Aiden navigated the long outdated forums of interstellarfonies.net, having a good laugh. It was the unofficial hub for Interstellar Forces deniers, where old geezers with way too much time on their hands really knew how to craft a story. Little did they know, Aiden did a little crafting of his own, building upon their wildest conspiracies.
“What’cha doin’?” His roommate Leon stood by the freshly-stocked refrigerator, chomping on a cheese stick.
“Convincing old geezers that the moon isn’t real.” Aiden gave an honest answer.
“W-Why?”
He smirked at him. “Because I can.”
The horrified expression on Leon’s face was worth more than a thousand words.
“Aidennn,” he whined, “it’s bad enough that they don’t believe in the IF, why do you want to rob them of the majesty of space?”
“Kid, they don’t believe in the majesty of space. These people believe in a government plot to siphon their tax dollars by building a dome city in a desert somewhere and pretending it’s on the Moon.”
“You’re on IF.Net, aren’t you?” Leon took another bite of his cheese stick.
“Yep.”
He shook his head, then seemed to notice something. “Hey… Isn’t that Jun’s tablet?”
“Yeah, he let me borrow it.”
Leon didn’t seem to believe that answer, but Aiden didn’t care. He could ask Jun himself if he wanted to know so badly. In fact, they almost bumped into each other as Leon left the kitchen.
“Aiden’s using your tablet for evil.” were his parting words. Snitch.
Jun watched him leave, then gave Aiden a tired look. “Do I even wanna know?”
Aiden raised his eyebrows. “Do you?”
“Whatever, as long as you’re not messing around on any of my accounts.” The older ranger took a seat beside him.
Aiden folded his friend’s tablet back into a phone and slid it across the table. “Here, you can have it back.”
Jun swiped it up. “Thank you.”
“How’s your friend doing? Still spooked?”
“Nah, she bounced back pretty quickly.”
He was glad to hear she was doing alright. She may’ve been a little weirdo, but she was the little weirdo who saved his life today.
“I’ve been thinking about what she said.” began the blond, pinching his beard. “About how we’re older than everybody else. Number one, that’s nuts. You know that’s nuts, right? There are four people younger than her, and two of them are our captains.”
“It’s a… really interesting situation to find ourselves in, yeah.” Jun tried to hide how obviously freaked out he was. He failed.
“Number two, I’ve been thinkin’,” he drummed his fists on the table. “Who’s to stop you from being fully… yourself?”
“What do you mean?”
Aiden would be more direct, but outing Jun in front of whoever might be watching the cameras wasn’t his intention.
He covered his mouth. “The ‘them’ thing.”
“Ohhhh!” Jun reacted like the airhead he liked pretending to be. “What’s stopping me from telling the others about that? I’m The First Woman in the IF, there are a lot of eyes on me. I don’t know these people yet; one of them might leak it out to the public.”
“JK, you know like half the ship! Me, Roxie, and didn’t you say you and her know that other red-headed girl?”
“Not that well, but I can’t see her starting anything.” responded the dark-haired ranger. “I don’t really sense your roommate doing anything like that either, but like I said, I don’t really know him well enough yet to really tell...”
“What about the other two?”
“Can’t really get a read on them.” Jun closed his eyes, or at least the one Aiden could see. “We rarely see one of them and the younger one… might be okay…? It’s hard to tell.”
Aiden leaned toward Jun. “The way I see it, besides you, me and Roxie are the only ones who really have any experience in the IF, and we’re already on your side, more or less. The others are gonna need our help at some point.”
“And you’re saying…? Hold our experience over their heads?” Jun made it sound like such a bad thing.
“Yeah! If they have a problem with you being who you are, let them see how far they can get without you!” It made perfect sense to Aiden. “If they’re smart, they won’t get on your bad side.”
Jun ran a hand through his bangs. “They might be young, but they’re not helpless!”
Aiden snickered. “Please. You shoulda seen your face when Rox told you we were the only ones over 20. Blondie barely knows how this ship works!”
“I’m sure their dad taught them everything they needed to know. Galhardo’s an okay guy as far as the chief commanders go; I talked to him a couple times back in the day. Really thorough, gave me some good advice.” Jun reminisced. “So I don’t think this is a case of thoughtless nepotism.”
“Oh, so it’s thoughtful nepotism. What a relief.” Aiden wanted to show Jun how ridiculous he just sounded. “Didn’t know you had a favorite overlord.”
“It’s not like… whatever.” The dark-haired ranger rested his head in his hand.
“You know what? You might be onto something.” Aiden leaned back. “Maybe it is thoughtful nepotism. Because they’re puppets!”
“What??”
“Why else would he pick his sons to do this? He wanted two guys who’d follow his every word. One to stay up in his room and listen and the other to keep us from noticing anything.”
Jun covered his face. “...Have you been hanging out on IF denier forums again? You’re starting to sound like them.”
“That’s beside the point.”
The older ranger groaned. “You’re so gonna get yourself fired, bro.”
Aiden ignored his warning. “Anyway, why else do you think we didn’t see our captain for a whole week?”
“I dunno!” Jun shrugged. “Maybe he got space sick! Or maybe he’s just nervous. And I mean, if I’m not mistaken, this is his first time in the IF and he’s got a whole ship and crew to look after. I’d be a little freaked out in his shoes, plus, he struck me as the quiet type. Besides...” He looked away. “I know for a fact that your theory is wrong.”
“You do?” This piqued Aiden’s interest. “How so?”
“I have my reasons.”
He waited for a second. “Sooo, you gonna tell me what they are?”
A smug look crossed Jun’s face.
“No.”
The blond sighed. “You’ve been hangin’ out with me too much.”
“Now you know how it feels!” The older ranger was entirely too pleased with himself. “But… I would tell you if I felt like I could.”
Aiden believed that much. Jun wasn’t the type to bluff. However, this did leave the two at a standstill, which was annoying.
“Why do you even care, anyway?” Jun moved on, more annoyingly.
“About what?”
“About people calling me the wrong thing. Back when I first told you about it, you thought I was being ridiculous.”
“I did.” Aiden admitted. “But now I think everything is ridiculous, so you might as well.”
“Huh? I don’t follow.”
“You said it yourself.” He remembered Jun’s words. “People rely on us to care way more about gender than it really matters, for what? So they can charge more for life insurance? Pink razors?”
“I should’ve figured that would be the thing that stuck with you.”
“But were you lying?” Aiden got a head shake in response. “And that’s just the little stuff! Don’t even get me started on how many dudes are told they should be proud to die in a war because it’ll make them a ‘real man.’ Or that women will explode if they go to space, so all they should focus on is being good enough servants for their man. What is this?”
“You’re asking me?” Jun shrugged. “Bro, I’m just as confused as you are. I didn’t think you’d be this passionate about it though.”
“Because so many people fell for it! They think it’s fair. That it makes sense. I’m mad I didn’t notice until you told me. I always thought it was kinda goofy how far dudes were willing to go to prove their masculinity or whatever, but I had no idea it went this deep.” Aiden shrugged in disbelief. “But it was right in front of me the whole time.”
“Hey, don’t feel bad for not realizing it sooner. If it makes you feel better,” like Jun needed to make him feel better, “I think it’s easier for people to realize it when people don’t ‘act like’ the gender they’re seen as. Like, you’d be considered a manly man.”
“I don’t even care about that.” Aiden knew what he was trying to get at, but he wanted to set the record straight that he never cared to live up to that kind of thing.
“You don’t, but other people do. No one’s gonna point out that you’re weird for a guy, or try to make you feel insecure about it. Even if they did, it wouldn’t work as well because you already fit the bill so well. Not to mention that you’re not the type to care about stuff like that.”
“What about you?”
“Well, I was never like, insecure about it or anything, but people sure make it a habit to point out how not-feminine I am.” Jun leaned back in his chair.
Aiden remembered the kind of stuff people would say behind Jun’s back. Honestly, guys criticizing him for being too masculine was the least annoying of it.
“That wasn’t too bad on its own, but I did realize that a lot of the things I wanted to do were mostly done by guys. It’d make it harder for me to prove that I’m capable, plus I’d be a target. Same for you if you wanted to be a nurse or elementary school teacher.”
“Would you trust me if I was a nurse or a teacher?” Aiden raised an eyebrow.
“No, but that’s because I know you, not because you’re a guy.”
“At least you didn’t become a pig.” He took the reasonable conclusion from this. “You woulda been a capable one though. Except for your pacifism and your whole moral code thing.”
“The pacifism was after I left training.” Jun lowered his voice. “Also maybe cool it with the cop hate around the authority figure who could be listening to us, like, right now?”
Aiden ignored him and shook his head. “Man, I’ve just been noticing this stuff more and more.”
“Welcome to the club, I guess.”
“We’re treated like different species or somethin’ just because one of us has a—”
Another blond burst into the kitchen.
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