Darkside
Vol 2

based on the characters created by

Aaron K. Carter

Darkside Vol 2

Copyright © 2019 by Aaron K. Carter. All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the author except as provided by USA copyright law.

This novel is a work of fiction. Names, descriptions, entities, and incidents included in the story are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, events, and entities is entirely coincidental.

Chapter 1

“T

hey’re going to catch us you know,” I say, walking slowly around the table in our commons room of the barracks. Tyrell is at the water fountain, innocently refilling his hydration system. I take off my oxygen mask and tank, won’t need that for a while. I have no intention of spending the night outside. I was made for finer things. I may not have experienced them yet, but I know I was.

“What?” he asks, backing away.

“Tsegi, Tim, Peter, all of them,” I say, leaning against a sofa. He’s going nowhere.

“I didn’t have anything to do with Peter,” he says, defensively.

“You were there,” I say, “You saw him with the body, next day he’s setting himself on fire. Wonder why that was? Couldn’t have had anything to do with anything you did?”

“No, I didn’t say two words to him. I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says.

“What’re you doing in here?” I ask.

“I have late duties,” he says bluffs. Baldy.

“You don’t. who was next, Leavitt? A tempting choice I must admit, in fact, the only likely one, considering he’s got to come back here for his kit,” I say, nodding at the barracks, “He’d be a trick to garret, wouldn’t he?”

“You’re mental.”

“So’re you. I would have thought we established that when we skinned Tim.”

“Yes,” he says, leaning against a sofa.

“Why Tsegi?” I ask.

“No reason, just wanted to get away with it,” he says.

“You fancied her and she kissed that leviathan Leavitt,” I say since he’s apparently not going to.

“How did you know?” he asks.

“I saw you in the woods, I see everything,” I guessed really well, I guess well all the time.

“So I just did it. they don’t know it was me,” he says.

“They found DNA on her—”

“That’s impossible---”

“I was up there with Kip, it’s what they were saying. They were going to get you from late duties,” I explain. I was supposed to be up there with Kip. I’ve no idea if he left DNA he probably did the stupid bugger.

“I can’t have---I used gloves she never----no, I can’t have,” he says, shaking his head, “You’re lying.”

“I’m not but, you don’t have to believe me,” I say, “Because, they do.”

“What?” he asks, his voice shaking, “What do you mean they do? You told them---you can’t have. they’d get you for Tim.”

“They won’t ever catch me,” that’s true.

“Did you tell them?” he asks.

“I told them everything, I told them about Tim, I told them about what we did to Peter, I told them about Tsegi, hell,I told them I was involved, might as well, they’ll never get me,” I say.

“No---we didn’t do anything to Peter you did-----I didn’t I swear I didn’t---”

“Yes since that redeems you so much considering you already chopped somebody up---”

“It still---it’s different it’s different it’s---oh god---wait, you’re lying, if you’d told them, then you wouldn’t be here they’d’ve locked you up by now, and they’d be coming to get me,” he blusters, finally dropping his hydration system and coming to circle me, “You’re lying. You never told them.”

“In a note, man, in a note, I sent a message to all of them, Wilde, Thorne, Ebbel, Kip, for grins Dr. Truth Juice, they all know now,” I say, taking a step back innocently, “As soon as they check their messages, which they will soon. I wouldn’t tell them in person, I told you. I’ll never be caught.”

“How? Then? What’s your escape plan considering we’ve had it---considering you decided we’d had it,” he growls, running a hand over his short hair.

“The undiscovered country,” I say.

“What?” somebody who probably can’t read asks, frowning.

“We journey on, our time in this world is done, we burned too hot, too bright, too impossibly clear for it, it’s over, truth justice morality were all concepts to us, we saw past them, we never had them, we were above everything, above the law. So we lived, so must we die, beyond it all, journey on and see if the next world is fit for the likes of us,” I say, eagerly. God I’m good.

“No, I don’t want to die---”

“Then why did you enter the game of death?” I ask, frowning, “If you didn’t want to die, why kill? It’s the rules of the game, the rules we must abide by. You send somebody over you must be willing to cross yourself someday. Why not cross like this, two immortal souls forever joined?”

“No---no, not now---I’ll run, I’ve got a head start, I can go to the mountains—”

“We are in a facility, surrounded by barb-wire, electric fencing, the lot, even if you could get out, if they caught you---when they caught you, you do understand that that fate would be worse?” I ask.

“How so? I mean, I’d just die---”

“Oh, no, not the likes of us, they keep us alive, to study, because we’re ill. Murderers so young? The great and powerful have determined that is psychosis, so they keep you alive like a lab rat, they study you, feed you twice a day, doomed to sit in a windowless room, padded of course, your arms strapped behind your back, they inject food into your stomach through a tube---”

“What how do you know all this?”

“It’s what they did to my father, when he killed my mother,” I say. I’ve no idea if it’s at all true, but it sounds plausible. It’s what I’d do to torture somebody. And the point is that he believes it.

“Really?” he asks, he’s weakening. Good.

“Yes,” I say, nodding.

“No, I’d rather run, have my chance---”

“Why die running? A coward? Join Tsegi,” I say, “Come with me, journey on, try our luck in the next world. We’ve had our fill of this one.”

“How? How would we even do it?” he asks, sitting down on the edge of a sofa. 

“Bleach,” I say, taking a packet of the stuff out of my pocket. I have two, one each. “I took them from the cleaning supplies when we were doing dorm maintenance this morning.” They packaged the stuff in little packets, so that this sort of thing wouldn’t happen. They hadn’t thought of us just smuggling away the packets.

“Does it hurt?” he asks, “Do you think?”

“No, not for long.”

It burned with unceasing rage for the better part of an hour.

After I got him to drink it, with plenty of very haunting “Join me” s and all that, I instantly regretted not cutting my own dose. I was confident it wouldn’t kill either of us, but I had thought I would be able to make to the door before he was able to stop me. I had swallowed slightly less, and had been prepared to bolt, but I didn’t think he would follow quite that quickly. As it was, he got a hold of my leg just as I got to the door, flinging it open and calling something to the effect of ‘help murderer’, with him clinging to my leg and trying to bite me through my SBUs, which are bite proof, in case you were wondering.

I did send letters by the way, they just incriminated Tyrell and not me, instead stating his intent to murder me and himself with bleach. And they were from him, his tablet that is, not mine.

And the only reason it burned for the better part of an hour, and I do not have exact times, is because I passed out after 43 minutes of the searing pain, at which point I was in IDMT getting sedated.

Mission accomplished.

“There are a lot of cops,” Logan observed, craning his neck to see the emergency personnel rushing into our barracks. All the MTIs but Harris had abandoned us to go and handle the commotion, we had lined up and received our tents, and were supposed to be setting them up. We are not. “What do you think happened?”

“Titus,” I say, wondering if he actually got himself hurt again. Probably. I wondered if Tyrell had survived. I knew it was Tyrell now, he had late duties tonight cleaning the barracks. And that was where Titus had gone, and that is where all hell is breaking loose. I almost smile. At least he had done it for Tsegi. That makes me happy. Somebody had done something for her in a world where we are Forgotten.

“Do you guys know what’s going on?” Liesel asks, coming over to us.

“No,” Logan and I say.

“Is Titus missing?” she asks.

Logan and I nod.

“What do you think he’s done?” she asks, “It’s over Tsegi, isn’t it?”

“And Peter as well, I think, yes,” I say, nodding, “I don’t know what though he wouldn’t tell me.”

“Is there any chance Card isn’t involved?” Leavitt asks, walking up to join us.

“No,” all three of us say.

“Damn, just when I wanted to talk to him,” he says, craning his neck to see, which works better for him than the rest of us.

“Why would you want to do a thing like that?” Liesel asks.

“He’s something of a human internet search,” Leavitt shrugs.

“So to be clear, do all of us really actually hate Titus, but can’t bring ourselves not to like him he’s so pathetic because he has no clue he’s actually an alien?” I ask.

“Yes,” all three of them say, nodding.

“Okay, just wanted to check,” I say, with a sigh.

“How many this time?” Thorn asks, lightly.

“Don’t answer him,” Ebbel says, walking past him.

“Card and another one, the Corescant flight leader, Tyrell Nolan, they’re alive though,” I answer, because for some reason I’m still nice. “They were the only ones.”

“I’m glad Leavitt’s all right, I’m beginning to get attached to him,” Harris says. He and I were locking down the barracks for when IA would descend.

“Oh I was as well, he’s a nice non-demonic sort of cadet,” Thorn says, “Ebbel can we keep Leavitt?”

“What are you even talking about?” Ebbel asks.

“Why do you still ask that question?” I ask as Thorn says:

“When the purge finally happens I’d rather he stay with us, we can feed the others to the black pit of demons that dissolve from the sea.”

“Oh my God,” Ebbel says, rolling his eyes and walking away.

“Don’t look at me like that, I do make some of it up for his benefit,” Thorn says, taking a drink from his hip flask and turning to Harris and me, “What happened this time?”

“Notice he only said some,” Ebbel calls over his shoulder. 

“They both drank bleach,” I say, “From the packets we used to let them clean with.”

“Used to?” Harris asks. He’s not all that bright.

“Well, after this they certainly aren’t going to ever let Cadets have access to those again,” I say.

“No, I suppose not, any idea what happened or is it a random mystery like the others?” Thorn asks.

“No, this time we do have an explanation, apparently Nolan messaged all of us as well as half the top brass that he was responsible for the last two murders,” I say, “Card somehow found out and was trying stop him from drinking the bleach, so he pinned Card down, poured some down his throat, then Nolan drank the rest himself. Card was just able to get help.”

“That’s almost plausible, Card’s so very little,” Thorn says.

“He’s tiny, and Nolan is at the top end of his weight range,” I say.

“Card told them all this?” Harris asks, still confused.

“The last bit, yeah, he managed to get that out even as his throat was burning, not hard to tell, we have Nolan’s confession, so does everyone,” I say, shaking my head.

“Well, that’s good I guess,” Harris says.

“Yes, mystery solved, it seems we can rest easy again,” I say.

Thorn starts laughing hysterically.

“What do you think happened?” Liesel asks, “Do you think that Tyrell was involved?”

“I don’t know,” I say, shaking my head, “But I don’t think Titus would be wrong. I think he’s crazy, but I don’t think he’s wrong.”

“You’re right,” she says, nodding, “I don’t know. it’s all just so weird. It’s like we’re not even living anymore, like this isn’t what life is like.”

“I don’t think we know what life is like,” I say.

“So, you guys feel like that too?” Leavitt asks, speaking up, “I thought it was just me, not used to the military. Or real life, really. My mum---I just live with her and my sister and we’ve not got a lot money or family or anything like most people have.”

“No, this isn’t life,” Logan says, “I’ve had life. This is weird.”

“What’s it like?” I ask.

“What?”

“Life,” Liesel says.

“It’s lying in bed late on Sunday mornings and chocolates after your tea, and going for long walks in the park with no real place to go, and watching the sun set over the misty hills as children play chase in the wet grass, it’s the sun on your skin the early morning as you wake to a fresh new day without any dread or terror or loneliness, knowing before you even wake up that something good is going to happen each and every day,” Logan says, quietly.

“I’d like that,” I say.

“Me too,” Leavitt says. I wonder what his secrets are, why he’s so distant quiet and most of all why he’s here. what brought somebody strong and innocent and steady like him here. Logan I know it’s ‘cause he’s clever. Leavitt is just honesty. I don’t see why they wanted him.

The moment I saw the man with no lips I knew that I had a long night ahead of me.

Now, when I planned to drink bleach and spend a very unpleasant night in the IDMT, I did not plan on being given barbiturates. In theory, all they should’ve done was give me some water or milk to drink (I requested milk. I was given water), pump my stomach if I was still unwell (I was), and then watch me all night, give me fluids maybe ----here’s a wild idea---a good meal and let me have a tablet to read so I can rest and rebuild my tissue and not go into shock after the ostensibly traumatic night I’ve had.

But after they pump my stomach and leave me in the room with an IV bag, they tie me to the bed.

Now that’s pretty unnecessary since they have no way of knowing I drank the stuff of my own accord and was well aware it wasn’t enough to kill me, so I don’t understand what the orderlies reasoning is until I see the lipless man. He’s nippleless as well but I can’t see that. Obviously. The fact that he doesn’t have the tips of his finger is hidden by a pair of hospital gloves.

My throat is burning still or I would have sworn in anger. I do not, not need to be drugged. What if the psychopath starts questioning me and he finds out the truth? No, no, no this cannot be happening I thought he was out of the way why are they still letting this man practice medicine?

“Just the juice, m’boy,” he mumbles, he can’t speak as clearly now. I struggle as he replaces my IV bag with a new one. The liquid in it is foggy. “Relax, just a little juice for you. get you well on your way.”

“I’ll make a deal with you,” I say, as I feel the cold bubble under my skin. there’s enough in that bag to kill a man twice my size, if my memory of basic medicine and dosages serves me which it ought to the drug hasn’t hit me quite yet.

“Just relax, enjoy the juice now---and tell us everything,” he says, sitting down on the bed and staring at me intently. “How’d you get here, m’boy?”

“NO----” I close my eyes and when I open them back up I’m not lying here. I’m not I this bed, I’m not in this room. I’m not in my body. I’m floating through my mind. this is better than sleep, except nothing is hidden, whatever I see or feel might say. I might be saying this I don’t know. it’s very cold.

“Stop it, I don’t want to go back here,” I say, I’m standing in a hospital waiting room. my mum is in the office with one of my brothers, getting his arm sewed up. He was stupid enough to go and get drunk and pass out on the floor of our room. so I gnawed on his arm while he slept and now they had no way of proving I’d done it. I’d managed to work a lot of skin off before he woke up screaming and I’d had to retreat to my bed, innocently spitting out blood into my hand. The beauty of it was that they couldn’t figure out what had happened Titus couldn’t have done it oh not not little sweet Titus who got woken up by his horrible big brother.

“What is with him?” my other brother, whose name I deleted from my memory because it is irrelevant to my life, said, watching as I sat in my sister’s lap, reading the tablet that they had in the waiting room for kids to play with. I’d gotten out of the program and found a book on the internet and was happily reading.

“He’s tired,” my sister said, stroking my hair, “He’s only little, and you woke up him up coming in like that.”

“Trevor’s arm wasn’t like that when we got in, I swear, I know mum doesn’t believe me. I’ll bet he was chewing on it, he’s not right,” my brother who wasn’t Trevor said, pointing at me.

“Don’t be stupid, he was asleep,” she said.

“He wasn’t I’ll warrant you, I’ll bet he crawled out of bed and chewed on him, he’s like some sort of wild animal, you know he is. He always has been. I’ve looked it up, he’s got all the traits of sociopathic disorder,” he said. I didn’t glare at him, he wasn’t worth it and I wanted them to think I wasn’t paying attention.

“He’s four years old, Jacob, he’s not demented he’s not strange there’s nothing wrong with him, he’s just a little boy,” she sighed, petting my hair again. it was long then, almost long enough for her to braid or tie back, which she did sometimes. I liked it, soft around my little face. but when I got to school the other children pulled on it. and It hurt, so I hacked it off with scissors. After that, I had it as long as I could without somebody able to get grip on it. now in the military it is all shaved off.

“He is, though, you’ve got to look in his eyes, there’s nothing there. I don’t know if it’s because mom and dad were so old or what---but he’s not okay,” the one who must’ve been Jacob said, “It’s not safe, it’s like he’s not a person.”

“I love him, he’s our brother,” she said, holding me tightly.

“You know he chewed up Trevor’s arm,” Jacob realized, “You just won’t admit it because he’s like your little pet!”

“He’s the only thing I’ve ever had,” she whispered, pressing her face against my head. I was reading about stars, I was happy.

“He’s not your kid,” Jacob says.

“Mum doesn’t love him,” she says.

“For good reason, there’s something wrong with him I think we need to take him to doctors going and chewing on somebody’s arm isn’t normal like that, we need to get mum to get him tested or something,” he said, “If you really loved him that’s what you’d do, get help for him.”

“He doesn’t need help, he’s fine,” she said.

“He is not! Two weeks ago you saw how he killed Stephen’s rats---”

“That was an accident he’s little---”

“He filled a bucket with water and sat there and watched them drown then took their dead bodies and started playing with them---”

“He didn’t know any better---”

“He was doing it to see what’d happen he’s clever, eh, Titus, aren’t you clever?” he asked, tipping my head up.

“Go away,” I said, “I’m reading.”

“How old were you when you learned to read, Titus?” he asked, kneeling down.

“Stop it---”

“You know the answer to that, don’t ask to prove your point,” I said, focusing on my book.

“How’d you teach yourself to read?” He asked.

“By looking at your school tablet when you weren’t doing your lessons,” I said, not looking up.

“That is not normal,” he said, standing and pointing at me, “Most kids his age don’t speak in complete sentences, let alone know how to read let alone---that fast.”

“So what?” my sister asked, “Leave him alone you’re just jealous.”

“I’m worried, about him,” Jacob said, “Titus, do you want to go to school?”

“Yes, I want to learn things,” I said.

“Why?” he asked.

“I like the way it makes my brain feel,” I said, looking up, “Hasn’t done you any good so I could be wrong.”

“You’ll like it,” she said, “You’ll go this fall, now shush baby you should sleep.”

“I don’t like sleeping,” I said.

“Titus, mate, I don’t think you’ll get along with the other children,” Jacob said, kneeling down. He was right. I didn’t. But I didn’t know that then.

“I have to I want a girlfriend,” I said.

“Do you?” he asked, amused.

“Yes,” I said, glaring at him. He didn’t have a girlfriend. “And I’m not crazy like Trevor or Stephen so don’t get your hopes up.”

“I think you are,” he said, “I think you’ll think so too one day.”

“Leave him alone,” my sister said, picking me up and walking away.

“Come on---it’s for his own good listen to the way he talks---we can’t just let him be,” he said.

“Why not?” she asked, angrily.

“Because what’s going to happen when he’s twelve? Or fifteen? He’s four years old and he’s already killing animals and intentionally hurting us, what’s it going to move to next? I’m not saying he knows what he’s doing---in fact I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have any clue it’s wrong but that’s the problem he needs to learn,” Jacob said, following us around to the sofa where my sister had gone to escape him.

“He’ll learn. He’s little, all little kids do stupid things,” she argues.

“None of the rest of us did---not like that, he’s why dad left remember?”

“Dad left ‘casue he’s an idiot---”

“Agreed, but remember how he’d cry all night every night?---”

“Babies have colic---”

“Colic that mysteriously disappears when their father moves out? He slept through the night after that, remember?” Jacob asked.

“No,” she did remember though. I didn’t. I hoped my memory would improve as I got older.

“Titus why do you want a girlfriend?” Jacob asked, kneeling again and this time tipping my chin up from the tablet to make me look at him.

“Because she’ll be beautiful, more beautiful than the stars and she’ll go on adventures with me and she love me and be as clever as I am,” I said, resolutely.

“Okay, good reason, what do you think she’s going to think about you, eh? Killing rats, chewing on people?” he asked.

“I’m like other people,” I said.

“No, no you’re not,” he said.

“Well, she’ll love me anyway,” I said.

“I hope so, Titus,” he said, stroking my hair out of my face. I leaned away, glaring at him and wishing it was his arm I’d chewed on.

“Leave him alone,” my sister hissed, “He’s a baby can’t you see that? He’s a little baby and he’s no stranger than any of us were at that age, he’s just clever. And mum leaving him locked up at home all day hasn’t done him any good either.”

“Yeah, well, it’s not like she can send him to school or care the way he is,” Jacob said, sitting next to us.

“Just go away,” she said, rocking me and putting her head on mine as I read.

“I’m only trying to help you, sis, really, I just don’t want you getting hurt,” he said, reaching out to touch her arm but she pulled away. But she did get hurt. She died in fact, less than ten years after that conversation. She died, cold and afraid in a dark alley. But I didn’t know that then. Then I just leaned back against her soft chest, thinking about how women’s chests were softer than men’s and that was a nice sort of thing for biology to do for us men in the world. And I think I did fall asleep as she stroked my hair, shush me and telling me there was nothing wrong with me and not to mind Jacob because I was normal and sweet and he was just plain stupid.

But she was wrong.

“Shh,” a hand is stroking my hair, then puts a cool cloth to my face.

I open my eyes groggily. I’m still sitting in the hospital bed, except now I’m sitting up, and I’m not strapped down anymore. Tom is sitting in front of me, she’s got the cool cloth to my face and she’s wiping it and my short hair gently “Shh, how much did he give you?”

“You’re more beautiful than the stars,” I say, reaching out a hand to touch her perfect lips.

“So you are awake,” she says, smiling and standing up, “Do you want to get out of here?”

“Yes, yes I can’t stay,” I can’t let them find out. I can’t let them know the truth about me.

“Okay, come on then,” she puts an arm underneath my shoulders and gently helps me to my feet.

“I can’t---wait,” I stumble, “Where’s the man with no lips?”

“Dr. Truth Juice? Getting high on his own juice in another room, we’re safe for now,” she says, leading me to the door, “Are you sure you’re feeling better?”

“I am well, yes---no we aren’t safe, you aren’t safe,” I mumble, leaning against her, I want to die in those arms. Then it occurs to me that I probably will someday. That is a happy thought.

“We’re fine, I think I’m capable of breaking you out of IDMT, we’ve both done it before, how’s your throat feeling?” she asks, leading me to the door. I close my eyes to try to get some sleep while she walks me out.

“That is of no consequence I am well---but tell me about you why did you come here?” I ask, realizing she had no way of knowing the man with no lips was back.

“I thought you might be lonely,” she says, rubbing my shoulder, “And you’d gotten a few of us out, figured I’d return the favor.”

“I think he was trying to get me to tell him things---I’m so glad you’re here,” I say. now they won’t find out about me. Find out the truth.

“You were talking away to him for a while, then he just left you to mumble to yourself while he went off with his juice, so I went in and got you off of it and waited for you to wake up,” she says, I’m getting tired from moving, I slump down. We are on grass now. I like grass.

“Was I telling you things?” I ask, wondering if my lucid memories had been shared aloud by me.

“Something about your brother arguing with your sister, it didn’t make much sense,” she says, sitting down next to me, “We really ought not stop out here.”

“NO no---I must tell you things, to protect you, I need you to know,” I say.

“It’s okay---”

“No, you have to listen---you see, I have a strange, twisted soul. And every fiber of it is devoted to worshiping you more with every breath I take,” I say, reaching a million miles through the darkness to touch her face. she takes my hand.

“Shh, you’re crazy,” she says, taking my hand through the ether and rubbing my fingers.

“No—no I know--- that’s what I’m telling you ----you need to listen to me,” I say, sitting up how did I get to be lying down?

“You’re not, he’s got you on drugs, Titus, that’s all,” she says.

“No, I can still think I can still think it’s still all there----the way of it is---it’s still there---I still need to talk you that doesn’t matter, this doesn’t matter I’ve been needing to tell you needing to tell you needing to tell you----” I squeeze my eyes shut to force my brain out of the fog into her mind so I could speak to her. “There’s something wrong with me.”

“No, there’s nothing wrong with you---”

“NO!” I cried, crawling away from her, “You need to listen to me, you need to believe me, there is truly something wrong with me, listen to me.”

“But Titus---”

“SAY IT!”

“What?”

“Admit, admit you know there’s something wrong with me!” I cry, sobbing now.

“Okay, there’s something wrong with you,” she says, slowly.

“Now, now I have to tell you,” I say, taking a deep breath.

“Okay, okay, so tell me,” she says, taking both my frozen hands in her warm ones.

“I don’t want to go back there though, that’s why we’ve lived our lives, so that parts of them are over,” I say, raising my head, I realize I’m crying, “But I have to take you back there---” It was a cold night walking home, like we always did. for some reason, Hilda would always walk me home. She got off of work, and would come and walk me back from the technical school I went to. 

“Why do you come every day?” I asked her, pushing my hands into the pockets of my leather jacket. The thing was warm, it hung to my hips, probably was meant to be on a taller person because it was used like everything I had. Underneath it I had only a white waffled shirt, and the wind cut my chest wonderfully, as though reminding me the world was alive when I was locked up all day inside.

“Because, you shouldn’t walk alone,” she said, shrugging, the wind tugging her dark hair. She was smaller than me just bit shorter, for some reason our brothers are all tall. But she and I were the small ones, I had passed her in height barely a year ago.

“I’m fine,” I said, walking ahead of her, “I don’t think you should come anymore. I’m enlisting in Space Forces, on my next birthday. I’ll be gone.”

“No I know, but I’ll still write to you,” she said.

“I won’t answer,” I said, stopping and blocking her from moving. 

“Yes you will, you’re being stupid Titus,” she said, dodging past me.

“I am not, listen to me,” I said, tugging her around backwards by the arm, “I wouldn’t. I don’t care about you.”

“Yes you do,” she said, tugging away, “Let go.”

“I’m leading you this way---it’s a short cut,” I said, “Don’t you want to get home? Only you look cold.”

“I’m fine,” she said, shaking her head. now I’d let go of her arm but she didn’t go. “I miss your hair longer, you always cut it now you’re in school, when you were little it was down to your shoulders,” she reached out and tugged on my hair. I slapped her hand away.

“You’re different, but so am I, I’m worse,” I said, motioning for her to go down the alley way between buildings. “I used to think everyone was a bit like me but I think I was wrong, I don’t think they are at all, not a bit.” 

“We’re all a bit the same,” she said, following me. I didn’t even think about the alley then, the alley she would die in. or maybe I did maybe that was always there.

“That’s what I thought as well, but I don’t think so anymore---I’ve begun not to think so,” I said, walking backwards so I could face her, “You see I’ve been watching everyone else. they don’t see the things I see. And they certainly don’t feel the things I feel. And what’s worse than that is, I don’t feel the things they feel. And I hate that. because it’s something I don’t know. I hate not knowing things. It’s the worse thing in the world, the thing you don’t know. and I don’t know what people feel inside sometimes.”

“You’re being stupid, Titus, you can always read people,” she said, shaking her head.

“I’m not talking about that, I know I can get to people I’ve learned how to do that I know what it’s like when they’re angry, I get angry I’ve got an idea how that feels but---I don’t know what they feel like when they’re happy,” I said, “I don’t think I feel that. I don’t think I feel love.”

“Of course you do---you love me, don’t you?” she asked.

“No,” I said, shaking my head, “I think there’s something wrong with me, because I don’t. of all the people on Keplar for me to love, it ought to be you. but it’s not. I don’t love you.”

“Yes you do---I’m sure you do,” she said, “You’re just not thinking about it right, hear me out---”

“All right,” I agreed, wanting her insight. That was why I had asked her, because I knew she was clever, because I wanted her help. well, she did help me. she gave me my answer.

“---how would you feel if I didn’t come and pick you up?” she asked, “And walk you home? Or make your lunch?”

“I’d steal something on the way, or at school. I wouldn’t care,” I said, shrugging.

“You would, who would you talk to?” she asked.

“Myself, I wouldn’t care,” I said, “I realize I should, I realize I’m supposed to, I realize people do feel this way I just don’t. there is something wrong with me.”

“Why? What would you think?” she asked.

“I don’t think I’d think about it. you’d be doing something else,” I said, shrugging.

“What if I wasn’t?” she asked, stopping. She would never walk out of that alley. she stopped then, she never walked out. I didn’t know that, though, didn’t think that then even then. I swear to you I didn’t know that then.

“What do you mean?---come on it’s getting dark,” I said. see? I even tried to get her to come with me.

“No, we’re finishing this, what if I weren’t just too busy to come get you, what if I was around?” she asked.

“Like off at school? I wouldn’t miss you if that’s what you’re asking,” I said, I was growing tired of the discussion. And angry. Angry that she wouldn’t believe me. “I’m asking for your help, here not to prove to me I’m wrong.”

“I am helping you, what if I were dead? Would you care?” she asked.

“How would you die?” I asked, turning around, looking at her white neck, “Strangled?”

“Why does it matter how I died?” she asked.

“Because, I’m only thinking,” I said, walking up to her and putting a hand over her neck, “Just thinking---like I do.”

“How would you feel if I died?” she asked, looking so fearlessly into my eyes.

“I wouldn’t care,” I said, “I told you, there’s something wrong with me.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” she said.

“Liar,” I said, tightening both hands her throat, and shoving her against the wall.

“Stop it,” she gasped, tugging at my coat with her hands but not able to claw my skin I was wearing long sleeves, gloves it was cold out.

“Why? I told you I don’t care so why in the universe shouldn’t I?” I asked, staring at her, actually ceasing. “Tell me why?”

“Because you’re wrong, you do care, there’s nothing wrong with you, I’m telling you, you’re fine,” she begged, stupidly, tears on her cheeks.

“Yes there is,” I said, tightening my grip again. she struggled, but I was stronger, bigger than her, she couldn’t even kick me, her legs were that short. “Yes, there is.”

“Titus,” she gasped, then the life went out of her, right there and then. And I kept crushing her throat until I was sure she’d stopped breathing. Then I let her body fall. I went to the police, crying, saying somebody’d attacked her, she’d walked ahead of me, I attacked one of them and they got away. I had punched myself in the face, though, so it looked like I fought. They did think I might have done it, but you see the injuries I inflicted on myself were greater than what she could have done, so it couldn’t be me---couldn’t be----but it was. and it is. And that is me. and that is why by everybody else’s standards, as far as the rest of the universe is concerned, there is something wrong with me.

“Then let the rest of the universe think what it wants because I think you are perfect, Titus Card, you aren’t measurable by the universe’s standards you are measurable by your own,” and her hands were holding me as I shook with sobs.

“I never cried for her then—it’s the drugs, or you, I don’t know,” I whispered.

“Shh, shh, it’s okay. it’s okay you told her you wouldn’t miss her, you do, don’t you?” she asks.

“I think about her, I wish she were here---but I don’t wish she weren’t dead,” I say, “I don’t feel bad.”

“I don’t think it was your fault,” she says, her arms around me.

“I think I should go, away from here, somewhere—I don’t know,” I say, trying to stand.

“No, stay with me,” she says, catching me and pulling me back down, holding me tightly with both of her lovely hands, “Don’t leave me, don’t run away. Don’t you want to have what you and I have never had? A real life? With happiness, and laughter, and music, and somebody who loves you, across the whole universe, somebody who won’t let time or distance keep you apart?”

“Yes,” I say, staring into her eyes, transfixed. “Yes, I do.”

“Okay, then be that with me, be that with me. Just be human---try to be human---let’s be normal. Get drunk and talk until dawn, sit out and look at the stars, go flying places, together, in spaceships far across the galaxy. And learn how to love, I can show you, if you’ll let me,” she says, caressing my face with one hand.

“I don’t know---”

“Just let me in. please let me in,” she says, standing with me, still holding my hands, “Keep looking into my eyes, just let me in. let me help you.”

“Okay,” I say, pressing my forehead against hers, “What if—”

“No ‘what ifs’ no buts, just you and me, forever, till the day we die,” she says, arms around me, “Even if the rest of the universe despises you, Titus Card, I’ll be right here, I promise, right here beside you.”

“What if I hurt you?” I ask.

“You won’t,” she says.

“You’re right---I won’t, I’m not going to. never you, never you, no matter what,” I say, holding her tightly as I can in my weak arms.

“Okay, then come with me. Come to bed, we’ll sleep in it’s Saturday tomorrow, remember? We’ve got the change of command for the students and you get relieved of your positions, because Monday we test for jobs, and then the ceremony tomorrow night completing this phase of training. And we’ll go to that, and we’ll whisper with the others, and go the gym afterwards and race each other, and just be sixteen, okay?” she asks, “Do you want to do that?”

“Yes,” I say, nodding, “I’ll try, I will with you.”

“Thank you, now, let’s go back, together,” she says, taking my hand. And I walk back to the barracks with her.

Chapter 2

O kay so we’ve gone over the fact that I really hate not knowing things? 

Right? 

Yes I’m sure we have I’m sure of THAT. But what I’m not sure of is what happened last night.

 I am aware that I was in the hospital last night. I am aware that I woke up in the barracks this morning. I am aware that the lovely Nicole Tom is somehow involved in this. 

But I am not aware in what capacity she was involved, or how much of what I think I said I actually said. I know I was thinking about my sister’s unfortunate death and my hand in it---or hands that is it did take two hands---that should be amusing it amuses me but I am too annoyed right now to be amused. I need to know. 

I need to know if she knows. Did I tell her? God, I think I did, yet she smiled at me this morning very quickly but she smiled at me. What did I say? Could she still love me? That is why I am upset, I don’t know, and I can’t dare to hope that she knows every part of my mind and still loves me. how could she? How could she when I am---this. And they are---all that they are? The innocence and the stupidity? How is it that they can be all that and yet she knows she is one of them yet still loves me. I want it to be true. I desperately do. and it is it is true it has to be she loves me and I know I was on the drugs, I was babbling and wanting to tell her about that night. not wanting her to make that same mistake.

Not wanting her to think there isn’t something wrong with me.

When there is.

I know there is.

It just doesn’t bother me.

It may bother her which is why I think she really ought to know before I make passionate love to her. I could get over her not knowing, but I’d rather she know and loves every complete part of me.

Like I said, though, I can get over it.

But I’d rather not. I’d rather do it simply, purely, I want her to know who I am and love me still. I think I hope in vain but I see her gorgeous face and I know I know, she does love me. and I know I tried to tell her. as incoherent as I may have been, was I so much so that she did not realize that I did the deed? That I was the villain of the tale I was telling? I was plain enough, wasn’t I? 

The shame is, I haven’t the nerve to tell her now that it’s daylight---no that’s not it I have the nerve I just don’t want to because it will make her that much less likely to want to have sex with me in the foreseeable future. And my lust outweighs my ethereal desire to be loved for what I am. no I can get over that if my libido is satisfied which I think it would be. But now that there’s the chance she knows, the probability she knows I want to know if what I think is true and I want to know so very badly but I just can’t---find a way to ask.

“Are you all right?” Logan asks. He’s standing in front of my running machine. I am dripping with sweat, bent over clinging to the bars. The read out says eight miles. No wonder my legs burn.

“Yes,” I say, nodding.

“You look like you’re having an existential crisis,” he says, helpfully.

“No, not really, this is more an affair of the heart,” I explain, “It’s not to do with Nolan, I’m over that.” Well over that. I’m quite glad he’s out of the way. It was nice, those fifteen minutes I’d thought I would have a coconspirator I could trust. No not really but it was nice thinking I could pretend to trust him and then waiting for him to try to betray me that had been fun. He’d just done it so badly when he went and tried to do it. I’d betrayed him SO much quicker than he’d even thought of betraying me. plus his murders were so shoddily done he’d have been caught before too long even with out my assistance.

“Oh,” he says, nodding, “I can’t help with that I’m afraid. I couldn’t have helped with the first one, in fact, but I’d have pretended a bit better.”

“That’s all right. I don’t need any help, nobody can help, really,” I say, shrugging, “It’s just me.”

“But you’re so clever at everything,” he says, cocking his head, “I don’t think about you having problems.”

“Thanks,” I say, still leaning on the now sticky exercise machine, “But I do.”

“They must be rather complicated if you can’t figure them out after eight miles,” he says, leaning over the machine to look at my distance.

“Deceptively simple, actually. I just have to ask somebody something. but that’s the one thing I don’t want to do because if I’m wrong, it’ll be worse than if I’m right,” I say.

“That didn’t make logical sense but I’ve just come off my run for the day so that could be why,” he says, smiling sympathetically.

“Yeah, maybe,” I say, with a smile as well, “How far did you go?”

“Point four of a mile----I felt like I was going to die! Don’t laugh like that Titus,” he says, grinning as well though.

“You know next PE test Tom and I may not be there to carry you,” I warn, “We passed today, that’s the battle not the war.”

“I know, you’re going to make such a good General, Titus. You’re clever and you’re loyal. You could do it easy,” he says.

“Yeah, that’s the problem,” I mutter. Easy. Everything is so easy it’s boring. Why do I always have to be bored? I want something to stimulate me for once. I’ve got to get around to killing Ebbel, that’ll cheer me up.

“Don’t be sad, Titus, as you said, we won the battle---we won’t have won the war till we graduate---but Monday we get to test for our jobs that should be fun!” he says, smiling, “I want to get engineering, what about you?”

“Pilot,” I say, “That’s all I want. To fly. I think I’ll love that, and I don’t love many things but I do love the stars. And that’ll bring me closer to them.”

“But you’ve trained in computers and things, surely you’ll test high in one of those,” he says, frowning.

“Add the word ‘could’ right between you and test and subtract the ‘ll and you’ll get the drift,” I say. it takes him a minute to get that one. He frowns and stands there then finally says.

“What do you---”

“I’m going to fail those, or just about. I don’t want them putting me in anything else,” I say.

“Oh, right, got it,” he says, nodding, “Well, they ought to give you what you want since you are brilliant at everything.”

“Oh, they will,” I say, nodding. I won’t let them do otherwise.

“Don’t you think you’re just about done?” he asks, “You’re awfully pale and you were in hospital just last night.”

“The bleach? That wasn’t so much, anyway the truth juice did me worse, and anyway I can’t just quit, I’m having a competition with Leavitt,” I explain.

“Really? I didn’t know we were having competitions,” he says.

“Nor does he so far as I know,” I say.

“Titus---he started after you, so you can quit,” he says, after all this I’m at nine miles.

“No because if he continues longer past when I’d have quit if we’d started at the same time then I lose,” I explain. It really isn’t all that complicated.

“But it’s not actually a completion,” he says.

“Oh, it is,” I say.

“What’re Leavitt and Card doing?” Liesel asks, we are lying on weight benches, doing presses while the stupid men have some sort of masculine testosterone based contest.

“Having some sort of testosterone fueled inane contest, would be my guess,” I say.

“Leavitt doesn’t usually go in for that sort of thing,” she says.

“Oh, I’m sure he’s not aware he’s involved, he’s not generally aware,” I say, sitting up and getting a drink of water.

“Probably not,” she says, “Good day, anyway. feels weird that Tsegi isn’t here with us, though.”

“It does,” I agree, “It’s just like she’s sick or away or something, I can’t believe it’s real that she’s gone. These past few days have gotten really strange, this whole week really. First Tim, then Peter and Tsegi.”

“Yeah, I’m going to be glad to be going to our specialist schools till we finish training,” she says.

“Yes, then six months in outer space, then A schools, then more schools,” I sigh a little, “The worst is almost over, though.”

I’m so very wrong.

“Look at the little demons, making themselves stronger so they can all try to kill each other later.”

“I brought you with because I thought you would relax seeing them be normal,” I mutter, leaning against the glass.

“Joking, honestly, after all that’s happened it feels rather true, though,” Thorn mutters, as though he wasn’t joking at all.

“They look tired,” Harris says. we are all watching them through the privacy glass. The Cadets are relaxing and working out after the morning’s dress ceremonies for the end of the basic part of training. They all passed their physical fitness test and comprehension test, the ones that lived and didn’t get arrested or institutionalized, that is. I have to admit, Thorne’s predictions are getting eerie. Not that I believe they had any credence, but honestly it is all rather odd. 

“Poor things, they do get up awfully early.”

“Being in pain is good for them,” Ebbel is with us as well.

“Yes, helps their even tempers,” Thorn says, not at all seriously.

“Seriously, though, shouldn’t we let them go back to the barracks for a bit?” Harris asks, sadly, “They could at least do with a lie down. I’m tired.”

“Well you don’t get to lie down,” Ebbel says.

“I’m glad they’re going on to their schools, at least we get to wake up an hour later,” I say.

“I’m not, we still have to be around them, they’re just more spread out,” Ebbel says.

“They aren’t all that bad,” I say, mostly to Ebbel and Thorne who are sulking.

“No, they’re not, some of them are nice they are kids,” Harris agrees, quickly. He’s gotten emotionally attached to a few of them.

“We still have to wake them up and stop them from trying to kill each other,” Thorne says.

“Yes we----what do you mean WE??? You’re not even posted here, you’re from basic you just sort of migrated over and stayed!!!” Ebbel growls.

“Oh, yean that’s true, but I still have to do something or they’ll send me back,” Thorn says.

“Since when?” Ebbel asks.

“Do I have to separate you two?” Harris asks, exasperated, “And will you quit talking about them as though they’re all evil? Two of them have died so far, for God’s sake, and two others are institutionalized. We should have respect.”

“More than that, we should have gratitude, it could’ve been us----no I take that back, we can be as flippant as we want it will be us next we might as well enjoy it,” Thorn says, searching for his hip flask which I confiscated a while ago. I still haven’t decided if he’s better sober or intoxicated. Hawking says I’d better just pick and stick with it but really it’s hard.

“Don’t be ridiculous, it’s accidents,” Ebbel says, “All this happening in one class is just a coincidence.”

“Right, I was waiting for somebody to say that---so I sat down and calculated the exact odds of precisely these things happening completely coincidentally---”

“Oh God they’re really low, aren’t they?” Harris guesses.

“No, they’re fantastic, fifty five thousand to one, you’ve got more chance of being struck by lightning on a clear day than that,” Thorne says, completely unhelpfully.

“Well, odd things do happen,” Harris, who isn’t good at maths, says.

“Yeah, but that’s really low,” I say.

“Yeah, in fact, the odds of something like---oh I don’t know----let’s say a teenage serial killer being chosen for OTS, is something like ninety times more likely to happen,” Thorne says, nodding.

“One of them couldn’t be doing it, we’ve got cameras,” Harris says.

“Somebody tell him those don’t work,” Ebbel says.

“The cameras aren’t always on,” I tell him.

“Oh, God,” Harris says, “So IA really doesn’t know who’s been behind all this?”

“Well, it’s pretty obvious, isn’t it? The one who tried to kill himself and Card---Nolan that’s his name, he confessed to killing the other two, and who knows what happened to Long that could’ve been a freak accident, so while it’s unsettling we’ve already got our killer,” Ebbel says.

“Right, so all three of you think bodies are going to quit showing up in odd places?” Thorne confirms.

“Yes,” we say, although by now I’m starting not to believe it.

“Card, could I ask you a question?” I ask, going over to where he stands, chugging water and leaning against the treadmill he just got off. I’ve done a six mile run, which was more than I felt like doing after the past few days, still it cleared my head. He looks spent, sweat running down his face and matting his hair. We are a couple of the last to get off the machines, the rest are quietly lifting weights and waiting their turns to get changed and shower.

“What is it?” I ask.

“Do you know how to---break into places?” I ask, stupidly. I’ve got no idea how to even talk about this I don’t know why I’m doing it.

“What do you mean?” he asks, not remotely innocently but I’m sure he thinks it’s very innocent. “Why ever would you ask me?”

“Because you’re the one who moves the bloody guidon every night---quit looking over your shoulder I know you do you paint your initials on it!” I say, exasperated.

“Oh, you noticed,” he says, annoyed.

“Everybody noticed---and I’m not trying to get you in trouble I need your help,” I say, “My sister’s locked up.”

“Where by whom and why?” he asks.

“They think she’s one of the mutants----and they’ve locked her up to study her and they’ll never let her back out,” I can hear my voice cracking even as I say it, “And so I have to get her out. and you’re twice as clever as most grown ups, and you’re always sneaking places you shouldn’t---so I thought you might have an idea how I could get her out. because I have to.”

“Oh, no, I’m sorry sneaking places only works here because I know the cameras and their blind spots, I’ve never been in one of those government buildings, so I’ve got no idea how to help you,” he says, unapologetically.

“But---you could think of something,” I say, desperately. He was my only hope, the only thing I had thought of was to ask him. I had no idea how I was going to do it otherwise.

“Oh, well, I can think of one thing that could help you,” he says, wiping his face with the corner of his shirt.

“What?” I ask, hopefully.

“Stop caring.”

I don’t actually intend to or think about punching him but one minute he is standing there with a callous smirk on his face, and the next my fist is wiping that look off of his face and he is falling against the treadmill. It really wasn’t a calculated thing, it just felt so right at the moment because, really, let’s face it. Somebody has needed to whack Titus Card upside the head for quite some time now, I’m just the first one to actually lose complete control and do it.

And it felt really awesome.

I figured I was thrown out at that point, which was okay because I needed to rescue Ginny. So I saw no reason to try to prevent the ensuing fight, or act like it was an accident (not that I know how I would have even done that). 

Because of, course, a fight does ensue. Titus may be a tiny, insignificant little twerp who swallowed a dictionary, but he has every intention of going down fighting.

He springs back up and is upon me before I’ve even finished thinking about what a bad idea that was. fists flying, teeth gnashing at my flesh he pounces upon me, with enough fury to drive me to the ground as well.

And then we are grappling, I’m surprised, he knows how to fight, and not only how to fight he knows how to fight dirty, to compensate for his small size by biting, kicking, grinding every boney part of his body into mine. 

He’d learned how to fight in the street, usually against multiple enemies, and he’d usually lost because he was so much smaller, I knew because of the way he fought. Relentless and wild, like a blind animal clawing out, nothing calculated, just getting as many blows in as he could before he was inevitably consumed. He’d learned how to inflict the most damage he could before the fight was ended, bite any bit of flesh, pull hair, and kick anything that moves because you might as well leave some scars to remember you by after you’re in ISS for the next few days.

Oh, and how had I learned to fight? 

The exact same way. I’d not had the best childhood in the world, or gone to the best schools. As should be obvious by now, I am not the most popular person. I don’t fit in, I’ve always felt awkward around people, and I generally do fairly well at school. The perfect candidate for bullying. After Ian died it only got worse, presumably because I quit talking they just decided they should try to beat my head in daily. I don’t really know. but learn I did, and my technique was perfected through many a long hour in ISS contemplating how not to get my face bashed in again.

Suffice to say we are a pretty good match for each other. What I have in size he makes up for in quickness. Also, neither of us have been in an all out brawl for quite some time, so it sort of feels good to just quit thinking and bend my whole body towards crushing him into the rough carpet floor, which is leaving interesting marks on his face as I drag him across him, him gnawing through my shoe as his feet go into my crotch, my hands on his shirt dragging towards the treadmill which I plan on stuffing his face in.

“Guys stop it,” Logan implores the idiots, close to tears, as he follows them across the gym. A couple of kids from Denab flight are pretending to try to stop it, but are more watching in fascination as their mild mannered obtuse flight leader tries to and appears to be succeeding in stuffing Cygenus’ small and psychotic flight leader into a stair machine.

“Aren’t you going to help him?” Liesel asks me, surprised.

“Who, Titus?” I ask, as I lean back watching disinterestedly.

“Yes,” she says, not daring to say I’m sweet on him because she knows I’ll deny it independent of the fact that it’s true.

“Lord no, he probably started it,” I say, calmly.

“True, he probably did,” she admits.

“So you’re not going to leave?” Ebbel is still arguing with Thorn. I’m sort of trying to separate them because I honestly feel bad for the guy. Thorn, not Ebbel. Ebbel isn’t the sort of person you feel bad for.

“No, I actually got orders issued to ‘observe training’ whatever that means, I think they were just getting sick of me---I hate planet duty,” Thorn says, casually, spiking his coffee with whiskey I didn’t know he had and not at all withering under Ebbel’s gaze.

“Lovely, so we’re stuck with you,” Ebbel says.

“It would seem so until I’m back on Space Duty, which I should be soon, assuming the universe doesn’t come to an end which, hey, it might.”

“Oh, would you look at that, they are actually trying to kill each other,” Harris says, flatly.

“What----who?” Ebbel spins around to look through the glass.

“How should I know? A couple of the boys, I can’t tell who they’ve both got crew cuts and I honestly try to pretend they don’t exist most of the time,” Harris says, making no move to stop them.

“Oh that looks like Card---it is, I recognize the back of his head,” Thorn says. Two of the cadets are rolling around on the ground trying to smash each other’s heads in with barbells. They don’t have very good aim.

“Well we should stop them,” Ebbel says.

“Yes, we should,” Harris says.

“Definitely,” Thorn says.

“What----why aren’t you?_---are you waiting to see who wins?” I ask them, disgusted.

“Well---”

“It is interesting---”

“We’ve not got anything else to do---”

“They’ll succeed some other time anyway---”

“And I forget why I hate men,” I mutter, going to break up the fight.

“No you don’t.”

“Oh don’t swear off all men, just on account of us.”

“Yes that would be like me swearing off humans because of Card.”

“You DO,” I called over my shoulder, at Thorn, as I slammed the door. They were useless. Men.

Chapter 3

“S

o, own up, who started it?” I ask, standing in front of the bloodied and bruised cadets. Card is holding a bloody rag to his nose and Leavitt is clasping a hand over a chewed on arm.

“Ma’am I did.”

“Ma’am I did.” they look at each other in surprise. I am surprised too, usually they blame each other.

“Ma’am I threw the first punch,” Leavitt says.

“Ma’am, I antagonized him,” Card says.

“Why? Both of you?” I ask.

“Ma’am, he antagonized me,” Leavitt says.

“Ma’am, I felt like it,” Card says.

“Explain,” I say.

“Ma’am he said---”

“No, not you, Card, why did you feel like it?” I ask him.

“Ma’am I was bored and it gives me great pleasure to antagonize people,” Card says.

“And why couldn’t you resist the temptation to punch him?” I ask Leavitt.

“Ma’am, I have been for quite some time now,” Leavitt says.

“Are you going to try to kill each other again, or have you got it out of your system?” I ask.

“Ma’am we’re good,” Card says.

“Yes, ma’am, got it all out,” Leavitt says.

“If you feel the need to antagonize somebody again, Card, let me know,” I say to him, “We will ship you to the Northern rim where you can antagonize the enemy to your heart’s content.”

“Yes, ma’am, thank you ma’am, that would be excellent Ma’am,” Card says eagerly. He probably would love it too.

“Leavitt, would it help if you utilized a punching bag instead of Card? Do you think you could do that?” I ask.

“Yes, ma’am,” he says.

“Okay, go to your flights,” I say, turning around. They stare at me for a minute before obeying.

“You didn’t give them the brig?” Ebbel asks, amused.

“No, it hasn’t done Card any good so far, and they both confessed, we expect a lot out of sixteen year old boys. And I certainly don’t blame Leavitt for wanting to wipe the floor with Card, if I had to live with Card, he probably wouldn’t be alive, and I couldn’t punish Card because as Thorn says, he’s brilliant, he’s only being him, and he’ll be excellent, if we can all survive training and get him to the front lines where he can be his peculiar, brilliant self to the enemy and not to us,” I say.

“Can’t argue with you there,” Ebbel says, shrugging, “Still, they can learn.”

“Oh, let them learn another night. They’ll be split up into their individual training units after this,” I say, shrugging, “Then we don’t have to have them in a group again.”

“Not till after tomorrow night, we have one more night with these miserable, miserable people all under one roof,” Ebbel says.

“You’re starting to sound like Thorn,” I chastise him.

“I’ve clearly spent too much time around him,” he sighs, “Honestly, though, this group has got me. Sometimes I feel like the world would be a better place if this whole building blew up.”

“Shh don’t say that around Thorn, he probably thinks that it will,” I say.

Of course, that point, I had no way of knowing that it actually would.

“So in serious answer to your question no I’ve no idea how to break into a building like that, but if we get leave at the same time, I’d be happy to give it a go,” Card says, almost cheerfully, examining blood on his fingers like a hungry lizard. What makes that image sicker is, it’s his own blood.

“Have a group of qualified people actually studied what’s wrong with you?” I ask, flatly, staring at him.

“No, I’m sure they’d like to though,” he says, shrugging , “When I was small, my mother locked me up in a closet all day rather than send me to day care so people wouldn’t try to do that.”

“Okay,” I say, nodding.

“My sister’s dead as well,” he says.

“What? My sister isn’t dead,” he says.

“They don’t study them alive--- I meant to say that more tactfully---okay no I didn’t, I just wanted to see if you’d punch me again interesting stars flashed in front of my eyes the first time---are you all right?”

I’m leaning catatonically against a punching bag trying to destroy it with my bare hands which is what I want to be doing to his head. Because in some fraction of that moment I knew that Ginny would be telling me to do as Wilde said and not to hit him because this job was all I had in the universe and that it wouldn’t bring her back. It wouldn’t bring her back. Her voice. You knew it. You knew you didn’t hear her voice. They killed her that night. The night they took her away you didn’t hear her again you knew. You knew she could’ve talked to you that this is the only reason why she wouldn’t.

“Because, I mean, I think it’s pretty obvious that I will do you no good if you are not all right with this, but on impulse, I may become inclined to get somebody who could help you,” he’s still talking but I’m pretending he’s not I don’t want him here I don’t want anyone here. I really don’t want to breathe. People should be able to stop breathing voluntarily.

He looked like he was actually going to die right there in front of me and as interesting as that would have been I didn’t want to be blamed for the one murder around this place that I was not responsible for, so I decide to do something.

“Tom, could you come here?” I ask, beckoning her with a hand.

“What is it?” she asks, putting down the weights she was pretending to lift in order to respond.

“We’ve established that I am no good at being nice to people----I give you an upset person,” I say, flourishing my hands toward Leavitt who is doubled over mauling a punching bag sort of sobbing and screaming.

“Very good job you’re not, Leavitt are you okay? You’re not hurt from the fight are you?” Tom asks, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. I watch cocking my head.

“Are you studying to know what to do?” Tom asks me, since Leavitt isn’t answering her.

“Yeah, I don’t see how you resist the temptation to strangle him right now,” I say, nodding. “You could make it look like an accident.” 

“I’ll explain later, just go and get one of the MTIs,” Tom says, rolling her eyes at me. She didn’t find that funny. That’s okay, I did.

“It’s okay to cry, I cry a lot. And you probably have something to cry about,” I say, kneeling down and patting Leavitt.

“Don’t say that, being you is something to cry about, Logan,” Titus says, in his helpful voice.

Leavitt is just shaking. Tears are running down his face as he sort of leans into Tom.

“Do these things just come to you?” Tom asks Titus, annoyed.

“Yes,” he says.

“Can you stop them?” she growls.

“It’s not easy,” he says.

“Try,” she hisses, going back to Leavitt, “Are you hurt? The asshole is supposed to be getting the MTIs.”

“I made a rude gesture----I knew it would be the fastest way to get them over here,” Titus says, holding his hands up innocently.

“That---probably was the fastest way,” Liesel concedes.

“Is he hurt do you think?” I ask Titus.

“Nah, I mostly was chewing on his arm there, got a few good kicks in, but I don’t think he’s hurt. I think he just needs to be alone,” Titus says.

Leavitt sort of looks at him but he’s still not saying anything.

“Move aside---is he all right? Leavitt, come on with me,” Thorn is pushing us aside, taking Leavitt’s arm.

“Card you have detention duties,” Ebbel growls, “There are faster ways of getting us to you-----quit looking at the clock we come just as quickly when you summon us properly.”

“Yes, sir,” Titus says, not very convincingly.

“I’ll take him to IDMT,” Wilde offers.

“No, I’ll do it, don’t want this one to die----come on Leavitt, you look tired, let’s get you a drink,” I say, leading him out of the gym and into our break room. “You don’t want to go to IDMT again, do you? I know I don’t. that little cannibal Card was chewing on you but that’s not what’s wrong is it?”

He leans against a counter, breathing heavily.

“No, it’s not is it? It’s okay don’t try to say anything not till later, I don’t mind if you don’t talk at all, not the rest of the day if you don’t like, here how about some cold juice?” I go to the refrigerator. We’ve got packets of juice in there, and sparkling water.

“I’ve had mine for the day,” he says, his voice is whispery. They’re only allowed one juice a day. “I like it. I had it at breakfast.”

“That’s all right, thanks for talking to me, here, have another, you look hot,” I say, handing him the packet. He just sort of holds it.

“Thank you, sir,” he says, holding the cold thing in his hands, staring down at it.

“You don’t have to tell me what Card was bothering you about, now, that’s not why I brought you back here,” I say.

“No, no I want to tell you. I want to talk to you. I feel like I should tell someone---it’s the sort of thing you talk to someone about----talk to them about,” he’s staring at me very intently.

“Okay, then,” I say, leaning against the counter, “I’m listening.”

“I think my sister’s dead----I know she’s dead my mum when she came---she told she’d been locked up ----as one of the mutants, and I thought---I wanted to think that meant she was okay, but I know they don’t let you go and see people, like that,” he says, slowly, “But I didn’t know why---but I guess I did. it’s because they’re dead, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” I say, nodding.

“You know?” he asks.

“Yeah, because of my ah---clearance, with training, I got to know. One of our cadets, we found out they were and ah---I thought like you, wanted to go see the kid, and with my clearance I thought I should get to and I did, I got to go but---they weren’t alive,” I say. I can’t say the rest. That they cut them up, to look at the bits of them, their brains mostly, split their heads open to see what their brains are like. I shudder. Somebody really should have told me that before I blundered in looking for the kid to say hello and bring them these crisps they liked. I got so drunk that night.

“Why would they do that?” he asks, he’s crying again.

“Cause they want to understand it, when we as humans want to understand something, we tend to kill it, when we don’t understand something, that is, we tend to kill it,” I say, shrugging, “I’m sorry. I wish it weren’t like that, honestly. And I’m sorry you had to find out like that. I’m sure Card---however the hell he knew---didn’t put it very gently.”

“Card,” he says, staring off, “They’ll kill him one day. they don’t understand him either.”

“We’ve nearly killed you, haven’t we?” I ask, staring at him, “We as in people, don’t quite understand you, we nearly lost you, didn’t we?”

He just nods, he’s crying.

“We lost your brother, we could’ve lost you too, but you’re trying---and I see that, but, I don’t know how much good I am but---I really don’t want them to get you as well,” I say, reaching out and brushing a tear from his cheek with my thumb.

He leans into me, just sobbing. Poor sweet, sensitive kid. His mother miles away not allowed to hug her boy. Not allowed to hug her only living child poor woman, who’d probably had a hell of a life as it was. Her only living child trying to make something of himself barely, struggling, getting pulled down by all the rot and the filth. And him, he’s just a kid, damn how many others like him had come through our doors? No brother, no sister now, sister was one of two people in the world who loved this boy. His father was god knew where not even knowing this precious, lonely life existed in this tormented world. I rubbed his short hair, as he just sobbed into my SBUs.

Wilde walked in followed by Ebbel, took one look at the sobbing boy, and walked back out shoving a protesting Ebbel with her.

“Shh, it’s not okay, it’s not okay,” I say.

He laughs a little, leaning away and trying to wipe his face. “I’m sorry, sir.”

“What’s funny?” I ask, with a small smile.

“You’re supposed to tell me it’s okay,” he says.

“But it’s not,” I say, shrugging, “I’m not going to lie to you, this is hell, your sister by all accounts shouldn’t be dead, your brother should be waiting to slap you on the back and get you drunk after graduation, your dad should have a picture of you looking so smart in that uniform, hanging on his office wall. I shouldn’t even be alive right now---there was a crash I was injured, my gunner is dead—his three year old, a Project 10, is never gonna remember her daddy’s voice. sorry. Yes life sucks. I’ve been a big, terrible part of it for a long time never necessarily making things better. I don’t know.”

“I think you’re doing okay,” he says, wiping his face again.

“I doubt it,” I say, with a sigh.

“Why, sir?” he asks, staring at the cold juice packet in his hands.

“I gave this talk to Card, something like it. He wouldn’t listen, he wouldn’t let me in and you know what? I don’t blame him. His dad wasn’t good, nobody’s understood for sixteen years, why should he bother with us now?” I ask.

“Us as in who?” he asks.

“Humans. Why should he bother with humanity? It served him on a platter years ago---his situation’s not much better than yours, no father to speak of as far as I know, nobody ever wrote to him, rode the train by himself to Basic, came with nothing, as you know not even a tablet—the kid loves books there was never the money ever to get him a tablet? A cheap one? Nothing? No, nothing, didn’t even see him, off, not a card not a message. Why should he think any of us would be any different? Why even bother? Why do you? Why do you bother?” I ask.

“I suppose, if I didn’t, we wouldn’t be making the world better,” he says.

“You think we will?” I ask.

“I was standing there crying, and you hugged me. Someday, maybe there will be a little boy crying, and I’ll be there to comfort them, maybe that’s all I’m here for, but little by little, I think it helps,” he says.

“You’re a wiser man than me,” I say, with a smile.

Chapter 4

“W

hy do they keep giving you detention duties?” Kip asks, leaning back in his chair, eating crisps. “You are obviously not learning anything.”

“I really don’t know,” I say, leaning back in my chair as well. My fitted SBUs came in so I’m feeling quite pleased and comfortable. Also they let those of us who don’t own tablets borrow tablets to read on. Those are supposed to be taken away due to detention duties, but Thorn said I might keep mine as I might need it to help Kip. So I’m quite happily reading. I’m trying to teach myself Russian. It’s going very well.

“The fight was pretty cool, and you weren’t doing so bad. What’d you say to him?” Kip asks.

“Nothing so bad to begin with, I was honestly being helpful. I just knew it was annoying,” I say, shrugging a little, “They broke us up before either of us could really get a clear upper hand, though, sort of a shame I haven’t been in a good fight since I got to basic. We do combat of course but that isn’t the same thing.”

“No, it’s not—but on to more important matters, how are you doing with the girl?” he asks, raising his eyebrows.

“Oh, all right. She gets alternately cross and enamored of me when I act like---me. like she forgave me for something I sort of did but she didn’t know I did, then she got upset again when I got in the fight, that could’ve been on principle, though, because she thought she ought to be cross with me for getting in a fight,” I explain, not looking up from my book.

“Hmm, yes, sounds like a woman, more than that, does she know how you feel? And you’ve quit trying to set her up with other people?” he asks, concerned.

“No, I’m done with that. I told her I worship the very sweet air she breathes, so I think that accurately appraises her of my emotions,” I say.

“That would about do it, yeah, what was her reaction?” he asks.

“She said ‘you’re going to be late for detention duties you moron are you actually trying to get thrown out?’,” I answer.

“You just told her this?” he asks, “What about before?”

“Oh, she’s known since not long after you and I last talked, that was just most recent,” I say, “I don’t know though. I’ve got another problem and it’s complicated. Far too complicated to explain.” I’m almost positive she knows the truth about me, about what happened to Hilda, stupid woman. It really wasn’t my fault---I was sure I’d told her. but would she be acting so casually if I had?

“I’ve got all night, and day actually,” he says, helpfully.

“Yeah, no, that’s all right, it wouldn’t help to talk about it, I just need to talk to her,” I say. I’m just working on how to broach the subject carefully without actually giving it away because I don’t want her to know if she doesn’t already know. which I don’t think she already knows there’s no way she could still be treating me like a something approximating a human being if she already knew but she could and she might. I sigh. It wasn’t getting any easier, only harder, as the world spun around me and I was made of glass yet nobody bothered to look right through me.

“Hey, it’s me, doesn’t talk to anybody doesn’t do anything little me,” Kip says, a bit hurt.

“Nah, it’s really complicated, and I’m not in the mood to go over it just---it’s me,” I say, with a laugh, “It’s all me.”

“You and Titus took a while getting back from IDMT last night,” Liesel comments. She and I have been talking at night, since Peter’s gone and Tsegi as well, we’re the few left now of the 10s, in our sect anyway. I know the others vaguely but they were always different floors or buildings or classes whereas we tried to stick together.

“Yeah, he was super drugged up,” I say, flopping back on my bed, remembering his disturbing mood. I flip idly through videos on my table, trying to sooth myself with familiar music videos or books, it’s not really working. Tonight we have a dinner thing provided by the chaplain, so at least we will get to talk and eat and relax a bit. as much as we could in this miserable place. “He kept collapsing, saying he didn’t want to keep going, wanting to just talk to me.”

“Aw, what was he talking about?” she asks.

“It was sort of sad, he mentioned Peter, and he talked about his sister---she got murdered apparently, that was odd, he seemed to feel guilty about it for some reason,” I say, frowning. “He wasn’t making much sense, though.”

“Titus feel bad for something?” she asks.

“Like I said, it was odd, still, he kept saying he wanted me to know, I guess he still misses her,” I say, shrugging a little. Titus’ drunken rant concerned me more in that he felt like he had to keep it hidden. I would have to ask him about it later, but tactfully, I am not sure just how much he remembers of it, and he certainly seemed hesitant, even nervous about mentioning it under the influence of the drugs. He’d said he’d told her to go down the alley that she died in, and it seemed as though they were having an argument. Maybe his family blamed him? Still, guilt isn’t entirely Titus’ style.

“I think about Peter, and Tsegi, I just don’t see why people have to be like this, I mean, Tsegi’d only just gotten to talk to her mum, they never even met,” Liesel says, “The poor woman’d just found about the child she’d missed all those years, and then this happens. And Peter. He’s somebody’s son, his parents don’t know he’s not well or alive or what. Same with Tyrell, they don’t know their son’s a murderer. It’s all just weird. how can people be like this?”

“I don’t know,” I say, rolling over and looking down at her on her bunk. She’s picking at strings on her uniform aimlessly. “Here, come on up I’ll help.”

She crawls up readily, with her uniform in hand. I take the blouse and she the pants. she hands me a lighter to burn off the loose strings.

“I think about them, sometimes, my parents, why they were like that, why they didn’t even care----I didn’t blame them for a long time, for wanting the money, then I made excuses when they didn’t want to meet me, that they were ashamed, the truth that I’ve been alive and here all this time is too much for them. that they’re only human and I can’t blame them. but after what’s happened, I don’t feel like that anymore, they knew what a miserable, lonely universe that we live in, and they choose to bring me into it anyway, and then they left me alone in it, to be a miserable part of it. so I don’t forgive them anymore, for a while, I hated them. because there is no way to forgive evil intent. And that’s what it is, to abandon a child, to subject a child to a life without love or care or comfort, for or mothers, who carried us in their bodies, to know you put this little person out in the world without you and know you never planned on coming back for them, for our fathers who never even felt our heartbeat or laid eyes upon us, to know that their flesh breaths somewhere alone everyday, they are a part of what makes this world as evil as it is. But hating them doesn’t do any good because it doesn’t stop them from existing, hate only stops us from existing because it makes us one of them. so now I don’t think about them, except how never to become one of them.”

“Thanks for telling me,” Liesel says, softly.

“I used to talk about it sometimes with Peter, but now he’s gone, partly because of them,” I say, shrugging, “But I know it’s still hard for you, while your parents did come back for you, they did wait, they still brought you into this world. And you don’t know who they are yet.”

“No, it’s weird, I don’t want to believe they’re some of the good people---I mean they had me, they can’t be. my mum doesn’t feel as bad as my dad, like, ‘cause she carried me, she feels like she took care of me for a while---she said this---she said that she got to talk to me and nourish me and so she felt like she’d done something she’d been there, she’d told me she loved me---so like in her mind that made it okay or a little bit okay----I don’t know if that makes me mad or not, or if that did me a favor or not,” she says, shrugging.

“I don’t know,” I say, “What’s your dad say?”

“Oh, he’s a complete emotional state over it. he has been pretty much since it dawned him I was alive somewhere with out him---I forgive him, because he’s suffered as much as I did, intentionally, like, so he’s sort of crazy and little stupid, but I think I love him anyway,” she says.

“That’s good, at least, you know he does feel bad,” I say. it feels like worlds to me but that’s because I have nothing.

“Yeah, I told him not to because it’s over now, but it’s not. I still wake up and feel alone, it’s like it’s not going to end, the memory of being alone,” she says.

“Yeah, exactly, but we’re our own family now, but the hurt stays,” I say, as she crawls up to sit next to me, more to snuggle than to work on her blouse but that’s what we were pretending we were doing. “It’s funny, last night when Titus hugged me, well held onto me not to fall down, I realized how long it’d been since I’d been hugged. Like touched with kindness, and how long I go without it happening. It’s strange when you think about it, when you’re married or when you’re a little kid, you’re supposed to get hugged every night, every time you see someone.” The chaplain at the Academy used to hug us when we came to services, but that was when we were small. The nurses did too back then. Now that we were older it was just when we saw our old nurses, or sometimes the monitors or hall mothers would give us a little squeeze. But it was nothing regular, nothing safe.

“I didn’t think of that,” she says, leaning against me a little, “I haven’t been hugged either, truth be told.” Her tablet buzzes in her pocket. She pulls it out, “That’s my dad, he gets on sometimes at this time.”

“What’s he say?” I ask. What do people talk about?

“He’s asking what I’m up to, how my day was,” she says, holding the tablet so I can see. She types JUST GETTING MY SBUS READY FOR TOMORRW, NICOLE TOM AND I WERE TALKING

“You told him about me?” I ask, surprised.

“Yeah, he asked about my friends,” she says, “He asked if I had a boyfriend, I didn’t know what to say.”

“You didn’t tell him about your crush on Wendy?” I ask, a bit slyly.

“Who told you about that?” she asks.

“Titus, but I already knew,” I admit, “This was last night when he was on the drugs.”

“Idiot, no I didn’t tell him. I didn’t know what to say it feels stupid,” she says, shrugging.

“I can’t help you there, since I don’t know either, but I’ll bet he only cares ‘cause he wants to be nice,” I say, though like I said I really don’t know.

I CAN LET YOU GO THEN ALL OKAY?

NO WE’RE JUST CHATTING YOU ARE FINE, YEAH LONG DAY IS ALL WE HAD GYM TIME THIS MORNING I’M A LITTLE SORE. She types WHAT ARE YOU DOING?

VISITING A SICK CO WORKER IN THE HOSPITAL. HE’S ASLEEP he types. THOUGHT I’D CHECK IN WITH YOU. ARE YOU OKAY MISSING YOUR FRIEND WHO DIED?

“I told him about Tsegi,” she explains WE WERE JUST TALKING ABOUT THAT ACTUALLY, SORT OF OUR LITTLE FAMILY HERE, IT IS WEIRD LIKE EVYERTHING BEING TAKEN AWAY EVEN THOUGH I’VE JUST GOT YOU, AND WE HAVE MADE NEW FRIENDS WITH SOME OF THE OTHER CADETS.

“Even if they are sociopathic walking dictionaries,” I add.

NICOLE SAYS EVEN THOUGH THEY ARE WEIRD she types.

LET ME GUESS ONE OF THE HORMONAL IRRITATING KNOW IT ALL BOYS HAS TOUCHED HER HEART IN HIS OWN STUPID WAY he types.

“Yes exactly,” I say with a sigh.

SHE SAYS YES.

WHAT ABOUT YOU?

“Tell him,” I hiss, poking her.

MY CRUSH DOESN’T KNOW I EXIST she types.

SORRY LIFE SUCKS YOU KNOW THAT BY NOW I GUESS. I REALIZE I’M A BIG PART OF WHY LIFE IS SHIT FOR YOU AND PROBABLY LOADS OF OTHER PEOPLE AND I MAY NOT BE ABLE TO HELP IT BUT I REALIZE IT

NO I’M GLAD YOU’RE HERE she types.

“Tell him better than my parents,” I say, dryly.

NICOLE SAYS BETTER THAN HER PARENTS. THEY DIDN’T WANT TO KNOW HER. IT’S LONELY. AND I’M GLAD I’VE GOT YOU BUT WE’RE STILL LONELY TONIGHT. WE WERE TALKING ABOUT HOW LONG IT’S BEEN SINCE WE WERE HUGGED she types.

I WISH I WERE THERE TO GIVE BOTH OF YOU GIRLS A HUG---I CANNOT HONESLTY REMEMBER THE LAST TIME SOMEBODY HUGGED ME he types. WE’LL NEED TO FIX THAT AT GRADUATION, EH?

YES LETS she types, smiling a little.

TELL NICOLE SHE’S GETTING A HUG WHETHER SHE LIKES IT OR NOT NOW THAT I KNOW SHE NEEDS ONE AND I CAN PUNCH THAT BOY OF HERS ON PRINCPLE IF HE’S UPSETTING HER he types.

“Tell him somebody’s already done that today,” I say, with a smile. He does seem kind, it was nice to include me; he seems like a genuinely nice person. maybe they do exist.

SOMEBODY’S ALREADY DONE THAT AND SHE SAYS IT WAS SATISFYING HE DESERVES IT HALF THE TIME she types. So Tom and Card are sweet on each other, well, she’s a fierce thing she can probably take him. and he needs to be taken, god that boy is wild. Thorn is right, he may be the death of us by sheer will power. I’m just glad Liesel isn’t interested in him, then we would have problems. She’s not as headstrong or---well violent—as Tom, so I’d be more concerned about her and Card. They seemed to get on well, though, so it bears watching, not that I can do any good.

MOST MEN DO I KNOW I’M ONE OF THEM I type, still smiling. This feels so good and safe and----not alone. I can picture her, sitting on the bunk with Tom, in their soft grey shirts and bruised legs crumpled under them as they stare at the tablet, probably clipping or burning strings from their uniforms. I sigh, not complete, though, they’ve no idea where I am which isn’t very fair. But it can’t be helped, hopefully she’ll understand. I PROMISE I’LL STOP BEING SO SECRETIVE AFTER WE MEET THINGS ARE JUST ODD HERE

ITS OKAY I JUST WORRY ABOUT YOU she types.

I’D SAY DON’T BUT HONESTLY YOU PROBABLY SHOULD, “Nobody’s worried about you, eh?” I ask, patting Peter’s arm. He’s asleep finally, he talked nonsense when he woke, but I calmed him down by telling him random emotionally crippling, but in all truth meaningless stories of my childhood.

WHY?

ALL SHALL BE REVEILED I PROMISE SORRY I’M NOT THE SMARTEST OR THE BRAVEST OR THE----BEST AT ANYTHING OR I WOULDN’T BE IN THIS SITUATION I AM IN BUT HONESTLY I PROMISE THINGS WILL ONLY GET BETTER THEY CAN’T GET WORSE, SINCE NOW I’VE GOT YOU AND I DIDN’T BEFORE I type with one hand, holding Peter’s hand with my other hand, his blood pressure goes down when I do that. he’s lonely I think.

NICOLE SAYS I’M LUCKY TO HAVE YOU EVEN IF YOU ARE A WEIRD PERSON BUT SOME OF HER FAVORITE PEOPLE ARE WEIRD SHE SAYS SO THAT ISN’T AN INSULT

OKAY GOOD I type, smiling. This is the happiest I’ve been in months---possibly years I realize. Sitting here in this miserable hospital in my SBUs, sitting with this crazy dying kid, messaging my daughter and her friend as they sit not two miles away, probably thinking I’m on another planet. YOU SAID YESTERDAY YOU’VE GOT SOME SORT OF PARTY TONIGHT ARE YOU GOING? I’m pretty sure it’s mandatory but if they don’t want to I can get them out of it, Ebbel doesn’t pay that much attention I can just put in bed rest passes for them.

YES IT’S MANDATORY, CHAPLAINS PUT IT ON SO WE GET COOKIES AND THINGS AND GET TO TALK TO EACH OTHER. BETTER THAN SITITNG HERE she types. Of course, she would be used to these things, the Academy did them. Hell, it was probably the only time the poor kid got sweets, the chaplaincy. That was really a crime.

OKAY TRY TO RELAX KNOW IT ISN’T EASY AFTER WHATS HAPPENED TO YOUR FRIENDS I type BUT YOU’VE GOT IMPORTANT TESTS MONDAY AND YOU GUYS NEVER GET ENOUGH SLEEP OR TIME TO REST

THAT’S THE TRUTH, NICOLE SAYS SOME OF THAT IS TITUS’ FALUT TITUS IS---

YES I REMEMBER HE’S THE MENTAL BUT CLEVER ONE WHO PUT GUIDONS ON A ROOF I type. Of course I know exactly what Titus is. Irritating beggar. I hope I wasn’t that irritating at 16. I probably was.

“Do you ever listen to music?” Kip asks.

“No, my brain is too busy,” I lie. Tom is curled up with Stowe clipping strings and chatting with Harris. She’d better not be bi. Okay well she can be that won’t alter my feelings of adoration for her but it gives me more competition.

“You ought to, it’s relaxing, I thought all young people did,” Kip says.

“I’m not a person---here, do girls sit next to each other touching each other because they are bisexual?” I ask, tipping the screen I’m looking at towards him.

“Yeah, no, that’s just a girl thing---I mean they could be but no, girls just do that, men don’t ‘cause we’re too afraid of being called gay not that there’s anything wrong with that except we are so clearly there is,” he says, shrugging.

“Right, that’s what I was thinking,” I say.

“Although---it is sort of stupid---”

“I’m not trying it with you,” I say, flatly.

“It is wrong though, I mean girls do that sort of thing all the time. men can never get a little snuggle without being called gay, and it’s not it’s just wanting a little comfort now and then---”

“Do I have to murder you or are you going to stop talking about this?” I ask, annoyed, I’ve just lost connection losing my current book and now I have to reboot the tablet.

“Oh all right, just a thought though,” he says, leaning back in his chair. We reach for the crisps at the same time and jump away from each other.

Chapter 5

I don’t listen to music. I’ve asked every person here so far. They listen to music. they know what sort they like. They can name a favorite song. I can’t. I was unaware of this peculiarity. I know I’m different from them. I know they don’t think like me. I didn’t know I was this different, though. that there was this other thing they all had that I didn’t. I knew about morals, aversion to dead bodies, aversion to murder, guilt, love, fathers, one plane. One thing they think about all the time. as opposed to me, which is eight by the way. Eight different things in my head all the time. Music isn’t one of them. it makes me sad somehow and I’m not usually sad. I don’t like it. I didn’t know I was this far from all of them, and the fact that I didn’t know it irks me. I couldn’t be prepared for it. Kip looked at me strangely. I don’t want them to know. I don’t like them to know.

“Hey, what’re you thinking about?” Tom is standing in front of me, she rubs my arms but doesn’t move them down from my head like my sister used to. I move them down by myself.

“How’d you know I was thinking?” I ask. We are at the Chaplain dinner thing, so we’re allowed to mingle and chat. I’m thinking.

“Aren’t you always thinking?” she asks, with a smile.

“Do you like music?” I ask her.

“I guess---what do you mean?” she asks.

“I mean do you listen to music?” I ask.

“Yeah, sometimes, when I run I used to, sometimes at night when I can’t sleep, why?” she asks, still smiling at me and holding my gaze.

“Do you have a song you could name---maybe sing some of the lyrics?” I ask.

“Yes, probably a couple, why?” she asks, bemused.

“Kip asked me, and I don’t---I can’t name any songs I know,” I say, “I didn’t know I was that different from other people.”

“You don’t?” she asks, surprised, “I mean---- do you just not like it---like quiet maybe?”

“No, no, when I was a boy, I remember hearing music, playing, in school for assemblies, or in stores and such, and like I remember hearing things I liked and hearing a note, and not being able to hear the rest of it and wondering what it was.”

“What about that song, the one you sing to us when we march?” she asks.

“That’s something my sister used to play,” I say.

“You were telling me last night, how your sister died,” she says, frowning a little. Oh excellent I wanted to bring this up.

“Was I? I don’t remember well, what did I say?” I ask. Well that was easier than I made it out to be for the last twelve hours.

“She was strangled? Did they ever catch who did it?” shit shit shit.

“No,” I say, with a deep breath, “No, they didn’t.”

“You doing okay?” Liesel asks, kindly.

“Yeah,” I lie.

“You looked pretty bad in the gym earlier,” she says.

“Just over exposure to Titus,” I say, shrugging, “I’m better now. it felt really good to hit him.”

“I bet it did,” she says, with a smile. “You didn’t get in any trouble?”

“No, just detention duties, apparently Card has that effect on a lot of people,” I say.

“Well, that’s good,” she says.

“Oh will you quit trying to make small talk with the likes of me and go and try to snog somebody---like that Wendy girl literally everybody but Logan and I stare at?” I ask, with a sigh.

“What?” she laughs.

“I may be an idiot but I’m not blind, off you go, don’t worry about me, eh? I appreciate the concern, but I’d rather you have fun,” I say, “Go on, I’ll create a distraction if you like.”

“So long as it isn’t mopping the floor with Card, again, you’re on,” she says, grinning.

“That’s a once a day event, I promise,” I say.

“Come on, you sing that bloody song to us all the time, don’t you remember what it’s called?” I ask. I don’t know why I’m standing here talking to him. if it makes any sense to you please tell me. It’s one of those things you do and you know what a shitty idea it is like eating too much cake and then you go and do it anyway and it feels really good so you go and do it again and again and each time you think okay I shouldn’t do this but just once won’t hurt and soon you do it all the time but it feels so good inside you can’t but you feel really incredibly disgusting because you know you shouldn’t. And that’s what being in love with Titus Card feels like.

“No, I don’t think I ever knew the name. She used to listen to it on her boom box, in her room. Then after she died the boom box just sat in her room. and nobody ever went in there,” he says, his eyes cloudy, “It didn’t occur to me to go and get it and listen to something.”

“Do you remember the words?” I ask. I can’t think of the name of the song, though the melody is familiar. 

“No, just the music, de deah dah, de deah dah, lada da lada da lada,” he sings, softly, his soft cold voice getting closer to my ear as he leans against me.

And I figure if I am going to love him for the rest of my life I might as well kiss him tonight.

“Hi,” I say, going over to Wendy. This is stupid. I’ve barely talked to her. why did I even listen to Leavitt?

“Hi,” she says, smiling a little shyly.

“So, ah, how do you feel about the tests tomorrow?” I ask, sort of leaning against the wall trying to look cool and not like I want to run away.

“Did you come over here because you want to kiss me?” she asks.

“Yeah,” I say, stupidly.

“Then why don’t you?” she asks, putting her hands on her hips and cocking her head.

“Okay,” I say. and then I do.

“So, please tell me more about Jesus---”

“If you’re trying to distract us from the cadets snogging they think inconspicuously by the bathrooms, you can stop at any point,” Harris says tiredly as he and Thorn and the Chaplain stand by the buffet of sweets. Half the biscuits and cookies and a dozen packets of milk are gone, most likely somewhere on Titus’ person but Tom would know she’s inspecting him right now.

“Okay, good, sorry, sir,” I say, wincing a little.

“Is that why you---” the chaplain looks hurt.

“Yes, sir, sorry, just trying to help,” I say, apologetically. After not getting thrown out for cleaning the gym with Card’s face, I’m honestly feeling pretty confident.

“Don’t worry about it, I don’t honestly care about their studies in human biology,” Harris says, craning his neck a little to watch Liesel and Wendy make out behind me. At least, that was what was happening last time I looked. “It’s better than other things they could be doing.”

“Like making improvised explosives out of cleaning supplies,” Thorne supplies.

“Yeah, at least now they’re occupied,” Harris says, still watching.

“Yes, if Tom distracts Card this much, we need to get them assigned together, then maybe the universe won’t come to an end,” Thorne says.

“Sir?” I ask.

“Oh, don’t you know, Leavitt? It’s the coming of the beast, soon the rider will come, riding a pale horse. As the seven monsters rise from the sea. And then the Beast will rise up and claim his followers with his mark upon their forehead. And they will ravage this land,” Thorne says, completely seriously.

“What?” the chaplain says.

“Revelation, you should read it, Father,” Thorn says.

“Sir, isn’t Jesus supposed to stop that?” I ask, “I’m not distracting from snogging now I am just curious about Jesus.”

“Oh my god,” the Chaplain says.

“Not God, Jesus,” Harris says, helpfully.

“No, only the three prophets can slay the beast,” Thorne explains, “But they also will be slain.”

“Okay---that is not actually what it says---sort of,” the chaplain says, to Thorn then to me.

“Thank you, sir, I was relying on Jesus to save us, good to know he’s on that---sir why don’t you care about snogging?” I ask Harris.

“Yes, Jesus is on that. Jesus and Thorn are totally on that,” the chaplain says, dryly.

“Because, I was once a young person so I am not going to hinder the biological research of young people, in fact, as I said, I think it’s better than what they could be doing---Ebbel on the other hand is against the studies in human anatomy and oh damn there he is,” Harris says.

“You’re spending the night in the brig Card---” the man who would soon be dead, says, pulling me from the bliss of the arms of the goddess of beauty and light, my Adonia, my everything, her sweet scent filling me, my mouth my lips caressing her, my eyes seeing nothing but her skin her taste filling my tongue as I explored every inch of her with every available bit of flesh. Which is admittedly not a lot since I was fully clothed but I was working on it god damn it.

“Sir, I kissed him,” Tom says, as he drags me from her.

“I asked you,” I say, quietly, as he shoves us apart.

“Believe me, I blame him, but for talking back, go to detention duties, now,” he says, to Tom, who locks eyes with me before leaving.

Okay, so Ebbel wants to die to night. can do.

“Why did he do that? Does he want to die?” Thorn moans.

“They’re just kids,” Harris says.

“How long have they been at it?” Wilde asks him, annoyed.

“About ten minutes, I’m amazed Card didn’t need air,” Harris says, looking at his watch. “That’s really impressive.”

“The girls have some stamina over there as well, 10 min 37 seconds without a breath—oh he got them too, damn,” the chaplain says.

“Were you seriously timing it?” Wilde asks.

“I don’t pretend to have a life,” Harris says, holding up his arms innocently.

“I leave you to watch them for ten minutes,” Wilde says, shaking her head.

“Hey, he didn’t hit anybody,” Harris says, pointing at me.

“Keep it that way, Leavitt,” she growls.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say.

She wouldn’t love me if I killed him. If she knew I killed him. she wouldn’t love me. damn it. I saw her. I saw her face. when asked about my sister, sympathy love. Not the eyes you look on a murderer on, oh no. no. never. And I want her love. HE isn’t worth her love. The joy of it. the joy of the kill, that isn’t worth her love. I’m cleverer than half them put together, I know that. so like Kip says, use my cleverness to be the man she loves. Do that. it’s what I want. That and murder but I can’t have both, not purely. There will always be that between us, and it wouldn’t be pure or true. and I want it like that. I want what she said last night. I want to be sixteen, to have a life, to have fun, to get drunk and make out in back rooms and laugh at things that aren’t funny---I can try to be one of them. I can do it, I could become one of them, I can try anyway. Just for a while. While I love her. So I have to try.

“Ma’am,” I say, going up to Wilde.

“Yes, Card?” she asks, a bit amused I think she almost definitely saw me and Tom.

“Cadet Card reports: may I have a word in private ma’am?” I ask, avoiding staring at Harris and the Chaplain and Thorn.

“Yes,” she says, motioning for me to follow her a few feet away, “What is it?”

“Ma’am, you told me to tell you the next time I feel the need to antagonize somebody,” I say, taking a deep breath. Just do it just say it. “Well, I am, so I’d like it if you could send me to the Northern Rim as quickly as was convenient, so I can properly antagonize the enemy. I can complete the rest of training when I get back, it’s been done before in times of great need I’ve read about it.”

“Of course you have---and to be clear the time of great need is you feeling the need to antagonize somebody?” she asks, amused. God damn it. I thought she understood me. Nobody does. My brain burns.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say, hoping she’ll see the pleading in my eyes.

“You’ll have to wait till training is over, but then we’ll be happy to oblige, write a memorandum about it once you’re out of the brig,” she says, sealing our fates.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say, coldly, “Good evening, ma’am.”

So he dies.

“Brig?” Liesel asks me, an odd smile on her face.

“Yes,” I say, an odd look on my face.

“Me too,” she says, and we fist bump right before Ebbel takes both our shoulders to steer us to the door.

Okay, so my daughter is a lesbian---all the men in the universe considered that is really okay with me. I’ll have to find a completely unobtrusive way to tell her  I don’t care since I’m pretty sure she’s been avoiding the topic on the messages, so I want to allay her fears. But that won’t happen tonight because she’s in the brig, poor thing. Only for kissing as well, that’s pretty rotten. Well, she’d gotten her kiss, if she takes after me she’ll be more than happy with that.

“Card is a trip,” Wilde says.

“What?” I ask, waking from my thoughts.

“Asking me to ship him off so he can antagonize the enemy, I think he means it as well,” she says.

“Good----was that his idea? Let’s do that, then, see what they make of him,” Thorn says, eagerly.

“Yes, he’s sixteen years old, we actually can’t do that, as in without emergency orders it’s illegal to do that,” she says.

“How do we get these emergency orders?” Thorne asks.

“We don’t, there isn’t imminent danger to the planet.”

“YES THERE IS!!!”

Chapter 6

I enjoy the killing. Now you think I’m horrible don’t you? You’re going on with morbid fascination, but you demonize me. Oh, you condemn me, but you’re going to go. See what happens. Go on because you like the heroes of this piece. The Leavitts and the Toms and the Kips and the Harrises, you like all them, so that’s why you say you go on. But that’s not why. You go on because of me. because you---you’re no better than me. you think you are, you believe you are. You say you don’t have the evil in you that I do. but let me say this. Just this.

In defense of murderers.

How many times have you cried? Probably a good many. How many times has somebody bullied you, humiliated you, mocked you, violated you, shamed you, burned you, outed you, cursed you----you’re in the tens, probably twenties. If you’re lucky, a member or two of your family hasn’t done all these things, hell, probably more than once. Let alone total strangers, the boy who knocked your new tablet out of your hands. The girl who broke your heart. the man who stole your girlfriend. The boy who stood you up. The boss who mocked you. the co worker who cheated you. the teacher who humiliated you. go on, you’ve got dozens more I know it. hopefully it only happened once, we won’t go into the fathers who abandoned you the mothers who beat you, the parents who starved you, the siblings you stole from you---we can find dozens of those as well. you’ve probably got ten, twenty of these people lined up in your mind now. They’re awful people, bullies, abusers, but hopefully you’ve moved on, you don’t see those people again. the Ebbels of this world. Rude. Crass. Impossible to deal with. mocking. Making life a misery so long as you’re in in it with them. They’re rotten aren’t they, you agree? Yes, I thought you might.

Well, let me tell you something. They go on. you don’t see them again, but they’re off, making life miserable for somebody else. bBut that’s just a little bit of pain, you say, I’m not dead, they just hurt me, wounded me, I’m still here or we wouldn’t be talking, eh? Yes, yes you’re still here. 

And I’m still here.

And don’t think that---I’m not defending myself in that I’m murdering the bully, the abuser. Oh, no, I’d never sink so low. I am, in this instance. But it would be just as sweet an act as if I were killing Leavitt, or Tsegi, or Peter, or any of them.

You see, there are many evil things in this world. Many, many evil people. Think about it, you’ve made somebody cry at some point, haven’t you? Been crueler than you might have been? Come on, own up, a harsh word here or there. for a moment, we’ve all been the Ebbel. I know I have. Many times.

Maybe but that’s not evil you say. that doesn’t make you evil. No, no it doesn’t. it makes you a bit of evil, though you’re a part of it. you, for however brief a time, you were somebody’s Ebbel. You were somebody’s bully, their broken heart, their loneliness. You added evil to this world, you didn’t subtract.

Nor do I. Oh, I must certainly add. I am evil as well. as I said, there are evil things in this world. I am one of them. I give that to you freely.

But, you see, in my evil, I am quick. I am neat. I am clean. Yes, I plan to torture him. Yes, I plan to take his life. And I will. I have taken life before. I stared into my sister’s eyes as she died, she did not deserve that, I admit. I was evil. I destroyed her. but I am quick. I torture, I have my fun, then I end you. I send you on to the next adventure. The afterlife---hailed as so beautiful. Well, my victims get to find out. I don’t make them live with wounds, nightmares, fears, hate, anxiety. 

No.

I set them free. 

I do my deed, indulge my vice, and I let them go on, as they would have anyway, a bit sooner with my interference, I grant you, but I don’t stop them. I don’t give them wounds to carry, scars, mental or physical, loneliness, torture. My bit of torture, under an hour, we’re done, you’re free to go. I’ve had my fun. It’s over. the same can’t be said of bullies, abusers, the Ebbels of this universe, their scars, you’ll be crying at therapists years later, sobbing into your pillow at night retelling stories when you’re drunk and bored, about how this happened and that’s why you’re drunk, that’s why you’re a bore, that’s why you’re not anything, that’s why you lurk in the shadows reading other’s tales, analyzing you call it---judging us.

So in defense of murders: yes we are evil, we are evil, yes we destroy. 

But we are quick about it. we are honest about wanting to destroy something. 

We don’t pretend to be something we are not. Our crime is not hidden under the guise of good intentions or authority or accident or---love.

 It›s there, unashamedly, for all to see. Pure, unadulterated. Evil. So join me. you know, you›re already here. So come on anyway. it doesn›t make a difference when you look at it like that, does it?

So join me, let’s go have some fun, we’ve evil to do together. go on for me. not for them. for me, because I tell you the truth. I give it all to you.

Let’s go.

Chapter 7

“C

ard, what are you doing? You’re supposed to be in the brig,” Ebbel says, turning quickly as he sees me approaching him. We are outside the brig. He’s going back to his rooms now, from checking up on us. He’ll never make it.

“I know. But I’ve come here to kill you, then I’ll go straight back,” I say, stopping a few feet away. give him good running distance make this fun.

“What?” he asks, staring at me.

“Just that, you shall be dead soon,” I say, cocking my head a little as I look around. Not knives, I don’t feel like wallowing in the blood tonight and I can already explain bruises from the fight with Leavitt. And Card School of Asphyxiation went oh so very well.

“What the hell are you talking about? How did you get out here?” he asks, approaching me.

I’m on him in a flash, and we are on the ground, struggling. His weight brings us down. and I’m letting him pummel me, as I feel systematically for the tubes to his oxygen tank. They are secured down so this sort of thing doesn’t happen but I can undo that.

He shoves me into the cement and I roll away, off the path and into the grass. He reaches for my boot, but I bring it up to kick his face. He falls back, just remembering his radio to call for help.

“Looking for this?” I ask, standing panting, holding his earpiece.

“Just give me that, Card,” he’s looking in my eyes, he’s seeing now, now he’s finally realizing what I am.

“Sure,” I say, charging him again. I have every intention of leaving it on his body. I curl it into my chest, though as we collide, again I let his weight carry us to the ground, which is far more painful for him at his size and age than it is for me.

“Card just calm down, we don’t----they’re going to catch you,” he says, his strength is waning. He’s out of shape, tired, old, I’m none of those things, I’m ready. I planned this, he didn’t. He thought he was going to bed in a few minutes. Well, he’ll sleep soon.

“I doubt that,” I say, crawling out from under him, clawing his face, he cries out, his hands racking my SBUs, getting a hold and trying to pull me back down as I work my way around him.

“Why are you doing this?” he asks, managing to get a hold and battering my head into the ground.

“Entertainment,” I say, breaking free of his grip by smashing his knuckles into the paved path.

“What?” he says, staring at me, aghast.

“Boredom,” I say, darting around behind him last time now the oxygen tubes are free.

“Is that all people are to you?” he asks, stopping even going after me and staring into my eyes to see the emptiness there.

“It’s all I was to you,” I say, and then I run into him again. this time, I let my hands hook the tubes and twist around his neck. One. Last time.

He realizes what I am doing, of course, and tries to work his fingers underneath the oxygen tubing, instead of just going for my eyes with his thumbs, which is what I would have done. He has stronger hands than, I though, so perhaps his reasoning is sound in that he could break the tubs. As it is, it doesn’t work, not in time anyway. He does do significant damage to the plastic, but it does more significant damage to his trachea. It is crushed and he dies rather quickly after that.

I take a deep breath, using a hand to further the damage crushing down as I regain my composure and prepare for the night ahead. Now that the fun’s over, I get to dispose of the body.

I check my tablet for messages but of course there are none. My poor Liesel got herself in the brig. That was really rotten of Ebbel, they are just kids. Stupid kids who don’t need to be kissing, maybe, but they are going to and it wasn’t as though they were on duty.

 I lie down on the bed. it›s late, well past midnight. Hopefully we don›t have any shenanigans in the morning. I›m glad it›ll be Sunday, just chapel services, milling about drilling, and then Monday we get to send them off to testing. I wonder how Liesel will do, well, of course, but what will she want to do? I haven›t asked her, but she also hasn›t specifically mentioned the testing either. I›ll have to prod her to see, I want to know, and anyway tomorrow is Monday so they›ll be wandering about just messing with their tablets. That will work out, I suppose. I am bone tired, all of a sudden. Herding the small noisy annoying people about is exhausting, funny I still think of them like that when my own flesh is one of them. Well, she isn’t annoying. Nor is Leavitt. Nor was that one who got chopped up. I close my eyes, it will feel good to just sleep.

I lay face down on my cot, trying not to breath too much and wishing for sleep to come. Every moment lying here is remembering Ginny is dead and wishing I were drunk so I could forget. And yet I don’t because I know that’s the last thing she’d want me to do right now. But it hurts. And I want the hurt to stop. 

Getting drunk is one step short of just hanging myself, so the problem is every time I talk myself round from getting drunk I start thinking about the ways I could kill myself. 

Then I think about how very out of here I would be if anybody knew I was this suicidal. And then I think about how lucky I am to be here when I am this suicidal. 

And then I think about how much I want to be happy and not feel like this and how good I was doing when the girl kissed me and everything was seeming okay and then the bastards had to go and murder my sister and life could get okay for me at anytime now. 

Except I’m a firm believer in making your life okay but the thing is right now I am just too damn tired. Except the problem is I’m too tired to sleep too. So I just lie here wishing for the absolution that is sleep.

I am very bored and lonely with both Liesel and that idiot Titus in the brig. Granted, that idiot Titus is usually in the brig, but even so. 

Peter gone. 

Terrel turns out to be a psychopath. 

Tsegi dead and cut up. 

Tim dead and baked. 

My world is so weird right now. It doesn’t even feel real. I miss them, in a way. Yet in another way I’m so passive to them being gone, it scares me. Like I didn’t want them gone, but there is this surrealness to my feeling, like yes they were here, now they aren’t. 

So now they just aren’t here. Them actually being gone or having died horribly doesn’t feel like it makes a difference. Yet it does. Just like not having my parents makes a difference, yet I can’t do anything about that or wonder because it’s over. and they’re dead. And I’m still here. I’d rather they were here, just like I’d rather have parents and a home. but they aren’t and I don’t. so I just sort of go on, a bit lonely, but just sort of resigned. I’d say it’s because I’m Forgotten, but Peter isn’t like that, Darla isn’t like that she’s crying her eyes out, has every night since they took Terrel away. I don’t think I’d cry my eyes out if they took Titus away. that would probably be for the best, actually, he’s a bit crazy. But I still love him.

I lie down to sleep and wonder what fresh hells we shall awake to. I wonder if it’s always been like this and I didn’t notice. If things have always been corrupt, evil, decaying. And now my eyes are just open. Or if things really have changed for the worse and we are slowly slipping to our deaths and most of them don’t know it.

Then I wonder about Card. He could save us if he wanted to. He’s cleverer than all of us put together, he knows it damn it that’s why he’s so annoying. But he could save us—or is that all a façade to cover up that he is actually Satan? I really don’t think Satan would be so obvious, but apparently it’s not obvious to everyone otherwise somebody with less control or more courage would have shot him in the head by now. The thing is, he’s a really horrible person, but it would take a horrible person to defeat the devil, wouldn’t it? Could good really conquer evil? I don’t think so.

I think evil in some way must conquer evil. Because to be truly good, you must have a heart, a soul, and to do the monstrous things we must to wipe out evil , we cannot have a soul. So I look at the soulless. And I wonder which are the redeemers and which damn us? And how do we tell which? And do they choose what they become, what separates them in their brains that small fraction of what we are that makes us either good or---evil? Or do we even know? I doubt if they know. They don’t know what makes them good or evil that I’m sure of. They think they’re just like us. Or close enough, but they’re not, they’re very different. And only time will tell how.

Chapter 8

“H

ow’d you sleep last night?” Tom asks, as we walk to the laundry, our mesh laundry bags slung over our shoulders.

“Quite well, thank you, and you?” I ask. The brig is always nice and peaceful. Especially after a good murder.

“Fine,” she says, flatly. Rather flat after our kiss last night. Then again, she could have gotten in trouble as well.

“Did they get you in trouble last night?” I ask.

“No, the MTIs assured me it was your fault,” she says, calmly.

“Right, then,” I say, shrugging, “Will you kiss me again? Only I quite liked it.”

“Shhh---” she hisses, looking around, “Not now.”

“Oh why not there’s nobody----Kip go away,” I say, with a groan, seeing him and Leavitt come around the corner with laundry bags.

“You’re supposed to address me as sir or something,” Kip says, not at all concerned, as they come upon us.

“Good Morning, sir, where’ve you been?” Tom asks, politely.

“We’ve been collecting laundry from the MTIs, apparently we have to do it,” Leavitt says, holding two bags of laundry over his shoulders, “Part of the next phase of training.”

“Oh, lovely,” Tom says, offering to take one.

“And apparently I have to supervise you,” Kip says, “Come on, then, at least gets me out of the computer room.”

“Right,” I say. No kisses for Titus. Okay fine I can live with that. It isn’t so very fair. But I can live with it.

“I remember reading that in our OCSMAN,” Tom says, nodding to Leavitt, “We’ll get Liesel to help us as well, then we’ll be done in no time---and, who’s Coruscant’s leader now that Tyrell is gone?”

“I don’t know,” Leavitt says, “They didn’t have a change of command ceremony---I guess that would be in poor taste.”

“They just didn’t appoint one,” I explain, since I am apparently the only one who’d memorized the OCSMAN, I am going to forget it soon, though, it hasn’t been all that helpful so far as brain space went.

“Why do you have to watch us?” Tom asks Kip.

“The MTIs are short handed, Ebbel decided not to report for duty this morning, not that you heard that from me,” Kip says.

“Of course not,” I say. I already knew.

“We shall have to iron their things, I suppose---I’m rotten at ironing,” Leavitt says, as we walk into the laundry room. it’s hot, as usual, and a few washing machines churn gently.

“Titus isn’t, he can do that bit, and I’m good at rolling things so is Liesel,” Tom says, going to an empty washer.

“Oh, thanks,” I say, teasingly, tossing my SBUs, grass stained and a bit bloody from murdering Ebbel last night, into a washer. I drop in a packet of soap and turn it on.

“Well you are, you get it nice and neat,” Tom says, sitting on top of her washer as Leavitt fiddles with his. He sighs, the one he picked isn’t working, he goes to look for another empty one. He doesn’t find an empty one.

“It smells in here,” Kip says, leaning by the door and looking around lazily, “Aren’t you guys supposed to clean in here?”

“I did just the other night,” I say, opening a washer. The smell hits me before the sight does. For a half a second, I think it’s just crumpled up clothes and SBUs. Then I realize it isn’t. It so isn’t. 

Leavitt staggers away from the washer, pointing. Kip walks over to look and then leaps away as well, swearing. I hop up and go over, a horrible, smell is coming from the washing machine. A dead smell.

A body that has been put in the washing machine overnight looks surprisingly purple, a variety of bodily fluids remain in the tub, tongue hangs out, and interestingly enough what is left of eyes remain open.

There, now that’s something we both know.

“Oh, my---oh my god---who---what,” Kip and Leavitt are leaning against the wall hugging each other. I’m trying to summon up the courage to go back and look. Titus is leaning over the washing machine staring at it.

“Who is it?” I ask him.

“The SBUs are mostly intact and stuck with suds from the attempt the machine made to wash its rather hefty payload---skin lacerations appear to be from the agitator---oh sorry it’s Ebbel,” Titus says, looking back up at us.

“We----we---we need to do something,” Kip stutters, still not moving.

“That is---oh my god that is really sick who? Why---?” Leavitt finally speaks, doubling over and looking like he’s trying not to vomit.

“I’m just pushing the emergency button,” I say, going over.

“Oh—nobody else wants to try to revive him or something? Okay,” Titus says, still looking in the machine.

“Revive---he is so not alive,” Kip chokes out.

“No, but we could haul him out and have a look at him before we realized that,” Titus says, hopefully.

“No---Titus I know how much you like dead things but no,” I say, going over to drag him away, “Just don’t touch anything.”

“Okay, let’s just get somebody,” Leavitt says, pushing the intercom button by the door. Needless to say it doesn’t work.

“Let’s just look---oh please Tom?” Titus says as I drag him bodily away. Then he notices Leavitt and Kip basically cowering in a corner. “It’s not like the cadaver can hurt you. It’s dead.”

“I’d sooner not be near it,” Leavitt says, backing towards the door, “Let’s just go and get someone.”

“Me neither that’s why I didn’t volunteer for front lines,” Kip says.

“Well I did; it’s interesting. He’s already dead,” Titus reasons.

“We’re still not touching it---I’ll go running with you later tonight Titus we can poke at dead things with sticks then not right now,” I say, succeeding in getting far enough away to try the intercom button myself. It doesn’t work for me either but it felt worth the try.

“Really? So long as we’re in the woods in the dark can we canoodle as well as poke at dead things?” he asks, hopefully, completely distracted from the body by now.

“We’ll see, now, can you run very quickly and go and get Wilde or somebody competent?” I ask, pushing him towards the door.

“As I’m not afraid of it and the rest of you are why don’t I stay and Leavitt go?” Titus asks, not really leaving.

“Because you’d poke at it,” I say, trying to push him out the door.

“And I’m in charge I say you’re going to get someone,” Kip speaks up.

“And I don’t want to leave him alone with you, I think that’d be rotten to do to somebody who’s alive let alone dead,” Leavitt says.

“Okay, I’m going to kill you and poke your body just for that forget chopping your legs off----”

“TITUS,” I say, pushing him out the door before he and Leavitt can start fighting again, “Go and get help, please? For me?”

“All right then----you guys had better not be doing this so you can poke at it without me---”

“We’re not.”

“Believe us we’re not.”

“We promise.”

Titus looks suspiciously at all of us then he goes.

“You could’ve gone with him,” Kip says to me, as I lean against the door. He looks very green and ill in general.

“Ah, call me paranoid but after all the weird stuff that’s happened around here I felt like if I left it might disappear,” I say, shrugging.

“Oh, that’s why I’m staying as well---God the smell’s awful in here,” Kip says.

“It isn’t his fault,” Leavitt says, a little sadly, going to stand by the washing machine, “That’s what happens when things die. Titus was right, we shouldn’t be afraid of him.”

“Please don’t say things like ‘Titus is right’ when he might be in earshot, it isn’t good for him,” I say.

“Thank you Leavitt, I heard it anyway, Tom---here, putting jelly under your nose helps with the smell,” Titus says, returning with a little pot of petroleum jelly in one hand.

“WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE???” we all three cry.

“Man, there is a body in the washing machine I truly think we should be doing something,” Kip groans, as Leavitt and I accept the jelly.

“I know, but it occurred me as all of you were not fond of the smell you might want this,” he says, helpfully, “And I saw Wilde coming towards the building she’ll be up in a minute.”

“Good morning---oh my god what is that smell and why does Titus look so happy?” Liesel asks, walking in with her bag of laundry then stopping in her tracks.

“Two questions one answer: there’s a body in one of the machines,” Titus says, pointing.

“We really shouldn’t be telling people I think that’s in a procedure manual someplace---” Kip groans, accepting Titus’ offer of jelly anyway.

“What---whose?” Liesel asks, aghast.

“Ebbel we think---Titus thinks,” I say, stopping Titus from going back over to look at it.

“Yeah, it’s Ebbel,” Leavitt says, leaning over the drum and looking in, with a mixture of sadness and disgust on his smooth, sad face. He leans against the machine quietly, like a dog patiently watching its ailing master, unsure of quite what’s going on but knowing that being there is all it can do. I rather liked him, then, standing there like that. Why couldn’t I love him and not the sociopath who wanted to poke the body and see what fluids came out or whatever he wanted to do to it?

“Yeah, and they won’t let me poke him and see what fluids come out, come Liesel, let’s haul him out of there before Wilde gets up here,” Titus says, motioning for her to come and help him.

“No, that’s horrible—what is it with you and dead things?” she asks, “Shouldn’t we get someone?”

“We’ve done that one,” Kip says, “And how do you know he likes dead things? Why does he like dead things?”

“Whenever we’re out running in the woods he runs faster than everyone else, not just because he’s competitive but also because he wants to reach the end first and have lots of time to walk around and find dead things to fuss with,” I explain, “And yes, Liesel, let’s go get help, Leavitt and Kip can stay here and stop him from actually touching it.”

“Yes, let’s, oh Titus don’t touch it you’ll get your DNA on it and then they might suspect you,” Liesel reasons.

“But you’ve all seen me touch it so you’d know that’s what happened, come on, let’s have a go---how many opportunities do you get to poke at a dead human body?” Titus pleads, like a petulant child being denied a favorite toy.

“Sgt. Kip how are things---what is that smell?” Wilde walks in and stops dead in her tracks.

“Ma’am MSgt. Ebbel’s in the washing machine,” Kip says, really quickly.

“Okay,” she says, slowly, looking at all of us, “I’m going to assume he isn’t alive.”

“No, ma’am and I was going to go and get you or somebody other than Harris but I decided to secure the location by staying here even though I’m afraid of it and we tried to send Card but he doesn’t want to go because he wants to poke at it,” Kip says, all in a rush.

“This is really bad, that made perfect sense---okay, Kip, I will secure the location, the cadets will remain here with me and somebody other than Card because he’s enjoying it too much and uses too many long words---will tell me what’s happened,” Wilde says, turning to us. we’ve lined up appropriately and are standing at attention. “Let’s see who’s voice am I not sick of hearing---none of you okay---Leavitt, what happened?”

“Ma’am, I just came in and opened the machine, to do the washing, and there he was,” Leavitt says, “So, my prints are on it, ma’am, because I was opening it, and we’ve all been in and out of the room and the cabinets.”

“Yes, you would be, all right, thank you, Leavitt, we’ll need all of you to stay here until IA gets here, then they should release you, was Kip here the whole time?” she asks.

“Yes, ma’am,” he says, nodding.

“All right, good, Card?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he asks.

“Give me some of that jelly and don’t tell me how you know that it works,” she says, holding out her hand for the jar.

“Ma’am, I wasn’t planning on it.”

Chapter 9

“A

ll right, sit down, in a circle, join hands---”

“Sir, how is this flight training?”

“Do you see a prop and wings on this SBU? Huh? How about a harp? No, Card, I don’t think so. I’M NOT FLIGHT TRAINED, I am not qualified to do this, I’ve got no idea how to do this, so we’re sitting in a circle chanting and talking about life and shit,” Harris growls at Titus, who sits innocently next to me holding my hand. He got that instruction very quickly. Liesel is on my other side, Logan on his other side holding hands with Harris. Leavitt is in between Liesel and Harris. We are all holding hands awkwardly.

“Yes, sir,” Titus says, “Only, sir, I quite like flight training—”

“We all know that, Ebbel, prior to his unfortunate demise, was trying to discover how you had more hours on the flight simulators than we’ve given you hours to practice, but that’s beside the point, today we are having this meeting because you are all doing testing for jobs tomorrow and all of you were supposed to get on the simulators this afternoon but the only person with the code to get in other than Titus---”

“Sir, since you know I have why can’t we----”

“Because Card, the thing about the code is you aren’t supposed to use it if it hasn’t been given to you---”

“Sir, it was given to me by God---”

“Yes, you’re very funny, going on, you can’t use it if hasn’t been given to you by your senior officer and as I said the only person other than Titus on this base to have the code got eaten by a washing machine so we can’t go in there till they unlock tomorrow morning so we are sitting here, is that clear?” Harris asks, annoyed. He’s really not cut out for caring for large groups of teenagers. I don’t really blame him, though, we are annoying. Mostly Titus, but we all have our moments.

“Sir, we could just use the practice, I’m no good at the things,” Logan says, sadly.

“I understand King, but nobody else is even flight certified, and you have to be flight certified to unlock the room,” Harris explains, a bit kinder.

“Sir, isn’t Captain Thorn flight certified? I know he isn’t here officially, but mightn’t he let us?” Leavitt asks, hopefully.

“CaptainThorn is not well at the moment,” Harris says, “He took ill after the discovery of Ebbel’s body.”

“How so?” Liesel asks.

“I don’t know,” Harris says, kindly, looking away from her a bit almost like he does know.

“Sir, I do,” Card says.

“Why don’t you tell us?” Harris asks, more as though he’s accepting the inevitable than giving permission.

“Sir, when we were all waiting for the IA to show up to question us about Ebbel’s body, Captain Thorn came in, discovered that he was dead and took ill,” Titus says, helpfully.

“In what way?” Logan asks.

“In the way that he fell to the floor at Titus’ feet, begging him to ‘save us from eternal damnation by preventing the fall of the universe, please you’re the only one quit saluting goddamn it’, and clinging to his legs,” I explain.

“And sobbing,” Titus says.

“I missed that, where was I?” Leavitt asks.

“You and Stowe were doing the interviews,” I explain.

“Why does he think you are going to save the universe?” Harris asks.

“We don’t know,” Titus says.

“But we think it has to do with Sgt. Ebbel being eaten by a washing machine,” I say.

“Okay, moving on---we’re supposed to be---doing something to do with flying,” Harris says, taking a deep breath, “All right, which ones of you actually want to be pilots?”

“Sir, I do,” Titus says, immediately. The rest of us just shrug.

“Everyone knew that, Card---okay, let’s just go in a circle, King what job do you want to get?” Harris asks.

“Sir, I want to do something with mechanics or computers, I’m rot at thinking on my feet and marching and such,” Logan says, “That’s what I went to university for. And I know I’m no good at flying.”

“Okay, sounds reasonable. Shouldn’t matter if you don’t get good scores on the flight test, then,” Harris says, reassuringly, “Tom, what about you?”

“It doesn’t much matter, sir,” I say, shrugging, “A job’s a job. I’ve been here my whole life, and I’m still here doing the marching and saluting and all that anyway. nothing’s much different. I’ll be all right doing whatever.”

“That’s a bit defeatist, surely there’s something you like better than everything else? Even a bit?” Harris asks, frowning.

“I don’t mind flying, well, I like gunning better than flying, and I’d hate to be the gunner unless I had a really good pilot.” Like Titus. eH’s amazing. I wouldn’t mind flying with him. But I would have to trust my pilot and I don’t trust people.

“Fair enough,” Harris says, “Card, what about you?”

“Sir, I’m going to be a pilot, next, Stowe? Leavitt?” Titus asks, politely turning to Liesel.

“Wait, wait---dare I ask how you are so certain? Or is this like you having the code to the simulators and Thorn thinking you control the universe--- I’d rather not know and we’d probably both be court martialed for knowing?” Harris asks, dryly.

“Sir, this one is simpler, I’m just going to fail all the other tests,” Titus says.

“But why?” I ask.

“You do realize that isn’t going to work they all know you’re bloody clever you tell us often enough,” Leavitt says.

“Because, I don’t want to do anything else and it will work, Quentin, because I will fail and they can’t make me be clever, I know, my horrible brothers used to do it all the time to get out of things except they are actually stupid,” Titus says, resolutely.

“I’m with Leavitt, I really don’t think they’ll accept that,” Harris says.

“They’ll have to if they have reason to believe I have a traumatic brain injury that impaired my thinking,” Titus says.

“Okay, nobody let Card actually get a traumatic brain injury, I knew I’d regret asking that question---okay, moving on, Stowe,” Harris says, turning back to Liesel expectantly.

“No, that’s not what I meant,” I say, a little quietly.

“I apologize, Tom, what did you mean?” Titus asks, his full attention immediately on me.

“I meant, why do you want to be a pilot so bad?” I ask, “You could do anything else, why that?”

“I like the way it makes me feel, it’s like---it takes my whole brain, and makes every part of it come together, like when you’re angry or happy and all the emotions rush together at once and nothing else can exist there except the feeling,” he says, looking down a little, his voice sort of soft, “I don’t feel like me, for a little while. I feel like somebody---more something else. and I like it.”

“What’s being you feel like?” Harris asks, quietly.

“It’s like---well if say a word, like milk, all of you, for one second, thought of milk, right? I said that word, so then it’s like, it’s there, it’s present and at the forefront of your mind, you envision it you think about what it tastes like, all that---well for me, if I’m here, only a bit of my brain is here, only an eighth of it. the rest is off doing something, whatever else I want, all the time all the things are going on in it and even if I just want to be in one place I can’t, except for flying, then it makes me whole again,” Titus says, “At least, that’s how I think it’s different, anyway---I don’t know precisely I’ve never been anybody but me, and I used to think everyone thought like me, but my mum said they didn’t. that they think more like that.”

“Yeah, yeah we do, one thing at a time,” Harris says, nodding, “So, then flying puts you back together again?”

“I guess,” Titus says.

“I hope you get it, then,” Harris says, kindly.

“Me too,” I say, wondering if there is anything that will make me feel like a real person. anything other than kissing him, that is. Then I feel real, I feel beautiful, I feel like a woman, I feel strong---and all because I feel loved. somebody loves me and holds me and I hate that I want that to make me feel complete. But it does. It is a wonderful part of living and I can’t help but want it.

I want to say that that’s not the only time I feel like that. The other time was when she kissed me last night. and I just pushed it all away and put every part of my mind on her, her body in my arms, her lips on mine. For a different reason than flying, though. flying takes my thoughts, snatches them. with her? with her I don’t feel alone. so I relax and my brain is one as I am not alone for a few minutes. I’m on the only one I’m not different or damaged or weird because she wants me. but I don’t say anything about that. because from my studies of human interactions that might be embarrassing to her so I decide not to publicly proclaim my undying love for her. but I do want her to know. I’ll publicly proclaim it later, but not now, she’s too young it might upset her.

“Stowe, what about you?” Harris asks, because we’ve all gone about a bit quiet.

“I’m like Tom, I don’t much care,” she says, shrugging.

“You must have a preference,” he pries, frowning a little.

“Not really---well I suppose---”

“HARRIS WHY DO YOU HAVE THEM IN SOME SORT OF HIPPIE CIRCLE?” Wilde bursts into the gym and walks past us. 

“MA’AM DO I LOOK FLIGHT TRAINED TO YOU???” Harris says, remarkably loudly for somebody who was conducting a very nice hippie circle.

“Fine just have a logical explanation if somebody else walks through,” she calls.

“That is logical, ma’am,” he informs her.

“Okay, Leavitt, your go,” Liesel says to me, as soon as Wilde leaves the room. Card and Tom are staring at each other when the other wasn’t looking and acting like they weren’t. it is pretty entertaining.

“No, Stowe, you were saying something, when she walked in, go on,” Harris says, quickly, he doesn’t have to though because I am too damn sleep deprived and depressed to articulate human speech.

“Oh, just that I wouldn’t mind doing something with mechanics, I’ve always been rather good at that. and I like staying on the ground,” she says, seeming surprised he wanted to know.

“That’s good---good I mean, makes sense,” Harris says, awkwardly, still unnerved by Wilde’s entrance, no doubt.

“Okay, good, I trust you, make sure they’re running well for me,” Titus says, cheerfully.

“Will do,” Liesel says, smiling a little.

Mechanics? Mechanics is fine, good, yes stay on the ground. That’s fine I suppose, lots of big horrible men in mechanics, I was always afraid of them but maybe she isn’t she doesn’t seem afraid. that would be good. Better than in space. Card is in space. That’s a good thing. Good. I can do this. This is fine, this was a good idea. See, I am capable of making decent decisions that are good for me and my daughter. I can be a good parent, I can do this. Sixteen years too late but I still have a chance I just talked to her that was fine I---

“HARRIS WHAT IS IT YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING???”

“SIR DO I LOOK FLIGHT TRAINED TO YOU??”

Chapter 10

“H

ow bad is he?” Hawking asks from behind me.

“Hey, you,” I say, turning around and giving her a quick kiss, “I didn’t think you’d be in this quickly.”

“After I heard about Ebbel I had to,” she says, wrapping her arms around my waist, “I’m not having anything happen to you.”

“I think I’ll be okay,” I say, leaning against her all the same.

“Well, I’ll just make sure of that, now, how’s James?” she asks.

“He’s in there with the doctor now, they’ve had him on sedatives since he broke after seeing Ebbel’s body,” I say, “He woke up a couple of hours ago.”

“What are they doing?” she asks.

“Oh, he’s holding up the doctor with his own scalpel.”

“What?!”

“It’s Dr. Truth Juice so that’s actually valid. The IA guys just told me to wait here for you and see if you could talk some sense into him, Harris is in there watching over things, the commissioned staff is watching the small noisy people,” I explain.

“Oh, well, that is valid, but what was he saying? Your message just said he was rambling,” she asks.

“His end of the universe thing---he’s told you that one right---”

“Yes—”

“Well it’s fixated on one of the students,” I explain, “He thinks that one of them is either the Beast or the Antichrist or possibly will slay the Beast, he waivers. But he’s convinced this sixteen year old boy is going to destroy the universe.”

“Sixteen---oh god,” she groans, tipping her head back.

“What?” I ask.

“I’ve just remembered---I’m an idiot, okay he had a Project 10,” she says, pointing at the hospital room.

“What?” I ask, “I didn’t---”

“No, nobody knew. he had a son, Project 10, he visited the kid when he could, all that, it was when we were only a couple years in that the kid was born, so pretty young, but even so he was happy, he’d always go back and see him. Finally had a family, he said. Well, the little boy died. stupid accident, running up some stairs or something and hit his head, blood clot went to the heart he was dead in a few days. We were on deployment, James never even got to go to the funeral. He’s never spoken about it since, only reason I know is I was with him when he got the news,” she said, tears almost in her eyes at the pain of her friend.

“Oh, my god, that’s horrible,” I say. I would be devastated if anything happened, happens to Tony. I’m worried now and that’s only because he’s busy and keeps his messages short.

“Yes, it is, thing is---this is the class he would be in---exactly if I’m right he was born in the fall and this is the spring class. I’m sure that this would be it. That’s probably why he’s so off, he doesn’t need to be on planetside duty right now, he said he was going mad, I should’ve realized,” she sighs, angrily.

“It’s okay, just help him now,” I say, squeezing her arm.

“Yeah, all right,” she says, going in.

“Stay away from me---”

“Justh sthm—jucie m’ boy,” the doctor slurs.

“Okay, James, put the scalpel down---”

“No, not until that lunatic gets away from me,” Thorn says, gesturing at the doctor with the scalpel.

“Reilley will get him----what happened to his face?” Hawking asks, noticing the good doctor is lipless.

“Oh, he was the mutilation I told you about, come on doctor,” I say, pinning him against the wall.

“Yeah, he jabbed me the other day and half the IA guys have had it from him so we’re not too sorry about that,” Harris says, glaring at him, as he sits safely on a stool away from the chaos.

“Hey, James, they told me you’ve been feeling bad,” Hawking says, artfully pulling the scalpel from him as he basically collapses into her arms sobbing.

“They won’t listen----we’ll all be killed, we’ll all die they won’t listen to me,” he sobs bitterly.

“Shh, shh, is that what’s upsetting you?” she asks, pulling away so he’ll look at her.

“Yes, yes, I’ve tried to warn them---” he says.

“Okay, then you know we’re all gonna die, right?” she asks.

“Yes,” he says, nodding.

“Okay, so let them. you’ve tried to warn them, now let them die, okay?” she asks.

“Okay,” he says, nodding, “I can do that.”

“Okay, yeah, we’re just going to let them all burn in hell,” she says, “Their choice, you tried to warn ‘em.”

“Okay, thanks, you’re right,” he says.

“Go and get your SBUs on, we’ll get something to eat,” she says, patting him on the back as he goes to the door to the bathroom.

Harris and I are staring at her.

“That is seriously all you had to say?” Harris asks.

“Yeah,” she says.

“I give up,” Harris says, leaving.

“This is going to be hard,” Tim mutters. 

“Shh, we’ll be fine,” I say.

“I just don’t understand---” Logan begins, then breaks off.

“How is it not easy for you to complete that sentence?”

“Titus you promised to be nice!” I hiss.

“Not all day just for breakfast!”

“Titus, we’re your friends, we don’t use however cunning and well thought out verbal jabs on our friends,” I remind him.

“That’s a rule as well?” he sighs.

“Why is he listening to you?” Leavitt asks, suspiciously.

“Wilde says until she gets back or until we both die which ever comes later, I’m Card’s handler,” I explain.

“Which means if she says so I have to spend the night in the brig and I don’t want to anymore we’re going to have new quieter accommodations and I can read my tablet,” Titus pouts. He knows full well I’ll tell on him and he still wants to kiss me I see it in his eyes the sad thing is that only makes me love him more. That and how stupidly childishly thrilled he is by that worn out old tablet Thorn made sure he got. I’m almost positive he’s wearing it under his SBUs right now so that no one steals it and what makes it so cute is nobody on this planet but him actually wants the thing because all you can do is read books on it it’s disabled for everything else and literally everybody else in Space forces has a better one. And he’s so smart and he totally doesn’t realize all that and if it weren’t so sad it would be funny.

“So, to be clear, you admit you’ve been wanting to?” Liesel asks.

“Oh, yeah,” Titus says, nodding, then he turns to me, “I am so bored, please can’t I at least antagonize Leavitt? I’ll probably never see him again and he’s just standing there existing breathing---”

“I can hear you,” Leavitt says, staring at him looking mildly annoyed but too sleep deprived to be properly annoyed.

“No, now why are you bored? You’ve got to epically fail all of these tests were about to take don’t you want to plan that?” I ask, helpfully.

“No I----how did you know I wanted to fail epically?”

“You try to do everything epically it’s endearing---”

“Exhausting,” Liesel supplies.

“Painful,” Leavitt says.

“Confusing,” Logan says.

“I didn’t honestly know you did that,” Tim says.

“But everyone but Tim knows you do that so don’t want to think about doing that with the tests?” I suggest.

“No, I did that last night it honestly wasn’t that hard anyway my nimrod brothers and I used to do it all the time at school so it was really just modifying that---”

“Anybody else wonder if his brothers are actually stupid, or if they’re just normal people because compared to him normal people are stupid?” Liesel asks.

“Yes, I’ve wondered that,” Logan says.

“Oh, no they’re really below bar, like I used to jape them so badly it wasn’t funny---okay, it was funny, but for instance I told one of them, their name isn’t important, that the other had been stealing his cash from where he’d hidden it and I acted like I didn’t know where it was so he goes to check like a simpleton and needless to say now I know where it is I take it and----”

“Wait stop—does this story involve bodily injury to one or both of them?” I ask.

“Three of them, actually, and to me when my mum found out because by then she really just had decided to blame me for everything because apparently, the house NEVER started on fire spontaneously before I learned how to talk,” Titus says, sounding hurt.

“How many times did the house start---” Logan begins.

“Do not, answer that, before we hear about whatever horrible cruel and life threatening but possibly deserved prank you pulled on your siblings, please explain why somebody as smart as you would fail tests at school?” I ask, stopping Titus before he answers.

“We would do it randomly because my oldest brother would do really well so the government came and examined him except he convinced them he’d been cheating so they left but if he hadn’t they were going to lock him up and examine him,” Titus explains.

“Why would they do that? And it’s not like it’s some secret now everyone knows you got like---nothing wrong on all the tests to get in,” I say.

“That’s because if you’re too young and too clever they tend to think you’re a mutant and our mother wanted to preserve us---”

“Okay maybe his family is stupid if this woman actively tried to keep all these kids under the same roof,” Leavitt says.

“See?” Titus points at Leavitt.

“I’m confused,” Logan says.

“Okay---okay I’m done, go on with the story where your house burned down,” I sigh, shaking my head. at least he’s off antagonizing people.

“It didn’t burn down, that’s the thing, it just looked like it was so when the fire people came---”

“Shouldn’t they have gone in by now?” Wilde asks, walking into the control room where I’m monitoring the cadets. Now that Thorn is stable the commissioned staff is more than happy to observe from a distance while I do the actual cadet-herding.

“Yeah, I’m watching them though, look,” I say, pointing at the screen, “They’re laughing and talking. Card’s laughing as well.”

“They all made friends, finally,” she says, leaning against the table next to me, “I didn’t think he’d fit in with them ever.”

“Not with putting guidon’s on roofs---I’d really like to know how he did that---and breaking into IDMT and all that nonsense,” I say, shaking my head, “Do you think it reprogrammed itself to function like a human?”

“No,” she laughs, “I think they got to understand him, that he isn’t half bad if you get past the him being him part.”

“That’s sort of encouraging, about the human race that is. They can still accept somebody like him,” I point out.

“Yeah, poor devil. He’s a rotten thing no mistake, but I feel like he’d be less rotten if he thought there were somebody out there that cared about him,” she says.

“You don’t think there is?” I ask.

“No, I don’t. and now that there might be I don’t think he even knows how to accept that somebody could,” she says.

“That’s sad, probably true, though,” I say, shrugging, “Have they told you anything new about Ebbel?”

“No, still’ve got no idea who or why. It’s bizarre,” she says, “You and I and all the cadets are accounted for, it must be somebody else on base who wandered into the complex. My money’s on Dr. Truth Juice.”

“Oh, really? That would make sense,” I say, nodding, “Certainly is most logical. You know as much grief as we give Thorn, it’s strange, I mean two cadets murdered, and two other institutionalized? Not normal, the most we’ve had is one death in a class, and those’ve been straight up accidents.”

“Don’t encourage it, Hawking’s just got him off the idea---but yes, things are odd around here,” she says.

“Let’s just hope things can be normal for now on,” I say.

She’s right. Just let them die. What does it matter? It doesn’t. I know all die, okay, fine, done, I’ll die. Big deal I was going to anyway. No I’ve tried to help them. but they won’t be saved. So oh well. I certainly did my best. Nobody can say I didn’t. I tried to help them. but they won’t be helped. So we will all die.

These tests are so boring. I know the answers, why wouldn’t I? It’s simple, stupid. I shouldn’t have to do this they know I’m clever they know I can do any job I should get my own volition. But they want to do it this way. So fine, we’ll do it this way.

I glance over at Titus he’s bubbling in answers, into----a dirty acrostic. Of course he is. I wonder how he even got in Space Forces when he’s incapable of doing what he’s told.

I look down at my paper and sigh. I can’t think straight. No wonder, my baby sister is dead, I’ve woken up next to dead bodies and found people stuffed in washing machines and nearly eaten people. How do they expect me to concentrate on this. I’ll probably fail. Good. Maybe then they’ll send me home. Home to what? Just me and my mum now, to stare at each other and think about Ian and Ginny. God I am tired. And there are no severed heads here. And it is actually quiet. I lie my head down on the desk, realizing as I fall asleep that this will totally disqualify me.

Tom and I have both done dozens of these practice things. They’re stupid. I don’t like tests. I’m ready for this bloody training to be over with. Titus is over there rubbing his head and rocking and probably making an acrostic out of the answers. Leavitt looks like he fell asleep. King looks like the only one actually concentrating. He would be he’s normal. He says it’s nice. I look back down at the tablet in front of me and think that that will be nice someday.

Done with my profane acrostic I’m bored again.

I ignore everyone else in the room and focus. This is my arena, there is, running and jumping and climbing on thing a deep breath, relax, and focus.

Mine is tests. And that’s why I’m here that’s why they picked me. so I just need to take a breath, relax, and do this.

Chapter 11

“W

here are they?” Thorn asks, coming into our break room. Wilde and I are pouring over tests, Hawking is drinking a cup of tea and being amused by our sarcastic remarks.

“Taking their flight simulator tests now,” Wilde says, glancing up at him quickly. I do as well, he looks much more himself. He’s shaved and his hair is damp as though he’s showered. His eyes are a bit clearer I think as well.

“Good,” Thorn says, “Did the commissioned staff get a look at the results?”

“Yes, and they printed them for us to keep to remember this wonderful experience by,” I say, handing him a stack.

“Why?” Thorn asks, “Or was this terribly unusual as well?”

“Most of it was typical, except one failed,” Wilde says.

“Let me guess---Card?” Thorn asks.

“Yes, got every single question wrong, commissioned staff were not pleased, they know for a fact he knows the material, his scores on the entrance exams were unprecedented,” I say.

“He probably knows they know,” Thorne says.

“I’m sure he does,” Wilde says, “Ones like him, too clever for their own good.”

“Let me guess, he’s passing the flight test?” Thorn asks.

“Flying colors last time I checked,” I say, nodding, wondering if it’s a good idea to talk so much about Card to him. he seems all right, though, and Wilde sort of nods at me to act normal despite his break down earlier.

“When he was in basic, he was going on about how he would be a pilot. I heard him telling the others. Of course, since he was enlisted, we were all just assuming he meant he’d steal one and stage a revolution,” Thorn shrugs.

“Well, so long as he’s happy, fewer guidons will be on roofs,” Wilde says.

“Yes, did anybody figure out how he was doing that?” Thorne asks.

“No,” we both say.

“Ah well, commissioned staff get to have fun with all of them from here on out, all you guys have to do is help them march places,” Hawking reminds.

“Yes, that will be nice,” I say.

“How did that boy, Leavitt do?” Thorn asks, looking at the tests Wilde and I sorting on the screen on the table.

“He got most all of the questions right up till he fell asleep,” Wilde says, “Which is like really really good getting that many right but he fell asleep part way through so he barely passed.”

“Aw, poor thing,” Thorn says.

“How could you sleep during a test like that?” Hawking asks.

“You really haven’t told her everything that’s gone on around here,” Thorn observes.

“A lot has happened!” Wilde defends herself.

“This kid woke up next to a severed head,” I explain to Hawking.

“Okay, good reason he might have trouble sleeping,” she winces, “And they said a cadet was doing the murders?”

“Yes, he’s been captured now, tried to kill Card and himself,” Thorn explains, “Card recovered quite quickly, however, seems he found it thrilling.”

“He’s not finding the combat test thrilling,” Wilde says, looking at her screen.

“What?” Thorne asks, coming over.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“Requirements for pilot is that they don’t go above a certain heart rate when presented with a variety of disturbing images, as well as during the entire flight test,” Wilde explains, mostly for me, “These are the cadet’s heart rates, they’ve been in for an hour and now they’re being presented with graphic images of either family members or fellow cadets in various states of death and decay.”

“I hated those, you can have an elevated heart rate, just not such that you lose all gross motor skills,” Hawking says, coming over as well, “A resting heart rate is 70-100bpm, about, and elevated is over 100bpm. The cut off for pilots is 130 bpm. “

“Poor King, he’s at 220 bpm,” Wilde says, wincing. That would so be me. “He’s practically having a seizure.”

“Where’s Card? Oh, 74bpm, that fits, classic sociopath,” Thorne says.

“Yeah, it hasn’t changed since he went to bed last night and put on the monitor,” Wilde says, “See Tom’s? Hers has, it was at 75 bpm all night, 80bpm during the day, 95 now,  so it’s elevated but hardly, still obviously sociopathic.”

“Leavitt’s at 110, so he’s still a pilot, just also a normal person,” Hawking says. I glance as Liesel’s, 150bpm, good. she’s not going to be a pilot that’s for the best.

“I don’t get it, though, why does that make Card and Tom sociopaths? Leavitt still has a lower heart rate than King,” I ask, “What’s the difference there?”

“Disassociation, you see, emotions and fear responses are centered in the amygdala. It tells us that we are like other people, giving us empathy. For individuals with a typically developed amygdala you see your buddy get his head blown off, your bpm rises, as your amygdala triggers cortisol to be released in the brain, that’s the stress response, putting you in flight or fight or mode, and adrenaline is triggered, you get the extra energy you need to run and fight and get the hell out of whatever situation you’re in. But as the stressing situation continues something else interesting happens in the upper regions of the brain, and that is disassociation. See Tom and Leavitt’s rates?” Hawking explains, leaning over next to me and pointing to the monitor. 

“When the pictures started, Leavitt jumped from 85 bpm, to 150, then within 2 seconds, back to 110 bpm. Same with Stowe, she went from 90 bpm, to 190 bpm, back down to 150 bpm after 30 seconds. See, elevated heart rate, cortisol, all that isn’t good for the brain long term, so our brains have a defense mechanism, and that’s disassociation, we don’t believe we are ourselves, that’s why in stress situations people describe an ‘out of body’ experience. Your brain is basically telling you that what is happening isn’t actually happening to you, it’s happening to sort of you or brave you or whatever you want to call it. so, when you are removed from the stressful situation, your brain goes back to functioning like normal. That’s all good and it’s healthy, what we are looking for in pilots is people who can disassociate quickly enough to get the job done, because the longer the cortisol and bpm are elevated, the longer you lose fine motor skills and detailed thought that will get you and your wingman out of danger.”

“But why the difference between Stowe and Leavitt?” I ask, “He lowered almost immediately, she took much longer.”

“Prior disassociation, he’s been exposed to similar trauma before, he already had a ‘brave Leavitt’ persona in place, his brain put him there, he’s ready to rock and roll. Stowe hadn’t, her brain had to convince her she’s all right,” Hawking explains.

“So, what makes Card and Tom different, then? I’m still confused,” I ask.

“Their heart rates never rose significantly, Tom’s rose just not much,” Hawking says, tapping on their names on the screen, “Look, these are films of their brain activity at the presentation of the traumatic incident. See that lighter spot at the bottom of Tom’s brainstem? That’s the amygdala saying ‘you should be afraid of this somebody died’---and here’s King’s, it’s all glowing saying ‘oh my god oh my god somebody is dead that could be you oh my god’ and then there’s Card’s. Look, no amygdala involvement, no cortisol released, no adrenaline. That’s actually a very bad thing in a foot soldier, and in fact it’s a bit dangerous for him in combat rolls, because what that means is, his brain has no concept that if he’s seeing people die, people like him, he might die. Tom has some involvement, enough to know ‘somebody died, I might as well’ she may have some empathy as well, but it’s very low. Card has none, he’s not even experiencing stress or adrenaline simply put, his brain is not functioning correctly. But for our purposes, it’s brilliant, because he doesn’t miss a beat he keeps those fine motor skills to keep him and his Spacemen out of danger.”

“Huh, I didn’t know all that, thanks,” I say.

“How long have you been doing these reviews not knowing all this?” Thorn asks.

“I don’t remember,” I say, tapping on Liesel’s to see her brain. A comforting amount of electrical activity in the amygdala. Good. “How does somebody like that function, then? If he doesn’t have that part of his brain working?”

“Learned behaviors, he knows other people are human therefore they must be hungry and cold because he gets hungry and cold, he can create a system of understand it. but he doesn’t have that instant sense of seeing somebody crying and walking up and hugging them.

“Not specifically because he doesn’t care---love is a totally different portion of the brain, we don’t understand how it functions without amygdala involvement, but it has been proven to--- so, he sees his boyfriend or girlfriend crying and his automatic response is ‘what’s wrong?’ or ‘stop’ because he wants to know what is wrong or for them not to be upset, not to walk up and hug and comfort them like you or I would. Now it can be and probably has been learned, he knows his mum is crying, she tells him ‘mummy is crying, she needs a hug’ well next time he’ll probably say ‘do you need a hug?’ but the difference is it’s a learning base, not an emotion triggered reaction.”

“What’s wrong with you?” I ask, staring at Logan, who is crying.

“Those images, Titus, they were awful,” Leavitt says, hugging Logan kindly.

“We knew that was part of it beforehand it’s not like they’re real,” I say to Logan.

“It was s-s—s-till t—t—terrible,” Logan sobs into Leavitt.

“Poor Logan, they were rotten weren’t they? But it’s not true,” Tom says, coming up and patting him.

“It was rather over done,” I say, climbing back into the simulator. I want to go flying again. It’s not really flying I know but it’s as close as I’m going to get for a while and I want to enjoy every minute of it that I can.

“Aww, you okay?” Liesel ask, hugging Logan and giving Leavitt the break, “I know I didn’t like it either.”

“The wh---h---h—ole thing was horrible. I’m no good at flying and I didn’t want to do it I was just hoping that I would crash----and then it would time out b-b—but th---this other sh---ship kept s-s—s-aving me at the l—last minute and it went on and on and then those awful pictures of my whole family and all of you dead,” Logan sobs.

“Oh---you were trying to crash? I thought---never mind, sorry,” I say, trying to deconstruct the override to turn back on the simulator.

“You kept saving me?” Logan asks, looking betrayed.

“I didn’t know! You’re usually incompetent, so it looked normal,” I say, holding up my hands.

“Titus that was nice of you, and good job apologizing to him when you realized it upset him,” Tom says.

“I am not usually incomp—incomp—” Logan still can’t speak clearly.

“Yes, you----you kind of are,” Liesel says.

“Yeah, I’ve been meaning to break it to you but you do actually suck at everything,” Leavitt says.

“Oh---well I was intentionally-- ---this time,” Logan says.

“Right, sorry, then---let’s coordinate, next time, so I know,” I say, leaning out of the simulator, I’m not able to get it working and they’ll be coming for us soon.

“There won’t be a next time, I don’t want to be here, I just hate it, I want to go home,” Logan sobs, as Liesel hugs him.

“Oh me too,” Leavitt says, patting his back.

“You know what I do whenever I feel like that? I try to think of the next good thing I’m going to do,” Liesel says, “Like tonight, we get to go to our dorm rooms, and set those up. It’s only two to a room so that’s way better, and look on the bright side, they sort by job so there’s no way you’ll be anywhere near Titus.”

“Oh, that is true,” Logan says, sniffling a little less, “I’ll get more sleep.”

“I don’t keep you up, and I make your bed,” I say, indignantly.

“No, but you lying there rubbing your head and not sleeping is creepy,” Logan says.

“Yeah, it actually is,” Liesel says.

“You’re nowhere near me,” I say.

“Nor am I but it still is,” Leavitt says.

“Okay, I’m going to disagree on that one I like it because I figure if something happens like a fire he’ll be awake and wake the rest of us up,” Tom says.

I don’t tell her if there were a fire I’d probably just leave and not wake anybody up.

Chapter 12

S o, I actually thought that after waking up next to the severed head of one of my friends, nothing would really affect me so far as roommates, for this next stage of the training. I mean, come on, what could be worse than what I went through? Of course, I found out.

“What are you doing here?” I ask, slowly backing out the door and double checking the room number.

“This is my room, we’re roommates, you see. In the letter it said ‘go to your assigned room which you will be sharing with your roommate for the remainder of training; I should’ve thought that it was a bit obvious,” Titus says, slowly, as he puts his duffel bag at the end of the bunk bed. there is a bunkbed against one wall, desks against the other, a tiny closet, a tinier bathroom, and a little ironing board. The most space I’ve ever had to myself in my life, and I am sharing it with Satan.

“Yes, I did read that---but you’re going to be a pilot. I’m not, I’m rot at flying,” I say, shaking my head, “They sort our rooms by what jobs we’re assigned to and I’m rot at flying.”

“Well, we’ve not actually got our letters yet, we get those after dinner, so we don’t know what job I was assigned to,” he says, “But, since I failed everything but that---it would seem you are a pilot.”

“No, I’m not that good, I hate stressful situations, I’m much better with machines,” I say, still not coming in the room.

“Well, it would seem you are, or they’ve decided to alter my test scores or something odd, but as flying was the only test I passed and therefore qualified for, it would seem you did as well. Even though you fly like a damp marsupial---”

“If I knew what that meant I’d deck you again---”

“You said you knew you were rot----anyway, even though you do have the elegance of a diseased gallinule, qualifying pilots are relatively rare, so if you did qualify based on physiological factors---”

“Wait, wait, speak English for a minute---”

“I was my command of it is just superior to yours---”

“Your command of it is superior to Shakespeare---”

“Agreed I have access to far more words than he did---”

“Going on, Titus, what are you talking about? Either you qualify or you don’t, how could I qualify when I don’t fly half as well as you or Tom?” I ask.

“Physiological factors,” he says.

“What’s that mean?” I ask.

“You’re fit and clever, and you have a high dissociation rate,” he says.

“What’s that mean?” I ask.

“In pilots, they look for people who can, in situations of stress and trauma, immediately calm themselves again, regaining gross motor skills quicker and getting yourself out of danger---you see adrenaline does us a lot of good when we’re running about the woods with sticks and stones, but when we’re operating a million rubles ship sailing through space, not so much, you need clear thinking---so they only draft people who either do not respond to situations of trauma or stress with adrenaline---”

“That would be you---”

“---and people who have a quick rate of disassociation. Disassociation is the brain’s response to a traumatic situations, it’s the brain tricking itself into believing, ‘this isn’t really happening to Leavitt’, so you can calm down in the situation and get yourself out of it,” Titus explains, going to the bottom bunk which I suppose he’s claimed. “So, I’m guessing you’re the latter, as you said I’m probably the former. But you---you’ve been exposed to trauma so your brain is very comfortable shutting off.”

“Yes,” I groan, leaning in the doorway. Damn it Ian. You had to ruin this for me too.

“Flying is fantastic, we get to sail through the stars, the best of the best, the Spacemen that make the space forces what they are. Not a grease monkey or cave dweller, but an actual Spaceman, with a mission and goals and Isylgyns to destroy,” he says, eagerly, “Why are you so upset?”

“I have to spend the next nine weeks rooming with you?” I say, in my obvious voice.

“What that’s it?” he scoffs.

“Most of it,” I say, nodding.

“My brothers survived sixteen years in the same room as me I think you’ll be all right for a couple of months,” he says, going over to his bed to start making it.

“And during that time how many times were they sent to the hospital?” I ask, still not going in the room.

“Ah---just sent or had to stay over night?”

“Let’s keep it manageable and go with had to stay overnight.”

“One hundred and seventy eight.”

“Individually?”

“That was an average of individually.”

“Oh dear God.”

“He doesn’t care about you.”

“I hate so much about who you are.”

“Hello?” I say, coming into my room. Darla is sitting on her bed, it’s already made. I was late coming up because I had to walk Logan to his room and avoid Titus who probably wanted to sneak off and make out somewhere and I really just wanted to get my room set up. We could be starting school tomorrow, I wanted to be ready for inspections.

She doesn’t look up, staring at her tablet. Her eyes are red as though from crying. I wonder if she’s still thinking about Tyrell. Probably. She did seem to love him.

I sigh. She’s already taken the top bunk as well, I rather wanted it. I don’t really want to room with her. She’s generally not the nicest person, and now that her boyfriend tried to kill mine it’s even more awkward.

“I’m glad it didn’t work,” she says.

“What?” I ask, setting my bag down.

“My boyfriend killing yours,” she says.

“Why?” I ask, because she’s not saying it in a good I’m glad he’s alive way. Granted that’s not the sort of thing one would say about Titus anyway.

“Just am,” she says, softly.

“Okay,” I say, beginning to unfold my sheets. It’s going to be a long nine weeks.

“They hate each other,” Wilde observes.

“I don’t see why you didn’t agree to my suggestion,” I say, sitting slumped at the computer monitors. I want a drink, but unfortunately Hawking is in favor of her fiancée’s James-sobriety-thing, so I don’t get one.

“Because we can’t put males with females, it’s against regulation,” she says.

“No, it’s against precedent, which is stupid because they are all sterilized anyway, so why not let them knock themselves out? It’s antiquated, same sex can do the very same thing, gasp shock horror, sex, could be going on, but nobody cares because no baby can come out of it, well all the little hooligans are fixed so why not let them be happy?” I ask, “Card and Tom have been dying to get it on since they laid eyes on each other and that little harlot---”

“Seriously, James, I don’t even know what you’re talking about and I know you shouldn’t be,” Hawking says, walking in.

“---has been wanting to undress Leavitt for weeks, so why make everybody miserable?” I ask.

“For one thing---sterilization procedures are not 100% effective,” Wilde begins.

“No, seriously, what are you guys talking about?” Hawking asks.

“Cadets rooms---with the males it isn’t, but that’s fairly rare and how can it not work on the girls?” I ask, frowning. I knew vasectomies occasionally weren’t effective, but those were pretty low odds.

“Tying the girl’s tubes doesn’t always work either, they can grow a new one, or the knot isn’t tight enough,” Wilde says.

“Really? That’s very interesting---but anyway what are the odds of that?” I ask.

“Really low, especially so soon after the procedure, but we still cannot put them in the same room,” Hawking says, almost laughing.

“When since the beginning of time has separate sleeping arrangements EVER prevented teenagers from conducting advanced studies in human anatomy?” I ask.

“Probably never, however, it is the sub-mission of the Space Forces to try,” Hawking says, amused though she tries not to show it.

“You two don’t actually have to help me with this Space Force mission, neither of you are technically assigned here, I’m fine, though of course your company is appreciated,” Wilde says.

“Actually they did assign me here, since Ebbel’s dead and I was just using my leave to hang about,” I say.

“Until the powers that be discover who and what decided to wash Ebbel I’m not leaving you alone, far too strange a things are going on here,” Hawking says.

“See? You agree,” I say, pointing at her.

“I agree odd things are happening, that does not necessarily mean the end of the universe as we know it,” she says.

“Or it might,” I mutter.

“But you’re going to just let everyone die, right?”

“Right,” I sulk.

I actually find arranging the dorm room is sort of soothing. As I said, I have never had so much space just to myself before. Me and my mom and Ian and Ginny and I always shared just the one little bathroom and one little closet and one bedroom so my mum and her boyfriend and later my mum and Ginny slept in the one room, with me and Ian always in the living room, then of course just me. 

But this room is actually bigger than the flat, and that is really saying something because I realize that this room is not so big. But we each have not one but two dressers, and a desk. I have never had a desk before and it makes me feel a bit grown up, which I rather like, as though I’ll be doing important things on it to help me and my mum. Just me and my mum, now. 

Odd that, how easily our family slips apart and my mind sheds the pieces of what my life used to be so readily, so prepared for the disasters that would befall us. I didn’t understand why, really. We weren’t bad. We didn’t do bad stuff, my mum worked hard to take care of us and she even had less to eat sometimes so we could, and before I started drinking I used to do well in school and work hard. Even after I started drinking I worked side jobs to make us money so Ginny could have clean dresses and sweet little notebooks and things to use at school so she’d fit in with the other girls. Again, odd how that doesn’t matter anymore.

I sigh, pushing my dismal thoughts away. it’s surprisingly therapeutic to roll and fold shirts and put them in MY dresser. Which yes, I realize a million and one hands have touched before but you know, now it’s mine. Titus must feel the same way because the little thing is strutting around happily in those SBUs they had to alter just to fit his smallness. He’s putting all his things away and checking the diagrams they left in the dressers for us. I’ll bet he’s never had so much space in his life either, he’s city trash like me I know he never had anywhere so neat and clean not with four brothers who shared a room with him.

But forget about him, even if he is in the lower bunk. This is my new home for a while, and I might as well enjoy it. I am actually beginning to feel like myself again, a little. Sitting in my PT clothes, all comfortable, with my fresh smelling shirts laid out around me. this is what my life will be like, I realize, a bit happily. Clean clothes and always someplace to wash them, for free. An actual bed to myself and dresser, money in the bank for extras like books or a new tablet. And my mum wouldn’t have to work two jobs ‘cause I’d send her money as well.

“What are you humming?” Titus asks, looking up at me almost sharply.

“I don’t know,” I say, shaking my head.

“You must know,” he says, annoyed.

“It’s just some song my mum used to sing to me and my sister when we were little,” I say, “I don’t know what it’s called.”

“Tell me the words,” Titus says, sitting down on the floor amidst the things he’s folding, looking at me like an expectant child awaiting a bedtime story.

“With a hey ho---the wind and the rain---for the rain it raineth every day,” I sing hesitantly.

“Go on,” he says, flatly.

“When I was and a little tiny boy, with hey ho, the wind and the rain,

 a foolish thing was but a toy, for the rain it raineth every day. 

But when I came to a man’s estate, 

with a hey ho, the wind and the rain, 

‘gainst knaves and thieves men shut their gate, but the rain it raineth every day----there›s more but I can›t think of it. I don›t what it›s about, but I always thought it sounded nice,» I admit.

“It does, sound nice,” he says, nodding, “Do you want me to tell you?”

“What?” I ask.

“What it’s about?”

“Okay,” I say, nodding, “Why do you ask, if you don’t mind?”

“Because people don’t like the things I know, sometimes, like Logan it makes him cry---so thought I’d ask. Because Tom says I need to learn how to be a person, and I’d like her to kiss me again so I think I’ll try,” he says.

“Okay, then, yes, what does it mean?” I ask.

“It means we think things change, as we grow up. But they don’t, we change, we think, but we don’t. it all stays the same, every day,” he says.

“But things have changed for us, we’re here, aren’t we? With good jobs, and I know it’s the nicest roof I’ve ever had over my head, with a real bed, and you don’t have to share with your brothers and I don’t have to share,” I say.

“Who’d you share with?” he asks.

“My brother, I used to,” I say.

“What, did he die too?”

“You don’t say things like that, Titus,” I say, annoyed, “You don’t ask if people are dead too.”

“Okay, as well then? Is he on the ravine side of this mortal coil as well then?” he asks.

“If by that you mean, dead, yes,” I say, rolling my eyes.

“Don’t be cross. I’m only asking. Your family members tend to die is all---”

“Tom is right you do need to learn how to be a person---”

“Well they do and I wish mine would, without help that is,” he says, shrugging and going back to his shirts.

“Okay, I’m going to regret it but I have to ask, what do you mean help?” I ask.

“My sister was murdered therefore there was less shuffling and more flying off the mortal coil as it were,” he says.

“I’m sorry,” I say.

“For what?” he asks.

“Your sister dying, when somebody says somebody died, somebody else says, I’m sorry,” I explain.

“I’ve heard that it just doesn’t make sense. Well in my family we usually just say ‘really, where was Titus at the time?’, when somebody ostensibly bad happens,” he explains.

“Well the rest of Keplar doesn’t we say ‘I’m terribly sorry’ or ‘that’s awful’,” I say.

“Thanks I’ll use that on Tom, convince her I’m neurotypical,” he says.

“Start by using smaller words, and just go for sane,” I say.

“Funny you, I’ll notice you don’t have a girlfriend,” he says.

“Who says I want one?” I ask, just on principle.

“Person you are striving to have sexual intercourse with, then, you don’t have a person whose clothes you really want to tear off, there was that small enough words?” he asks.

“No, I don’t; I don’t pretend to be an expert on things, but I did live with two women---”

“Before one of them died and so did I before one of them died,” Titus says, haughtily.

“But your one of them died before mine so I did longer,” I say.

“Not all women are the same,” he refutes, “And anyway sister or mum is different from sexual partner.”

“Which you clearly still don’t have or you wouldn’t be so obsessed with it,” I say.

“As if you aren’t a virgin,” he says, clearly annoyed now.

“Didn’t say I wasn’t, but I’m not obsessed with changing that either,” I point out.

“You would be if you’d met the perfect one,” he says, and its so romantic and sweet I can’t be so mad at him anymore. “She’s the one for me, and I’ll love her till the day after I die.”

“Why then?” I ask.

“Because then I’ll probably be busy it should be interesting and if she loves me half as much as I do her by then she’ll have joined me and we’ll explore the next world together,” he says, and he says it so seriously and in such an important tone it is genuinely hard not to laugh. But I don’t dare because he is so serious he would be hurt.

“How do you know—that she’s the perfect one?” I ask, slowly, trying not to show my amusement. I have so few illusions about love and life it’s very pathetic. And in somebody as hard as him I’m intrigued to hear his views on his one true love. Somehow in his hard little heart of stone, he had decided that out there somebody would love him, probably because nobody ever had. And I am pretty sure he is wrong. And that is so sad. For me and him.

“Because, she’s more beautiful than starlight,” he says, as though it should be obvious, “Can’t you see it?”

“No---I mean she’s pretty enough,” I say, adding the last part quickly. I don’t think she’s pretty at all, really. Her face is all right, if hard, her eyes are all right, if small, her voice all right, if harsh, and she’s tallish and wiry and just not all that attractive in my humble relatively inexperienced opinion.

“I’m not talking about how she looks, simpleton,” he says, adding the last pert as an after thought, “I’m talking about everything else. Her soul.”

“Oh, right, then, yeah like you said, I wouldn’t know. I haven’t met the one,” I say, to end the conversation because when talking about his love for her and my questioning it even so gently his eyes look almost---murderous.

“How are the small people?” I ask, walking into our office where Thorn is finishing sorting out the room arrangements.

“Unhappy with their room mates, but that was bound to happen,” he says, “I wanted to do cross gender rooming to increase physical activity and general moral but oh no, can’t have that.”

“Oh, did they put our sweet Leavitt with Card?” I ask, tapping one of the files on the tabletop screen.

“They did I was cross about that,” Thorn says, leaning back in his chair, “Leavitt is innocent and sweet and Card is---”

“Card,” I agree, nodding, “Shame that.”

“Well, perhaps we can convince them to give them separate rooms, it’s not as though we don’t have space on that floor,” he says.

“No, we have the space, and the girls aren’t fairing much better in the other building I don’t think Tom and that slutty one liked each other,” Thorn says.

“Don’t call her that---”

“Don’t pretend you know her name.”

“Okay fine I won’t---wait if Leavitt’s with Card that means they chose him as a pilot? That’s odd,” I say, frowning, “I thought pilots were made of much more self assured stuff.”

“They are, but relatively few pass the test with the required mechanics grades as well, they need a solid background in computers or mechanics in order to fix their own ships in the event of a crash,” Thorne explains, “I know ‘cause they told us later, in training, because have to take all these engineering courses so we can get our ships flight ready from ground launch---which is horrible and hard especially with a broken ship it’s near impossible and honest to God I don’t think I could do it right now if you asked me, but they’re retraining us on it all the time, so, whatever.”

“Oh, right, hope he likes it, he wasn’t hoping for that,” I say.

“Oh, yes, you had your hippie circle thing,” he says, nodding.

“I am not—not---flight certified and they were supposed to be doing simulators work, but with Ebbel eaten by a washer---”

“That’s really horrible we need to find a better way of putting that—”

“Yeah, let’s do that later----with Ebbel eaten by a washer I didn’t have a thing to do with them,” I explain, “So I had them sit on the ground and talk about life.”

“How was that, anyway? I mean I try not to speak to the little smelly things if I can’t help it,” he says, idly looking back down.

“All right, figured I might as well talk to them,” I say, shrugging, and looking away. of course, I wanted to talk to Liesel, more than anything. and that had gone rather well, she had talked to me, not that she knew who I was. “Nobody ever does, the Project 10s that is.”

“No they don’t, most of them----wait a minute, you had a Project 10, didn’t you? From before you enlisted,” he realizes, looking up.

“No,” I am an idiot and flat out lie, “What’s a Project 10?” okay I never said I was smart. 

“You did, you told one me one time when we were getting drunk a few years ago, at one of these training things---it was last time I was planet side I remember,” he says, pointing at me accusingly, “What class would they be in now, then?”

“I didn’t---” I am such a moron.

“Oh, God, it’s one in this class, isn’t it? That’s why you’ve been more incompetent than usual, Wilde was wondering---oh will you quit hyperventilating do you think I---who was in IDMT yesterday in a straight jacket prophesying the end of the world which is still totally happening by the way---am in the position to tell anyone?” he laughs. And I calm down enough to breath because I forgot he is crazy.

“You can’t tell anyone, I’d be court martialed we’re supposed to disclose that and I just------I didn’t---,” I plead.

“Why the hell would I tell anyone? And whom? I only talk to you and Wilde and Hawking and I only talk to you because you’re just sort of here and you are entertaining even if you are a waste of space,” he says.

“Please, thank you—just don’t tell anyone, I’ve not told her she doesn’t know,” I beg.

“Her? It’s one of the girls is it?” he asks, grinning now, “You have a daughter, congratulations, Harris. Get you a wife and we’ll have you being a real person.”

“Thank you, thank you for not telling anyone,” I say, smiling, suddenly. Nobody’s ever said that to me before, I’ve never said it before. “Yes, I have a daughter.”

“Which one is it? Please tell me it’s Tom, that girl could use somebody to chase Card away from her and she seems lonely that girl could just use somebody no wait—--”

“I’m not telling you--- we---we shouldn’t even talk about this---”

“Okay, good, cool, let me guess---no it can’t be Tom she’s too intelligent to be related to you I know they say IQ comes from the mother but really, with your genes there would be retardation going on---is it the slutty one no you didn’t get mad when I said that and I’d certainly hope you would----it’s one of the ones we caught snogging the other night, isn’t it? You were upset about that, all worried about them in the brig? That tough little lesbian who can march a flight better than you---Stowe isn’t it?” he asks, triumphantly.

“I’ve not even told her---I’ve not told anyone,” I stumble, not trusting him enough to confirm or deny but not knowing what good it would or wouldn’t do at this point, considering he had guessed very accurately for somebody certifiably insane.

“You don’t have to---that’s utterly hilarious,” Thorn laughs, doubling over he finds it so amusing, “And what---you’ve spent this whole time being panicked somebody will find out, haven’t you?”

“Yes,” I say, panicked because somebody did find out.

“Oh calm down do, it’s not as though I’m going to tell anyone, it’s not as though anyone would believe me anyway,” he says, his smile fading, then, “They never do.”

“Sorry it’s just----I really, really don’t want to be court martialed, but I had to meet her,” I confess, “I couldn’t help it was so easy just—not to say anything, and more than meet her I wanted to make sure she made it through this all right. You know how rough it is on some and look at Long, the one they had to institutionalize? What if that were her I mean---I wanted to be there.”

“You’re a better man than my father,” he says, his eyes almost misty.

“Not really, considering she doesn’t even know who I am,” I say, realizing I’m chocking back a sob. I have never talked about this with anyone and now that I get to it’s all sort of pouring out. “And I failed her and I abandoned her and brought her into this miserable world and condemned her to this awful place and she doesn’t know how to find me and she’s sad and lonely and I can’t be there and -----not really.”

“No,” he says, “Really.”

Chapter 13

TRIGGER WARNING: SEXUAL ASSAULT,
ATTEMPTED RAPE, AND OVERT VIOLENCE DEPICTED

W ell we all got our pilot letters. That was very enjoyable, a nice crisp packet explaining our future training and how lucky we are and all that shit. I’m very enthusiastic about spending the next few years in yet more training for the wonderful Space Forces. Since I’ve not spent enough of my life training to be a Spaceman. No, I shouldn’t be this down; it’s mostly rooming with Darla that has me in a funk, she doesn’t talk and she doesn’t do her bit to clean up the room.

Also, Titus was the only one of us excited, Darla is still depressed over her boyfriend trying to murder mine. Quentin quiet as always, I’m in my mood, and Titus is thrilled like a child on Christmas morning if a child is in a family and gets presents and not some stupid care package from the government---but I don’t think Titus ever got that excited about Christmas presents because I’m sure that his presents didn’t give him to billion ruble machinery to amuse himself with to his little heart’s content.

Also the packet told us that we would have a pilot’s induction ceremony in six days, which would be our appointment to flight officer school, which our families would be invited to, to which Darla and I were just like ‘hooray, we’ve not got any’, and Titus was really excited about a ceremony all about him, and Quentin was worried about his mum affording the train fare and getting off work. So yes, our feelings were mixed. We were all generally happy about getting flight suits and dress whites with our pilot insignia sewn on, a nice little ship and some stars around out it; that pleased Titus to no end and I confess I liked it was well. We are to get fitted for the dress whites this week.

About this week, however, it told us that we would not starting training till after the next ceremony, which meant that we are to spend this week doing nothing. well, not nothing, cleaning our dorms and the training buildings in general, awaiting the arrival of our instructors who will escort us to Milton SFB (yay, Darla and I only grew up next to there at the Academy) where we will begin our space training. That last bit was exciting, because it explained out that we would get an individual mentor to teach us to fly. The first bit, however, was something like intellectual homicide to Titus Card.

Now, none of us liked the busy work of just cleaning. I could find some pleasure in it, in that it was sort of therapeutic to wander about polishing things and spraying them with good smelling cleaner and thinking my own thoughts. Titus, however, was apparently not so easily amused, rather than doing such menial tasks as a child apparently he tended to get other people to do them and he knew he couldn’t actually do that so pretty soon---pretty soon being by the end of the first hour, he is stark raving mad.

Granted, he did have it worse than the rest of us. The general consensus of the MTIs was that if given access to cleaning supplies he would attempt to build a nuclear warhead just to prove he could---this was actually supposed by Thorn, and when Titus protested on the grounds that if he did he might not get to learn how to fly a ship, the rest agreed that his needing to add a caveat as to why he wouldn’t made him inherently less trustworthy with chemicals---and since he was so upset about not getting any chemicals they didn’t give him any access to anything he could use as a weapon, so basically he ended up with exactly three paper towels for the entire day. Yeah. Not a good situation.

To explain a bit more. When we were asked to clean the main conference and auditoriums, we were given lay outs of how the furniture was to be set up. But these lay outs don’t take everything into account. Everything being Titus Card.

“DO YOU THINK WHAT YOU ARE DOING IS FUNNY??”

“More than a little.”

“What did he do?” I ask, following Leavitt into one of the flight rooms, where Titus is lying on a table grinding his hands onto his head. Leavitt really isn’t having a good day either.

“Titus, just because the directions don’t say you can’t mount the chairs to the ceiling, doesn’t mean you should,” I say, with a sigh.

“I’m so very bored, Tom, it isn’t fair they know we’re the best of the best they shouldn’t leave me unoccupied,” he says, rolling over to look at us.

“How did you even---it’s just----hell, Titus, must you?” Leavitt asks, “We’ll only have to fix it again.”

“No, they won’t know we did it and it didn’t technically say we can’t and so they can’t prove anything or get us in trouble,” he explains. “Besides, they need so many pilots they can’t afford to lose some of us for some inane prank.”

“I know you’re bored Titus and I know they should keep you occupied and it isn’t technically wrong but just because you can doesn’t mean you should,” I explain.

“But I can and I want to,” he says, going back to rubbing his hands on his head.

“The last room he turned all the carpet tiles upside down, the one before that he removed all the pictures and placards from the walls, and cut up the words and reorganized them into anagrams—Darla’s still in there fixing that,” Leavitt sighs.

“How’s she fixing the posters?” I ask, frowning.

“She’s not we’ve given up on those, she’s just making sure he didn’t miss any little scraps of paper form the cutting---this is why he wasn’t given scissors,” Leavitt sighs.

“I know I found some, okay, next room,” Titus says, hopping up. Leavitt and I catch him by each arm.

“Titus, this is day one---day one, please, for the love of god---”

“I don’t love god—”

“It’s an expression, I am begging you, stop,” Leavitt says.

“Please, Titus can’t you find something else to do? Read something on your tablet?” I ask.

“I did that last night,” he says, looking annoyed, “I’m out of books.”

“Let me show you how to get on the free library, there are hundreds of free books,” I say.

“I did that last night, I’m out of books,” he repeats, flatly.

“What---you can’t have read all of them?” I ask.

“Leavitt let me use his tablet so I did two at once,” he says.

“I’m not going to ask how that works----Quentin why did you do that?” I ask, “He needs to be slowed down.”

“He makes really weird and creepy noises when he’s not fully occupied in the middle of the night, plus I was afraid if he got bored he’d start trying to do experiments on me while I slept,” Quentin says.

“I did that anyway---come on let me go,” Titus struggles.

“No, you’ll start logging into tablets and telling the president to go to war with New Russia or something—”

“I did that before lunch please---”

“No, you need to think of something constructive to do with yourself,” I say, stopping him from bolting off. “Surely there’s some library you can hack into?”

“The tablet’s browser is too slow,” Titus says, pathetically, finally twisting out of our grip by slithering out of his blouse, “I could barely have two open source documents running at once.”

“Well use mine then,” Quentin says.

“I was talking about yours,” he says, still pouting.

“Watch a film, an educational one, you can’t have watched all those free ones,” I say.

“Films are too slow reading’s quicker---let me use your glass cleaner in the next room?” he asks, hopefully, holding out his hands for it.

“No,” Quentin says, holding the bottle protectively.

“Why, what do you want to do with it?” I ask.

“Nothing,” he lies very badly.

“No, I’m with Thorne you’d build a nuclear war head just to prove you could,” Quentin says.

“That’s ridiculous, I’d need radioactive materials for that, and a simple improvised explosive device would be almost as entertaining,” Titus says.

“See? It’s saying things like that that makes them give you only a few paper towels to play with,” I say.

“I know but I’m just so bored, Tom, my brain hurts,” he says, sadly.

I am so cross with myself, I should have waited to murder Ebbel. It was so much fun and now it’s over and I’ve a whole week to wait for training and nothing to think about no good murders to plan and that was my one treat for this interim and if I’d known I’d have this whole awfully boring week I’d have waited.

“Aww, I know,” Tom says, putting her arm around my shoulders. She does know. That’s why I love her. “It’s almost dinner time anyway, we’ll finish up here, then meet you in the gym for a race after dinner, you go ahead and get your run in.” She knows I love running and I don’t eat dinner like the rest of them. meals are optional now, so I just take enough milk packets at breakfast and lunch and skip dinner.

“Are you sure?” I ask, frowning, wondering if it’s a trick.

“Yes positive,” she says.

“Please go,” Leavitt says.

“All right,” I say, “Leave the chairs though.”

“I have no idea how not to,” Leavitt says, tossing me my blouse back. 

“We will, Titus just go on, you’ll feel better once you’ve had a good run and thought about how much fun we’ll have once we get to fly,” she says.

“All right,” I agree, reluctantly. It is more interesting than staying here. and I still have the three paper towels. I’m clever enough to entertain myself with those tonight.

“Thank god, that was a good idea,” I say, as Titus leaves.

“For some reason he likes running,” she says, “Did you really leave Darla in the other room straightening his mess out?”

“Yes, she’s hardly talking though, I know she’s upset about Tyrell, but she could be nice when she does talk,” I say. I’m not one to talk about not talking but I don’t take things out on other people.

“I know, I have to room with her,” I say.

“Yeah sorry---”

“No, you—you have it worse—”

“Okay yeah I probably do—oh about my roommate as much as I don’t like talking about him or acknowledging he exists when he isn’t here, I feel like I should tell you---do you know how much he loves you?” I ask, awkwardly.

“What?” she asks, looking down from trying to get glue off of the interactive board.

“We were talking last night, like guys do---okay I’ve no idea how guys talk but you know—we were talking, and I asked him or he sort of said, how much he loves you and it’s like---a lot, and I think you ought to know that he thinks he’s going to love you his whole life and die with you and explore the afterlife with you and he said as much,” I say, wincing a little.

“Oh my god, he is crazy,” she says, shaking her head.

“You don’t feel that way? I mean, not that it’s my place or that’s wrong but---I didn’t think people felt that way,” I say.

“People don’t; he’s sweet and a nutcase,” she says.

“That about sums it up, but I wanted to warn you in case he proposed marriage or something,” I explain.

“Okay, yes, thank you,” she says, with a sigh.

“Is he bothering you or do you like him?” I ask, slowly.

“Oh please don’t be asking me this because you actually like me but have this noble thing going on where you---”

“No, no, I’m not, I just genuinely thought you should be informed. I don’t like you---I don’t not like you but I don’t like you---”

“Okay yeah, good---”

“No I really don’t,” I explain.

“Okay, just, that’s all I need he’s---impossible,” she says, staring after where he went.

“But you love him anyway?” I guess.

“Kind of, yeah,” she says.

“He thinks you’re more beautiful than starlight,” I say.

“Oh he told you that? I thought that was something from him being on drugs,” she groans.

“Yes,” I say, nodding.

“He really has got it bad, I don’t know, he just gives me the creeps sometimes,” she says, shaking her head, “I don’t know if that’s me because I’m not ready for a relationship or it’s him not ready or it’s him because he’s weird---”

“Oh he’s weird, definitely, weird, I wasn’t joking about the making strange noises in the night, thing,” I laugh.

Tom and Leavitt do finally join me for a run, but they are tired and still cross with me for my unique furniture arrangement plans and refuse to race me. It isn’t really fair since I’ve been running and working out much longer than they and I still wanted to race with them. but they were just too annoyed and wouldn’t race at all with me. Tom tried to cajole Darla into joining us, but she declined.

Hot and tired, we all retire to our dorm rooms, Tom distressingly far from us in another building. Leavitt is hot but he’s a gentleman so he offers that I shower first and I’m hot and sweaty and not a gentleman so I take him up on it. The shower doesn’t work that well and the water isn’t as cold as I’d like but it gets the job done, and soon I’m snuggled in bed with my tablet, having read all the free books I can download I’ve resorted to entertaining myself with news articles which are not as educational as I’d like but they will have to do.

Above me, Leavitt curls up with his tablet, no doubt messaging his mum or something equally boring. He’s a boring person. I’m not boring. But I am bored. and I don’t want to go to sleep. I don’t like sleep. It makes everything stop and go away. but I know I have to try anyway. my brain will not function as well as I’d like without it so I must try. but just read a little bit more first...

Tom is sound asleep in the bunk above me. I don’t want to sleep. If I sleep I think of Tyrell. I think about how I never had him and I never will. How he’s locked up in that place not eating not sleeping just trapped in his own lonely mind. that’s cruel. They should just shoot him like a dog they’re treating him worse than a dog. And I can’t live with knowing he’s not living. I want to die. But not yet. not quite yet. after tonight I will die. But tonight there is one more thing I want to do. One revenge I want to take.

I check messages from Liesel but there are none. She’s probably had a busy day, she goes to A school next week, like the pilots, but she’s going for battle management not actual pilot school. Same ceremony and similar training, just different duties. Good, I want her far from the fighting. She messaged me all that last night, hopefully she’s bonding with her new friends in her SFSC. I lay down; I’m exhausted, they still haven’t got any new evidence as to who killed Ebbel, and now that Thorn knows my secret I’m on edge. He said he wouldn’t tell anyone, but I don’t entirely believe him, moreover he is actually crazy so he might tell somebody just because he’s crazy. My only consolation is that he’s actually crazy so nobody will probably believe him. At least we haven’t had any trouble with the cadets lately.

“Shh, wake up,” a voice whispers. A female voice. a female Darla’s voice. I knew I hated sleeping for a reason.

“What---” I begin, but she has a very large sharp combat knife pointed at my nice tender throat so I don’t continue. She’s sitting directly on top of me, her pelvis uncomfortably poking into my less than desirably muscled stomach.

“I need you tonight,” she whispers, bending her face down close to mine. She’s in her SBU bottoms but just a grey t-shirt, no bra. This is weird, I’m sincerely hoping she isn’t intending to kill me Card School of Winning Knife Fights has not had nearly enough sessions.

“Okay, let’s talk, how can I help?” I ask, her eyes are wild this is not normal.

“Lose your pants, bitch,” she says and this is when I realize I’m about to be raped. She gets up and motioning for me to follow, the knife still pressed against my throat. I stand up slowly. I really don’t know if I can overpower her for the knife, and the slightest move will slice my jugular she has her wits about her enough to have planned this well.

“Okay why don’t we just talk about this?” I ask, slowly and calmly.

I hear Darla’s voice and nearly get up, but then I see the glint of the knife and slowly lower back down. What the hell? She blames him for Tyrell’s imprisonment? I suppose so but that really doesn’t matter, she’s going to kill him certainly.

I seriously consider not starting a knife fight. In my position, that bastard Card probably would have lain there quietly and listened to me get raped. But I’m not him. I’m me. So I tighten my fist on my combat knife and jump down.

Then there’s that moron Leavitt who brings a knife to a gun fight. I would have lain there quietly and listened to him get raped then reported it like a sensible person. But oh, no, he decides to be the hero.

“PUT IT DOWN,” Darla says, angrily, holding a gun on me. I hesitate to obey, my arm is bleeding from our initial scrabble, and I am breathing heavily. Card is watching calmly.

“Okay,” I say, standing slowly and putting the knife on the ground, “Okay, Darla where’d you get the gun?” I wonder if it’s loaded.

“if that’s not loaded I’ll be dreadfully disappointed,” I say, calmly. The longer I keep her talking the more time she has to make an error I can seize upon. “Death by knife is so bloody don’t you think?”

“Oh, I’m not going to kill you, not tonight. I die tonight. Haven’t you ever wanted to make love to a dead girl?” she asks, walking up to me, gun still on Leavitt, knife on me. I would dive for it but we’re awfully close, and she might turn the gun on me.

“Not very much,” I say. Necrophilia has never been particularly appealing to me. nor has losing my virginity to anybody but Nicole Tom. Looks like that’s not going to happen oh well, life’s full of little disappointments that can be cured with a few simple beheadings.

“Don’t think about moving,” she says, to Leavitt, “There, get your belt from the desk.”

“Cool, can I ask why?” Leavitt asks, his voice is shaking though.

“Guess, pretty boy, guess, now, take your shirt and pants off,” she says, gesturing at him with the gun. He hesitates, “NOW,” she growls.

“Okay,” he says, slowly obeying.

“Set them on the floor, nice and slow,” she says, then she looks at me, “You too, now, looks like I have two fresh ones tonight.”

“You can’t do this,” Leavitt is very upset right now, he is shivering and he really doesn’t look very good naked. Most people other than Nicole Tom don’t I’m just saying but he does not.

“Shorts as well, now,” she says, looking at us both, weapons still on us.

“Really can’t we discuss this---”

“NO!”

“Got anything better Titus?” Leavitt growls, annoyed.

“Oh it’s my fault? You failed at jumping her,” I hiss.

“Shut up you two, I don’t want your mouths,” she laughs, “Card, gag Leavitt, tie him to the bunk, very well, I’ll cut you if you don’t.”

“Yes,” I say, picking up the belt and tightening it around Leavitt’s wrists. He glares at me as I do it well. It’s not so well he couldn’t get out of it if he really tried, but I’m not risking fooling her. I also stuff my old socks in his mouth at her request, well she doesn’t request them to be my old socks that’s my improvisation. But again I don’t do it so well that he wouldn’t be able to get out someday.

“You first, Card, against the other bed post, I’ll tie you myself,” she says, setting down the knife and picking up my belt with her free hand.

“No I really need to talk with you about this---” I say. last chance, choice A) lose masculinity in front of Leavitt B) sort of betray Tom by having sex with someone other than her. Ah------shit---shit---choice A. “---I need medication, I can’t perform, just let me get it from my drawer---it’ll be more pleasurable for us both.”

“Really?” she asks, staring at me intently.

“Yes, it’s a condition I’ve had since the surgery they do on us, they gave me pills,” I lie. 

“You’d better not be pulling something, Card,” she says, motioning for me to go to the drawer. Sadly the only drawer is rather far away from her so my aim will be poor, however it is worth the try.

The gunshot rings out loud and cold in that tiny room, and I confess I jump nearly as much as the two of them do, but the bullet nearly grazes me so I have a reason be disturbed. Leavitt was not almost shot so his anger at me is not very justified.

“Against the bed, Card, it’s going to hurt for you now,” she says, pointing the gun directly at me, the pencil I launched at her sticking out of her left cheek. She doesn’t even pull it out.

“That was the best you could think of?” Leavitt growls. He’s spit the socks out by now.

“Well now we both know the gun is loaded,” I say, calmly, as she uses the belt to strap me to the bed post. She’s done a good job of it as well, it’ll take me at least two minutes to get out, and her less than one minute to undress, even one handed with a pencil in her face.

I confess I don’t even hear the door open this second time. I do see Tom though, standing in the doorway, combat knife in hand. I immediately avert my gaze, however, so as not to give her away. I needn’t worry, though, she reveals herself soon enough.

In a flash, the girls are on the floor, fighting for gun and knife, grunting in exertion as the gun goes off again.

I twist my hands free and dive for my shorts, just getting them before a bleeding Darla rolls on top of them, attempting to escape Tom who has Darla’s ear in her mouth. They roll again, the gun skidding under the bunks, which is probably for the best and Tom really doesn’t seem to need the gun she’s doing quite well on her own.

Both rise, bloodied and angry, eyes locked. Darla kicks and Tom catches her foot, twisting her over and slicing at the tendon between foot and leg. They fall again, screams of rage rising as they scrabble. I walk carefully around them to the closet to fetch my SBUs.

Tom cries out as Darla smashes a chair over both of them, the knife is imbedded in Darla’s shoulder buried too deep for either to pull it free in the ongoing brawl.

Tom pulls the drawer from our dresser smashing that and getting a splinter as new weapon. Both jump to their feet, then charge each other headlong. Dressed now, I cross to the small bathroom to get the first aid kit. It looks like it will be needed.

They scream again as they twist, fighting now over Tom’s splinter. This fight isn’t long, however, the splinter is soon lost and Tom has Darla in a headlock, the sleeper hold. Thirty seconds more and it’s over, Darla slumps, her brain deprived of blood for far too long.

“Impeccable timing as always, Cadet Tom, are you hurt?” I ask, holding up the first aid kit helpfully. She’s rather bloodied but I don’t know whose blood it is.

“I’m cut a bit, not bad,” Tom says, taking a deep breath.

“Lovely, that’s great—thanks for joining us Nicole---COULD ONE OF YOU POSSIBLE UNTIE ME???” Leavitt is still naked chained to the bed, by the way, in case you’d lost track of him. so he’s not very happy right now.

“Yeah, thanks for the help, Titus,” Tom says, noticing that I’m fully dressed and quite composed by now.

“It looked like a one person job,” I say, stepping around Darla’s body to help Tom undo Leavitt, who springs eagerly for his clothes.

“What? We’ve all seen each other naked before,” I say, as he hurriedly puts them on.

“Yes, Titus, because this is so---so normal,” Leavitt growls, pulling on his PT clothes which are bloody from the knife/gun/splinter fight.

“Do you want to change before we go and get somebody? I’m sure we’ve a long night with IA ahead,” I offer Tom, who is surveying the mess calmly and still breathing a bit heavily from the fight. I hand her my hydration system, which she accepts.

“No, let’s just um---go and get people,” she says, shaking her head, “Going to have to explain this.”

“I can do that,” I offer.

“What---is she dead?” Leavitt asks.

“No, people live after they lose blood flow to the brain for over fifteen seconds,” I say, then clarify, “That was sarcasm our would be rapist is quite dead.”

“God,” Leavitt says, putting on his shirt.

“Okay, yeah, let’s go and get people,” Tom says, finishing drinking from my hydration system, ignoring my offer of a hand as we step back over the body.

Chapter 14

“R

eally? Do you feel better now? Really?” Wilde was less than pleased to be woken by two bloody cadets and one neat one. I was nearly livid to be woken by Wilde, two bloody cadets, and one neat one. “We have another dead person here now. IA might as well just open a branch right here --- as often as you three find bodies.”

“Ma’am, I’m sorry,” Leavitt feels bad.

“Ma’am, I didn’t mean to kill her,” Tom says.

“Ma’am, I’ve got it all recorded,” guess who said that. just guess.

“Of course you do,” I say. I’m in no mood to be formal.

“Okay, I’ll ask, how and why?” Harris is leaning in the doorway, looking tired and disgusted.

“Sir, Leavitt said I make noise in my sleep so I was recording it to study,” Card says.

“You were seriously going to watch a video of you sleeping?” Harris asks.

“Yes sir, I don’t get to be there when I’m sleeping so I thought it’d be interesting,” Card says.

“Of course you did,” I say.

“Tom you admit you did strangle her?” Wilde asks.

“Yes, ma’am. she was threatening cadets Card and Leavitt with the gun and knife I was afraid for their lives,” Tom says.

“Okay---how did he get fully dressed when you two are still in PT?” I ask, gesturing at Card.

“Sir, he got dressed while I finished fighting her, sir in his defense he also got me the first aid kit,” Tom says.

“Sir, in his condemnation he didn’t untie me,” Leavitt says.

“Cadet Leavitt, why is that such a calamity still? You weren’t being raped anymore,” Card says.

“Cadet Card if it has to be explained to you---”

“Okay, stop talking,” I say, waving a hand at all of them. I seriously need a drink. Maybe after this Hawking will let me have one.

“All right, all three of you go with Harris, he’ll get you clean things to change into with the exception of Card who is already clean, you’re spending the night in another dorm for now, we’ll get IA to close off the scene, no Cadet Card you cannot have the tablet back in the foreseeable future since there is a crime recorded on it you’ll be issued another one,” she says the last bit when Titus looks crestfallen and glances at his bunk where his precious tablet lies quietly recording all this idiocy. Leavitt was right he did love the thing. Didn’t mean less bodies for us though. hmm, maybe he isn’t the anti-Christ. You know, maybe he is. maybe he isn’t.

“Yes, ma’am,” they say, in unison, doing their best to step out of the room without stepping on the body or in the blood.

“Right, I’ll go and get IA,” Wilde says.

“I’m going to a bar.”

“You’re coming with me.”

“I’m going to a bar.”

“You’re coming with me.”

“Yeah, I’m going to a bar.”

“You’re coming with me.”

“Really think I’m going to a bar.”

“You’re coming with me.”

Needless to say I go with her.

“Any idea why she did it?” I ask, as I lead the cadets out of the dorms. Leavitt and Card look depressed about that. Poor things they were probably liking having their own room, city trash that they were they’d probably shared a room with more than one other person most of their lives. Now it’s covered in blood. Oh well.

“Sir, I think she missed Tyrell,” Leavitt says.

“Sir, that was what it seemed like,” Card says.

“That’s too bad, huh, never can figure people, apparently not this class anyway,” I say, opening the door to let them outside, for exactly two seconds I consider taking them to the SBM, space battle management dorm, like I was supposed to. But Liesel is in there. and these three tend to find bodies independent of the fact that’s it’s their fault death kind of tends to happen around them. Yeah, I’m not taking them there. Thankfully, Wilde and Thorne think I’m an idiot---okay that’s not totally fair I also think I’m an idiot. But they think I’m an idiot without motives and I have motives. So I’ll act like I misunderstood and set these tykes up back in their old barracks where they won’t cause anybody any trouble.

“You’ll stay in your old barracks just---go to your old bunks,” I say, as we walk down the path towards the indoctrination barracks, “There will be clothes and things there for you to change into.”

“Yes, sir,” they all three mumble, a bit dejectedly.

“Are you all right, do you need to see a doctor or---anything?” I ask, looking back at them. Mostly I’m worried about Leavitt he’s sensitive and has had a rough time of it, poor chap. But Tom was the one in the knife fight so she might be cut, though she swore the blood on her was not hers.

“Dr. Truth Juice?” Leavitt asks.

“Pass,” Tom says.

“I’ll go see him---”

“Nobody was worried about you Card—are you sure that was understandably traumatic,” I stumble, looking at their hard, lonely faces in the moonlight. Such sad, miserable children. How did they get to be so hardened?

“I’ll watch motivational videos on the internet,” Leavitt says.

“I’m just a bit hungry,” Tom says.

“I really will go and visit Dr. Truth Juice,” Titus says.

“No, you’d just get him high on his own stuff and try to figure out who cut his lips off—”

“Sir, so?”

“So I can’t knowingly let you do that----what did you say?” I ask.

“I was hungry,” Tom says.

“No, you,” I say, Leavitt.

“I would watch videos on the internet to help me with trauma,” Leavitt says.

“They have those?” I ask. 

And that is how I end up sitting in the DFAC with three cadets drinking cold milk and eating cold biscuits and watching very helpful videos on the internet telling you how to live your shit life and be happy doing it.

“So, how’d it go with IA?” yes we are sitting in a bar. No I’m not drinking anything apparently Hawking has a good rapport with the local bars. I hate her so much.

“Turns out, Darla Richards didn’t go straight to the boy’s dorm,” Wilde says, coming back with beers for her and Hawking and water for me. I hate her too. I hate both of them. let them die in the apocalypse see what I cared.

“Didn’t she?” I ask, raising my eyebrows, “Do tell.”

“She went and broke her boyfriend out of IDMT, Tyrell Nolan, he was still there and being sedated for further study,” Wilde explains.

“So why come and go after Leavitt and Card, why not go Bonnie and Clyde like young people tend to?” I ask.

“We don’t know, Dr. Truth Juice is still out cold and there’s no sign of Nolan,” Wilde says.

“What, they can’t find him?” I ask, surprised.

“Not hide nor hair, I told them to have fun looking, and I had Kip make an announcement for all cadets to lock their room doors,” Wilde says.

“Ok who is Dr. Truth Juice and why was this girls’ boyfriend in IDMT?” Hawking asks.

“You remember, Dr. Marrow, that freak from the Academy, the one Tony told us about, he’s working here now,” Wilde says.

“Lipless,” I say.

“Don’t explain that—”

“You took my alcohol and you think I’m not going to---”

“Please I’m eating---”

“Somebody cut off his lips---”

“The sobriety is for your own good—”

“and tits—”

“I’m not listening---”

“And finger tips---”

“Not listening---”

“And stuffed them in his mouth and taped it shut,” I finish, prying her hands off of her ears so she hears.

“That’s disgusting, why is he still here?” Hawking asks.

“He loves his job,” Wilde says, shrugging.

“Why are they letting him still be here?” Hawking asks.

“He says he’s fit for duty,” Wilde says, shrugging.

“Does he know who did it?” Hawking asks.

“He says ‘one of the paleish ones with a crew cut, that describes 200 people walking around, he thinks it was a girl but not positive,” Wilde says.

“And since he drugged me and half of the IA guys apparently, none of us care that much to find out,” I say.

“Okay, back to my other question, why was Richard’s boyfriend in IDMT?” Hawking asks, “Or is that sinister and disgusting as well?”

“Only slightly,” I say, “He tried to kill Card.”

“And he succeeded in killing two other cadets,” Wilde says, “Decapitated one, mutilated the body, put the other in the meat grinder for the pies.”

“Okay, I remember you told me a bit of that----do we know why he did this?” Hawking asks, wincing.

“No, Dr. Truth Juice was finding out,” I say, “Though all things considered they are tentatively blaming thig girl for Ebbel’s death.”

“So, she kills Ebbel, waits a couple of days, breaks her boyfriend out, and then decides to take rape Card and Leavitt? That’s just plain weird,” Hawking says.

“No, we haven’t gotten to the self-immolation and the guidons with the mark of the beast, soon it’s going to seem pretty normal,” I reassure her.

“Please tell me he’s exaggerating,” Hawking says.

“He’s not,” Wilde says, taking a long drink.

“Okay, explain James after one thing---how is that idiot Harris still alive in all this?” Hawking asks, shaking her head.

“I know, right? Ebbel dies before him. that’s the end times for you,” I say.

“I don’t know, the cadets sort of like him, though, and he’s got a soft spot for this group,” Wilde says, “So I guess the crazy ones decided not to kill him.”

“Or they have something special in store,” I say.

“Like what?” Wilde asks.

“Like blowing us all up,” I say.

Chapter 15

“D

o you think our families will be coming yet?” Quentin asks, looking out the window of Logan’s dorm room.

“They said they’d have them in by nine,” Liesel says, she’s looking as well. I’ve got no family to look for so I’m sitting on the floor with Logan helping him fix his whites up. He and Liesel are both battle management positions, so they are having the ceremony with us.

“I don’t know what I’ll tell them,” Logan says, sadly. He’s been low ever since the pilot’s test. Frequent hugs and bedtime stories have helped. “It’s all been so horrible and I don’t want them to think I had a miserable time.”

“You did have a miserable time,” Cadet Obvious says from where he’s reading three tablets at once. I gave him mine and Logan gave him his and Liesel gave him hers if it would keep him occupied and out of our way while we try to get ready. I don’t know how he had access to new books when he was complaining just the other day that he didn’t have any but he was begging for tablets so we just took what we got.

“I know, but I don’t want them to worry about me,” Logan says, wringing his hands.

“Just tell them that---you made friends----and tell them about how Titus never could flip you in combative, that was funny and---”

“And?”

“I’m working on it, it has been horrible!” I say.

“And about how I got sent to IDMT twice, after the numerous violent deaths and sexual assaults there is an element of humor to them getting me high twice for no reason,” Quentin says.

“Are you done with the iron?” Titus asks, looking down.

“If you’ll talk less, I’ll just do yours after I do mine,” I say.

“Okay,” he says.

“Why don’t you have an iron?” Logan asks.

“We’re not in our room because SOMEBODY got in a knife fight in the middle of it,” Titus says.

“Oh, I’m sorry Titus, next time, would you rather I let you be raped so that there won’t be a crime scene in your room?” I ask, very, very sarcastically.

“NO!! Strangle anybody you want in my room, Tom, I love and appreciate you,” Quentin says, very quickly.

“No, but if you’d rolled her through the window, the crime scene would have been outside---just---saying---something to improve on ----for next time---ow, stop it----,” he laughs the last bit as I crawl up onto the top bunk where he’s lying to tickle him.

“Next time!?” Quentin says.

“Stop talking about killing people please, I’m traumatized enough,” Logan begs.

“So am I,” Titus says, wiggling away as I leave him be.

“I’ll traumatize you---what’re you reading anyway?” I ask, giving his leg a good shove before crawling back to the floor.

“Books,” he says.

“I got that; I thought you’d read them all,” I say.

“I did, I have new ones. Thank you Leavitt,” he says, adding the last part robotically.

“You got him books?” I ask Leavitt, surprised.

“No, I told Wilde that if she didn’t give him access to the military library, then she was going to have another murder to investigate,” Leavitt says.

“Is he that bad?” Liesel asks, amused.

“You don’t even know---we’re not in our room anymore because it’s a crime scene --for the best possible reasons, don’t look at me like that Tom---so instead where are we? A freaking closet. A freaking closet with mats, and supplies and things and on a nightly basis he rearranges them into various demonic shapes and symbols looming over my pallet,” Leavitt says. “So, he needed entertainment.”

“Titus, why’d you do that to him? That’s mean,” I say.

“It was funny,” Titus says, as though it should have been obvious.

“What did he rearrange and how?” Liesel asks.

“Towels, PT mats, brooms which for your information look a like sycles in the dim light,” Leavitt says, pacing.

“So that’s why you’re all in my room?” Logan asks.

“Yeah, my room is a crime scene too, technically, but my roommate’s the one I strangled for the best possible reasons so I’ve got a closet to myself while stupid beggars have to live with each other,” I say. I stayed less in the closet, though due to frequent bedtime stories and hugs, I almost always wound up in Logan’s room. in a real bed, In the top bunk because he’s afraid of heights. not in a closet. And Logan had company. It was win win for me.

“Yes, so I had to make sure he was amused so he’d quit trying to drive me insane,” Leavitt says.

“Yeah, now I’m learning Isylgyn and Russian,” Titus says, happily.

“At the same time---”

“No don’t ask him questions he’ll keep talking and the point of the entertainment is he doesn’t talk,” Leavitt cautions Logan.

“Yes, King, at the same time with different parts of my brain it isn’t that hard,” Titus says, happily.

“Titus, you know if you read all that now in three days you’re going to moping around bored that you don’t have anything to do at night when other people are sleeping,” Liesel says.

“But then I’ll be moping now,” he says, suspiciously.

“Not if you go and ask Kip to look at the computers to see if your family’s come. You know he’d let you,” Liesel suggests.

“What---you want me to see if your family’s come but you’re too nervous to ask?” he guesses.

“Yeah, please?” she asks, “I know you know what they look like you played with my tablet and probably went through my messages yesterday.”

“Okay,” Titus says, sitting up and powering off the tablets.

“Get some meal bars while you’re on your way, you know they’ll have us lined up for hours and won’t let us eat anything,” I call after him, as he leaves the room.

“Thank you,” Leavitt says, grabbing Liesel’s shoulders and shaking her. “Thank you.”

“Has he been that bad?” I ask Leavitt, amused.

“Yes! At this point any moment free of a practical joke or random sarcastic commentary is a beautiful one,” he says.

“Your mum going to come down?” I ask him, now that Titus is gone.

“I hope so, I hope they got her fare, I know she couldn’t afford it and they wouldn’t let me wire money,” he says, “On her last message she told me not to worry but that’s it and I do worry.”

“I wonder if my dad’s coming,” Liesel says.

“Didn’t he say he was?” I ask.

“Yeah, but he’s really odd. He doesn’t tell me what he does for a living, and I don’t even know what he looks like,” Liesel says.

“Why didn’t somebody tell me till now that Nolan is still loose?” I ask, walking up to Wilde and Thorne angrily.

“Because we knew this would be your reaction?” Thorn says.

“I honestly forget to talk to you,” Wilde says.

“How can they not know where he is? What is he eating grass and hiding the woods?” I hiss, “This is a military base for God’s sake, how hard is it to find one Cadet?”

“Apparently very,” Thorn says.

“And why aren’t you concerned? You’re always concerned about everything,” I say, annoyed.

“Oh, I’m heavily medicated,” Thorn says.

“I am concerned, but that’s the MPs jobs, not ours. We’ve had our flight certified cadets locked up cleaning things for the past week, much to their dismay---”

“But now that Card has access to the full library we’ve had remarkably fewer, death threats, insidious pranks, and machinery malfunctions—”

“And the rest are at their A schools elsewhere on base. We are doing the best we can,” Wilde says, “We told the cadets last night, so they could be on guard. They aren’t to leave their barracks.”

“You told the cadets and not me?” I ask, annoyed.

“Like I said, I tend to forget to talk to you, sorry,” she says.

“Fine, but it still means trouble,” I warn.

“Of course it does, everything here means trouble, but it will all be all right in the end,” Thorn says.

“How so?” I ask, thinking only of Liesel. I was supposed to meet her today—had no idea how I was going to pull that off or what I was going to say, but I was. In less than an hour, in fact. We were supposed to meet the cadets right before they got to go and get ready to get in formation for the ceremony. Right now I just want to be sure there were no more weird accidents or attacks or fires started or murders or anything. needless to say all of those things happen.

“We’ll all die,” Thorn says, calmly, “Then everything will be all right.”

“Do you think they’re here yet?” I spin around in the auditorium. There aren’t that many people, most of them look as nervous as I am which is comforting in a way. None of the children are out yet, though. But surely they are coming soon they said we’d get to see them.

“I’m sure they didn’t lose him,” Jacob says, dryly. He’s not been very supportive or helpful, which is irritating since he did volunteer to come with me. “Honestly why are you so apprehensive? It’s not like we don’t know what the heathen looks like.”

“Because, it’s been weeks and----” and something might have happened something always happens “---and after they said they’d sent him to prison and all that---I just want to know what’s going on.”

“And you think we’ll find out from him?” Jacob asks, bemused.

“If you’re going to be so negative about seeing Titus why did you come?” I ask. This is hard enough, to pretend I actually want to see him, without my eldest miserable son hanging about making sarcastic remarks.

“Because I wanted to meet these people who have promised to take him to a different planet from us and I wanted to thank them.”

“Jacob!! That’s horrible,” I say.

“Admit it, that’s why you came.”

“it isn’t.”

“It bloody well is,” he laughs.

“I’m not thanking them, I want to make sure it’s true and what they want to do but not thank them,” I say. that would be wrong. You don’t thank a person for committing suicide.

“We should. It’s probably saved all of our lives,” he says, dryly.

“Jacob, you’re being ridiculous,” I say, because he’s echoing my thoughts too much.

“Hilda’s already dead, I’m amazed he stopped there,” he says, eyes devoid of emotion.

“We don’t know that that was his fault,” I say, but my voice cracks at the mention of my only daughter, long dead now, sweet child. Dead at her own brother’s hand, no doubt.

“No, they were just walking home alone and she gets strangled by somebody the police never catch and poor little Titus sees the whole thing,” Jacob says, mockingly, “We’ve always known there was something wrong with him. Why can’t you just admit it?”

“He cried,” I say, “He never cries, he’s never cried in his life. He cried for her.”

“He was acting. Making us believe he was upset so we wouldn’t suspect him, Jesus, we all know he’s a sociopath,” Jacob says, “We’re lucky they are taking him away, let him murder Isylgyns instead of humans.”

“He’s just---he’s just too clever for his own good, and he never had your father around that was hard on him---”

“No, I think that actually went better---”

“And you were all so much older than him and he’s different. They would know if he’s crazy---”

“Space Forces? They launch themselves into orbit in little tin cans to fight monsters that is the very definition of crazy,” he says, “Titus is evil, and we are lucky if we can escape him.”

I slap his cheek but he catches my arm before I can move it away, his grip is like a vice.

“Don’t take out on me what you should’ve done to him,” he hisses, slowly letting my hand go. There are finger nail marks in my skin.

“I did beat him, for putting his hands to his head like he did and all else,” I say. don’t tell him that I beat him the night Hilda died. I blamed him. even if he did just witness it, I blamed him. Bastard spawn. I never wanted him, never wanted to raise him never wanted to have him. so many nights, crying and screaming in his crib, I could have so easily smothered him and spared the universe the pain of his existence. And I didn’t. and now we had to pay for what I’d brought into the world but what I didn’t see what I’d never seen was why Hilda had to pay? Sweet thing, he wasn’t her fault. He wasn’t her fault. Why did she have to pay? Why did he have to take her from me? I found a broom and beat him with it, black and blue. He sobbed and he barely fought back, it took Jacob to get us off each other both of us sobbing. Him saying he couldn’t save her, me screaming at him that he killed her.

“And look at the good it did,” Jacob says, darkly.

“I tried—”

“You failed.”

“I know that,” I say, close to striking him again, “God help me I know that, but I wasn’t ready. In all the evil I imagined I didn’t know he would be---him.”

“I know,” he says, reaching out to touch my arm but I move away. “I know. I’m just afraid.”

“So am I,” I say.

“Should we just go?” he asks.

“No, let’s at least do this, see him one last time. Maybe he’s all right. Maybe he’s changed.”

Since I can blow the entire building up with all of our families inside, and make it look like Nolan did it, I fail to see why I shouldn’t. Time for some fun.

“Hey, Kip, is Titus here with you?” I ask, going into the control room. I should remember customs and courtesies, but we’re in a rush, and it’s been a really long week, a lot of it spent helping Kip clean computers and listen to his philosophies on life.

“No, I haven’t seen him all day,” he says, spinning around in his chair, “Why? Aren’t you guys supposed to be meeting families if you have them?”

“Yeah, if not we just get to eat before the ceremony, thanks,” I say, bolting back out of the room, cutting off his response which is: “Eat? Really? What? Could I come I---”

“Titus isn’t there?” Liesel asks, as I meet her in the hall.

“No,” I say, shaking my head, trying to stop the panic in my chest. “Do you think---”

“As often as we joke about him blowing up the base do you think he’d actually do it?” Liesel asks, her eyes meet mine. We are thinking the same thing.

“That and Nolan’s loose and---things don’t go well when Titus is missing,” I say.

“Let’s go and find him,” she agrees, and we both hurry down the hall.

“You have to go and meet your family---” I say, remembering, of course, she has something to look forward to.

“Not if the entire building burns down,” she says, dryly, “Come on, let’s just take a quick look around.”

Chapter 16

N ow, you would think walking into the broom closet that you’ve been living out of for the past week would be uneventful. You’re going to get your flight cap which it seems you forgot because you can’t find it anywhere, and you’re in a hurry because you want to see your mum before the ceremony because you need to talk about your sister’s murder. So running back to the closet is an inconvenience at best. Boring, annoying maybe, but certainly not life threatening. That is what you would think.

You would be wrong.

I step in the door and hear the click of the trap that is positioned on the door jam. As the door swings open, a simple lever swings down, looping the noose around my neck. I step automatically forward, as though to run away from it, and my feet crack through the floor, which has been cut away and replaced with bare drywall, plunging me downward towards the lower level, suspended only by my neck in the noose.

My hands reach up, grabbing the rope above me and pulling me up, so that at least I can breathe. But I can’t let go, I can’t move. If I let go the noose around my neck will strangle me or crack my neck I’m not sure which but one of those things will happen. I look down at the floor beneath me, but it’s fallen away. somebody took out the carpet tiles, sawed away the support beams, and now took away the tiles all together so that my feet, when they landed on the floor, went straight through the insulation and ceiling tiles, about to plunge me to my death.

My arms already ache from holding myself up from the knot of the noose, now lying oh so placidly around my neck. I twist in the knot and look around. Nothing. surely somebody will come? No, everyone’s getting ready for the ceremony, they wouldn’t be---

I hear footsteps, blessed footsteps, somebody is coming thank god just hold my legs up, call for help, unloop it from around my neck now anything---

The footsteps stop and there is a very distinct high pitched scream, and then the footsteps retreat.

“Come back!!” I cry but I don’t know if don’t make sound or the person doesn’t hear me because they are already gone. Either way I’m still trapped. I breath. Just try to breath. Just breath it’s okay you’re hanging on just hang on. just hang on.

“Let go.”

I close my eyes but open or closed I still see him standing there. The purple rope marks around his neck. His eyes a bit bulging from just hanging there for hours and hours while we waited for someone to come.

“Just let go,” he says, “Release your hands. It’ll all be over.”

“No,” I choke, my hold is slipping it’s getting tighter around my neck but I cling to the rope with all my might.

“Just. Let go,” Ian says, “It’s so easy. So very easy. To let go. What you are doing is hard.”

“No, no I don’t want to. it’s hard but that’s okay. I don’t want to let go,” I whisper, my voice is breaking.

“Why? It’s so very hard. Just let go, don’t be afraid. let go and you can step right down and be with me,” he says, pointing at the floor. It’s whole now. whole and safe.

“No. It’s not real. And you’re not real. You’re not you,” I say, feeling tears well in my eyes, “I want to stay here.”

“No you don’t. you want to let go,” he whispers, reaching out to touch my face with his cold hand. He moves his hand up to mine, gently pressing against my aching fingers, “Let go it’s all safe down here. it’ll all be all right.”

“No. no I’m not coming with you you’re not Ian. You’re something else you’re not him. Ian wouldn’t want me to die, he didn’t want to die he was just hurting too much. And it hurt to even leave me that’s why he didn’t tell me. but he didn’t really want to leave. And neither do I.”

“No, you’re right, I’m not him, Quentin,” he laughs, “I’m you. I’m in you and I’m stronger than you are. And you will give in. and then I’ll stop and it’ll all stop.”

“No. No, I won’t give in. I won’t give up I know that now,” I say.

“Let go.”

“Hold on,” Ginny is standing next to Ian, she’s holding my feet. Her face is pale and there are burn marks on her arms. Where they electrocuted her. and there’s a scar on her head, where they cut it open to look at her brain. It’s stitched up with blue stitches but her hair is still shaved. And there’s blood on her hair and the stiches. From where they took her brain out so they could look at it and find out what made her so beautiful. “Quentin it’s okay, just hold on.”

“No, Ginny,” now I want to let go and scoop her up in my arms and put her on my shoulders and make her laugh like I should have done a million more times when I had the chance and I didn’t. I want to kiss the tear stains on her cheeks and tell her it’s all okay now. but the only reason I cling on is because she tells me too. Because we both know she’s not real.

“It’s okay Quentin hang on,” she says, “I’m okay you need to hang on.”

“Let go,” Ian whispers.

“Hold on. If he is in you so am I---and together we can hold on,” she says, she’s crying now because she knows my hands are slowly slipping, strangling myself.

“Just let it go. Your fingers hurt now it won’t be much longer anyway. nobody is coming to save you. they never come to save you,” he says.

“You don’t need them to save you. holding on is breaking you. let go with one hand. Get your knife. You’ll slip but you’ll still be able to breath. Get the knife and cut the rope,” Ginny says.

“It won’t work. you’ll die trying to get the knife and you’ll die slower. Let go with both hands. You’ll be okay,” he says, “You’ll come be with us, you miss us don’t you?”

“No, Quentin you have to try. you’ve got your life to live for all three of us you have to try. there will be a time when we’re together again, the real us, all three of us just like it was just like it should be but that time isn’t now go on, Quentin, get your knife cut yourself free,” Ginny pleads, desperately.

“Fall.”

“Try.”

“Fall, just let go. Let yourself fall. Fall to freedom,” Ian says.

“No,” I say, and I let go with one hand. The other one burns so much I can’t feel it and the noose tightens as I try to hold myself up. My free hand pulls the combat knife from my belt; swinging the large blade precariously over my head, I slash at the rope with my numb arm. I have no idea where it is and I’ve no idea how to cut it my arm is so sore from holding me up I can’t feel it anymore and my fingers ache and---

I drop the knife. I don’t even think I cut the rope. Desperately, I take hold of the loop around my neck and pull, tugging it up over my face. I don’t get it all the way but I do get it past my chin before my grip breaks and I fall.

The rope burns across my face, tightening, but with no chin to block it and gravity on my side, the noose tugs painfully across my face before finally releasing me to fall to the floor below.

Which isn’t there.

I fall.

Through the floor, away from the noose, the closet, all of it, into the hall below.

That really hurts, but it is nothing compared to how badly my arms are burning right now. and my fingers. And my neck hurts, and my face where the rope burned across it. and my knees and legs hurt where they hit the floor that hurts too. I hurt a lot.

Which means I’m not dead.

I actually start to sob, softly. So close, locked in the embrace with death, her fingers on my face her lips on mine and I broke free. The noose around my neck, my worst nightmare the stuff of my nightmares, a noose tightening around my neck, and I got free. I am free. I don’t have to fear it. I am free.

I can’t stop crying or even move as I lay there, the realization of how very alive I am and how very close to death I was all washing over me.

I don’t know how long it takes me to realize that somebody tried to kill me.

That was a trap. Set for me.

Who sets traps in my closet let me see?---oh yes only one person. Titus Card.

The murdering bastard.

And where might he be?

“Where’s Liesel?” so I thought that the way I would meet the woman who bore my child would be a little bit different. Not a lot. I mean I am an idiot. I accept that and move on. But I thought it would be more awkward and stupid and less panicked and short.

“What?” she asks, looking me up and down and realizing who I must be. we got numbers for tables where we were supposed to meet our cadets. She’s youngish, not much older than me, looks a lot like Liesel I suppose. Brown hair, brown eyes. simple, neat dress. Two little girls stand with her, sort of staring at me. I’m wearing a black collared shirt and a dark jacket and dark pants and my combat boots because clearly if I’m out of my uniform none of my fellow Spacemen will recognize and court martial me for my actions over the past couple of weeks. Like I said I am an idiot.

“She isn’t here?” I ask, looking around. No. the other cadets are out. Just no.

“No,” she says, and she sees the fear in my eyes and realizes I care and then suddenly the awkwardness is gone and she knows I love our daughter as well.

“Shit, I have to go find her,” I say, and I turn around and run. She probably calls after me but I don’t bother to turn around. It is way---way---way too hard to explain and I need to find her. I have to find her.

“This is stupid he wouldn’t be down here he’s probably just hiding from his family,” I rationalize, feeling bad, “You should go up there your mom and dad will be there---”

“But Nolan is loose and if everything’s all right they’ll still be there after the ceremony,” Liesel says, as she and I go into the lift that leads to the energy room. there is a maze of boilers and power cells that give power to the training buildings. A few dozen meters above us, the families and flight school are preparing for our graduation into pilot training.

“Yeah, you’re right, let’s just have a quick look around,” I say.

“Leavitt? You’re still alive? King is crying over there that you tried to hang yourself, I was sending somebody to collect your body,” Thorn is really really concerned, as you can see. Well he’s been saying he’s heavily medicated his eyes are cloudy and his voice slow. So that could be what’s wrong with him. That or I did actually die and this is hell. That is so possible it’s not funny.

“Logan? Okay I need to go hit him he could have helped---no I’m fine, tell me—theoretically----if you were going to blow up this building how would you start?” I ask, rubbing my neck which is still sore but at this point I’m trying to spread the red marks and purple bruises so they aren’t so damn obvious and I don’t have to look at them for the next few weeks.

“The energy room, there are all sorts of supports and things under there---why?” he asks. We are standing outside the big assembly hall where we are supposed to find our families. I’ve been messaged a number, on my tablet, for what table to meet my mother at. I’m not going. I need to catch a murderer.

“Never mind—you might want to evacuate like everyone---just, you know, as a precaution,” I say, turning and running back towards the service lifts.

Chapter 17

S o, somebody tried to plant a bomb. Really badly, I might add. He’s got it wired to blow, but the timer mechanism looks unreliable at best, a simply circuitry error and could have ruined his entire----wait, yes, it did. okay---so the bomb isn’t live that’s a good thing.

I step back, slowly. It’s still a live bomb and I should tell someone. But who? And who planted it? Tyrell? Titus. Who knows, they’re both loose and equal amounts of trouble in my opinion. I can’t leave the bomb here. but I also can’t pick it up and walk around with it, “I just found this bomb” certainly doesn’t seem like a very good excuse. I sigh, I can’t just stand here with it either. What am I going to do?

This is the perfect place to plant bombs. You don’t even actually need that many initiators, one or two real ones and those will trigger the packs of explosives. There were more than enough cleaning supplies to make a few bombs. Plus, all the environmentally friendly materials that they use burn up so easily, this section of the base will go down in no time at all. The rest of the bombs have to look authentic, of course. Can’t have somebody trying to move the explosives so that they won’t go off. not that anybody is down here---

“Titus---what are you doing?”

Except the woman I love, she is here. needless to say.

“Nothing,” I didn’t think that would work. If he lives, I’ll have to talk to Harris about what it feels like to say the wrong thing, I’m sure it’s an emotion he’s familiar with.

“What is that?” Tom asks, slowly stepping towards me, her eyes on my nice bomb.

“What does it look like?” I ask.

“A bomb,” she says, her eyes darting back to me.

“That’s what it is,” I say.

“Okay,” she says shifting backwards ready to run or take a blow from me but not actually running or attacking me.

“What does it matter though? If they all die?” I ask, nodding at the upstairs. “Nobody came for you. I bet nobody came for me either. Or if they did it was only to make sure somebody was promising to send me to a different planet. It’s not as though they care. It’s not as though anything will ever change. The Peters will be left alone and the Quentins will kill themselves and the Tsegis will die and life will go on. so why not help it along, the despair? Let them all die.”

“I’m sorry your family isn’t stronger---I wish your dad hadn’t left---I wish my parents had bothered to ever come---but that doesn’t excuse this, that doesn’t excuse killing them. Just come with me, please---we can fix this, I promise, together---,” she says, holding out her hand, her eyes pained. So she’s not going to agree to help me. Oh well. it was worth the try.

“Oh,---wait, you think I made this bomb?” I ask, pointing at my bomb, almost laughing. But inside I’m sad. I can never tell her. She can’t know what I am. Or she wouldn’t love me anymore.

“What—yes,” she says, carefully.

“No,” I say. we can’t fix me. I’m sorry, Tom. We can’t fix me.

“Well---why did you just say that then?”

“Ah, I found you down here with a bomb, I thought it was best to go along with it,” I say, innocently. Now I’m going to have to defuse it like a gentleman. Optimum use of the preposition, by the way.

“You didn’t find me with a bomb! I found you with a bomb!” she’s annoyed now, relieved but annoyed.

“Okay, let’s just compromise, we’ll just say we found each other with a bomb, and leave it at that,” I offer generously.

“No, I found you with a bomb—”

“Trying to defuse it and you came up looking like you’d just set it---”

“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard you can’t look like you’ve just set a bomb---”

“What did you think I looked like then?”

“You were standing by it!” she’s still breathing quickly a sign that she’s deeply annoyed with me for making her think I was planting a bomb. Think of how mad she’s be if she knew I actually was. Then she’d never kiss me.

“So are you that doesn’t mean you built it,” I say.

“Okay, forget it, neither of us built the bomb---let’s just---figure out how to defuse it,” Tom says, shaking her head. she comes closer, “There must be some wire to cut or something.”

“We just have to break the power supply to the initiator, then it won’t go off,” not that I know anything about bombs or making them. with a little sigh, I dismantle my perfectly good bomb until it’s useless.

“Is that it?” she asks.

“Should be, not that I know anything about bombs or making them,” I say.

“Right, but we can’t just leave it here, we need to get help,” she says, “We have to tell Thorn and Wilde.”

“There could be more, if you and I didn’t plant it, somebody else down here did, and there could be more of them,” I say, reasonably. For a purely random example the other eight bombs I have on the main support beams. Like those. Very similar to those.

I spin around in the crowd, trying not to panic. He’s fine. Absolutely fine. He’s just not here. But he’s fine. Except I don’t see him.

Did I read the little card they gave me right? Yes, table 42, and I’m standing here in my best dress which is about ten years old and when I got it it was second hand I got it for Quentin’s school awards, he’d won some science award, because he was so clever, he won some award, so he walked up on stage and got this cheap little trophy and the director shook hands with him and I got this dress because I wanted to look decent and like a good mother, and—and Ian was there too, he’d not gotten the award ever but he clapped for his brother. 

He didn’t smile all night though. Why didn’t I notice that? Why didn’t I do something? What should I have done? Anything to stop him doing what he did my sweet boy and Ginny---oh god Ginny now here too please, Quentin, just come here and be all right. I know it’s just the two of us now and it shouldn’t be and it hurts like hell but please, please, please be okay.

“Ma’am,” a Spaceman is standing in front of me, for half a second I want to believe that it’s Quentin he’s as tall as Quentin is, but no, this is a man, close to my age, perhaps a bit younger. His eyes are red and bit foggy, he’s clean shaven but there are cuts on his face from doing it, and his stance is swaying, like he’s used to being in space and not on the ground. Is this what Quentin will look like twenty years? Another one of their clones, on medication no, doubt, by the trembling of his hands. Not even able to care for himself properly? If Quentin were here this moment I would take him and hug him so tight and take him home—home where? Home where his brother died, home where his sister isn’t anymore? Yes, yes, yes it’s just the two of us and it shouldn’t be but I’ll make it work I’ll take care of you please.

“Where is my son?” I ask him.

“He’s unavoidably detained but so far as I know not dead---against the odds, so, because he’s a nice kid and I rather like him I’m going to ask you to step outside with me and we’ll wait for him,” he says, taking my arm. His grip is like a vice, despite his almost drunken demeanor, he’s terribly strong.

“What? No, where is my son?” I ask, kicking him but he grabs my other arm and pins it behind my back hard.

“Shit---like I said, he’s detained, now come on,” he twists my fingers, I wince.

“And don’t think about screaming, this for your own good damn it, and I can hurt you a hell of a lot worse without looking like it so just be quiet,” he says, dragging me towards the door.

“Where are you taking me?” I hiss.

“Outside, like I said, to wait for Leavitt,” he says.

“Why? We’re supposed to wait in here,” I say.

“Oh, I don’t know. the whole building might just blow up. Who can say?”

Of course I find a bomb. No Liesel. Just a bomb and the cadet who planted it.

“What the hell?” I’m very creative.

“I did not plant this---I found it, I don’t know quite how to defuse it,” Leavitt says, looking at bomb almost ready to cry.

“Well---why are you just standing here?” I ask.

“Why are you dressed like that?” he asks, suspiciously.

“That is not important---wait you don’t think I planted it?” I realize as he stares at me nervously.

“Well, why aren’t you in uniform?” he asks, reasonably.

“Why do you look like that?” I ask. He’s in his dress whites, but they are scuffed at the knees and disheveled in general, as though he’s fallen through the floor or something. his neck is red and bruised, like somebody tried to strangle him.

“I was nearly killed by a trap—why aren’t you in uniform?” he asks.

“That---really doesn’t matter, do you honestly think I am smart enough to plant a bomb?” I ask, desperately.

“Probably not, it looks pretty sophisticated,” he admits.

“I should really pull a 314 for that actually working---okay, if you didn’t do it why are you just standing here?” I ask.

“Well, I found it and I don’t know how to defuse it and I can’t just leave it and if I somehow carry it with me then it really looks like I made it and it might go off,” he says.

“That is a problem,” I say, studying the thing. It’s a packet of what is probably explosive with wires running into and out to a timer thingy. “I’ve no idea how to defuse it either, unfortunately. My SFCS isn’t mechanics.”

“Well, then go and get help,” he suggests.

“I can’t leave you here with it!” I say.

“Why not?”

“Because---”

“You really still think I planted it?” he asks, annoyed.

“No, but I can’t leave you standing here next to a bomb,” I say.

“We need to evacuate the building,” he says, “Then we’ll try to defuse it.”

“Okay,” I say, “I’ll stay here, you run you’re faster than me.”

“Okay,” he says, taking off his jacket, which is a bit torn anyway, “What do I do?”

“I don’t know---pull the fire alarm or something, then go and find Wilde,” I say.

“But if I pull the fire alarm everyone will scatter and be harder to find,” he points out.

“Well then, just find Wilde or somebody equally in charge and then do something I don’t care,” I say.

“Okay,” he says, nodding and starting to back away. He doesn’t get far, though.

“What’s going on?” Tom and Card run up, they are carrying what look like disassembled piece of a bomb but I’ve been wrong before they could be delivering cookies. Not.

“We found a bomb,” I say.

“So did we,” Tom says, holding up explosive as evidence.

“Why not just defuse it?” Card asks, lazily, going right over to the bomb and starting to fiddle with it.

Well well well I’m not the only random bomb maker in these parts. How terribly interesting.

“Because we don’t know how---how do you know how?” I ask.

“I don’t know specifically but we defused the other one without exploding so this one should be similar, there you are,” he says, holding out the timer mechanism makes go boom thingy piece of it, “It’s safe.”

“It’s not safe, it’s still a bomb!” I say, annoyed at how calm he is I always knew I hated pilots for a reason sociopathic little shits. “And there could be more. If you found one and we found one, then it stands to reason there are more. Plus whoever planted them is still down here.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that,” Card says.

“Where have you been?” Leavitt asks suspiciously.

“Down here looking for bombs, Tyrell is loose,” Card says.

“No whoever---possibly Tyrell--- is probably gone, we still need to get help though,” Tom says.

“Have any of you seen Stowe?” I ask.

“Yes, she and I went looking for Titus, we split up, she’s down here somewhere,” Tom says.

“All right, I’ll look for her, all of you go back to the surface where it’s safe and tell Wilde or somebody equally competent who isn’t Thorne what’s going on,” I command. Thorne would technically be all right too, but he would gloat too much since he’s been so sure the world is coming to an end.

“All right, Stowe shouldn’t be far,” Tom calls.

“I hope not,” I mutter, turning and looking at the maze of ducts and pipes. Please dear god let her be safe.

“What are you doing?” for a second I think it’s Titus bent over what looks like a bomb. But it’s not. It’s Tyrell. Oh god.

He giggles uncontrollably.

“Tyrell, what’s going on?” I ask, stepping closer to him.

“Lookit---yooo, little spaceman, eh? Nice little Spaceman,” he steps forward surprisingly quickly, reaching out a finger to flick the ribbons on my chest. Marksman and Kepler Defender and Science achievements, Kepler defender everyone gets, I earned the other two at the Academy.

“I’ve been looking for you,” I say, calmly, looking at the thing he was fussing with yep it’s a bomb. He’s clearly insane, and he’s a bit bigger than me. He’s weak, though, living in the woods for the past week, only in those dingy hospital clothes, he’s bruised and dirty.

“Why?” he asks, suspiciously.

“I was worried about you,” I say, reaching out and stroking his cheek. He relaxes, a little but not much, he’s sweaty and his skin feels cold. “Why don’t we go back up? It’s dark down here.”

“Okay, okay---but first,” he goes back to the bomb, giggling, “First they all die.”

“That one looks good, let’s just go,” I say, encouragingly, I need him to turn his back to me, that would be good, he’s not though. I’d rather strangle him than anything but it might have to come to blows.

“But first,” he says, and he presses a button on the bomb. Then everything goes black.

“Let’s split up,” Tom suggests, “That will make finding Wilde quicker.”

“Agreed,” I say, shoving her in the lift and slamming the door shut, locking it with a click. Just as I do, the first explosion goes off. You see the bomb Leavitt and Harris found was about to blow. So I figured whoever set the bombs, presumably Tyrell, would have more than one set to blow, with choice packets of explosives set about that would be triggered by the initial explosion. I know I was going to. and it seems I’m right.

“What are you doing?” she asks, spinning around angrily and shaking the bars, as the lift starts to rise. I punch the buttons to the lift, they sizzle and the lights go out. now nobody else can get up. Good.

“Yes what are you doing?” Leavitt asks, grabbing my arm.

“Trading my life for yours,” I say, turning my head to watch her as she goes up, “Get out of here, now, before the entire place burns down. I’ll do my best to neutralize the other explosives.”

“No, Titus damn you,” she hisses, trying to reach through the bars presumably to strangle me.

“Know I worship you, and always will,” I call after her, right before Leavitt grabs me and rams me against the wall.

“What were you thinking? Are you trying to get us killed?” he growls.

“Not specifically, calm down, this was the best way to prove my eternal devotion to her,” I say.

“I DON’T CARE ABOUT THAT!!”

“Why not?” I ask, “I do.”

“BECAUSE I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOU I HATE YOU VERY VERY MUCH,” he says, dropping me and pacing away, punching the wall. 

“Oh. Okay. Too bad. Now she’ll love me---anyway I don’t think we’ll die, we just need to neutralize the explosive packs that are bound to be about, before the fire reaches them,” I say, nodding behind me. I can smell burning but not hear it.

“Okay, fine,” he says, nodding, “But that doesn’t stop the fire.”

“No, that’s the part that makes it likely that we’ll die.”

As soon as the lift stops, I run to the end of the hall pulling the fire alarm. There, now the building will be evacuated. Time to get back down there.

“Oh wow. An inexplicable fire. And Titus is in the vicinity but not where he’s supposed to be. how utterly unremarkable,” I say, looking up as the fire alarms go off and people start trying to shuffle us outside.

“Shut up, just shut up, I wish you’d never come,” my mother says, taking my arm and pulling me towards the door as people try to fight their way out.

“So do I, you’d think they’d have booze,” I say.

“No, you wouldn’t, it’s military.”

“There has to be something that retards their thinking otherwise they wouldn’t have kept Titus this long already,” I say, “I do hope they aren’t going to ask us to take him back.”

“They couldn’t,” She says, almost fearfully.

“He is burning the place down.”

“We don’t know---”

“Yes we do.”

“He isn’t necessarily---”

“Yes he is.”

“You’re right let’s just leave.”

I wake up aching all over, it’s amazing how much pain your body can be in. instantly I wish to be asleep again because then nothing hurt. I can’t be though, the pain is keeping me up now. I try to breath and I inhale smoke, coughing. Then I remember, of course, that a bomb went off. Oh, God, I cannot possibly be okay.

“Liesel, wake up for me, sweet one, wake up,” a familiar voice is talking to me and I slowly become aware that somebody is holding me. I force my eyes open.

“I’m okay,” I cough, as slowly feeling comes back into my limbs. I hurt all over but I’m whole, that’s something.

“Breath, baby, just breath,” Harris god knows why he’s here, is holding me, kneeling on the ground and holding me in his arms.

“I’m okay,” I cough again even though I’m clearly not.

“You’re burned bad and you’ve been knocked pretty good, We need to get out of here, and I can carry you but if anything’s broken I don’t want to break it worse,” he says, “I moved you as far as I dared from the flames but you weren’t moving, I thought your neck might be broken---Jesus---don’t get up!”

“Just my wrist, I can stand,” I say, basically wiggling away, and trying to stand, which hurts because my dress whites are basically burned to my skin but I don’t think I’ve ever been held like that by somebody in my memory and it felt creepy even if he is only trying to help. also he called me sweetheart but then he thought I was dead and my head is wringing so that might have just been general ‘oh my god she’s dead’ affection and not creepy affection.

“Okay—um---don’t---okay you are---be careful, here,” he stands and takes off a black jacket and hands it to me. he’s not in his uniform that’s random. Okay.

“What, no that’ll hurt,” I say, taking it with my good hand.

“Yeah your shirt is sort of ah burned off and onto you put that on,” he says, “you’ll get infected or something otherwise.”

“Okay,” I am too numb and incoherent to argue, he wraps it around my shoulders and I wince painfully.

“Now, we need to get you out of here,” he says, looking around. There is fire licking its way along the ceiling and igniting a few pipes.

“Tyrell, he was planting a bomb,” I say, as my mind comes back to me, “I tried to stop him---what are you doing here?”

“Looking for you! You were missing I---I came looking for you,” he stutters.

“How’d you know I was missing?” I ask.

“I didn’t see you, at the reception, thing----I just knew you were----you and Tom and Card and Leavitt, are all down here, apparently, I’ve sent them up,” he says, “I came looking for you.”

“Thank you,” I say.

“Of course, now, I think the elevators are that way---”

“They are that way Harris you have the sense of direction of a pre-pubescent cephalopod, you literally just came from them---look we’ve found explosives we’re trying to keep them away from the fire---Liesel can you really not feel third degree burns? I’ve read a variety of literature about it but I’m curious about the actual sensation---”

“My arms are full of explosive materials can you please punch him in the throat for me?”

Leavitt and Card come up from the actual direction of the lifts, with their arms full of what are apparently homemade explosives.

“I can actually get you in trouble for talking to me like that---” Harris begins.

“Thing is you can’t-----”

“Did any of you see Tyrell? He was right near me when the bomb went off?” I ask, realizing Harris ought to have found him and me.

“No,” Harris says, shaking his head.

“Great, the insane bomber is wandering around somewhere Jason style half burned up and my arms are full of bombs,” Leavitt growls. His neck is all bruised. I don’t dare ask what happened to him he doesn’t look happy right now and honestly it probably has to do with something Titus did.

“He’s got to be worse off than me, we were right near the blast,” I cough.

“I’ll find him---Card, Leavitt I told you to go to the lifts,” Harris says.

“Here, get the fire blanket from the kit over there we’ll wrap these up---,” Card says, taking the explosives from Quentin, “And how do you plan on finding him you couldn’t even find the lifts a minute ago.”

“Well it doesn’t matter because I have no idea where he is and I should have known where the lifts are it’s my brain that’s damaged not my eyes,” Harris retorts.

“We did go to the lifts the asshole decides to push his girlfriend in so she’ll go up and then stay down here playing hero,” Quentin says, going to the wall where a pathetically small fire extinguisher and a fire blanket kit are.

“There are another set of lifts over there, and she knows that, she probably hit the fire alarm and come right back down,” I say.

“Good, another minor is wandering around in a burning building,” Harris says, taking a deep breath, “All right, we are all going up and waiting for the fire crew to come in.”

“No, I’m going to find Tom,” Card says.

“No, you are not, you don’t even know if she’s down here,” Harris says, as Titus dumps his armload of explosives into the fire blanket Quentin brings back.

“I wouldn’t love her if she weren’t and I do so she is,” Titus calls over his shoulder.

“Let him go. Maybe he’ll die,” Quentin says, encouragingly, “Wouldn’t that be great?”

The entire building is up in flames now. Tt started down in the energy rooms, the marshalls said. I told them we’re still missing cadets, they say the fire is burning to hot in the top for them to go in just yet. so I stand and watch it burn.

“Well well,” Thorn is here as well, standing in front of the line of horrified families, most of whom are happily reunited with their cadets.

“Don’t say a word,” I say.

“What did I tell you? Dark cloud,” he says.

“Card is one of the missing,” I say, harshly. That boy probably burned up. That irritating, far too clever BOY, is probably dead in there right now.

“I know, I’m not saying it’s his fault, I’m saying the end is coming, and he is a main player in it,” Thorne says.

“I thought they had you on medication,” I say, with a sigh.

“Medication doesn’t make it go away,” he says, then he melts back into the crowd. I sigh and watch the flames.

Because he’s right.

The end is coming. I just don’t know how we can stop it.

I cough in the smoke. Shouldn’t there be a fire suppressant system in this place? There should be, I’m sure of it. I’m beginning to regret coming back down here it was stupid of me but I am too stubborn for my own good sometimes and despite myself I love that idiot Titus Card, and I’ll not let him burn up to save me. It’s only him I’m worried about. Liesel and the others will have gone to the other lifts like sensible people but not Titus, he’ll be wandering around down here playing the hero because he thinks it’ll make me more likely to kiss his stupid face.

In retrospect, I really shouldn’t sabotaged the fire suppressant system, but, if I am hospitalized for smoke inhalation then she’ll be even more likely to kiss me. that thought makes me smile.

“Why the hell isn’t there a fire suppressant system?” I ask, holding the explosives nervously. The committee voted that just leaving them someplace even wrapped in the fire blanket defeated the purpose of collecting them in the first place, so I was elected to carry them.

“There is, somebody probably sabotaged it,” Liesel says.

“Same person who sabotaged the lifts, damn,” Harris punches the controls since that will obviously make them work better, “I don’t suppose any of you know another way up?”

“We came down these,” Liesel coughs.

“There’s bound to be stairs,” I say.

“Those are blocked off as well,” Tyrell is standing behind us, giggling. I turn around, with a sigh. He’s half blown up, as bad as Liesel, except he’s got crazy going for him so he doesn’t care.

“Just tell us where the stairs are and maybe they’ll give you a padded cell with a window,” Harris sighs.

“Tyrell, come on, just come out with us, you’ll burn up too,” Liesel says.

“Yeah, plus, Titus is down here if we all go now maybe he’ll burn up,” I say.

“Card? Card is here as well---good everyone joins the party now,” Tyrell giggles, leaning against one of slightly on fire ducts. “Time to burn up Mr. Card. You do know it’s all him don’t you? He tried to kill me, not the other way round. But you don’t believe me do you? Because I’m quite mad. Well, I’ve got something to tell you. he’s quite mad as well----we’re all---all mad—” he starts laughing uncontrollably.

“Did I hear my name taken in vain?” Titus asks. It would be bold but he says that whenever somebody says his name and he’s ostensibly not around.

“Card, join the party, it’s a barbeque, roast Cadets, with a touch of MTI,” Tyrell giggles, looking up as the flames crawl across the ceiling.

“Really? Doesn’t look like they’ll be done in time, do you think this will help?” Titus asks, taking something out from under his shirt and tossing it to Tyrell. The insane cadet barely catches it. it looks like plastic explosive to me but what would I know?

“Titus that was not a good idea,” Harris says.

“Yes, lovely---no tricks no---no always tricks with Card, Card tricks,” Tyrell says, tossing it back. “What is it? Plastic explosive?”

“No, it’s my tablet, I just needed you looking this way so she could do that,” he says, and Tom is suddenly behind Tyrell, dropping him with a kick to the back of his head.

“Impeccable timing, as always, Tom,” Card says, walking over and kicking Tyrell in the face for good measure.

“Please tell me you two planned that,” I say. I have a feeling they didn’t.

“No, what were you going to do if I weren’t standing there?” Tom asks, folding her arms.

“It’s not my tablet it’s actually a bomb,” he says, fiddling with the tablet, “Well it is my tablet but I’ve rigged it with explosives so that it will go off.”

“Okay---let’s put the bomb down,” Harris says, “And get out of here.”

“It’s defused now don’t be so melodramatic,” Card says.

“These are the lifts I came down, I’m assuming they don’t work now?” Tom asks.

“No, Tyrell got to them before we got here,” Liesel says, coughing. Harris moves to help her but she shakes her head that she’s all right. She doesn’t look all right.

“There should be stairs as well,” Titus says.

“Yeah, but I don’t know where those are,” Harris says.

“You don’t actually need to speak anymore we know you don’t know anything---”

“Titus be nice,” Tom says.

“I don’t want to be it’s getting harder to breath,” Titus says, coughing. There is an awful lot of smoke.

“Shouldn’t there be some sort of rescue crew looking for us?” I ask, about two seconds before the lift doors open and a stream of anti-fire foam hits me in the back.

Chapter 18

S o, being attacked by angry firemen is not pleasant. I feel bad for fires. In the firemen’s defense, they had no idea we were down there nor did they have any reason to think we might be down there. But I still couldn’t walk or see properly for about two hours since the pressurized stream of foam threw me halfway across the entire energy room and into a duct. My only consolation was that Titus was thrown the entire way across the energy room and into the opposite wall and then he was pounced on and hand cuffed. Apparently they thought he was mad bomber. No idea where they got that idea considering he had an IED in his hands. But whatever.

My mother had shown up for the ceremony, which was needless to say postponed due to the entire academics building burning down. A little of it blew up too. Apparently Titus and I didn’t find all the explosives.

Oh speaking of Titus, his family never showed up. I feel bad. I know, I know. Don’t worry I still hate him. but it was sort of lonely to see him standing there, bandaged up, one arm in a sling, eating cake and drinking milk and reading off of a tablet, while everyone else reunited and laughed and smiled and talked. He was alone. I didn’t wish that loneliness on anyone.

“I can’t believe you’re safe.”

“Mum you can let go now,” Quentin says, wiggling a little. He’s got a bandage on his head and he’s a bit scrapped up, his neck is badly bruised, but he’s blessedly and wonderfully ALIVE.

“Don’t scare me like that,” I say, feeling tears in my eyes, “I can’t lose you. not my sweet Quentin.”

“Not me too?” he asks, quietly, as I finally let him go to look at him.

“No, not you. you sweet, wonderful, handsome you,” I say, stroking his cheek, “My beautiful boy, don’t you ever, dare, think you’re not worth it or no good or it’s all too hard because you, just you, are made of the best stuff in the universe.”

“I love you mum,” he says, hugging me again, his voice cracking with tears, “Love you forever.”

“Love you forever,” I whisper.

“Hello, mum,” Liesel says, awkwardly, the words strange on her lips. I’m standing in the corner of her hospital room, looking signed and as invisible as possible. Liesel didn’t even really ask why I came, so I really didn’t say anything I’m good at that. I only just got out of the exam room myself, I’m banged up pretty good but apparently my head can’t be damaged because there’s not enough in it to break, so you know, I’m fine. I just forced my way in here and started quizzing her to make sure she was all right, which she seemed to appreciate as annoying as it probably was. now her mum and sisters have been brought in to see her.

“Hello,” her mother says, staring at her sweet daughter so small and frail looking in the bed. her other two daughters stand behind her, in matching dresses, their Sunday best no doubt, both holding little bouquets of flowers for their big sister. I smile a little. A real family. Here I stand in the corner in a grey-shirt, black cargos, with my hair and face burned up a bit and my eyes bloodshot and running from the fire suppressant foam. Well I started out the day looking presentable.

“What happened? Are you okay?

“Was it exciting?”

The two little girls break the ice, hopping eagerly onto their big sister’s bead and giving her the flowers.

“A little, it was a bit scary too,” Liesel says, hugging them as much as she can, they’ve got her well bandaged up to prevent infection in the burns. But her eyes are bright, she’s feeling much more herself than she was a few hours ago. “I couldn’t wait to meet you guys.”

“We couldn’t wait to meet you either---”

“No we missed you---”

“Like forever---”

“I missed you too,” her mother says, stepping forward, “I’m so glad you’re okay ---when you didn’t come out---”

“I know. I’m sorry,” Liesel says, “I wouldn’t leave you---I had no idea that would happen---”

“No, I know---you were very brave---what I’m trying to say is, I’m proud of you, even if it scared the life out of me,” she says, taking her daughter’s hand.

“Me too,” Liesel says.

I do not mutter an assent, considering I aged about ten years seeing Liesel lying there like that. I also say nothing because I really don’t want them to notice me because this is terribly awkward and I’m a coward I had my courage up this morning but after both of us nearly dying I’m not doing so well.

But Liesel’s mum notices me anyway. She’s really looking around for something to wipe her eyes with but I’m standing there in the corner smelling like smoke and fire suppressant fluid and trying to disappear completely so she sees me.

“You---you came up to us at the reception---,” she remembers, vaguely of course. I’m dressed differently.

“Yes, my name is Rellion Harris,” I say, heavily, looking only at Liesel, “I’m your father.”

“What?” she says, staring at me blankly.

“I didn’t tell you, because it’s against regulation, of course, to have been training your class---and I didn’t want you to get in trouble so I didn’t tell, but---I had to meet you,” I say, hearing my own voice crack, “I’m so sorry, so sorry, that’s why I’ve been so secretive this whole time, I was afraid to message you at first in case they were reading it----but that’s why I never told you my name or what I did---I couldn’t have you get in any trouble if they found out---I knew I’d get in trouble but---I just had to see you. I had to be there for you, I couldn’t leave you in this place alone, not any longer I know you have been---too long, but now that I can be here, I had to be.”

“That’s why you were down there---,” she realizes, I have no idea what I said when I was sobbing over her body but I’m sure it was something emotional. Excessively so given she thought I was her MTI.

“Yes, when you weren’t upstairs with your mum, I went looking for you---on which note do not scare me like that, ever---screw what she said about being brave, do not, do not die on me,” I say, almost laughing, she actually smiles, now at me. for the first time. ever. I just look at her eyes.

“I’ll try,” she says.

“You jeopardized your job to stay here and take care of her?” Liesel’s mother realizes, understanding bits and pieces of what we are saying.

“Yes, I’m an MTI---on the of the Space Force instructors,” I explain, turning back to her and tearing my eyes from Liesel, who is still studying me, rationalizing my messages with the man who can’t march a flight as well as she can, and who woke her up at four thirty every morning. “Needless to say we are supposed to transfer to other duties if a child is in our training class.”

“You could have been fired,” she says, surprised, studying me as well. No doubt she always assumed I would be some sort of an idiot, which of course I am. I’m just a well meaning idiot.

“But---you’re Space Forces, why didn’t you have visiting rights with me? If you wanted to meet me?” Liesel asks, hurt.

“I had you before I enlisted---once I did I fought to have my rights back dated but they wouldn’t allow it. I’m sorry,” I say, shaking my head, “I was young and stupid and that’s no excuse but---I regretted not knowing you every day since they told me you were born.”

“So have I,” her mother says.

“We have that in common then,” I say, looking at her, “We both missed our little girl.”

“And you have me now,” Liesel says, leaning forward to take both of our hands.

“And I’m never going to let you go,” I say.

“Hey,” I say, walking up behind Titus. he’s sitting reading and drinking warm milk. One of his arms is in a sling, and he’s got a bad bruise over one eye and I think that’s from Leavitt, but other than that he’s no worse for the wear.

“Good Evening, Cadet Tom,” he says, smiling and turning.

“Liesel sent me a message, she says she’s having dinner with her family tonight, she’d like it if we came,” I say.

“Sympathy for the bastards?” he asks.

“Something like that. She says she’s got two sisters and a mum and a dad, and the all say there’s more than enough of them to go around and they want a play by play of what happened this morning,” I say, shrugging, “Logan messaged much the same thing, he’s got a mum and dad too, and he says we’re welcome to join him.” Quentin also messaged and he said he didn’t want to see ‘Titus’ face in this life or the next, so I if I saw him the least I could do was hit him for him’, but if I wanted to have dinner with him and his mum, I was more than welcome.

“Will you go?” he asks. He’s not. I already know.

“Yeah, probably, it’s not you know, my family, but it’s somebody, something real. Close to real,” I say.

“Yeah, it is,” he says.

“Will you come?” I ask.

“I am for other than for dancing measures,” he says.

“What’s that mean?” I ask, smiling I know it’s from a book.

“It means while all that’s real and good and nice. I’m not, I think I accept that now---you see if I were meant to be with a family, to be hugged, to be having a hot meal, somebody talking to me and wanting to hear what I had to say—they’d be here. but I’m not, and they’re not, and I’m alone, and I think that’s the way it’s supposed to be,” he says.

“I think that’s sad,” I say.

“I don’t know, I have my books,” he says, looking at his tablet, “And things could be worse. You could not exist, then my world would be so much more dark. So other people have homes and families and love and warmth and dreams and futures and light. I have you and my books. And I’m all right.”

“Okay,” I say. I’m going to go and join them. because as he said. he’s not real. Or good. or nice. But he is him. and I do love him for it. I lean over and kiss his cheek, “Goodbye.”

“For tonight,” he says, watching me go.

“For tonight,” I say, moving my eyes from him, where he sits, quietly, with his hand on the cheek where I kissed it.

Chapter 19

T hat was fun, wasn’t it?

Go, on you know it was. You didn’t really think we’d burn the building down but here we are. You probably didn’t think I’d murder Ebbel either, the way things were going for a while.

Yes it’s me.

Disappointed?

I don’t think so.

The universe would be a much less interesting place without me in it, wouldn’t you agree? Oh it would be more peaceful, I give you that. but much less invigorating. Who would we have doing evil deeds, lying and scheming. You can’t love the Toms and Harrises and Quentins, without hating me. I give you the lens through which you can enjoy them. You cannot have true joy without knowing pain.

And I’m the pain.

So I’ll teach you some harsh lessons, show you some wondrous things, we’ll have a fine time. because this isn’t over. This most certainly isn’t over. I’ve got far too much to do. You can’t have yin without yang, heroes without villains. And you can’t have Space without Titus Card.

Oh, you have to be going now? That is a shame. I’ve enjoyed your company over the past few days. You haven’t mine? That’s all right, you don’t have to. come back though when you have some time. when you’re angry when you’re hurting, when the world isn’t fair. Lock it up in here. and then it will disappear into space. Waste an hour with us let the never-ending darkness absorb all the misery and the sadness, and the light of my stars heal your pain. We’ll do it together. and there will be more adventures when come back again. I promise.

So do come back. We have much more magic up our sleeves.

Oh, now you don’t want to leave? Don’t. you’re making me blush. You know how I hate happy endings. Don’t say you’ll miss me. we both know that isn’t true. or isn’t it? You’re used me perhaps. No, you absolutely despise me? well, you’re still reading, aren’t you? So you be the judge of that.

You won’t miss me you’ll miss them? Well they’re here, and I’m here, and so are you. go on, it’s over for now, the tales been told, the story is at an end. we’ll be all right, save the best laughs for when you’re around.

So, goodbye. For now. We’ll be waiting here till you find your way back to the Cygnus galaxy.

Chapter 20

2 years Later

G lad you could join us. Haven’t seen you around in a while, were we boring you?

I thought not. It’s not usually boring around here. What have you missed? A good deal, and then at the same time, not so very much. 

I wonder if you know you’ve missed things, or even that you’ve been gone at all. Or if you remember me or if it’s happened before for you or all again. But no matter. You’re here now.

You should know, I have a child now. she’s the most fantastic thing that has happened in this universe, and I adore her. for a while I thought that this might be what love is. What other people feel when they say they love something.

But it’s not.

It’s purely selfish. Because, now, you see, I’m no longer alone. There’s somebody else like me, more than that, a person like me who I can teach, I can train. I can mold. Yet she’s quick and clever and contrary as I, quite soon she’ll be defying me like mad I know it. I can’t wait for that to come.

Oh, and I made a deal with the Isylgyns, the aliens trying to take over our planet. Not officially mind you, not officially so far as the actual government goes. But so far as my fictitious government goes, quite official.

You see, I was captured some time ago, I and my co pilot. But I’d studied Isylgyn and knew the rudiments of their language. So I was able to get it across that I didn’t want to be killed as I was the human leader in exile trying to set up a truce. They went with that, seems they are as sick of war as we are. As a show of good faith I let them kill my co pilot.

I made it out in perfect health, back to Kepler in time to meet my infant daughter. I didn’t feel the urge to let my fellow humans know I’d had the positive communication. Didn’t think that was the sort of thing they needed to know.

But anyway, now you know who we are and what we’re doing, care to jump right on in? Only I’m rather busy at the moment, not that I don’t simply love your company.

“You’re three meters away from a set of doors. Take them to the lifts take the lifts up----”

“I’m not doing that,” I say, into my headset, ducking into a narrow hallway and sliding down to the ground, my laser gun is on a low charge, why wouldn’t it be I’m sixteen miles deep into an Isylgyn overrun asteroid fortress we are trying to reclaim with infinitesimal success. “If I take the lift up that puts me fifteen meters from the control rooms and two levels above the power breakers where I’m supposed to be if I can get the power breakers back on then you and the others can launch.”

“We’re not trying to get you to the power breakers anymore we’re trying to get you out of there, it’s 1800 the Isylgyn reinforcements are twenty minutes away, there are over a hundred of them on the third and fourth levels,” my ever competent and occasionally correct fellow pilot, Brenner, says, she’s in the control room where I left her when I and the others went in to try to reset the power banks so that we can at least launch and get the hell out of here.

“That gives me a 76 percent of running into an Isylygyn, I’m fine,” I say, sliding down the hall on my knees, the Isylgyns use the ducts to move around, at this level, I’m below the ducts and therefore out of their line of sight. “The mission was to get to the power breakers so we can launch, that’s what I’m doing.”

“That was when there were twenty of you, not one,” she hisses, she’s genuinely annoyed with me now.

“One is far greater than zero,” I inform her.

“Major Card, I have orders to tell you to return to your ship, and wait for reinforcements,” she says.

“Then none of us live because then we don’t have any way of launching and the Isylgyn reinforcements will be here in a matter of minutes whereas our reinforcements will be two hours at best,” I say, dropping to my hands and knees and crawling as quickly as I dare. The Isylgyns can sense movement up to twenty five feet down here they’re less likely to notice me. it’s going to be a long way down.

“Major Card----”

“I’ll call you once the power banks are back on,” I say, cutting off the communication with her. she can continue to monitor for the others.

“Major Tom?” I ask, tapping another code into my earpiece.

“Major Card, good to hear your voice,” she says, her voice is strained and I hear gunshots. “Are you to the power breakers yet?”

“Almost,” I say, standing up to enter the stairwell, “How are things up there?”

“Not good, there are about two hundred of them,” she says, and I can hear gunfire in the background, “We’re holed up in our ships, those that remain, we won’t last ten more minutes.”

“Thanks, no pressure,” I say, descending the stairs two at a time. “How many still live?”

“All sixteen that made it out of the ships, Captain Leavitt is still alive, but he won’t last long---”

“I’M FINE TELL THAT ASSHOLE TO FOCUS HIS BIG BRAIN ON GETTING US OFF THIS GODFORSAKEN ROCK AND QUIT TALKING TO PEOPLE—” Leavitt isn’t happy. He was my copilot and gunner this mission. His legs got crushed in the crash landing we had to make. So tragic, they’ll never get them back on if I’m not very much mistaken. And I’m very rarely much mistaken.

“He’s not fine, but he’s the worst off, we have a few burns but no casualties since the initial crash, how are you fairing?” she asks.

“I’m fine,” I say, jumping over the railing to avoid a pool of acid, and falling heavily onto the next flight of stairs, “Just hurrying.”

“What about the others?” she asks, realizing that I just mentioned the most important person. Me.

“Oh, they’re dead,” I say, trying the door. It’s locked. I slam it with a shoulder. That hurts and it doesn’t work.

“What? -------How? Never mind, just get out of there, you’ll never be able to reset the power banks alone---” she says, urgently.

“On the contrary I have a fourteen percent chance of success which is awfully far from never,” I say, hanging up, and then I do get the door open and step into the generator room, which is lined with lead, cutting my signal. I sigh, and look around, it takes me a whole second to see the Isyglyn standing two meters in front of me, about to shoot acid at my face.

I shoot but not in time, burning acid seeps through my helmet and I instantly feel it on my skin, burning through to the bone. I scream and fall to the ground as the creature is upon me, burning acid through my legs and wrapping around me as I try to struggle away.

“It’s me, you fool,” I hiss, in Isylgyn, taking off my mask as the acid burns my face.

Instantly, the creature lets go, extravasating away from me, rightfully subdued. Well that worked, I wasn’t sure it would. I pull the packet of water from my waist, squirting my face to wash the acid from me before it eats further into my flesh. But I am too late to prevent permanent damage, my face burns so much my mind threatens to collapse into darkness.

“Sorry, great one,” it chirps, oozing away as I look at it wanting to shoot it really badly but it does recognize me now. So, convincing the entire Isylgyn race that I am the human’s god or leader (the words are similar, not sure which they thought I was saying but they treated me with reverence) who has been overthrown and is fighting to negotiate peace with them turned out to be a good idea. Honestly, I haven’t done that much with the situation since last year when I used it to escape captivity. but it seems they still remember.

“Didn’t I give orders that my rank and number be memorized?” I ask, pointing at my serial number on my armor. I am pretty sure I did in fact, tell them never to shoot acid at me, that sounds like the sort of thing I would do; I give them a lot of orders but I’m almost positive that that was one of them.

“Yes, master,” it says, there are about four more behind it, all groveling.

“Get out of my way,” I say, limping towards the power banks. I need to reset these and I need to get to the surface, now quicker than ever with my face like this. I can feel the cold air on my bones.

I flip the switches, typing onto a keyboard. This is a Russian station, but thankfully I saw fit to learn Russian as well as Isylgyn. Now if I could only convince the Russians and the humans I’m their God as well, then I’d really have things made. Oh well, one race out of three isn’t bad.

“What brings you here master?” one of them asks, squelching forward, probably trying to see how bad my face is. It’s bad.

“Shut up,” I say, shaking my head, “I need to focus now just shut up.”

“Everybody please rise for a moment of silence for our lost Spacemen. The Space Forces Command has declared the Alpha Centari Suicide Squadron lost after they crash landed on a Russian controlled asteroid belt earlier this morning. Space Forces states that no rescue attempts will be made, as they have received no viable communication, and any attempts to rescue the ships from Isylgyn control would result in more causalities. Please join me in a moment of silence honoring our lost Spacemen.” The mechanical voice says over the loudspeaker.

I put my tablet to sleep, standing up from my desk and adjust my white, Space Force Academy dress.

“Isn’t that the squadron your dad is on?” Aiden whispers, as we stand up.

“My dad doesn’t need a rescue mission,” I say resolutely.

“The Isylgyns have captured them, they’ll brainwash them, just like the last ones,” Alexandra, a girl on my left, predicts. She’s just jealous because my dad is the most famous, bravest, cleverest Spaceman in the universe and she doesn’t even know who her parents are.

“My dad got out before,” I say. he did, he escaped last time they took him captive.

“I hope he does,” Aiden says, kindly.

“Silence,” our instructor walks by, seeing us whispering.

I stand there quietly, as they flash the names and pictures on the screen of the lost Spacemen. My dad’s picture is among them. but somehow it doesn’t matter. I either don’t believe he won’t come back.

Or I don’t care.

I don’t know which and I don’t know why I don’t cry. I want to know, but the only person who could help me understand is on an asteroid, somewhere, dying, alone, surrounded by aliens. Nope. I still don’t feel bad.

“I am brilliant, worship me.”

“Card that had better mean you have the power breakers on,” they gave Leavitt the radio, apparently. Lovely. He doesn’t like me very much right now as he blames me for losing his legs, completely independent of the fact that I am in fact guilty. It isn’t easy, crash landing a ship such that your gunner’s legs are severed just below the knee.

“It means I have control back to the main panel which means, unless I’m very much mistaken and I don’t recall ever being so, I can use the Russian’s radar sensors to override the Isyglyns, so that they’ll get the intel that we have reinforcements surrounding them when we don’t, if my Isylgyn’s up to snuff which I don’t see why it wouldn’t be,” I say. I was just going to tell the Isylgyns to retreat but that would be hard to explain, granted them letting me walk away last time I got captured was hard to explain, but I’d done it. Still, this made more rational sense so since I had the alternative it was better to actually trick the Isylgyns not to attack rather than tell them not to attack.

“Lovely, that’s a really brilliant idea take your time writing an entire computer program to do that, Card, it isn’t inconvenient at all up here under fire---”

“Oh, do shut up, I’m doing both at once, and I have our coms up now, where’s Tom? I’d like to talk to her?” I ask, hopefully, taking a bite of a cookie.

“Helping prevent us from getting shot since I can’t stand because my legs are still in our ship, I’m in charge of communicating with you to see if you’re still alive,” he says, darkly.

“It was only half your legs don’t be so melodramatic,” I say. I was going for the whole things, shame, it’s hard to crash land a ship that precisely. Live and learn.

“Oh only half my legs, thank you, Card I was forgetting, it was only half of two of my favorite limbs and I’m not losing blood at all from that-----are you EATING?”

“It’s been five hours, you should eat as well, and drink with the bloodloss,” I say, past a mouthful of biscuit.

“Do you have anything you need to say or shouldn’t you be focusing on trying to get us all killed in a more dramatic manner than we are now?” he asks, I can hear his teeth gritted. I don’t know if it’s annoyance at me or pain.

“I’d really like to talk to Major Tom if she’s available,” I say, in my pathetic voice. thing is, he knows if he humors me I’ll work faster and we might all live.

“I’ll ask her-------,” He mutes his mic for a moment. “Nope, she says ‘I’m shooting at aliens right now, do your brilliant YOU thing and be nice to Quentin because he’s probably going to die’----which isn’t true I can’t possibly die before I’ve smacked you upside the head one more time.”

“Leave it to you to complain when you could’ve died on impact,” I mutter. He knows me too well, that’s why I seriously considered letting him die on impact.

“I’m still smacking you upside the head if only because you’re probably eating cookies and drinking milk with your feet up programming a computer your sociopathic little brain perfectly happy while I’m lying here without feet,” he says.

“I am not—” that’s exactly what I’m doing “--and there was one thing I wanted to ask you, could you save an anti-acid kit for when I get back up?” I ask.

“Card, what in God’s name makes you think you’re ever getting back up here?” he asks, his voice heavy, “There are over two hundred Isylgyns in that compound with you and we’ve got no one to even cover you to get back out.”

Shit how do I plan on getting out? That is a good question, Titus, you brilliant fiend, how do you plan on getting out? I look around at the Isylgyns, about fifty of them are in the control room with me, watching me nervously wondering what retaliation I’ll take for having my face shot with acid. They are the ones who brought me the cookies and milk. Russian cookies are not that bad.

“Brenner was helping me get around, where is she?” I ask.

“She died about two minutes ago, they got her in the control room,” he says.

“Right, I don’t know how yet,” I admit, “But I’ll think of something. remember you still need to hit me upside the head.”

“Okay,” he says, laughing a little, “It’s a date then. Do your thing, Card, get us home.”

I walk into the hospital room quickly, shutting the door behind me. Not my patient, but they can’t technically stop me. Even so I still feel a sharp shot of nervousness in my gut. I don’t need to get caught doing this. But it’s what I have to do.

I walk over to the bed where the little girl lies. She’s asleep now. Lacerations to her wrists and ankles, malnutrition, and burns on her neck as though strangled. Identical to three other cases we’ve had, although all of those also involved sexual assault. This one doesn’t. Also the other three were dead or close to. I want to know why, what’s the difference? The police haven’t come yet they won’t till morning when we say they can, except I want to hear from her first. The Vindicta has been following this particular killer for weeks. His MO is always the same, girl around eight years old. same age as my daughter.

Tied up and starved for days in an empty flat, raped, then murdered. One we got alive but her throat was so badly cut she died shortly after. This girl they found sooner. And I want to know what she knows. This bastard needs to pay, and the wheels of justice are far too slow for the retribution he deserves.

“Hi, sweetheart,” I say, adjusting her IV drip. Immediately upon hearing my voice, the girl’s ice blue eyes snap open. “I’m Dr. Lutz. I’m here to make sure you’re doing all right.” The little girl doesn’t say anything. She just stares at me.

“Do you remember who did this to you?” I ask, moving to check the bandage on her wrist. My hand is frozen mid air. The girl keeps staring at me. I try to move my hand back but it doesn’t work. I’m stuck in place, and I feel a slow tingling as the blood quits flowing to my fingers.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” I say, keeping the fear of my voice. The child is a mutant, cursed or blessed if you prefer with telekinesis. That explains her escape from her would be rapist and murderer. He couldn’t get near her so he gave up. Hopefully she hurt him. “I won’t hurt you. I promise. I’m here to help. I’m not going to get near you if you don’t want.”

Her nose and mouth are bleeding. and I see tears in her eyes. the blood can’t be good, I don’t know why it’s happening, though, the only injuries were to her ankles and wrists.

“I’m a doctor, I’m not going to hurt you,” I say.

“He was a doctor,” she whispers.

“He was one of the bad people,” I say, raising my other wrist, “I’m one of the good people.” I show her the tattoo, a single line, with Vindicta tattooed through the top to form a cross. “I’m here to help.”

“Are you going to turn me in to them?” the little girl whispers. Them meaning the government. Our government are great ones for locking up things they don’t understand. 

“No,” I say, shaking my head, “I’m going to get you out of here.”

She lets go of my hand. “Promise?”

“Promise.” I say.

Chapter 21

“D

id you use all the anti-acid kits thinking I am not getting back up?” I hope they took that cretin Leavitt off the coms and put somebody nice and pleasing whose body I want to fantasize about like oh I don’t know---Major Tom-- back on them.

“Fuck no, Titus, we thought they looked like they taste good so we put them in a big damn gift basket for you wrapped up real nice---” they did not take him off the coms, in case you were wondering.

“All right, fine,” I sulk. I’ve already used my emergency anti-acid kid on my face and leg, but the patches only do so much good there’s better ones on our ships. “I’m not going to keep calling if you are just going to be cruel to me.”

“Good, good because thing is Card, I really, truly don’t want to die listening to your arrogant whiny little voice,” he hisses. I can still hear shouting and gunfire in the background damn it to hell, why haven’t the Isylgyns picked up on the communication I sent that there were Russian ships bearing down on them? I’m going to have to just call a cease fire and explain it later, at this rate.

“I’m your ranking officer I can actually have you court martialed for that,” I say. I’m a Major, he’s only a Captain, so I can technically try but the problem is the person I’d report it to is Thorn and he says that sort of thing about me on almost a daily basis since I tricked him into flying a squadron into an asteroid which he can’t prove I did but he and I both know I did.

“Considering I am so very dead as well as medically discharged due to lack of limbs, I couldn’t possibly care less, how is being brilliant down there going for you, by the way?” he asks, his voice is slurred.

“How much morphine have you taken?” I ask, frowning. He shouldn’t even be conscious with the pain he’s bound to be in let alone blood loss.

“Enough to keep me shooting the slimy bastards and talking to the slimy bastard trying to get the power back on,” he says. He’s really taking this death-discharge thing too far. The problem is he’s right I can’t actually do anything to him right now. Oh, wait, I already cut his legs off. that’s okay I can stand a little verbal abuse.

“Yes, you’re very funny, experiencing any ghost pains from your feet which are still in our ship?” I ask, tapping on the keys of the computer bank as I eat another cookie.

“Fantastically enough, yes, it feels like my entire lower half is being ripped apart by wild dogs, thank you so much for asking,” he says, icily, “Now, how is the power grid?”

“Complicated, how’s Major Tom?” I ask.

“Alive, unlike me,” Quentin says, he’s really far gone, “That’s okay, funny I never wanted to die out here. Stupid job to have when I don’t want to die in space.”

“Yes, incredibly stupid, but then you are,” I say, reaching for another cookie.

“If you are still eating, Card, I will crawl down there and shoot you,” he hisses.

“I’m drinking now, actually,” I say, past swallowing the cookie, as an Isylgyn brings me a pack of milk. Not even expired. Lovely. I thank it, muting my mic so Leavitt won’t hear me.

“Why’d you mute it?” he asks. Suspicious bastard.

“I hit it by accident, trying to adjust the anti-acid packs on my face,” I growl.

“Oh, they got you in the face? Nice how bad?” he asks, not sounding particularly sorry. Almost like he knows I meant to cut his legs off.

“Not that bad, my legs are worse,” I say, moving my legs to keep the feeling in them. “You out of water yet?”

“Have been for two hours thank you so much for bringing up such a sore subject when you know for a fact I’m dying of thirst from blood loss,” he says.

“You’re welcome,” I say. That is of course why I brought it up.

“Jo, I need you to help me get somebody out of the hospital tonight,” I say, tapping my earpiece. I say it as loudly as I dare, stepping into the breakroom. Nobody else is there, but I’m still on edge.

“What---are we kidnapping somebody?” she grunts.

“No, it’s some kid, a mutant,” I explain, “We need to get her out of here.”

“Okay, taking a kid is the definition of ‘kidnapping’, but I’ll go with it and I want you to appreciate that there are very few people you can just randomly call up and ask to help you kidnap somebody,” she says.

“I appreciate and love you madly, room 202, I’ll create a distraction,” I say.

“Fine, where do you want me to put the kid---you better not be thinking my place---”

“Your place is an abandoned warehouse. We can’t put her in my flat,” I point out.

“Okay, fine, but you have to help me feed it.”

“Deal, see you tonight,” I say, hanging up just an orderly walks in.

“Dr. Lutz, the night nurse left some messages for you,” the orderly says.

“Lovely, thanks,” I say, smiling quickly, “Just put the files in my office---and would you have them send up a lunch from the cafeteria? I don’t think I’ll have time to go down today.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the orderly says, and leaves. Good, now Jo can’t say I didn’t bring food.

Morning PE run is usually diverting, the air is cool and fresh, and I don’t mind running. It’s relaxing a bit, and I like the way it makes my skin feel, all tingling and cold.

“Cadet Card,” one of our instructors, a singularly unpleasant woman named Borne, walks up.

“Yes, ma’am?” I ask, politely.

“You’re excused from classes for the remainder of the day, in consideration for the recent tragedy,” she says. It actually takes me a few moments to realize what she’s talking about. of course my dad’s squadron is lost. He’ll come home. he promised me he would, when I asked him, he said nothing could ever stop him from coming home. So he will. He’s never broken a promise and I see no reason to believe he will now. But he said to take advantage of any little privilege they might offer me since he’s the best Spaceman in the Force.

“Thank you, ma’am,” I say, I see Aiden craning his neck hopefully at me, “Can one of my friends come with me to my dorm? So I have someone to talk to---” I tip my head down and look sad like my dad says makes me look pathetic. We practiced one afternoon because it does not come naturally to me.

“Ah---yes, go on,” she says, nodding Aiden who practically bounces to my side.

“Thank you, ma’am,” I say, as the two of us back away to run back to the dorms.

“You okay?” he asks.

“My dad doesn’t need rescuing,” I say.

“Okay, whatever, you want to get into trouble?”

“Sure.”

Chapter 22

“D

o you want the good news or the bad news?” I don’t usually give these choices I just give people the bad news and don’t tell them the good news because I like upsetting people but Leavitt is very high on the morphine and I want to trick him into caring because I don’t actually have any good news it’s all bad.

“Oh, let’s have the bad news----what is it, Titus----they aren’t going to give us our choice of flowers at our funerals? Or they’re going to run out of folded flags to give our mums? And what’s the good news? We’re running out of oxygen so we might actually just suffocate before we get shot with acid by the space buggers?” Leavitt asks, okay he’s not high enough not to know me.

“No, the bad news is the power reactor is never going back on, the Russians took all their nukes when they left this place; we got nothing you’re sitting on an empty shell,” I explain, “Where’s Tom?”

“I’m here---give me that—

“—but abusing him makes me so happy—”

“----no you’ve yelled at him enough even if it is making you feel better, give---Titus just get out of there, then, how badly are you burned? Can you walk?” Tom asks, good she is there and she does love and appreciate me.

“No---yes I can walk but I’m not leaving just yet, I’ve got a plan,” I say.

“Ask him---ask him what the fuck the good news was---” Leavitt sounds like he’s trying to wrestle her for the com. 

“How badly are you burned?’ she asks, again.

“Just my leg and they splattered my face, the anti-acid kit went mostly on my leg, we’ll save most of the muscle,” I say, glancing down at it as I stand. An Isylgyn runs to try to help me up and trips us both. I groan and it grunts.

“What was that?” Tom asks, correctly hearing the little thing apologize in Isylgyn while I hit it upside the head which does not make it shut up even though that was the intention.

“I fell down,” I say, that, “Leg’s worse than I thought but I’ll live---”

“Yeah considering you still HAVE A LEG---”

“He’s really not getting over that---”

“He wouldn’t, Major Card, people don’t get over losing limbs, now do you think you could make it back up if I went and spotted for you over the computers?” she asks.

“No---no, no don’t do that,” I say, quickly. I’ve given orders that she not be shot but I also gave orders I not be shot and look how far that got me damn it hurts to put weight on this leg. “I’m fine---stay up there, I’ve got a plan.”

“What is it, and how likely is it to work?” she asks.

“Ah, 63%,” I say.

“I hate it already,” Leavitt says, sounding like he’s given up wrestling for the com.

“Shhh, go on,” Tom says.

“Well, all we need is a heat surge to get our ships going, right? So if I blow this place up, then we’ll get a heat surge,” I say, using small words so Leavitt can understand me.

“I still hate it---no wait that means he’ll probably blow up, love it-----love the plan Card,” Leavitt calls.

“Wait---Titus, blow it up with what, and how hot could you get it to burn? We need over 1000 degrees Centigrade, if we want any sort of liftoff. And you’d never be able to get out,” she says. she’s using my first name she is worried about me she thinks I might die. Not today, love. Not today.

“I don’t know I’m sure there’s something explosive in here, and tell Leavitt not to get his hopes up, I’ll rig it to blow and be out in time to get in my ship,” I say.

“What about the Isylgyns? You’re in a nest of them,” she says.

“Oh, yes,” I say, looking around at about a hundred cephalopods who are looking at me expectantly. “I will look out for them.”

“There are hundreds of them, it’s not a matter of looking out for---I’ll just come down and help you spot your way out,” Tom says, I can hear her moving to get ready.

“No---no, stay up there, stay there,” I say, urgently, she really, really cannot see what is going on right now which is the afore mentioned hundreds of Isylgyns following me like so many loyal puppies. I could tell them to stop but when I do things like that they sort of shuffle off and look dejected and not at all convincingly like alien monsters. “We don’t need two of us lost in here, and we need as many pilots on the surface to get the wounded out. I can do this.”

“If anybody can you can,” she agrees, heavily, “All right. Stay alive, I’ll talk to you later.”

“Yeah, we’re flying home together,” I say, confidently, limping to the nearest computer to start looking for a way to set the place on fire.

“Of course we are,” she says. But she doesn’t sound like she believes it. I can’t think about that now I will get her out of here I am getting her out of here. Card school of Large explosions is now in session.

“What’d you want to do?” Aiden asks, sitting on my bed. we’re in my room because theoretically I need to be here because theoretically I’m upset. I’m not.

“I don’t know, I’m bored,” I say, swinging on the pull up bar that’s over the door to my bathroom. We all have private rooms but they’re pretty small, one narrow bed, a dresser and a little desk a thin closet and a small bathroom. My room is decorated neatly with my favorite posters and essays on the walls. a couple of teddy bears sit on my desk, with my dad’s medals pinned to them. they give him medals for being so brave and he gives them to me. sometimes I pick them up and feel them when he’s far away. and he doesn’t feel any closer. I walk over and pick up one of the bears, feeling the cold medal. It’s the one they gave him after last time he went missing.

“Do you really think your dad is coming back?” Aiden asks.

“I don’t know. he said he would. He always does. He says not to worry even if they say he’s dead because he probably isn’t,” I say, sitting down in my desk chair and spinning in it. I fiddle with my shirt. I changed out of my uniform since they won’t expect me at practice, now I’m wearing one of my civilian long grey tunics, with stringy ties on the ends that are good for fiddling with.

“I know he’s really smart and all that but---it’s been a long time that they’ve been missing. And Space Forces aren’t sending aid,” he says, quietly.

“Yeah,” I say, shrugging, “Then he might be dead.”

“Does that make you sad?” Aiden knows I don’t care about people like people are supposed to.

“I don’t know. I guess not. I don’t know if it doesn’t because I don’t believe it, or it doesn’t because there’s something wrong with me,” I say, “And since it doesn’t make me sad I guess I don’t care.”

“Okay,” he says, “Just trying to be a good friend.”

“That’s nice, thanks,” I say, nodding, “Let’s go and do something, though, I really don’t want to just sit around waiting for them to declare my dad dead.”

“Okay, you want to go and visit Billy?” he asks, eagerly, sitting up. Billy has been sick and he’s in the hospital in the Capital. Last he messaged us, the doctors were still running tests.

“Yeah, let’s go surprise him,” I say, eagerly, going into my closet for my civilian clothes, I toss some pants and a sweatshirt at him, “Get changed, I’ll create a distraction.”

“What sort of distraction?” he asks, pulling off his shirt.

“A distracting one!”

Chapter 23

I enter the hospital room quietly. As Shannon predicted, the little girl is lying in the bed, bandaged like Jesus, hands and ankles wrapped, her side bloodied, her neck red and bruised, and her forehead scarred from what looked like barbed wire. She’s asleep soundly, though, despite the injuries. Shannon said she’d have her heavily medicated so I can take her away, but I’m still wary. The government fears the mutants for a reason. not a great one, but it is still a reason. They are powerful and after what this little girl has been through, I wouldn’t blame her for wanting to lash out.

Carefully, I undo the IV bag and examine the bed. The little girl isn’t strapped down in anyway, it should be straightforward. I pick her up, carefully, wrapping her in the hospital blanket. She is limp in my arms, her head lolling on my shoulder, a mess of blonde hair, she’s indistinguishable.

I walk out of the room, calmly and confidently as I entered. I’m wearing a dress which I HATE it but it makes me look maternal and normal. So does the knit hat that covers my typically blue hair and ear piercings. Normal and maternal are not two words typically used to describe me, but I need to be both to walk this child out of the hospital looking like a mother taking her kid home or outside or something not to do with kidnapping.

Nobody stops me. it’s brilliant what you can do when you look like you know where you’re going. I just walk calmly confidently, down the hall, smiling at nurses and thanking a man who holds a door for me.

And I walk right out.

“I cannot believe you set the guard house on fire,” Aiden is cross with me. I don’t see why I didn’t set him on fire.

“It worked,” I say.

“You can’t use that as an excuse for everything, murdering somebody would work but that doesn’t make it right,” Aiden groans. We are standing on a train, going into the Capital. We are both dressed in street clothes, so nobody pays us any mind. There are enough orphans wandering the streets that we blend in. nobody glances to see that we are a bit too well fed, our skin too clean, our hair too well kept, to be actual urchins. They see what they expect to see. A couple of rag tag children chattering and getting in the way. Not a pair of Project 10s on the loose.

“Right by whose standards?” I ask.

“The---like---the universe’s standards---what if somebody had gotten burned?” he asks.

“They shouldn’t have gotten to so close to the flames,” I say, “And anyway I didn’t start a fire, I made a small explosion which caused the fire.”

“Oh, okay, you made something blow up, that’s better---”

“I don’t see why you have to be cross with me I didn’t burn you or blow you up---”

“I’m not just----I don’t want you to get in trouble, like real major trouble,” he says.

“You’re thinking with my dad gone nobody will be around to protect me,” I realize. My dad sometimes gets me out of trouble because he’s so famous and important, people have to listen to him when he says I must be innocent for the things I’ve clearly done.

“I’m thinking I will be,” he says.

“I don’t need protecting,” I say.

“Everybody needs protecting sometimes, Tess,” he says, “I know you’re cleverer than I am, and than most people, but someday you’re going to need somebody there just to care about you. and you need to let them be there.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” I say.

“You will,” he says, sighing a little.

“Sorry I made you sad,” I say.

“It’s okay, you’re just being you,” he says, shaking his head, “Let’s find Billy and have some fun, eh?”

“Okay,” I agree, cheering up. I wonder why he gets so upset sometimes. My dad says if I make a chart it’ll make more sense. I don’t wonder that much. And it’s rich coming from my dad because he’s the one who complains that his Major Tom doesn’t love him with the unending frankly inexplicable passion he loves her with, yet I don’t see him making charts.

“Tell everyone to get ready and to get in their ships we have four minutes fifty seconds----make that two minutes thirty seconds,” I say, tapping on the last control panel inside the main lift for the Russian facility. 

I’m about to go up, and when I do I have about one minute to run get in my ship and be prepared for take off before the whole thing blows, giving us enough power to lift off. the Isylgyns have loyally offered to set off the explosives for me, but their number system is slightly different from ours and I haven’t fully figured out how except that it’s about half of what ours is in terms of digits. I am aware I should just ask them, but you can’t go around asking those sorts of questions when you’re trying to convince a race of people you’re omniscient.

“It’s gonna take at least a minute for the lift to come up, you are never going to run across the entire tarmac in a minute and twenty seconds, it’ll take you two fifty max, that’s your fastest running speed in ideal conditions---”

“The heat won’t reach me for forty seconds that gives me----fuck---” I trip as my acid burned leg gives way.

“Did you seriously forget AGAIN that one of your legs is burned?” Leavitt asks. He’s been narrating this for some time.

“My brain is processing more important things at the moment,” I say, haughtily, because of course I did.

“You did, didn’t you? That’s weird, I find it hard to forget not having legs anymore,” he growls.

“Are you still on that?”

“I’M GOING TO BE ON THAT FOR SOMETIME, TITUS, I LOST MY FUCKING LEGS---” there is a brief scrabbling which gives me time to giggle, then:

“Major Card, what is your location?” that’s my Major Tom, again.

“I’m ready to set the timer and come up, get in your ships and lift Leavitt into ours—can he still shoot?” I ask, concerned. My escape plan hinged on him being able to shoot.

“TELL THAT BASTARD I’M GONNA BE ABLE TO SHOOT EVEN AFTER I’M DEAD WHICH SHOULD BE SOON THANKS TO HIM----”

“That’s a yes,” Tom says.

“Okay, good, lift him into our ship, get in yours, I’ll set the thing to blow, run out, climb in and take off,” I say.

“Ten four, good luck,” she says.

“I don’t need luck,” I say, into the dead com. I shake my head and turn to run, of course falling down because yes I did forget again that my leg is burned if you think it’s so funny why don’t you remind me, eh?

Chapter 24

“W

e’re not going to hurt you,” I say, precisely two seconds before the little girl pins me against the wall. She’s still wearing the bloody hospital robe, and the bandages are still on, making her look like a little horrific doll. She holds out one hand, pinning me in place. Blood begins to trickle from her mouth.

“We’re not going to hurt you; I’m not forcing you to stay here. you can go if you like,” I say, carefully, “I’ve just brought you here to keep you safe. You know they’ll lock you up if they know you can do that.”

“Doctor,” she says, “The doctor knows.”

“Dr. Lutz? Yes, she sent me to you,” I say, “She’s going to come and check on you. we only want you safe. We’ll help you get home, if you like, where’s your family?”

“Who’s we?” she asks, still not letting go. Blood is running from her mouth and eyes now, as well as nose. It’s hurting her to do this to me.

“We,” I say, shaking my sleeve down on my left arm to reveal the tattoo on my wrist. A thin line with the word Vindictafroming a cross. “Help people.”

She lowers her hand and I’m instantly released. I stagger a little. “Thank you,” I say.

“Why didn’t you turn me in?” she asks.

“We help people. I don’t think you want to hurt anyone. I think you can, but then again, so can I,” I say.

“Bad people?” she asks.

“Yes,” I say.

“Like who did this to me?” she asks, looking at the bandages.

“Yes,” I say, “Do you know who did it? Dr. Lutz says you said it was a doctor.”

“He is,” she says, “I don’t know his name. but I know what he looks like.”

“We can work off that,” I say.

“You’re really not going to take me back to the police?” she asks.

“No, I’m really not. I’ll help you get home, who are your family?” I ask, “Surely they’ll be worried about you. I only meant to kidnap you from the police, not from them.”

“I don’t have a home,” she says, shaking her head.

“You have somebody you lived with,” I say, frowning.

“No. I’m from an orphanage,” she says.

“What’s your name?” I ask.

“I’m not telling you,” she says, wiping her mouth on the sleeve of the hospital gown.

“Okay,” I say, shrugging, and running a hand through my hair, “I’ll try to find some of my clothes you can fit in. you can stay here with me as long as you like.”

“Why?” she asks.

“Because you can,” I say.

“I’d have to stay hidden,” she says.

“Not forever, I know there are other mutants loose, some I’ve heard live with the gypsies, some just disguise themselves in the cities, we’ll work out something,” I promise.

“Okay,” she says, unwrapping the bandage on her wrist to look at the scar. “Am I really free to go?”

“Yeah,” I say, “You’re really free.”

Tom lowers me into the cockpit, she’s surprisingly strong because I’m about twice as big as her even if a good chunk of me is missing. But she lifts me with only a grunt, lowering me into the half crushed cockpit, still crusty and damp with my blood, my severed legs right where I left them mostly beneath the smashed metal, just bits of bone and skin sticking out. She looks at them as though aware of how bad this is but knowing full well we can’t do anything about it. this is the best we’ve got to get us out of here.

“Can it run?” she asks, as I begin tapping the control panel.

“Well enough, Nav’s down but the asshole can handle that,” I say.

“If Major Card lives,” she says, connecting my suit around me.

“Did I hear my name taken in vain---get in your bloody ship Major Tom this place is about to be on fire,” the asshole says, clapping her on the back as he climbs in above me. He’s taken off his helmet and is only breathing through his oxygen tubes. His face is noticeably mostly covered with anti-acid packs, except unfortunately his mouth.

“Going, safe flying,” she says, slapping the back of his head as he belts himself in, switching both of our feeds over to the ship’s oxygen.

“Fun, fun, fun, fun, flying, ready to see some stars, Captain?” he asks, exactly as excited as a child on Christmas morning with a toy airplane. A mechanical one that flew around the living room, that you could chase your sister with and put her dolls in it. Not that I ever had one of those. I wanted one, though. I didn’t tell my mum because I knew we didn’t have the money.

“Took you long enough, Major Card,” I say, as the ground heats beneath us, my control panel comes to life. I instantly take hold of the joystick, firing at the Isylgyn’s hold out in the guard post not fifty feet from us. It explodes in flame. I laugh which is when I realize I really, really am high on the morphine.

“AC squadron do you read me?” the demented bastard asks, tapping his headset.

“Loud and clear, Major Card,” Major Tom replies.

“Yes sir,” the others answer, four others, all that’s left of our crew of twenty ships.

“Let’s go home,” he says. and we have lift off.

“What are the two of you doing here?” Billy sits up in his hospital bed, happily, upon seeing Aiden and I dart in his room, closing the door quickly behind us.

“Seeing you, silly,” I say, climbing on the foot of his bed.

“We snuck out,” Aiden says.

“Sneaked.” That’s me in case you were wondering. 

“Shut up.” Aiden, obviously. 

“Guys you shouldn’t have come all this way,” Billy says, pulling us both in for a hug. “You’ll get in trouble.”

“I was born in trouble,” I say, squeezing his feet like my dad does to me when I’m tucked up in bed.

“I heard your dad’s squadron went missing,” Billy says, sympathetically, “Have they found them yet?”

“No, not yet,” I say, confidently, “But I’m sure they’ll get in contact with them soon. My dad says he’ll always come home.”

“How are things?”

“A hospital dinner? Seriously?”

“You said bring food you didn’t say how,” Shannon mutters, going to the heating unit to put the tray in. “Hi sweetheart.”

“Don’t call me that,” our sullen refugee is sitting on my bed, licking her wounds quite literally. I figure she can’t poison herself with her own spit so I’m letting that happen. I’ve dressed her in one of my t-shirts and a pair of cargo pants. the pants are a bit too big for her but she looks comfy at least.

“We’re doing very well,” I say, smiling at the little shaggy person sitting on my bed, “And she’s not told me her name so it’s hard to know what to call her.”

“Why haven’t you told us your name?” Shannon asks, frowning at her.

“I don’t have one,” the little girl says.

“Everybody’s called something,” Shannon says.

“Not me.”

“What do you want to be called then?” I ask, tiredly. She’s very obstinate. And proud. And annoying. I really deserve her.

“Nothing,” she says, still licking blood off her wrist.

“Well, we’re going to call you something,” Shannon says, trying to be playful but not really smiling. I can tell she’s awkward---oh yes she has a kid about this age. Project 10, that’s why she does this, protect little kids without mums. Unlike me, I do this for revenge. Not very healthy but you know, satisfying, so whatever.

“Fine, I’ll name you, just give me time,” I say, flicking my hair out of my face.

“Fine, I don’t care,” the little girl mutters.

There is no more perfect feeling in the world than flying. My whole being washes away and I take the moment to let every part of my senses eclipse into the perfect oneness that is flying, sailing through the stars, being a spaceman. Sailing through outer space. The lights fading out and the dark closing in, like a song you can’t get out of your head playing beautifully on and on and you can’t stop it even if you wanted to try. and then you disappear which is the best part because there is some of us who hates all of us and that part is gone till the end of nonexistence journeys into the ecstasy that is flying.

“You in your zone?” Leavitt asks. I realize I’ve rolled my head back and I’m staring straightforward, arms relaxed a little as my eyes go unfocused into enjoying the passion of it. we’re safe now, just cruising, no more fancy maneuvers or tricks just flying. Leavitt and Tom mostly dispatched the last of my Isylgyn ships about fifteen minutes ago, and they were retreating anyway because of the communications I sent out, now we’re just on our way back to Kepler.

“Yeah,” I say, tipping my head back.

“Good I like you that way you’re more human, except I don’t have legs so I can only work the big guns not the missiles, and I’m pretty sure my coms unit got smashed with my legs and Major Tom’s coms unit got shot out a couple of hours ago so we need to try yours,” he says.

“Right,” I say, tapping the controls, “It’s live, I’ll try the Ulysses, see if they’re missing us, eh?”

“Yeah, tell ‘em not to arrange our funerals just yet,” he says, and I can hear him grinning.

“They probably already have,” I say, then I realize that that means Tess probably knows we went missing. I wonder what she thinks. I’ve told her I’ll come home. always.

“Your little girl will be happy to hear you’re okay,” he says, guessing my thoughts.

“I tell her I’m always coming home,” I say.

“Still, she’s a kid,” he says, “I tell my mum I’m probably not coming home. She says that isn’t very reassuring but I say it’s probably true so I’m not lying.”

“I’m not lying either,” I say. I’m not. I’ll always come home to her, right up to the day I take her to the stars with me.

“I didn’t say you were,” he says, quietly. The unspoken agreement that somehow I have the power, and so long as I like to I will use it to come home. and since I have her I will go home. home. funny word for a place that never suited me. the stars are home. That’s going back.

“You ever think of out here as home, Leavitt, and back there as the place we come from?” I ask, because that is how I’ve quantified it.

“Yes and no,” he says.

“I do hate that phrase, how so?” I ask.

“No, not for me. for me that’s home, Kepler is home. Yes, for you I do, I think you were meant to be in outer space, somehow wires got crossed and you wound up being human but you were meant to be a star or a galaxy or something,” he says.

“You are completely high you know that?” I ask, tapping the coms unit which still hasn’t connected.

“Oh, yeah, definitely, I should have been unconscious if not dead hours ago,” he says, laughing, “Thing is at this point I don’t care.”

“You don’t care about your legs?” I ask, because that’s disappointing.

“No, I still care about those,” he says, quietly, “it comes and goes, like walking through a fog, and knowing which way you’re supposed to be going but you can’t see it.”

“I don’t know what that’s like, I always know where I’m going and where I’ve been and where I might go,” I say.

“That’s sad, depressing really---shit the last time I was this fucking hammered I was probably fifteen---God it’s awful, it’s like everything is cloudy, yet you see everything,” he says.

“Just see any enemy ships for me, all right?” I ask.

“Got it, I told you I can still kill. Funny I can always kill,” he says.

“So can I---hello Kip. Think I was dead this time?” I ask, as the coms unit finally connects.

“Major Card, wonderful yet not excessively surprising to hear your voice what is your location?” Kip asks, lazily. I doubt if he thought I was dead.

“Four leagues from Kepler, we have an ETA of 2043,” I say, “We left Isylgyns in our dust ten point nine leagues ago.”

“Wicked---your orders are to report with the remainder of the squadron to the Ulyssess,” Kip says, sounding like he’s reading off of a chart, “Can you give me your damage report?”

“Negative, my six remaining ships and crew are returning to Kepler, pressure sickness be damned our injuries are too great we need more urgent medical care my gunner alone has about two hours before he flat lines,” I say, looking down at Leavitt’s vitals which are quite erratic. He took far too much morphine and he’s lost far too much blood. His heart rate is at 300 bpm which his heart simply can’t keep up with as little blood as he has in him, plus there’s not enough oxygen getting to his brain at this point. Also my acid burns need immediate treatment to promote skin regrowth.

“Your orders are to return to the Ulysses,” Kip sighs. He knows when he’s lost.

“My orders be damned, I am taking my men home,” I say, “And retract whatever melodramatic announcement was made saying the whole crew of Alpha Centari is dead because we aren’t.”

“Copy that, Major Card, anything else you’d like?” Kip asks, that’s probably sarcastic.

“Yes, I want EMTs waiting when we land to treat the pressurization sickness as well as our injuries my gunner will probably need a crash cart and I need emergency anti-acid packs while awaiting cleansing,” I say, “Do they need---”

“No, Card, they know how to treat you, thank you I’m sure they’ll appreciate you explaining it to them while they do it, though,” he says, guessing I was about to explain the anti acid baths I will need. Which of course I was.

“You could be nicer to me when I nearly died,” I say.

“No, I can’t, you were probably just fine,” Kip says.

“Why do you say that?” I ask, sharply, wondering how he guessed that I was never in any actual danger.

“You’re you, you’re never afraid, Card, you just know you should be. Now get them safely home, I’ll talk to you later,” Kip says.

“Right, better to save the life of the unit, over,” I say.

“Over,” he says, and I flick the unit back to communicating only with Leavitt.

“You tell them to tell everyone we ain’t dead?” Leavitt asks.

“Yeah,” I say.

“You think they will?” he asks.

“No, probably not till we land,” I say, staring out at the stars. Familiar, taking me closer to Kepler. Kepler where I’ll be planet side for at least six months. Half a year of my life with no flying. I suppress a sigh. I won’t be free for much longer.

Chapter 25

Six month later

I walk into Thorn’s office unannounced and without giving him the proper greeting, but I’m not at all happy with him right now. I rarely am in fact beatific that he exists in general, however, today is a particularly trying one. Especially since today I was FINALLY cleared to fly again he goes and does this.

“How dare you?” I ask, folding my arms.

“Major Card we need to talk about how you enter a room, not particularly with me because I understand you but with other people specifically slamming the door like a five year old it’s not very becoming it’s against customs and courtesies you aren’t in space anymore---” Thorn turns around in his seat preparing to return the salute I didn’t throw. He lowers his hand wearily.

“Yes which piques me which is a part of what I need to talk to you about---”

“SIR, I do outrank you really, please, Major Card, I am busy right now can’t you write me a memo with a profane acrostic in it and then we’ll chat later?” Thorn asks, hopefully. He wants to eat his lunch which isn’t going to happen now after this last stunt he’s lucky it isn’t already poisoned.

“Major Tom’s new flight partner---and my new flight partner,” I growl, trying to control my rage. “Why?”

“Your flight partner, Leavitt, was medically discharged,” Thorn says, “And Tom’s was on his last mission. Therefore you both were assigned new flight partners--- yes I’m following so far.”

“Last time you promised she could be my gunner,” I say, folding my arms.

“No, you said ‘next time you have to assign Tom as my gunner’ and I said ‘no actually I don’t’ and I don’t so I didn’t,” he says, “I’m sorry Titus, I’d accommodate your childish requests in the interest of promoting Kepler peace, I really would, except thing is she’s far too good of a pilot just to be your gunner we’re short on pilots as it is after the massacre of Alpha Centari which you both survived, I’m terribly short and I can’t put a good pilot, one of our best, on simple gunner duties. And Riley is an excellent gunner and you like her if you actually like people you like her.”

“It’s not my flight partner it’s Tom’s gunner,” I growl.

“What about him?” Thorn asks, innocently he knows damn well what he’s done.

“He’s younger than I am.”

“I know.”

“And better looking.”

“I know.”

“And his face isn’t scarred by acid.”

“I know.”

“And he looks like he’s better in bed than I am.”

“I know----wait how can you even quantify something like that?”

“I have a chart some women helped me design it---I could find out if he actually is better in bed than I am though---do you know where Hansen is?”

“Titus, I’ll stop you from doing that---”

“And he’s charming and makes good conversation and he probably knows how to be nice to people,” I plead.

“I know,” Thorn says.

“And I can’t kill him because his mother is Lt Col  Zigfield and she taught me how to fly which automatically gets her off my nearly all encompassing hit list and onto my actually tolerate existence list so I really really don’t want to kill or maim him,” I groan.

“I know,” Thorn says, smiling evilly.

“Damn it---that is it, I will have you beheaded. I hadn’t decided till now but I will. I will decapitate you,” I sigh, pressing my hands against my head and closing my eyes.

“I don’t know why I take it for granted you’re kidding---”

“Neither do I please?” I beg, “Please? Please?”

“No, Titus, in all seriousness I’m shorthanded as it is, Zeigfield is a decent gunner, you and Tom are my most experience pilots, I don’t even want you flying together because I can’t lose you at the same time, let alone in the same ship,” he says.

“Please?” I say, pathetically.

“No---why do you even think that will work?” he asks.

“I like you,” I lie.

“I know for a fact there’s a cockroach in the boxed lunch sitting there,” he nods to the box which he hasn’t opened.

“What does that have to do with me?” I ask, innocently.

“Would you believe that insects and various laxatives don’t wind up in my food at sequential intervals when you’re on a different planet than I am?” he asks, raising his eyebrows. Damn if only my insidious but highly immature pranks weren’t so terribly amusing to me.

“Wow really?” is all I say.

“I know shocking isn’t it?” he says.

“Please?” I say.

“No, you’ll have to deal with it, Titus,” he says, shaking his head, “My decision stands, you fly with Riley, she flies with Ziegfeld.”

“Then let me go back to the Ulysses and be based there till I can take the next Suicide Squadron to the North Rim,” I beg, “I’ve been on the ground too long as it is.”

“I wish I could put you in a different part of the galaxy than I’m in but no. No, it’s mandatory one year planetside after stage 10 pressurization sickness which you sustained,” he says, “No the answer is no.”

“Please?”

“No, no, and no,” he says, “But as I have you here, I did have something else I needed to talk to you about.”

“What?” I ask. I wonder if he’s finally found a way to prove I’m the one who made him fly into those asteroids.

“It’s on the subject of our being shorthanded----I need you to take a trainee,” he says.

“No. I don’t train people I don’t like people and you can’t force me to isn’t part of my SFSC, you can’t, no,” I say, flatly. I hate being around people.

“Emergency orders because I don’t have enough willing trainers so yes I can force you but----but out of the goodness of my heart, I’m going to let you choose,” he holds up a stack of print outs.

“Fine,” I growl. Just don’t expect them to survive with their sanity. I’ll have them deserting in three days and then they won’t make me train people again, fine be that way.

“So you can pick between these, who are compared to you slathering idiots, and then this one. First cadet to match your scores on the SFOT, tested out of basic, just like you did,” he says, holding up one of the print outs.

“Really?” I ask, surprised, taking the file.

“Yes, he’s never been to a university, just a trade school, like you. Terribly clever,” Thorne says, “Wants to fly more than anything.”

“I’ll take him,” I say, looking at the file.

“Not that fast---Titus, look at me, look me in the eyes,” he says, pulling the paper back so that I look at him. I glare at him.

“If anything happens to this kid----if he dies. If he loses limbs, if he loses his mind---if he so much as develops a head cold while he’s in your care---I am going to blame you and I won’t care about making it stick I will just actually physically hurt you. This is a sixteen year old BOY who is too clever for his own good but he’s a child and I will protect him understood?” he asks.

“Yes, sir,” I say. no problem. If I want to drive the cadet insane I just have to kill Thorn first.

I sit waiting quietly. It’s superfluous to have me get up at 0400 to wait for my trainer who probably doesn’t even know they have a cadet waiting for them. All of my friends from OTS have already been collected. My stomach burns. They gave me an MRE this morning and left me to my own devices in this unused classroom. But I don’t want to wander around or take my jacket off or anything when some Captain or Major might walk in at any moment and I want to make a good impression. It isn’t very well scheduled. I have coursework I need to keep up with and they’ve not even left me with access to tablet. Doesn’t the Space Forces understand economy of time? And I’m excited, I finally get the chance to fly, to learn how to be a Spaceman, an officer cadet. Nobody saying I’m too young or too poor or too quiet or anything. I’ll show them all.

Chapter 26

I push my body through the pool, the water is cold on my hot skin and my arms burn. I quit counting laps a while ago. A long while ago by the feel of my arms. I just want to move. To be free, to have my brain go quiet as I can’t breath my muscles ache so badly. But it’s not happening.

Because I can’t run. I’ll never run again.

I pull myself up on the side, breathing heavily and thinking about the fact that I am probably sweating but there’s no difference between my sweat and the water. No value difference, I’m wet either way.

I rest my chin against the cement of the pool edge and watch the other hospital patients. Some on crutches, some in wheel chairs. Some using walkers. I’m at the civilian hospital now, in the Capital. That made it easier for my mother to visit every single day like she thinks she needs to. Also I agreed because I’m medically discharged, so it only made sense to transfer to the hospital where I’ll be getting the continuing care for the legless. It’s comments like that that extended my stay because my mother made them put me on a suicide watch after I kept making stupid ass comments like that.

I’m not suicidal, though. That would be pointless. I wouldn’t walk again if I die either. I won’t be anything. I’m pretty depressed, though. The Space Forces are giving me a substantial stipend to live off of, since they took away my life they thought that was fair. And they set me up with someplace to live, a flat that I haven’t been to because I don’t care. 

I don’t want to live in the city. I’ve never wanted to, it’s full of smoke and people and sadness and it’s too crowded. I’ve always wanted to live out there in the country where there’s open space and the stars and everything. Ever since my mum took us kids out to the countryside, once. I think we stole the train tickets honestly, or jumped on somebody else’s pass I don’t know. but I think we did. and anyway we just rode the train as high up in the mountains as it went. and we sat there and we looked at the stars. 

Then of course we had to go home because our mum had to work. and I haven’t been out to the forest like that since. Not just to exist. we get sent to do combat training, now and again. And some of the bases are more remote. But you’re still on a base full of people. No I’d like to get away.

Except I can’t now.

Because I don’t have any legs, apparently I need to keep going back to the doctor. And I can’t always wear artificial legs and I’m prone to infection and they’re worried about my nubs of bone dying slowly and them needing to take more leg. And the artificial legs I do have won’t go over rough terrain anyway and they need adjustment and tools and all manner of things and the remainders of my legs need salve and things.

I don’t even know what I’ll do with myself when I’m discharged. I don’t have a job, I don’t know how to get a job. I don’t even know what jobs are or what I’d qualify for or what I can do since I have no legs. My back up careers of wild life technician or dog walker or raptor hunter or any of the non-military alternate careers I had picked out all involve wait for it...legs.

I sigh, still half in and half out of the water. It’s only like this that I can pretend that I’m whole.

I lean there and watch people come in to the fitness room of the hospital. I call it a fitness room, it’s really a rehabilitation place, only ex-military like me try to use it for actual fitness. Which doesn’t work very well because we are ex military because some part of us got blown or cut off. so there’s usually about half a man to keep fit.

A group of children come in with their nurses. Cancer ward, they all have pathetic little bald heads and pallid skin. the nurses lead them over to the hot tub. I wave at them, and they just stare at me. I sigh. I like kids, I like talking to them. Before, when I had legs, I was in this program thing where we’d go visit all the little Project 10s. They were always so thrilled when they saw the stars on your lapel and the slick sleeves, then the prop and wings and little spaceship insignia on the chest, an actual pilot, an actual Spaceman. They’d been so thrilled. I think it was my favorite part of being a pilot, the way their little eyes would light up when they saw me come in. so tall and strong, I could lift two of them on back. they loved it, especially the little ones, ask me all sorts of questions. I’d just sit and talk with them for hours. Half of them didn’t have dads or mums or if they had they’d died, so I was the most they had of a grown up to sit and talk with them.

Space Forces discontinued the program of sending us round to visit, after a few years, not enough participation for the trouble. I kept going anyway, anytime I had leave planet side, I’d always stop in and meet a few of them, the staff were more than happy to let me talk to classes or sit in the rec room. That was always fun, I’d sit there in one of their commons rooms and wait and the little clones would file in in their matching uniforms and their mouths would drop open when they saw me just sitting there. Waiting to see them. Like they were the most important people in the world. Because they were.

The downside is now when I see a group of children I tend to wave and smile and when I’m not in uniform that makes me look like some kind of pedophile. I sigh. Like these kids. I’m just some crazy half naked bastard with no legs staring at them. they don’t know they remind me of my friends. I don’t suppose they’ll let me go back now. Wouldn’t want the next generation to see what could and probably will become of them. That’s too bad.

I was never able to have children, signed up for the Project 10 thing, but after two failed pregnancies, the mother and I both decided it clearly wasn’t working. She was a mechanic at another base, nice enough, we’d agreed that we’d take opposite leave, different planet side rotations so we could be with the kid as much as possible, one of us. But twice we’d lost the baby, first time a miscarriage, second was stillborn. A girl. After that, we both agreed it was too hard on both of us to hope again, worse on her than on me, but even so just thinking about it was too much. She was pretty bad, I told her I was sure it was my problem.

She said she didn’t think that was even a thing but I said if it was then I would have it. Sure enough a few years later she married and had a kid the old fashioned way. Yay her. No seriously I was glad she’d been really depressed after losing our daughter and the other one that we never knew what it was. After all that I just kept visiting the project 10s, figured I could be a dad to those kids. Now I don’t get to do that. funny the things life does. To me. I’m not an inherently bad person. I don’t go out of my way to hurt people. I only hate one person and he really deserves it. So I don’t seem to understand why things don’t work out for me. I must’ve done something, I just can’t think of what.

“Hey, I’m going to work,” Jo says, shaking my shoulder. I don’t roll over or get up. She got back late last night with dinner and we stayed up late. I can keep sleeping so I will.

“Okay,” I mumble into my pillow.

“Tomorrow, Sam’s gonna come over with her kids, you guys can go see a film maybe, yeah?” she asks, not leaving or showing any signs of thinking about it.

“Okay,” I say. I don’t like going out. other people are out. I am safe in here. Nobody come and get me. Then I realize tomorrow is her day off, “What’re you gonna do?”

“I’ve got something planned,” Jo says.

“You’re doing something for Vindicta?” I say, sitting up and pushing my tangled hair out of my face.

“Yeah,” she says, nodding, “I am.”

“Is it to do with the guy?” I ask. The guy who used to have me. the one who tied me up and hurt me.

“Yeah, we think we’ve finally tracked him down. he moved after the police found you,” Jo says, nodding.

“Are you gonna kill him?” I ask.

“Maybe not me. we haven’t even cased it yet,” she says, shrugging, “Once you tell us it’s him, though, we can arrange for you to go somewhere else.” she thinks I want to leave. I don’t. I’m safe in here.

“Okay,” I say. I’m not leaving.

“We’ll find somewhere good for you, I promise,” she says.

“Okay,” I say. but I’m not leaving. I don’t want to leave. In the past few months this warehouse has become my home. I like it here. I don’t know how to live places and I’ve learned how to here so I’m fine. and Jo isn’t too annoying. She’s okay. I wouldn’t miss her. she’s fine, but I don’t want to leave here. I flop back down.

“You’re pale, you need to get out in the sunlight---I’ve got the oxygen tank, for you, why don’t you and I go for a walk before I have to go to work tomorrow?” Jo suggests, she knows I don’t like leaving. Not in the day. It’s okay at night.

“I want to sleep in, can we get ice cream when you get back?” I ask. I don’t mind going out after dark. That’s okay.

“Yeah, we’ll see how late it gets, I’ll try to hurry,” Jo says, reaching out almost to stroke the hair out of my face but she thinks better of it.

“Okay,” I say, rolling back over into the pillow, ending the conversation.

“Bye,” she calls. I don’t answer. I don’t like saying goodbye.

Chapter 27

I still can’t shake Thorn from my mind. He’ll get his. I’ll give it to him. Pairing MY Major Tom with that lovely young handsome thing. How dare he. I’ll see them both get theirs before this story is out. But Thorns murder and Captain Ziegfeld’s mutilation will come at another time, I’m afraid. for now, to cheer up.

I see her lying in the grass, looking at a tablet, dark hair a veil around her face. I soften my steps so she doesn’t hear me come up behind her. her legs are bare and brown from beneath the short grey pants she’s wearing. It’s a warm day, nice to be outside in the sun.

I bend down carefully and lock one hand around her mouth, the other around her waist, lifting her into the air quickly. She kicks in annoyance but I easily hold her away from me.

“What have I told you about letting people sneak up on you?” I ask flipping my daughter upside down and finally releasing her mouth.

“Put me down, Dad,” she laughs, hanging upside down and wiggling, trying to kick my face, “I was ruminating on my classes.”

“You must always keep a portion of your brain dedicated to self defense, you know that,” I say, letting her down. she immediately hugs my legs. I can’t stop from smiling at her. Bouncy, happy, clever little thing. Terribly clever, my copy, my clone. I do not foresee ever ceasing to worship her. Not that she needs to know that, cocky devil she is my clone after all, it wouldn’t do for her to know I would never harm a hair on her head, possibly not even to save myself.

“Yes, sir,” she says, looking contrite, “But you are more skilled than most, others would not have gotten the better of me.”

“Nobody can get the better of you, ever, because you are the best,” I say, tipping her chin up and stroking my hand through her thick dark hair, a shade lighter than mine though still a rich brown deep almost ebony in parts.

“Yes, sir,” she says, nodding.

“What were you studying?” I ask, nodding for her to walk with me.

“Mathematics,” she says.

“I’m well aware you’re on summer break.”

“I’m working ahead so I can get into a higher grade next term,” she says, skipping a little bit.

“Good, I’ll quiz you tonight if you like,” I say.

“Your face is looking better,” she says.

“Quit trying to placate me it does not work I know when you are being false,” I say.

“Okay. Aiden says if I fake it people will like me better,” she says. Aiden. One of the scrappy little sub par Project 10s my offspring is regrettably allowed to mix with. I would have had her moved except most of them are scrappy and sub par. I know Aiden’s father, or knew him. He was one of the Spacemen I betrayed in the process of convincing the Isylgyns I was not loyal to the human race. Hopefully Tess will be able to do similar to this fellow, but for now she seems to hold him with a childish affection. I need to explore that.

“Why bother? Do you care what people think?” I ask.

“No,” she says, immediately, “But people can be useful.”

“Yes, they can, and there may come a time when you must manipulate people, but I do not want you to waste energy on that. your mind is better devoted to your studies than understanding these people and their ways. You’re like me, and I hated being trapped in the nothingness of them. wanting to be one of them yet knowing I wasn’t, trying sometimes to pretend I was only to know deep inside I’m something very different. It’s lonely. but it’s less lonely if you are who you are, then gain allies that way,” I explain, “Leave any manipulation and charm to me, sadly I’ve had to learn it. I don’t see why you should when I can clear the way for you.”

“Okay,” she says, nodding. She’s quiet but she’s soaking it like a sponge. I know she is, she has everything I’ve ever taught her. “How is your day going, really? I want to know because I’m curious, I miss you when we’re apart.”

“I’ll tell you for your education but don’t miss me,” I say, stopping and looking at her, “That’s a waste of energy. Missing.”

“How do you feel when we’re apart?” she asks.

“I look forward to seeing you again because I have so many things to teach you, and I love watching you learn and grow,” I say, petting her hair and kneeling down in front of her. “What do you think of?”

“I think----I’d like to be with you---”

“You will be someday. Out in the stars. I promise,” I say, immediately. “But go on.”

“I think sometimes it would be nice if you were here, or when we can’t talk it’d be nice if we could talk to each other---”

“But those emotions are curiosity based,” I point out, “Not ‘missing’. ‘missing’ is a selfish emotion from the lower region of the brain. Linked to anxiety and other wasteful syndromes.”

“There was something else. When they said you weren’t coming back, “ she says, looking down at her feet, “I wasn’t what people call sad. I didn’t want to cry. I could imagine a future without you in it. but I felt...restless. Like I couldn’t settle my mind down.”

“Odd,” I say, nodding, “Perhaps it was solely the anticipation of a possible change in our situation that was overstimulating you.”

“Maybe,” she agrees.

“Why don’t we discuss it at length at dinner? I’ll do some research based on changes and loss and the neurological effects on the brain, and you do the same? But that is all inconsequential as I will, always. Always. Always. Come back, understand?” I ask, “Nothing is going to stop me from coming back for you---I take that back, one thing. If you ask me not to. if you ask me not to come for you, I won’t. But so long as you want me, I’m here, understood?”

“Yes, sir----why would you think I wouldn’t want you?” she asks.

“I don’t anticipate it, however I felt the need to add the caveat as it is true,” I say, “But, I never did answer your question. My day is total shit. Major Tom has a handsome new flight partner who isn’t me---”

“Is he scarred from acid?”

“No, thank you so much for reminding me. and he is charming as well as clever and in tune with emotions and not likely to psychologically neglect her, everything I am not,” I sigh, “And I’ve been assigned a trainee.”

“Really what’re they like?” she asks. 

“I don’t know yet. Instead of picking him up I came to visit you to see how he handles disappointment.”

I wake up with my tablet still in my hands. Two in the afternoon, lovely. I only got off at six am and made it back here at eight, probably didn’t fall asleep till nine---yes I should still be asleep, I need at least seven hours. I’m so tired. I look at the webpage I had pulled up. It’s the glossy information packet on Project 10s. They updated the page a couple months ago. new photos of the dorms, updated pictures of the dorms, different wording on the explanation of coursework and activities.

I soak it all in. blurbs and obviously staged rooms, with wooden beds and fluffy comforters and pictures of children reading tablets while they sit in a perfectly arranged room with toys ever so carefully laid about. it’s obviously staged but I love it anyway.

 I need it. I shouldn›t do this to myself yet I do. somehow it makes me feel better while the hole inside of me burns. My daughter is in there. one of them. my beautiful little girl. She’s eight years old now. old enough to still play with dolls, they must let them have dolls in the picture there are dolls but who gets them dolls? Nobody, there’s a ‘token and reward system’ in which cadets (not children, cadets) may ‘redeem tokens for pleasure items such as educational toys or personalized room items’. So if she failed a test or didn’t do chores she didn’t have enough tokens to buy a doll or a new blanket? Kids shouldn’t have to save up to have blankets or alarm clocks or posters. Those things should be there like food and love.

Love. ‘each floor for ages 6-12 has nursing staff, available to meet the children’s emotional and physical needs 24/7’, so a staff member, comes to make sure she’s brushed her teeth and put away her books and put on her pajamas. For 0-6 they were two to a room, with one nurse per room, rotating twelve hour shifts. Different people, always different people no bonds no attachment.

Stop. She’s clean and clothed and fed and warm and safe today. She’s probably out playing in the sunshine with friends just like she would be if she were with you. You’re halfway there. halfway, damn it. she’s eight. At sixteen she can contact you, she’ll see the message. She’s bound to be curious. She’ll want to meet you. you’ve made it half way.

That doesn’t help. it should help but it doesn’t. All the comforting shit I told myself before I let her go. That she was getting a universe class education. That we’d get to meet when she’s sixteen. That doctors and scientists and everyone clever has formulated a perfect formula for caring for them they want them to succeed it has to work. 

Bull shit. I want my baby. My stomach, where I carried her for those precious nine months, burns. It feels empty, all the time. I know very well it’s psychosomatic but knowing it doesn’t make it go away. when I’m half asleep or just waking, sometimes I’ll feel her move inside me, like those precious nights when I was pregnant, and we were together, and I would lie there, rubbing my swollen belly, singing softly and telling her how much I loved her. I was sick as a dog the entire time I carried her, but I didn’t care. It was so stupid, I didn’t care. I loved her anyway, more than I ever thought I could love something.

I roll over, turning the tablet off. Continuing to look at the words won’t bring her back to me. I fell asleep holding a floppy bunny. I got it a year ago, almost. On her seventh birthday. Sometimes I get her things that I would get her if she were with me. Half the time I throw them away, sobbing, because when I meet her she won’t want blocks or rattles or stuffed toys. I have my spare room set up. I go in and wash the sheets and fluff the pillows. Waiting for the day she contacts me. Tells me she wants me to be her mom.

But each day is harder and harder even as I know I’m a day closer. I’ve made it eight years. Hell, the first week I didn’t think I’d make it one. Make that the first day. And look how far I’ve come. Half way. Half way there. but all that time left to cover God I can’t do this. I clutch my burning stomach. It hurt so much when I got home I couldn’t eat. Now I just want to sleep. Because in my dreams, I see a little girl with long hair, laughing, and playing in the grass. Sometimes it’s a baby, and I’m lying on a blanket, watching her look at the sun.

But more often I dream I’m standing waiting for her. Or trying to find her and I’ve lost her. or I am looking at an empty crib and carry basket and bottles and everything and I can’t find her and I know she’s supposed to be here and I hear her crying but I can’t get to her.

But even that is better than reality. Reality being I’ll never meet my little girl or baby. I’ll meet a young woman, who will have grown up without me. have done all the missing me she wants to do and now she’s just curious and she doesn’t need her mum anymore because she’s more interested in dating and being popular and all those things popular media would have us believe sixteen year olds care about.

It’s odd I never think of the father. whatever man, whoever’s child I carried. That never really enters my mind. that I bore some man’s child, some man I’ve never met, who could be anybody I could meet him on the street and never know. I don’t know if he kept custody. I can’t think about that. I doubt it, he had to match my IQ which is pretty high, it’s bound to be some poor academic, why would anybody that clever be in the military?

Chapter 28

“T

itus did you get paired with a cadet?” it’s sad that I have an innate sense when he’s not doing what he’s supposed to be.

“Yes.” he doesn’t sound like he’s nicely indoctrinating some sixteen year old and showing them around the base. He sounds like he’s balancing his precious eight year old girl on his shoulders probably while reading something and walking.

“And did you go and pick them up?” I ask.

“Um----are you going to quit talking to me for a while if I say no?”

“Titus! How long have you left the kid waiting there?” I ask, annoyed.

“Ah----somewhere between one and two hours, definitely no more than ten,” he says.

“You self-centered jerk, quit being AWOL----don’t deny it I know you are---and punishing Thorn just because you aren’t going to be back in space for another year it’s protocol you know that if it were up to Thorne he would send you as far away as possible,” I lecture.

“I’m not---”

“Just because Riley is AWOL doesn’t make it okay you are,” I say. I know for a fact they both frequently go AWOL to go and visit their kids at the Academy. Which I don’t mind on the principle that I wished somebody’d visited me at the Academy, but I do mind when they are intentionally shirking their duties to do it.

“All right, fine, I’ll go and get the cadet. But it won’t be entertaining,” he says. that means he’ll do it slowly.

“Yes it will, you have so much fun with your daughter, why? Because you get to teach her things, tell her how to be like you---it’ll be really similar with a cadet, and you’ll get an excuse to spend hours and hours on the flight simulators,” I point out.

“That true I’m excited about that---but my daughter’s little and she listens to me sixteen year olds-----”

“Yeah, when you were sixteen, you wouldn’t listen to anybody truth be told you probably never did, but this is different, first off, thank god, this cadet isn’t you, second off, remember how excited you were to get actual flight training? You listened to Lt Col Ziegfeld, because she was teaching you something you wanted to know,” I remind him.

“You’re right, as usual, Major Tom,” he says, his voice cheering a little, “I’ll go fetch him.”

“Good,” I say, “I’ll see you at dinner, WITH your cadet, all right?” I ask. He would try not to or just forget to feed the kid.

“Yes, ma’am, see you then,” he says, and hangs up.

I sigh. My cadet is looking at me nervously.

“Now, don’t say I’ve never done anything for you,” I say, pointing at him.

“Yes, ma’am, thank you ma’am----,” he stumbles. He said that one of his classmates had not been collected and I know I was late because I was doing Titus-management-projects for Thorn, so I put one and Titus together and got a pretty good idea who might have left a cadet waiting around for eight hours. “Only, I was worried, you were one of the last ones to pick me up and Cadet Starr was still waiting---thank you, ma’am---was that---?” 

“Would you like another round?” a bartender is standing looking at us expectantly. I never said I wasn’t AWOL too.

“No, the first three did the trick, more orange juice for him,” I say, as my cadet nods happily. The precious little ginger haired thing likes sweets, apparently, and just got out of being deprived them at OTS.

“You were saying, Cadet Jordan?” I ask him, doing my last shot. I’m going to need it.

“Ma’am, may I ask who you called?” he asks, nervously.

“Major Card, he’ll be training Cadet Starr,” I say, putting mint leaves into my mouth. I need to get rid of the smell of alcohol, but I won’t be able to do what I’m going to do without the alcohol.

“The---Major Card?” he asks. I forget sometimes that to cadets and civilians, Titus Card is a living legend. Besides being the most daring pilot the force has, he’s been caught by the Isylgyns twice and lived to tell the tale, his bravery and talent is known planet wide. And he’s a complete and utter pain in the neck most of the time, the rest of it he’s just an idiot. A hyperactive, too clever for his own good, idiot.

“Yes, the one who recently got the Kepler Medal of Bravery,” I say. It would be more annoying to relate Titus’ accomplishments, but I’ve got my share of medals, and Jordan was suitably impressed to have me training him.

“Ma’am, will I get to meet him?” he asks, still nervous.

“Unfortunately yes,” I say, dryly. I’m not pleased with Titus today, Thorn had me in meetings all morning, signing paperwork to the effect that I’m actually semi-responsible for anything he does over the next few months when Thorn has to be exposed to him. it worked well enough when it occurred to Thorn to make me in charge of him at OTS, so he’s figuring it will work now. I would rather baby sit hungry velociraptors, but this was not a volunteer opportunity. “Major Card is unique, as you heard from my side of the conversation with him.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he says, as though he understands. He definitely does not.

“What’s up?” I ask, waking up and tapping my earpiece. I fell asleep holding my tablet, still in my scrubs, tear stains on my face. I wish this weren’t normal.

“D didn’t show up for coffee today at his usual spot---did I wake you up? I’m sorry,” Jo says, she sounds like she’s outside. She probably is.

“Yes, no, it’s okay---the transfer to his hospital went through yesterday, I start tomorrow, so I’ll follow him home, and then we’ll have an address,” I say, rolling over and rubbing my eyes.

“Okay, don’t get caught---he’s a creepy bastard, don’t let him know, at all,” Jo cautions.

“It’s not my first time,” I remind her, dryly. “I think I’ll be fine.”

“Just, be careful, he’s a serial killer, they are weird as well as randomly violent,” Jo says, “This one just really gives me the creeps.”

“Yeah, you’re not usually this cautious,” I notice, waking up a bit more.

“Maybe it’s the little one, knowing what he did to her, I don’t know, makes it more real,” Jo says.

“She okay?” I ask.

“Pretty, I don’t know, I really would like to know who her family was, who took care of her, but she won’t say anything,” Jo says, “Sam’s going to go and check on her.”

“Okay, that’s good,” I sigh, sitting up. She’s so little and somebody hurt her so badly. Which is what sick bastards do to little kids. Which is why I stop them.

“I have to train a cadet, that’s what I was talking to Major Tom about, can you read for a while then I’ll come after dinner?” I ask Tess, I’ve walked her to the Milton library where I’ll leave her till after dinner. She can eat there in the cafeteria I’ve given her rubles.

“Yes, can I meet your Major Tom?” she asks.

“I hope so someday, I think you’ll like each other, but she doesn’t want to meet you,” I apologize.

“Why not?” Tess asks.

“Because she knows I’m in love with her and she doesn’t want to be in love with me, and she knows she’ll be more likely to love me if she sees how wonderful you are,” I explain.

“I see, I’d like to help then,” she says, smiling charmingly.

“Don’t bother, I shan’t be an aid to affairs of your heart,” I say, stroking her hair, “Now, go and read the psychology texts we discussed.”

“I’ve read most of those,” she says.

“Make it all, then you can go to your beloved classics,” I promise.

“Okay, hurry,” she says, hugging me.

“I will, love you,” I say, kneeling to hug her back and kiss her cheek. “Be my excellent Spaceman for me, okay?”

“Okay,” she says, clutching her little backpack. It’s got stars on it, and little sparkles. I got it for her at the start of the last school term. The first new backpack I ever had was when I joined the Space Forces. Before that, I always had cast off from my brothers. I was quite attached to that thing, I remember lugging it about for years, all my worldly possessions in it, but most importantly my precious tablet, the first and only thing I bought with my first few paychecks, the fastest, most reliable tablet I could afford. Tess has an identical one now, she’s eight years old. She’s on it all the time, exactly like I would have been at her age. I used to stay late at school, sneak in early, to try to read. I’m leaving her in a library full of books. And she wants my attention. I wonder if I would have wanted anything if I could have been left in this place.

“What is it, Dad?” she asks, cocking her head.

“Nothing---thoughts nothing more. I should go, you study all right? I’ll come and get you later, I promise, we’ll go back to our flat,” I say. It pleases her to no end that we have a flat of our own on base. I have no idea why when she has a room all to herself as a Project 10, but it does so I indulge her by keeping her there with me as often as possible. It is good I’m on the planet, for a little while. She does need me, physically. I can only do so much good when I’m out in space.

“Okay, love you,” she says, raising a hand and then closing her fist, smiling. I do the same. It’s our signal when we have to be apart. Find the brightest star you can. Take hold of it. then that’s where I’ll be, I tell her. always waiting for you.

“Love you too, Tess,” I say.

Chapter 29

“H

as it occurred to you, Nicole, that we’re all just waiting to die?” Now you see why I needed the stiff drink before I did this.

“I suppose,” I say, looking out across the grassy field of the hospital. Quentin is sitting next to me, in a wheelchair, I’m on a bench, slouching. And I’m still higher than him. He used to be so big, so strong, gentle, steady, quiet, predictable. All around a nice break from Titus. Now he’s withered, he looks ten years older, with grey already in his oddly long hair, wearing yellow tinted glasses, because his eyes were damaged by the smoke from the crash that took his legs. His shoulders are a bit slumped, and his face sunken, pale from too many hours in the hospital.

“You don’t have to come to see me,” he says, not looking at me, “It’s kind of you.”

“I haven’t seen you since the ceremony,” I say. When we all go get medals for nearly dying. Yay us. He and I and all the others were melancholy about it, since we had lost so many of our squadron, it didn’t feel right getting medals for staying alive. Titus thought it was a complete waste of time and mental energy and spent the whole time either complaining or waxing on about the injustice of it. The injustice being that we were finally out of the pressurization chambers and hospitals and had to spend a whole day standing around in our dress whites getting medals when we could be doing something like oh he didn’t know flying and shooting Isylgyns---not the injustice that a lot of people had died and some were maimed. I had to remind him of that. And smack him. And eventually find something to entertain him. And something for him to eat. and then he shut up.

“You saw me week before last,” he says. I was pretending to come by on official business but really I’d been checking on him since I knew his mother had him on a suicide watch. I’d met his mum several times. She was nice, decent sort of person, loved her son, which I figured was what mattered most.

“So I did,” I say.

“It’s all right. That it’s not all right. I’m going to be fine,” he says, though he doesn’t sound like he believes it. “I’ve been thinking is all. Thinking a lot.”

“What about?” I ask.

“About what I want to do now. about what happened. I really don’t remember much after the crash,” he says, shaking his head, “Major Card gave me the first adrenaline shot, after that it’s hazy, like I was drunk. I hate that.”

“Yes, probably best though,” I say, quickly.

“Why?” he asks, frowning, “What happened?”

“What we’ve told you, Major Card and a couple others broke into the compound while the rest of us had a fire fight with the Isylgyns on the surface,” I say, innocently.

“Did I say anything? To Major Card in particular?” he asks, suspiciously.

“A few things, I don’t know,” I lie.

“Tom, what did I say?” he asks, “I remember being angry with him, blaming him for the crash---did I say anything to that effect?”

“Sort of---Titus really didn’t care though,” I say, wincing.

“What did I say?” he asks, annoyed, trying to move in his wheelchair to get closer to me.

“You might have completely blamed him for the crash and called him a bastard along with a variety of other choice adjectives and likened him to the Isylgyns,” I say, unable to meet his eyes.

“What??! Why didn’t you guys stop me?” Quentin moans.

“Titus has deserved to be called those things to his face for quite some time and you were dying and we thought we were dying and in the situation it was kind of funny and like, fulfilling,” I say, weakly.

“How long did I---what did you just leave me on the coms to berate him while he was breaking into the Russian’s compound?” Quentin realizes.

“Yeah,” I say, nodding, “Like I said, we thought we were dying, so we wanted to enjoy ourselves.”

“You just let me tear him up? What were you doing?” he asks.

“Sitting there listening and returning fire to the Islygns, I did take it from you when I needed to talk to Card,” I say.

“What did Card say?” he asks.

“Oh, he insulted you right back; he really seemed to enjoy it,” I say.

“What seriously---I thought he was---affectionate last time I saw him I thought it was because he was glad I’m maimed,” he groans, “He could have me court-martialed.”

“You were under the influence of drugs, and like I said he really didn’t care,” I say.

“God,” Quentin says, looking up at the sky.

“You don’t still think it’s his fault—do you?” I ask, gently.

“I don’t know---no, I suppose not. I’ve seen him land better in worse conditions is all---but he’s human, in theory----just like us---it was a rough a landing many a pilot would have killed us both—I’m lucky to be alive as badly as we were under fire,” he says, shaking his head.

“I had trouble getting my ship down,” I say, nodding, “And I was on the western edge so I wasn’t in near as much danger as the two of you.”

“I’ve flown with him in worse though---not that it matters. A simple flick of the wrist, two seconds too late, one miscalculation. And here I am, without any legs,” he says, shaking his head, “It’s over now.”

“I don’t know if it’ll ever be over, any of it,” I say, “I still have dreams about the battles, all of them. I’m sick of flying the suicide squadrons, they’re just that. waiting to get killed.”

“Yeah, well, we are either way,” he says.

“I suppose. Still, I’m not going back out there,” I say, “I’m staying on the Ulysses and running patrols from there, from now on.”

“What about Card?” he asks.

“He tried to falsify emergency orders sending himself back to the North Rim,” I say, dryly.

“He failed?” Quentin laughs, “How’d they find out?”

“He did it under Commander Hawking’s name, and she happened to be on base to deny she did it,” I say, smiling at the memory. “We are doing our best to get you killed in action, Card, however you will have to just be patient and give us some time,” she had growled, as Titus stood there, eyes burning with annoyance that he hadn’t known she was on base to contradict his plot.

“I’m sure that was amusing,” he says, half-smiling.

“For everybody involved except Major Card,” I assure him, “Commander Hawking could barely get through it with a straight face, nor could I. Commander Thorn was suggesting she find some exception and just let him go since he wants to so badly. She refused.”

“Huh,” Quentin says, looking off again. his smile has quickly faded.

“When are they going to release you, do they think?” I ask.

“Probably later this week, I’m well enough to keep off infection and such with outpatient care, and I’m steady enough on the prosthetics to get about in between therapist visits,” he says, “Truth be told, I think they could’ve discharged me ages ago, but they know I don’t honestly have anywhere real to go.”

“Didn’t Space Forces set you up with a flat or something?” I ask.

“Like I said, I don’t have anywhere REAL to go,” he says darkly, “I don’t want to go to some dingy flat someplace where I can’t see the sky.”

“Where would you want to go?” I ask.

“Hardly matters I’m going to a dingy flat someplace where I can’t see the sky---my mum’s gone and cleaned up and moved my clothes and things from Milton---she’s confirmed it, you can’t see the sky,” he says, darkly.

“That was nice of your mum---where would you rather go?” I ask.

“Like I said it doesn’t matter---I don’t know, even. It’s not like I’ve ever chosen where I get to live,” he says, shrugging.

“Nor have I,” I say. come to think of it I’ve never actually thought of having a place of my own, where I’d want it or what I’d want it to be or anything like that.

“Well this is depressing. I’m sure you’re glad you came to talk to the crippled guy---who is that Space Forces person loitering over there?” he asks, craning his neck.

“Oh, that’s my new cadet,” I say, “I’m training him.”

“Huh, you always liked taking the kids,” he says.

“Close to my own as I’ll ever get,” I say, shrugging.

“Why?” he asks, “Why not have a Project 10?”

“I was one, I don’t want to do that to somebody,” I say, adamantly, “I couldn’t be away from them that long. And Spaceman is all I know how to be.”

“Makes sense,” he says, shrugging.

“The kids are fun, I get to be there for them when family isn’t, it works out,” I say, “What about you?”

“Yes, I and my metal legs are going to be catnip to the ladies,” he says, rolling his eyes.

“Don’t, you’ll get better on the prosthesis,” I say, “People don’t care about that sort of thing---”

“Actually they do---”

“Then they aren’t worth it,” I say.

“Okay. the majority of humanity isn’t worth it, I’ll just join Major Card’s ‘fuck everybody but me’ religion and have done with it,” he says.

“It’s not a religion, it’s a philosophy,” I say, rolling my eyes.

“Then what do you call what he does with his hands on his head?” he asks.

“Being autistic?” I offer.

“Praying to himself?” Quentin says.

“He’s not---he might not be,” I say, shaking my head, “And you don’t have be cynical, just---I don’t know, I’m rotten at helping people, sorry. I’m only trying to make you feel better.”

“No, you’re doing fine, as well as my mum and she thinks she’s rotten at talking to me as well. I think it’s me. I can’t be talked to,” he says.

“No, I’m sorry, I’ve made you more depressed,” I say.

“That’s really not possible,” he says, “I’ll be fine. really. I just need to get on with it, get used to life like this. And I will. Eventually.”

My cadet is tall, polite, handsome, obedient, and in love. I don’t know with whom but he is and it’s going to be annoying I can tell already. The first four things are going to be annoying as well. I dislike people taller than me, yes, that’s a lot of the population I still don’t have to like it, I dislike people who are overly polite, and ever since I got acid sprayed in my face I dislike men who haven’t had acid sprayed in their face. And I hate. Hate. Hate. Blind obedience.

“Card do I want to know why you are having your cadet stand with an apple on his head?”

“Commander Ziegfeld, how nice to see you, no I doubt if you do,” I say, smiling genuinely. She is one of the few people I like. Because she taught me how to fly and she knows I’m cleverer than everyone else and she still remains fond of me. and she doesn’t typically get cross with me for just being me.

“Card,” she says, smiling knowingly, “Why?”

“I’m doing an experiment to see how far his blind obedience stretches,” I say, innocently.

“It’s supposed to stretch far, don’t punish him for doing what we, the Space Forces, actually want him to do, which is obey orders without question,” she groans.

“I’m not! But I need to know, he waited for me to pick him up for eight hours without eating, drinking, or taking his blouse off or anything and I need to see if he really is that stupid or if this is act and he’s planning to take over the galaxy,” I say.

“That’s only you, Titus—”

“I’m planning to take over the universe get it right---”

“---I’ll ignore that for the present---please tell me you’ve fed him,” she sighs.

“The apple is his food,” I say.

“Damn you Card----Cadet---what is your name--?” she goes over and inspects my cadet who is obediently doing a wall sit with an apple on his head.

He looks at me but doesn’t answer.

“I don’t like the sound of his voice so I’ve ordered him not to speak,” I say.

Lt. Ziegfeld glares at me.

“You can speak to her,” I say, innocently. My innocent voice rarely works. Especially with her.

“Ma’am, Starr,” he says.

“Cadet Starr, you may eat the apple, and stand up, I need to speak with you---go away,” she says, to me.

“No, he’s mine, I get to keep him for six whole months----Major Tom said he belongs to me----”

“Card, go away, now,” she says, shooing me away. I smile a little and obey.

“Cadet Starr,” the Lt Col says, taking me by the arm. I’ve taken the apple off my head but she’s a Lt Col and I don’t dare eat it in front of her. she’s---she’s the first female bomber pilot the space forces ever had. I’ve always wanted to meet her.

“Yes, ma’am?” I ask.

“Eat, for God’s sake----go away, shoo,” she hisses, over her shoulder, at Major Card, who is still loitering about leaning in our direction.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say, taking as small of a bite as is possible while still obeying.

“And we’re getting you more food than that in a minute---about Major Card, I’m going to tell you how to survive the next six months and I can tell you this because I taught him to fly, understand?” she asks.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say.

“I want you to treat him exactly like he treats you, understood? He won’t respect you otherwise, and if he doesn’t respect you he’ll have you doing stupid shit like that,” she points at the apple, “He needs you to show him how clever you are, and don’t obey every stupid thing he tells you to do, argue with him. He likes it. He needs it, he’ll make your life hell, otherwise. He wants a little resistance, a little competition, the universe is too easy for him, make it a bit harder, eh?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I say, staring at her stupidly. I imagined I’d get to meet a Lt. Col. one day but I didn’t think they tell me to make my superior’s life hard. What she said makes sense, but I don’t want to be court martialed.

“I can tell you’re thinking ‘I’m not going to do that’, and it’s all right, you don’t have to, right away. But you do need to, it’s the only thing that will help, now come on, let’s get you some real food,” she says, nodding for me to follow her. “You can come, now, Card.”

“If you like him you can have him, I don’t really want him,” Major Card says, hurrying to join us.

“I don’t, I don’t want him or you, oh I was talking to Thorn earlier, I saw his desk,” she says, looking pointedly at Major Card.

“Yeah, the thing about him is, he’s categorically convinced I spend 95 percent of my time doing things to actively destroy his life and career, which is blatantly ridiculous, it’s more like 10 percent of my time, at maximum,” he says.

“Yes, well try to leave him unmedicated in your time on the ground, for me? This time?” she says, then adds to me, “Starr, this is the way to the officer’s mess, since clearly you’re going to have to get there yourself.”

“I was going to feed him.”

“That’s very obviously not true.” 

“Eventually.”

“He is a boy, he needs to eat, just because you somehow survive off of liquid does not mean other people can, particularly not growing boys,” Ziegfeld chastises me.

“As you wish,” I say, magnanimously. I realize I’ve missed her telling me off.

“Three times a day---don’t you feed your daughter?” she asks, suspiciously.

“Yes---no---usually other people do or she tells me to,” I admit. Typically she eats at the academy, or if she’s with me she gets her own food when she’s hungry or tries to persuade me to buy her treats. That usually doesn’t work though if her argument is convincing I’ll indulge her.

“Okay, good to know---Cadet Starr, you will need to inform Major Card whenever you require food, or other bodily necessities such as sleep, understood?” she says, over her shoulder, to my cadet.

“Yes, ma’am,” he says, obediently.

“And give him time to wash his clothes and such,” she reminds me.

“I will,” I hadn’t been planning on it. She is taking the fun out of this. The only thing she doesn’t take the fun out of is flying but that’s because she has as much fun at it as I do and that’s why I forgive her most things. No, it’s because she knows I have as much fun at it as she does, and so she forgives me most things. We are an odd pair. It’s a shame I really wish her son were dead. but I’m not going to kill him. I’m not. No. just because I really don’t want him and his beauty within a lightyear of MY Major Tom does not mean I get to kill him.

“How is your daughter?” Ziegfeld asks, kindly. Her son was a Project 10, so she knows what it’s like to go and visit them when you’re off, constantly checking up.

“Wonderful, I think she’s the only person glad I’m grounded,” I say, dryly.

“She’s one person,” she says, shrugging, “It was good you got to see her on your medical leave.”

“Yes, she quite enjoyed it, and I can have her at the flat with me most days,” I say, realizing how odd it feels. This is the longest I’ve been on the ground since she was born---since I was a pathetic hungry looking cadet Starr’s age. Getting her up for school in the morning, being able to talk with every night. It is what popular culture believes occurs for small children but it never did for me.

“Nice to have a bit of a life, eh?” Zeigfeld asks, smiling knowingly.

“It’s educational,” I say. I don’t like not flying.

“I’ll have to come and see her one day, what are your days off?” she asks.

They make small talk. I want to pay attention but I’m so hungry that I can’t think too clearly and I’d rather focus on memorizing my way around. I’m tired as well, I didn’t sleep well last night, my last night in the barracks. Not that I ever slept well in the barracks, too many people all making noise. And most of the others ostracized me, because I’m not University or Project 10. But we’re all the same now. I’ll show them.

I nearly run into Major Card and Lt Col Zeigfeld, who stop abruptly at a lift. Thankfully they don’t notice or are too consumed with the people coming out of the lift to comment.

“Major Tom,” I say, smiling annoyingly, as she and her cadet step out of the lift. “Nice to have you back.” She was AWOL as well I just know it.

“Because you weren’t AWOL this afternoon when you were supposed to pick up your cadet?” she asks, after giving Zeigfeld the appropriate greeting.

“Because you weren’t AWOL after picking up your cadet?” I ask, innocently.

“If you had been on base you would know the answer to that, don’t let us keep you from getting to the mess hall, late,” she says, icily. She’s annoyed with me I wonder why. Her cadet, a lanky red-head, is behind her, shifting his weight nervously.

“Which definitely isn’t where you are going, late?” I ask.

“Floor three, why don’t we send the cadets on ahead?” Ziegfeld says, sensing our argument will go on indefinitely. They tend to.

“Yes, let’s,” I say, motioning for mine to enter the lift.

“I’ll pick you up in a half an hour,” Tom says, to her cadet.

“I probably won’t, go to the gym afterward, I’ll meet you there,” I instruct mine, who nods.

I step into the elevator with Terrence, sighing a little as the doors close.

“Are you all right?” he asks immediately.

“Yeah, hungry’s all,” I say.

“Was that Major Card?” he asks, “Mine’s Major Tom.”

“Yeah,” I say, nodding. I recognized her. She has her picture in the papers nearly as much as Major Card. “Do you think they’re sleeping together?”

“Definitely,” he says.

“Do you think they know we are?” 

“No.”

“Good,” I say, as the doors open.

So that’s who my taciturn trainee has been pining after, mystery solved and now we both have a motivation to follow Major Tom around this might be a mutually satisfying relationship.

“Where were you---both?” Zeigfeld asks, us, as we walk together to the mess hall upstairs, which is where we upper level officers usually eat. Let the first and second lieutenants have their noisy fun while we are upstairs in the quieter, more mature hall. It was not officially set up that way, yet that is the culture they have both taken on and we leave it as such.

“I was legitimately showing my Cadet around the Capital while visiting one of wounded Spacemen,” Tom says. Oh that’s why she’s cross with me, she’s been visiting that cretin Leavitt. He hates me. for good reason though he doesn’t know it.

“I was completely illegitimately visiting my daughter,” I say, unapologetically.

“Card, you really need to stop functioning off the belief that they won’t court martial you,” she sighs.

“But they won’t,” I say.

“Unfortunately he’s right,” Tom says. I’ll bet Thorn didn’t give her leave, even if she has a better excuse than I do.

“Anyway, what do you think of your cadets?” Ziegfeld asks, as we walk into the chow line. A few others are lazily looking at tablets and lining up for food.

“Cadet Jorden is nice, he’s nervous, which is good I suppose, he seems like he’ll do well,” Tom says.

“Mine is very laconic,” I say.

“Cadets aren’t supposed to talk all the time, that was just you,” Ziegfeld says, flatly.

“I didn’t---”

“You did, after the first hour I realized you actually meant EVERYTHING you said so it was very disturbing but I got used to it,” she says.

“Nobody told me I wasn’t supposed to speak unless spoken to,” I mutter.

“They did you probably weren’t paying attention,” Ziegfeld says.

“He was paying attention he distinctly said ‘I’m probably not going to do that’,” Tom laughs.

“I didn’t---all right I did, I thought it was stupid,” I say. I had a lot of questions about learning to fly and I have important things to say most of the time, so I thought it was inane to require that I not speak.

“How have you been doing, back on duty?” Ziegfeld asks. Both Major Tom and I are grounded for another six months, and we’ve been on medical leave for six due to pressurization sickness.

“I’d be better if they’d let me fly,” I say, taking out my tablet and returning to my current book.

“I know, I wasn’t talking to you,” she says. I shrug.

“All right, every time, it’s weird that I come back, and all these other people don’t. Either they didn’t come home or they won’t return to duty. I guess it’ll stop being weird when I’m the one who doesn’t come back,” Major Tom says.

“I’ll always make sure you come back,” I say, immediately. And I will. The Isylgyns have orders already not to harm her. Yes that didn’t work out well for me last time but I’ve made it very clear now.

“And what’s so sweet is I think he thinks he can,” Major Tom says, sighing and looking at me.

“I can,” I say, glancing up at her to get my point across then back down at my book.

“You don’t control everything,” she says.

“I know but I’m working on that,” I say.

“It is hard, that’s why I quit flying the suicide missions, there’s a reason they call them that,” Ziegfeld says, “I love flying, but I don’t love my friends dying.”

“Nor do I,” Tom says.

They go quiet for a moment.

“This is the point where you agree, Titus,” Tom groans.

“Oh---what---yes, I was reading,” I say, innocently.

“Since when aren’t you doing two things at once?” Tom mutters. She’s still annoyed with me. probably over Leavitt. But I’ve been wanting to cut his legs off for ages now.

“Titus, go sit down and drink your milk,” Ziegfeld says, handing me two packets of milk which she knows is all I want.

“Fine,” I say, staring at my book. She wants to get Tom alone to talk to her fine. let Tom blame me it is my fault anyway I don’t care if she’s angry with me. Who am I fooling? Yes I do.

“What’s he done---lately?” Ziegfeld asks me.

“Nothing,” I lie.

“Is it because his gunner who you both trained with was maimed or is it that he nearly got his face burned off being an idiot?” she asks, knowingly.

“Both,” I admit, “One minute I look at him and think about how easily he could be dead right now and here he is---being him, and not even noticing his brain nearly got eaten away by acid—and then I went to see Leavitt today and, well Titus was flying the ship. He’s landed in worse conditions safely.”

“You can’t blame him for a simple miscalculation, we’ve all made them. and as much as he pretends he isn’t human, he is,” Ziegfeld says, “Believe me, I’ve felt the same way. No pilot is perfect. We’re all a twitch of a muscle away from doing the exact same thing.”

“Yeah, I know. that’s why I need to get out of flying missions. I told Thorn, this’ll be my last rotation. I’m just sick of it,” I say.

“But---?” she asks.

“But he’ll never quit, not until he’s dead,” I say, looking at Titus who is reading two tablets at once, sitting on the edge of a sofa contentedly drinking his milk. A couple others are lining up to watch him like they do. I’m pretty sure they bet on when he’ll take a drink or how fast he’ll tap the screen to change pages.

“No, he won’t. that’s his problem, he is walking around like he didn’t nearly die, two weeks into medical leave that moron is trying to hack into his file to put himself back on flight duty. There’s something wrong with him,” she says.

“Yeah, there is,” I say, almost laughing.

“No, seriously, like, something clinical wrong with him. but you can’t let that get to you—or if it does then you have to get away from him because he’s not going to change, ever,” she says.

“I’m thinking that second one,” I admit, “But how can you say that? You’re fond of him.”

“He’s too much like me for me to hate him,” Ziegfeld says, “Not in the odd way---but the way he loves to fly. I’d never met anyone who lived for like I did, not until him. He was made for it, for better or for worse. So I have to forgive him his faults, in a way---plus he’s just a bit older than my son. I’d want somebody to forgive my boy if I wasn’t around, and his mum quit caring a long time ago.”

“That’s why I hate it. it feels like too few people in the world care about him because of who he is and he can’t help who he is,” I say, “And then he says sweet idiotic things like that---I don’t know.”

“Don’t feel like that. I’ll keep an eye on him, and Thorn is fond of him despite himself, you do what makes you happy. Find somebody to make you happy, somebody who consumes solid food,” she says, we are still staring at Titus drinking his dinner and reading, his blue eyes glowing in the reflected light from the screens of his tablets. Like five people are sitting across watching him and putting rubles on the table. they are totally betting.

“That might be a step,” I say. I just don’t see why I can’t take it. It’s not love. Ziegfeld thinks it is, but I don’t think so. it’s like he needs watching. I don’t know how or why I feel like it, but I do. I pity him and almost----fear him? Could he have saved Leavitt? No, you know he couldn’t have they did like each other well enough----don’t go there. but if anybody could have landed that ship he could have. Yet he didn’t.

Chapter 30

“I

t looks nice.”

“Mum, you saw it yesterday you don’t have to act so pleased,” I say, pretending not to lean against the counter because I can’t balance as well on my replacement legs as I like to pretend I can.

“It is nice, nicer than I’ve ever lived in,” she says, taking my hands because she knows I’m unsteady.

“Would you like it?” I ask. I would rather live under a bridge. Because there are eighteen flight of STAIRS up to this flat and I am too damn proud to take the elevator but I also can’t walk up stairs well with these horrible not-my-legs.

“Quentin, you are living here, at least till you find someplace that better suits you,” she says, petting my cheek like I’m eight and just lost a football game. Except I never played football. And when she was comforting me it was always more of a clinging and not letting go sort of thing.

“Yeah, looks that way---is this really all the things I have?” I ask, looking at the few duffel bags of stuff she brought yesterday from my barracks.

“That was all they gave me---is there anything missing?” she asks, worriedly.

“No, no, I’m sure there’s not, it’s fine---sorry you only took a half day at work, probably, we should eat something,” I say, looking around.

“It got you some food yesterday, I wasn’t sure what you would want,” she says, nervously. She feels like she has to take care of me now but she knows the last thing I want is that.

“Anything not shrink wrapped in tin is fine,” I say, smiling for her, “Preferably no milk.”

“Why not?”

“Longish story I don’t want to go into.”

“Are you nice to your cadet?”

“What do you think?”

“I don’t think you have an operating definition of nice,” Tess says, knowingly.

“Oh, define it for me?” I ask, with a grin. It’s early morning still, and she hasn’t got classes till later and I gave Starr lots of things to do to keep him occupied. So I’m still at my flat with Tess. Even as much as we communicate when I’m in space she’s still starved for my attention.

“To be nice: to perform acts which lead only to reinforcement through witnessing the pleasure of another sentient being,” she says, slowly, as I lift her into the air. She’s helping me exercise, I typically make her do morning stretches with me but because of the pressurization sickness I have to do more than usual. Right now I’m doing leg lifts with her balanced on my legs. Which is not as impressive as it sounds, my offspring is rather small.

“Very good, why would you care if I did these things?” I ask.

“I think that it would be good practice. I practice being nice,” she says.

“Do you gain reinforcement from witnessing brief pleasures of others?” I ask.

“No, but I am aware I should and it may lead to reinforcement in other areas if people believe I’m nice, they will in turn provide more tangible reinforcement,” she says, “Do you gain reinforcement from being nice to me?”

“What makes you say I’m nice to you?” I ask, pushing her off my legs and onto the other exercise mat. She giggles as I let her roll off, shaking her dark hair out of her face. her smile. Her smile isn’t like mine that bothers me.

“You appear to gain reinforcement from my happiness,” she says, flopping across my legs.

“I don’t. I gain reinforcement from you, simply existing,” I say, untangling her hair with my fingers.

“Why do you do things that make me happy, then? Like get me tablets or books or spend time with me?” she asks.

“Because I want you to love me, and therefore I have a formula in place to gain your affection,” I say.

“It’s working,” she says, with a charming smile.

“Good, it doesn’t work with Major Tom,” I say, pushing her off my lap and going to the kitchen to get a drink of milk. My muscles ache after relatively little activity. I hate being on the ground.

“She still won’t have sex with you again?” she asks.

“No, which is confounding not only in the carnal sense but also in relation to my algorithm,” I say, offering her a glass. She shakes her head.

“Well, she’s known you longer than I have,” she says.

“I know, which means I have had more time to work on her,” I point out.

“You must not be taking into account facets of her personality,” she says, helpfully.

“That’s what bothers me; what I don’t know. The unknown,” I say, quietly.

“Maybe she’ll just tell you, since she likes you,” she says.

“What makes you think she likes me?” I ask.

“If she didn’t, she wouldn’t still speak to you,” she points out.

“What are you studying?”

“Good morning, ma’am. Russian, ma’am,” I say, standing up quickly. I did not notice the Major’s entrances to the library. Terrance is behind her, he gives me a little smile but otherwise does not react.

“Major Card’s idea?” she guesses.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say. I suspect he just wanted me busy all morning so he could do as he pleased.

“If you’d like you can come with us, we were going to the gym,” she says.

I was about to tell her I had my orders to wait here, but then remembered what Lt Col Ziegfeld had said. but was she to be trusted? Her suggestions had been nothing short of bizarre but...so is Major Card.

“Major Tom, Commander Thorn wants to see you,” a young captain runs up. He’s younger than the Major but a good bit older than me, with clear eyes, a handsome face, and curly ink black hair. So he’s the one Major Card doesn’t like.

“Did he say why?” she asks.

“No, ma’am,” he says, shrugging, then he turns to me, “You’re Cadet Starr, Major Card’s new trainee?” I’ve not got my name tapes yet. 

“Yes, sir,” I say, quickly.

“He wants to see you as well,” he says.

“That’s odd, all right, come on, Cadet Jordan, go ahead and wait at the gym for us,” Major Tom says.

“I’ll go with him,” the Captain says.

“Thanks Ziggy,” she says, nodding to me, “Let’s see what he wants.”

I am unduly concerned for the entire walk over, convinced they are going to tell me there’s some mistake and city trash like me doesn’t belong in the officer program and they’re sending me back to basic or something of that kind. I needn’t have worried, however:

“Major Tom do you know where Major Card is?” Commander Thorn asks, standing behind his desk. He’s an older man, a good bit older than Major Tom and Card, with greying hair and a sharp look like he knows more than he ought but not as much as he’d like. 

“I believe so, sir,” she says, wearily.

“Good, tell Cadet Starr where that is, then Cadet Starr I need you to deliver him to me, as quickly as possible,” he says.

“Yes, sir,” I say.

“Major Card is probably still at his flat, I’m messaging you the address,” Major Tom says, tapping on her wrist pad. I have one too, it’s standard issue and doesn’t look as nice as hers. I barely know how to use it and Major Card is not a patient teacher.

“Very good, Major Tom, I have an assignment for you,” he says, tapping on a tablet, “Read and accept.”

“Sir, please tell it is not making me more responsible for Major Card’s actions than I already am,” she groans, tipping her head back.

“All right, it is not making you responsible for Major Card’s actions, accept there,” he says, handing her the tablet.

“It is! Why do you make me do this?” she asks, annoyed.

“Because he’s wanted to have lots of sex with you since you were both sixteen---don’t look at me like that literally everyone knows if the boy didn’t already he would have soon, hell, Card probably told him,” Thorn says, tiredly. I like him.

“He didn’t---Starr you aren’t to repeat this,” Tom says, her cheeks reddening.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say. I really don’t want to repeat this.

“See, look at him, he knew---did you not know that?” Thorn asks me, “Already that is?”

“Yes, sir,” I say.

“When did you find out?” Thorn asks.

“Approximately two hours after meeting Major Card, sir,” I say.

“See---he probably did tell him—”

“Don’t tell me if he did,” Tom says to me, quickly.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say.

“Sir, you can’t actually do this,” Major Tom sighs, she’s still looking at the tablet.

“Actually after about twenty hours of search I’ve found a way I can,” he says, “I just wrote him up for all the inane things he does on a bi weekly basis, then put him on probation with you in command of him for retraining. You don’t have to do anything, but he’ll know that if he does anything serious like---oh I don’t know, burning down the entire base—”

“He wasn’t actually responsible for that---”

“That we know of yet---then he knows that you’ll be cross because your name is on the line and if you’re cross then you’re less likely to make love to him which aside from Kepler domination is all he wants,” Thorne says.

“I don’t think he actually wants that,” Major Tom says, “Kepler Domination, that is.”

“Possible not, he quips about it enough, though, now, just tell him to be good he listens to you---”

“Only sometimes,” she sighs.

“That’s more than he listens to other people,” Thorne says, “Now, Starr, off you go.”

“Yes, sir,” I say, “Sir, how am I to tell Major Card he’s to come?”

“Oh, you’re authorized to use absolutely any means necessary I’m in charge of him so I can order you to cuff him and drag him here if necessary which it may be do you know how to deploy your cuffs?” he asks.

“Yes, sir,” I say. they said cadet training would be hard. I didn’t expect it to involve actually being commanded to arrest the living legend of the Space Program. I thought Major Card was a hero. Everybody here treats him like a fixture, if an annoying one.

“Sir, Major Card doesn’t want Kepler domination and me,” Major Tom says, “He wants flying and me. that’s it. He lives to fly. That’s why he’s so impossible when he’s grounded, like now.”

“You’re right, the quips about dictatorship and genocide could stop though, they are getting tiresome---off you go, Cadet Starr,” Thorne says, to me.

“I’ve sent you the address, he probably won’t answer the door,” Major Tom says, looking at me almost sympathetically.

“I’m sure I’ll find him, ma’am,” I say. I have a very good relationship with security doors. They generally do whatever I ask. A skill I’ll admit I did not expect to employ in the Space Forces. Terrance will be amused by this one.

“Hey,” I say, walking into the warehouse. The girl is predictably curled up in a fetal position on her makeshift bed. she raises a hand at my entrance and I am immediately stopped.

“It’s me, Shannon---Dr. Lutz----I’m just here to bring lunch, Jo is going to be late or not at all, so I’m hanging out until she gets back,” I say, waiting for the invisible force to subside. She was probably asleep, she gets jumpy when woken up. Admittedly it’s like dealing with a live bomb, but a sweet little underfed one.

“Sorry,” she says, sitting up slowly.

“It’s okay, sweetheart, did I frighten you?” I ask.

“I guess,” she says, looking around. “Is Jo going to kill him?”

“We just need to see where he is,” I say. the answer is yes. Her or me. But we’re thinking I will do this one. She’s had more care of the little girl. So I probably ought to. A little less personal emotion makes for better reaction times.

“I want her to. She thinks about killing him,” she says, staring off. I know she can see some of our thoughts, in a weird way. She doesn’t know everything but more like long-lasting impressions or underlying feelings, like she can sense if we are afraid. Or happy. Or plotting a murder.

“I know he hurt you,” I say, “That’s why we are going to.”

“He hurt other people worse,” she says. She still hasn’t told us when he took her, or where she came from before that. There hasn’t been anything in the press about her family looking for her, and she’s not said anything, so I’m assuming it wasn’t good. 

“Yeah,” I say.

“Who is she?” she asks.

“Who?” I ask.

“The girl you always think about. You think she’s about my age. But you don’t think she’ll look like me. but you sort of wish I could be her. who is she?” she asks, cocking her head. “It’s okay if you don’t want to tell me. I understand.”

“No, it’s okay----she’s my daughter,” I say, realizing I must’ve looked taken aback.

“What happened to her?” she asks.

“Nothing---nothing----that I know of----she’s a Project 10. I don’t have visitation rights,” I say.

“Why?” she asks.

“Because I was young, and stupid, and I needed the money, for schooling and my mum was sick. I thought I’d be okay, knowing she was cared for, all that. Turns out I wasn’t----how it works is, they pay you, to have the child and give it up to them, or you get the child for free, or you give the child to them to raise and pay for visitation rights. I didn’t have the money for visitation rights. She gets to contact me when she turns sixteen---if she wants to, I thought I’d be okay till then. I’m not, okay. I figured that out, the minute she was born. That I wouldn’t be okay,” I say, looking down at my hands. I don’t talk about this, my hands are shaking.

“They wouldn’t let you just keep her since you changed your mind?” she asks, frowning.

“No, they would---but I’d have gotten no money. And I had no money as it was I couldn’t, possibly, have provided for an infant, not when I barely had enough to live. I’d have had to drop out of school, even then I’d not have been able to work to pay to support myself and my mum and her. I’d thought about it, a lot. I couldn’t do it,” I say, shaking my head, “I had to give her up. So now I wait, praying, she’ll contact me when she turns sixteen.”

“She’ll probably want to know who you are. I would, if I didn’t know,” she says.

“You would?” I ask.

“Yeah.”

“I hope so. More than that, I hope she’s okay. I want her to be happy, having a nice life,” I say, looking back down at my hands.

“Who was her dad?” she asks.

“I don’t know---they don’t tell us. somebody who matched my IQ, that’s it. I don’t know if he has visitation rights or anything, could be military if so he’d have them for free if he wanted. I sort of hope so, I mean, it would be good if she had someone there. But I’m jealous, too, that she might not want me,” she says.

“He probably doesn’t. most men are awful,” she says, flopping back down.

“Don’t say that, I’m sure some are good---just not the ones you and I come across,” I say, tickling her feet. She giggles, “Come on, let’s get you up, have something to eat, eh?”

“Okay---why is Jo taking so long anyway? I thought she was just renting a flat to use to spy on him,” she says.

“She was but the flat with the good view of his wasn’t available so she’s finding another way to get in,” I say.

“What way?”

“Knowing her a stupid one that will barely work.”

“This is my flat.”

“This is my flat.”

“Lovely, it’s mine as well.”

“No it’s not.”

“Clearly it is,” the girl says, walking past me. Girl probably isn’t the appropriate term but whatever. She has blue hair, rings in her ears, and tattoos on her neck. I wouldn’t let her past me at all, except I’m not the most balanced on my replacement legs and I was afraid if it got to shoving then I would fall over.

“No, look---ma’am, I am completely certain this is my flat,” I say, as she walks around my duffel bags and looks through the window.

“And I’m complete certain it’s mine----what did you call me?” she asks, spinning around quickly. She’s wearing a black jacket that buttons down to her knees, black, tight pants, and big silver necklace.

“Ma’am?” I say, staring blankly at her.

“Absolutely nobody’s called me that before in my life I think, it’s divine say it again,” she laughs. She has a pretty laugh. If she weren’t trying to rob me which I’m pretty sure she is, I would think she was pretty.

“This is my flat---you must be mistaken look let’s go down to the front desk and ask,” I say.

“I’ve just been there and they sent me up here, do say it again, I’m thinking I like it,” she says, sitting down on the edge of my duffel bag.

“Yeah no, um---can you please leave? We both know this is my flat,” I sigh. I’m not up for this.

“Well we don’t I know it’s mine you think it’s yours now, what makes you think it’s yours?” she asks.

“Space Forces booked it for me?” I say.

“And Space Forces is absolutely one hundred percent accurate all the time?” she asks.

“No,” I growl. Like them being accurate is how I lost my legs? “No they aren’t---but I doubled checked this is my flat.”

“Why are you so cross now? We’re just two people trying to sort out a misunderstanding,” she says, charmingly. I realize she has no way of knowing I don’t have legs, she didn’t mean that she can’t tell I’ve got my fatigues on, she has no idea. She’s just some stupid scammer.

“Nothing,” I sigh, “Nothing, look, can you just---go?”

“I’ve no place to go. This is my flat,” she says.

“I will give you money. For a hotel, or something----just----please leave I’m not very good---at talking---to---”

“People?” she offers.

“Yes,” I say, almost smiling, “To people.”

“Well then, it’s a good thing I am, you see I’ll do all the talking look my papers are right here and isn’t that this room number?” she asks, taking papers from the pocket of her coat.

“Yes,” I admit, going over to look and nearly tripping over the strap to the duffel bag.

“There, so you see? No problem at all, it’s my flat,” she says.

“It’s mine as well, I had the key,” I say.

“Well, look, it’s a Sunday, the office is closed, let’s just work something out,” she says.

“Yes, you go, you get a hotel, I don’t have to see you ever again,” I say. but as I say it I realize how horrible it sounds and how much I don’t mean it.

“Well that’s silly when this is my flat.”

“It’s not!”

“It is though I’ve got papers. Now let’s start again, like civilized people, what’s your name?”

“What?”

“What is your name?” she asks, smiling.

“Captain Le------” I wince, I’m not anymore I’m used to introducing myself like that. “Quentin now. just Quentin.”

“Nice to meet you Quentin, I’m Jo. You’re not in service anymore?” she asks.

“No, they tend to have you quit after they cut your legs off,” I say, heavily.

“Oh my,” she says, her face darkening, “That’s horrible.”

“Yes, it really was. Now, Jo, what do you propose we do?” I ask, tiredly.

“Well, we can think for a bit, maybe look up if there’s another building with the same name? Or room numbers?” she pulls a tablet out of her pocket.

“Yes, you do that,” I say, “From a hotel.”

“Or we could do it right here together,” she says. Then I realize she hasn’t stopped flirting with me even though I don’t have legs. That’s sort of nice. Other than the fact that I don’t like being flirted with. Or robbed from or whatever it is she thinks she’s doing.

“Or not,” I say, “Come on, will you just go?”

“You are the man, I’m the lady in distress. I think you should go.”

“You’re perfectly fine!” I cry.

“I could become distressed, though, here, let’s have something to eat be brought up and we can talk about it properly.”

“I am not having lunch with you!”

“It looks like you are.”