There had to be a trick to it, Cyrus thought as he pushed the strand of hair away from his face again. And once more, predictably, it flopped right back into place. He groaned and turned away from the mirror in frustration.

This was stupid anyway. He was going on a ship raid, of all things and here he was, spending far too long in the bathroom of his quarters fussing with his appearance. He’d never taken this much time before, why should he now? Who cares if his hair was a mess? Who cares if he looked like he just rolled out of bed? Or like he was wearing a rather stifling hat all day? Who would even care?

He would, he realized after a moment, spinning back towards the mirror and trying again, to no avail. He would, because she would. Or maybe she wouldn’t. But what if she did? What if Addy, working alongside him, looked over as he navigated the Society frigate’s security console and realized just how much of a dork he was? Continue reading →

“No way.” Nikkolai shook his head in disbelief. “There’s absolutely no way.”

Corra shrugged and spread her hands helplessly. “It’s true, I swear. We got lunch together earlier and she told me. It was this big romantic thing too. This long wild goose chase on Tarin that ended in his bed.” Nikkolai continued to stare at her as though she’d told him the sky was actually green. She took a sip from her beer and shrugged again. “Leta and the captain are apparently a thing now.”

In fact, they were such a thing that Leta hadn’t been able to join Corra when she’d invited her out for drinks that evening. As her best friend who hadn’t seen her in a few weeks, she was of the belief that she had every right to drag Leta out to Genisi’s finest dives the first night the Dionysian was on Archeti. Fiearius, however, had other ideas.

So Corra had invited Nikkolai instead and they had spent most of the evening so far, as they often did, gossiping about other people’s lives. Continue reading →