The Hands We're Given

by O E Tearmann

  Liza shrugged, her face wearing that blank mask she hid behind when she was scared. That couldn't be good.

  "He's got a reputation for going off on rants, sir. And he and Taylor used to have kind of an… issue going. They didn't get along. Watch out?"

  Aidan sighed. "Yeah, sure. Thanks, Liza."

  He sank into his chair and typed Shultz's tab ID into the call app. The wait to connect made his stomach feel like lead.

  The man's paunchy face hadn't improved since he saw it last. If anything, it was redder and uglier.

  "Headly, I want your logistics officer relieved of duty right this fucking minute. Put him on a charge of abuse of duty."

  Aidan blinked at the red face on the tab as his brain tried to do a system reboot. Abuse of duty? What the hell kind of thing warranted an abuse of duty charge handed down from the sector quartermaster?

  "What for, sir?"

  Shultz's face turned purple. "What for? What for? What the fuck are you doing on that base anyway? Do you think this is a little girl's camping trip or a frat house or something? Don't play stupid with me, Headly, and if you aren't playing, you're a fucking idiot!"

  "It's been a long couple of weeks here, sir," Aidan replied as calmly as he could manage. Which was surprisingly even-keeled given the fact that he was facing a sector-level officer who was furious for a reason he couldn't wrap his brain around. "My tab's stuffed with error code from our slick tarps and I haven't had a chance to sort through it to find other reports. So please, sir, just tell me what Kevin's done and I'll fix it up."

  "What he's done is gross abuse of duty, not to mention waste of funds. If he were under me, I'd throw him to the Fringe! Look at these orders!"

  A file flashed up on Aidan's screen. "Look at this fucking bull shit! Reclining couch? I've got a reclining couch sitting in my requisitions center! Chocolate, vodka, a games console! People have to make these requisitions! People risk their lives every day to get us what we need, and your. Man. Ordered. This! I want him relieved of duty! Permanently! Waste of money, waste of time,risking lives, Headly! Do you hear me?"

  Liza winced, leaning away from the screaming coming out of the tab.

  Aidan stared at the file Shultz had sent over, stunned by the list.

  Kevin had ordered this? When? Why the hell had Kevin ordered such frivolous things? How much had it cost to get them, in money and in blood? How long had this been going on without him noticing?

  Had he really messed up this badly? Had he been so head over heels about the guy that he hadn't seen things he should have?

  He swallowed hard and forced himself to minimize the file, facing the angry quartermaster again. "Yes, sir. I'll talk with him. Figure out what's going on and ensure it doesn't happen again."

  "You fucking better! If you don't, I'll see to it that Magnumdoes!"

  The call clicked off. Aidan stared at the blank tab for several long minutes, trying to remind himself to breathe. Kevin had put in orders for things that could have gotten people killed. Carrying a reclining couch through the Dust would have attracted way too much attention, and Kevin had to know that. What the hell was going on?

  Why would someone as careful as Kevin do something so stupid?

  But he wasn't always careful, was he? When he got angry, he got reckless. And when he got scared. And hadn't he just ordered something special for Aidan from God knew where?

  "You'd be surprised what I can get my hands on."

  The memory of the words Kevin had said knotted his gut.

  "Sir? Aidan?"

  Aidan took a breath, yanked himself out of his thoughts and looked up to his personnel officer.

  "Liza. Could you get Kevin, please?"

  Liza nodded slowly. "Sure, sure, Commander. Should I- I won't say anything."

  She stood, her body stiff as she walked to the door. One hand on the frame, she looked over her shoulder. "Sir? I've known Kevin nine years. There's got to be a mistake. He doesn't do this."

  Aidan nodded tightly, but wasn't sure what to say to that. People change? Obviously, he did? At this point, he was desperately trying to focus on the damage control he was going to need to do for his base, not the fact that he had been sleeping with a man who might have wasted precious resources and put people in so much danger.

  Ten minutes later, Kevin poked his head in, a baffled half-frown on his lips. "What've you done to Liza? She looked like someone walked over… her… grave… What's wrong?" His voice was tight on the last words.

  "Did you approve this requisitions list?" Aidan asked, his voice quiet. He couldn't quite meet Kevin's gaze as he pulled up the file Shultz had sent and slid the tab across the desk.

  Kevin blinked. Pushing his glasses up his nose, he read, his eyes growing wider with every line. "What the hell?" His head shot up, his eyes wide and panicked. "Aidan, cancel all my credentials. Do it now."

  The churning heat that had been building in Aidan's chest released. If Kevin had faked that look of shock on his face, Aidan would eat his desk. He grabbed his tab back and typed furiously. When he had suspended all of Kevin's active credentials and put his IDs on leave, he looked back up.

  "You want to tell me what the fuck is going on here?"

  Kevin shook his head, bewildered. "I got hacked, but this doesn't make sense. If any of the Corps gained access we should have been attacked, not sent the proverbial box of chocolates. It doesn't… make…" He blinked twice. Then, slowly, he pulled off his glasses and covered his face with one hand.

  "Oh Jesus, blessed Mary and Joseph. That importunate, intrusive, egoistic, self serving little mercenary plebeian jackdaw! I'm going to wring her little- Aack!"

  He kicked the leg of the desk, making the rickety structure rattle.

  "Kev?" Aidan asked, watching him and waiting for the whole thing to make any sense.

  Kevin raised his head. His face was frighteningly blank. "Tweak."

  Aidan's brain froze. Tweak. Of course. This was the kind of thing Tweak would do. He'd been caught so far off-guard by the sudden message from Shultz that he hadn't had the time to put the pieces together.

  "Shit," Aidan whispered. "Oh, shit."

  Kevin held his gaze, eyes opaque. "You really thought I did this. Didn't you?"

  Aidan looked down quickly, fidgeting with his tab. If it had been anyone else on base, he would have been able to look the man in the eye and tell him exactly why he had thought he had done it.

  But this was Kevin. The man who knew his secret, who had taken him to bed regardless, who whispered such sweet things to him.

  How could he tell Kevin he had spent ten minutes sitting in his office and believing that he had approved that ridiculous requisitions list?

  He tried to lay out the points.

  "Kevin, I… Yes. I thought you did it. I mean, like you said, the Corps wouldn't be ordering us these things, and you're the only one with high-level requisitions requests like this, except me."

  Kevin didn't say a word. A moment later, his chair rolled back. "Fine." His steps sounded loud in the small room. "If you want to do your job and deal with your hacker, sir, I'd like help. I'm going to go find Tweak and you can shake some sense into her." His voice was flat.

  Aidan nodded on auto-pilot.

  Kevin hadn't betrayed the base. Tweak had. Was that good? Bad?

  He hadn't had the time to process any of that.

  No, he'd had time. He hadn't taken the time. He'd panicked instead. He'd let an officer's yelling and his own fear of showing favor panic him into blind agreement.

  And now he'd fucked up with Kevin, too.

  He stood and raked his fingers through his hair. "Yeah. I think that would be a good idea."

  Frigid silence and a blank grey stare were the only answers he got. Then Kevin turned away and walked out of the room.

  Tweak was in the canteen, tapping at her pad and gulping down the crap t
hey called coffee with a grimace, when Kevin shoved his tab with its glowing file under her nose. Aidan had been planning on taking her to his office, but Kevin had beaten him down the hall. The expression on his face was a little bit terrifying. It was that same distant, utterly dismissive look he'd worn the first time Tweak had insulted him.

  Aidan considered stepping in, but if Tweak had really done this, maybe Kevin had the right to the first crack at her. Standing behind the table, he watched, ready to break it up if things got hairy.

  Silence spread from Kevin like ink spilled into water as his basemates nudged one another and nodded in the direction of the trouble.

  "Did you do this?" Kevin demanded, his syllables clinking like ice cubes. "Did you actually take the credentials that I'm entrusted with and use them to order toys and junk food?"

  Tweak looked up at him blankly, shrugged her shoulders. "Yeah. You never get it. You're cheap. This place's a dump. Needs stuff. Easy."

  Kevin's face went paper white. Aidan shifted his weight, wary. Could somebody look that angry and keep from violence?

  "You are an egocentric little gutter rat," Kevin managed as he watched, voice shaking with rage. "And you have no concept of the damage you've done."

  Tweak blinked once, slowly. "Fuck. Off. CES."

  Aidan stepped in before somebody got killed. He wasn't sure who'd come out in a fight between these two, but he didn't want to find out.

  Kevin gave him a look that made him feel as if his gut had frozen solid when he gently put a hand against his chest and pushed him back. God, the man was so angry at him. And maybe he should be.

  But he had to deal with one shit-show at a time.

  "Tweak," Aidan muttered. "You can't just hack into our credentials and use them any way you want. People could have died because they were carrying a couch we don't need."

  Tweak blinked. Her laugh was the staccato yelp of a dog, but her words had a hint of worry in them. "It's just stuff. Didn't hurt n-nobody. Chill."

  "I can't chill on this, Tweak," Aidan replied quietly. It was easy to sound calm when his insides felt numb. "Folks get killed bringing us food off the Grid. Stuff you can carry in your pockets is enough to get them targeted. Carrying furniture? It's a downright miracle no one got killed on those runs."

  Tweak stared into his eyes. Slowly, her blank expression faded, leaving her face looking much younger. "Seriously? Die? Thought you p-p-people n-never got caught."

  "Then you're an ignoramus," Kevin growled.

  Aidan held up a hand to silence his requisitions officer. Now wasn't the time. Tweak had made a mistake and his base was going to pay for it through the nose, but she was still just a kid, a scared one. She needed people to teach her this lesson. If they yelled, he knew she'd shut down. "Billie? Can you move over?"

  The taller girl scooted down, and Aidan took a seat between them, holding Tweak's eyes. "You ever see reports on the Grid of terrorists brought to justice or killed before they could go through with an attack? More often than not, those are Dusters that got caught. We lose more people daily than any of us like to admit. And stunts like yours add to the body count. Understand?"

  Tweak looked away, staring at her bandaged hands. She stood in a blink. "I'll pack."

  "No. You won't," Aidan stated, allowing the coldness into his voice. "Sit down."

  Tweak sat without looking up, her head sinking onto her chest. The room was so quiet that Aidan could hear the girl's breathing, short sharp pants. He studied her profile.

  She was the best hacker he'd ever heard of. They needed her talents. Of course, that meant somehow explaining to Sector why he wasn't decommissioning the person responsible for such an epic fuck up.

  Well, that was something a commander would have to do.

  Finally, he drew in a breath. "You're part of this base, Tweak. And that means I'm not letting you off the hook that easy. You don't just run away. You fucked up. Royally. Now you're going to help me fix it. How much did your requisition list cost?"

  Tweak shrugged. "Didn't check. Do the code, stuff's free. Never check."

  "Then find out," Aidan replied, keeping his voice to a monotone. He slid his tab across the table to her. "I want to know where you ordered everything, how much it cost, and how you requested it be delivered. And I want your report in twenty minutes. Understood?"

  Tweak raised her eyes to give him a scowl, but the expression looked to be made more out of habit than any real emotion.

  "Twenty? Think I'm that slow? Ten tops. On your tab."

  He nodded. "I guess you better get to work."

  Aidan turned away without another word. Keeping his eyes straight ahead, he walked out of the room. He didn't dare look at Kevin.

  When he reached his office, he quietly closed the door, crossed to his chair, and dropped into it with his head in his hands, trying to force his brain into motion. It had been awhile since he had had to punish someone beyond a reprimand. He'd have to figure out something serious enough to really get through to the kid without turning her off as an asset. He still had to report back to Shultz. And, on top of it all, he'd started a fight with his lover over this bullshit.

  It was going to be long, long day.

  Event File 34

  File Tag: Adjustments

  Timestamp:0900-9-18-2155

  Kevin didn't join Aidan for lunch that day, and he didn't knock on Aidan's door that night. He wasn't there on the couch Tuesday night. It was late the next Monday morning before Kevin knocked on the frame of his open office door.

  "I'll need my credentials reinstated when you've got the time. I've got rather a lot of work to do." His tone was conversational, but he didn't look up from the tab in his hand, and the set of his shoulders was stiff.

  "As soon as I can," Aidan promised with an irritated sigh. He glanced up from his own tab briefly, considered saying something else, asking if he could make up for his mistake, but thought better of bringing that up now.

  Instead he took a breath and admitted, "I turned in a full incident report, but I'm still trying to convince Shultz not to kill Tweak. Might take a while."

  "I might save him the trouble," Kevin muttered. For a moment, he glanced up, meeting Aidan's eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, but closed it again, smiled weakly and shrugged.

  "I can work around some of it." Then he was gone, his footsteps fading down the hall.

  Aidan opened his mouth to call him back, to try and mend things, but no sound came out. He groaned and fell back in his chair, raking his fingers through his hair in irritation. This was driving him insane. He hadn't realized not having Kevin as a confidante, as a bedmate, as… as Kevin would be so irritating. And dealing with Shultz wasn't helping either. He'd had another three vid calls with the bastard, all of them heinous.

  Speaking of which, he still owed one more.

  Swallowing another groan, he tapped Shultz's ID pin into his call app. He still had to arrange a pick-up for all the things Tweak had ordered, since sending them back onto the Grid was even more dangerous. Making an in-person try at convincing the bastard wouldn't hurt either.

  "So when are you getting here to fix your mess?" Shultz asked acidly, not even bothering with a greeting this time. "I want this shit out of my hub, Headly. Yesterday. And Magnum wants you in here for an in-person briefing before he approves McIllian's reinstatement. An explanation, Headly, for this entire fuck up. You'll get the summons any time now."

  Aidan bit his cheek to keep from groaning aloud. Could this mess get any worse? Doing his best to remain polite, he replied, "I've been waiting for your transportation schedule to get my team together, sir. If you approve it, I can get a truck out this afternoon. And if Commander Magnum needs me, I can be on it, sir."

  "You damn well better be," Shultz snapped. The tab clicked off. A heartbeat later a transportation schedule shot up on the screen, a note blinking in red besid
e the entries.

  Commander and Logistics Officer Requested For Debrief

  Aidan winced as he accepted the order. Last week had been a dumpster fire, and it was looking like this entire week was going to suck, too. Shoving his chair away from his desk, he stalked out of his office to gather people for the trek.

  Tweak yelped when Aidan tapped her shoulder, yanking the cord of her headphones right out she jumped so fast. "Fucker! Don't touch me! Never ever ever touch!" she gasped, her headphone cord dangling pathetically.

  "Then maybe you should make sure you can still hear people through those headphones," Aidan replied dryly, already out of sympathy for the day. "Come on. You're coming with us to the sector base to pick up all your… purchases."

  Tweak rolled her eyes, turning in her coding chair. "Already said sorry, okay? J-Jesus."

  "On your feet, Tweak. Now," Aidan snapped. Over the last few days, the girl had seriously begun to strain his patience. He had barely had time for anything beyond cleaning up her mess and trying to sort Kevin's credentials. He was trying his best, but it was wearing. He wasn't entirely certain what he might do if she kept pushing his buttons and mouthing off right now.

  Tweak's black eyes went flat. "Fuck. You."

  She snapped her head back to her console.

  "Came. Here. To. Work. Not your dog. Not your bitch. I work, you pay me, that's it. The hell I'm going to-"

  "Perhaps you'd like to apologize to the man in the infirmary because of you."

  Commander and coder glanced up at the lean figure in the doorway.

  "The hell?" Tweak demanded, black hair swinging.

  "There's a man with a bullet in his leg and one in his back, because you wanted a crate of vodka," Kevin stated quietly, his thin face empty of emotion. "You hear a lot in my line of work. If it were me, I'd feel the need to pay my respects. But, you'll do as you see fit, I'm sure."

  Tweak's knuckles went white on the faux leather of the seat. "Got shot?"

  "For your treats," Kevin agreed coolly. "Yes."