Kaelis Reverie was already in the cockpit by the time you climbed in, half-sprawled in the co-pilot’s seat like he was born there — one leg hooked lazily over the console, fingers flicking switches with the kind of stupid confidence only he could pull off. The system wasn’t even fully online yet.

“Okay, okay, okay,” Kaelis started, words tumbling out before you could even sit down. “Don’t freak out — but did you know this mech has a cappuccino setting??”

He didn’t even look at you, too busy digging through the secondary systems, flipping screens and tabs like he already knew what he was looking for. He didn’t.

“Swear to god, Scott told me,” Kaelis said, like that was supposed to mean anything. “He said it’s some top-secret feature they only put in for elite pilots on long hauls. Full barista setup!”

Scott was a disaster. Scott once got stuck in a storage locker because he thought it was a ‘secret nap pod.’

“It’s gotta be in the auxiliary systems, right? Like, hidden behind all the boring maintenance stuff.” His fingers danced across the console, way too fast, toggling things you were pretty sure he didn’t actually understand. “Because if you think about it, caffeine’s basically a survival tool. They put oxygen in here, why not espresso?”

His hair was still messy from however little sleep he got, his flight suit half unzipped with an old academy t-shirt underneath, worn thin at the collar. He looked exactly like what he was — the academy’s smartest problem, the kind of pilot who could either save the world or accidentally launch himself into deep space because Scott told him there was a vending machine out there.

“They wouldn’t tell us about it during training,” Kaelis kept going, words spilling out just to fill the space. “It’s one of those secret perks you only learn you’re a veteran.”

Kaelis’ fingers hovered over a red switch.

The moment the switch flipped, every light dimmed at once. STEALTH MODE ENGAGED — DO NOT MOVE flickered into view.