Spaceship Parking (and Beyond!), Sunday

[firstofitskind]

The weekend, Liam felt, had been a pretty good success so far. Sure, Sarah hadn't really been up to anything involving crowds, but that was fine. There were plenty of things they could do that didn't involve lots of people.

Like go flying in Liam's shuttle. Sure, for three out of the four of them it was not actually a new experience, but Liam never got tired of flying and besides, this time it would be Verity behind the controls for the majority of the flight.

(And okay, he genuinely liked Antimony, but he had to admit that picturing her face when she found out that not only did Sarah get to go to space but she did so in a ship that Verity was piloting was pretty damn funny.)

Of course, just out of habit he headed right for the pilot's seat, but then stopped, shook his head, and settled in to the front passenger seat instead, twisting around to grin at Sarah and Renee. "I promise she's a more patient pilot than she is a driver," he said, mostly for Sarah's benefit since it wasn't like Renee had ever had to experience Verity on the road.

[ooc: for two blondes and a cuckoo! posted early for SP purposes.]

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[thejourneysend]

"I pulled him out of a tight spot," Renee said, grinning. "And he was ever so thankful."

[firstofitskind]

Another snort of disbelief from Liam.

"The President had just declared a State of Emergency due to an assassination attempt," Liam said. "I was holed up in a Resistance safehouse with the opposing Presidential candidate, when the door was kicked in and a swarm of Volunteers in full riot gear raided the place. One of them recognized me and was about to place me under arrest when his partner turned around and shot him. Told me to follow her out of there." And of course he had, because what was the alternative? Wait for another Volunteer to recognize him and try and drag him back up to the Mothership?

[cryptidsandkinfolk]

Sarah nodded thoughtfully, gleaning several more details from what people were thinking and not saying.

And then looked at Liam. "Oooooh," she said, eyes wide with sudden understanding.

So that's where that stress had been coming from.

[arboreal_priestess]

"Sarah," Verity said softly, more as a reminder than to reprove. Sarah ducked her head a bit and blushed.

[thejourneysend]

Liam had told her, of course, about the telepathy. Because that wasn't the kind of thing he'd felt comfortable not sharing with her, considering they were all going to be on a small space ship together.

(And, you know, presumably a part of each others' lives on and off as the years went on.)

But hearing about it and seeing what she presumed was it in action were two different things entirely.

"He left out the part where I planted a virus that took all of Augur's computers offline the second his facial recognition program found a match," she smirked.

[firstofitskind]

"Which happened way quicker than you thought it would," Liam pointed out with a smirk of his own.

Because ribbing her about that was much preferable to dwelling on that particular hellish-in-general experience.

[arboreal_priestess]

"It's such a good face," Verity teased as the ship broke through the last of the Earth's atmosphere and into starlight.

[cryptidsandkinfolk]

And there went Sarah, losing the thread of the conversation as she gasped, staring out into the void of ever-night.

"Artie is never going to believe this," she breathed.

[thejourneysend]

Renee grinned at the expression on Sarah's face, remembering the first time she'd been this high up. Yes, it was as mundane as taking a taxi now, but she'd never forgotten how thrilling it had been in the beginning.

"Artie... that's another cousin?" she checked, because of course she'd been given the basic rundown on the Price family. Going into a situation without intelligence was just foolish.

[firstofitskind]

"On Very's father's side, yeah," Liam confirmed.

And until recently, Artie and Sarah had held the dubious honor of being the most oblivious two people who were clearly in love that Liam knew. Then he'd met Steve and Danny.

At least Sarah and Artie both were capable of admitting to themselves that they felt something that was more than Just Friends, even if they refused to believe the other would ever feel the same way.

[arboreal_priestess]

"And Sarah is my cousin on my mom's," Verity added, super-casually.

For, you know. Whenever Artie and Sarah got over themselves and admitted they'd been hopelessly in love with each other for forever.

[cryptidsandkinfolk]

Sarah was just going to roll her eyes at both of you right now.

"I'm Verity's mom's adopted sister," she explained to Renee. "Which would make me their aunt, but we're so close in age that's just weird."

[thejourneysend]

"Mmm," Renee hummed, carefully filing all this information away. "I can see how the age thing might be weird, yes," she said drily, gaze flicking over to the one person in the shuttle who was technically the same age as a second grader.

[firstofitskind]

"Don't make me make Verity turn this ship around," Liam grumbled.

[arboreal_priestess]

He was pretty the same age he'd appeared to be when he and Verity'd first met!

...That was a confusing sentence to anyone not from Fandom.

"Why, is it close to your bedtime?" Verity gibed.

[cryptidsandkinfolk]

"This is how they flirt," Sarah told Renee. "All the time."

Beat.

"Well, those times after Liam's gotten his cootie shot and is okay to talk to girls."

[thejourneysend]

Which was another difference: with Renee, the age thing had come up once, when Sandoval had been dying and then, even when everything had started going all weird with Ma'el's prophecy and what that meant for Liam, had never come up again.

"At least it's mutual," she pointed out. "Watching people throw themselves at him while he remained utterly oblivious and uninterested was almost painful, at times."

[firstofitskind]

"Hey!" Liam protested. "I wasn't oblivious." A beat. "All the time."

Not denying the 'uninterested' part though. Because he hadn't been, then.

[arboreal_priestess]

"Still is," Verity confirmed. "I mean, I find it hilarious more often than not, but it can also be painful, yeah."

[thejourneysend]

"He told me about the five minute dates," Renee nodded.

"He also told me they were nowhere near as awkward as you'd hoped."

[firstofitskind]

"Only one of them was an actual stranger, and absolutely none of them flirted with me," Liam said, weirdly smug about not being flirted with.

(Because he had his two people and that was all he needed, thank you very much.)

[arboreal_priestess]

"I'll get you next time," Verity sulked, weirdly put out about people not flirting with her husband.

[cryptidsandkinfolk]

Sarah looked over at Renee and shrugged in a very much I don't get it but they seem stupidly happy together kind of way.

She didn't get it, other than banter being the lifeblood of all of the Healy-Prices, but she was absolutely certain that they were stupidly happy together.

[thejourneysend]

Renee's shrug mirrored Sarah's own, and she rolled her eyes. Sarah might not be great at facial expressions, but the fond amusement that rolled off Renee like a wave probably made up for that (that was on purpose, because again, Liam had explained some of what to expect with the telepathy thing).

[firstofitskind]

"Hey!" Liam protested. "I can hear you two thinking at each other."

Not entirely true; Sarah's telepathic presence was the same as usual, like listening to a familiar piece of music being played in an unfamiliar key, but he wasn't a telepath, he couldn't hear anything she didn't choose to project directly at him. And Renee certainly wasn't a telepath (at least, insofar as they could tell. There'd been that weird incident with Jeff, but all the evidence pointed to him being the telepathic one). So yeah, Liam had no idea if that was actually what was going on, but it seemed like a reasonable guess.