes on with a huff, "climbing around up there like it's no sweat because he's got four freaking hands to hang on with and I've basically got one, teasing me for being dead weight, like he didn't invite me along himself to do all the heavy mental lifting. The jerk."

Rich opens his mouth and then isn't sure if he should ask. Basil sees his look, though.

"It's not really load-bearing," he says, tapping his prosthetic forearm, and sighs. "If I wanted it to be delicate enough for precision, I couldn't also be doing pull-ups with it. I had to make a choice."

"Oh," Rich says. "Shit, that sucks. I mean, climbing one-handed sounds, not fun?"

"Nope!" Basil agrees. "Not much, my other arm's all sore from picking up the slack." He grimaces and rubs his shoulder, wincing.

"Here, lemme see," Rich says, sitting up and spilling kittens everywhere. He wraps a hand around the slim length of Basil's upper arm to rub his thumbs firmly into one lean bicep. No wonder he's sore, he probably never gets any more exercise than he's forced to on the job. Basil twitches, startled, and then makes a hitching sound, trailing off into a moan that makes Rich's ears heat up. Then he sighs hugely and flops back against the couch in a clear 'do whatever you want with me' move.

"God," James groans from the other end of the room. "Fucking—knock it off! We're on shift, can you maybe not paw at each other while I'm still trying to get work done?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, Technician Laurent," says Rich, all earnest Family Fleet concern. "I know it's hard when you feel like you're not part of the group. Would you like to share what we're doing with Technician Wright? He can practice listening politely and being respectful."

"Yeah, I'm always happy to help my friends with their social skills," Basil says. "Caring comes naturally when we take a little time to share ourselves with each other, you know!" He pulls his arm out of Rich's grip, but only so he can twist around on the couch and put his wet feet in Rich's lap. Rich smiles at him, completely charmed despite the cold squish of his socks through Rich's jeans.

"I'm going to help you with your clothes now," Rich says, "because you're my special friend!" and James makes a loud noise of total horror. Rich grins at Basil and starts taking off his socks, humming the tune for Lend A Hand And Make A Friend, which makes Basil give an incredibly cute little hitching giggle into one of his elbows. Basil's feet are grossly pruny under the wet socks, but there are freckles all the way down to his toes and Rich can't help but be stupidly charmed by it. He grabs one foot and presses a thumb experimentally into the arch, seeing if baseline guys like foot-rubs anywhere near as much as fourhands do. Basil squeaks and then makes a great whining noise of ecstasy, eagerly wiggling his soggy legs more firmly into Rich's increasingly-damp lap.

"Oh my god, tell me you guys didn't roleplay goddamn Family Fleet puppets when you fucked," James groans, and throws a cushion half-heartedly at Rich, who catches it neatly out of the air and slides it under Basil's wet shins.

"That's between me and Rich and all our very most special friends and family viewing at home," Basil says, with hilarious primness, and Rich starts laughing like a naughty under-ten.

"Yeah, if you weren't at the party then I guess Ivanna forgot to count you this time, buddy," Rich says. "Maybe next time you oughta use nicer words and kinder actions, huh?"

"Ouch," Basil snickers, then goes back to moaning when Rich pats his feet and starts rubbing his bicep again. Rich will get back to the foot-rub in a minute; it's only fair to finish what he starts, after all.

"Oh my god keep doing that," Basil groans, "fuck—James, you gotta play nicer with Rich, you are missing out."

"Yeah, I think I'll stay over here in the grown-up zone, thanks," James says, in a snide, cutting tone like he thinks that's a devastating put-down, and then goes back to his screen with a pissy look on his face that only makes Rich's good mood feel ten times better.

Rich finishes working over Basil's arm and then his wrist and hand, for good measure, enjoying the way the guy melts under the touch. "So, the Tempestuous," Rich says, finishing off the massage with a little squeeze to Basil's palm. "They say anything about when the storms are gonna start this year?"

"Just a bunch of mmh, god, 'We're not at liberty to discuss' and 'We'll keep the Fleet fully informed of all relevant meteorological'—oh fuck, Rich," Basil breaks off into a soft, sexy moan, as Rich wraps both hands around one freezing-cold foot and rubs gently, trying to warm it up as best he can. "It, hha. Ah...fuck. I mean. Since, y'know, since...they had us up there, I gotta think they're expecting the superstorms early this year?"

Man, a storm is the last thing Rich needs screwing with his head right now. Although, come to think of it, he's not on the Sympatico anymore. Maybe it'll be nicer, maybe he won't have an overclocked AI screaming down his implants the whole time now that he's on such a nicely-run ship.

"Man, I barely remember docking protocols for a cruiser," Rich says. Then, in case admitting that made him sound like a moron, he adds, "The Sympatico was a 50, you know, too big to dry-dock for anything less than category 4 superstorm, too small to take on any other boats. All I had to do during storms was survive 'em."

"It'll be fine," Basil says, his voice gone low and foggy with pleasure. "Mm, don't...you don't have to worry, man, Ben and Raoul run a tight ship, we've got, ah! we got this. You won't be handling everything on your own like before...oh, and Liam's docked here too. Soon's he shows up, everyone gets taken care of, whether they like it or not."

"That sounds pretty fucking fine, then," Rich agrees, trying not to let on just how touched he is at the reassurance. He squeezes Basil's feet, experimenting with how best to rub the ball of a foot that's got a normal big toe instead of a cramped-up prehensile thumb. Basil squirms distractingly, making happy, shameless little noises.

After a bit, Rich takes a break from foot-rubs to grab his fancy new self-heating thermos. Right now it's holding black tea brewed strong for the caffeine and then mixed with a wicked portion of his new vodka, which tastes vile, but it's doing a great job of simultaneously keeping him awake enough to code and relaxed enough to cheerfully co-exist with James.

"Is that tea?" Basil asks longingly.

Rich smiles. "Yeah, this'll warm you up," he says, although he does have the decency to warn, when he hands it over, "Just sip first."

Basil blinks at him, leaning up on an elbow to take the thermos. "Why, is it super hot or something?"

"Nah," Rich says, waving a hand at him to go on.

Reassured, Basil takes a sip, and nearly spits it all over himself. "Aughhblughh gross!" he yelps, scrubbing his mouth on the back of his gloved hand, and gives Rich a hilariously betrayed look that has Rich snorting. "What did you do to that tea?!"

"Just made it a little stronger," Rich says, grinning at him.

"Shit," Basil says, looking weirded out, and hands it back to Rich. "Man, that's—shit, man."

Rich salutes him with the thermos, still grinning, and takes a long slug. Yeah, it tastes thoroughly nasty, but it sure warms him up.

Basil's looking at him still, though, with that uncomfortable, weirded-out look on his face.

"You..." he starts, and sighs, and looks away. Then looks back. "You doing okay, man?"

Rich blinks at him, confused. "Yeah, I'm fine, I've been here all afternoon," he says. He squeezes one of Basil's cold feet. "Why, what's up?"

Basil looks to James, who's been watching whatever the hell this interplay is intently, and shakes his head.

"Nothing," Basil says. "Just—I dunno, nothing. You gonna finish all that? Like, during your work-shift?"

"I mean, not if you wanna share it with me," Rich says, and hands it back. Basil takes it, and takes a tiny sip, and grimaces. But he doesn't give it back, so. Rich figures maybe he's gonna work his way up to it or something. It's pretty cute.

Rich leaves off the foot-rub and starts working again, and Basil sits up, curling his legs to warm his feet against Rich's thigh. Occasionally Rich mentions an issue to him and they toss ideas back and forth, which is surprisingly fun. Basil's gotten a lot better at explaining his own thought-process from when he was a little baby genius who could only say 'but isn't it obvious?' when asked how he'd gotten his solutions, and Rich has mostly managed to get over his own jealousy for Basil's innate talent now that it's backed with such obviously practiced skill. It helps that Basil seems to genuinely appreciate Rich's own hard-won experience, too. They have more to talk about, now. They actually work well together. It's nice.

"Hey, baby boy, if you're not gonna drink that, can I have my thermos back?" Rich says eventually, when he finds his mouth getting a little dry from all the chatting.

"I am! I'm gonna drink some, I'm just—taking my time!" Basil says, and takes another careful sip, grimacing again. Rich snickers at him, steals the thermos for a swig of his own and hands it back. After that Basil takes the occasional sip, huffing afterwards like he can't believe what he's putting in his mouth. It doesn't take much of that before he gets distinctly flushed and starts leaning against Rich, snuggling in, and a while after that Rich realizes he's fallen asleep. He must have really had a strenuous shift, if a few sips of mixed tea is knocking him out.

"Right," James says loudly some time later, and shuts down his screens with a sweep of his hand. "I'm going to dinner."

Basil twitches and murmurs and Rich raises his eyebrows at James. It's just hit the end of shift, and it'd be a real coincidence if James finished the job he was working on at just the right time.

"Enjoy your meal, Technician Laurent," Rich says sweetly, and James sneers and stalks out. Rich keeps working, because even if he's not supposed to be taking extra shifts anymore he's almost figured this last issue out, it won't take that long, and he still doesn't like leaving work unfinished. He wraps the task up in less than half an hour, marks it complete, and closes his screens with a sense of immense triumph.

Then he looks down at Basil, curled up against him hugging the thermos, dozing peacefully, and everything just feels that much better. God, this guy's cute. Rich is aware he may be smiling dopily as he strokes curls back from Basil's face, but it's fine because there's no one to see. Basil switched to day shifts, holy shit, Rich is gonna have a warm glow over that for like the next week.

"Hey," he says quietly, patting Basil's cheek. "Basil, it's dinner, buddy, come on."

"Mngh," Basil comments, and tries to burrow down behind Rich's shoulder to escape the patting hand.

Charmed, Rich switches to working his thermos out of Basil's sleepy clutch. That gets a confused mumble and the beginning of actual wakefulness.

"Wake up if you want any food, baby boy," Rich tells him, and Basil squints up at him.

"...Did I fall asleep?" he mumbles.

"You did," Rich says. "It was adorable. I arranged you in rude poses and James took pictures."

Basil bonks his head vengefully against Rich's arm. "Did not. You and James couldn't cooperate on something like that if your lives depended on it."

"Damn, you got me," Rich agrees, and pulls Basil more upright to lean over and kiss him gently. "I can't believe you switched shifts," he murmurs.

Basil looks up at him, dazed, and licks his wet lower lip a few times. "Well, it's, uh," he goes, coherently. "It's…no big deal, man, really. I just, uh." He shrugs, strokes his bare hand over his hair, looks shyly away.

Rich gives a helpless little laugh, low and warm in his chest, and leans in to kiss him again, because the first one went over so well. Basil makes a sweet, soft sigh against his mouth, and curls his bare hand in the neck of Rich's shirt.

Rich draws back after another minute of that, because it feels like things could get pretty hot and heavy if he lets them and he is hungry for dinner, even if he's not starving anymore. Basil's tired, anyway, and…maybe not every single time Basil lets Rich kiss him should lead directly to Rich trying to get ahold of the guy's dick. Maybe it's good to establish that Basil can let Rich kiss him and, like, that's…it. Just some straightforward affection, because Basil's so cute and Rich likes him so much.

The way Basil looks up at him when he pulls back though, all flushed and wide-eyed and licking his kiss-dark lips some more, really tests Rich's resolve not to immediately go for Basil's dick as soon as he can possibly manage.

Rich hauls himself to his feet instead, then offers Basil a hand up. He clutches at Rich's arm once he's upright, swaying dizzily, and Rich steadies him. "You alright? Stand up too fast?"

Basil huffs at him. "No, your stupid drink happened to me!"

"Oh, come on!" Rich says, startled. "Don't tell me you're drunk, you were sipping that shit like someone's fussy granny!"

"Yeah, cuz it's hard liquor!" Basil says. "Vodka's a lot stronger than jar beer for people who aren't built like goddamn tanks, I dunno if you noticed." He lets go of Rich, takes a couple of careful steps, getting steadier as he goes. "Shit," he adds, sounding cranky.

"...You didn't have to have any," Rich says, feeling weirdly guilty and confused about it. Basil getting a free buzz should be a good thing, he's off duty and everything, he doesn't have to care about how far gone he happens to get. And he liked drinking with Rich well enough before, it seemed like. But he's not acting like he likes it now.

Basil looks back at him, glances at the thermos, and sighs.

"No, I guess I didn't," he says. "I just—I dunno, sorry. C'mon, man, didn't you say it's dinner?"

"I did," Rich says, and they head to the mess together.

They're halfway there when there's a voice from behind them.

"Rich. Can I talk to you a minute?"

Rich turns to see Ben walking towards him, and okay, Ben rarely looks happy: reluctantly amused is the closest he usually gets. But right now he looks really displeased, thin-lipped and eyes narrow. Swallowing, Rich nods.

"You can go on, I'll catch up," he tells Basil, who frowns but doesn't say anything as Rich turns to follow Ben back down the passage. Rich's mind is running frantically over everything he's done recently that someone might be mad about, first likely and then more and more unlikely offenses. Maybe Mitch reported that Rich didn't intend to turn in the techs who were screwing up the Mall? Maybe Mitch has decided he's not okay after all with Rich having sex with Basil. Maybe Rich should've checked with Ben as his superior before getting his ears pierced. Maybe someone's found out about him buying the vodka? But that's not something anyone cares about, Doreen wasn't trying to hide her wares or anything, Security didn't stop Rich on the way out—

"Okay," Ben says, turning to him, and Rich stares at him blankly. They're alone in an empty passageway, there's no Security at Ben's back, not even a couple guys with wrenches or something. Rich's heart is beating too fast anyway, and he's hot and cold and he doesn't know what to do with his hands.

"Can I see your thermos?" Ben says, and Rich stares at the thermos a second before handing it over.

"It's mine," he says hastily, "I didn't—" steal it, no, don't say that, "I bought it at the Mall."

Ben opens it and sniffs, takes a sip and raises his eyebrows at Rich. "What's in it?" he says quietly, seeming not at all concerned about the provenance of the thermos, in which case Rich has no idea whatsoever what this is about. The uncertainty doesn't help his nerves at all.

"Black tea, with some blackberry vodka mixed in," he says.

Ben nods. He closes the thermos and crosses his arms, grim as he stares up at Rich. "This is a warning. I'm not gonna give you demerits yet because I know you're still figuring things out. But next time you drink on duty, I'm going to have to report that to your caseworker, and you're gonna get help straightening yourself out whether you want it or not."

Rich licks his lips, a flicker of waking anger tangling with the fear and bewilderment. He doesn't need to straighten out, he just, what? "You guys don't—seriously, no one has any drinks on duty here?"

Ben's brows snap down. "No, kid. That's illegal, remember? Intoxication is a serious job hazard, especially our job. Drunk mechanics only risk themselves and their crewmates—drunk techies risk entire boats."

Of course Rich knows getting drunk is technically against the rules, it's a job hazard or whatever, but he thought it was one of those regulations no one paid attention to. On the Sympatico, no one was ever more sober than they had to be.

"I'm not drunk, though," he can't help but say, because he's better than that, he hasn't screwed anything up, and he didn't even when he was drunk yesterday. "I don't get drunk on duty, I'm not—I'm not a drunk, I wouldn't!"

"I don't care," Ben says in a hard voice, and jabs a finger at him. "Even if you're not just bullshitting the both of us about that, you sure as hell went and got Basil drunk, and he may be off-shift right now, but it looks like you wouldn't have known any better if he'd been working! He's a good kid and he's always looked up to you, and you could get him in serious trouble like this!"

Rich's anger gutters out entirely as he stares at Ben, stricken, because…that never occurred to him. He didn't even realize Basil would get drunk; the thought of him getting in trouble for something Rich didn't even think about is stomach-twisting. The thought of Basil innocently copying all of Rich's screwed up bad habits, getting poisoned by the Sympatico second-hand, makes Rich want to crawl into some dirty little corner of the lowest, darkest deck he can get to, and die there.

"Sorry," he mumbles, finding himself on the burning edge of tears, "I didn't mean—I didn't realize."

Ben lets out a long breath and passes a hand over his hair, sagging as the anger leaves him. He looks almost regretful, but—firm, still. And very unhappy.

"You're a good kid, too," he sighs, shoving the thermos at Rich. "You work hard and you mean well, you just picked up a couple of bad habits you gotta knock off already. No more drinking on duty, no need for demerits. Got it?"

"Got it," Rich mumbles and takes the thermos back, feeling about three inches tall. Ben nods, satisfied, and stumps off the way he came.

God. Rich is so tired of hearing about what a screw-up he is. Shape up, straighten up, fix your shit, do better—it pisses him off because most of the time he's already doing his best and they just don't care, but this time he has screwed up without even knowing. It feels even worse than the sick, miserable fury of when Angie was yelling at him about stuff she didn't even understand, because now he can't be mad at anyone but himself.

"Fuck," he mutters, rubs a hand over his face and heads back towards the mess. He's halfway there when James comes around the corner in front of him and stops to look him up and down.

"Got caught, huh?" James smirks. "This isn't the Sympatico, dumbass. We don't put up with delinquents here."

Normally Rich would just shrug James off, because it's just James, he's just a dick, Rich is used to so much worse. James' stupid taunts are just, just that, just stupid, they don't have to matter. Right now, though, he's stupidly hurt and stunned by the jab, arms slack at his sides with his stomach knotted up around a weight of sick guilt. He's only too aware that he's all wrong for this ship. Rich knew how things worked on the Sympatico, but here he's guessing and fumbling around and he keeps screwing up no matter how hard he tries to be good.

Rich is still standing there, sucking in air through a tight throat and trying to figure out what he can possibly say, when he becomes abruptly aware of the sound of loud, uneven footsteps getting closer by the second. Basil swings around the corner, breathing hard, cheeks flushed and more furious than Rich has ever seen him.

"Shut the fuck up, James," he snaps, with no preamble, and shoves himself in between James and Rich, fists clenched at his sides. "You're a real great guy to shoot your fucking mouth off about delinquents when there've been more complaints about you than anyone else in this department, combined, you big jerk!"

James draws himself upright with a sharp huff, but Basil keeps going, taking one stomping, unsteady step forward after the next.

"You wanna know why no one ever fucking invites you back to their bunk?" Basil demands. "You're an asshole! You're an asshole and you think it's cool, you think you're so cool, and you think being so cool makes up for the fact that Miguel is the only guy on this whole boat who can fucking tolerate your shit for more than ten minutes at a stretch, and that's just because he feels sorry for you!"

"Holy shit," James says, actually backing up as Basil continues to advance. He's gone pale, and his mouth is twisted in a nervous grimace. "Man, hey, Basil, c'mon—"

Basil gets right up close and jabs a prosthetic finger into James' chest, hard enough that James winces. He growls, "If you got Rich in trouble with Ben because you're jealous I slept with him instead of finally fucking falling for the idea that no one else but you would condescend to give me a shot, I will rip your dick off. I will rip your dick right off. And you know no one would ever believe it was me, too, so I'd get away with it and you wouldn't have a dick anymore!"

Rich decides it's time to intervene: Basil's wobbling and glassy-eyed and James is looking deeply freaked out. He's not a genuine bastard, Rich doesn't think. He's just a sad, petty little jerk, and he isn't worth the demerits.

Rich puts his hand on Basil's shoulder, firmly but gently, and tugs him away.

"C'mon, buddy, you told him off," he says. "Let's get you back to your bunk now, okay?"

"Okay," Basil says, wobbling on his heels. "Okay, but—okay, but, so—" he refocuses on James, pointing dramatically. "Rich is from a fucked up murder-boat where they solved all their fucking arguments with knives, you know that? He's got like, knife scars!" Rich twitches uncomfortably, but Basil doesn't notice, keeps going. "And I've never even seen him be mean to you! You are officially meaner than the guy from the fucking murder-boat! How fucked up is that?! You need to go and think about how fucked up and sad your whole stupid life is, James, that you're still the worst guy on the Reliant after we got sent a guy from the stupid goddamn murder-boat full of knife—guys!"

Rich is pretty sure he's blushing like a moron right now, embarrassed and unsettled, but he manages to reel Basil in against his side, and tuck him under his arm.

"We're going now," he says, very firmly. He's not meeting James's eyes. From what he can tell, James isn't looking at him, either.

"I'm never having sex with James in my whole life," Basil mutters, into Rich's arm.

"Great, glad to hear it," Rich says, and starts dragging him away.

"Yeah, well—fuck both of you, who cares!" James yells at their backs, too late and too loud, and cracking pathetically. He might be crying. Rich doesn't turn around because he does not want to know. Everything is already way too much; he tenses his arm around Basil and keeps marching him along when Basil makes an angry noise like he wants to keep the fight going. Eventually, he gives up, and starts walking with Rich instead of getting pushed along. It still feels like it takes forever to get back to their berths.

"...Hey," Basil finally says at his doorway, sounding uncertain. "You okay? I, sorry, I was kind of—I mean I meant it, but. Sorry. Are you okay?"

Rich has no idea how he is, really. He's hungry, and his stomach is twisted up in knots, and he's deeply grateful to Basil for lighting into James like that, and humiliated that Basil even had to, and relieved that it was nothing but a bit of yelling, and guilty for getting him drunk and risking trouble for it and teaching him bad habits and everything. He wants to push Basil into his berth and then go hide in his own and get blackout drunk for the rest of the evening and forget everything that's happened so far in like, his whole entire life.

He nods anyway, and tries a shaky smile, looking over at where Basil's not making any attempt to get out from under his arm. Whatever his face does instead makes Basil bite his lip and pat Rich's arm, and then reluctantly let go of Rich to give him a gentle, prompting push toward his berth.

"I'll be right back, okay?" he says. "Like, right back. Can you—never mind. Okay. I'll be back. You'll be here?"

"Yeah?" Rich says, somewhat uneasy. Basil can't be planning to go yell at James some more, but what if he's got some weird idea, like that Rich needs more people around, company to cheer him up? That sounds like the kind of Family Fleet idea Basil might go for, and absolutely the opposite of what Rich needs right now.

When Basil eventually comes back, though, he's not dragging any of Rich's friends, to encourage him or something. He knocks nervously on the door of Rich's berth, and smiles hopefully when Rich opens it, holding up a big stack of salad and fruit cartons, and a mesh bag of oranges. Confused, Rich steps back to let him in, and Basil goes and piles everything up on Rich's desk with tipsy delicacy, then steadies himself against the back of his chair and peers at him with wide-eyed, intent concentration.

"...Have you ever watched The Silver Scale?" he says, like it's the most important question he's ever asked.

"No," Rich says, still a little confused. "You wanna, uh, introduce me?"

Basil relaxes all in a relieved rush, like he was scared Rich was about to kick him out, and smiles instead, awkward and crooked and glad.

"Yeah! You'll, it's great, I think you'll like it. I bet I know who your favorite character is gonna be. Should we, uh…" he gets one of the water bottles and edges toward the bed, perches his narrow ass on the side and pulls up a screen, a directory of what must be episode titles. "The first three episodes are maybe a little rough, I mean, I think. You might like them! Uh, that, that'd be cool too." He takes a distracted swig of water, scrubs at his rosy-brown cheeks and then looks up at Rich. "...I can sit in the chair though," he says earnestly. "If you wanna be alone, on the bed I mean."

He looks good sitting on Rich's bed, on the nice blue-green bedspread, and Rich's smile widens a little. "I think I can handle myself, even in close proximity, without giving in and ravishing you," he says dryly. He sits down next to Basil, dropping a casual arm over his shoulders. He can be cool, and not a walking collection of bad habits and maladjustment. He can hang out like a reasonable guy, and not immediately creep all over Basil, or get him any more drunk.

"Um, do you like soda?" he asks, belatedly hospitable. "I've got some, if you want something more interesting than water but not, uh."

"...Soda would be cool," says Basil, and his voice sounds all soft and weird. Rich can see Basil looking at him out of the corner of his eye, catch flashes of his flushed cheeks and the way the light from his screen glints off those big, pretty brown eyes.

"Cool," Rich says, getting back up instead of leaning closer, touching his face or kissing his stupidly kissable lips. He opens his locker and pulls out a soda and his jug of blackberry vodka without thinking about it. Then he stops and looks at Basil, the way his eyes flicker between Rich and the jug, the odd look on his face that's something like unease, but not of Rich, exactly. Good example, right, no bad habits. Rich carefully puts the jug back and hands the soda to Basil. Rich will finish off his thermos and that'll just have to be enough.

Sitting back down, he pulls over the nearest carton of fruit and helps himself eagerly to mixed apple slices and grapes while Basil opens the first episode. A dramatic, punchy opening starts playing, full of muscular, attractive people posing dramatically and having improbable fights, and Basil glances over again and then not-very-sneakily inserts himself under Rich's arm. This accomplished, he gives a criminally cute little sigh of satisfaction and takes a sip of his soda, like there's nowhere else he'd rather be in the world. It makes the wretched weight of shame in Rich's chest lighten a little.

Watching cartoons with Basil is almost as entertaining as the cartoons themselves, and they're pretty good cartoons. Basil has obviously seen them a thousand times, because he gets twitchy and excited under Rich's arm when something cool is about to happen, and when Rich glances down at him, his lips are moving silently along with most of the dialogue. He still watches like every single scene delights him, and it's incredibly cute.

"Okay," he says, at the end of episode three, and pauses for the first time since they started, looking up at Rich. "So the whole team's introduced—who's your favorite so far?"

Rich considers not the question, but which character he suspects Basil most dislikes. "You know, I think I like the kid sidekick, he just—he's trying really hard, you know?" Trying to be a smarmy little self-righteous douche when he's not too busy feeling sorry for himself to function, but no need to mention that.

"What?" Basil says, transparently disgusted. "No, come on! He doesn't even do anything!"

"Aww, that's not true!" Rich says, managing to look disappointed. "He's so supportive and encouraging!"

He manages to keep a straight face while Basil launches into an impassioned rant about all the other cool characters who should be Rich's favorite, and then Basil runs out of breath and has to stop, and actually concludes his argument with a disgusted "Hmph," arms crossing. Rich busts up laughing, dropping over sideways onto the bed, knocking the empty fruit carton and his thermos onto the floor. Basil growls at him and then dives on top of him and does his best to hit Rich over the head with his own pillow, and eventually they settle down again, laughing and dizzy, both of them too warm and comfortable to get back up again. Basil starts the show again. Rich wraps both arms around him and props his chin on one skinny shoulder, watching until his eyes go blurry.

Eventually he surfaces from a comfortable doze to check the time, and he blinks at how late it's gotten. "Shit, you've gotta get to sleep, man, you—oh, no, you switched shifts."

"Mmmhm," Basil mumbles in agreement, snuggling back closer against Rich's chest. "Switched to days, 'member. 'S fine."

"Yeah, cool," Rich says, still thrilled about that. He nuzzles Basil's fluffy hair. "Hey. If you're, uh. You could, uh, you could sleep with me again. I could, maybe I could blow you? If you want?"

Basil makes a sleepy version of his shy, pleased giggle, and shifts around, gets himself facing into Rich's chest and throws an arm over his ribs.

"Can I—maybe, can we, some other time?" He yawns, hugely, nuzzles into Rich's collarbone and gives a happy sigh. His voice drifts up as a blurry mumble, warm against Rich's skin. "...'N we just do this tonight?"

Oh. Rich has to breathe in carefully at the sudden ache in his chest, something so soft and amazed it hurts. Someone wanting to be this close to him, to be held by him, and not even wanting anything for it in return: he never even considered that could be a possibility.

"Yeah," he says, hushed with awe, and strokes Basil's hair. "Sure, baby boy." He reaches up an arm to stop the episode that was still playing, closing Basil's screen, and fishes a blanket up over both of them. Then he turns out the light and lays his arm over Basil in the dark. Something tender and breathless and ecstatic is welling up in him. Part of him wants to worry about it, because it seems so fragile, as easily crushed as any hope. It feels too good to resist, though, and he's already falling asleep smiling.

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