Kindness
The early morning air was more gold and silver than gray, and the smell of the sea and wildflowers clung to the fog that would burn off, and wafted up onto the porch to mingle with the scent of freshly brewed coffee.
The two men on the porch were certainly old enough to be the types who would spend all day sitting on that porch, perhaps grousing at any kids who dared step on a lawn and certainly grousing about politics; the first had near white hair, and a good amount of unshaven scruff, and the second had silver-gray hair and likewise was sporting a decent start on a beard. They were both on the lean side, part from age and part from work, brown like farmers or lifelong sailors, baked by years of labor in the sun and likely a dermatologist's worst nightmare.
Despite the shared age, however, they had very little else in common in terms of genetics. One had blue eyes; the other, brown. One was taller; the other, short. They didn't share even a similar skeletal structure.
Thankfully, no one bothered to tell them that it was impossible for them to be siblings, and long ago, a half a century or so, they decided that they would be brothers and had yet to find that fraternal tie disagreeable.
It had not been a contract drawn up or anything of that sort, nor some dramatic speech issued forth at some appointed hour. Just a mostly silent, mutual decision, which was then passed through the fire a number of times until it was tempered to something so strong as to be unbreakable by most outside influences. If there were Fates, then here they had been merciful; both lived to this age, and were still brothers.
After about a half a century, of course they knew each other well enough that one would imagine that their conversations would get boring. What do you say to someone, when you already know what the answer will be? Regardless, however, they still had yet to get bored with each others' company, and therefore could often be found grousing, like old men, about politics. The difference between them and the stereotype, though, was that they did it with barely hidden grins and a firmly tongue-in-cheek manner. Drove everyone nuts. Why didn't they act their damned ages?
Of course, in many a way, they did -- both were community oriented and worried over things such as paving roads and protecting the bridge from well-meaning DOT employees wanting to replace it, and both were quite happy in the role of grandfather and great-uncle respectively, and they certainly did complain sometimes that they couldn't move quite like they could when they were young and able to shimmy up a mast. But while age had slowed them a little, it had not slowed them enough for them to consider not going to sea or stirring up trouble on Earth.
They were delightfully rebellious old men, these two, flippantly amused and defiant at the universe that had changed drastically from the one they knew in their youth -- they scoffed at talk of politics, except that good-natured and tongue-in-cheek grousing. They certainly and whole-heartedly loved to make something of a mockery of the so-called enlightened modern day values creeping into society.
Needless to say, one was a fairly famous biomedical engineer, responsible for quite a bit of innovation and the second was a very famous engineer, and they had been invited quite often to speak at different diplomatic functions until said politicians realized that they were not good old men who would talk about how wonderful the universe had become and how hard it had been in their day, and how easy it was now.
They still did speak, but to smaller crowds now -- when they weren't at sea with their rather large extended and biological family, they were teaching youngsters in the Gamage shipyard how to build boats. Teaching at least a handful of teenagers every class that working by hand to build something, from the ground up, was important. That determination and grit weren't things to be ashamed of, no matter how undiplomatic or old-fashioned it was to pick a course and stay it regardless of what the greater whole of society told you.
Now, they were merely two old men on a porch, not stirring up trouble, going through the morning's news and drinking their morning coffee as old men do. In a few hours, they would take to the sea, pick a horizon and sail with the rest of the family, both those from Scotland and those from Midcoast Maine.
"And the morning headlines are... Portland to expand transporter facilities. Ugh. Three new treaties with the Klingon Empire are falling apart, as the Federation refuses to move colonists along the Neutral Zone, though the Klingon Empire can prove that they have a historical claim to the area. Rising music star Rubbie Dubbie -- what the Hell kind of name is that?! -- soars to the top of the charts. Holograph technology show potential full-room application in the form of an entertainment medium." The first man set aside the portable reader and picked up his coffee to take a sip, nose scrunched up slightly at the news.
The other man had his eyes closed, his cup held two handed up close to his face, as he listened to the report and replied, "More tourists, more pissin' about ancient borders, stupid bloody name, never be as good as the real thing."
"Succinct." The first man grinned, then went back to reading again, "And in lifestyles, apparently heels have made a return."
"Aye, that's an important thing to print." There could be no missing such sarcasm. "Next season, they'll be wearin' sandles and callin' people herberts or some othersuch nonsense and think they're doin' somethin' new."
"In sports--"
"Don't bother."
"Moving on to Fleet news... huh." A sad silence fell over the first brother, causing the second to look over instinctively. "They're calling off the search for the Jenolan, apparently."
A more lasting quiet fell there, even as the fog had burned away and now revealed a blue, bright world.
Neither knew particularly why that had felt so significant, the loss of some small personnel transport, but they had followed the news since it had come out, on one of the back pages, that the vessel had gone missing. After the second man lost a former captain only seven months earlier -- the memorial was one of the only times he spoke in public without it being to backhandedly ridicule the modern government -- both had found a strange feeling around them, as though they had somehow dodged something terrible, something ancient and immeasurable and that might yet catch up to them.
It was not the first time such a feeling had settled over them; for near a year and a half, the same sense had fallen on them as well, though that was a couple decades ago or so, and at that point they were still living very different lives. The sense that, perhaps, the universe had afforded them some great mercy or kindness that it had not been inclined to give; that the Fates had stayed their shears.
It was when the second brother returned to the island, this time for good, that it went away and had not come back. Not even when he again went out, not for duty but out of friendship, to stir up trouble more than once, including stealing a starship, destroying it, then having a hand in saving the planet they were now on. He had gone as a retired civilian and had only given brief warning before running back into the stars, but the first brother had known certainly that the second would return.
But the loss of the captain had brought back that pall. And now, with the sad news of a ship's loss, that sense of unease faded away into the proper sorrow of families mourning somewhere, but mercifully not here.
It was near an hour before they spoke again; this time the second breaking the quiet.
He stood, looking across the Damariscotta thoughtfully; then, finally realizing something perhaps not for the first time, he picked up his coffee mug and tapped his brother on the arm on the way inside.
"C'mon, Cor. Let's go sailin'."