Chapter Text
The first thing Gansey did when he got home was visit Adam.
While Gansey had been forbidden from taking his journal with him to D.C., it hadn’t stopped him from thinking about his thesis and ponder over the parts he had thus far collected. There were depressingly few of them: he knew that something big had happened to the Earth six months ago, something so big that the CIA had felt it was necessary to hide from the public what had actually happened. He knew that six months ago, he had died and been brought back to life. He knew that six months ago, Adam had felt the world crack underneath him and had never been able to touch the ground with his feet again.
He knew that six months ago, all of the dolphins disappeared.
It was an unprecedented disturbance: with how rapidly the climate was changing and how much humans had destroyed the planet they lived on, species were disappearing left and right in a biological timeframe. But no species had ever entirely vanished in one night – until the dolphins. Gansey had interviewed a marine biologist who worked with them; the poor woman had been entirely flabbergasted as to what could have happened. One day she was monitoring a population she’d been studying for so many years that she could identify individuals by noting the scars each one had on their dorsal fin, and the next absolutely no dolphins were to be found anywhere on the planet. There was no explanation; they were simply gone. It was a huge coincidence, she’d said, that they’d disappeared the day everyone had had the same massive hallucination.
Gansey did not believe in coincidences.
He knew there had to be a reason, even if it was one that seemed impossible. But it felt like no matter how much research he did, he was grasping at straws. He’d been so ecstatic to meet Adam—as he’d finally found someone who’d had a similar experience as him—and while he treasured their friendship dearly, Adam hadn’t known any more than him about what happened. He couldn’t talk to the CIA. The world’s leading dolphin biologist hadn’t a foggiest idea what happened to the dolphins.
Every time he found a trail, it seemed to dissolve in his hands.
Now, he was going to visit Adam because he’d heard about a woman in California who claimed to know what happened to the dolphins and he wanted to see what Adam thought about her. Any chance was a chance Gansey was willing to take, but even he had to admit it was starting to feel like this was just a mystery that he would never be able to crack.
It was unusual for Gansey to feel disheartened about a tough puzzle. He was hoping Adam would be able to snap him out of it.
Adam was a delightful creature, not least of all because he was entirely pragmatic but he also had the same adventurer’s heart as Gansey. Adam wanted to know what had happened to him as much as Gansey did, so he was sure that Adam would be able to logically convince him that he was on the right path, that he shouldn’t lose hope.
And if they were both disheartened, well…Gansey didn’t know what he would do.
He strolled up to the bottom floor of Adam’s apartment anyway.
He had never quite figured out how Adam’s apartment worked. It was an old converted stable, or something, which apparently explained why the front door was nine feet off of the ground. There was an intricate pully system that apparently took one up there somehow, but Gansey, having come from an old money family and therefore knowing absolutely nothing about farming, could only pound on the wall and hope that Adam heard him. The last time he’d tried to make it up there himself had been an embarrassment for all involved.
“Gansey,” Adam said, poking his head out of the door only a few moments after Gansey had knocked. “Hey.”
“Hello, Adam!” Gansey shouted back, waving.
Adam helped him up to the second story door in only a pair of boxers. His hair was completely disheveled, which wasn’t necessarily unusual, but what was unusual were the bruises that dotted his neck. Gansey peered at them suspiciously but decided not to comment.
“How was your trip?” Adam asked as they retreated into the apartment.
“Oh, it was—” Gansey stalled by Adam’s bed as he realized that there was someone in it. A very naked someone, completely passed out on top of Adam’s covers. “Who—?”
“Oh, that’s Ronan,” Adam said, already halfway down the stairs. He offered no other explanation.
Gansey stared back and forth between this ‘Ronan’ and Adam’s retreating form. It was unusual for Adam to have this kind of company over, especially when he knew that Gansey would be coming. Did that mean it was something serious, then? But if that was the case, then why hadn’t Adam told him anything about it?
Feeling even more puzzled than he had when he arrived, Gansey continued on down the stairs. When he followed Adam into the kitchen, he realized that Ronan wasn’t the only strange visitor: a corvid was perched on Adam’s only dining room chair, and it watched Gansey with beady black eyes as he entered. He wanted to say it was a raven, but something about it seemed odd, different.
Curious, he leaned against the counter and began sketching the bird in his journal. It relaxed significantly when Adam walked up to pet it, even making little rumbling noises that reminded Gansey of a cat purring. He noted that, as well. “Where did you find a corvid, Adam?”
Adam hummed and moved to the stove to pour hot water into a cup. “She’s not mine, she’s Ronan’s.”
Curiouser and curiouser.
Gansey accepted the cup of mint tea from Adam. “I have so many questions.”
“Of course you do,” Adam said, grinning as he held his arm out to the corvid. Once she hopped up onto his shoulder, he headed towards the couch, Gansey close behind.
“I had questions before I came here,” Gansey said as they both settled on opposite ends of the couch, “But I think I now need to ask this first: who on Earth is Ronan?”
Adam smirked, as if Gansey’s question amused him. “He’s my…partner, I guess. We haven’t really talked about it.”
Gansey opened his mouth to ask another question, but Adam was already continuing, “You’ll love him, Gans. He’s…he’s everything you’ve been looking for.”
Gansey’s ears perked up at this. “…You mean he knows about what happened six months ago?”
“He knows some of it – a heck of a lot more than we did. There’s still pieces missing, but I think you’ll be fascinated to hear what he has to say.”
Gansey was practically on the edge of his seat with excitement already. “Where did you find him, Adam?”
Adam laughed. “He almost ran me over with his car.”
“What?”
So Adam told him the story of how he’d met Ronan, leaving nothing out as he knew that Gansey was a sucker for details. He fed the corvid as they talked, tearing off pieces of a hard-boiled egg and tossing them up into the air for her to jump for. It was strange to watch, though Gansey couldn’t quite place his finger on why.
“And yeah, then he showed up here and we…kind of got together.” Adam paused, not seeming to notice as the corvid stole the rest of the egg right out of his fingers. “God, Gans, I can barely process it honestly, like…I like him so much, and yet I barely know him? How does that work?”
Gansey smiled. “Sometimes when you meet the right people, you just know right away.”
“Maybe.” Adam glanced down at his hands, hiding a smile. “But I’m usually suspicious of everyone right away.”
“I’m sure you were suspicious of him too, the very first time.”
Adam laughed. “You know, you’re right – I thought he was trying to kidnap me.”
Gansey floundered. “And you got in with him anyway? Adam, I’m really starting to question your—”
“Adam,” a raspy voice called from above.
Gansey glanced up and then immediately glanced back down. Ronan was a lot of things, apparently, but he was also still very naked.
Adam snorted. “Might want some underwear, babe.”
Ronan grumbled, as if this was a large inconvenience, but retreated back towards the bed and didn’t come down until he had a tank-top and black skinny jeans on. He sat on the arm of the couch that was next to Adam, pressing a kiss to the side of his head as he accepted the corvid from him. It was all very domestic.
Gansey was fascinated.
“Thank you,” Adam said, leaning into Ronan. Gansey had never seen his friend this relaxed.
“I’m still not wearing underwear though,” Ronan said.
Gansey looked at Adam, but Adam just rolled his eyes. They must know each other well enough by now that Adam had come to expect a reply like that. Gansey wondered how long it had taken.
“Anyway, wonderful first impressions aside—” Ronan snorted at this and Adam jabbed him in the side with his elbow, “—this is my best friend, Gansey.”
“It’s a pleasure,” Gansey said, sticking his hand out to Ronan.
Ronan just stared at his hand, an eyebrow raised as if to say, Is it?
“Don’t be an asshole,” Adam said. “He knows about the Vogons and the Earth being destroyed, too.”
“…Vogons?” Gansey repeated, frowning.
“…So your feet don’t touch the ground, either?” Ronan asked, looking significantly more interested.
Gansey shot another look at Adam. It was unusual for Adam to tell people about his problem, which meant Ronan really must be important.
He turned his gaze back to Ronan. “No. But six months ago, I died and came back to life.”
Ronan’s eyes were ablaze. “Tell me what happened.”
Gansey was more than happy to. In fact, he recited his story to anyone who was willing to listen; he prescribed to the theory that, if he told enough people, maybe someday he would finally find someone who knew what was talking about and could give him some information. Despite his belief though, Ronan was only the second person, after Adam, who didn’t laugh in his face when he was done.
Instead, Ronan merely looked confused. He glanced at Adam. “The dolphins disappeared?”
Adam nodded. “It happened the same day as the ‘mass hallucination’. Every single dolphin in the world just up and vanished.”
Ronan frowned and looked back at Gansey. “Well, I don’t know what the hell happened to the dolphins, or what’s going on with your whole ‘came back to life’ thing, but here’s what I do know.”
Ronan told him the story, about Vogons and hitchhiking across the universe. He told him about Cabeswater and Krikkit and other mystical planets that he had visited but had, apparently, ultimately hated. Gansey took notes as he spoke, only interrupting once or twice to clarify something, but mostly he listened in raptured and awed silence. It was unbelievable, what Ronan was telling him; how could the Earth have been gone for eight years when for them it had only felt like a second? It was disturbing, to think that so much time had been lost.
But somehow Gansey believed it. If it was coming from anyone else, he probably would’ve been doubtful, but there was something about Ronan that made him impossible to disbelieve. Especially since everything Gansey was hearing from him corresponded with his own memories of six months ago, and resounded within him with a sense of such rightness.
He imagined Adam felt much the same way.
“Why did the Vogons attack?” Gansey asked. “And how did the Earth come back afterwards?”
“The Vogons attacked because they were going to build a hyperspatial express route through here and needed to knock out the Earth to do it.” Ronan said this incredible thing like it was nothing. “But I don’t know how the fuck it’s back. That’s what I want to know, too.”
“It has to be connected to why I can’t touch the ground and why you came back to life,” Adam said, “But I have no idea how.”
Gansey thumbed at his lip, deep in thought. “I agree with you, Adam. It can’t all be a coincidence.”
“The dolphin part is also weird as shit,” Ronan said. “If they really did up and leave, how the fuck did they do it? I sure as hell didn’t seem them on the Vogon ship with us.”
“That’s actually what I came to talk to you about,” Gansey said. “I heard about a woman in California who claims to know what happened to the dolphins and I was thinking about going to visit her.”
Adam’s mouth was a thin line. “…I don’t have the money for that, Gans.”
“I’ll just pay for it, Parrish, it doesn’t matter,” Ronan said and Gansey shot him a warning look. He obviously hadn’t been with Adam long enough to know that money was a touchy subject.
But Adam merely rolled his eyes. “Like you have the money, Lynch – haven’t you been hitchhiking across the Galaxy the last eight years?”
“Oh, right.”
“I can pay for everyone,” Gansey said slowly, bracing himself for the explosion. Adam glared at him, but Gansey continued quickly, “Please, Adam, I think it’s important. You can always pay me back when you can.”
He hated saying it, but it was one of the only ways to appease Adam without a big fight.
Adam relaxed marginally, but his posture was still slightly defensive. “…Alright. I admit it does sound like the only lead we have right now.”
Gansey beamed. “Great!”
“Okay, this is great and all, but if we’re about to go on a big journey I have to go feed my animals first,” Ronan interrupted.
Gansey stared at him. “Your animals?”
“Oh, so we get to see your mythical farm, eh Lynch?” Adam said, his voice teasing.
“It’s not mythical, you just don’t believe me,” Ronan griped.
Gansey blinked. “…You have a farm?”
Adam pointed at Gansey and Ronan scoffed. “So you can just sit there and believe that I’ve been hitchhiking around with a bunch of aliens the last eight years but me having a fucking farm is the part you can’t believe?”
“It’s the most unimaginable part,” Gansey said and Adam laughed.
“Fuck you,” Ronan said, but his tone wasn’t at all offensive.
Gansey grinned. He and Ronan would be great friends.
“Alright, let me just get dressed and grab some things and then we can head out.” Adam stood, pressing his fingers to Ronan’s wrist in a decidedly intimate way, and made his way upstairs.
“…What kind of name is Gansey, anyway?” Ronan asked as soon as he was out of earshot.
“It’s my last name,” Gansey said distractedly, jotting down the last of Ronan’s story. “I like it a lot more than my first name, so that’s what I go by.”
“What’s your first name?”
“Richard.”
“So, Dick?” Gansey looked up to an absolutely wicked grin on Ronan’s face.
“…I fear I’ve made a grave mistake telling you that,” he said after a moment, and Ronan barked out a sharp laugh.
“Lynch, you better put on your fucking underwear!” Adam shouted from upstairs.
Ronan flipped off the stairs before turning to Gansey. “Well, Dick, if nothing else you have fucking good intuition.”
And then he grinned that horrible grin again and stomped up the stairs, leaving Gansey feeling strangely exhausted.
--
Gansey had a silver fishbowl at home.
Someone had delivered it anonymously to his doorstep the very day after he’d moved to Henrietta, and he’d been trying to find the sender ever since. He knew, somehow, that if he found the sender, he would understand some things he didn’t before. It was perfectly transparent, but with a silver quality to it, something right away that was already incomprehensible. When one tapped it with their fingernail, the fishbowl rang with such a deep and glorious chime that Gansey had found himself in tears the first time he heard it. The sound sustained for a much longer time than normal—forty-two seconds, in fact. Gansey had timed it.
The strangest part about the fishbowl, however, wasn’t all that. Instead, it was a small inscription engraved onto the glass.
It read: “…all the fish. We have…”
And that was it.
Gansey had inspected every inch of the fishbowl—he had even used a magnifying glass—but had found no other inscription. It had made him feel ecstatic with the sense of adventure: after all, with the way the sentence was formatted, there was a very good chance that there were at least two other pieces of the puzzle that he needed to find.
Not only that, but there was just something so other about the fishbowl that Gansey could feel it in his bone marrow that it was something magical and important.
That was how witnessing the Barns felt.
The gravel driveway up to the Barns was surrounded by oak trees, giving the Barns a mysterious, as well as magical and important, feeling. Gansey and Adam both gawked out the window of Ronan’s BMW as Ronan took a right onto a road that at first looked to go straight into the oak trees but actually went through them. On the other side were sprawling pastures dotted with cows and bright white farmhouses, barns of all shapes and sizes, and a large farmhouse that looked like it had been lovingly added onto many, many times. Above it all, the sky was orange, pink, and yellow with the setting sun.
It was mystifying.
“Ronan, this is—” Adam started, but whatever he was going to say was stolen from him by the sheer beauty of the Barns.
Ronan grinned something ecstatic and delighted. Not even out of the car yet, he looked like he belonged here. “Home sweet home.”
It was the first non-sarcastic thing Gansey had heard him say.
Ronan pulled into a gravel lot right in front of the farmhouse and they all piled out of the car. Unbelievably, a spaceship was crashed in the grass immediately to the right. Even more incredibly, Ronan hardly even glanced at it before continuing up the path to the house. Gansey and Adam however stalled in front of the ship, gawking. The spaceship was so white that Gansey thought briefly that he had never truly seen the color white until now. It was enormous and long and absolutely beautiful.
Gansey was so awestruck he didn’t even have the mind to pull out his journal.
“…You see it too, right?” Adam asked eventually.
Gansey could only nod.
“I believed him, when he told me, but…” Adam trailed off for a moment. “…It’s different seeing it in person.”
“The Heart of Gold is quite stunning, isn’t it?” someone said behind them, making them both jump.
Gansey whirled around and came face to face with something he had never seen before: a person with two heads.
It was a miracle he didn’t faint right then and there from sensory overload.
“My name is Henry Cheng,” the two-headed man introduced himself, giving an exaggerated bow. “President of the Imperial Galactic Government.”
“You have two heads,” Gansey replied, dumbly.
Perhaps it would’ve been better if he’d just fainted.
“That I do.” Luckily Henry didn’t seem offended by Gansey’s embarrassing comment. Instead, one of his heads grinned at him; the other winked. “All the more to kiss you with.”
Gansey gawked. Henry seemed to find this amusing. Or, at least, one of his heads did. “You must forgive my second head – it can be quite flirtatious.”
“Is this your ship?” Adam asked, thankfully steering the conversation away from its incomprehensible topic. He seemed to be functioning far better than Gansey at the moment.
“In a sense,” Henry said. Both of his heads smirked.
Adam frowned. “What do you mean by that?”
“Well, dear boy, it’s mine in the sense that I brought it here. But is it mine in the sense of ownership? No, because I just stole it.”
There was complete silence for a moment except for a cow mooing in the distance. Then, voice loud enough to startle the ravens perched in a nearby oak tree, Adam shouted, “You what?!”
“Now, now, we can discuss this all with Ronan a bit later.” Henry clicked his tongue and began ushering them towards the farmhouse. “My companion and I have been waiting quite a while to talk to our tall, dark, and handsome friend.”
Gansey shot Adam a completely flabbergasted look. He was relieved to see Adam sending the same look right back. He was glad he wasn’t the only one completely overwhelmed by what was going on.
They came inside the farmhouse just in time to hear Ronan say, “Maggot, what the hell are you doing here?”
The scene they walked into was comical: Ronan, over six feet tall with a shaved head and a menacing back tattoo, stood in the kitchen looking mildly annoyed at an incredibly short girl standing on the coffee table in the living room. She was wearing what appeared to be a lampshade and she had her hands on her hips as she glared murderously at Ronan.
“First of all, nice to see you too, and second of all, do you know how hard it is to find you? It took us weeks to find out where you live, and then when we got here you weren’t even here!” the girl snarled.
Ronan just shrugged.
Surprisingly, this ‘Maggot’ woman (that couldn’t be her name, right?) merely stuck her tongue out at Ronan before continuing, “Anyway, I came here mainly for personal reasons, but also to tell you that you’ll never believe what we’ve discovered!!”
Ronan looked decidedly unimpressed. “You mean that pile of junk outside?”
Henry gasped loudly from behind Gansey. “Ronan Niall Lynch! How dare you call the Heart of Gold a pile of junk! And after all the effort I went to to steal it!!”
“For Christ’s sake, Cheng—”
“You don’t get to judge us, you’ve stolen more spaceships in eight years than every single person on Earth,” Maggot growled. (Gansey couldn’t keep calling her Maggot – what was a better name? Ah, yes, Jane seemed rather fitting. He would call her Jane.) Jane jumped off of the coffee table. “Besides, we had our reasons.”
She looked over at Henry and seemed to notice Gansey and Adam for the very first time. She stared at them for so long it began to get uncomfortable. She was extremely pretty. “…Who are they?”
“Partners in crime,” Ronan said. Jane gave him a withering look until he conceded. “Alright, alright. This is Parrish.” He nodded at Adam, something softening in his expression as he did. The soft look completely melted away into a devilish grin as he turned to Gansey, “And this is Dick.”
Jane rose her eyebrows. “’Dick’? Isn’t that the male human sex organ?”
Gansey rose his eyebrows right back. “’Maggot’? Isn’t that a life stage of a fly?”
Ronan laughed, a loud, joyful thing that seemed to surprise everyone in the room.
Jane cocked her head at Ronan. “Are you feeling alright? You’re not, like, depressed.”
“The Earth’s back,” Ronan said, which sounded more like an evasion tactic than an answer, and walked over to sling his arm around Adam’s shoulders. “What’s there to be depressed about?”
“Ah, love,” Henry said sagely. “The sweetest thing in the Galaxy.”
“Fuck off, Cheng,” Ronan growled. Unbelivably, he was blushing.
“Anyway,” Jane spat, glaring daggers in Ronan’s and Henry’s general direction. “I go by Blue on this planet.”
“She didn’t doublecheck her facts before deciding what were ‘realistic names’ on Earth,” Ronan whispered to Gansey and Adam, a wolfish grin on his face.
“I did too!!” Jane shouted, her face bright red. “Those facts were triple checked by the Ursa Minor publishing corporation!!”
“Those lot are a bunch of drunkard fools,” Ronan snorted.
“I admit I’ve never heard of any human named Blue,” Adam said, badly attempting to hide a smirk in his shoulder.
“I’d much rather call you Jane,” Gansey added.
Jane spluttered. “Jane? That isn’t my name – you can’t just decide to call me something!”
Gansey frowned, confused. “But I thought Blue wasn’t even your real name anyway?”
“It’s not, but neither is Jane!”
“What is your real name, then?”
“You can’t pronounce it! I can’t even pronounce it!”
“I can,” Henry said, and proceeded to make a long string of sounds that were similar to someone pulling up liquid in a straw.
Gansey paled. “I will, uh, have to work considerably on that.”
“Ugh, whatever,” Jane groaned. “That’s against the point!”
She swiveled and stabbed a finger in Ronan’s chest. “We have a lot of catching up to do, Lynch.”
--
They all sat around the living room and talked as Ronan whipped up a quick pasta using tomatoes he grew on the farm. Ronan gave Blue and Henry a quick rundown of what had happened to him since they last met, which was really only meeting Adam, and Gansey informed them of all of the notes he had gathered about Earth’s strange return to existence. Blue and Henry were just as puzzled as they were about why the Earth was back, which apparently was why Henry had stolen the Heart of Gold.
“It runs on an Infinite Improbability Drive,” Henry explained.
Adam rose his eyebrows. “Meaning?”
“Meaning, that if we’re going to find any answers to the improbable, the best place to do that is on a ship that runs off the energy of the improbable.” Henry sat back in his chair. “You see, we’ve known how to generate finite improbability for a while now, but only recently did a brilliant soul realize that, if it was virtually impossible to build a machine that generated infinite improbability, then that in itself was a finite improbability. Therefore, all he had to do was figure out what the exact number of that improbability was, feed it into the machine, give it a fresh cup of hot tea, and then bam! The Infinite Improbability Drive was born, and now it is possible to cross the mind-boggling distances between the farthest points of the Galaxy. When the ship’s in Improbability Drive, it passes through every point in the Universe and, of course, ends up where it is most improbable to do so.”
“That,” Adam said, deadpan, “makes absolutely no sense.”
Both of Henry’s heads winked at him. “Exactly.”
“So, what, we’re just going to traverse the Universe at random, hoping the ship happens to bring us to what we need to know?” Ronan snorted and crossed his arms. “No fucking thanks, I had enough of that the last time.”
“That’s only part of it,” Blue said. “Henry…has a mission he needs to complete.”
“And you can’t do it, like, probably?”
“I don’t know what I’m looking for,” Henry said. “I don’t even know how to figure out what I’m looking for.”
Ronan just stared at him. “What the fuck? Are you crazy?”
“That’s a possibility I haven’t ruled out yet,” Henry admitted.
Ronan and Adam exchanged a look. Adam turned back to Henry. “Henry, what in the world are you talking about?”
“For a long time, I’ve always just gone out and done things – I became the President, no problem, I stole the Heart of Gold, no problem. But then, if I start to really think about why I’m doing those things…I can’t. It feels like I physically can’t think about it, like part of my mind just doesn’t work.” Henry wrung his hands together. “When we retired on Blue’s lovely home planet, I was feeling quite anxious and paranoid about this, so I had her father perform a brain scan on me. He can do that, you know. And what he found was, well, rather strange.”
Henry tapped both of his heads. “Parts of both of my brains are sealed off. They relate only to each other and not to anything else in my heads.”
Heavy silence fell over them for a moment. Gansey was frowning, his thumb at his lip. Ronan had known him for all of a day, and yet he had already seen him making this pose at least ten times. “…Someone did that to you? Why?”
“That I don’t know.”
“Do you have any idea who could’ve done it?” Gansey went on.
Henry leaned back with a sigh. “Well that’s the thing, Dick: it was me. My initials are carved right on my synapses.”
The room was silent. No one apparently knew what to say about the fact that Henry had at one point decided there was something he knew that was so important—or scarring—that he had to completely block himself from accessing the memories. It was a disturbing thought, to say the least, and Ronan had had enough disturbing thoughts to last a lifetime.
“I still don’t get how this stupid ship of yours is supposed to solve any of this,” he quipped eventually. His head was throbbing from all of the new information to keep track of and he really needed to go to sleep. He hadn’t slept much the last couple of days at Adam’s.
“One thing being President of the Universe has taught me is that I actually do jack shit in my job.” Both of Henry’s mouths quirked. “The person who really has the power, and truly has the answers, is the Ruler of the Universe. And the only way to get to him is to fly on the Heart of Gold.”
“Because it’s the most improbable that you’d end up finding this ‘Ruler’,” Adam said.
Henry pointed at him. “Bingo – two points for Parrish.”
“Aren’t you concerned that what you sealed off from your brains might be…overwhelming?” Gansey asked. “What if you don’t want to know again once you’ve found out?”
“I don’t know, but I think I would rather know than be left wondering for the rest of my life, you know?”
“…Yes.” A small smile grew on Gansey’s face. “I do know.”
“So yeah, basically we need to go find this Ruler to figure out why Henry sealed his own brain off and why the Earth’s back,” Blue summarized. “We figured you’d want to be in on that last part, Lynch.”
“We’ll also want to find out what happened to the dolphins, if that woman in California can’t help us,” Adam added. “And why I can’t touch the ground and Gansey came back to life.”
“Fuck, this is getting complicated.” Ronan ran both of his hands over his shaved head. “But dammit, fine. Let’s get going, then.”
Blue and Henry exchanged a look. “We, uh, can’t.”
Ronan growled, more than done with all of this. “Why the fuck not?”
“Well, I kind of…crashed the ship during landing.” Henry rubbed the back of one of his necks. “I’ll have to spend some time repairing it.”
“We can go visit the dolphin lady, then, while you’re doing that,” Adam said, glancing at Ronan and Gansey. “See if we can get any answers out of her before we head out into space.”
“I agree with that plan,” Gansey said, rubbing his forehead. “Plus it’ll give me some time to adjust to the fact that, uh, we’ll be leaving Earth soon.”
“You never really get used to it,” Ronan informed him unhelpfully.
Gansey seemed to physically sag at this knowledge.
They all decided it was best to retire for the night.
“Ronan.” Blue caught him as he was following Adam up the stairs to his bedroom. Adam stalled and glanced back at the two of them, an eyebrow raised, but continued on when Ronan gestured at him. Once he was gone, Blue continued, “I know you know I was joking before, but I just wanted to say that it makes me really happy to see you laughing and smiling again.”
“Dear God, Sargent,” Ronan groaned.
“Don’t give me that! You were…messed up for a long time, Ronan, when the Earth was destroyed and I’m so glad to see that you’re finally recovering.” Blue rocked on her heels. “Have you seen your brothers?”
“Yeah, the very minute I got home I was sorting mail in the kitchen and my brother just walked in like I hadn’t thought he was dead for the last eight years. And God, Blue, it felt…nothing could describe how I felt to see for myself that he was alive.” Ronan huffed out a laugh. “And that was for the brother I don’t even like very much.”
Blue grinned. “Was it even better than all the sex you’ve been getting lately?”
“For fuck’s sake, Sargent, you and Cheng are both insufferable,” Ronan hissed, blushing despite himself. “Leave Adam out of this.”
“Oh, so his name’s Adam?” Blue sang, her tone so high-pitched he was worried Adam would hear her.
“Shut up holy fuck.”
They wrestled for a while, Ronan’s arm around her neck, Blue’s elbow in his gut, but they somehow ended up with Blue’s arms wrapped tightly around his torso (which was as high as she could reach). Her face was buried in his chest and she stayed there until he reluctantly wrapped his arms around her. “I missed you, Lynch.”
Ronan let out a long breath. “Well, Maggot, I may have missed you too.”
“I always knew you loved me,” Blue teased, pinching his stomach as she pulled back. “Now get some sleep, you look like shit.”
Ronan scoffed loudly. “Right back at you.”
--
It was surreal having Adam in his room.
There was probably a part of Ronan that had believed that the last couple of days had been some wonderful, delusional fever dream and that one day he would wake up from it. This was likely because they’d spent most of their time together in the air, something that still distinctly felt unreal to him despite his vast experience with flying. But it was very different having Adam here at the Barns, in his childhood bed: he was real, in a way that Ronan could never really believe before. His warmth was something solid against Ronan’s back as Adam spooned him from behind.
“I can’t believe this is where you grew up,” Adam whispered.
“If you make one more joke about me being a farmer boy—”
“Not that,” Adam snorted, and then amended, “Well, not just that. It’s just…I don’t know, it’s hard to imagine you living in such a homey place like this with a big family. You always give off this vibe of solitude that I just thought…I don’t know. You didn’t even tell me you had brothers.”
Ronan shifted uncomfortably. He was glad it was dark and that he wasn’t facing Adam, because he didn’t think he’d be able to talk about it otherwise. “My parents died in a car crash shortly before I left Earth and it really fucked me up. Still does. I got into a lot of stuff I shouldn’t have and even tried to…tried to kill myself. And then, when I was finally starting to pick my life back up, the world exploded. Literally everything and everyone I knew was just wiped out of existence in a second – the Barns was gone, my brothers were dead. I didn’t…I couldn’t cope with that. Blue and Henry can tell you that. I thought I was alone in the universe – fuck, I thought I was the last living member of my species.”
Adam was silent as Ronan paused to suck in a wet breath. “So yeah, family’s kind of a touchy subject for me.”
“…My father hit me.” Adam’s words hung in the air as heavy as a storm cloud. “My mom let him. He’s the reason I can’t hear out of my left ear – I got a restraining order on him after that, but I’m still…I still go to therapy for it. So I get not wanting to talk about family, I didn’t mean to sound accusatory. I guess I just had trouble picturing the happy family you must’ve had.”
“Shit, Adam,” Ronan hissed and rolled over to face him. Adam hadn’t been looking at him, but he was now, blue eyes meeting blue eyes. “…Thanks for telling me.”
“It’s only fair – a secret for a secret.” Adam reached up and cupped Ronan’s cheek with his hand. “I’m glad the Earth came back so I could meet you.”
Ronan turned his head to kiss Adam’s palm. “Fuck, Parrish, you can’t be half as glad as me.”
Adam smiled and leaned in to kiss him. Ronan tangled his fingers in Adam’s hair as he pulled him closer, parting his lips so Adam could slip his tongue into his mouth.
They may have gone farther, but a sudden creepy laugh filling the room made them both jump. Adam nearly fell out of bed with how hard Ronan flinched against him and they both looked around wildly. Ronan’s eyes caught on a dark shape that was just slightly darker than the shadows in the room; Chainsaw was perched on the mysterious silver fishbowl, her beady eyes gleaming as she cocked her head. “Kerah.”
“Shoo, bird,” Ronan growled and waved his hand in her general direction.
She cawed at him, displeased, but took off in a flurry of wings and darted out the ajar window.
“What the fuck?” Adam asked when she was gone. “Chainsaw made that sound?”
“Alien ravens are apparently creepy as fuck,” Ronan replied, trying not to let on how spooked he still was. He had heard Chainsaw make a lot of strange noises, but none ever quite like that.
“…What’s this that she was perched on?” Adam reached over Ronan and tapped the fishbowl. The glorious ring echoed through the room, the melodic nature of it seeming to settle gently underneath Ronan’s skin.
He shrugged. “Hell if I know.”
Adam made a vague humming sound in the back of his throat. “If this were any other day, I’d ask you to tell me more about it, but I don’t think my brain can handle one more sci-fi-esque thing.”
Ronan snorted and leaned forward; he could feel Adam’s smile as he kissed him. “Still want to be associated with me?”
Adam’s fingers hooked into the dip of Ronan’s tank top. “Always.”