Hold Fast Through the Fire

by K. B. Wagers

  The other navy ship, the Normandy, and its two Interceptor passengers had arrived at Trappist an hour earlier. Unlike Dread and Zuma, they’d gone to the NeoG base outside Amanave.

  “You doing okay, Chae?” Jenks asked when they came down from the bridge a few moments later.

  “Nervous,” they admitted.

  “Everything’s going to be fine. Come on.” She slung her bag over her shoulder and hopped down the stairs.

  Chae followed, taking a deep breath and closing their eyes as they stepped off the ship. Amanave hadn’t really counted as being back. They’d visited the big habitat a lot, but this was truly home.

  The dry air of this southern part of one of three massive continents brought tears to their eyes and when Chae opened them, they had to blink several times to get the figure standing by a transport to resolve.

  Their heart thumped painfully in their chest. “Dad?”

  “Go on,” Jenks said, nudging them forward.

  Chae sprinted across the landing pad and launched themself into their father’s arms. “Dad!”

  “Ho-ki.” Michael swung them in a tight circle, laughing in delight. “Look at you! You went and grew up on me,” he said, setting Chae back down and cupping their face.

  “I did.” Chae couldn’t stop the sob and threw themself into their dad’s arms again.

  “It is so good to see you. We’ve missed you and were so worried until Lieutenant Carmichael started emailing us with updates.”

  “She what?” Chae lifted their head and found Max in the approaching crowd. She extended her hand.

  “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you, Mr. Chae.”

  “Just Michael, but likewise, Lieutenant. Thank you.”

  The introductions went quickly. Chae knew they should probably let their father go, but they didn’t want to, and no one—least of all their dad—seemed to mind.

  “I’ve got the transport ready for you. The outpost is a little ways from the habitat in the wide spot of Yara’s Canyon. The rest of your friends arrived this morning,” Michael said.

  “Good,” Nika replied.

  The yard out in front of the outpost was teeming with people. Chae spotted their other father and leaped from the transport before it had come to a complete stop, hurtling across the packed dirt and into his arms.

  Jenks smiled and heard Tivo chuckle. “Softy.”

  “Hush.” She grabbed her bag and Chae’s and jumped out of the transport, one eye on the building in front of her.

  Jenks heard the noise Tivo tried to suppress when Luis came out of the main house. When she’d told him the news in the safety of the SEAL quarters, she’d known he couldn’t quite allow himself to believe it until he could see Luis with his own eyes.

  She would have done the same.

  Tivo crossed the red dirt yard, grabbing Luis by the face and kissing him hard before he pulled the senior chief into a tight hug.

  “Commander.” She nodded to Stephan. He had dark circles under his eyes and seemed to be favoring his right arm. “You look terrible.”

  “It’s good to see you, too, Chief.” He held out his left hand. “I’m sorry, Jenks, about everything.”

  “This is not on you.” The forgiveness came easy on the heels of everything else as she took his hand and squeezed.

  “It’s kind of you to say.” Stephan smiled and Jenks knew that look. The painful effort it took to keep up appearances and pretend everything was okay.

  “Hey, Stephan. You know I’d tell you if I was still mad. We fuck up, we get back up.” She spread her arms and was surprised when he stepped into the hug. She patted him, careful of his arm, and whispered, “They started this, we’re here to finish it.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  She snorted. “I’m always right.” That got a laugh out of him and Stephan straightened, giving her a little shove toward Luis and Tivo.

  “Go say your hellos and don’t vanish, we’ve got dinner in ten minutes,” he ordered as Nika joined them.

  “I’d say something, but it would traumatize you both.” Jenks dodged Nika’s laughing swing and ran across the yard.

  Nika watched his sister join the men by the door, the pair enfolding her into their hug without so much as a pause, and then looked back at Stephan. “I am both relieved you are alive and furious at you.”

  “If it helps, this was never part of the plan.”

  “What happened to your arm?”

  “One of Grant’s goons broke it. Should be completely healed in a few weeks.”

  Nika smiled. “Well, you’ve got all year. There are people around here to do the heavy lifting in the meantime.”

  “So I’ve heard. You want to tell me about this plan of yours? All Admiral Chen would say was that I wasn’t going to like it.”

  “You’re not, but it’s done. I just got a message from Melanie Karenina that she’ll be on Trappist-1d tomorrow.” Nika met Stephan’s suspicious look with a blank expression. “I may have implied that I have proof of her involvement and I’m willing to sell it to her so that Jenks and I can get out of the NeoG.”

  “You did what?”

  Stephan’s voice was loud enough to carry across the yard and draw the attention of the half-dozen people in the area. Nika waved Max over, figuring it was only fair she get yelled at also.

  “Did I mention it was Max’s idea?”

  “What was my idea?” she asked as she joined them.

  “Using me as bait.”

  “Ah, yeah.” Max grinned. “Did Admiral Chen mention I threatened to make Julia disappear?”

  “I left you all alone for three weeks.” Stephan closed his eyes and shook his head. “Get your asses in the house.”

  Nika felt Max slip her arm around his waist as they headed for the door of the main house of the outpost. For a few moments, chaos reigned as the SEAL team, Zuma, and the four members left of Dread were introduced to the TLF contingent led by Chae’s parents.

  “All right everyone, listen up,” Stephan said, raising his voice over the crowd. “Rooms are down that hall, there’s plenty of space. Go get your gear stowed, be back here in five minutes.”

  Max settled into a chair between D’Arcy and Nika at the long table located on one side of the massive kitchen. “How are you holding up?” She rested a hand on D’Arcy’s arm. There hadn’t been much of a chance to talk with him about Paul during the prelims, but Max knew the warrant officer’s betrayal had wounded him deeply.

  “Pissed, but better.” He smiled at her. “I’m glad you’re here. Happy these two assholes are alive.” He gestured at Stephan and Luis. “Still angry about what’s happened.”

  Stephan slid a pot of greens onto the table, negotiating for space amid the dishes already there. “We’re about to deal with it. Eat up everyone.”

  They passed food around and chatted as they ate. Max watched everyone. Scott was in a conversation with Stephan, and her brother smiled at her when he looked her way. Jenks was talking to Tamago across the table, but she was leaning against Luis and kept reaching her left hand out to touch Tivo’s forearm where it rested next to her.

  Chae was eating, eyes on their plate, but Max could tell they were listening to the conversations and she wondered if they could keep track of them all.

  After the meal had wound down and the food was cleared from the table, Stephan tapped a hand on the wooden surface and waited until everyone had fallen quiet. “All right, people. I’m running on the assumption that everyone got introduced before dinner—if not, do your intros when we’re done here. We’re going to be working together in close quarters even after this is over. I don’t expect you all to be best friends, but I do expect you to be moderately professional.”

  “You know that’s asking a lot of me, Commander.” Jenks snorted and Stephan sighed.

  One of the TLF soldiers, a slender trans man by the name of Ro, choked back a laugh at Jenks’s grin. “I like you already,” he said, pointing a finger across the table.

>   Jenks winked, but then Max watched the amused expression slide off her face like water off glass. “Get to it, Stephan. Melanie is on her way here and I want these people in custody before sunset tomorrow.”

  “That’s my cue, then.” Nika cleared his throat and stood, detailing out the plan that Max had thought of and they’d refined on their way to Trappist. Jenks had already protested the idea of Nika going alone, and judging from the set of her jaw she was about to do so again.

  “I’m coming with you.”

  “You are not,” he said.

  “You’re not going solo,” Jenks replied. “And no one else but me can go without raising suspicion.”

  “I could, Chief.” Chae raised their hand and Max suppressed a smile when the Neo didn’t flinch from Jenks’s sharp look.

  “No. I’m not putting you in danger when I could go myself. It makes sense for me to go with you, Nika, especially if we want Melanie to buy that we both want out.”

  “At the risk of getting yelled at for interrupting this sibling argument, does someone want to clear up for me how this is actually going to implicate Melanie in Tieg’s operation?” Luis asked.

  “It’s not,” Nika admitted, and the disappointment flickered across Stephan’s face. “It’s just a smokescreen to get her here. She’s got too much influence on Earth and we don’t want Tieg to be tipped off that we’ve got her until it’s too late. We’ve already got the proof we need that she’s involved.”

  “What proof is that?”

  “Cabbages.”

  Thirty-Six

  “What? I’m not following,” Stephan said.

  “Julia was smart,” Max said. “She made herself an insurance policy. Logs and details of the operation, and recordings of conversations she had with Melanie stretching back more than five years. I suspect it’s still not enough to convict all our targets, though it would damage Senator Tieg’s reputation.

  “However, Trappist Express’s supply chain program has a flaw. One Melanie Karenina was able to exploit, and it explains why you didn’t find anything when you investigated her. Using her master override, she could order the program to siphon off product and assign it to freighters of her choice rather than ones the algorithm assigned it to. They have freight controllers who do the same thing, but this program is meant to be used as an emergency protocol only for when ships are damaged or need to be commandeered for specific purposes. The adjustments don’t show up on the main logs.”

  “I didn’t realize they had a separate program.” Stephan cursed.

  “Precisely.” Max looked around the room. “Unfortunately for Melanie, the program keeps logs of the overrides and she never bothered to cover her tracks because she was the only one with access.”

  “Or so she thought,” Nika added.

  “Julia was able to copy the logs and Sapphi thinks they’re legitimate. Now, the logs themselves are hard to use as proof in our case, but when Sapphi looked at them she found that Melanie had exclusive control over where this product went, including how long it would sit in the warehouses. Because of that, she was able to avoid tripping the spoilage warnings that all the shipping companies are required to have when she was sending bad product out to the habitats and then forcing them to buy the unspoiled stuff she could get cheaply thanks to Tieg.”

  “And the freighter we tagged for spoiled cabbages was owned by Trappist Express. It wasn’t a contract run.” Jenks drummed a little tattoo on the table with a pleased grin.

  “You found the freighter in the logs,” Stephan said, and Max nodded.

  “We did and it’s not the only one we found. Moreover, we think Nika can get her to admit her involvement when he meets with her.”

  “When we meet with her,” Jenks corrected.

  Max didn’t try to argue and instead shot Nika a quick message.

  Max: I’m going to let you handle that, Commander.

  Nika: Are you at least going to back me if I order her to stay?

  She glanced at him, grateful that for the moment Luis was protesting Jenks’s insistence that she go with Nika.

  Max: You know you’d be setting her up to disobey a direct order. Is it worth it to you to see her get busted back down again?

  Nika: It’s worth it to keep her alive.

  Max: If she goes with you it might keep both of you alive.

  Nika: Do you think if Grant is there, which he likely will be, she won’t go after him? This was personal for all of us, but Hoboins was the closest thing to a father she ever knew.

  Max: And you are the only family she has left. Asking her to stay here while you put yourself in danger is asking for trouble.

  Nika: Whose side are you on here?

  Max: I’m saying Jenks is an unstoppable force, and we both know it. Given my choice, I’d keep you both out of harm’s way, but I can’t do that. So I’ll do the next best thing and have you watch each other’s backs.

  “I’d like to see you make me.” Jenks’s voice had escalated to the point where it dragged Max’s attention back to the room rather than her conversation with Nika.

  “I could just sit on you until you see reason,” Luis snapped. “This isn’t the Games, Jenks. You lose a fight here, it’s for good.”

  “What am I, a newbie spacer? No offense, Chae.”

  “None taken, Chief.”

  “That’s enough,” Nika said, holding up his hand. “Jenks’ll come with me.”

  “Nika, you can’t—wait, did you say I could go?” Jenks whipped her gaze to Max, who kept her face expressionless.

  “You’ll come with me,” Nika repeated. “You’ll do as I say, understood?”

  “Yeah.” She leaned back in her chair and shot a smug smile at Luis, who in turn glared at Nika.

  Chae cupped the warm mug of tea between their hands and walked out of the house. The sun was just setting over the western side of the canyon edge and the last streaks of gold were illuminating the burnished walls. Max stood by the edge, one arm wrapped around her waist, the other cradling her own mug.

  “I don’t mind the company,” she murmured over her shoulder. “Did you get caught up with your fathers?”

  “I did. Thanks, LT.” After the meeting had wrapped up, people had splintered off, some lingering in the kitchen while others—like the Chief—had immediately vanished. Chae’s fathers had stayed for several hours before heading back to their own house in West Ridge.

  “Is it good to be home?”

  Chae was silent for a moment, sipping at their tea. “Yeah,” they said finally. “This is weird, but good. You know?”

  “I don’t,” Max admitted. “I guess Earth is sort of my home, but it’s not. Not really. I didn’t grow up anywhere but on ships, and that whole ‘home is where the heart is’ thing only works if your family has a heart.”

  “So that means you’ve come home, too?” Chae held their mug up in salute and Max laughed.

  “I suppose you’re right.” She tapped her mug to theirs. “This is really good.”

  “One of the great things One-d puts out,” Chae replied with a nod. “The tea, or whatever it is they call tea, on Jupiter Station was so horrible I went looking to see if I could buy some Trappist tea. Do you have any idea how much they sell that for? I was so shocked.”

  “It’s apparently a big deal on Earth,” Max said with another laugh.

  “I almost asked you to call my dads just to have them send me some. We make ours off the crop remnants, and it’s still better than anything off-world. Thanks, by the way, for keeping them updated, LT. I really appreciate it.”

  Max bumped her hip into them with a smile. “It was the least I could do.”

  “You do a lot, LT. You know we’re all thankful for it?” The question seemed to surprise Max, but any reply she could have made was lost as Jenks slipped out of the house and joined them.

  The chief didn’t say anything, just stole Max’s mug from her hands and took a sip before handing it back. The three of them stood in silence, watching as
the sun disappeared under the ridge.

  “Wait for it,” Chae murmured.

  It was almost like magic the way the stars appeared, scattered over the quickly darkening sky, a handful of glittering glass tossed against blackened silk. It was startling to realize how much they’d missed it while on Earth and then on Jupiter Station. Nothing could compare with the night sky on Trappist-1d.

  “Look at that,” Max whispered.

  “In the summertime Bean and I used to sneak out of the house and climb up the canyon. We’d watch the stars and listen to the coyotes.”

  “I forgot they brought coyotes here as part of the Resurrection Project.” Jenks looked up at the sky and whistled in appreciation. “I guess they survived, then?”

  “Thrived.” Chae nodded, dropping to the dirt and setting their mug down so they could stare up at the sky. “You have to watch out for them at certain times, and occasionally we have a pack go heavy feral and start edging in on the habitats. Otherwise they mind their business and we mind ours.”

  “I’ve never seen a coyote,” Jenks mused. “Lots of feral dogs in Krasnodar. Best case, they’d only steal your lunch. Worst case, they made you lunch.” She crouched down next to Chae, Max following.

  “I grew up worrying about explosive decompression more than feral dogs,” she said, and Jenks snorted.

  “Honestly, the coyotes were the least of our worries,” Chae replied. “Buildings collapsing because they were made with substandard materials. Wondering if we were going to have enough food to get through the winters. People getting sick with diseases that Earth never considered an issue because they’re specific to Trappist.” They reached for their tea, took another drink, and then looked at Max. “This has been going on a lot longer than Tieg, you realize that, right? He just decided to profit off what the CHN has been doing to the habitats for years.”

  “I am starting to figure that out.” Max elbowed Jenks when the chief snorted again. “I may be super-clueless rich, as this one likes to say, but I am learning.”