Chapter Text
“Goddammit, Rush!” Young says when he finally catches up to the man. “How long were you planning on avoiding me?”
He hasn't seen Rush since the other Destiny disappeared, and that was yesterday night.
Rush rolls his eyes and crosses his arms over his chest. “Longer than this, obviously.”
“Look, this is about them, right?” Young asks, careful and cautious and basically just really trying not to set Rush off. God, the man is a lot of work.
“Didn't you say you thought our future wasn't as set in stone as they said it was?”
“Yes,” Rush answers grudgingly.
“Then why are you freaking out?”
Rush huffs. “I'd hardly classify not wanting to stop every five minutes for a heart-to-heart in the corridors with you as freaking out, Colonel.”
“Yeah, okay, fine,” Young answers dismissively. “The thing is, maybe we won't end up like them, maybe we will. Either way, acting all squirrelly and weird around each other is not going to do a damn thing to make any of this less awkward. If anything, it's just going to make people aboard the ship suspicious.”
Rush clearly doesn't agree, but he keeps his mouth clamped tightly shut.
“Just because it happened to them, doesn't mean it has to happen to us, right?”
“Probably,” Rush concedes.
“So then can we just be normal around each other for now? I'm really not enjoying the high school drama.”
Rush's mouth twitches incrementally. “High school drama.” His voice sounds slightly disgusted.
Young feels a small smile tug on his lips. “Well, aside from the time travel, surprisingly similar.”
Finally Rush looks up at him, a sober expression on his face. “I'm not going to play into their hands, Colonel. Don't get your hopes up about this.”
A surge of irritation flows through him. “Yes, because of course you would translate 'Let's not behave like children' into a confession of undying love.”
“I saw the way you looked at the other me when you said goodbye,” Rush mutters darkly.
For once Young is glad for the low lights in Destiny's corridors, because he feels himself flush at the implication of Rush's words. The tickle of fingertips against his palm is still fresh in his memory.
“Don't flatter yourself, Rush,” he bites out.
Rush just gives him an insolent look.
“We're going to review the kino footage tomorrow morning,” Young says, changing the subject before this can turn into a fight.
Rush suddenly looks cagey. “We?”
Ah. Young understands his apprehension. “You and me. I've told Eli to keep all the recordings pertaining to us to himself. I figure we need to collect all the hints and warnings our other selves left us, but I'd rather keep this...thing between us, for now.”
“Right,” Rush says, with a vague nod. He's still frowning slightly, but Young figures his worst fears have been laid to rest for now.
“Okay. Tomorrow morning, then.”
And with that, he turns around and makes his way over to his quarters.
-
“Colonel Young, you need to come to the control interface room. It's Rush.” Even through the radio Young can tell Eli's voice sounds strained.
“On my way, Eli,” he answers, already shrugging on his jacket with a resigned annoyance. He's become intimately familiar with the feeling since coming to this ship.
-
He can't say he's entirely surprised by the turn of events. Doesn't mean he's not pissed off, though.
“Damnit, Rush!”
Rush is standing next to the console, looking vaguely guilty, but mostly just irritated.
“What the hell was your plan, even?! To destroy all the recordings, so that, what? You could change the future?”
Rush crosses his arms and looks to the side. “Not all the recordings,” he mutters defiantly.
“Oh, well, I guess that's okay then,” Young says sarcastically.
Rush sends him a withering glare.
“Uh, well, good thing my other self warned me about this, because the future seemed pretty great, for the most part,” Eli says, interrupting their little stand-off.
Rush snorts disrespectfully, and Young isn't sure whether it's an 'I should have known' snort, or if it's a comment on how he feels about their supposed future. Maybe it's both.
Young rolls his eyes and shrugs off the unrelenting frustration Rush is so good at inspiring in him. They're different now. They've been getting better since before going into stasis. Since Rush finally came clean about the mission.
Yes, there have been a few setbacks. And yes, every now and then Rush still insists on being an antagonistic little shit, but Young is starting to make peace with that. The important part is that Rush failed, and honestly, for how smart that man is, he really does come up with some stupid plots.
“Great,” Young says. “I was looking forward to finally catching a full night's sleep, but it seems that's off the table now.”
He's not going to give Rush the entire night to try again. Besides, maybe this is one of those cases where it's easiest to just rip the band-aid off quickly.
“We'll start watching the footage now, then. I'm thinking we start with whatever you tried to erase.”
Rush sends him a look that is pure, unadulterated panic, before his face closes off and his expression becomes unreadable. “Fine.”
Young keeps his own face passive as Eli lines up the recordings for them. Everything about Eli's body language betrays his obvious discomfort.
“Uh, just press these buttons if you want to go to the next bit, or if you want to fast-forward,” he explains quickly. Young is glad he seems more than willing to leave Rush and him alone to go over the footage, because it will be awkward enough without a third party present. He remembers his conversation with his other self, and feels uneasy just thinking about having to sit through that with Rush present.
“Alright, thanks, Eli. You can go now.”
“Yeah,” Eli says. “Good luck.”
Young has no idea whether it's meant for him, for Rush, or for both of them, but it sure bodes well for how fantastic the rest of his night will be.
-
After Eli leaves, they stand mutely in front of the monitor for a full minute. Neither of them is particularly looking forward to what they're about to do, obviously. But Young knows that putting it off any longer is only going to open him up to more sabotage attempts from Rush. He sits down on the bench.
“Come on, let's just get this over with,” he says to Rush, and watches with an odd sense of accomplishment as Rush reluctantly takes place next to him.
When Young moves to press 'play', Rush's hand shoots out to stop him.
“Wait, could we...” he says, quickly retracting his hand before actually touching Young's arm. “Could we start from the beginning?”
Young considers it for a moment. He has a hard time saying no when Rush asks him things earnestly. Maybe that should have tipped him off a long time ago.
“Alright,” he answers, as he selects a different file. There's no real reason to make this more difficult than it has to be. They'll watch it chronologically.
For some reason he feels slightly better about the whole thing when Rush's shoulders lose a bit of their tension at his concession.
They watch the other Rush and Young step aboard on the screen. Rush huffs out an annoyed breath when the other Young puts his hand on the other Rush's shoulder, and Young feels somewhat amused. It's not hard to see the other them derived at least some pleasure from messing with him and Rush. Feeling Rush's irritation practically rolling off of him in waves, Young kind of understands the appeal.
-
They watch the other Rush explain how to rid the water filters of the tiny organisms growing in them. While TJ and Camile are busy decontaminating one of the filters, Rush takes the other Rush aside and asks about the time travel.
“I can't tell you much more about it than I already have,” the other Rush says with a slight shrug. “You will figure it out as you go. Don't spend too much time going over the technical details in your mind right now; it's a waste of effort.”
The Rush on screen crosses his arms in annoyance. “You should know that it doesn't work like that. Better than anyone, I would say. There has to be something you can tell me.”
“Hm.” The other Rush smiles slightly. “I can tell you some things will change drastically over the next three years. Mostly for the better. I can tell you to listen to Park when she warns you about tectonic overpressure, and to ignore Volker when he worries about electromagnetic radiation from an asteroid belt influencing the long-range sensors. I can tell you to check out the orange grain when Scott finds it on the planet. And I can tell you that relief and adrenaline can be powerful negators of inhibition, and that when the time is there, you'll make things much easier on yourself by just accepting what you really want.”
Rush scoffs next to him, in sync with the Rush on the recording, and Young looks over at him with a raised eyebrow.
Rush ignores him.
-
The scene in the mess hall is slightly awkward for both of them, but none of it is a surprise. They were there when it happened. In hindsight, it's so obvious the future versions of them had been dropping hints from the moment they set foot aboard the ship that Young doesn't know why it came as such a shock to find them making out in the control interface room.
-
The silence between them is deafening. On the screen, the closed doors to the control interface room are all that's visible. The other Rush had somehow managed to program the kinos assigned to him and the other Young into staying outside while they...well.
Young fast-forwards through twenty minutes of just that, trying desperately not to think about what's happening inside the room, until he and Rush enter the scene. He feels his face flush as he puts the recording back into normal speed just in time to see them catching the other two in the act. They both sit in still silence as the events from yesterday are repeated on the monitor in front of them. Young is mostly embarrassed about how he handled his gun. He also has a really hard time not watching the other Rush's flush, or the way his gaze goes from dazed and hazy to sharp and taunting. It's strangely alluring.
After the clip ends, Rush starts fidgeting next to him, and Young wonders what exactly happened in between them stepping out of the control interface room and them saying goodbye to the future versions of themselves that Rush is so anxious about.
Then the next fragment starts playing, and it's Rush and the other Young.
“Hey,” the other him says.
“What now?” Rush asks, annoyance clear in his voice. He's typing something into a console, but the other Young just steps up next to him.
“I know this is hard for you.”
“And how would you know that, Colonel?” Rush nearly sneers.
“Because you told me,” he says with a small shrug.
Rush finally looks away from the console and regards the other Young with a haughty expression. “I'm not sure exactly what kind of game you're playing, but if you expect me to play along, you'll be sorely disappointed.”
The other him just sighs. “Why exactly are you so opposed to this?”
“How about simply because it's you?” Rush says heatedly, and Young feels something unpleasant crawl in the bottom of his stomach.
“That won't be enough of a reason, Rush,” the other him says mildly.
“Yes, you seem very certain of that.”
“You're already important to me, to him, you must realize that, right?”
The Rush on the screen looks as tense as Young feels.
“I'm the best he's got.”
The other Young smiles. “Sure. But it's not just that, and you know it.”
“No, I don't.”
“Well, then trust me.”
Rush looks down at his console again, and Young almost doesn't catch the hint of amusement on his face. “Now why would I want to do that, Colonel?”
The other Young huffs a quiet laugh.
“Ah, the cavalry,” he says to the other Rush, who's just meandered into sight. A small smile and a nod pass between them, before the other Young excuses himself and strides out of the room. The recording switches over to the kino following the other Rush seamlessly.
“Well, your taste has certainly gone to shit,” Rush says by way of greeting.
The other Rush smirks meanly before replying, “Pretend all you like, I know you've wondered about it.”
The Rush on the screen looks up in shocked outrage. “I have done no such thing!”
The other Rush shoots a glance right at the kino, before turning back to Rush. “Of course you haven't.” He leans closer and his voice lowers conspiratorially. “It's good, though, with him. The Colonel is solid, strong. Well, you already know what those hands feel like on you. You've thought about it plenty. And his mouth...ah, he's quite good with it.”
Young feels as mortified as the Rush on the screen looks. He wants to glance over at Rush, but from the way his entire being is suspended in tense stillness, he's pretty sure the man is one wrong move away from fleeing the room. Young has a hunch this is what Rush had been trying to delete earlier.
“Are you just here to irritate me?” the Rush on the screen grinds out after a few beats of silence.
“Tempting, but no. I'm here because there are some more things I'm supposed to tell you.”
“Right. Wouldn't want to ruin your precious future,” Rush says caustically.
“It's one of the best outcomes for everyone, you can't refute that.”
“I have no interest in repeating the same message over and over again,” Rush says, dragging his hand through his hair with an annoyed expression on his face. “But I will say it one more time: I do not want this.”
The other Rush regards him quietly for a moment. “That's not entirely truthful, though, is it? Part of you wants more of it, that feeling you had when Young told you he'd stay behind on the ship with you.”
The Rush on the screen looks away, bends over his console again, but it's clear to Young that he is listening to every word the other Rush says.
“It's a big ship. A big mission. You want nothing more than to not have to carry the load all by yourself anymore, and Young is right there, every day. He's strong enough. He can help. He wants to help.” The other Rush looks almost troubled for a second. Then he says, “I know how alone you are. It's better when we're together. Let him in.”
Rush sighs and presses his palm against his forehead like he has a headache. He doesn't speak.
“You can try to deny it all you want, but it's going to happen eventually. I'm not convinced this intervention was even necessary.”
Finally, the Rush on the screen looks the other Rush in the eye. “You keep acting like this is a matter of choice solely on my part. It's not as if Colonel Young wants this either.”
The other Rush smiles, and for the first time it seems there is something approaching actual sympathy in his eyes. “He's unexpectedly receptive to the whole thing.”
“Well, none of this is open to debate,” Rush snaps suddenly, drawing himself up to his full height. “It's not going to happen, because I don't want it to happen.”
The other Rush shakes his head. He seems mildly disappointed, despite the fact that he must've already known how this conversation was going to end. The recording ends when the other Rush starts making his way back out of the room. The kino catches a glimpse of Rush before swinging to follow the other Rush along. In that one second, the Rush on the screen looks vulnerable, eyes dark and teeth worrying at his bottom lip. Young isn't sure what to make of it at all.
-
After the revealing footage he just watched, he suddenly doesn't feel quite so embarrassed about his own conversations with Greer and his other self. Sure, the way Rush looks over at him when the other Young hugs him on the screen makes him feel a little flustered, but it's alright. They've both been embarrassed by all of this, and somehow it's not so bad, because at least they're in this together.
He hopes Rush sees it the same way.
-
“Well, this was enlightening,” Rush says acrimoniously, as he gets up from the bench. “Are we done here?”
“Rush,” Young starts to say, but he has no idea what he's going to follow it up with.
“Good.” And with that, Rush marches out of the room.
It's four AM. Young stifles a yawn and shuts down the console in front of him. All in all, this wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. He decides to get a few hours of sleep while he still can.