by Lee Stephen
David fought back a frown. “Don’t say anything. Put this behind you. Be strong—be what you’ve been trained to be. Just be there, ready to go when we get called out again.”
She pressed her palm to her forehead. The disappointment in her voice grew heavier. “I was always so proud when I did something well. I was so proud when I graduated. What have I to be proud of now? I feel as though I’ve betrayed the unit. I wasn’t what I was supposed to be.”
“Esther, you can’t think like that. You know we don’t feel that way. Becan and Jayden went looking for you earlier today, and it’s not because they’re disappointed.”
She scoffed and looked away.
“I’m here,” David said. “And I’m not disappointed. Max isn’t disappointed in you, and neither are Galina or Varvara.”
For the first time in their conversation, her eyes rimmed with tears. “What do I say to him? To the man who needed something, that I tore away?” A teardrop rolled down her cheek. “How can I put on that uniform? How can I look at his face?”
He pulled her against his side. She didn’t resist.
“I just want to go home…”
“I don’t want you to go home,” David said. “Neither does anyone else.”
“This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. It’s not who I am.”
“Esther…”
“I’m leaving, I have to.”
“Don’t.” The forcefulness of his voice made her stop. She turned her head to him. “Esther…this is hard to understand, because right now you’re in the middle of it. You haven’t had time to look back.”
“To when?”
“To right now.” She turned her face fully to see him. “Sometimes…we have to fail to succeed. Sometimes our most important moment is when we rise up from our worst one. What you did today isn’t what’s important. What’s important is what you do tomorrow, after you’ve absorbed and acknowledged what’s happened today. That you’ve learned a lesson and become stronger—that’s what defines who you are.”
She stared at him in silence for several moments, before she turned her head away. “You don’t understand. You don’t understand this at all.”
“I’ve made mistakes, Esther.”
She almost laughed. “Did your mistakes cause people to die?”
David watched her for several seconds, until he drew in a very deep breath. He returned his eyes to the landscape. “Yeah, they did.”
Esther was taken aback. Her mouth lingered partially open as she sniffed in a breath and faced him.
“I know where you are right now,” he said. “I know what it is you’re feeling. You see, Esther…we’re all damaged. And the people who aren’t damaged yet…someday they will be. That’s just life. Life happens to every one of us.” Esther watched him as he spoke. “What you did can’t be undone. It can’t be revised or revisited. But you can always change. You can always grow.”
She hesitated, opening her mouth to speak. No words came out.
“I can’t tell you what to do,” David said. “I can’t tell you how to deal with this. But I can tell you one thing.” He turned his head to face her. “This is your most important hour. This is the hour that’s going to dictate what you do with the rest of your life. There are only two choices. You’re either going to run from it…or you’re going to face it. You’re going to face it and say, ‘I made a mistake. I’m not perfect. But I refuse to let that stop me.’” He looked at her gravely for several seconds. “I believe in you, Esther. Not because I know anything about you, but because I know that you care. Sometimes…that’s all that separates heroes from washouts.”
She stared at him in silence, her watery gaze never wavering from his own. When she finally looked toward the horizon, she allowed herself a small smile. “I suppose I don’t have to ask which of those two choices you made.”
“I ran.”
She turned quickly to face him, her eyebrows arched with surprise. “You ran?”
He turned his eyes back to the landscape. “I’m here, aren’t I? And that’s why I want you to hear me.”
For several seconds, she simply stared. Then she too fixed her gaze on the distance.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow. I don’t even know what’s going to happen tonight.” He turned his head back to her. “But I hope we go through it together. You, me…Scott, Becan, Jayden. All of us. I hope you don’t choose to run away.”
Her eyes fell blank as they distanced. She lowered her stare to the ground.
“Think about who you are, then think of who you always wanted to be. Then, make whatever decision gets you there. You know that’s what you have to do.” He sat in silence for several moments, then slowly pushed up from the ground. He winced when his left shoulder moved.
“Mr. David…”
“Just David,” he said with a smile, hiding his pain.
She smiled, too. “David…”
“Yes?”
She lifted her head toward him. The moisture still dwelled under her eyes, but the tears had long stopped falling. She stared at him somberly for several seconds, before her smile faintly widened. “Thank you for finding me.”
He winked. “There are still more people to find.”
Esther gave him a warm grin, and watched as he stepped back, turned, and walked away.
She remained on the sidewalk for many more minutes, her eyes remaining fixed on the distant landscape. Aside from the occasional brushing of loose hair from her face, she remained comfortably captivated by stillness.
No one else sought her out.
* * *
Dostoevsky was repressed as he eased open the door to his private quarters. He stepped inside, sealing the door shut behind him. An eerie silence accompanied him into the room. It was the same silence that had followed him since he first stepped in Room 14 minutes before. There had been no acknowledgments when he’d walked past his teammates. There had been no words of greeting. And for the first time in his Nightman life—ever—one of his subordinates had struck him. Fearlessly. But that wasn’t what weighed on his mind.
What weighed on his mind was that no one else cared.
Dostoevsky’s room was black, until a sharp tug at his desk lamp caused a dim yellow hue to flush away the darkness. He padded to his bed, sat on its edge, and slipped off his uniform and undershirt.
He was well aware of his status as one of the most notorious Nightmen in Novosibirsk. While fitness was a strict requirement for all of Thoor’s men, Dostoevsky was an exception to the rule—a superior one. The aggressive firmness of his muscles had always been the marvel of all Nightmen who knew him. He did not have the body of a model, but he had the prowess and strength of a savage.
Four classes of Nightmen dominated the Nightman regimen. There were sentries, donned in their metallic hulls, serving as guardians. They surveyed The Machine through the mirrored lenses of their zombified helmets, greeting new arrivals with icy coldness, leaving no question as to who was in control. Next there were the eidola, the hidden eyes of General Thoor, mingling among the innocent as wolves in EDEN clothing, undistinguishable from the general populace. There were the slayers—the grunts—who made up the majority of the Nightman army. Their rank of armor, slender and purposeful, was the most frequent of all Nightman classes.
Then there were the fulcrums. The pivots. The devils. Their armor was indistinguishable from the armor of the slayers, save for one distinct feature. Their spiked half-collars—their horns. The fulcrums were the Nightman leaders—the leaders that Thoor called his own.
Leaders like Yuri Dostoevsky.
Prior to the Assault on Novosibirsk, there had been two fulcrums in the Fourteenth: Baranov and Dostoevsky. Despite the fact that Baranov outranked him in the unit, there was no question that Dostoevsky held a special place in Thoor’s order. He was one of the general’s most prized soldiers. He was one of the general’s best.
He was also one of the Fourteenth’s most feared. Few in the unit dared to
speak to him, and Baranov was the only one who had ever ventured to confront him about anything. Even Clarke watched his tongue when Dostoevsky was near.
Until today.
Like many in the Fourteenth, Dostoevsky was skeptical of Scott upon his arrival at Novosibirsk. Unlike the rest of the unit, Dostoevsky’s feelings didn’t change. Scott’s amiable personality grew on everyone else. They came to embrace him. With the fulcrum’s cold approach, that embrace never happened. Even during Dostoevsky’s personal training with Scott, the two men kept an emotional arm’s distance. As far as Dostoevsky was concerned, the Golden Lion was an overrated idealistic embodiment of a hero.
An embodiment whose love had been murdered.
Dostoevsky exhaled and leaned back on his bed, taking a moment to look at the ceiling above him. There was a small crimson triangle imprinted there, directly over the pillow he’d placed his head on. He had put it there himself as a constant reminder of his singular purpose. He lived to serve the Nightmen. He lived to serve Thoor.
His gaze lingered on it—the Nightman symbol—before he finally rolled his head to the side. His face was as immovable as when he entered, yet for the first time, his emotions verged on something different. Emotions no one had ever seen on his face. Emotions that, for the first time in his life, frightened him.
Reaching over to his nightstand, Dostoevsky flicked off the light. The yellow hue faded from the room. Without a word, the commander rolled over, closed his eyes, and fell asleep.
One hour later
Esther closed her eyes, leaning her head back as her brown hair drifted atop the glistening surface of the water around her. She was alone in the gymnasium-sized swimming pool. The delicate swishing of her body in the water was the only noise in the room. No one was there to hear her or watch her. There was no one to tell her she’d failed. It was exactly the way that she wanted it.
She loved the feeling of water surrounding her body. Since her childhood, she had always felt lured to it. She’d excelled in underwater training at Philadelphia; she’d always sought out the pool to find refuge. In the water, she could disappear. She could drop out of sight, where no one could see her. Temporarily, she could cease to exist.
She lifted her head, the weight of her wet hair slicking it down the back of her head. Water streamed down her face.
David had done wonders that day. She understood why the unit looked upon him as a father. He was. When all she had wanted to do was run away, he was there to put his arm around her—as he would have his daughter—and tell her she mattered. He’d given her the confidence to stay. In truth, he reminded her of her own father. But she hadn’t seen her own father since Philadelphia.
Closing her eyes, she laid her head back again.
She knew she was better than Khatanga. She knew how to handle a comm. The fact of the matter was that the reality of combat had flustered her, like nothing had flustered her before. It had flustered her into stupidity. She had always heard from her instructors that regardless of training, regardless of time in simulators, there was nothing that compared to a real mission. In simulators, she knew she’d survive. Even if she failed, she knew that when the clock hit zero, it was all just pretend.
In Khatanga, it wasn’t pretend.
The Ceratopians were real. The neutron rays were real. Her failures were real. She wasn’t incompetent—she was just a wide-eyed rookie, seeing the reality of danger for the first time. Feeling true fear for the first time. Experiencing for the first time the price of allowing emotion into the equation of combat.
She opened her mouth, drew a deep breath, and pushed herself beneath the water’s surface, right along the poolside wall. Where no one could see her—completely hidden from the world.
Away from Scott.
He made her nervous. Even before the mission, even before Nicole’s death. There was something about his presence that stirred her emotions—that wrenched her stomach. He made her feel something she hadn’t felt since she was a teenager. She’d been terrified when he’d cornered her in his room. She’d been frightened almost to tears. But deep down inside, in the corner of her heart that she kept tucked away, the tiniest part of her inexplicably enjoyed it. She was disconcerted by his shirtless body—by the experience of the firmness of his form. She liked that when he pushed up from his bed, his arms flexed. She liked the aggression in his voice. She wished he would have thrown her to the floor.
That thought made her nervous the most.
Emerging to the surface again, she once again slicked back her hair. She was alone still. Just how she’d wanted it.
At least for right then.
When she finally did return to Room 14, the unit was waiting. The showers gushed to life with warmth, and for the first time in some time, they were enjoyed by everyone.
Though the tension was far from relieved, there was a hint of forced normality in the air. It was the kind of forced normality that could only come with a unit blindsided by circumstance. It was the kind of forced normality they were getting used to.
If normality, fear, and indefinite uncertainty could ever be reconciled.
16
Wednesday, August 10, 0011 NE
0700 hours
Novosibirsk, Russia
It was early morning when the Fourteenth was called into operation. Their comms had sounded, and the tail-spun unit once again mustered in the hangar to receive their assignment. There was a very different feel to the call, much different than the one for Khatanga. Prior to Khatanga, there’d been a sensation of dread in the air. Now, there was nothing but numbness.
By the time David arrived in the hangar, the battered but determined Captain Clarke had already arrived. He was the only other man David saw.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” Clarke said, indicating the older man’s shoulder.
David’s left arm was still cradled. “I’ll be fine once adrenaline kicks in, captain. I’ve been banged up before.”
“As you wish.”
Several moments of silence passed before David spoke again. “What are we facing?”
“Bakma,” Clarke answered, his eyes watching the hangar entrance, where the rest of the crew slowly gathered. “A Coneship was shot down between Kachug and Ust’-Ordynski.”
“Where is that?”
“East of here. In a region known as the Irkutsk Oblast. By Lake Baikal.”
“That’s a lot of names.”
Clarke’s face remained placid. “I know.”
David watched as the rest of the crew filtered in. Scott was yet to be seen. David turned to address the captain again. “Permission to speak freely, sir?”
“Go ahead.”
“I’m not sure Scott should be a part of this. I’m not sure he’s ready.”
“He won’t be,” Clarke answered. “I’d informed Mr. Remington of my decision when the initial call to action came through. He is to remain here, under Varvara’s supervision. His emotions have become a liability.”
“Wha’?” Becan asked as he approached them. “Remmy’s not comin’?”
“I’m afraid not, McCrae.”
“Why the bloody hell not?”
“Because he’s acting on impulses, and they’re not positive impulses. He’s going to get someone else killed.”
“The captain’s right,” affirmed David. “He needs to be away from this.”
Becan shot David a strange look. “Now wait just one bleedin’ minute. Weren’t you the one sayin’ Remmy was a volcano with a cork? Tha’ he needed to release everythin’?”
“Yes, I did. But there’s a right and a wrong place to release it.”
“Then where’s the righ’ place?”
“I don’t know, Becan. But I do know that this is the wrong one.”
The attention of the unit was diverted as Dostoevsky made his way in. The horns of the fulcrum commander glistened with polish. But that wasn’t what caught everyone’s eyes. Behind him, four other men—all Nightman slayers—marched in tow.
>
“Wha’ the hell?” Becan turned his gaze to the captain. “Wha’ are they doin’ here?”
Clarke sighed, cleared his throat, and addressed the now-gathered unit. “For those who are unaware, we will be operating today without two of our own—Mr. Remington and Ms. Yudina. We were undermanned with them, and we’re more undermanned without them.” He motioned with a head tilt toward the Nightmen. “These are our reinforcements.”
Becan’s mouth tumbled open. “Yeh got to be bloody kiddin’ me.”
“I was informed by the general that we would receive ‘outside assistance’ for this operation. They are it.”
The crew stood paralyzed with shock.
Scott stood in silence in his private room. His hands gripped the sides of his sink as he stared at his face in the mirror. He hadn’t said a word since Clarke had commed him—commed him to say Scott would remain. Scott didn’t need to say a word. The ferocity in his eyes said everything.
Varvara sat timidly in her chair at the other end of the room. She hadn’t said a word, either.
“I’m going.”
Her eyes widened as soon as Scott said it. “What?”
“I’m going.” The two words stung with finality. Scott wasn’t staying behind. He didn’t care if it came down to blows. He marched to his closet.
“Scott, wait, please…” Varvara’s voice grew frantic as he strode past her. “You cannot go! You heard what Captain Clarke said.”
Scott pulled his armor from his closet and began to gear himself up. “You don’t want to debate with me, Varvara.”
Her hands trembled as she ran them back through her hair. She looked around frantically as if to instinctively see if anyone else would support her. But the two of them were alone. She turned back to Scott. “Please, Scott…listen…”
Scott clamped on his breastplate and arm guards. He didn’t even have a working helmet. He’d broken his last one when he threw it to the ground. But he didn’t care.
