#some roci crew bonding with classic jimbo angst families and the canon sprinkle of alex being a nolden shipper

[rocicrew]

for the prompt list: Alex/Holden #32 <3

prompt: “My patience is wearing thin”

Holden was tired. The kind of bone-deep tiredness that doesn't go away with sleep. Not that he was getting much of it in the first place. Not after the Cant, Eros... The Hybrid... Going back to an empty bed... Even with enough painkillers in his system to knock him out for two shift cycles. 

He dealt with it, more or less. Tried not to put too much weight on his leg and silently thanked Alex for the low third of a G he kept the Roci's gravity. At least, when they're not rescuing high-ranking Earther politicians and rogues Martians.

He attempted to mind his reactions to others. The past few weeks he had been less than an ideal Captain, let alone crewmate. Though, attempt was the keyword. He still hadn't managed it fully. He had yelled at Alex, snapped at Naomi, and Avasarala had kept pestering him about getting once more involved in the war. He already had a long list of regrets to make up for, he didn't need another thing to screw up.

He was so tired. 

So much, in fact, that he didn't notice Alex walking into the galley before he spoke.

"Oh, hey Hoss," Alex greeted while removing his headphones. "Didn't expect to find you here so early."

"It's quiet," Holden offered in return, even though, it was less of an explanation and more of a cop-out answer. 

Alex just nodded, taking in his answer. If Holden had paid more attention, he'd have noticed him working the courage to ask him the following question. But instead, it'd just caught him off-guard. 

"You doing okay? I mean with your leg and everything going on... It's... It's got to be... rough, right?"

"I'm sorry," Holden replied instead, which only confused Alex. He didn't get it and Holden as much as he'd like to, knew he couldn't avoid talking about it head-on. "About earlier," he started and then cut himself off because earlier didn't even begin to describe it. There were so many times earlier could describe, and the bitterness he felt had nothing to do with the cup of coffee in front of it. "I yelled at you, again. I keep taking it out on you, on this crew for weeks, and- I'm sorry." 

What more could he say besides genuinely apologizing?

"It's all right," Alex said and was cheery enough to smile at him. Of all the ways he thought this conversation would go, a dismissal hadn't crossed his mind as a possibility. 

"It's not-"

"Look, Eros did a number on us. You most of all. I understand you are not being exactly yourself. And everything after... I mean, we've got the UN Undersecretary running around the ship suddenly, and Nao-" Alex cut himself off looking apologetic. "What I mean is, how are you really feeling?"

Holden made a comical expression; a mix of a shrug, raised brows, and twisted lips, that could only begin to describe the pool of emotions that swam in the cavity of his chest. "My patience is wearing thin."

Alex nodded, taking it in, and slowly sipped from his bulb. "Yeah, could tell you that much," he said and Holden immediately winced, pointedly avoiding making eye contact with the broken coffee machine.

He wasn't proud of it, or any of his latest behavior but the only thing he could do was accept the consequences. It hurt more than he wanted to acknowledge that after everything Naomi couldn't trust him. It hurt because he did trust her wholly. In the middle of every terrible, shitty thing they went through, he knew he could turn to her. At a time when he couldn't even trust his own body not to fail him, he believed Naomi wouldn't. 

None of it was fair. She was her own person with her own demons and as much as they tried to ignore everything else and distract one another, it was bound to blow into their faces. 

And she'd taken the one thing that kept him up at night. The one thing he hadn't been able to leave back to Eros after escaping.

But hearing her explanation, knowing he reminded her of- Just the thought made him sick. No matter how many times he could say that he wasn't like that, that he could never hurt her like that and mean it, wouldn't erase his failure. His failure to be a better crewman, a better partner, a better person. 

"Sorry Jim, I didn't mean it like that," Alex was quick to try and smooth over the sudden shift in the atmosphere. 

A better son. 

"Avasarala mentioned my mom," Holden blurted out. "One of my mothers, Elise."

He stopped not knowing how to say the rest. About leaving and running, and the guilt that was always present. He knew what she was doing and he fell for it anyway. 

"How many years has it been?" Alex asked instead.

Jim didn't do the math. That would weigh on him more. "I left when I was eighteen." 

Left. Like it was a choice. Like he would've been enough otherwise.

They've talked since then, of course. They managed to have a steady communication before the shitstorm happened.

He still hadn't looked up toward Alex until he heard the other speak.

"Yeah, I know a thing or two about leaving people behind," Alex said and a sharp memory of the picture with Alex's wife and son hit him out of nowhere. Right, Alex had left a son (and so had Naomi-). What right did he have t- "I'm not proud of it, but... you can love your family with everything you have and still... find your place somewhere else."

The lump in his throat disappeared, and he reached out to cover Alex's hand and squeezed.

"Even if that place's captain is sometimes an asshole?"

"As long as you don't break the oven next, we're good," Alex joked.

"Hey, that's-" Holden protested.

"Deserved," Alex argued back.

"A little, yeah..."

They didn't solve anything but he felt lighter anyway.

"So, uh," Alex started again. "Naomi said she'd come to talk to you. Did you two... y'know..."

They were having this kind of talk now... Holden took a sip from his coffee to brace himself and began replying in broad strokes. Naomi's story was hers. But he could talk about them in general.

They stayed in the galley for a long time talking until their hand terminals chimed and reality found its way back to them.