only human, after all

Pax was not the sort of exorbitantly wealthy that spend their billions on luxury spaceships and sports teams and extensive aesthetic body modifications, but he was well off thanks to a combination of a high and steady income, and a general lack of desire to buy extravagant things for himself.

Combined with his siblings’ savings, the Monarch Kids had a proper small fortune saved up.

It had been more than enough money to buy a bonafide mansion in the country—or, as close to the country as existed in Mallos.

It was the suburbs, really, just a thirty-minute shuttle ride outside the city proper, but the complex spread across a decent amount of land, and fences and shrubbery along the boundary made it feel like its own personal oasis.

It had stuck with him, what Peck had said about the Monarchs not having a home. Ever since they’d been the Monarch Kids—the group of children acquired by the massive tech and medicine titan, Monarch, to do controversial cybernetic testing on—they’d had no one but each other to look out for them.

They’d scattered to the winds over the past few years, but it had taken one of them almost dying for Pax to realize how separated they’d become.

Getting Peck on board was easy, and where Peck went, Gemini went. Percy was a bit more stubborn, but he was stubborn about everything, really, so it was just a matter of convincing him. Lyra had been trickier, but even she had ended up sending money their way.

So here he was. Standing in the first place that has ever really been his. It’s home.

He glances over at Leo and smiles, hooking their pinkies together. “They should be here any minute,” he murmurs. “You ready?”

The step-down unit of the New Eden General Hospital was full of light. Floor to ceiling glass windows were featured in every patient room, showing the glittering jewel of the city below, and this one was no different.

Vulpecula Rask, the name above the biobed proclaimed.

It had been a long road getting her here. Pax had done what he could, and what he’d done had saved her life, but as with all medicine done in the field, there were complications. There was the heart transplant first, and then for weeks, it was secondary infection after secondary infection, a trial and error of which cocktail of drugs was powerful enough to work without killing her in the process. Her old heart had stopped twice before the transplant, and her fever had spiked so high once they’d had to put her on a cryobed.

But she was alive, dozing on the flimsy white hospital sheets. There was no ventilator—no whirring machines—just a PICC line and the steady readout of her vitals on the screen beside her bed.

Pax flicked his fingers, scrolling through the data. He read everything once, twice, three times, just to be sure.

Her vitals were normal. She was on her last few doses of antibiotics. She was going to be okay. Peck was going to be okay.

So why couldn’t he shake the feeling of dread in his chest?

He watched Peck breathe, watched her chest rise and fall gently in sleep.

It had been a long, long couple of months, made longer by the fact that he’d been pouring himself absolutely into his work. Home was… home was difficult. Some nights it was just easier to sleep in the on-call room than go home to a person who was trying so hard to make up for something Pax had no real right to be angry about.

And. Yet.

Pax sighed.

She watches the device, here eyes wary and shoulders tense. Although she trusts Pax for the most part she still doesn’t like all the mysterious bits and bobs he used to analyze her. She preferred a more direct approach: a keen eye, a decent guess, and sharp scalpel. But she supposed technology was helpful even if she was suspicious of it, “I think it’s more that I have a habit of seeing danger and running right into it: knowingly and willingly. I just don’t understand how anyone could stay on the side lines. How do you just stand back and watch?”

Pax sets the device down when he’s done with it, and grabs his holopad instead, tapping a few buttons and projecting her chart into the air for easy visualization.

He shrugs at Kitra’s question as he swipes through a few displays. For the most part, the numbers were in the green. “If everyone ran straight into danger, who’d be there to help them get out of it?” he countered. “I’m not exactly built for all those flashy heroics, but I can make sure that those who are can stay alive to keep doing them.”

Gemini crosses the halls of the grand alliance ‘medship’ following the same path that she does every day. It is routine by now and she no longer needs to cling to the arms of a guide to remember her way. As she walks, fast but still unsure, she catches the eye of a passerby who looks even more uncertain than her. she takes a moment to look at him, but cannot get her eyes to focus and feel as if she is looking through him. 

She can feel her brain working to connect dots, but every attempt is a near miss. So she decides to ignore it and keep walking. 

Pax’s eyes catch on the figure walking to his left and he does a double-take. 

“Gem? Is that—? What are you doing here?” he asks, taking the few steps it took to get closer to her. He’s hit with a sudden rush of emotions and remembers the last time they had all been together, his family, before all five of them ended up scattered across the galaxy. “It’s been— How are you doing?”

             the unfortunate luck of meeting the unfriendly one has inevitably caught up to her.    of course,    nina didn’t assume that any of them would be half as friendly as they have been so far.     she just got comfortable in knowing that most of them are,    and now she’s disappointed and doesn’t necessarily know how to respond. 

     “   oh,    i know that,   ”     she smiles,    still nervous,    still avoiding eye-contact.     “   but tell me,    when has being somewhere that you’re supposed to be brought about excitement ?   ”     she reasons,    finally glancing at him again.       her stubbornness doesn’t want to turn around,   but his cold stare certainly makes her reconsider.      “   uh,   you know,   i-i could help you.   ”

Pax’s posture loosens slightly. This person doesn’t seem like a threat, but he knows appearances can be deceiving. And he kind of likes her logic.

“How can you help me?” he allows finally. He might as well give her a chance. It’s not exactly like they had a lot of people out there offering to help—he had to take advantage of the resources he did have.

Kitra snorted, the trace of a laugh playing under her breath, “Pax, I’m beginning to think you stay with us just because you like a challenge. I am a challenge in all regards,” she says leaning back on the table. This was almost a comfortable routine now, she still hated the process but at least she knew he wasn’t going to cut her into pieces and take her memories. He wasn’t that kind of doctor, “I can respect that even if it’s kind of stupid. It’s a similar brand of stupid to my own.” 

Pax sets his tablet down and snags his handheld med scanner before walking to Kitra’s side at the bed. He clicks the button on the side of the device and it beeps to life. A blue light flashes in the upper left corner of Pax’s visual display, indicating the device’s connection with his optics. “When you get too comfortable in a place—that’s when you lose your edge. I’ve seen it happen. Makes things easier, I guess, but it sounds pretty boring if you ask me. And you can never get too comfortable with this crew,” he says wryly. “You all have a habit of attracting danger.”

There’s something unsettling about boarding the Alliance ship. Pax has heard stories, whispers. Gossip travels fast through the medical community, but Pax had never really taken the time to stop and care much about it. He’d never thought he’d get this close. He’d never thought their paths would cross. And why had the ship requested their presence in the first place?

Crushing the coldness in his stomach down, Pax takes his first step onto the vessel.

                juan,   of course,    doesn’t mean to undermine in any way,  whatsoever,   pax and his conviction to his work.   medics are individuals who juan has always had a great amount of respect for,    and pax specifically holds much of that respect.   he kept them bandaged together after they were floating in mid empty space,   torn apart and running out of oxygen.      “   there are more doctors here who are willing to help those patients while you’re away,    pax,   ”     juan says,   finding it difficult to get the words out,      “   but there are no doctors in roame who are willing to give kitra the help she needs.   ”     with a sigh,   he shakes his head.     “   i don’t–   i wish i wasn’t asking you to leave the life you’ve been settling here.    forget what i just said–   i’m not trying to guilt-trip you into it.    i’m asking you because i trust your skills undoubtedly and because i know that if i ask any other doctor i know to go into a non-alliance cleared mission,    they won’t go.   ”

Pax’s expression doesn’t change as Juan talks, his small frown seemingly stuck in place. There were other doctors, it was true, but there was only one him and call him arrogant or call him controlling, but there was no one like him.  

But.

Juan had only been his captain for a short time, but Paxton respects him. Juan is charismatic and powerful and truly good, and if Pax was going to skirt Alliance regulations at all, he was going to do it with Juan as his leader.

There is no one like Pax. There is no one that can do what he does. And it’s for that exact reason that Juan, that Kitra, can’t ask for anyone else.

Pax releases the tension from his shoulders he hadn’t known he’d been holding. “All right. All right,” he says softly. "I need some time to get things arranged. Have you talked to Leo?”

kitra sighed, the exhale resonating in her tired lungs. there was a twinge of pain as the tense muscles caught and strained. she needed a doctor, and thee only doctor she trusted enough was pax. 

[ kitra. cathrax.  446601. ] ::   former lt. kitra cathax. 

[ kitra. cathrax.  446601. ] ::   roame. exact coordinates unknown. 

[ kitra. cathrax.  446601. ] ::   sginal is weak. i am locked underground. 

The message hits him like a wall of bricks. How much trouble must Kitra have gotten herself into for her to be reaching out to him? It was unlike her to ask for help from anyone, especially someone like him. Roame. How could he possibly get to Roame? He tries to think of colleagues he has in the area, and then he thinks about how Kitra would react if a stranger showed up to her location.

[ PAXTON HELIOS RINNE, MD ] : Do your comms have GPS? I could try to track them when the signal’s there and triangulate your position.

A pause. His colleagues are at his left, laughing at a joke Pax missed.

[HOST NAME 0.0.0.1] ! [HOST NAME 0.0.0.9] [CAMERA FEED #12: MED BAY] [HOST NAME 0.0.0.9] [TIMESTAMP: 07:13.46]

A split second after the last message, something new pop up: not a still image, but a video stream. The same location: a dusty looking med bay, medications scattered as if it had been left in a hurry, without proper time for its last caretaker to clean up before departure.

There’s no movement, save for a small screen in the lower left corner playing a newsfeed.

[HOST NAME 0.0.0.4] query: sutures, location [HOST NAME 0.0.0.4] ? assist ?

Despite the warmth of the shuttle, Pax shivers. Everything about this feels too real to be some sort of scam. Who had access to the video systems on their ship? Pax could probably could that number of people on one hand. That newsfeed, though—it’s playing current news. He watches the flickering cyan glow of it, entranced for half a minute as his brain wracks through all the possibilities.