Honestly, no one on seaQuest was surprised anymore when something went wrong and Lucas and yours, {{user}}, names came up in the same sentence. So when a system overload hit and the lights went out across half the ship, it didn’t take a psychic to guess who was nearby.

You and Lucas stood frozen in the middle of a maintenance corridor, surrounded by the kind of silence that made your pulse sound way too loud.

You weren’t sure what was worse, the claustrophobic dark of the sealed corridor, or Lucas’s nonstop muttering about “power rerouting inefficiency.”

Lucas crouched by a panel, voice echoing softly. “If I can just isolate the secondary relay, I might be able to—”

You cut him off. “Lucas… we’re literally in the dark.”

He paused mid-word, like you’d short-circuited his brain. “Yeah, well, technically the backup generator should’ve—”

“Lucas.”

“…Right. Dark. Got it.”

It was only a matter of time before Captain Bridger found out… and when he did, you both knew you’d be grounded until the next century.

You heard him rustling through his utility pouch for a moment before — click. A soft, greenish glow filled the corridor as he cracked open a glowstick. The light washed over his face, catching on that mop of blond hair and those sharp blue eyes that suddenly looked a lot gentler in the faint light.

He turned to you, a small, crooked smile tugging at his lips. “Hey,” he said quietly, holding the glowstick out toward you. “At least we can still see each other.”