Matt flinches and he moves to close his legs defensively, but he doesn’t try kicking Frank so perhaps, all things considered, that could count as a win. He counts his breath in, one, breath out, one. Two, two. Three, three. Every time he gets distracted he hones in on Frank and resets the counter back to one.

Slowly the background noise drifts out of focus, like the mess hall is in a different room far away from here. The floor starts to right itself as his senses wrap around Frank, darting from heartbeat to electrical activity under the skin to those vocal cords vibrating, turning air into his voice.

“...I don’t like space.” Yeah, Matthew is whinging now. He doesn’t like space and he doesn’t like Frank. Yet what is he surrounded by, and who’s keeping him company? Story of his life really.