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Next Steps

“Now, open your mouth in preparation,” Jace told Khoth, trying to hide the wide smile that wanted to bloom on his face.

“I do not understand the purpose of this endeavor. If we are going to eat the popcorn, would it not be better to place a piece in our mouths instead of trying to catch a piece you toss into the air?” Khoth sounded dubious about the whole endeavor. “There is a greater than even chance that we might miss it altogether.”

“And you won’t eat dirty popcorn? You don’t know about the five second rule.” Jace let out a chuckle.

“Five second rule?”

“Food touches the floor for less than five seconds and it’s perfectly clean. The dirt does not have time to adhere to it and--”

“That is not scientific. You must know this,” Khoth interrupted him. His whole face scrunched.

“I know that, but I still tell myself it’s true,” Jace said.

“So you believe something you know is not factual?”

“All the time.” Jace winced. “That’s one of the good and bad things about humans. It often leads to bad things, I admit. But not the five second rule.”

“It will if the food becomes contaminated and someone becomes ill though it is unlikely that you will get ill. I am assuming that the Osiris has upgraded your digestive tract.” Khoth’s head shifted.

There was no clack of selchitte when he did so. The Thaf’ell frowned and one of his hands lifted to his head, but he firmly lowered it to his side. Jace mourned the loss of those beads, too. He wondered if there was something that he could give Khoth to replace them. Something that would represent his new family.

But maybe that was incredibly presumptuous. Maybe it wasn’t something that Khoth would want. Selchitte represented family and rank in the Thaf’ell. Would it seem lesser to Khoth to have non-Thaf’ell “family” and rank? He would have to ask Thammah about this before he even considered speaking to Khoth.

“You have to take risks, Khoth, even if you don’t have a cast iron stomach like me. Because it’s all part of the experience of popcorn,” Jace told him. “You have to throw some up in the air and catch it in your mouth to truly understand this superfood.”

“Why?” Khoth was doing that furrowed brow thing that Jace loved and the smile kept threatening to bloom.

“Well… it’s just a thing you do with popcorn,” Jace answered, finding that his ability to speak seemed to become reduced the more those eyebrows drew together.

“Does it taste better?” More dubiousness and frowns though they were hard to see as the two of them were laying on Jace’s bed on their backs.

“No.”

The ceiling up above them was showing worlds that Jace wanted to explore that might have manufacturing facilities to create ships for Earth. They were supposed to be napping. Or, Jace was supposed to be napping, but he’d found a second wind the moment that they’d come into his quarters. So food and planet gazing were the plan. But it had led to popcorn and cuddling. Well, sort of cuddling.

Deeper frowns. “Does this act make the popcorn more nutritious? Though I cannot see how that would be.”

“No, it’s just… fun,” Jace explained.

The bowl of popcorn was between them. One side resting against Jace’s hip and the other against Khoth’s. They were one popcorn bowl apart from cuddling. Both of them had kicked off their boots and taken off their jackets. But they weren’t undressed. They were very far from undressed and Jace wondered if he should press this issue. But Khoth, for all his strength, seemed so fragile still.

“This is very perplexing. I am beginning to think that I do not understand the meaning of the word fun,” Khoth told him.

“Just try. See if you like it,” Jace suggested and picked up a single kernel.

The popcorn was perfectly buttered and salted. A few grains of salt stuck to his fingers and there was a faint sheen of butter too. The Osiris had sent it up, along with a bunch of other snacks. It had also refreshed Khoth’s lunch, though it had sent up a different dish that his mother hadn’t made for him, but was a favorite. The dishes for that were empty by the side of the bed. Now there were just the snacks surrounding them.

Khoth’s handsome face was filled with interest. There was none of the emotional strain he’d seen there after they left the elevator. That relieved him though he was under no illusions that Khoth was “fine” yet. But a stress valve had been opened and some of the steam had been released.

I really wonder if I should have made that deal with his mother and not gone with someone else, even if they were a lesser known quantity, Jace thought.

But he realized that even if Nova Voor wasn’t the High Councillor, it wasn’t like Khoth was going to forget her. And he might think of her anyways every time he faced whoever took over for her. It would probably have hurt more. Not to mention that he thought Khoth maybe needed to deal with his feelings about his mother, his father, his sister and his exile.

“All right. I will open my mouth. You,” Khoth turned his head to look at Jace, “will aim well, Jace, will you not?”

“Oh, most definitely,” Jace said.