9/8

The flightmates suck and there are no new leads. Trying to cheat the thermostat system because my room is lousy cold.

9/10

Felicia M. Dmitri, Amanda L. Mathers, Arnold R. Thomas-Higgins, Ricardo F. Torres, Charity D. Washington

– non-exhaustive list of Kerberos mission contributors

Got the thermostat figured out.

9/13

Felicia Maria Dmitri – age 47, Garrison employee for 19 years, responsible for deep space thruster monitoring. Worked closely with one Charles Cooper from the engineering department. Records show no unexpected or dangerous thruster activity.

9/15

Amanda L. Mathers – age 39, Garrison employee for 7 years. Bioengineering department. Gave a lecture to our class today about sustainable vegetation used in space travel. Brought a colleague named Dr. Davidson and I'm pretty sure they're fucking. Doubt she would have any useful information.

9/17

Can't do any REAL research today because there's a big project coming up. Annoying flightmates want to get together to work on it so I guess we're doing that instead.

9/20

Still unable to get back to research. Been getting kind of antsy about it, and Lance said I look like shit and should go see the nurse. Lance is one of the idiots on my team.

9/21

Redact last message, Lance is the ONLY idiot on my team. My other teammate (Hunk) is actually pretty competent, so I left him with some of the bigger tasks so I could get back to more important things. I bet Dad and Matt actually enjoyed doing group projects here, and I wish I could, too… but I think they'd understand.

9/22

Arnold R. Thomas-Higgins – age 58, Garrison employee for 30 years.

Jack shit.

9/29

iversonmi

k1ckassgoto$pacerepresenttheHumanrace!

9/30

Fucking god.

Started sifting through Commander Iverson's emails starting on the date of the disappearance. Had to stop after twenty-two minutes.

Nothing useful to report, but he writes, and I quote, "I'm not letting humanity's best people disappear without answers."

Damn straight, Iverson.

10/1

Still feeling like shit after yesterday. Looks like some classmate of mine noticed, and she asked me if I needed a hug.

Maybe if I knew her, yeah, but I don't. Not that I would really MIND a hug right now. My teammates are really huggy with each other, I guess they're probably a nice bunch if you know them. Too bad I don't and I can't be honest with them about pretty much ANYTHING.

10/2

Today some girl asks if I want to sit with her at dinner and then wants to know if I'm feeling better. Turns out it's the same girl from yesterday, and her name is Sheila. I sort of hate it when people remember my name from class or something but I still have no idea who they are. I swear I'm not TRYING to be a piece of shit, it just kind of happens because of who I am. Lord praise my flightmates for putting up with me.

Still no real progress.

10/5

Ricardo F. Torres – age 62. Astronomy department. Deceased.

10/10

Sheila's been following me around and talking to me a lot for some reason. We're in the library now because she won't leave me alone so I'm writing about something stupid until she goes away.

Tacos. Bread pudding. Hermit crabs. Aluminium chlorohydrate. Socks.

I don't get how Sheila gets any studying done if this is how she behaves in a library. It's been like an hour and she hasn't shut up yet.

10/11

Sheila's invited me over to study so I guess that means I'm not going to get any work done tonight either. She's been telling me a lot about her stuffed walrus so I'll just write about HIM so I look busy.

Mister Bigbutt has been in her possession for eleven years and fifteen days, having been a birthday present when she turned five. She's going on and on about how she spent her birthday alone this year. Or like, she's not really going ON about it but she looked at me all weird when she said it and I FEEL like there was supposed to be something important about that. I think it's a guilt trip. I don't even KNOW this girl, though, what the fuck.

Anyway, Mister Bigbutt is powder blue with cream-colored tusks, or at least he WAS and now he's pretty darn grimy. He's kind of a fleecy-flannelly type of material, stuffed with P.E. pellets and polyester fiber. I know this because she handed him to me and I really didn't want to touch him but it feels like it would be rude to refuse. Also he was made in Taiwan.

She asked me if I have any favorite stuffed animals, and if I brought them here with me. So I'm just telling her I don't have one. She says it's okay for boys to like stuffed animals, and I don't have to be embarrassed or lie about it.

This is a really weird conversation.

10/12

Nothing in Commander Iverson's email account looks like he knows what could have happened to the Kerberos craft. Working on a code to pick up any deleted items.

10/14

Found a picture of an ass in Iverson's recently-deleted emails. Not that that helps me, I just think posterity needs to know this.

10/15

Sheila says she wishes someone would ask her to get coffee together sometime. I don't know why she's telling me this. She should just go get some coffee if she wants it. Why is she so weird? No offense to Sheila, but you have to be Pretty Fucking Smart to get accepted into this program. Does she really not understand how buying coffee works? Even Lance is smart enough to do it.

She also told me that I'm cute, which I'm sure she means in a "you're short" kind of way. That's what always made me the cute one in the family. And on my team. Sometimes I worry that if I hit a growth spurt I might lose some of my cuteness power. Which may or may not have gotten me out of a few detentions in the past. It's amazing how much you can get away with when you're the cute one. Like that time I put a dead frog in the utensil drawer and then blamed it on Matt.

And of course he still forgave me even when he had to wash all the utensils by hand. Because I'm so damn cute. And because he's the best brother in the whole fucking universe and I sort of don't deserve him.

But maybe I'll be about halfway there when I get him back.

10/19

Today marks the first day I have been grateful for my team, because they saved me from another awkward conversation with Sheila. Doesn't this girl have any other friends? If I don't have time for my own team I sure as fuck don't have time for HER. And I really wish she would stop prying for details about my life.

Too bad my team does the same thing.

10/25

Dearest of diaries, I have fucked up.

It was between classes. Lance asked me if I'm going to ask Sheila out or what, and I asked him why I would do that. He says because Sheila is pretty and she totally has a crush on me.

And I think what he was saying actually made sense. So I panicked and told him I was gay.

I'm not sure if that surprised him or not.

He then goes on to say that he's totally not gay, but if he WAS gay, he would be gay for the late, great Takashi Shirogane. And then he asks if I'd fuck him, too.

Sorry, Shiro, but I told him yes. It was just easier.

THEN Lance asks if I have a crush on anybody at the Garrison. And I guess being flustered by that question means you're hiding something because when I said no he doesn't fucking drop it.

So I told him I had a crush on Hunk.

And then he got all stupid and excited about it and I made him to promise not to tell anyone. Especially Hunk.

10/26

I'm pretty sure he told Hunk.

Hunk is acting all weird around me and he's being more self-conscious than usual.

I had no idea I was such a fucking heartbreaker.

10/30

When I finally got Lance out of the way I asked Hunk if Lance told him any "sensitive information." Hunk got all blushy and said no, and now I can see why it looks like you're lying when you react that way. So I just point-blank said, Hunk, I don't really have a crush on you.

He said he was glad not to be breaking my heart. And he asked why I would tell that to Lance if it wasn't true.

And fuck me, I said it was because I actually had a crush on LANCE and I was too scared to tell him.

And I made Hunk promise not to say anything about it but I think I know how this is gonna go.

10/31

Yeah, I was right.

Lance comes up to me today and says he's sorry, I'm cute but he's totally not gay, if he'd realized it before he'd have nipped it in the bud so things wouldn't get worse for me.

I told him that was very nice of him and I appreciated it.

Then Lance says if I want to kiss him just this once, he'd be okay with it. Because he feels bad about all this, and I may be an ornery little shit but he'd understand if that was just because I was afraid to talk about something.

Which he isn't technically wrong about.

I really wish I had another option, but it seems this Pidge Gunderson character we've been creating, who is suddenly a gay boy with a crush on Lance, wouldn't have said no to that.

So I said yes.

God, it was weird.

I also think Lance might be a little gayer than he realizes.

He laughed afterward, said I still counted as his first kiss. I think he might have been blushing.

I told him it was mine, too. Not EVERYTHING has to be a lie.

He said for someone who doesn't kiss many people, I wasn't half bad at it.

And that's precisely when Sheila walked in.