Atton smiled. “Don’t worry about it. Tails doesn’t like anyone who can turn a man’s head away from her, and Gina doesn’t like anyone—period.”
“You want to know what they’re calling me?”
“I’m not sure I want to know what they’re calling me, but sure, why not, let’s have some scuttlebutt.”
“They’re calling me Green V. As in greeny, but . . .”
“What’s the V stand for?” Atton asked with a furrowed brow. Ceyla raised her eyebrows patiently, waiting for him to catch on. Then he got it and his cheeks turned red again. “Oh.” Atton tried not to smile. A greeny was a rookie pilot who hadn’t seen much action. Green V . . . well, it was phonetically similar, but it didn’t refer to a lack of experience in the cockpit. “Well, Corbin, it could be worse.”
“How?”
“You could be me.”
“How’s that worse?”
“I’m just as green as you, but I’m a guy, and I don’t have any religious reasons for it.”
Ceyla smiled. “Well, I think that’s—”
“Sweet?”
“Yes.”
“That’s what Gina said.”
“Being sweet isn’t a bad thing.”
“Maybe not, but it’s not smart either. Last I checked, wearing sheep’s clothing in a wolf den is a good way to get eaten alive.” Atton’s eyes left Ceyla’s face and travelled around the room. He caught Gina stealing a backward glance at the two of them. When she saw him looking, she blew a kiss, and he looked away with a grimace. “You want my advice about the nickname, Corbin?”
“Why not? You know them better than me.”
“Don’t let them use anything to get to you. Green V is only an insult if you think the way they do, that a lack of experience somehow means you’re undesirable or strange. For you, believing the way you do, that nickname should be a point of pride, not shame. So own it. Make it your call sign and rub it in their faces. The men will respect you for it, and the women . . . well, women are more complicated. If you act like them they’ll call you a sclut, and if you hold to your values they’ll say you’re an ice princess.”
“So how am I supposed to make any friends?”
“You already have one. I’d say that’s a good start for your first day with the squadron.” Atton stuck out his hand. “Put it there, Green V.”
Ceyla smiled and took his hand. “Thank you, Commander. That means a lot.”
“Hoi, us greenies need to stick together.”
“I suppose we do,” she replied.
They spent the next hour by the viewport talking. Atton found out that Corbin was a war orphan who’d been raised in a government institution for children without parents and children whose parents couldn’t afford to provide for them anymore. Ceyla fell into the former category, having been rescued by a shuttle pilot during the exodus. She’d become an Etherian in the orphanage, and when she turned 16 she joined the fleet for a chance to get back at the aliens who’d taken her parents from her. Now, two years later, she was already a Nova pilot with a training rating of 2A over 12. That meant she had an average of two kills per sortie across 12 officially rated training missions. It wasn’t the highest kill score Atton had seen, but her A letter grade put her right at the top of the squadron along with Atton and Hawkeye. It meant she was likely an even better pilot than Gina, who had a 2B rating—although hers was combat, not training.
“Well, Corbin,” Atton said, rising from his chair with an empty beer mug. “I’d better get some rack time before Lieutenant Thales’ memorial service.”
“Right, I almost forgot about that. I’d like to go, too . . . even though I didn’t know him.”
“I think that would be a good idea,” Atton said. “After the service maybe we can meet up here again, and this time, who knows, maybe I can convince my squadron to play nice.”
Ceyla winked at him. “Sure, it’s a date. I think I’m going to hit the rack, too. You mind walking with me?”
“Not at all.”
They made their way to the lift tubes and Atton punched the call button.
“We’re on the red-eye patrol, aren’t we?” Ceyla asked while they waited for the lift.
“Technically, but we won’t be launched unless there’s trouble at the reversion point, and there won’t be. We should be clear all the way to the Enclave. All the same, I expect to see you seated in the ready room at zero one thirty.”
“I’ll be there,” Ceyla said.
The nearest lift opened and Atton and Ceyla both tried to walk through at the same time. They bumped shoulders and both stopped in the open doorway, looking embarrassed. “Where are my manners,” Atton said, and gestured for her to go ahead of him.
“No, you’re the SC; you should go first.”
“Beauty before rank.”
“Well . . . okay,” Ceyla said, blushing.
“Hoi, wait up you two lovebirds!”
Atton turned to see Gina jogging toward them with a broad smile.
She reached them a moment later and Ceyla started to object. “We’re not love—”
Gina stopped her with an upraised hand. “You don’t have to explain anything to me Green V. I saw you two sitting over by the viewport.”
Atton punched in their destination—deck 7, the flight deck—and the lift doors slid shut with a swish.
“Jealous?” Ceyla challenged, crossing her arms over her chest.
Gina turned to her with an incredulous look. “Jealous? No, girlie, you can have the Iceman all to yourself.”
Atton began chuckling. “So that’s what they’re calling me?”
“They who?” Gina asked as the lift slowed to a stop all of a moment later. “That’s what I’m calling you. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go get some sleep.” As she left the lift tube, Gina shot him a leering grin and said, “I’ll leave my door open, just in case you’d rather not sleep alone, sir.”
Atton frowned and shook his head, gesturing for Ceyla to go out next while he held the doors open for her.
“Don’t pay any attention to her, Commander,” Ceyla said as they walked down the corridor to the pilots’ quarters.
“I could say the same to you—you just called her jealous.”
“Because she is.”
Atton laughed. “Come on, we both know that’s just her way of getting under my skin.”
“No, it’s her way of getting into your pants,” Ceyla replied.
They reached the pilots’ quarters and Atton stepped up to the door to wave his wrist over the scanner. “You think so?”
“Come on, sir . . . you’re not that young,” she said as they walked through the doors. “Tension between two people is often a sign of unexpressed attraction. It’s obvious she likes you, and from what I heard, she’s not even bothering to hide it. I’ll leave my door open, just in case you’d rather not sleep alone? What does that sound like to you?”
“Hmmm,” Atton rubbed his chin. “I just assumed because she’s always so defensive with the other guys that she’s not interested in that type of relationship inside the squadron.”
“Maybe not with them. She’s probably wary because she’s been hurt before, but it’s obvious you’re not like the others, sir. You’re a gentleman, and if I had to guess, I’d say that’s why she likes you.”
Atton ran a hand back through his short dark hair. “I suppose it’s possible.”
Ceyla stopped walking and turned to him with a small smile. “It’s more than possible. Trust me. She likes you for the same reason I do.”
Atton did a double take. “You like me?”
Ceyla shrugged and averted her eyes. “Of course. You made me feel welcome when no one else did, and you praised me for my values instead of making fun of them.” She looked up again. “Who wouldn’t like that?”
Atton smiled, understanding what she meant now. “Well I’m glad I could be a friend.”
Ceyla nodded and smiled back. “So am I.” She turned to the door she’d stopped beside and wav
ed her wrist over the scanner. The door opened and Atton realized that they’d reached her quarters. “Sweet dreams, Miss Corbin,” he said as she walked inside.
“To you, too, sir.” Ceyla turned and waved from inside her room, and then the door slid shut between them with a quiet swish.
Atton continued on to his quarters with a thoughtful smile. A few minutes later, he was lying in bed. As he drifted off to sleep, Gina popped into his head out of nowhere, half naked, wearing only her underwear, and smiling at him in that wry, taunting way of hers.
“What’s the matter, Commander?” she said as she slipped off her bra straps. “Never seen a naked woman before?” With that, she crawled on top of him and stole his reply with her lips and tongue. He felt her warm body pressing against his in all the right places, and a wave of desire washed over him. Then he rolled her over, and he was on top, kissing her. When he withdrew for air, he realized it wasn’t Gina at all, but Ceyla. Atton smiled as he gazed down on her, somehow unfazed by the fact that she’d abruptly morphed into someone else. “You’re beautiful,” he said, admiring the way her long blonde hair fell across her naked breasts.
But Ceyla shook her head in dismay. “What have you done?” she asked, her blue eyes wide and full of horror. “You seduced me! How could you? I thought you were a gentleman!”
Atton woke up to the buzzing of an alarm. He rolled over to the comm suite beside his bed and smacked it until it shut up. Then he sat up with a frown and shook his head, wondering what that dream meant—if anything. “It’s just a dream,” he whispered to himself. But as Atton got up, showered in the room’s vaccucleanser, and washed his face, he realized that maybe it meant something after all. He’d enjoyed the dream, and not just for the obvious reasons.
So what did it mean?
“It means I like them both,” he decided, watching in the mirror as water dripped from his chin to the sink. “The question is, Iceman, what are you going to do about it?”
Chapter 7
“I want to know what we’re going to do about it! For frek’s sake, Admiral! Do you think we’re all stim-baked skriffs?”
Admiral Hoff Heston folded his hands on the glossy black table of the operations center and met Captain Ocheron’s blazing brown eyes with a calm look. “We’re not going to do anything,” he said.
Ocheron blinked. “We have a Sythian Fleet on our doorstep—Gors eating all of our food—” Ocheron gestured to Tova, who sat at the foot of the table, glaring unblinkingly at Hoff. “—the Hydroponics Guild is raising prices on all shipments from food to caf and salves, and you want us to do nothing?”
“I have the situation in hand.”
“How exactly do you have it in hand?” Ocheron demanded, his thick black mustache twitching as he loomed across the table. Hoff eyed the man’s shiny bald head, and wondered absently if he might be able to see his own reflection there. Ocheron was a big brute of a man, the former Outlaw Captain of crime lord Alec Brondi’s fleet, now one of Admiral Heston’s own captains in the legitimate Imperial Fleet. Ocheron had been pardoned along with everyone else after Brondi had been defeated, but like virtually all of the outlaws in Dark Space, he wasn’t adapting well to the level of discipline and structure in the Imperial Fleet.
“Unfortunately, that information is classified.”
“Of course it is,” Ocheron said drily. “One question, Admiral, how do you expect us to trust you if you won’t tell us what you’re planning? I think I can speak for the skull faces on that, too—right Tova?” Ocheron turned to the High Praetor of the Gors, and Hoff was relieved to see her finally break her death stare with him. She turned the glowing red optics of her helmet on Ocheron and began warbling at him. A moment later the translation came through Hoff’s ear piece.
“We . . . skull faces, as you call us, are aware of the Admiral’s plan.”
Hoff winced at that revelation. Captain Ocheron hadn’t been present for the initial strategy meeting which had led them to the conclusion that they needed to get reinforcements from Avilon. Few people in Dark Space even knew Avilon existed, and for good reason. If they knew that a lost sector of humanity was out there somewhere, untouched by the war, then there would be more unrest than ever. The people would demand to know where Avilon was, and insist that Hoff take them there.
But it’s not that simple, Hoff thought. Even if the Immortals agreed to take them in as refugees, few would meet up to the Avilonians’ strict standards for humanity, and those who didn’t would be turned away.
Captain Ocheron turned slowly back to Hoff, his pale skin having turned an ugly shade of purple. “The skull face knows and we don’t?” Ocheron jerked a thumb over his shoulder to Tova.
Hoff shrugged. “The Gors were required for my plan to work.”
Ocheron breathed a deep sigh and turned to the man sitting beside him, his XO, Master Commander Leskin. That man had more bright and glowing tattoos than visible skin. He was a quiet man with a frightening appearance, and in Hoff’s experience, it was the quiet ones you had to watch. “I think we’re done here, Commander, don’t you?” Ocheron asked.
Leskin turned to look at Hoff. He wore a pair of glowing blue contacts which contrasted sharply with the pulsing red tattoos that whorled around his eyes. Leskin nodded once and rose to his feet in tandem with his captain, while Ocheron turned back to Hoff with a scowl. “I had thought we’d learned to trust one another, Admiral. Apparently I was wrong.”
“I’m sorry you feel that way, Captain.” Hoff watched Ocheron and Leskin leave the operations center, leaving him alone with his bodyguards and Tova. Turning to the alien, he raised his grizzled eyebrows. “Are you going to storm out of here, too, Tova?”
“Be thankful I am not the one you leave out of your meetings.”
Hoff regarded Tova quietly for a moment. “Is that a threat?”
“No,” she said, rising from the table. “It is wisdom.”
Hoff nodded slowly and regarded her with a small smile.
Tova stepped up to the doors. The pair of bodyguards standing there eyed her for a moment, looking nervously between themselves, and then to Hoff. He nodded, and they opened the doors for her. She stooped to get through the doorway. The doors swished shut behind her, leaving Hoff alone with his thoughts. He wondered about the uneasy alliance he’d constructed. Criminals, ISSF, and Gors—all forced to work together for the common good. It was a recipe for disaster, but none of them had a choice. They had to stand together if they wanted to have even a scant hope against the Sythians. And soon we’ll be adding Immortals to that alliance. . . .
Hoff’s thoughts were interrupted as his comm piece trilled insistently in his ear. Incoming call from Councilor Destra Heston, the comm piece declared. Hoff was grateful for the distraction. After the tension-filled meeting he’d just had, it would be nice to hear his wife’s voice.
“Hello, darling,” he said.
“Hoff, we have a situation developing.”
“What kind of situation?”
“The kind where the council just declared an emergency session. We have riots on Karpathia, Etaris, Forliss . . . basically everywhere, and almost all of the guilds are on strike. The entire economy just ground to a halt.”
“What?” Hoff sat suddenly straighter in his chair. “Why? What happened?”
“They know about the Sythian Fleet.”
“Ah . . . that does explain things. How did they find out?”
“Someone leaked recon data to the commnet. It’s everywhere, on all the news nets.”
Hoff frowned. It had been inevitable that people find out about the Sythians, since the whole fleet knew about them, but what was harder to imagine was how highly classified recon data had been leaked to the commnet. His thoughts went straight to Captain Ocheron and the rest of the outlaws. “This is the price we pay for bringing a gang of ex-cons into the fleet. The press probably bribed one of them to leak the data.”
“Well, whoever’s responsible, they’ve forced our hand. We need to ma
ke a formal statement about this crisis, and you need to give the people a reason not to be afraid.”
“Yes, you’re right. Get a holo conference together with the press. I’ll start preparing a statement. Let me know when my audience is ready.”
“I will. . . . and Hoff?”
“Yes?”
“Should we be afraid?”
He was about to dismiss his wife’s concerns with an empty platitude, but the worried tone in her voice gave him pause. She was worried, not just as a councilor, responsible to millions of citizens on the planet she represented, but also as a mother and a wife, and she deserved to know the truth. Hoff’s eyes went to his bodyguards, who were watching him discreetly from the doorway. “Fear is wasteful, Des. What we need right now is hope. I’ll see you soon.”
“I’ll be waiting in the press briefing room.”
Hoff nodded and ended the comm call. As he left the operations center, his bodyguards took positions flanking him. He stalked down the corridor, heading for the nearest rail car tunnel, his mind twisting and turning over recent events. He considered what he was going to say to the press, briefly toying with the idea of telling them the truth, but that only led to visions of even greater unrest as the people demanded he lead them to safety in Avilon. Hoff shook his head.
No, the time hadn’t yet come for something as dangerous as the truth.
* * *
Ethan and Alara waded into a heated infinity pool, passing through gauzy white curtains of steam which rose perpetually from the surface of the water and into the chilly air. This was the Vermillion Palace on Karpathia, a ski resort built high on the near-vertical cliffs of White Cap Mountain. Guests staying at the Vermillion had the best of both winter and summer activities. While staying on the mountain they could enjoy gravboarding, ice skating, and skiing, while just a short gondola ride away was the small seaside town of Ostin where guests could make their way to the waterfront to enjoy sun, sand, and surf, along with fresh seafood. There was something for everyone at the Vermillion. They’d arrived on Karpathia and checked in to the honeymoon suite just a few hours ago, and now—finally—Ethan could relax. No more Kurlin Vastra, and no more wedding plans—just him and Alara in paradise.
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