The soft, warm wood taking shape under his fingers and the precise strokes of the knife felt good; gave him the first moment of peace he'd had in such a long time. It brought back memories, the dank, salty smell of the air on the Glasgow wharf, the sounds of men shouting and laughing, the clanks and thuds of ships and freight, and the metallic roar of the cranes and trucks. His own head bent over another chunk of wood, carving silently in a corner, staying out of the way as instructed, yet unable to sneak away – yet – to dive into the books he loved and his father didn't comprehend.

No one had ever comprehended Nicholas Rush. He'd been a fish out of water among the big, rough, hearty men of the Glasgow docks. His Da – now – he had been well-liked: hard-working, barely literate, loved his pub and ale, footy on the TV, a good game of shinty, and arguing Scottish nationalism and Labour politics. A big, brawny man with an accent so thick you could cut it with the knife flashing in his son's hand, he had always known his place in life. Nicholas had never been that lucky.

Nicholas wanted more. He wanted something different. He loved books and the straightforward calculations of mathematics and staring at the sky at night wondering what was out there. He wanted to learn everything and he had an aptitude for it. He never forgot anything he read or heard. Sometimes at night he'd curl up under his blanket and silently recite books to himself, the pages gleaming against the back of closed eyelids, photographs caught in his mind's eye.

And he got his wish; he did get out of Glasgow. Beware what you ask for, the older Nicholas thought wryly to himself. Off to Oxford he had gone, thinking that there he'd have what he had spent his childhood dreaming about. All the books he wanted. Amazing things to learn. People who understood his drive to understand how the universe worked and could talk to him intelligently about it. And those he'd found.

He'd also found that he was still a fish out of water. He still didn't fit in. He was the poor scholarship kid whose voice betrayed his origins. Every word out of his mouth condemned him. His clothes, his manners, everything set him apart. They hazed him unmercifully. The only advantage he had was that he was smarter than them. Even here, he was so much smarter. So the same hard-learned skills and hardened attitude that had protected him from street gangs were reinforced against upper-class English cliques. Bullies were bullies, regardless of how they spoke and how much money they had. He learned to recognize the type with instinctive certainty and to take preemptive action.

That's why he'd known Colonel Everett Young for what he was the moment he met the man. The false bonhomie didn't fool Nicholas. The man was not just incompetent and a moron, he was yet another bully who used violence to cope with anything he didn't understand. Since Young didn't understand him, sooner or later, it would come down to violence. That had been the pattern Nicholas had seen his entire life. So he did what he knew he'd have to do, sooner or later, and took action.

He wasn't used to failing, but there were just so many variables out here on the far side of the universe. It shouldn't have come as a surprise that he'd missed a couple pieces of the calculation. It certainly wasn't a surprise that Young chose to assault him. The soldier seemed to think that beating Nicholas up would be a solution; that Nicholas would just accept it as a defeat. But Nicholas had been beaten up by physically stronger bullies most of his life; he'd been hurt far, far worse. So he meant it down to the bottom of his soul when he told Young that this would never be over. Nicholas would never bow to someone who used force to get his own way. He'd never accept defeat.

It had been a close call, though, when he realized that he was stranded on that planet without food or water. The rage, the simple pure fury, had been the hardest part. Survival – doing what he could to try to stay alive came naturally. He'd had to scrounge and steal and even beg for food as a child when his father drank or bet away his wages. The loneliness, the sense of abandonment, those too were familiar. A fact of his life that he'd grown so accustomed to that he didn't think twice. No, it was the sheer intensity of his anger that surprised him. The rabid taste of his hatred for Young was bitter and strong in his mouth.

In the end, though, it was that anger which kept him going. It gave him a new level of strength. He found depths in himself that he hadn't known were there. He found the ability to fight and fight and fight, no matter how desperate the situation, even when his rage at Young shifted onto the blue aliens as they tormented and tortured his mind and body. Even as he screamed in pain and terror, he found the determination, the strength, the ability within himself to deny them what they wanted to tear from him. He built block after block after block in his mind. He lived for the sense of their frustration that came through with their probes into his mind. He was stronger than they were. He was stronger than even he had thought.

The sudden release had shocked him. Discovering that Colonel Young had somehow used the communication stones to get on board was stunning. His emotions towards the man had faded somewhat in the face of a truly alien threat, but he still felt the edge – more a bitterness now than the earlier rage. It did feed, though, into killing the alien that had briefly held Young's consciousness. In a sense, in that moment, he was destroying them both – the alien and Young.

Freeing Chloe, rescuing her with him, that was instinctive. She was a human being and he knew what the aliens were doing to her. He couldn't leave anyone, especially a naïve young girl, in their hands. So he saved her; he saved himself. For the moment, at least, though he knew it wasn't over. She knew it wasn't over as well.

Sitting alone in the mess hall while everyone else slept, knowing she'd join him sooner or later, Nicholas pondered the changes in himself and in her. She'd matured as she'd been forced to; he had done so as well. You discovered what was truly inside of you when you were faced with raw survival, threatened by that which was utterly alien, beyond comprehension. You found your own strength or you went mad or you died. Those were the choices. Chloe and Nicholas had found their strength, each in their own way.

There was still fear, though. Terror haunting their dreams and the painful knowledge that the aliens would return. They had to be ready. They planned carefully. They took advantage of Camile Wray's powerplay. Nicholas had long since given up on caring who was in command as long as Young didn't try to hurt him again. That was a secondary concern, though it fed into the decisions he made. Young was still dangerous.

Again, there were too many variables. People were hard to predict, especially in a crisis situation. Only Chloe had remained rock steady. He didn't have the time to tell her how much he appreciated her calm thinking, her loyalty; too much happened too fast. Events spiraled and he found himself falling towards the realization of another nightmare.

He woke up on the makeshift operating table, too horrified to scream, and then tumbled back into blessed unconsciousness...

Apparently, while he'd been sedated in the infirmary, something or someone had hit Young over the head hard enough to penetrate his thick skull with the idea that ruling through force and the threat of violence might not be successful. That even this random group of scientists and civilians had just enough gumption to stand up and fight back.

Young's floundering attempts to try to be reasonable and 'make an effort' were amusing. Nicholas was too ill in the aftermath of yet another serious trauma to his body to really enjoy the spectacle, but it was viscerally satisfying. Still, there was far too much work to do. Eli hadn't even managed to figure out everything Nicholas had been working on before the Colonel marooned him, much less make progress on any of it. So he put himself back to work, taking comfort in the familiarity of it, in the sheer pleasure of solving those puzzles, the mental challenge of struggling to understand and conquer Destiny's systems.

His life's work was spread out before him and there were far fewer people to distract him with so many camping out on the newly located planet.

It was a curious thing, though, that someone out there had created a star and planet. How he wished there would be time to study more, learn more, and perhaps even find out who they were. He hated that he didn't have enough control yet of Destiny to be able to make the ship stay.

Then he discovered many of them didn't want return to the Destiny. Chloe wanted to stay on the planet. He was surprised by how much that hit him. He'd hardly had a chance to say "thank you" to her before she'd left. Honestly, he hadn't known how to say it. He'd never done well with people; often he thought he'd prefer it if people just left him completely alone to work instead of always wanting him to interact with them. They made him very uncomfortable; they expected him to somehow know the right things to say, the right way to act, without telling him what those were. He always got it wrong, so he'd long ago given up trying. He didn't know the rules, so it was a game he refused to play.

But Chloe…

He simply didn't want to lose her. Somehow she'd touched him the way only one other person ever had. Those thoughts were like worrying a sore tooth, like the wound slowly healing in his chest. It hurt more than he could have imagined. He couldn't lose her.

Young never listened and Nicholas couldn't tell the man that all he really cared about was bringing Chloe back. The others, well, OK, Volker admittedly had his moments, though the man really was rather dim, but all of the others could stay and play pioneer for the rest of their short lives and he honestly couldn't have cared less. He just wanted Chloe back.

There was no way to articulate that emotion, especially not to Young. Nicholas would never trust the Colonel. He'd meant what he'd said – that it would never be over between them. For now, he'd play along with Young's amusingly foolish attempts at reconciliation, but Nicholas never forgot. He couldn't, even if he'd wanted to. His mind never, ever forgot anything.

She did come back. He hadn't spoken to her. He didn't feel the need. She was onboard, she wouldn't be left behind. Nothing else mattered. He could continue to try to keep her safe; she didn't even have to know he was. It was easier that way.

He had nearly finished another chess piece, his hands working automatically while his mind wandered, before he was interrupted again by Young. Bloody hell, that man was an absolute moron. Still, Young said he liked chess… OK. Nicholas looked down as Young drifted away and almost smiled to himself.

Now that could be amusing.