His arm trembled slightly, and he paused. A drop of sweat patiently rolled from his forehead to land on the floor between his crossed legs. Azzie didn't even dare to blink. Come on... His forearm gave one last, nervous twitch, then steadied. He reached forward once more.
The metal connected with its port, and began sliding into place, catching on imperceptible flaws and irregularities. Patiently, Azzie kept the pressure slow and constant.
At last, the wire refused to move any further. Insulation was butting up against the port opening. Azzie closed his eyes and breathed once, slowly. In, hold it. Out. He released his death grip on the wire and pulled his hand slowly, so slowly, from within the metal and plastic jungle.
Azzie looked up and nodded to June once, and then collapsed on the floor, massaging his cramped wrist. June swayed on her feet until Azzie was afraid she was going to join him on the floor. However, her balance steadied and she blinked twice, hard, squeezing the fear and the redness out of her eyes.
"Let's not do that again, all right?" She asked weakly. Azzie nodded and gave a grunt in reply. His throat felt like leather. He forced himself to swallow once, wincing.
"Water?" His voice sounded inhuman. June nodded and began shoving equipment around in the wall cabinet. Papers and jackets fell out onto the floor and a metal can bounced once before rolling against the far wall. June growled once in frustration.
"Can't you keep anything organized?" She forced the question through clenched teeth. Azzie was so agravating.
"Some stuff. It's not really my nature." Azzie swallowed again and grinned. "Sorry."
June grunted and removed a small plastic bag from the cabinet. It squished and sloshed in her hands, and was so slick from condensation that she almost dropped it before tossing it to Azzie. He swiped with his right hand, catching it and opening the press release with his left thumb and forefinger in one well-practiced motion. The transparent plastic made it possible for June to watch the water level plummet as Azzie sucked at the opening noisily.
June's eyebrows came together as she observed the display. "Peace, Azzie. Don't drink the whole thing. We only have one or two left, and its a long way to Earth from here."
Azzie cut short his drink with a whiny sound and replied, "Don't frown like that. You're getting lines on your forehead."
"Only since I started working with you, Azzie. I found a grey hair this morning, too."
Azzie laughed. "You're only ten years older than me. Don't give me that garbage."
"I'm serious, Azzie. You're going to give me a nervous breakup. And sixty-five is old enough to get grey hairs."
"Breakdown. The term was nervous breakdown, not breakup. And you can't give someone grey hairs just by...living an exciting life." Azzie smiled. It was his best feature, and he knew it.
"Exciting! Is that what you call this?" June's voice skyrocketed to near-screech levels. "We were five minutes and half a centimeter away from certain death, Az." Suddenly she cut herself off. After a moment's pause, she whispered, "Do you have any idea how scared I was?"
Azzie's grin faded. "Yes. I was ready to go myself. I do get scared, you know." June's look said that she found that unlikely.
"Well, come on. Get up. I'm not going to carry you back to the G Chair, even at this gravity. We've got to get going."
"Yeah", Azzie said, looking around him at the cluttered work area. He shifted his hand around beneath his body and pushed up. The floor was uncomfortably warm against his slick palms. "Yeah, you're right. Let's get going."
Azzie's knees creaked as he straightened his legs. This sort of life is hard on your body, I suppose. He walked shakily through the small doorway and entered the flight deck. While the work area looked like a sterile closet from some Doctor's office, with white cabinets and white lighting and uncomfortable chairs and unnameable equipment strewn over every horizontal surface, the flight deck was dark and neat. Four G Chairs were arranged before the great viewing screen, which currently showed white noise. A faintly smoky smell still hung in the air and stung Azzie's eyes somewhat as he reached his chair and flopped down. Designed to buffer humans against the rigors of high acceleration, the chair took little notice of Azzie's meager weight.
"Okay, June, see if you can get the viewscreen to display something meaningful. I'll work on getting this tub turned around, and then we can both get some sleep while the navigator does its job. Agreed?"
"Aye Aye, Captain. Me and the other scroungy lads will get right to work."
"Scurvy lads, June. Scurvy lads."
"What's scurvy? I like scroungy better. It makes more sense."
Azzie frowned. "How do you know it makes more sense if you don't even know what scurvy means?"
"It just sounds better. Come on, Az, turn us around. Forget I said anything. We need to get out of here."
Azzie began nudging the ship into a slow u-turn with small boosts from the directional rockets, while simultaneously making a sneering face. "We need to get out of here. Blah blah blah." His voice was a high-pitched whine that sounded very little like June. She snorted, but otherwise made no reply.
It was, indeed, a good omen.