Moonhawk

Chapter 4 - A Change For Once

"I can't believe what you just said, Hawk. That's crazy!" A deep angry voice shouted out loud in Hawk's thoughts. He was still gazing over at the portrait. He tried to ignore those memories that surfaced after he tried to leave all of it in the past. Hawk just can't let go of the past trauma so easily.

"That's the only way to protect our crew, Pitch! Trust me, please!" Hawk tried everything to get rid of those nagging voices in his head. But, no matter how hard he tried, he failed. He began to envision the old crew and the normal lives they had before everything went crazy.

"I doubt that. You know how willing I am to protect my crew but your suggestion... that's sheer suicide!" Pitch said, disgruntled. Hawk had to try and shut down those thoughts again: He seriously was so fed up of it. Luckily, he managed to clear his head, but not without depressing him slightly. Hawk walked back to his table after he returned the image back where it should be on the wall and gently sat down on the chair. Silence descended on the room again. A distressed look crept across his visor. Maybe I should check on my crew to distract me a bit? Hawk pondered and beamed himself down to the Polus Station.

As he beamed himself down, he saw Mr. Food and The Doc walking towards the dropship, where he just arrived. They were surprised to see Hawk here.

"Hawk, that's a surprise!" Mr. Food said as he stood in front of him.

"We thought you wanted to take a break. Is everything alright?" The Doc asked just to be sure.

Hawk had to take a moment of silence to think about a reply. "Yes, everything's alright, Doc. I just wanted to see how the crew is coming along."

The Doc was quick to notice that something was not quite right with Hawk. His tone of voice may have been nothing out of the ordinary, but there was something tangible in his voice. "Alright, Hawk. But please take care. Too much stress isn't good for anyone. Taking breaks is a good thing to do once in a while." The Doc advised.

"Thank you." He replied, but his words were empty.

"Anyway, The Doc and I are beaming up now. We're done with our work here and would like to go back to the ship. We've something else planned for later, but that's a surprise for now." Mr. Food said before both beamed up to the spaceship. I wonder what it'll be, Hawk thought for a second, but the curiosity didn't stick.

As Hawk walked forward aimlessly, he caught a glimpse of Moon, standing outside in the freezing storm, checking on one of the weather nodes installed. Moon's attention was focused solely on the task and didn't notice him. "Moon?"

"AH!" Moon, as she heard Hawks' voice out of nowhere, suddenly shouted out in alarm. The shock was so intense that she tripped over her own shadow and fell to the snowy ground.

"Oh my god! Hawk, you scared me!" She called out breathlessly; her aquamarine body was now covered with snow. Hawk couldn't even get a word out; with seeing Moon sitting there so innocently there, she looked way too beautiful.

"I'm so sorry, Moon; I didn't mean to scare you. You were too focused on the weather node." Hawk then gently said, trying to calm her down. He really didn't mean to scare her: He should walk louder next time.
"Come here, Moon, let me help you up out of the snow. As beautiful as you look there, I'd hate for you to get sick." Hawk replied softly and helped Moon to get back onto her feet. She shook the leftover snow that was still stuck to her spacesuit, using her hands to brush off the clumps.

"Thank you." Moon said, grateful for the help.

"Seems like the storm is also getting stronge. Itt's probably better to go inside for now. I could make some tea for you in the office if you'd like, Hawk?" Moon asked. Uplifted by the offer, He agreed to it and followed her to the office.

As they arrived in the office, they noticed that they weren't the only ones there. Queen and Davy were in a chatty mood with each other, and it seemed like they were starting to get along well. Hawk was pleasantly surprised to see this change of events. "Did something happen while I was taking care of our spaceship?" He asked.

"Ah, no big deal." Moon answered, surprised as well to see Davy and Queen getting along like that - That's unusual for them. Maybe they finally listened to my advice back then in the meeting, even though it wasn't much, Moon thought, feeling very proud of her crew mates. Not wanting to interrupt their conversation at all, Moon then tried to prepare and bring the tea over for her and Hawk while being as unnoticeable as possible.

"I am impressed. I haven't seen Queen and Davy getting along like that for a while. That's a blessing for my visor for once." Hawk admitted, glad that he had decided to beam himself down to check on the crew. He took a small sip of the tea from the mug Moon handed him and felt like everything was unwinding. Better still, the yea was a strawberry infusion, his favorite flavor.

"Alright, how many members have finished their tasks by now?" Hawk asked, attempting to start a conversation with Moon.

"Uhm... I believe a few so far." Moon said, looking around to see that Davy and Queen had noticed them. They were also surprised to see Hawk in the office room.

"Captain! Nice to see you here. We are done with our tasks, and we would like to go back to the spaceship again: The Polus Station gets kind of boring." Davy said.

"Hm, I'm not really in charge, but sure you can. I'll see every one of you up there." Hawk said. It was clear he was in a relaxed mood. Queen and Davy both headed off together to the dropship and beamed themself up to the spaceship. In the meantime, Hawk finished his tea.

Moon and Hawk were now both alone in the office room; everyone else is finishing their tasks somewhere else. The cyan colored crew member was sitting there, pondering the reasons why why Hawk decided to check on the crew even though he said they all needed a break. Hopefully, nothing bad did happen to him... that wouldn't be great. It would break Moon's heart in no time. Should she ask about it? Moon wasn't sure if she should. He seemed to be in a pretty good mood now, very relaxed and satisfied. Asking him now would probably destroy his current mood if something happened to him in the spaceship earlier. Moon decided not to ask, at least for now. Just seeing him like that made Moon happy. That is all she wanted. To make Hawk happy, to show him that the crew could work together. Sure, there'll be turbulent times in the future, Moon knows that, but she just hopes that things will turn out alright in the end.

"The tea was great, thank you, Moon." The purple Captain said, thankful for the tea as he finished it.

At that very moment, the last crew members, Shepp, Slimey, and Flash, all walked into the room to report to Moon that they were finally done with their tasks. Even if Flash got into an accident with Slimey's palls Zin and Tin as he tried to repair and check on the wires, he got himself a tiny wound on his hand, though.

"Even if it's just a tiny wound, you should go to The Doc to check it, Flash. Please try to be more careful next time, alright?" Moon advised.

"It doesn't hurt that much, but I will." The yellow crewmate Flash replied. Hawk was even more surprised: Not even a mocking line from Shepp this time? Flash doesn't get annoyed. He had seen how Shepp was just ignoring everyone save for the occasional nod while someone was speaking. As much as Hawk enjoyed the moment of Shepp not teasing anyone, this time, he noticed how difficult it was for him to say nothing.

"I must say... seeing you all like that for once is quite a nice change." Hawk admitted.

"Ah well about that -" Slimey started to speak. "I am still trying to teach my pals that they shouldn't make that much trouble anymore. That's why Flash got in a tiny accident. I am sorry about that." Hawk couldn't believe his ears. Hearing that made him very cheerful that they changed for good. Yet, Shepp really tried hard not to say otherwise. If it was up to him, he would still have loved to mock a few people for the heck of it.

Moon gently leaned down to the creatures' level and petted them a bit. "They are learning, and that's what counts."

After that conversation, everyone decided to beam back to the spaceship. Everyone else was already there, waiting for their return.

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Edited/Corrected by: https://www.deviantart.com/spectra-shift