Hellyeahconcrete

Since the so far successful process of colonizing a new planet, the Invincible II has seen quite a few more voyages in her day. And Molly has surveyed every trip. So far, things have been smooth aside from a few minor hiccups. Light turmoil amongst her crew. Expected wear and tear of the ship. Being haunted by the no longer existing, but formerly present corpses of Molly's failures. The usual.

But there was something different about this trip. Something Molly couldn't quite place on how to handle. She always prided herself on being an astute problem solver, and yet… she had been drawing nothing but blanks lately.

"Captain?" Molly very nearly jumped out of her skin. She carefully put her now cold coffee cup down and turned to Celci, who had been there for much longer than Molly ever would have guessed.

"Yes, Celci?"

The Head of Cryo handed her a tablet. "Just needed your approval to utilize the vacant cryo pods for our shipment of perishables."

Molly quickly gave her E-signature. "Of course," she murmured.

Celci brought the tablet back against her chest, looking over her Captain with concern pulling at her brow. "Are you… feeling okay?"

"Yeah," Molly lied. "Why would you say that?"

"You just seemed a bit out of it." Celci spared a quick glance around the room. "You've been keeping up with your virtual appointments since we set off, right?" Some time after the initial colonization, Molly took up A.A. It was probably one of the major differences the crew easily detected about her. It was rough the first few months or so, expectedly, but there was a significant improvement in her leadership and the way she interacted with the crew overall.

"Yes, yes, of course," Molly reassured. "I think I just haven't been getting that much sleep lately." Which wasn't particularly untrue. Lately she's caught herself burning the dim green glow of the decorative stars in her quarters into her irises. That being said, it didn't make Celci any less skeptical.

"Just… don't be afraid to reach out, Captain. Okay?"

Molly offered a small smile. "I won't." Celci left with that. Molly's shoulders slumped. To hell if she's uttering a word about this to anybody. There's enough shame and guilt to be had from her own self. She couldn't even imagine….

Molly forced herself to circle round to her desk, sitting herself back down in front of the forever accumulating pile of distractions. She let her gaze drop down to the paperwork, but she found herself unable to make sense of the words in front of her. Her eyes could only focus on four letters. Her Head Engineer's name scrawled at the top of a revised blueprint for modifications to the ship.

Molly's jaw set tightly. Truly, she was mad at herself. Falsely quested lifetimes length of revenge against the man, repented for it, and suddenly she can't handle even stand the thought of him. It felt just like going back to square one, like the wormhole hadn't been closed in the first place and this was merely another timeline. An extreme, extreme, extreme unliklihood that has finally claimed its turn.

She felt sick to her stomach at the mere thought of him.

"Hi, Captain." Molly 's head snapping up to find the very man before her standing in her doorway, a genuine smile on his face. Molly always hated seeing that smile. She hated how in spite of the fact she was as big of a tormentor to him during the wormhole crisis he still smiled at her like that.

"Hey," she replied, her voice too soft, too unsure. "Did you need something from me?"

Mark tilted his head toward the virtual clock embedded in the wall. The last time Molly eyed it, it claimed it was roughly 6pm. Now it was very near midnight, an artificial moon softly glowing along with a message encouraging crew members to retire for the day. How did that much time pass?

"I was under the impression we were keeping each other in check with staying out late?" Mark replied.

Molly rubbed at her face with a sigh. "Well, shit." She stood up from her desk. "Didn't even know." She stalled in one place, pressing a hand to her back, feigning to crack it. "Why are you out here right now?"

Mark shrugged. "Couldn't sleep. Thought I'd get some work done, but I saw you in here."

Molly raised an eyebrow. "Isn't it a little hypocritical of you to be booting me out of my office while you're trying to work after hours?"

"Well, I'm not booting you. I'm just… firmly encouraging. Don't think I could ever force you to do anything, Captain," Mark said in a lighthearted manner.

"You'd be surprised," Molly muttered.

"What?"

"Nothing." She brushed past her Engineer to shuffle off back to her room.

"Uh, Captain?" Molly froze in her tracks. She turned her head just slightly. Not enough to actually peek over her shoulder, but to give the impression of it. She can't bring herself to look Mark in the eye right now. "Did I do something wrong?"

Molly's eyes screwed shut, a long breath of air blowing out through her nose. "I'd tell you. Wouldn't I?"

The soft features of Mark's face hardened in an expression that was not often seen by most, but Molly was all too familiar with. She swiveled her head back to its original place.

"Don't give me that." Mark reminded himself to unclench his jaw. "You've been avoiding me." Molly said nothing. "Did I say something? Do something? …Molly."

Hearing her first name from his lips stung worse than his smile, to be honest. Even nowadays, Mark would loft her title with only the utmost respect and admiration. Maybe occasionally, he'd shorten her real name in a way she still claims irritated her. But her name plain and simple, not something she ever earned but granted through obligation?

Molly's body twitched to the beat of her unending heart, or so it felt like as each second ticked by in silence. She slid her slick hands down the sides of her uniform before finally turning around.

The Captain regarded her Head Engineer with a narrowed gaze. "After everything, I don't scare you? Not one bit?"

The question took Mark off guard, but he was quick to adjust. "Of course you scare me."

Molly shook her head. "Not in the way I should." She knew the feeling of his body being strung apart by the atoms. She knew the feeling of his pulse fighting erratically against her palm. She knew the feeling of his blood even more intimately. And Mark could recall similar events like her muffled screams against a taut pillow.

The dangers of an open wormhole. Drives the most sane into fits. All in all, these two are lucky they're here to stand in front of one another and regret.

"You want me to cower then? Is that it?" He would if she asked, of course.

Molly rolled her eyes. "Obviously not."

"Then how do you want me to respond, Captain? Sh-should I do it like you? Get all broody and sulk—?"

"I'm not sulking—"

Mark sucked in a breath, crossing his arms over his chest and raising his shoulders up to his ears. "You just wouldn't understand, Mark."

"Why are you lowering your voice?"

"You were doing the exact same thing I was and wasted a thousand years building a death machine. You couldn't even begin to get what I've gone through."

Molly pinched the bridge of her nose. "You are such a child."

Mark lowered his shoulders, taking down the act. "How else am I supposed to act when that's all you give me?"

The Captain placed her hands on her hips, letting out a deep sigh. "Mark. It's late. Can't we just save this for some other time?"

"Molly, I want to talk with you. We finally made some progress, and then out of the blue, you just… start disappearing on me. I mean is-is it about you thinking I need to be afraid? Do you think you're so irredeemable you don't even want to give me the chance to—"

Molly curled her hand around the front of his jumpsuit, dragging her Engineer toward herself. "There is no use in psychoanalyzing me," she said coldly, plain and simply. "You're wasting energy trying to."

"Because nobody will ever get you?" Mark said with a roll of his eyes.

"Yeah. Especially you."

Anyone else probably would have tucked tail and let Molly be. But Mark had spent far, far too much time with the Captain. His hand covered Molly's, who was still holding onto his jumpsuit like a lifeline. He could feel the near imperceptible twitch of her fingers underneath his touch. It might as well be a jolt in this proximity.

"What am I gonna find out about you that's got you so scared?"

A taut tension was drawn as Molly's silence stretched. This, too Mark was familiar with. He wondered sometimes if his Captain was ever aware of the power she held within any given room she stood in. How she changed the very warmth of the space around her like a flickering star.

"Why do you care?"

"I trust you the most out of anyone else on this ship. I always have. I worry when you're not yours—… What are you looking at." Molly's eyes quickly snapped up to Mark's.

"What?"

"You were like- looking down just now." Mark glanced down at himself, checked his collar. No grease he smeared on himself, for once his shirt was actually clean. He met Molly's gaze once again, catching the quick dark brown blur of them as she corrected them once again. "Why can't you look me in the eye?" She's never really had that problem before. Intense eye contact was practically her forte, and yet, for some reason, her eyes keep drifting downward from—

Oh.

Oh.

Molly's staring at his lips. And she can't look away. Parts of the equations began to link together before Mark's eyes. He still didn't believe the outcome, though.

His hand came up, cautiously settling beneath her clenched jaw. Mark held it there for a while, seeing if she'd bat him away, but she didn't. He gingerly tilted his Captain's head up to look him in the eye once more. "Tell me what's going on," he spoke in a gentle plead.

Molly breathed in slow. "I wanna kiss you." Mark was desperately trying to quiet his pounding heart. It seemed so loud in between them. "And it's a bad idea."

Her Head Engineer swallowed. "Why- why would that be so bad?"

"I'm your boss. Beyond that, I'm kind of a major dick to you."

"Kind of?" Mark blurted out, immediately wanting to facepalm himself. Molly wasn't taking it personally, though.

"I'm not good for you."

"…How come you're the one who gets to decide that?" The Captain fell silent as her eyebrows raised in slight surprise. "You haven't been perfect. But I still look up to you, you know? You've never given up on this ship… and despite what you may say, you've never given up on me. I'm where I am now because of you, Molls, rough spots and all."

Molly looked Mark firmly in the eye. "And is that really enough?

Mark soaked in her response before giving a slight shrug. "Well. If it's not, I'm always willing to make a bad decision if it's with you, Cap."

Molly shook her head and her Head Engineer feared for just a moment he said the wrong thing. "You're always convincing me to do dumb shit." The Captain swiftly leaned forward to kiss Mark, the contact extremely foreign and yet sparking a familiar sensation of deja vu. Comes with causing a time paradox together.

But in those faint, almost-there recollections, neither could recall a kiss ever occurring when they were themselves. Some snake was always swooping in, or their minds were addled by whatever given storyline was occurring at the time. Nothing natural, nothing real. Unlike right now with Mark's scruff scratching at Molly's face, her hair tickling his eyelashes, the Captain's palms still slick with sweat.

It was messy and brash, but it was them. And dare they say it, they liked it that way.

Mark's hands found Molly's hips, indulging himself in a quick squeeze. Then suddenly there was the far too close sound of a door sliding open. Molly was quick to depart, taking Mark's hand and pulling him with her as she pressed her back up to the nearest wall. She watched carefully as a straggling crew member stumbled sleepily out of a work room toward their quarters.

Neither the Head Engineer or the Captain moved until they were well out of ear shot. Molly went lax once the coast was clear. "'Kay. New rule. We get a room next time."

Mark looked on, hopeful. "Next time?"

"Yeah. …As long as that's fine with you?"