Coran Lyesmith hit his head gently on the edge of the table. “You,” he said with feeling, “are too good at this game.”

“I try my best,” Kamui DyBane agreed, rolling Coran’s king between long fingers, eyes laughing. “Want another game?”

“Sure, but give me back my damn king.”

Kam laughed and complied, tossing his friend the glossy piece.

“Do they play chess a lot where you’re from?”

“No-o.” Kam said the word rather oddly, as though he wasn’t quite sure of the answer.

“You’re damn good,” Coran said with a sigh, setting his pieces out as Kam mirrored the actions.

Coran had not set out to play chess with Kamui DyBane. He hadn’t even set out to invite the other man over to his apartment. It had just happened, as natural as anything, and there was nothing Coran could do to stop it.

They sat next to each other in Dr. Naismith’s introductory anatomy class, in the third row from the back. Kam sat there because he was tall, slightly over six feet, and big, with broad, strong shoulders that always made it look like whatever he was wearing was going to be stretched to the breaking point.

Kam had explained to Coran, after their first lecture, that he hadn’t wanted to be in anyone’s way.

Coran sat near the back because he had lost his way and arrived twenty minutes late for class.

Kam was always very quiet during class, except when the doctor opened the floor for questions, at which point one of Kam’s long arms would invariably shoot up and he’d begin waving it like a misshapen flag in the air.

Coran asked questions because he would sometimes mishear things and need clarification on key points.

Kam asked questions because he understood things, and was constantly seeking to understand more.

Coran had grown up in the city and knew it better than he knew himself.

Kam was foreign. He got lost easily, in the city, and was constantly looking for someone to show him around. He spoke with an accent, although it was little more than a soft roll to his ‘r’s and a lilt to his ‘l’s.

Coran had never, however, paid Kam much attention. He was simply an overly curious foreigner who sat next to him in class.

But one day they both arrived early. The door had been locked and Kam had been sitting on the floor in front of it, his knees in the air, his arms dangling down between his legs. His face, bone white with heavy black brows, a square jaw, and a too-big nose, had gone instantly from drowsy introspection to bright-eyed enthusiasm. His eyes had lit up, a shade of violently happy blue.

Coran had, on occasion, wondered about Kam’s eyes, which never seemed to remain the same colour for more than ten minutes at a time. He had narrowed down possible explanations to very expensive contact lenses or some kind of genetic modification, but Kam was disinclined to comment either way.

Kam had smiled, and motioned for Coran to sit down, and Coran had done so, feeling overwhelmed by the smile and the vibrant eyes, the exuberant greeting.

They had talked, as students tended to, about their classes and professors, homework and exams.

Then, running out of things to talk about concerning their shared pain, Coran had asked Kam where he was from.

“Kyoto!” he answered, grinning.

“What, the one on old Earth?”

“No! This is a different one, somewhere else!” He had laughed.

And then, Kam proceeded to tell Coran about his Kyoto. His voice was full of longing as he spoke of a busy home overflowing with life and love, constantly buzzing with excitement.

He spoke of warm summers spent on beaches, building towers and temples of moist sand and shells, wrestling with brothers and sisters (so many of them!), and watching the sun set over the ocean.

There were autumns, in which Kam’s birthday fell, full of crackling dryness and rainy torrents, and a return to school. The leaves of some trees burst into colourful flame-colours while others remained stubbornly green, speaking of warmer times.

Winter would be an icy, snow-filled wonderland one year, and a damp, soggy afterthought to autumn the next.

Coran had never seen snow.

Springs, the way Kam described them, were always joyful things, full of flowers and trees bursting into blossom, swimming in still-cold lakes, stomping in puddles until you were soaked through, and festivals full of food and celebration of life.

Real seasons, all of them, the kind Coran had only read about.

Coran had thought his eyes were going to pop out of his skull when Kam had begun talking about his siblings in detail.

His oldest brother, he had said, was married and, from what Coran could understand, was some kind of religious leader. The second oldest brother was an artist who seemed to be in need of therapy, but had somehow managed to get married despite it all. Then came the younger ones. A quiet boy who was studying science at another school and hoping to go into veterinary medicine (there were animals everywhere, on Kam’s world). Another brother, in a relationship Kam described as ‘kin-kee’, with a position as a military advisor, despite his youth. A sister who, like the oldest brother, was of some significance in the local religious community, and two more who were still in school, and simultaneously loved and loathed Kam. Then, a final one, the family baby, an invalid, by the sound of it, who was educated at home.

Privately, Coran had marvelled over this list, at the thought of a world where such freedom existed. “Is that why you want to be a doctor? So you can help your brother?”

“Oh, no!” Kam shook his head fiercely. “Of course, that doesn’t mean I don’t want to help him! I would do anything in my power to help Kurome-chan! But, to focus on only one person is not healthy at all! I want to help as many people as I possibly can!” he said, and Coran had known, looking into that beaming face, that he meant every word he said.

“What about you, Cor?” Kam had asked, smiling, always smiling.

He always shortened the names of people he considered friends, Coran found out. Coran never knew how he felt about it. He had been Cor, to his friends, until the age of nine, when he had decided he liked Ran better. Then, after puberty, it was Coran to everyone. When Kamui said his name, it made him feel strangely childish and immature, as though the bigger man was teasing him.

It was also disturbingly intimate.

He never bothered trying to explain any of this to Kam.

“Just curious, I guess. It’s a good job, and the galaxies will always need doctors.” He had shrugged a shoulder at Kam after saying this, feeling embarrassed and strangely petty. But Kam had merely nodded, as though this was the most natural reason in the world, and, without changing tone or expression, proceeded to pull most of Coran’s life story out of him.

Kam found out that Coran was an only child, that he had lived with his mother because his father had left to seek his fortune in other galaxies, that Coran had lived in the city his entire life and never been off-world, that he had always loved history and cheesy holo-vids, had wanted to be a pilot when he grew up, had his first crush on Jeana Turner at the age of nine, gone on his first date with Kaila Runner at the age of thirteen, not been allowed to pierce his ears until he was sixteen, and lost his virginity that same night to his best friend, Ky Blaze (after which point they both felt rather embarrassed about the entire thing and did not speak to each other again). He knew Coran’s favourite food was stuffed peppers, and that he disliked most form of protein, except for nuts and trout. Kam would have known even more things, hideous, humiliating things, if another professor hadn’t come down the hall at that moment and stopped to stare at them.

“What,” he asked, “are you two doing here?”

“Waiting for Dr. Naismith’s lecture on anatomy, sir.”

The professor had stared at Coran, as though the boy had just spontaneously declared that what the world really needed was a monarchy transported along the paternal line, before telling them that there had been some sort of crisis in Dr. Naismith’s family and all her classes were cancelled until further notice. He said all students were supposed to have been notified, and walked away, muttering about kids never paying attention to anything they were told.

Coran had stood up, feeling very foolish, while Kam sat and laughed, wondering how the time of the lecture could have been so completely passed without either of them realizing something was odd.

“Do you want to switch pieces?”

Coran shrugged and turned the board around so he had white and Kam had red.

Coran began without thinking.

The other students in the med program had told Coran that Kam DyBane was weird, and not very bright.

Brilliant in class, of course, they would hurry to say, maybe even one of the best students in their year, but not all that bright otherwise. An idiot savant, they said.

They said he was fun to be around, if you didn’t mind his tendency to frown upon alcohol, but half the time it was like having a little kid tagging along, full of enthusiasm and boundless energy, easily excitable and easily distracted, totally clueless about the real world.

Coran had suggested that things were different where Kam was from.

They said: What kind of backwater dump do you have to be raised in to not realize, at the age of twenty, that Sheri Glass wants to take you home and let you screw her all night long?

It was hard to disagree with that. Coran thought you’d have to be dead to not notice Sheri Glass if she was interested in you.

He suggested: Maybe Kam likes boys.

They had shrugged: Maybe.

“Check,” Kam said amiably.

Coran scowled and moved his king over.

It was the day before a long weekend and after class, Coran had asked Kam what he was doing to celebrate the brief respite from classes.

Kam had admitted, cheerfully, that he had no plans, and the short holiday wasn’t long enough to make a visit to his family worthwhile.

“I capture your queen,” Kam said, swooping it up between two fingers.

Coran killed the regicide-inclined pawn.

“That’s a shame, Kam,” Coran had said, putting his notes together before closing his computer. “I know you miss them.”

“I don’t mind too much!” he had laughed. “I get to see them when it counts!”

“We should do something together, then. Watch a vid or go to a club or something. You can’t just spend holidays alone, Kam, even if they’re short ones.”

“This was my last class today.”

“Mine too.”

“I don’t have anywhere to be now that it’s done.”

“Me neither.”

“I live on my own, so no one’s really expecting me home.”

“Same here.”

“What?! But you told me you’d lived around here your whole life, Cor! Don’t tell me you lied!”

“I didn’t lie, Kam. But I didn’t exactly want to spend the rest of my life living with mym other and her lover.”

Kam had laughed, tossed his bag over his shoulder, agreed with this sentiment, and proceeded to follow Coran home, much to Coran’s surprise and slight dismay.

The little apartment, smelling of soap, Coran’s shampoo, and, more strongly, of a week’s worth of takeout dinners, had delighted Kam. He poked around, sticking his nose into everything, overwhelmingly curious without actually managing to be offensive. “I capture your bishop. Again, Kam.”

“The bishops aren’t important, Cor.”

Coran had opened two cans of something sugary and non-alcoholic, although part of him debated the wisdom of letting Kam have sugar, sprawling on the couch while Kam examined every corner of the room.

Coran had expected Kam to try and seduce him. It would be a lie to say he was opposed to the thought. Kam wasn’t attractive, but he was interesting, and his eyes could be hypnotic. He would have been a pleasurable relief after Coran’s last girlfriend.

But Kam had found, buried under some disks and an old shirt, a dusty chess set that had been the last present Ky Blaze had given him. Ky had played chess like a master, and always beat Coran, but it was still fun.

When Kam had requested a game, face bright and hopeful, Coran had been unable to refuse.

Part of him kept expecting Kam to gently push the chess board and the pieces out of the way after killing Coran’s king, and push him tenderly to the floor, but Kam was completely enthralled by the game, even though Coran was rusty and Kam was better than Ky.

Idiot savant, Coran though.

“I capture your king. Check mate,” said Kamui.