Chapter 5 - The Arrival

I was still on cloud nine a full ten minutes later, when I finally stopped grinning insanely. I packed the chess board and pieces back into their box, since they were still strewn over the bed and the floor. Still smiling, I made my way into the cockpit of the small spacecraft to join Keleon.

He was just climbing out of a hole in the floor, his toned arms showing off his tight muscles either side of his armless T-shirt as they lifted his weight out of the cavity. I wanted to press rewind and watch him do that again.

"I couldn't find anything wrong with the artificial gravity," he said thoughtfully, as he looked up at me with those crystal blue eyes, wiping his hands on a cloth.

"Do you think it could have just been a glitch that rectified itself?" I asked.

"I thought that too," he replied. "So, I checked the system. According to the logs, there was no glitch. As far as the computer's concerned, the gravity was fine."

"Maybe the computer got it wrong?" I offered. I hadn't had much experience with computers, so I didn't really know if this was possible.

"I've never known a computer to not log a technical glitch," he said. "However, I guess it could be possible, theoretically." He shrugged. "Well, we saw things floating, and it seems like the only explanation left. Still, it's probably a good idea to check the other systems in case we have a bigger problem."

Keleon got to work, checking various other systems. He talked me through what he was doing and how he was doing it, and I felt like I learned quite a lot from him. I asked lots of questions, but I didn't feel like I helped that much, other than pass him tools now and again. Best of all, I got to see yet another side of him; a side that had a great depth of knowledge about ships' systems. I remembered he also had a great deal of knowledge about nuclear reactions in different star types as well as being a good pilot. He was certainly intelligent.

After we finished the system checks, I grabbed some food and water from the ration store and sat in the co-pilot chair next to Keleon, who was back in the pilot's chair.

"Hey," I started. "Can I ask you something?"

"Sure," replied Keleon, facing me with his feet still up on the dashboard.

"So, you're pretty amazing. You know all sorts of things about stars and planets. You can fly a ship, fix a ship and break someone out of a medical facility ... but you seriously didn't recognise I was flirting with you?"

"I don't know what 'flirting' is," he admitted.

"Oh, OK," I uttered, although I probably shouldn't have been surprised, given the way he'd been acting. I wasn't sure how to describe it though. "Um, flirting is when one person is saying suggestive things to another person, or acting a certain way, hoping that it may result in something like kissing."

"And you were doing this with me?" he asked, looking slightly confused.

"Yeah," I admitted, slightly sheepishly. "I guess you haven't had many people flirt with you?"

Although with him looking that gorgeous, I couldn't imagine why not.

"I've spent a lot of time on my own," he said. "I like exploring. Being out in space. I don't often have a lot to do with others."

"Right, makes sense."

And it did. If he wasn't around other people much, he wouldn't have experienced innuendo and flirty banter before. I hadn't too much myself, being essentially behind a forcefield for three years, but there were other people there, and some of them did a little flirting. And of course, there were films.

"We're scheduled to arrive at Epsilon 4 tomorrow morning, right?" I confirmed with him.

"Correct, we should arrive tomorrow morning, Selenia time," he replied. "Although it's likely to be afternoon on our location on Epsilon 4."

It was now evening, and we'd soon need to sleep.

"It seems we don't have that much time left alone together," I pointed out. "A substantial amount of which will probably be spent sleeping," I added, letting my eyes wander over his body.

"Correct," said Keleon.

"Any suggestions for what we could do with the remaining time?" I blinked at him innocently.

Realisation flickered across his features.

"Are you ... flirting?" he asked.

"There might just be hope for you yet," I smiled. "But in the meantime, I'm happy to make things easier for you. Would you like to join me in the bedroom?"

I offered my hand and he took it.

"Do you want to kiss me again?" he asked as he followed me, fingers threaded through mine.

"I certainly do," I replied, leading him to the bed, where I sat down and guided him to sit down with me. I wrapped my arms round his neck and savoured his crystal blue eyes, the way his dark hair flopped over his forehead and his dimples when he smiled back at me.

"Do you know how attractive you are to me?" I breathed, as I absentmindedly played with a piece of hair at the back of his head.

He cocked his head slightly.

"I guess sometimes it works that way. But nobody's had this reaction to me before."

Part of me wanted to ask what the hell he was talking about. But I was getting kind of used to him saying weird things, and the desire to feel his cherry-flavoured lips connected with mine again won that battle.

We spent the rest of the evening making out, moving tenderly and slowly, with tongues in each other's mouths and hands in each other's hair, until I was so tired, I couldn't stay awake any longer.

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The next morning came at me in the form of the floor colliding with my face. I could only assume that my body was still adjusting from being used to having more space to sleep in, and I'd fallen out of the tiny fold-out bed.

I guess waking up in Keleon's muscular arms was a little too much to ask from the universe.

After freshening up and helping myself to some rations, I went into the cockpit where Keleon was watching the stars. My heart flipped the second I saw him.

"Morning, gorgeous," I said, walking towards him.

He looked round and smiled at me.

"Hi," he replied. And then, after a brief pause, "Are you flirting again?"

I turned him back round to look at the stars. And then leaned over, wrapping my arms round his shoulders from behind his chair.

"I was just letting you know I find you attractive," I beamed.

I wasn't sure if I could ever stop touching him in some way, now that I knew he was unlikely to object.

"I know, you told me that yesterday," he stated.

I laughed. That response was so typical of Keleon. Now I knew that it wasn't a negative response, it was easier to be relaxed about it. I was finding I really liked his quirky nature.

"I didn't think it would hurt to remind you," I said. "Besides, I like telling you." I kissed his cheek and let my face rest against his. "What are you looking at?"

He pointed ahead and slightly left.

"Tetra Prime," he said. "It's the second star to the left of that cluster, the bright one."

"You like Tetra Prime?" I asked, our cheeks still pressed together as we looked out to his star.

"The fifth planet of that system supports life," he said. "The life is very primitive, just animal and plant life, but it's really very beautiful. The climate is temperate. Mia and I spent a few days there once. I guess you might have called it a holiday. We hand-fed some of the wildlife and explored the mountains and waterfalls. It was nice."

"Sounds lovely. Why would you ever leave?" I asked.

"Well, I guess Mia and I are both explorers at heart. We never really stay in one place for long. We like to see different things, have different experiences."

It made sense. I knew what it was like to be in the same place for three years. Even if it were the most beautiful place in the universe, if it was all you ever saw, it might get a bit stale.

"Hmmm," I agreed. "Who's Mia?"

I realised I hadn't heard him talk about anyone else before.

"She's my travelling companion and my friend," he said. "She'll be waiting for us when we dock. You'll like her."

I hoped I would get along with Mia. I wondered whether she was quirky like Keleon. I couldn't work out what Keleon's friendship circles would be like.

"I'm looking forward to meeting her, then," I said genuinely, and he smiled.

"I need to start manual flight," said Keleon. "The autopilot only follows specific routes. I need to land manually and we're getting close."

"Sure," I said pecking his cheek and unwrapping my arms from his shoulders, pulling back.

"You don't have to move," said Keleon. "Unless you want to."

My heart did a little flip. Was Keleon initiating intimacy? Taking the lead in our continued closeness? Maybe he wasn't just reacting to my advances anymore. It seemed like he was actively seeking physical affection. I knew it wasn't an actual request for engagement, but it was the closest to one I'd had from him.

"I just didn't want to distract you from concentrating on controlling the ship," I reassured him, wrapping my arms back round him over the back of the chair and pecking him on the cheek. "But I'm more than happy to stay put if you want me around."

"You'll have to buckle up as we enter the atmosphere," he said, and I took that as a Keleon way of saying, 'yes, I want you around until we enter the atmosphere.'

He switched off the autopilot and talked me through the decisions he was making. A lot of it was similar to the flight lesson I had before, but some aspects were new. I asked various questions that he seemed happy to answer. And all the way, I kept my arms round him, and pecked him on the cheek periodically.

We started getting closer to a planet is a system orbiting a yellow dwarf star. It was smaller than Earth, but similar colours; browns, greens and blues. As we got closer, it seemed the land masses mainly consisted of a broad archipelago, containing lots of little islands, scattered over the planet's surface, like the lego blocks that used to end up strewn across by bedroom when I was a child.

"That's Epsilon 4?" I surmised, as Keleon had only talked me through how to get to the system, and not where we were going when we got here.

"It is," he confirmed. "The atmosphere is similar to Earth, which it why it was chosen as our base. Now would be a good time to buckle up."

Reluctantly, I pulled myself from him and strapped myself into the co-pilot's seat. He also strapped in.

"I'm going to put the ship in orbit until I've spoken to Mia," he said. "We've had to keep long-distance radio silence, so she wasn't sure when I'd be back. We're within range of talking on the short-range communication system now. I know where to land but I need to know she's in the hanger so she can open the hatch."

Once we were successfully in orbit, Keleon tried to contact Mia a few times without success. When she did eventually pick up, she sounded excited.

"Keleon, you made it! And you have Damon?" came the female voice through the communicator.

"I have Damon," he replied. "Can we initiate the landing sequence?"

"Doing it now. You have the coordinates?"

"I do," he said, and talked me through how to land it as we started to come out of orbit and started a controlled descent.

The group of islands he'd pointed to became larger as we descended, and I started seeing more detail that looked like it may be colonies and vegetation. We descended into a large hanger, which was housing another two spacecraft.

"Ready?" smiled Keleon as we unbuckled and stood.

"I guess so," I replied.

As the docking clamps locked us in place, my stomach twisted with nerves.

I had no idea what I was walking into.