by Zen DiPietro
“Stick with me, little grasshopper,” he said. “I’ll teach you the ways of the galaxy.”
“Ugh. That’s the worse holo-vid paraphrased quote I’ve ever heard. I’m leaving now. Don’t try to stop me. I’ll see you later at the meeting with the captain.”
“Don’t pretend you didn’t like it,” he said as she stepped toward the door. “We both know you’re secretly in awe of my super cool vid-quoting skills.”
She shot him a raised eyebrow of extreme dubiousness before ducking out of his quarters.
“We’ve been pleased with how quickly the crew has gotten up to speed,” Minho concluded. “We think they’re ready to take over all operations, with no assistance or oversight. With your approval, of course, sir.”
“That’s good to hear,” Captain Lydecker said. “Of course, I’ll trust your judgment, and theirs, and approve your suggestion.”
“Of course, we’ll be available for consult until we leave, and will be evaluating for official purposes, but at this point it’s just protocol.” Minho smiled easily. “Asimov Station is in good hands.”
Lydecker nodded. “I agree. We have a good crew here.”
Minho used that opportunity to segue into the other matter. “Is there anyone who isn’t performing up to your expectations, sir? There’s still time to make changes.”
Lydecker frowned thoughtfully. “No startup is perfect, and there have been a few bobbles here and there. I think it will all shake out just fine. I see no need to replace anyone.”
Fallon looked to Minho. Would he press further? She would have, given her feeling of responsibility for Priestley, but that might be a mistake.
She’d leave it to Minho to decide.
“What about Priestley Simkopf?” Minho asked. “I’ve heard some things.”
Fallon hid a smile. He’d brought it up, and by being vague about what he’d heard, he could imply that others might have complained about the young Zerellian.
“Who?” the captain asked.
“A low-level maintenance and custodial worker,” Minho answered. “I believe you’ve crossed paths with him a couple times, and might not have found him entirely satisfactory.”
Lydecker frowned again, more deeply this time. “I think I might know who you mean. Young Zerellian man, looks a little…well, rough?”
Since Priestley wore the same work outfit as any of the other maintenance people, there seemed no reason to think of him as rough-looking. Was that an indication that the captain had a bias against him because of his background?
But the captain had denied any particular knowledge of Priestley. If that were true, he wouldn’t know the young man’s background.
Fallon kept her mouth shut, waiting to see how Minho played the conversation.
“A young Zerellian, yes,” Minho conceded. “I’ve never noticed that he looks rough, but he does crawl around in the bowels of the station, so it’s entirely possible you saw him at an inopportune moment.” Minho smiled. “Some types of work are just dirtier than others, aren’t they?”
Fallon had an odd sense that Minho was not only making a point of the nature of Priestley’s work, but also making a point of the difference between contract workers and officers, and the expectations thereof.
After a pause, the captain said, “That’s true. Like I said, I don’t think anyone needs to be replaced at this point. I think everyone will settle into life on Asimov just fine.”
Minho nodded. “Glad to hear it, sir. If that should change while I’m still here, I’d be happy to facilitate any replacement assignments. I want to be sure I leave here knowing I’ve done everything I can to ensure an ideal beginning.”
“I appreciate your eye for detail,” Lydecker said. “In your shoes, a lot of officers would be looking to slack off and enjoy a few days of rest before shipping out. Your dedication is noted.”
There was a note of dismissal in the captain’s voice.
“We’re at your disposal, until the very end, Captain,” Minho said.
Minho and Fallon bowed, then left the meeting room.
The mission was winding down. Minho joined Fallon to see Jacen off. They had no more official duties, other than monitoring the security team in a hands-off kind of way. They used their remaining time to scrutinize every move Captain Lydecker made.
Sometimes they used her quarters, but mostly they used his, since they were larger. She was pretty sure they would wear indentations into the couch before they left, due to how much time they spent hovering over the voicecom display.
“If he’s up to anything, he’s got some very underground way of communicating about it,” Minho said. “And that seems unlikely, given how far out of the way we are from most PAC traffic. It looks like he’s clean, at least now. Maybe in the past he wasn’t, but that’s for someone else to uncover.”
“So what now?” Fallon asked. “Will I be returned to my team?”
He took a long moment to answer. “They have their own assignments. You’ll go to Jamestown and continue your covert security training there until the rest of your team arrives.”
“How long will that be?”
“I don’t have that information,” he said. “Their assignments are above my clearance level.”
“Really?” She’d assumed that he knew everything about what was going on with her team.
“Why does that surprise you?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I kind of thought you were our keeper, in a manner of speaking.”
“I’m not,” he said bluntly. “I’m your keeper, for exactly three more days. After that, you’ll report directly to Admiral Krazinski. Whatever the other three are doing is not for me to know, and it won’t be for you to know, either. Just as you won’t be permitted to discuss this mission with them, they won’t be able to discuss their assignments with you.”
“But we’re a team,” she said. “Shouldn’t we know what experiences the others have had?”
“Not this time,” he said flatly.
“Is that how it was for your team?” she asked. “Did you have secrets from one another?”
He turned to her. “You’ll always have secrets. Even from your team. That’s what you signed up for, and that’s how it will always be. Whatever happens here on Asimov, you won’t speak of it. Whatever happens wherever they are, they won’t speak of it. If you get split up again in the future, same thing. Your first duty is always to PAC command. Your second duty is to your team.”
“That’s not what you said before. You said that if I ever got caught in a situation where I had to choose between following orders and saving my team, I should save my team.”
He let out a soft breath and his gaze dropped. She sensed he was reliving his past.
“That’s life and death,” he said. “And maybe I shouldn’t have told you that.”
“But if you could go back, you’d defy your orders in order to keep them alive, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?” She kept her attention fixed on him, willing him to look up at her.
Finally, he did. “Because some things will break you, deep inside. Not in a way that anyone can see. In a way that, in time, maybe you can even ignore. Like losing an arm or a leg. As long as you focus on the limb you still have, you can avoid thinking about what’s missing for a little while. But whenever things are too quiet, or too still, you’ll remember how broken you really are.”
He held her gaze and, for the first time, left his expression unguarded so that she could see the depth of his suffering.
She reached out and touched his hand. “You’re not broken. You’re still here. Strong. Smart. Funny. People love you as soon as they meet you. I can name three officers right now who are going to cry when you leave here.”
“That’s just my cover,” he said. “It’s not me.”
“Then what’s the real you? Is it how you are when you’re with me?”
His gaze dropped as he considered, then his eyes met hers again. “I�
�m more of the real me than I’ve been since I lost my team. So thank you for that. I’m going to miss being assigned with you.”
A sense of alarm rose in her. “Then stay. Let’s campaign to have you join my team, just like I said earlier.”
He shook his head. “You don’t want that.”
“I do.”
“You’re the leader of your team, but I’m senior to you. What’s that going to do to your authority?”
“We’ll figure it out,” she said. “I don’t care about that. My ego won’t be hurt by sharing authority.”
“It’s too messy,” he said. “Teams don’t work that way.”
“This one can,” she insisted. “Or is it that you don’t want to join my team? You’ve already had your team, and don’t want to be part of mine?”
He smiled faintly. “That’s not it. I like your team. I like you. If there were no other concerns, I’d be happy to be part of Avian Unit.”
“Then let’s make that happen,” she said.
He simply looked at her, and she became aware that she was still touching him. She pulled her hands back, but he caught her fingers between his hands. “Wouldn’t that be complicated?”
“No,” she said automatically, but she knew she was lying. She had chemistry with him, and as of that moment, she was sure he had feelings for her. She had feelings for him, too, but they were different than what she felt for Raptor. And it wasn’t in her nature to have those kinds of feelings for more than one person.
She pulled her hands free. “Maybe,” she amended. “But what isn’t complicated about being in Blackout? My team would be better with you, and as the leader, it’s my job to advocate for what’s best for my team. Unless you don’t want to be part of Avian Unit, you should expect me to fight to have you stay with us.”
Now empty, his hands curled loosely on the couch. He smiled. “All right. If you’re sure, then who am I to argue with the leader of a Blackout unit?”
His response surprised her. She’d expected more argument. She eyed him cautiously. “Really?”
He smiled. A real smile. “Yeah. Life’s messy. Complicated. We’ll make it work as well as it can.”
She smiled back. Maybe he was right, that it would be messy and complicated, but that was what she expected from life. He needed a team and something to fill the void in him, and she knew her team would be better with him.
She felt a violent surge of something good. She was more than ready to be back with her team. And if Minho was with them, too, it would be worth whatever adjustments they had to make.
“Good. Now let’s watch Lydecker like a hawk right up until the moment we leave this station,” she said, turning back to the voicecom. “Today’s the third day in his cycle. Tomorrow, we can watch his every move and see if we can figure out what he does every fourth day.”
9
“I wish we could have put surveillance in Lydecker’s quarters,” Fallon frowned at the silent image of the captain as he receded down a corridor.
Tracking him in this manner was inefficient.
“Command was clear,” Mino said. “Nothing out of the ordinary that he might discover. And if he were up to something bad, he’d be careful to watch such things, so it would only serve to let him know that someone was on to him. And if he’s innocent, what do you think his reaction to such surveillance would be?”
“Not good.”
“Yeah. Someone would have to take the fall for that. I sure don’t want it to be me.”
“Or me either, right?” she prompted.
“Eh. You’re on your own, kid.” He waited a couple of beats to let the humor hang in the air, then bumped her playfully with his shoulder. “Anyway, sometimes we’re limited to relative basics like this. It’s good practice for you. All the spy equipment is fun, and sure does help, but you can’t rely on it to do your work for you.”
“Do you think he’s innocent?” she asked. “What are the odds that we’ll find something now, after not having found anything all this time?”
“Amount of time is irrelevant. Just because someone isn’t doing shady shit today, it doesn’t mean they won’t be doing it tomorrow. Or next week.”
“So basically, you consider everyone guilty until being caught at being guilty.”
He smiled. “I like that. Yeah, that pretty much covers it. Everyone’s guilty of something. It’s just that most people are only guilty of unimportant things.”
“If his pattern holds true,” she said, watching the display in front of her, “he’ll skip the mess hall.”
A moment later, he boarded a lift and they waited to see what he selected for his destination.
“Deck Five,” Fallon said in surprise. “Definitely not the mess hall, then, but why would he go to five?”
Minho frowned and shook his head.
She’d have to run back all prior security footage of each fourth day, checking Deck Five. Did he visit that same area each time or was this something new?
They watched him approach the seal-off point for the deck, then enter the heart of the containment system.
A tingle ran down Fallon’s spine, like a drop of adrenaline charging up her backbone. This wasn’t typical behavior. The captain had no reason to visit the containment system. Sure, it was his prerogative to visit any section on the station he chose to, and it wasn’t impossible that he chose an unlikely place to visit every fourth morning, just to keep the crew on their toes.
But she didn’t think so.
Judging from the tension she felt radiating from Minho, she didn’t think he thought so, either.
Fallon checked the login details to see the last time someone had entered that area, and she realized that the captain wasn’t alone. Someone else had entered just twenty minutes prior.
The zing of energy down her spine grew stronger.
“Priestley’s in there,” she murmured, her eyes glued to the view inside the containment unit.
“He must be outside of camera view,” Minho said. “I can’t find him in there.”
They watched the captain advance into the area, move around a huge manifold, and pause.
“He must be there, taking physical readings,” she said. “I’ll see if that matches with the expected schedule.
She cross-referenced the master schedule of expected maintenance checks. “Yeah. That’s due to be done today. Priestley’s supposed to be there.”
“But the captain isn’t.” Minho’s eyes didn’t leave the screen, though there was nothing to see. The captain’s left shoulder and part of his back were visible, and he appeared to be looking downward.
Probably talking to Priestley.
“I wish we had audio,” she muttered. Of course, that was against PAC’s agreement among its member planets. Specific situations could warrant general audio recording, or could prompt short-term recording, but without probable cause, the privacy of PAC citizens was not to be impugned by excessive surveillance.
“What’s so bad about having sensitive areas tapped for sound, anyway?” she asked. “It could provide important information in the event of a disaster.”
“Audio recording happens automatically when an alert goes up. It’s a slippery slope, to do constant surveillance, even in a sensitive area. That’s why the matter is clearly addressed in the charter.”
“Which Blackout breaks on a regular basis,” she said.
“There are two levels of rules.” Minho glanced at her briefly. “The ones that everyone understands as a given. Those give people a sense of expectation and safety, and they’re for the betterment of the PAC as a whole. But then there’s the other set of rules that people don’t want to know about. The rules that govern the things that prove that their lives aren’t as safe and protected as they think they are. Both have to exist. We need the populace to feel secure, and we need to be able to do the things that keep them that way. It may seem hypocritical to have two sets of rules that oppose each other, but in reality they work together for the same purpose.�
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“I know that,” she said. “It’s just strange to come to a crossroads between those two different sets of rules.”
She saw movement on the screen. “Hang on. I think he’s leaving.”
Captain Lydecker turned smartly on his heel and left the same way he’d come.
“He doesn’t look upset,” Fallon ventured.
“No,” Minho agreed. “He looks just as he did when he entered.”
“So what did he and Priestley talk about?” she wondered. “It seems clear that Lydecker went there seeking Priestley out. He went directly in, spoke to him, and left without doing anything else.”
Minho continued to watch the screen. Priestley came into view, carrying a diagnostic scanner.
“Two possibilities,” Minho said. “Either Lydecker and Priestley have always been in league with each other, or the captain wants to coerce him into something.”
She’d thought the same thing. “Lydecker’s been feigning disapproval for Priestley to throw people off.”
“Maybe,” Minho said. “Or he wanted to increase pressure on Priestley. To flex his authority and push Priestley toward desperation.”
“Which wouldn’t be too hard,” Fallon realized. “Since Priestley doesn’t have any fallback. No place to go back to. No people to rely on. He’s the perfect mark.”
“Exactly. But now the question is, what is he the mark for? And we’ve got another problem.”
They looked at each other in understanding.
She said what they were both thinking. “We only have two days to figure out what the captain’s doing and gather the proof because if we were to stay here longer, he’d be instantly suspicious.”
They had their work cut out for them.
At lunchtime, Fallon sent a message to Priestley, casually suggesting he drop by her quarters after his shift. She didn’t want to arouse the captain’s suspicion by doing anything out of the ordinary.
She didn’t invite Minho, both to keep the meeting lowkey and not noteworthy to any observers, and to keep Priestley at ease. She sensed that he’d be more comfortable with just her.