There wasn't much else Jove to do but go to bed. He'd never experienced such an odd juxtaposition of emotions before. The usual feeling of intense satisfaction after the sexual conquest of a beautiful woman did battle against a wealth of regret and shame and, most of all, fear.
If his mother found out, he'd be dead. Their family, in a sense, would be dead.
He slid the door of his bunk room closed and climbed into bed. On top of everything else, he needed a shower in the morning. The smell of stale sex would give him away if nothing else did.
The unfamiliar pillow reminded him again of his situation. How much heating fuel did they have left? How much food? What about the ice drones? Was his apartment back home spared in the destruction, along with all of his possessions inside, or would he return to a smoldering crater?
He slept, somehow, and awoke the next morning to the indifferent ambient hum of the station's machinery. His head hurt, and he realized he'd drunk enough to earn a solid hangover.
A soft knock came at his door after a few minutes. He propped his head up on his arm and said "come in."
The door slid open and his mother poked her head in. "Morning, Jove. Do you still like pancakes? I was going to make them for breakfast."
"Uh, yeah, I like pancakes." He felt a rise of deja vu. "You always used to make them on the weekends. Me and Eve would eat pancakes and… play Pokemon on the couch."
"I remember," said Kira. "In this case it's more due to the station having tons of uneaten pancake mix. They weren't super popular among Ryan or the other researchers. We don't have syrup, I should add."
"I'll still eat them."
"Good." She started to pull back from the door but paused before closing it. "Thanks for last night."
He nodded, but had to skip past the more lurid memories of the night to arrive at when he'd tried to cheer her up in her room. "Just looking out for you, Mom. This is probably harder for you than it is for us."
"Oh, I think that's something of an exaggeration," said Kira, with a smile. "I'm still right where I chose to be before this all happened. For you, and Eve, and Aster, especially, I think the adjustment is going to be a challenge."
"Yeah, maybe," he said.
She left and closed the door. Jove got dressed, wincing a little as his bare feet touched down on an unexpectedly cold floor. He put on both his t-shirt and his long sleeve shirt, wondering if his mother had turned down the heat to ration fuel.
Eve was in the cafeteria, reading a thin book with white mountains on the cover. She put it aside as he sat down next to her.
"Morning, little brother," she said. "What's got you so smiley?"
"Nothing." He shook his head and softened his expression as his thoughts immediately jumping to the previous night, the taste of Aster's lips, the texture and softness of her body.
"No, seriously." Eve looked at him with more scrutiny. "Come on. Tell me. What else do we have to talk about?"
"I remembered that I'll never have to pay rent again," he said.
She stared at him for a second before slowly shaking her head. "That's kind of petty, don't you think? Millions of people are probably dead, just based off what we've heard so far."
"Don't ask questions you don't want the answer to."
"I wanted an answer, just a more evolved one than you seemed to be capable of."
"Fuck off."
Eve laughed in the same way she used to whenever she beat him in a Pokémon battle, which had been often. She'd been obsessed with those games, once upon a time. An edge of bitterness crept into the memory as he considered that, barring some way of acquiring a Nintendo console and cartridge, they'd probably never play them again, either.
"Mom's making pancakes," said Eve.
"She told me."
"Brings back memories."
"Yeah, it does." He smiled and glanced at her. "I was actually just thinking about how much I'd miss Pokémon."
"I remember that," said Eve, wistfully. "I don't think you ever won a single battle against me."
"I definitely won at least a few times."
"Nope. Unless you're talking about that one time when Mom told me to let you win."
Jove felt a stab of outsized annoyance. "You're such a sore loser that you can't even take a loss in a memory."
"Goes both ways, Jovian." Eve sighed and looked at him strangely. "I do miss those days."
"So do I," he said.
Their mother entered the cafeteria with a platter of pancakes just as Aster came through the door. Jove glanced at his aunt, trying to meet her gaze, but she kept her eyes fixed on the food.
"You look tired," said Kira, to Aster.
"Can you blame me after yesterday?" she muttered.
"When a bottle of tequila is missing from a liquor cabinet I always keep locked, I certainly can," said Kira, stiffly. "I suppose your hangover is punishment enough."
Aster cleared her throat guiltily. "Well, I was in a very emotional mood! I'll be the first to admit that I drank too much. I can't remember a single thing from the time I first opened that bottle to when I woke up."
"You blacked out last night, Aunt Aster?" asked Jove.
She met his gaze with a furrowed brow. "It would seem so. Please tell me I didn't do anything overly embarrassing in front of you, darling, did I?"
Jove had dealt with both men and women who'd been blackout drunk before and the level of inebriated hysteria they tended to exhibit was beyond anything he'd seen from his aunt the previous night. She'd seemed a little drunk, maybe, but not out of control, not sloppy. And he'd seen how much she'd been drinking - it hadn't been a crazy amount.
"Nothing embarrassing," he said.
He wanted to call her out on the lie so badly, but not in front of Eve and his mother. It would sound like he was admitting to taking advantage of her while drunk. He felt a sudden stab of uncertainty. Had he taken advantage of her while she was drunk? He'd been drunk, too, but still…
It was as disappointing as it was confusing. The sex had been incredible, sensation wise, but the intimacy had soothed a part of him that'd been fraying since the start of the disaster.
He loved his aunt, and the thought that they might deepen their relationship, even in a forbidden way, had given him hope, somehow. Waking up to her saying she had no memory of it was like waking up from a dream. Worse, almost.
"Well, dig in," said his mother, putting a pancake on each of their plates. "I want to talk to you all about our current situation some more while we eat."
"We're listening," said Eve.
"I don't have much good news to share, I'm afraid," said Kira. "We still have plenty of food, and plenty of power, but it was always fuel which was going to be the issue. I've turned the station's heat down by a few degrees to make the propane last longer, but I doubt it will buy us more than a day or two. We need to find a way to resupply our fuel within a week or this station will go cold."
She didn't articulate what that would mean for them, and as far as Jove was concerned, she didn't need to. There would be no survival if they ran out of heat. Hell, Antarctica didn't even have any fucking trees. They couldn't even start a fire in desperation.
"Wasn't the plan always for us to head back to Port Sirius?" asked Aster. "You're talking as though you intend for us to stay here long term."
"We all saw Ryan's video," said Kira. "The situation at Port Sirius has likely gotten even worse than the glimpse we witnessed."
"You don't know that," said Aster. "For all we know, they're evacuating everyone. We might well miss the last plane or boat back to civilization if we don't hurry!"
"Aster…" said Jove. "I don't think it's that simple."
"How would any of us know for sure?" she snapped.
"I do think we should go to Port Sirius," said Kira. "But not with the intention of evacuating. Port Sirius was our fuel supplier and should, in theory, still have plenty of propane in store.
"They plan around the possibility of weather delays and irregular shipping. Especially now, I don't see where else that fuel could have gone. But we'll need to wait for a clear window in the weather, given that we'll be planning to make the trip out and back in a single day."
"Just to play the devil's advocate," said Eve. "Wouldn't it make more sense for all of us to go, just in case there is a rescue going on? Not that I'm in a huge rush to leave, but if it is our only chance…"
"Without Andromeda, the base needs someone to monitor its systems and keep everything running," said Kira. "I'm the only one who currently knows how to do it. I'm also the only one who can guide a party back to Port Sirius. It's another issue we'll have to address before the weather clears."
"We'll figure it out." Jove cut another piece of pancake with his fork. "One problem at a time. Pancakes turned out great."
"Yeah, they're awesome, Mom," said Eve.
A smile crept onto Kira's face. "Thanks."