Astronauts' Zero-G Strap-On Orbit

The station was quiet in a way that felt almost sacred. During the long orbital night shift, only the hum of life-support systems and the occasional metallic tick of expanding panels broke the silence. Commander Elena Voss floated near the cupola, her short auburn hair drifting in a weightless halo around her face. At thirty-eight, she had flown three previous missions. She knew every creak of the ISS, every rhythm of its machinery. What she hadn’t anticipated was how badly she would come to crave the soft, steady breathing of the woman currently finishing a systems check at the other end of the Destiny module.

Lieutenant Maya Torres, twenty-nine, brilliant propulsion engineer and the most dangerously attractive person Elena had ever served with, pushed off a handrail and drifted toward her. The motion sent the hem of her loose blue flight shirt fluttering upward, revealing a strip of smooth olive skin at her midriff. Elena’s gaze lingered there a second too long. They had stopped pretending not to notice these things weeks ago.

“Coffee’s hot, Commander,” Maya said, voice low and teasing as she offered one of the squeeze-bulbs. Their fingers brushed. Even through gloves that weren’t there, the contact felt electric. “Thought you might need something to keep those legendary focus skills sharp.”

Elena accepted the bulb, took a slow sip, and let her eyes travel openly over Maya’s body. “My focus has been shit for days, Lieutenant. You know exactly why.”

Maya’s full lips curved. She anchored one magnetic boot to the floor panel with a soft clack, stopping her drift so they faced each other in the dim blue night-cycle lighting. “We’ve been dancing around it since we lost the other three to stasis. The shared showers. The way you look at me when I’m toweling off. The way I look at you when you’re pretending to read telemetry.”