by DuBoff, Amy
In some ways, they were too strong. Whatever effect being around Wil had had on Saera seemed to be repeating with them, if not as pronounced. “I don’t think they’ll be at that classification for much longer.”
“At least you get to set the rules for their advancement.” Saera returned to the couch next to Wil, fully dressed.
“It’s such a tight timeline, it’s not as rewarding as it should be.” Wil reoriented toward her, the couch cushion cool against his bare back.
“You’re doing great. They’ll be fine officers.”
“I know they will.” He took in Saera’s loving gaze—the patience and support. His men weren’t the only ones he needed to take care of. “But a break would probably do us all good, before we get too far into a new training routine.”
Saera’s eyes widened. “You. Voluntarily taking a break?”
Wil smirked. “Just a short one. I was thinking maybe we should take a trip to Earth.”
Her brow furrowed. “Why?”
“Well, we’ve been engaged for almost two years now, and I have yet to meet any of the family that raised you. It might be nice to have some introductions before the wedding,” Wil said.
Saera let out a long breath. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“If not now, then when?”
“Is ‘never’ an option?” she asked.
Wil shook his head. “Sorry.”
Saera moaned. “What did you have in mind?”
“I’d like to meet everyone, but a little sightseeing might be nice, too. I’ve never been down there.”
“Well, it’s March right now. That’s not a great tourist season for northeastern Virginia.”
“I’ll use my imagination.”
Saera eyed him. “And you’re sure you want to meet my family?”
“As many as I can. I’m curious to see where you came from.” He took her hands. “I know not all of it was good, but revisiting the past with a new perspective can be a good thing.”
“All right. I guess I should give my dad a heads up,” Saera said, making no effort to hide her reluctance. “When do you think we’ll be there?”
Wil shrugged. “We can go as early as next week, if you’re up for it. That should give me enough time to brush up on the English you taught me.”
“Or you could use that cortical imprinting machine like anyone else.”
“They won’t let me anywhere near that device.”
“Why not? Afraid you’ll modify it to turn yourself into even more of a crazy genius than you already are?”
If only that was the biggest concern. “No. My neural structure is… different. Ever since I was shot.”
“Oh, right.” Saera frowned.
“Besides, it’s kind of nice to learn the traditional way. And you’re a great teacher.” He grinned.
“If you count ‘teaching’ as you memorizing a few books and me correcting pronunciation,” Saera quipped. “Okay, we may as well get the trip out of the way as soon as possible, then.”
“That’s no way to think about it!”
“Yeah, well you haven’t met my family yet…”
Wil laughed. “Like the meeting with mine went great.”
“It’s different. I grew up with mine.”
“It’ll be fine.” Wil squeezed her hands. “I’ll be there with you.”
“I’ll let my dad know we’re coming.”
* * *
“You’re free to go,” the doctor told Laecy. “The High Commander asked to see you.”
Laecy rose from the exam table, cradling her bandaged arm. The biografting had repaired the damage already, but the bandage would protect the new skin as it toughened overnight.
She wasn’t in remotely the right headspace for talking to Taelis. However, declining a meeting with the High Commander wasn’t an option.
Laecy made her way to the top level of H2, taking her time. Her arm ached from the repair procedure and her heart was heavy with loss. The final death toll from the explosion was seven, including two of her immediate crew—Richards and Jaeron. Their brilliance and optimistic attitudes would leave a hole on her team.
Richard’s death left her especially hollow, knowing their dreams of “one day” and “maybe” would never come to pass. No more was there a fanciful future of retiring together to the green pastures on Aderoth and living a quiet life free of the war and responsibilities. The place he held in her heart would always be more than just a colleague or friend despite never having the opportunity to explore what the relationship could become. All that she could do was honor his memory.
The High Commander’s office door was flanked by guards, as usual. They nodded at Laecy as she approached, and one opened the door for her.
Inside, Taelis was gazing out the window at the back of the room. He turned to face Laecy when she entered. “How’s your arm?” he asked.
“Good as new, sir. What did you want to see me about?”
Taelis stepped over to his desk. “The timing of the attack is unfortunate. I had just procured something I wanted to share with you.”
I couldn’t care less about anything he has to share. Maybe if I go to bed I can wake up from the nightmare of today. “What is it, sir?”
The High Commander unlocked a cabinet behind his desk and pulled out a hard plastic case. He set the case on his desk and flipped it open toward Laecy.
Her eyes widened. The case contained a smooth metal sphere with a crack down one side. It was metallic but had an iridescent quality that made it appear to almost glow. “Is that one of the testing spheres?”
Taelis nodded. “The one Wil cracked several years ago. We’ve been using it with the new graduates, but we were finally able to collect enough material to craft a replacement. Rather than repair this one, I thought it might be useful for the telekinetic relays in the new prototype warship.”
“Yeah, I bet it’s perfect. Trouble is, that was Richards’ specialization, not mine.” The hole in her heart tore with the mention of his name.
The High Commander looked down. “Yes, I heard. It’s a deep loss for all of us.”
That doesn’t begin to cover it. Laecy looked past Taelis and out the window. The nearly empty space dock revealed how thin the TSS’ resources had become, compounding the impact of the latest blow.
“Unfortunately, we don’t have the luxury of mourning our losses,” Taelis continued. “The mission hasn’t changed. When can you be production-ready?”
Laecy stared at the High Commander with shock. “That’s the last thing on my mind!”
“I know it’s been a tough day—”
“I just lost two of my best engineers! They were my friends. My family. And you want us to pick up like nothing happened?”
“We lose people every day, Deena.”
“Not here in Headquarters. Not like that.”
“You want revenge? Finish the ship.”
“I think Wil would want us to take some time to recover.”
Taelis stared her down through his tinted glasses. “Don’t tell him about this attack.”
“Sir—”
“I know you’ve been in communication with Wil.”
Do I deny that we chat? She thought better of it. “Why would you keep it from him?”
Taelis paced across the room. “Because if he knew the enemy had breached our walls, he’d be here tomorrow to enter the fight.”
“Good! Let’s end this.”
“No. With where we are right now, we could drive the Bakzen back, but not eliminate them. Only a large-scale telekinetic weapon will be able to finish the war.”
Laecy swallowed her anger. “The warship.”
“If Wil and his Seconds can pool their power, we have a fighting chance.”
Laecy bit her lower lip. “I don’t know if I can make it work without Richards.”
“Find a way.”
Laecy nodded.
“We win the fight at any cost.”
“Yes, sir.”
/>
Laecy trudged back to her quarters, slumped under the weight of her assignment. The loss of her friends was a bitter reality she was reluctant to admit, but she needed to accept that they were gone. It should have been easier to accept, having seen them die. So many had gone off to battle and never come home—that should have been far more difficult, but it wasn’t. That was the way it had always been. To have seen the moment of their death, witnessed the instant they departed, she kept thinking about what could have been done differently. She could have ordered everyone away, or ejected the jet into space. Those actions only made sense in hindsight, but she couldn’t help replaying the minutes leading up to the tragedy. Countless others had passed in battle, but this loss within her home would be far more haunting.
Once in her cramped room, Laecy eased onto her bunk. She was thankful for the quiet and solitude.
She laid down on the bed and closed her eyes. Her arm needed rest to finish healing. Yet, her mind was still too active to let her sleep.
Laecy grabbed her tablet off of the wall and scanned over her inbox. Most of the messages were mundane business, but she spotted a message from Wil titled: “Check-in.”
Does he know about what happened, despite Taelis wanting to keep it secret?”
She opened the message: “I’m going to be unavailable for a while, so I wanted to check in and see how you and the crew are doing. Everything okay?”
So he didn’t know, or at least didn’t want to come out and say it.
No! Laecy wanted to scream. Everything is falling apart! I don’t know how we’re going to make it to the end of the month, let alone through the years ahead. When are you coming to save us for good?
But she couldn’t say any of those things. If TSS Command was keeping track of Wil’s personal files, they would certainly have an eye on her correspondence with him.
With nowhere left to turn, she allowed herself to cry.
Under any other circumstances, she would consider it an act of weakness. But in that moment, she needed the release—anything to relieve the crippling vice crushing her from within. She sobbed into her pillow for everything—everyone—that she’d lost. She mourned the life that her friends would never be able to have, and her own alternate path that had never been and never would be. The war is my life. I need to see it through.
In time, her mind quieted and her sobs ceased. She dried her eyes and exhaled the final barbs of pain still clinging to her. There was no sense dwelling on the past.
She had a ship to design—a weapon that could help deliver an end to the suffering around her. She couldn’t imagine a future for herself without the war, but ending the conflict could perhaps offer others a new chance at life.
Laecy typed and sent her reply to Wil: “Everything is just fine. Best wishes to you and your bride!” At least half the statement was true.
CHAPTER 17
“I wish you would have let me drive,” Wil muttered, sulking in the passenger seat of the rental car.
Saera rolled her eyes. Is he going to be like this the whole trip? “There was no way I was letting you behind the wheel. You laughed out loud when you read the driver’s manual.”
“But twenty-five miles per hour!”
“Yeah, case in point. At least I took driver’s ed.”
“Hey, I have thousands of flight hours logged,” Wil countered.
“And that has absolutely zero to do with driving on a residential street.” Saera returned her attention to the road.
The streets were familiar from her youth, but she was now viewing her former community with new eyes. Seeing an advanced world like Tararia made the precarious state on Earth that much more apparent to her. Trash littering the shoulder, homeless huddled in bus shelters, smoke in the air—things she had been blind to as a resident but that now turned her stomach. She couldn’t be sure, but it seemed like conditions had noticeably deteriorated in just the six years she’d been away.
“This is so surreal,” she murmured.
“Even for me,” Wil commented. “Earth is one of the only places in the galaxy where any random person wouldn’t know me by name.”
“That’s true.”
Wil shook his head as they passed by a sprawling strip mall decked with sale banners. “It’s crazy to think that there’s such a thorough departure from typical Taran life so close to Headquarters.”
Saera smiled. “Imagine my surprise when I found out what was just out of sight off-world.”
“To go from thinking of yourself as being one life among billions to knowing there are actually trillions.”
“Do you even know the total Taran population?” Saera asked him.
“The official citizen count is somewhere around six trillion, last I heard. But, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there were a lot more planets like Earth beyond the fifteen-hundred or so recognized Taran worlds.”
Saera turned off the main artery into a side street to bypass some traffic up ahead. “I can’t even fathom that number.”
“It’s so spread out you’d never know it,” Wil replied. He examined the stores in another shopping plaza. “Are your parents expecting us at a particular time?”
“Not really. Why?”
“We should get you a ring,” Wil suggested. “One that you can actually wear. If you’d like.”
Saera eyed the pair of jewelry stores to her right. “Okay.”
She pulled into the driveway and parked between the two stores. One appeared to be a cost-conscious provider while the other was more high-end. “What’s my budget?” she asked Wil.
“Whatever you want,” he replied.
“You have to have some number in mind,” she pressed.
“I guess we’ve never really talked in detail about finances, have we?”
She paused. “No, we haven’t. Clearly your family is wealthy. And I figured you get some kind of salary from the TSS.”
“I do. My parents and I take the minimum allowable—about 20,000 credits each year into a retirement account, of sorts.”
“And what about the rest?” she asked.
Wil slumped back in his seat. “Well, you’ve seen the Sietinen estate.”
“Yeah, it makes a statement.”
Wil nodded slowly. “That’s only part of it. I don’t even know how to put it in a perspective that you could understand. I can hardly grasp it, myself.”
Saera smirked. “Throw out a number.”
Wil hesitated.
“Come on,” Saera encouraged.
“I’m worth somewhere around four quadrillion.”
Saera blinked, speechless. Did he just quadrillion?
Wil looked down. “Yeah… like I said.”
“And that’s your personal assets?” she finally managed.
“More or less. A lot of it is tied up in SiNavTech, so I’m not sure where to draw the line. However, I personally got 200 billion credits for that two-year exclusivity term licensing the independent jump drive to the Priesthood.”
Saera eyed him. “How can you even say that with a straight face?”
Wil burst out laughing. “I know, it’s absurd.”
“So, what you’re saying is that money is no object.”
“Right. But, get what makes you comfortable. Something you feel like you could wear regularly.”
She nodded. “Okay. Well, I was ready to go the low-cost route, but I see no reason not to check out what the fancy designers have to offer.”
“Then high-end it is.” Wil unbuckled his seatbelt. “Now, let’s go pick something out,” he said in English, with only the slightest hint of an accent.
“All right,” Saera replied, reverting to her native language.
Selecting a suitable ring proved harder than expected, since the jeweler kept suggesting special order pieces. They looked through a dozen in-stock options that were in her size, ranging from simple solitaire settings to behemoths that took up half her finger. In the end, she settled on a delicate ring with a modestly sized round
center stone and two round side-stones. The design supposedly represented past, present, and future, which seemed fitting.
With the new ring on her finger, Saera and Wil returned the car.
“Now to my parents’ place?” Saera asked.
Wil hesitated. “I was thinking we should make another stop first.”
“More shopping?”
“No. I’d like to pay Michael’s father a visit.”
Saera let out a slow breath. “I’d tried to forget about that connection.”
“It’s still not sitting right that a former TSS Agent somehow ended up on Earth with what I can only assume were orders to watch over you.”
If that was the case, he did a pretty poor job of it. “Is he still in the same house?”
“I looked him up before we headed down here, and it seems he is.”
Saera nodded. “I know the way.” She paused. “Are you sure about this? We might not like what he has to say.”
Wil smiled. “Since when has that stopped us?”
“Fair enough.” Saera started the car and headed for her former community.
The commercial streets gave way to residential neighborhoods, varying in affluence. Her neighborhood was in the middle of the spectrum—kept up well, but no overly large or lavish homes. The older vintage of most of the residences gave character to the streets, and the mature trees evoked a homey sense of establishment.
The Andres’ house was one street over from Saera’s former block. She had spent plenty of afternoons playing on the front lawn, which was presently short and brown in its late-winter dormancy. Seeing the aged, forest green house reminded her of a simpler time in her youth, before responsibilities and burdensome thoughts of the future clouded her mind. But looking back on it, perhaps the future was always closer than she’d realized.
“What do we say to him?” Saera asked Wil.
“That will depend on how he reacts to an Agent showing up on his doorstep with his former charge.”
Saera nodded and opened the car door. “He might not even be home.”
Wil stepped out of the car. “He is. I feel it.”
They walked up the concrete pathway to the front door under a narrow overhang. Wil located the doorbell and pressed it.
Saera’s stomach knotted, knowing some of the only fond memories from her youth were about to be cast in new light.
