Chapter Text
Chapter 1 – Grace in the Mess
September 2267, EAS Excalibur
Lieutenant John Matheson sits in the Excalibur's mess hall, mentally reviewing Captain Gideon’s plans for the oncoming week. There’s something not quite logical about pursuing a lead on the Abbai Matriarchate in Sector 16 at this point. Granted, it’s not exactly against sound judgment, either. Just, a bit out of left field. They’re not necessarily being as methodical as he’s come to expect from Gideon. And no, the strange psi signature coming from Gideon’s office has nothing to do with Matheson’s unease. He’s an EarthForce officer, not a professional telepath. He doesn’t scan, he doesn’t make decisions based on accidental whiffs. He definitely keeps that airlock clamped down. And yet, despite Gideon requesting Matheson to join him on the Excalibur as XO, he clearly doesn’t fully trust him. He’s clearly withholding something.
“You aren’t eager to see the Matriarchs, Lieutenant?” Gideon had prodded.
“Desperately, sir,” he’d deadpanned back. “Just, would it not make more sense to investigate the leads in Sectors 12 and 13 en route?”
Gideon pretended to give it thought. “No. Set course.”
Not that Gideon is obligated to explain himself, but--
A female voice breaks into Matheson’s thoughts. “They have kimchi here?”
He smiles politely up at her from his seat. “No, I bring it in myself. The rice and... whatever this meat is, is from the cafeteria, though.” She’s familiar, one of the other 20 or so frequent attendees of the transdenominational Christian services led by Father Dean. Sits on the left side, the only one among them who seems to have the winding melody of the Gloria down solid. Her hair has more of a reddish hue to it in the chapel than here in stark lighting.
She’s crestfallen. “Oh. Of course. Well, good work getting it on this ship. The best I can do is noodle cups with kimchi-flavoured powder.”
He chuckles. “That’s definitely not the same.”
A devilish glint flashes in her eyes as the corner of her lips twist upward, making his body temperature rise by a full degree. She leans forward theatrically and inhales deeply. Hums dreamily. “That is some good stuff. But never mind me, sir. I know I’m being weird. Just... enjoying your kimchi secondhand. Masitkke deuseyo.” Her knuckles graze his as she pulls away. She winks and leave.
A small group of other women make room for her across the mess hall, where she seems to immediately forget about the encounter. When his brain circuitry is working again, Matheson collects a paper cup and divides half the kimchi into it. She was flirting with him. Almost certainly for the sole purpose of stealing his kimchi away and making him think it was his idea. But honestly, who can begrudge a person for wanting real food? Especially one with striking blue eyes like that.
He crosses the hall and plunks the kimchi cup by her elbow, causing everyone at her table to look up. “Masitkke deuseyo,” he smirks back, then withdraws before anyone can respond.
He hears it, regardless: Why is the XO giving you food? “Probably because I drooled on it too much for him to want it anymore.”
Sure that none of them can see it, he allows his smirk to become a wide grin.
Six days later, Captain Gideon holds Matheson’s gaze across the conference table. “Well,” he drawls. “That was a bust.”
Galen strides circles around the table, presumably attempting to be commandeering, but leaking anxiety from every pore. “Yes, Matthew, a complete bust. I warned you against making that trade--”
“But it’s not clear what exactly went wrong,” Gideon cuts in. “Any way I look at it, I had almost all the information I needed. Had I known about the Abbai taboo on holographic projection, everything would have been fine. And I’m fairly certain you knew about that, Galen.”
“Oh, this is my fault, Matthew? I did everything I could to talk some sense into you but-”
“-but tell me what I needed to know.” He waves Galen away, stretching back in his chair like the king lion of a pride. “We’ll talk about this more. In private. But for the rest of you, you’ll find the coordinates for our next target on the feed.”
Matheson looks at his comm pad, attempting to tune out Galen’s arguing. Sector 12. Ruins on an asteroid that may have once been a galactic Library of Alexandria.
“Does that suit you, Lieutenant Matheson?”
He bows his head. “Of course, Captain. I’ll make the arrangements.”
But not until after a supply run on Abba VIII. Which means he’s free to attend the church service by Father Dean before hitting the bridge.
Matheson’s always sought church services as refuge. It was part of his life before his psi abilities triggered, and he’d clung to it throughout Psi Corps’s attempts to scrub out allegiance to any power beyond themselves. It makes him remember he was someone before all that. And that he isn’t alone. He often finds he needs the grace – both for himself and to extend to other people.
Unfortunately, today, Father Dean is ill with some strain of Abban flu, leaving his tiny flock to scratch their heads and try to pull off a service themselves. Even with the written instructions the father has left, it starts out with a fart noise and deteriorates from there.
“I don’t know why Papa D insists on us flipping back and forth between literal books,” one young member in a leather flight jacket grumbles. “It could be streamlined into a single script if literally one person cared to program the parameters.”
“All hail the metaphysical information transfer!” quips the woman Matheson met in the cafeteria. Still in civvies. He’s not sure who she is.
“Paper cuts aren’t holy, either,” the leather jacket man grumbles.
Nevertheless, huddled together in a circle, rather than in their usual lines, twelve people trip and stumble their way through the liturgy. They designate a young flight crew member to read the Kyrie, and he pronounces each word like he’s never heard it before in his life. Despite Matheson’s best attempts at reverence, he glances up to see if anyone else is struggling to maintain a straight face, and meets her eyes. Sparkling as devilishly as when she stole his kimchi.
“Come on, Parker,” someone groans. “Have you ever--”
“Well, maybe you shouldn’t have assigned the low-church plebe to read archaic Latin!” Parker retorts.
By the time they get to the place in the text earmarked for the sermon, all eleven pairs of eyes whip to Matheson.
“Hello?” he freezes.
“Well, you are the ranking officer here, sir,” says leather jacket man. “I think this duty falls to you. What wisdom do you have to share?”
Silence reigns supreme.
“Um... choose carefully who you trust?” He suspects his smile is more of a grimace.
But Parker nods his head. “Good words. Good words. Sound advice, sir. Hey – I read a devotional yesterday that I thought was pretty good. Not connected to today’s scripture readings as far as I can tell, but I could read it all to you if you’d like.”
Quick agreement, and Parker does so, but Matheson misses it all battling his blood vessels over the colour of his face. When he finally dares to look back up, kimchi woman is obviously losing a battle with herself, also. She's almost convulsing with mirth. But she acknowledges his glance with an attempt at a dignified nod, and they hold the look two seconds longer than they should. She gives the tiniest shake of her head – don’t you dare make me laugh out loud in church. He answers with the smallest tightening at the corners of his mouth.
By the time they get to the Gloria, kimchi girl has herself under control. She spends a full five minutes trying to teach the lot of them which way their voices are supposed to go on which syllable. To her credit, a few of them manage to catch on, including Matheson.
Then someone leads a very low-church style group prayer for the recovery of Father Dean. She closes it with, “who we now know more than ever we very definitely need here,” setting off another round of ill-concealed giggles. And they haven’t even consumed any wine, having opted to forgo the Eucharist without the Father to bless the elements.
Despite the gong-show, Matheson has to admit at the end that he feels rather... springier... than he did when he first arrived. He won’t complain about the group’s levity when they made him feel fully included – lack of sermon readiness notwithstanding.
“Hey,” kimchi girl says as everyone finally ambles out to their various destinations. “I’m so sorry about the other day in the mess hall. That was not professional.” But she says it with a toothy smile, like she’s still laughing from their general religious ineptitude.
He rolls his eyes. “Yes, we seem to be struggling with professionalism lately. Though I suppose, kimchi and church services fall outside the realm of professional strictures.”
“There’s just so much fear and anger, so much driven intensity. Can’t live in that all the time, you know?”
He nods. “I assure you, I’m in no way offended.”
She relaxes slightly. “I’m Eliza, by the way. Schofield. I do microbiology.”
“John Matheson,” he says, though she clearly already knows. “And I definitely don’t do sermon-giving.”
Her smile re-emerges, making his stomach flip. “Nevertheless, it’s good to know there are like-minded people on this ship. We might make a right mess of things, but if we go down, we go down without losing every part of ourselves.”