I Want To Simply Put It Here.

I want to simply put it here.

Kondrat smugly slides a piece of paper to the other side of a a table in the dining hall. Big part of the science crew stands behind him, whispering about his choice. Its not an every day that something grant like this is happening. His opponent takes the paper and examines it. Another part of a crew is behind her, whispering and hushing each other. Its her time to make a step, she had to choose wisely, so much depended on the outcome of this. Every second she was planning and strategizing, but time was limited and it was running short. She had to do it. Breath in... Breath out...

She writes it on a paper and slides it to her opponent and taps the timer to her right. Whispers behind her grow louder.

" Mm, up left corner. Good choice…”

Kondrat muses aloud. She can’t stop but fidget with her pen. He complimented her move. His face doesn’t show if he’s stressed like her or not, but knowing him Kondrat is just coldly strategizing without anything else plaguing his mind. He quickly draws a circle seemingly not hearing gasps and loud whisper behind him. The timer is tapped by them. The paper is slid right in front of her. She looks at it in horror but there is nothing monstrous on a paper. She looks at it, then at Kondrat, again at the paper, then at Kondrat. 
Their smug face almost instantly vanishes as they realize what mistake they’ve made. He hides his face behind his hands and scratches his horns, muterring something. She looks at him and blindly draws her finishing X. The paper is in front of him again, he takes it and looks at it tiredly. His eye are getting wider each time he looks up from the paper to her.

Why- Why is he so confused?

She did the finishing stroke! He was supposed to look defeated, not confused! Then he puts the paper on the table, sighs and draws his circle. She now can see their tic-tac-toe board and everything is like last time but when it’s in front of her again -

THE X IS LOWER!!!

She hides behind her hands much like her opponent and lets out a sheaky breath. It’s repeating again! It’s the 20th time in a row when both of them get distracted and do a wrong move! Noooooo…

She fills up the last free space and slides the paper in a middle of table. Both, she and her opponent sigh defeated, covering their eyes in embarrassment. Someone comes up and adds the paper to the stack of draw results.

“ How you do that? It’s been going for hours!“

People behind them moan tired, she can even hear a certain wheelchair user taking his bets. She probably should later ask the spaceship computer to delete a part of their tic-tac-toe tournament, because no-one would want to watch them struggle with that child's game for so long. She looks up and sees tired Kondrat stretching out his arm to her.

“Draw?” He asks quietly.

She takes his arm and shakes it slightly.

“Draw.” People behind them cheer.

I wrote it after being inspired by some post on tumblr, sadly I don't remember what that post was about. And I wrote that a month ago or smt.

Funny thing I know absolutely nothing about Kondrats' opponent, because at first Dorzo was supposed to fight in the tic-tac-toe tournament, but I decided that he would lose much earlier. So I made her (noname for now I think), but she probably works as an engineer on the spaceship.

Kondrat is the security leader on the spaceship. He is kinda of a hothead, but that somehow doesn't prevent him from doing his job excellently. He had to swallow his pride for his last line L.

About the tic-tac-toe tournament. Its just a silly little event so scientists and workers wouldn't go insane from doing nothing but work with the same people for like half a year. Its like a mental safety practice (idk how to name it).