LOVE ME IN ENGLISH

When they had thought to stock the spaceship with the best of the best no one had stopped to think that might include a lot of intelligent people who couldn’t understand each other. After all, the best weren’t all just from one country, much less one continent. It got even worse when some of these examples were in the same department together. Translators only did so much and pretty soon a good number of geniuses were finding themselves learning new languages.

Elsa Shergotty disliked English, it was a language of contradictions and exceptions with a penchant for sneaking off with the vocabulary of other tongues. Never mind her inability to work her mouth around the way her accent mangled her pronunciation. Still, she had spent weeks learning it. Painstakingly fighting with the grammar and syntax as much as she wrangled the words.

When she had originally been brought onto the project she had been more interested in the opportunity of going into space then thinking about who she would be working with. The cream of the crop she came to learn, had a wide variety of personalities and quirks. Some that grated on her and others she had quickly refused to work with. As a prickly person she wasn’t exactly a favorable match to work with either. Shergotty had been worried for the first month, trying her darndest to be sociable enough to at least manage a partnership with anyone in the Engineering department.

However, just when she had thought she was doomed to wash out, she found that somebody had volunteered as the necessary second mechanical engineer on the crew. HR had jumped on it and she found herself assigned to partner with Anna Hanson, an American that surprised her with the sheer amount of knowledge she had working with the FTL engine.

However, Hanson only spoke one language fluently and that was English. While she might know curse words in dozens of other languages, and could even manage to name most of the engine parts in French or Dutch, the guttural Russian eluded her to the point that Shergotty had instantly given up on her being the one to bridge the gap. Shergotty simply put in a request for English lessons and was assigned a class with almost a hundred other people.

That’s exactly when she learned she hated English. Only because Anna Hanson spoke the damn language was it worth the effort. Hanson put up with a lot of her prickly nature, weathering it like a rock and despite her unorthodox workstyle, Shergotty was finding that she was learning a lot from the woman. Besides, she had taken a leap of faith on Shergotty and, as it turned out to Shergotty’s surprise, was working just as hard as she was on trying to breach the language barrier. Even if it hurt her ears to hear her mother tongue butchered that way.

Plus, it had been nice to understand what Hanson said while she worked. And Hanson said a lot. The officer had the weirdest habit of rambling on and on in her native tongue, no matter that Shergotty hadn’t understood a lick of it until now. Though, considering the subject of the rambling it was probably for the best that Shergotty only now did.

Shergotty was now well aware of Hanson’s feelings for her at this point.

She just needed to learn how to say ‘Ты мне тоже нравишься’ in English.

Hanson was working on the FTL engine mock-up, rambling again, when Shergotty interrupted.

“I give up.” Shergotty muttered, her boots echoing on the metallic flooring.

Hanson looked away from the machine and turned into a kiss. All words fled her brain instantly, and suddenly she thinks she understands what computers go through when you reboot them.

“There. I have been trying to get a translation for ‘Я тебя люблю’ into English for weeks now, but this should do.”

“I love you.”

Shergotty tilted her head. Hanson coughed awkwardly.

“It translates into ‘I love you’.”

Shergotty paused and then narrowed her eyes in confusion.

“The bases’s language classes have nothing like that in the vocabulary.”

“I looked it up and even asked Yasha for confirmation. I wanted to be able to say it to you in your own language but never, ah… wait. Why did you kiss me if…?”

Shergotty blushed a little.

“I have been taking English.” At Hanson’s confusion she smiled mischievously. “I understand pretty much everything you say while you tinker now.”

In comparison to Shergotty’s blush, Hanson’s face was pretty much on fire.

“Oh. Oh, really? Oh. Geez… that could have been awkward I guess. Um. Assuming the kiss meant…?”

“Yes, Hanson.”

“Oh. Good! Um… Я тебя люблю.” Hanson said shyly.

“I love you too.”