Dez steeled himself and stuck to his story. “Well I did. I didn’t like what she was doing, but I didn’t try to kill her, Fiearius. It was a–”

“An accident?” Fiearius finished for him, feeling a spike of madness run through him. His knuckles were white and his fingernails, curled into his palm, were starting to draw blood. “Was it an accident? Did you not mean to fuck everything up?!”

“Fiearius–”

“You were just looking out for me, is that it?” He heard himself laughing in a voice that wasn’t his own. “Just trying to act in my best interest?”

Dez took a slow step back.

Fiearius followed him. “It’s not your fault, it was the will of the dov’ha that they die! Was that it?!”

“Fiearius–” it was Leta this time, hesitant and worried, but Fiearius couldn’t bring himself to hear her. His blood boiled and his vision narrowed and all he could see was an image of Aela and Denarian, standing side by side and dripping blood onto the dirty floorboards. And he couldn’t hold it back any longer.

Pride be damned.

The noise that erupted from his mouth as he flung himself at Desophyles Cordova was barely human. It could be identified as many things: fury most of all, grief, pain, despair, vengeance, but sanity was not among them. There was nothing conscious about the way Fiearius attacked, trying all at once to seize Dez’s arms, pummel his fist into his face and rip the flesh from his neck with his fingernails. He wanted blood. He craved the feeling of its warmth on the palms of his hands, the dirt that clung to it, scraping against his skin and riding down the lines of his sweat.

Dez didn’t go down without a fight. When the two men hit the floor with a heavy thump, he tried in vain to hold off Fiearius’ wild thrashing from above him. But there was no force that could stop him now. He felt a fist crack across his cheek and the hot metallic tang of blood spreading through his mouth, but it hardly registered. He was pure energy and adrenaline, a hurricane, a tornado, nothing could stand in his way.

Not that nothing tried.

“Fiearius, stop!” said a voice behind him he couldn’t place as he managed to get his hands around Dez’s throat and squeezed.

“I know you’re mad, but this isn’t the time!” the voice went on. Wasn’t the time? This was the perfect time. There was no place more fitting for an end. Dez was clawing at his wrists, leaving lines of red as he gasped for breath. His legs kicked out beneath him, trying to sway Fiearius’ balance, but it was all useless. Fiearius’ throat laughed a laugh that wasn’t his. Nothing could stop this. It was inevitable.

But then something grabbed his arm and pulled, catching him off-guard. He was so surprised, he didn’t even know anyone else was there, that he let go without resistance, releasing Dez from his hold. Furious, he threw that arm out behind him, feeling it hit flesh and bone just before Dez took his shot and pushed. Fiearius didn’t have the balance anymore to fight it. He was flipped onto his back and pinned down.

“That’s enough,” said Dez through heavy breaths as Fiearius flailed madly under his grip, desperate to get out. But he had the disadvantage now. Dez was bigger, stronger. He was stuck.

“You okay?” he asked someone else and when Fiearius tilted his head to look up at the other presence in the room, he wasn’t shocked to see the wild red hair and dark freckled face of Aela looking back at him.

“I’m fine,” said Aela before focusing on Fiearius. Her eyes were sad, but stern. “Fiear, you need to calm down. We need to leave.”

But Fiearius shook his head, a little and then a lot. “You–” he breathed slowly, grimacing as he still tried to struggle away from Dez. “–You don’t get to tell me what to do anymore. Never again.”

Aela looked briefly confused. “Fiear–”

“Why didn’t you fucking tell me?! What the hell were you doing?!” He finally got a fist out of Dez’s grip and into his ribcage. The man flinched but didn’t let up.

Aela still seemed lost. She glanced at Dez who muttered, “He thinks you’re her,” which made no sense and only served to make Fiearius angrier.

But now she looked at him not with confusion, but pity. She crouched down above his head and carefully put a hand on his temple, but he shook it off immediately. Her touch was poison, she was just as bad as all the rest. She had used him, betrayed him. She was vile. And then she said, “Let him go.”

“You’re fucking kidding,” said Dez.

“I’m not, let him up.” She got to her feet and waited as, understandably reluctant, Dez did as she said, one by one releasing his hold on Fiearius’ limbs. He was right to not want to. The moment Fiearius was free, he leapt to his feet and raised his blood-stained fist to pick up where he’d left off, but a small hand seized his wrist and held it back.

He turned to find Aela looking up at him, stern and serious. “Fiearius. You need to come back to me now.”

He stared at her for a moment, his mind racing. Hadn’t she died? What was she doing here? How dare she show up and order him around? He grit his teeth and ripped his wrist from her grasp. “Fuck you.”

She was unphased. “Fiear.” Both her hands reached up and grasped his face. Her palms were soft and warm and made his skin crawl. He wrapped his fingers around her wrists and was about to push her from him when she gave him pause. “You’re having an episode. You need to come back.”

The words didn’t compute inside his head. Episode? What was she talking about? He wasn’t having an episode, he had an obligation. His son had been killed, he needed to avenge him. His son, Denarian, he–

–was standing in the doorway, his hands shaking, tears starting to well in his eyes. He took a step backwards when Fiearius looked at him, afraid, like he’d been caught where he shouldn’t have been. He shouldn’t have been here. He shouldn’t have seen this.

“Both of you, honestly,” Aela was saying. She didn’t know he was standing there yet. “How many times does this have to happen? Do you not have enough violence in your lives already without bringing it home? Next time maybe I’ll just let you two rip each other to shreds.”

Fiearius didn’t listen to her. His eyes were locked on Denarian’s, trying to apologize without words. The last thing he wanted was for the boy to see him like this. At his worst. But he had. I’m so sorry, he willed across the room. I’m so so sorry.

I’m so sorry I let them kill you.

“Come back to me.”

The hands holding his face turned him back to their owner, but it wasn’t Aela. The red hair beneath her headscarf was now brown, her skin turned to snow and her green eyes shone up at him sadly. “Come back to me,” she whispered again.

“Leta–” Fiearius finally relaxed against her touch, but as he searched over that familiar face, desperate for it to ground him here in reality, he saw what he’d done to it. There was a circle around her eye, tinged red and the beginnings of purple. Was that from– Had he–

“Shit. I–“

“It’s okay,” she spoke over him, shaking her head. “I’m fine. We need to go, okay?”

He was nodding before he knew what he was agreeing to. “Right,” he said for the second time today. “Let’s–”

Suddenly, a great vwhirr erupted out of the window, leaving a space only long enough to wonder what it had been before everything shook so violently that all three of them lost their footing and fell to the floor.

When Fiearius looked up again, the room was filled with smoke and dust. The screams he’d heard before were closer now, just outside. A woman shrieked a name. A child was sobbing. Someone was shouting out orders, telling people to leave, to run, this whole place was going to come down.

“Are they trying to kill you now?” Dez asked as he got to his feet. He held out his arm to help Fiearius up and he took it, dragging Leta with him.

“They should know where we are,” Leta breathed before coughing into the smoke. “They shouldn’t be firing near us.”

“They shouldn’t be firing at all.” Finally, he started to feel his senses come back to him. They needed to act. Quickly. “Leta, grab what you can fit in your pack.” He pointed to the pile of Aela’s documents. “Dez–” He met the man’s stare. Minutes ago, he’d wanted nothing more than to kill him, but now? Now he just wanted to get out of here alive and with the city not destroyed. Dez wasn’t ideal. Dez was a liar, a traitor, scum. But he’d do. “Come with me, let’s see what we’re dealing with.”

“I’ll be right behind you,” Leta promised as she hurriedly scooped whatever she could into her bag. Fiearius didn’t feel guilty leaving her in the room alone as he and Dez ran from apartment 24, down the stairs and out onto the street. She was probably safer in there anyway.

The street was in chaos. Fiearius couldn’t tell where the blast had landed, but it wasn’t far. Everything was in a haze. He could barely make out the silhouettes of buildings against the clouded light of the suns, he could see people running through the streets, carrying what possessions they couldn’t leave behind, desperately clinging to loved ones and scattering in all directions. Where could they go? Where would they be safe?

It was then that he noticed a pair of eyes on him. They belonged to an older woman, one that at first he didn’t recognize through the smoke and through the years. But slowly her face returned to him, younger than it was now, peering through the crack in his apartment door and demanding he pay his rent. When he’d known her, she’d always been frowning and grumpy, but now she was frightened. Of Carthis? Or of him?

He was still trying to figure out which when Dez nudged him with his elbow. Breaking away from his old landlady, he glanced back to ask what he was gesturing at, but he didn’t need to ask. All around him, the people that had been running and fleeing had stopped to stare. They watched, waited, expectantly, as though at any moment he might burst into flames or light or who knew what.

Well, Fiearius certainly didn’t know what. What the hell did these people want from him? If they were looking for a savior, they were looking in the wrong place. As soon as Leta joined them, they were leaving and these people could figure out what was next on their own.

But as confident as he sounded in his own head, his feet didn’t move and as he realized slowly that he knew more of these faces than he’d like to (the man with the dog across the street, the owner of the store at the corner, a woman he’d went on a few dates with way back when), the reality of this, being home, started to sink in.

These people looking at him now weren’t afraid of him, the supposed nefarious Rogue Verdant. They were curious. Patiently waiting to see what he might do next, this man that they’d once shared a home with. In their eyes he wasn’t a story, he was a person, one from the very same ground as they were. These people were his neighbors, people he’d known, celebrated with, greeted every morning. And now they were in danger because of something he had done. He had brought Carthis here. He had trusted them to do as he asked.

Dez had been right to be angry. What the hell had he done?

The next blast hit a block away. The calm in the street vanished in an instant. Those that weren’t running in the opposite direction as fast as they could, weren’t, only because they had fallen to the rocking ground and couldn’t right themselves.

Choking through the smoke, thick and black and flooding the narrow street, Fiearius hurried to the side of his cranky landlady, Dez meeting him on the other, to help her back to her feet.

“Head to the tunnels on Mari’lea!” he shouted, the first thing that came into his head. She might not be safe there, but she’d damn well be safer than here.

Fiearius put his palm on the floorboard and pressed. For a moment, nothing happened. Gods, it better not have broken. But finally, the board shifted. It lowered just enough to then slide underneath the board beside it, revealing the small dark space hidden beneath it. And inside? All the heavy bound documents, printed copies and miscellaneous evidence Aela had left there.

“Guess she was right,” Fiearius remarked, mostly to himself as he crouched down and pulled out the first thing that met his fingertips, a stack of records relating to an Internal agent going undercover on Ascendia. “No one ever found it.”

Leta crouched down beside him and reached her hand into the hole to fish something out. “Department of Health Incident Report on the Transport of Wellian Virus Specimen–” she read and then looked up at him in alarm. “This is about the outbreak on Vescent. The one that killed the Senate.”

Fiearius shrugged. “She knew what she was looking for in terms of blackmail, that’s for sure…”

“This is about–Rebeka Palano.” Leta continued to sift through the documents. “Arleth Morgan? All the Councillors, they’re all in here. The takeover of Vescent. ARC?” She looked up at him in alarm. “Fiear, she knew everything…”

The revelation didn’t surprise him exactly. Of course, if anyone had uncovered the identities of the Councillors and the unsavory actions of the Society long before anyone else, it would be Aela. But even so, having the proof in his hands didn’t comfort him. If she’d known about all this–why hadn’t she told him? Sure, she’d stored all her evidence in a space under their bed that he had access to, but–she’d made it sound boring. “It’s all just paperwork and accounting,” she’d said, essentially discouraging him from ever bothering to look.

Above that, even, it changed the context of–well, everything. Aela had always been pushing them to leave Satieri, start a new life elsewhere, but she had never given an exact reason. But if she knew, if she knew all of–this? Did she–

“Alright, hi, here we go.”

He hadn’t heard that voice in over a decade. He’d last heard it pleading for the life of their son, desperate and cracked and strained. But now it sounded calm, collected, the same logical woman who had asked him to marry her once upon a time. For just a second, he thought it was a ghost.

But the thought passed as quickly as it had come. The voice had come from a tablet Leta was holding in her hands and hurriedly paused. She looked over at him in alarm and then grimaced an apology before handing it to him.

And there was her face on the screen. Her dark skin, her sharp green eyes, the freckles that dotted her cheeks that he could still mark the constellations in. It had been so long since he’d looked at that face and yet every inch of it was familiar, right up to the top of the orange sundress that hung from her shoulders. It was her favorite dress on a warm spring day, she wore it constantly. She wore it when she died.

Hesitantly, he pressed play again and her voice once more filled the room.

“If you’re watching this, it means–” She heaved a sigh. “Something went terribly wrong. Which, as you might imagine, given what you probably know now, is a little difficult to talk about.” A fleeting smile passed across her face. She was nervous, her eyebrows knit together in worry. “I guess I’m dead. Which–really sucks. I’m–or by the time you watch this, I was–really trying to avoid that. Something must have happened, I maybe made a mistake or there was another factor I didn’t think about or–”

Beside him, Fiearius felt Leta start to get to her feet to leave, but he reached out a hand to her. “No, stay,” he ordered. Leta sat back down without a word.

“Okay, I’m sorry, this is not how I should be doing this.” Aela shook her bushy red hair and crunched her eyes shut like she always did when she was concentrating. “Alright, let me start over.”

There was a long pause before another deep breath and then she looked straight into the camera and smiled. “Hi, F. If you’re watching this, it means I died. And I owe you an explanation. A few, really. I’ve owed you explanations for a long time, but you never asked for any. You’re too trusting, you know that? You don’t think you are, but you are. And–it’s not fair to you.” She nodded solemnly. “You deserve to know.”

She shuffled a little in her seat and settled in. “I’ve done some things that I regret. Who hasn’t, I guess? But mine, it started many years ago. We hadn’t met yet.” She spoke so calmly, so plainly, like she was reading off a teleprompter. “I was approached by a man named Dorrion E’etan. At the time, he had just become the Verdant of the Society. You’ve seen him, you know who he is now. This was before then. Before he was everywhere. And he gave me an assignment. The assignment was to get to know you.”

A brief flash of a grimace passed over her face before she hurried on, waving her hand in front of the camera, “This sounds terrible, I know. But hear me out, okay? I was an up and comer in Information, I’d been working towards investigator, this guy, this really important guy tells me that I’m perfect for this really important job, of course I’m going to take it without a second thought. So now you know. That’s why I was at that party I had no business being at all those years ago. That’s why I sat right where I knew you’d see me. And that’s why I didn’t totally write you off when you delivered that absolutely terrible pick up line.” She cocked a brow knowingly. “Seriously, dear, I know you’re single again now, but never use that again.”

She cleared her throat. “Anyway. At first I didn’t know why I had to stalk you. I would just report back to E’etan with whatever I had and he never asked for more. And eventually? He stopped asking for reports. No fanfare, no closure, the assignment just ended and I moved on. Of course by then, you’d kind of grown on me, doofy as you were.” The smile that twisted in her lips put a terrible knot in Fiearius’ chest. “And since you weren’t an assignment anymore? I think you remember the day I turned in my last report, let’s say.”

But her smile only lasted a moment before it changed to an expression much more tinged with sadness. Her eyes cast downward and her jaw tightened. “I wish that was the end of it. But. Like I said. I have regrets. And meeting you was not one of them. What was, however, was telling E’etan all that I told him. All good things, mind you. Competent, efficient, a good leader, loyal to a fault. Everything he was looking for–” She hesitated and her stare flicked back towards the camera. “–for his replacement.”

“This should come as no surprise to you, right about now,” she admitted. “If what I think is happening today happened already, you already know. But Fiearius–” She began to shake her head, slowly, painfully and then locked her eyes on his with a disturbing intensity. “You can’t. I don’t know what you saw, I don’t know how it went down, but I need you to understand this. You can’t stay here. You have to leave.”

“E’etan–once I found out his intentions for you, I reached out to him again. We’d been together a while, you and I. I needed to know what it meant. I’d read things in my work, discovered things that–well, they’re all here. You can read them yourself. You should read them, I’m sorry I told you otherwise until now. You had dedicated your life to the Society. They were your guiding light. I couldn’t just tell you that the Council you serve had been corrupted and had done horrible, awful things. I should have told you before. But I’m telling you now.”

Lifting her hand to literally regrasp her lost train of thought, she went on, “But E’etan, he already knew. He told me about being Verdant, he told me about the Council, who they were, how they acted. I was horrified. He was horrified. And when I asked about you, he–he told me about his plan. Why he had already sought out his replacement. He was already done being Verdant, he couldn’t do anything as Verdant. He was aiming for Councillor.”

Aela was breathing heavily now, there was a slight sheen on her eyes as the corners of them filled with water. “His plan–F, it wasn’t good for you. It didn’t end well for you. But I saw an opportunity and I took it. I agreed to help him. We launched an initiative behind the Council’s back. He was Verdant, they’d never find out if he didn’t want them to. It was foolproof.”

“The man was no idiot though,” she clarified, “he knew my intentions were to protect you, but he played along. We each made our moves. I tried, gods how I tried, to extract the both of us from the game. I tried to convince you to leave Satieri, when we got married, when Denarian was born, every chance I got–” Her voice cracked a little and she put her hand over her eyes. “If I’d just told you, if I’d just been honest–” Her hand fell away and when she faced the camera again, her expression was starting to break.

“I have regrets. I made mistakes. And today, if you’re watching this, no matter how good or bad I was at the game, E’etan outplayed me. I’m gone. But, gods willing, you’re not.”

Her hands reached out to grab the camera, but she may have well have reached out of the screen and seized his throat. “F, no matter what, you need to leave. You need to take Denarian and you need to leave. Take everything stored here and go anywhere. Remember that restaurant you always talked about opening on the shores of Paraven? Do it. Or go to Tarin. Yseltin will help you. Go anywhere, just get away from here as quickly as you can.”

Her tone deepened suddenly. “But F, if you killed him? If he succeeded and made you Verdant?” The camera, still held in her hands, shook ever so slightly. “They’ll never let you go. They’ll chase you across the Span. But E’etan was wrong.” And here, she frowned with determination. “The Verdant isn’t powerless. With all you know, everything you have, everything here? You don’t have to take it. You can fight back. You can make a life.”

There were tears now, running down her cheeks as her voice quivered. “I screwed up, F. But it’s not too late. Protect our son. Protect yourself. I love you so much and I’m so sorry. I’m so so sorry.”

The screen turned to black and she was gone, just like that. As gone as she’d ever been. Fiearius didn’t know what he was supposed to feel, but the reality was somewhere between getting punched in the gut by someone twice his size and complete and utter numbness. He still held the tablet in front of him and the planet must have been shaking. Or was that his hand?

“Fiear?” he heard Leta begin to ask.

“No,” was all he could say. “The answer is no.”

He felt her hand on his back for just a moment before she gasped and grasped at her gun. When Fiearius turned to look at what had shocked her, he was not at all surprised to find Dez standing in the doorway. Of course he was. He’d be more surprised to not find him there watching, waiting.

The room was still, none of them daring to move or speak. And then the planet did shake. A burst of light rained down from the skies above them and collided with the cityscape out the window. The blast was so loud it was silent and Fiearius’ ears were still ringing when he stood up to look out at the plume of smoke that followed it, dark and heavy and black.

“So,” Desophyles mused, leaning against the wall. “What now, Admiral?”

But as similar as it was physically, it felt entirely different. This street, this community, had once been warm, kind, welcoming, but now it was cold, dark and empty. Which made sense, there was a battle going on above them. Even in the daylight, the explosions could be seen in the skies. But it was more than that. Fiearius got the distinct impression that it had been cold here for a while.

Still, he was glad to find no blatant opposition as he traversed the shadows of the buildings towards his old home, Leta behind him. She was being extra careful to stay beneath the cover of shade, he noticed, but he couldn’t tell if it was to remain unseen or simply to keep her delicate skin out of the harsh Satieran sun. Any other time, he might have teased her about it, but now, when the only noises were the distant shudders of ship fire and their own footsteps, it felt wrong to disrupt the quiet. It felt wrong to make jokes. Everything, actually just…felt wrong.

He tried not to think about the wreckage they’d left in the Satieran atmosphere…

“Fiear,” he heard Leta whisper behind him and her hand reached out for his arm. His grip on his gun tightened as he looked back at her, but she didn’t seem to be reacting to a threat. She was standing very still, facing him, but her eyes were locked on the upper window of a building across the street. “Look.”

Carefully, he did as he was told, though not quite as subtly as she had. He met the pair of eyes that were watching them from above, they widened in alarm and the curtain was drawn shut instantly.

“There were others, too,” she muttered, glancing over her shoulder. There were no more obvious spectators in view, but Fiearius didn’t think she was wrong when she said, “I swear it, I can feel them watching us.”

So they weren’t as alone as he’d thought. He felt a touch of pity for these people, terrified and holed up in their homes, waiting for whatever was going to happen to them next. What would he have done, if he’d still lived here during all of this? Been like these people and stayed inside with his family, hoping it would all turn out okay? Or would he be up in the sky, fighting off the invasion?

It didn’t matter now. “As long as they’re watching and not attacking, I’m fine with it,” Fiearius mumbled and continued onward. They were almost there, he could see the steps to the door from here, still missing a chunk after Fiearius had gotten into an impromptu fight with a shotgun in 1853. He stepped over a dark patch of concrete, tinged ever so slightly red, where he’d once tripped and reopened a wound from a recent job gone wrong. He didn’t have to look at the wall of the neighboring apartment to know that there would still be one big and one tiny handprint stained into its surface.

Fiearius had always been acutely aware of the marks this place had left on him over the years, how Satieri still lived in his veins and shaped his bones, but it had never occurred to him how many scars he himself had left. And as he approached the front of the building he had once called home, it quickly became clear just how much of an effect he’d had.

“Dov’ha ti’arte…” he breathed, finding himself stunned to a stop as he looked up to take it all in. The building hadn’t changed in a decade. It was the same shambly old building, dated, but comfortable, homey, with its friendly green door and cheerful round windows. It may have been given a fresh coat of paint, but it was hard to tell given the layers of graffiti that covered the lower floor.

There were libreras, and then altered versions of libreras, the same that Dez and his followers wore. Anti-Carthian slurs, scribbled Ridellian prayers, Society posters of his face, their slogans changed from ‘beware’ to ‘be aware’. But the piece that took up the most space, the thing your eye was drawn to first was the huge painting of Fiearius, his eyes and mouth covered by the bold phrase in red paint ‘THE ROGUE VERDANT LIVES’.

Startling was an understated description.

Fiearius was still standing, staring in a stupor, when he felt Leta’s hand on his arm. “You okay?” she asked.

No. No, he was not okay. This was not, in any sense of the word, okay. Fleetingly, he thought of Dez. This was probably his doing. Spreading lies and bullshit to garner more people to his crazy purpose. But then just as fleetingly, he remembered someone else. A ship captain he’d met long ago on Archeti, long before Dez’s movement, aboard a Society ship he was stealing. The first he stole, actually. And the words that had never left him. ‘You’re an inspiration. A legend. You give us hope.’

Gods, how the hell had this gotten so messy?

“Yeah, come on.” He marched up the stairs, decidedly ignoring the bizarre, disturbing shrine that had been resurrected here on his behalf, but as he barged through the front door, he found it didn’t end there. The murals continued in the hallways. On the doors to the apartments within. The ones that hadn’t been torn down to reveal equally defaced and trashed rooms inside anyway.

People had lived here, that much was certain. There was tossed furniture, strewn linens, things left behind that weren’t worth packing when the residents had been run out. There was an abandoned plush dog toy at the bottom of the stairs. What remained of a dresser at the top of them.

“It’s apartment 24,” he told Leta, though he didn’t need to. Even from the landing, the door they needed was apparent. It was where all the paintings and drawings and scribbled sentences culminated. The original color of the doorframe wasn’t even visible anymore, so covered in additions. The door itself was nowhere in sight and as Fiearius carefully stepped over a beat up couch cushion onto the threshold of his old home, he didn’t feel the same sense of familiarity he had on the street. The four walls of the cramped living room may have stood in the same place, the doors to the balcony, shattered, were where they were meant to be, but this wasn’t his home.

“Is this stuff–yours?” Leta crept around him into the living room, stepping over abandoned paint cans, broken furniture and glass.

“No. Don’t know what happened to my stuff.” He shrugged. He hadn’t even thought about ‘his stuff’ in a decade. Must not have been that important. “Didn’t have much to begin with.”

“So this is recent then.” She gestured to the mess around them. By the way some things still sat, untouched and innocent, it seemed whoever had been run out of here had been run out of here quickly. When she reached the one remaining bookshelf that hadn’t been torn apart, she lifted the broken picture frame from it gently. It flickered on, just briefly enough to show its image.

“This poor family…” Fiearius heard her mutter as he walked the opposite direction towards the bedroom. It was difficult enough to not wonder if he was in some way at fault for this. He had no intention of getting to know his victims if he was.

The bedroom was less ransacked than the main room of the apartment. There was still a bed in it, for one thing and though the writings on the wall were similar to the rest of the building, he spotted a few cruder ones in here. He almost wanted to laugh at the absurdity of it. Almost.

“You okay?” he heard Leta ask from the doorway and this time, he frowned back at her.

“Would you stop asking me that?”

At once he saw her bristle with irritation. “Oh I’m sorry, is my genuine concern for your wellbeing bothering you?”

He rolled his eyes. “A little bit.”

“Well get over it.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “This is really weird. I’m sure it’s even weirder for you. I just want to make sure you’re alright because I care, deal. Now I’ll ask again, are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” he lied, almost smirking. Annoying or no, Leta’s eternal willingness to battle him on even the smallest things added just a touch of normalcy to this otherwise alien situation. “Now help me move this, would ya?”

Setting their hands down on the mattress,they pushed the heavy bed out of the way into the corner of the room. Underneath, the hardwood floorboards looked entirely innocent, just like any other piece of flooring. He could still remember the afternoon Aela installed the box beneath them, smiling ever so proudly to herself. “No one will ever find it,” she had declared pulling her palm from the floor and wiping her hands together in satisfaction.

Overhead, a great metallic mass was just visible through the window, blocking out the sun and plunging the bridge into darkness as it passed over them. It was an impressive ship, at least impressive compared to the Dionysian, though that wasn’t hard. She was about four times in size, for one, made within the last century and equipped with actual weaponry integrated with her systems rather than a single turret Cyrus had welded on when the war started.

“Our friends upstairs are holdin’ their own, how bout I lend my talents to gettin’ you lot planet-side?” Quin asked as her ship sped off in front of them and started firing in all directions. The swarm of fighters tried to regroup to attack her, but one by one, Leta watched them turn to flames in the atmosphere and burn up into dust. At the very least, the new ship was drawing more fire away from the Dionysian, allowing their shields a break to regenerate. At best, it was clearing out an entire path that would lead them to Satieri.

Fiearius seemed to relax a little as the Dionysian settled into Quin’s quiet wake. “You gonna hold this one over me too, then?”

Quin’s laugh could be heard through the COMM. “‘Course sweetheart. Your debt to me ain’t ever gonna shrink at this rate. You can win this war and free whoever, won’t matter, you’re gonna be workin’ for me til the day you die.”

Fiearius shrugged. “I can think of worse fates.”

“Your optimism is misplaced, I’m puttin’ you on whichever latrine duty I can find.”

“My cruel mistress,” Fiearius chuckled.

Leta tried not to laugh herself at what this had turned into. From a panic-stricken descent with danger flying at them from all sides to a calm pleasure cruise for Fiearius to flirt with his colleague. True, there were still fighters barraging them, but Quin’s ship was blasting them down one by one while barely taking a few hits that bounced right off her superior shields. They were nearly to the planet’s surface which was when the ground defenses started acting up.

A blast from the city below flew right past Quin’s ship, barely missing its hull and Fiearius had to roll the Dionysian out of the way to spare their own.

“Alright, I’m gonna take out these shitty turrets for ya,” Quin promised, redirecting her ship’s weapons towards the surface. “These fuckers are scrambling our radars so cover me?”

“Our gun’s down, but–” Fiearius began only to be cut off by another laugh. He ignored it and continued, “I’ll let you know if you’re in trouble.”

Fortunately, the immediate area had been completely wiped of life. If nothing else, Quin was thorough and though Fiearius kept his eyes locked on the viewport, the skies were clear. And they were truly in the skies now. The city was now laid out in front of them, finally within grasp. They’d made it. Thank the gods, they’d made it. All at once Leta was both relieved and more nervous than ever.

The last turret on the surface erupted in a burst of flames and smoke, which was Quin’s cue.

“You’re all clear, love,” she called to them. “Take care o’ yourself down there, alright? You die and your debt transfers to next of kin and I’ve met that lil brother o’ yours. Don’t think he’d like that much.”

“For Cyrus’ sake alone, I will survive.” Leta couldn’t help but notice how hard Fiearius swallowed before he said, “See you in a few hours, Q.”

“Countin’ on it, hotshot.”

The great ship before them turned away from the planet and started to make its ascent back into the atmosphere to rejoin the rest of the fleet, which was when Leta caught sight of something in her peripheral vision. Something moving fast. Very fast. That ground turret hadn’t been the last, she realized, just in time.

“Fiear–” she got out just barely, sure that he was seeing it too, sure that he would warn Quin, tell them to reroute frontal shields to the rear, surely he would–

Boom.

The impact shook the Dionysian as a blast of fire and metal from Quin’s ship exploded out into the sky. There was smoke, so much smoke, Leta caught a glimpse of the ship’s front drifting through it just before the second shot hit.

“Quin!” Fiearius shouted into the COMM, his voice cracked in desperation. “Quin, do you read?!”

There was no response. A third explosion.

“Quin, come in! Anyone, please, come in,” Fiearius tried again, his hand that gripped the COMM was shaking. Still, no response. Leta felt her chest grow both heavy and empty at once. There would be no response. Three direct hits from ground artillery? There would be no response.

“Quin!”

Leta didn’t feel like she could speak or move. The smoke was starting to clear and the ship that had saved them minutes ago — rather the wreckage of what little was left of it — floated helplessly in the sky before them. She could barely stand to look at it, but she couldn’t look away either. Neither could the rest of the bridge crew. She could hear Maya, her wide eyes locked on the viewport, breathing shallow breaths beside her. Javier had finally looked away from the nav console and collapsed into the co-pilot’s seat. And Fiearius–

“No, no, no, no,” he was muttering under his breath, gripping the edge of the console with quaking hands. “No.” He shook the dashboard. “No!” His fist rammed into the metal. As he drew it away, Leta saw the dent and the speckle of blood.

As shattered as Leta felt, she knew she couldn’t fathom what Fiearius was feeling. He stood hunched over the dashboard, his head down, his chest rising and falling in jagged motions, his arms barely holding him up. But as much as it pained her, now was not the time for grief. Now, they didn’t have time for sorrow.

“Fiearius,” she said, her voice sharp and an equally sharp spike of guilt rushed through her. He glanced back at her and the look on his face almost changed her mind. But she steeled herself and stared straight back at him, face stony. They had to keep moving. They had to finish the mission regardless of loss. And he knew it.

It was a long moment of silence. She didn’t want to say what had to be said, she didn’t want to speak the words, and thank the gods, he didn’t make her. At last, he released the breath he’d been holding in his lungs and turned back to the console. It was another moment, his eyes clenched shut, before he got his focus back.

“Right.” His hands gripped the controls. “All power to front shields.”

“You got it, capitaine.”

“Weapons still jammed?”

“Working on it, cap’n.”

“Get it running. Pigeon?”

Javier tapped a few buttons on his console. “Signal’s coming back strong, captain.”

“Great. Keep an eye on that turret for me.” Fiearius heaved another deep breath. “Making our final descent.”

In one swift motion, the Dionysian sped forward. Javier barked something, Fiearius dodged a blast, Maya relayed the shield power and they soared straight through the wreckage and towards the Paradexian skyline, but all Leta could focus on was the back of Fiearius’ head. She wanted to comfort him. She wanted to put a hand on his shoulder, pull him into an embrace, soothe the turmoil that was surely rifling through him.

But she stayed in her seat and let him fly the ship. She said nothing, did nothing, as he and his crew expertly navigated the last few thousand feet to the planet’s surface. She kept her urges to herself as the Dionysian leveled itself and lowered between the buildings and touched down on Satieran ground for the first time in over a decade.

It was only when the shuddering of the ship stopped, the engine powered down and Fiearius rose from his seat that Leta acted at all. He didn’t meet her eyes as he headed out of the bridge and told her, “Let’s go.” At once, she was on her feet, following him through the ship. Javier hurried past them, getting the door to the cargo bay unsealed before they arrived and the outer ramp down. Rhys was there too, with Eve, handing Fiearius a gun, a second gun, patting him on the back. Richelle and Maya rushed in after them, but Fiearius moved through them all like a ghost, perhaps not seeing them at all.

It wasn’t until Fiearius was halfway down the ramp, Leta on his tail, that he looked back at his faithful crew, hovering awkwardly at the top of it in a row. “Take care of the ship,” he managed and they nodded fervently.

“You got it, cap’n,” promised Eve.

“Aye aye,” said Rhys.

“Don’t worry ‘bout a thing,” said Maya as Richelle nodded.

“Good luck, captain,” said Javier.

Fiearius provided them perhaps the weakest smile she’d ever seen grace his face before turning back out and continuing slowly down the ramp. Leta still followed in silence until he stopped again, right at the base of it, staring down at the Satieran ground in front of him like a challenge he wasn’t sure he wanted to take.

“Fiear…” Leta touched his elbow gently.

“I should have seen it,” he said and Leta didn’t have to ask to know what he meant. The shot. The shot that took her down. “I should have seen it coming.”

Horribly, she had thought the same thing when it happened. She had seen it from further back in the bridge. It was right in front of him and he’d done nothing. She had seen it though. She’d seen it–it hit her suddenly–on the left. Unconsciously, she looked over at Fiearius’ glassy left eye.

“It’s not your fault,” she assured him, gripping his arm now. “It’s not your fault at all.”

Fiearius heaved a sigh. “Sure.” He hesitated just one more moment before setting his foot down in the dirt of his estranged home. “Be on your guard,” he warned, drawing his gun. “We’re not far.”

“Why?”

He swung back towards her. “Why?”

“Yeah, why? Why do you need to do this alone? Why do you need to put yourself in unnecessary danger?”

“Leta,” Fiearius groaned again.

“Fiearius,” she growled right back. “Tell me why. Give me one good reason and I’ll consider backing off. My name doesn’t count as an argument.”

“Because.”

“Because why?”

“Because it’s personal, okay?”

“Your reason?”

“Wha–No! This mission is personal!” he snapped, stepping back towards her in a burst of anger. “Digging through my dead wife’s stuff is personal. Looking for evidence of her involvement with the man who killed our son is personal. It’s personal and I need to do it alone.”

The rare moment of perfect clarity stunned Leta to silence, even though she’d been expecting it. Even though she’d pushed him to it. But as stunned as she was, it was the rest of the crew, still hovering around the bay, looking very much out of place, that had the biggest shock. Richelle’s eyes were wide, Maya’s mouth had dropped open, even Eve looked confused and it only took Fiearius a few moments of hard breathing to realize they were still there.

He grit his teeth. “Did I not fuckin’ give you orders?” His tone was low and voice barely audible, but the rage in it was enough to send the crew scattering. In instants, Fiearius and Leta were alone in the cargo bay.

She spoke gently. “You know what I’m going to say.”

Fiearius, who had been content to try and stare her down, flicked his eyes finally to the floor in what could only be defeat. “That it being personal is even more reason to have someone else there.”

Leta nodded. “I respect your privacy, Fiear, and I get the sensitivity of this. But I want you to come out of it alive. I don’t have to look through Aela’s stuff with you. You don’t have to tell me anything you find there. But I’m going with you. Just in case…you need me to be there.”

His stance, at last, loosened. His tense muscles relaxed. He put his hand on his forehead. “Fine. Fine, you can come.”

“Good.” Leta stepped forward and looped her arm through his, turning him around and leading him through the cargo bay up towards the bridge. “Not that I would have taken no for an answer.”

At her side, Fiearius snorted a laugh. “I know. You really do belong on this fucking ship, don’t you?”

—————

The blast barely missed them, but it still made the Dionysian shudder violently. Leta gripped the edge of her seat in the crowded bridge, her knuckles turning white as she watched the planet out of the viewport spin and sway in and out of view. She’d been on enough ships now and particularly this one enough to not flat out vomit at the sight of it anymore, but she wasn’t totally immune. Her stomach groaned its nausea.

“That was a close one. Runaway, I need more power to my starboard thrusters,” Fiearius shouted into the COMM over the noise of the Dionysian and the Society ships swarming the atmosphere around them.

The descent to Satieri was about what Leta would have expected: terrifying and totally outnumbered. From the moment the Dionysian arrived in Exymerian space, they were under attack. Carthian warships and select dreadnoughts from Fiearius’ own fleet followed after them, drawing in much of the heavy fire from the planet’s defenses, but even so, the barrage was overwhelming. It was as if the entire Society was here trying to shoot them down and it was only Fiearius’ reckless piloting that was keeping them afloat as they plowed forward towards the planet.

“On it, capitaine! More power to starboard!” Richelle called back from the engine room.

“We’ve got a stealth coming up at our five,” Javier from the co-pilot’s chair announced, clutching onto the console, his eyes locked on the navigations radar.

“Harper, you got ‘em?”

“Positive, cap’n.” The ship jolted suddenly, indication that Eve had fired off the Dionysian’s retro-fitted turret. It was followed by a symphony of clanging as pieces of the felled ship met the Dionysian’s body.

Before Fiearius could even ask, Maya, crammed into the seat beside Leta with a monitoring device hooked up to the dashboard, shouted, “Hull’s holding strong, shields at 40%.”

“That could be better,” Fiearius mumbled as he yanked on the controls and the ship barrel-rolled out of the path of a sleek black fighter headed straight at them.

But from where Leta sat, she didn’t exactly see how that was true. Sure, things could always be better, shields could be at 100, they could not be narrowly avoiding an all-out assault, Satieri could be Society-free and full of puppies, but by Dionysian standards, how they were faring was remarkable in and of itself. In the old days when Leta had lived aboard the ship fulltime, there was a constant sense of panic. Everything that could go wrong went wrong and the crew was eternally engaged in yelling matches with one another.

The Dionysian today was practically unrecognizable. They were still barreling towards danger, Fiearius was still barking out orders, but the ship and her crew was adapting to every step like a well-oiled machine.

“Starboard power compensated, capitaine!” came Richelle’s voice over the COMM.

Fiearius hit a switch and the ship gracefully zoomed to the left just as another blast flew past them. “Beautiful. Let’s–”

“Work on shield regeneration next, already on it.” The COMM went dead as Richelle got back to work.

Leta had once teased Fiearius that his new crew were all young and inexperienced in running a ship, but watching them now, she regretted it. Perhaps it was a testament to their captain’s improvement in leadership abilities. Or perhaps being on a boat in the midst of a war just required them to step up their game and learn to function. Whatever the reason, Leta was impressed and she had more faith than ever that the Dionysian would make it to ground.

Unfortunately, the crew’s skills weren’t the only factor and though Fiearius continued to fly them further and further through the atmosphere and the city of Paradiex grew closer and closer, there were still countless fighters they had to avoid and even more countless blasts flying at them from all directions.

One of them hit.

The Dionysian shook violently and her alarm started to blare overhead. “Shit,” Fiearius growled as Maya started to rattle off a damage report.

“Shields down to 10%, no systems affected, minor hull breach in the cargo bay–”

“Decompressing and sealing bay, routing additional life support power to engine room,” said Javier, tapping furiously on the keyboard.

“And rerouting to shields,” called Richelle.

“Shields back to 40.” The alarms switched off.

Leta was glad that she took a moment to look at Fiearius just then and catch the utterly proud smirk on his face. If he hadn’t been in the middle of maneuvering his beast of a boat out of the way of three separate attacks, he probably would have turned to her, gestured to his crew and snapped, “See?”

Good thing he didn’t though, because in the next moment, their triumph was quickly overshadowed by a new squad of fighter ships suddenly drifting into the viewport, these ones even more numerous than the last.

Leta saw Fiearius grit his teeth and clutch the controls tighter. “Stay on ‘em, Harper, I’ll avoid what I can, but–”

“I’ll take ‘em down, cap’n,” Eve promised from the upper artillery, staying true to her word and firing off a round that shattered one of the ships like glass. But just one. The rest, on cue, fired their weapons and all at once, some twenty bursts of light were speeding straight towards them.

“Oh shit,” Fiearius whispered as he yanked the ship controls back even harder than before and the Dionysian spun upwards, the planet and the ships swinging out of view. “Shoot them faster, Harper!”

“Captain, they’re scattering our sensors,” Javier shouted out from next to him as Fiearius swung the Dionysian back around, making a quick sprint towards the planet and narrowly avoiding the much faster, more maneuverable ships.

“What?! How is that even–”

“We got another problem, cap’n!” came Eve’s voice. “Turret’s jammed again, I can’t shoot!”

Javier was still gripping the navigations console and searching over the screen desperately. “I can’t see them!”

Just then, as the Dionysian attempted to power forward, six of those fighter ships Javier couldn’t see zoomed into the viewport again.

“Well I can!” Fiearius shoved the controls forward and the ships swooped downwards, underneath the enemy blasts and zooming straight below them right as two of them inexplicably exploded. The debris rained down on the Dionysian’s hull as they passed beneath, sounding like a storm overhead.

The Dionysian’s weapons were jammed, thought Leta. And even if they weren’t, Eve wasn’t that good of a shot, so how–

“Why am I always havin’ to save your ass, darlin’?” came Quin’s voice over the COMM and Fiearius’ face lit up with a smile.

“‘Cause you love me,” he chimed back cheerfully, swerving around another ship that promptly blew up.

“I was thinkin’ more ‘cause you still insist on drivin’ that piece o’ junk around.”

He shrugged in admission. “That too.”

Cyrus didn’t need to be told twice. He sighed again, his contentedness meter filling back up, and turned around to get back to work. But instead, he turned around to find Kalli standing at his feet, looking up at Addy’s screen.

“Freeship!” the girl exclaimed, pointing at it.

“What?” He glanced at Addy who shrugged and reminded, “Did you finish picking up your toys?”

Kalli ignored her and said again, “Freeship, freeship!”

“Both of you and your lack of sentences,” Addy muttered.

“What’s ‘freeship’?” Cyrus asked her and Kalli rolled her eyes and groaned.

“Freeship! With the trees that hang from the sky,” she explained in entirely uncertain terms. “The trees and the sharp bits I can’t touch.”

Cyrus stared down at his daughter, completely at a loss. When she’d been too little to talk, he’d wished she could master words to tell them what she wanted or needed. He’d been foolish to hope that would help…

Addy looked just as lost as he did, but just as he was about to give up and assume Kalli was just playing one of her games again, a spark of memory. A memory of hanging gardens that Kalli had been fascinated by and a lot of debris that Cyrus had warned her to steer clear of. He swung his attention to the console in alarm. It couldn’t be. How the hell would she even recognize it anyway? They’d visited once many months ago.

But as he looked at the screen and tilted his head, he too recognized the shape of the ship Addy was researching. “Holy shit…”

“Cyrus!” Addy scolded at once as Kalli laughed and muttered, “P’ahti said a dirty word.”

“S-sorry,” Cyrus apologized quickly, but waved off his girlfriend’s anger. “But look at this. Adds, we know where this ship is.” She frowned at him, but he was on the verge of laughing. “It’s the Conduit.”

———-

Fiearius was running over what he was going to say all the way through the Beacon’s airlock, down the halls of the Carthian warship and right up to the door of Gates’ office. The plan was still shaping and morphing in his head, but presumably by the time he spit it out, it would make sense.

Hopefully.

“Admiral.” The door slid open, catching Fiearius off-guard as he was halfway through the speech in his head again.

He looked over at Gates’ tired eyes and felt a touch of pity for the man. Or perhaps just solidarity. He’d come here preparing for a fight, but now that he saw his counterpart, just as exhausted and run down as Fiearius felt (though perhaps a little less bruised and beaten physically), he didn’t feel quite so combative.

That is, until Gates said, “Late as always, I see.”

Fiearius’ brows snapped together into a frown as he pushed past the man into the room. Of Gates’ offices, it was the smallest he’d seen yet with a desk barely crammed into the tiny space and only a few boxes of personal items still unpacked.

“Bet you’re missing the CORS right about now,” Fiearius muttered as he looked around for a chair. There was only one, a rickety-looking metal thing with one of those boxes on it. He’d stay standing instead.

“It was an unfortunate loss for the greater good,” Gates admitted which was verbatim the Carthian press release about it. Closing the door, he shuffled past Fiearius and leaned his palms on the desk. “How are your injuries?”

Fiearius glanced down at the bruised scar that was forming from where he’d been shot, a nasty looking thing. “I’ve had worse,” he lied.

“And what about –” He gestured vaguely towards Fiearius’ face. The eye, of course, which people couldn’t stop commenting on.

“Doctor said the nerve got fucked up from the electrical shock that brought me back. There’s some surgery they could try, but it’s basically gone.” Fiearius shrugged. Of all the things he could have lost over his lifetime, an eye hardly seemed the worst of it. “Doesn’t bug me much.”

“Does it affect your performance though?”

The question gave Fiearius pause and he couldn’t stop himself from shooting a glare at the older man who probably hadn’t fired a gun or raided a base or headed an operation of his own in over a decade.

“No.”

Thankfully, Gates didn’t argue. “Good, because we’re definitely going to need you for the next phase.”

“Right, I heard you lot were holding meetings behind my back,” Fiearius grumbled good-naturedly, though Gates may have thought he was serious considering his response.

“With the aftermath of Ellegy, we couldn’t wait for your recovery to convene the council. We needed action and we did extend an invitation to Ms. Utada in your absence, but she did not attend any of the meetings.”

Fiearius snorted a laugh. “Yeah she hates you.” Gates provided him a glare that read ‘the feeling’s mutual,’ but he kept the thought to himself.

“Regardless, we’ve decided to move forward with an action I hope you and your fleet will get on board with,” Gates went on, sitting down now and tapping the screen of his console to power it on. “We’ve tracked the Ellegian fleet that took down the CORS. About half of it reported back to Satieri, the last remaining Society stronghold, but another half seems to be holding point in the wreckage for reasons we can’t determine.” Fiearius was busy thumbing through a stack of papers, but he flicked his eyes towards the admiral briefly and held his tongue. Carthis didn’t need to know that the reason was Dez. At least not yet.

“We have reason to believe both the Ellegian fleet and the Satieran fleet are regrouping as we speak to launch an attack on our occupation of Ellegy. With the Society and now the rebellion joined forces on the ground, an air assault would end us entirely. With nowhere close by to retreat to anymore, we need to launch an offensive and quickly. We’ve got enough bombers to–”

“Alright,” Fiearius cut him off suddenly, dropping the papers back in the box and turning to face the desk. “Let me just stop you right there. We’re not bombing anything.”

Gates had paused with his mouth open and his hand in the air. He watched Fiearius, neither surprised nor irritated by the interruption, but curious. He lowered his hand. “I assumed you might say as much. We’ve weighed our options, admiral. Sacrificing the safety of the civilians of Ellegy or Satieri is hardly ideal, but with no other course of action, we must–”

“No,” Fiearius interrupted again and this time Gates laced his hands together in front of him and waited patiently. “We’re not sacrificing anybody. We don’t need to.” He took a deep breath and stepped towards him. “I found the final Councillor.”

Gates’ brows lifted in interest. “Oh?”

Fiearius considered amending the statement. Well, not exactly found. More like figured out something that may help to find him. A possible clue. But that was hardly very convincing, was it? So instead, he nodded.

“And where is he?”

“Satieri.”

Gates stared at him for a moment and then looked down at his console and shook his head. “We can’t breach Satieri’s defenses. We’ll have to move forward with our plan and you can deal with the Councillor afterwards–”

“No.” Fiearius stepped forward again and put his fist down on Gates’ desk. “We don’t have to breach it. Not entirely. I just need to get the Dionysian on the ground.”

“Which would require the rest of the fleet to clear out a path in the air defense. Which we can’t do. We don’t have enough firepower to battle the Satieran barricade head-on, we–”

“I’m not asking you to battle them.” Gates flicked his eyes back towards him and Fiearius could see just the hint of interest behind the mask of skepticism. “I just need you to cover me. Distract them, don’t engage, just enough for me to slip through. When I’m done, you warp out of there to safety. You don’t have to win, you just have to survive.”

That hint of interest, Fiearius could tell, was starting to inch towards belief. But then he asked, “How long do you need?”

Fiearius grimaced. “A few hours.”

Gates dropped his head and stood up, leaning on the desk again. “That’s a long time to survive a superior fleet barraging us.”

“I know, you’re just gonna have to get creative,” Fiearius countered. “But you can do it. We can do this. I can do this. And once it’s done?” He lifted his hands in a shrug. “The Society can’t function as a unit without a commander. That superior fleet?” He dropped his hands again dramatically. “It’s gonna fall apart. I didn’t just start out on this stupid mission for my health, Kaiser. Dismantle the Council, dismantle the Society, dismantle the war. It’s still the best plan and you know it. We can make it work.”

Gates stared at him, his jawline tight and his fists clenched against the wooden desk. Finally, he sighed and growled, “Fine. I guess you haven’t let us down this far.” Fiearius opened his mouth to express his gratitude, but Gates spoke over him. “But! You’re gonna have to convince the war council yourself.”

A smirk danced across Fiearius’ face. “My pleasure.”

Leta provided him with a weak smile. She didn’t have any words of comfort or reassurance to give. This wouldn’t be easy or pain free and given the subject matter they were investigating, it had the likelihood of being quite awful for him. But as unenthused as he was and as guilty as Leta felt for pushing the matter, if the alternative was watching Carthis finish their war the most uncivilized way they knew how, she knew it was for the best.

“We should go tell Gates.”

“Right,” Fiearius agreed, swallowing the lump in his throat and hardening himself. “Let’s go get this over with.” He headed for the door and Leta made to follow him, but Quin spoke up.

“Actually, ya mind stayin’ a spell, doc?”

Leta paused in the doorway to look back at her. Then she looked at Fiearius who just shrugged and said, “I can handle it, don’t worry,” and headed off towards the airlock. Leta watched him go before reentering the room.

She’d known Quin for a long time now. She’d had meetings with Quin, conversations with Quin, she’d even drank with Quin, but she had never, not until this moment, been alone with Quin. It was only just now, in this room, that she realized just how much of a presence the woman had. It was Fiearius’ quarters they stood in. And truly, they were on the Beacon so they belonged to Corra and Finn. But right now, Quin stood in it so confidently that Leta could not imagine this whole ship belonging to anybody but the woman before her at any point in time in its history.

“Sure, what do you need?” she asked, feeling more self-conscious than she liked to.

Quin didn’t immediately answer. She looked Leta up and down. She unfolded her arms and clasped them behind her back. And then she said, “I need you to go to Satieri.”

Leta frowned. “I–Well I was already planning to, but –”

Quin held up her hand and Leta instantly closed her mouth out of some strange survival instinct. “I need you to go to Satieri with Soliveré. To find this whatever it is he’s looking for and get him through it.”

“I–I don’t disagree,” Leta muttered, confused as to why this conversation was even happening. “But–why?”

“Because with all due respect to our dear admiral, brave and intelligent as he may or may not be, let’s not pretend that without a bit of steering every so often, he’d run himself right into the ground. And from what I’ve seen so far, you’re the best candidate for the job. You might even be the only one pointing him in a direction he actually agrees with. So. I’d like you on the ground with him for this one.”

Nothing Quin was saying was news to Leta, though she’d never heard it said so frankly before. Still, the question remained. “Why are you telling me this?”

There was a momentary twitch of irritation in Quin’s brow, but nonetheless, she explained, “Because the damn fool has it in his head that you want nothing to do with him. And look, honey, I don’t know what the state of your relationship is at the moment, nor, honestly, do I give two shits, but now ain’t the time for squabbles and I couldn’t care less about your pride, either of ya. He ain’t gonna ask ya to go with him, but you’re gonna go anyway, alright?”

There was a lapse of silence as Leta gazed at Quin, finally understanding what this was about and finding herself at a loss for words. Fiearius was still bitter that she’d asked for distance weeks ago? So much so that he’d told Quin about it? So much so that he thought, even after Ellegy, that Leta wouldn’t have his back in the upcoming crux of this whole war?

She didn’t know whether to be offended or amused.

Finally, she decided on the latter. “It’s funny,” she mused in a breathy laugh as Quin narrowed her eyes on her, “that you think him not asking was going to stop me from going.”

It took a moment, but slowly, a smirk twisted into Quin’s lips. “I always knew I liked you, Adler.”

—————-

“Oh no! Look out!”

Cyrus gasped and ducked under cover as something went flying over his head and hit the wall. “We’re under attack! Where’s our ammunition?”

Addy, to the left of him, looked over in alarm. “We gave it all to the enemy!” she despaired. “What are we going to do?”

Another projectile was launched right over them. They were doomed, backed into a corner and out of options. “We’re going to have to surrender,” Cyrus told his lover grimly and she provided him a horrifying look of sorrow. “We have no choice. We’ll have to give ourselves over to Great and Powerful Dark Wizard and–”

“Darkness Wizard!” came a shrill correction from the other side of the room.

“Sorry, Great and Powerful Darkness Wizard,” Cyrus reiterated in total seriousness, “And hope for the best.”

“Oh my,” cried Addy, leaning against the couch she hid behind, surrounded by the plush toys that had been viciously lobbed at her. “If only we had someone to save us.”

Both of them waited for a moment in silent expectation, but the room was quiet. Cyrus frowned. Addy glanced over her shoulder. Cyrus said it again. “If only we had someone to save us!”

This time, there was some muffled noises, pattering feet, the sounds of cloth being moved about and finally, a tiny person clambering up onto the furniture above their heads.

“I’ll save you!” shouted Kalli, her hands on her hips and the purple and silver shambles of a costume haphazardly wrapped around her.

Addy gasped and threw her hand onto Cyrus’ chest, looking up in admiration. “The Mighty Dragon of the North! She’s here to rescue us!”

“Go Mighty Dragon! Defeat the Darkness Wizard!” cried Cyrus as Kalli, nay, the Mighty Dragon, leapt off the couch and ran across the room to tackle the bear dressed loosely in Cyrus’ clothing that had presumably been behind the attacks.

“Yes, go fight the wizard,” Addy whispered in Cyrus’ ear, sidling up to his side and letting her hand slide south from his chest. “And I’ll take the prince.”

“Doesn’t the hero get the boy in the end?” Cyrus asked, turning himself towards her and looping his arms around her waist.

Addy shrugged her shoulder towards where their daughter was still furiously wrestling a stuffed bear. “Ya snooze ya lose,” she cooed and closed the distance between their lips.

The kiss, warm and sultry and ever so enticing, however, only lasted up until Kalli was suddenly above them again grimacing. “Ew, gross.” She stuck out her tongue and Addy laughed as she broke the kiss to look up at her.

“Did you win?”

“Of course!”

“Know what to do now then?”

Kalli let out a long dramatic groan, dropping her head and her hands in utter defeat. “Clean up…” she grumbled, kicking a misplaced couch cushion as she retreated to pick up the array of toys and clothes and miscellaneous furniture she’d thrown across the room in the heat of battle. “But I saved you!” she tried, a note of desperation in her tone.

“And we’re very thankful,” said Addy, standing up and helping Cyrus to his feet. “But does the Mighty Dragon of the North want her people to live in squalor?”

The little girl sighed heavily. “No…”

“Then?”

“Clean up…”

As Kalli resigned herself to her task, Cyrus started to lend a hand and Addy sat back down in front of her console, where she’d been when this whole attack had begun. Over her shoulder, Cyrus could see images of ships on the screen. Very very old ships. Ever since Corra had found a hint that the missing puzzle piece in the Transmitter mystery was a ship made from the Ark, they’d been reading everything they could to locate one. Ships didn’t just disappear, after all. Even if they were torn apart, those pieces went somewhere. It was just a matter of finding out where.

But right now? After everything that had happened yesterday with Dez and Fiearius and Leta and the hours long discussion about the state of the war, the Transmission wasn’t exactly on Cyrus’ mind.

Pushing one last couch cushion into place with his knee and leaving Kalli to finish the rest, Cyrus sauntered over behind Addy and wrapped his arms around her, leaning his chin on her shoulder.

“Found anything?” he asked, just because it seemed like the right thing to say. Of course she hadn’t. She would have told him if she had. But it was easier than bringing up what he actually wanted to talk about.

Addy shook her head. “Nothing yet.”

“Hm.” Cyrus squeezed her a little and tried to form some words. Just a couple. None came.

Fortunately, Addy knew him far too well. “What’s on your mind, Cy?”

“Satieri,” he blurted out before he could second-guess himself. Addy turned away from the console and looked up at him, curious. “I mean. Going to Satieri,” he continued. “Since I guess that’s on the agenda. Maybe. From what Fiear was saying last night. They might be going to Satieri soon.”

“Yeah, he did make it sound that way,” Addy admitted, shifting her body beneath his arms to face him. “You thinking about going with him?”

Cyrus swallowed the lump in his throat. “Yeah?” was his first answer. “Well, no,” was his second. “Thinking about it, yes. But–going to Satieri? It’s dangerous. Really dangerous. And–I don’t want to dictate any of this or force us to–not that I’d force us to–”

“Cy?” Addy smiled at him kindly. “Use sentences.”

He chuckled nervously and met her stare. “I just–I know this is important. And a free Satieri is what we wanted all along. And you said you wanted to be more involved and I don’t want to hold you back from that. If there’s any point to be involved, this would be it, right? So–about Satieri. It’s dangerous. And honestly it scares the crap out of me. But if you want to help, if you want to be a part of it, we’ll do it.”

Addy watched him as he stumbled through his explanation, quiet and pensive and patient. She continued to do so even after he’d finished. But finally, she smiled and lifted her hands to his cheeks. “Oh Cy-Cy. You are sweet and adorable and you heard me and that means so much, but–” A light chuckle passed her lips. “Marching into the midst of battle with your brother to free Satieri was definitely not what I meant.”

Cyrus couldn’t deny the relief that flooded through him. “No?”

“We’re nerds, sweetie,” Addy laughed. “Not warriors. I want to be involved, I want to be present and aware and doing something that helps if possible, but I don’t want to be dead. I trust Fiear and Leta and the others to do right by Satieri. I believe in what they’re doing. But I’m perfectly happy to root for them from the sidelines over here.” She gestured to the room around them. “If something comes up, something that caters to our specific talents, then by all means, let’s help where we can. But for now?” She leaned forward to kiss him briefly. “We’re all good where we are.”

Cyrus took a moment to let his emotions catch up to where his head was at. Finally, he exhaled heavily. “Thank the gods.”

Addy let out a long chuckle and turned back around towards the console. “No, thank me, for not being as delusional as you to think we could handle covert ops to home. Now get a console and help me find this signal booster.”

Fiearius’ arms dropped back down to his sides as he stared at him in disbelief, “You did what?” Shocked, he spun to Leta. “But–you had the CID when–”

“He had it for a while,” Leta admitted, not quite meeting his eyes. “You were dying, I had to focus on that, not–”

“So you let him borrow it?!”

Now, she did meet his stare, angry and defiant. “I didn’t have a choice, Fiearius, he didn’t give me a choice.”

“And even if I had, you made the right one,” Dez put in, pulling attention back his way. “Without my intervention — well, your intervention — the battle would have turned very quickly away from any side we favored. It would have turned into a slaughter. As it stands, Ellegy is liberated from outside clutches both Society and Carthian. The Rogue Verdant finally stepped up to his role and commanded the Society forces that have long looked to him for guidance, leading to the betterment of an entire planet.”

“You commanded the Society forces to join with the rebellion?” came Addy’s quiet demand. “You?”

“Technically he did.” Dez pointed to Fiearius.

“And they just….listened?” Corra asked, skepticism dripping from every word.

“Many of them, yes.”

“Why?” asked Finn. “Why suddenly switch sides just because you–Fiear told them to?”

“Because I gave them compelling reasons.”

Finally, Fiearius, who had been massaging the part of his temple that began hurting as soon as Dez started talking, snapped his eyes open. “What did you tell them?” There was an unfortunate note of panic in his voice.

Dez regarded him with what he could only assume was pride. “That the Council was decimated, that Carthis is closing in on their empirical endgame and that if they followed me–you–we could stand up and bring in a new age of the Society.” He shrugged. “Pretty straightforward.”

Fiearius, for quite some time, could do nothing but stare at the man standing before him. This fucker, who he’d known since the days of playgrounds and scraped knees, now trying to, once again, manipulate the course of his life to fit into his agenda. New age of the Society? Straightforward? The longer he stood there, stunned into silence, the more the anger boiled within him until at last, it exploded.

“Are you fucking crazy?!” He felt Cyrus jump away from him in surprise. “What the hell, Dez?!” He felt like hitting him. Hard. Very very hard. “Of all the fucked up things you’ve done–” He raised his fist and was about to give into his rage and lunge towards him, but a hand caught his arm and held it back.

It was Leta. She was staring up at him, her eyes ablaze and it gave him a moment’s pause. Only a moment’s. “Let go.”

“Hear him out,” she countered at once, and for a second he knew he must have heard her incorrectly.

“Hear him out?” he repeated incredulously. “Hear him out. You. Are telling me to hear him—HIM–out? You?”

“Fiear, have you looked around lately? We’re in an impossible situation here. With everything that’s happening on every planet we’ve touched, things are not good and our outlook is even worse.” She swallowed hard and he got the feeling she was swallowing her pride too to even say this. “So you need to hear him out. Because we need to know every option we have.”

Stunned as he was, Fiearius stared back at her. Then he looked around. Corra was thoughtful, Cyrus looked nervous, Addy, worried. Finn gave him a helpless shrug. And Fiearius let out a sigh.

“Fine.” He turned back to Dez, his eyes narrowed into slits. “What’s your plan here? Make your point and make it quick.”

Dez, who did not seem even the slightest bit concerned at any of these proceedings, did just as he was told. “You take your place as Verdant and command the Society forces that will listen to overthrow Carthis in the regions they’ve invaded and free Satieri from Council rule.”

It sounded so simple like that. So easy. So, as he said, straightforward, that Fiearius was laughing quietly when he said, “You want me to betray Carthis.”

“I want you to not betray the Society,” Dez corrected and Fiearius frowned at him.

“Little late for that.”

“It’s not. You’ve betrayed the Council. You’ve betrayed the system. Perhaps you’ve betrayed your planet, but you’ve not betrayed the Society because that’s not what the Society is.”

“Sure, it’s really just a bunch of sunshine and rainbows, not like they kill innocent people or use drugs to indoctrinate populations or destroy planets or anything,” Cyrus mumbled.

“Under order of the Council, yes. In the current system, absolutely. But the Society isn’t those things, the Society is a network of citizens. Ordinary people. People like us.” He gestured to himself and Fiearius. “People like you.” He waved towards Leta. “It’s a body of people doing what they think is right or people doing what they think they have to in order to survive. They don’t need to be invaded and killed, they don’t even need to be liberated. They just need new leadership.”

It was a fancy speech, perhaps the fanciest he’d ever heard Dez give. So much so that he wondered if someone had coached him in it. Varisian maybe? Or one of his other followers? But fancy as it was, it didn’t put him at ease.

“And you think I should be that new leadership?”

“Absolutely. You’re the Verdant.”

“Not anymore I’m not,” he argued.

“Doesn’t matter. The people know you as their Verdant. You’re the most qualified. You’ve successfully commanded a fleet for half a decade. You know the intricacies of this conflict probably better than anyone. And they look to you already. Carthis made sure of that.”

Fiearius snorted in disbelief. “If you’re trying to sell me as the new leader of a free Society, I’m pretty sure joining up with Carthis and killing them all did the opposite.”

But Dez was shaking his head. “Carthis recruited you precisely because you’re sympathetic to the Society. They’ve used your image to prove that they’re not the merciless conquerors they are. Why would the Verdant, a man who understood what it was like on the inside of the Society, how hard it is to get out, team up with a government that didn’t have their best interests at heart? Then they put you in situations to prove that. How many times did you show mercy to agents who stood against you? How many did you save despite being on opposing sides? Whether they know it or not, they built your reputation for you.”

There was a part of Fiearius that thought maybe he was right about all this. Maybe this really was an option available to him, that he could control the good parts of the Society, the parts that weren’t brainwashed into servitude, and fix everything he’d done. Everything that Carthis had done.

And then there was the logical part.

“This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

Dez rolled his eyes. “Fiearius, what happened when Society defectors on Vescent surrendered to Carthis after the battle?”

Leta was the one who answered. “They were captured and imprisoned. Offered forgiveness and then locked away to be forgotten.”

“And how much of Vescent was part of the Society? Maybe eight percent? Ten max? They were still new there, still growing.” Dez fixed his stare on Fiearius and for the first time since he’d known him, he actually looked like he believed in something when he said, “What’s going to happen when Carthis takes over Ellegy? Or Satieri? Where that number is closer to sixty percent. What happens to a planet after sixty percent of its population is deemed criminal and disappears?”

Silence fell over the room and every pair of eyes was on Dez, but his stare was locked onto Fiearius, his jaw clenched and his fists balled at his side. “Things are coming to a head now in this war, we all know that,” he went on, his tone low and quiet. “There’s not much time left. You need to consider who you are and what you stand for. And if I can’t convince you, so be it. But you said it yourself. Under slightly different circumstances, you and I could still be back there on Satieri, getting assassination orders every afternoon and being home in time for dinner.” He lifted his hands helplessly. “Take the time you need. But there’s a flock of our kin and a fleet of ships awaiting your orders.”

Dez raised his hand to his forehead in a half-hearted salute before taking a few steps backwards and then turning back towards his ship, leaving the group in a hushed, hurried discussion of what he’d said. All except Fiearius, who could do little more than stare at the black ship as it rose off the hangar floor and sailed out into space.

He couldn’t hear what those around him were saying, whether they agreed, whether they thought the whole thing was crazy. He didn’t really want to. He only remembered they were still there when he felt a hand brush against his softly, a fleeting touch of warmth.

Leta was watching him, intense and serious. She asked the question he didn’t want to hear. The question he had no idea how to answer. “What are you going to do?”

“Sorry, you can go, you definitely don’t need to listen to me rant.” She waved him towards the door. “I’m fine, really.” But Fiearius didn’t walk away. Instead, he sat down next to her.

“I know you are.”

“I’m not upset about him,” Leta told him affirmatively. “Or anything he said.”

“Didn’t think you were.”

Leta clenched her hands in her lap and let out a sigh. “The whole thing just got me thinking too much. About the things that are really important to me. The things that matter and the things I can’t compromise on. Things like –” She picked up the tablet Corra had left beside her and tossed it onto the furthest cushion, her expression crinkled in disgust. “That. And then–things I can compromise on, things I can forgive. Or things I should have forgiven.” She glanced over at him, feeling more nervous than she cared to admit, though he only gave a thoughtful nod as he propped his chin in his hands and stared off at the wall opposite them.

Before she could consider the implications, she asked, “Did I do the right thing?” Now, he glanced over at her, questioning. “You know, back then. When you and me–” She hesitated and shook her head. “I know, it’s ancient history now. It doesn’t matter, but I can’t stop thinking about it. When I left. Should I have stayed?”

Fiearius considered her for a long, almost uncomfortably long time. She found herself watching his clouded eye because it was easier to meet than the one that searched her intently. Finally, he drew a deep breath and said, “Well. I wish you had,” which was an answer that threw Leta off not because she hadn’t thought it was true but moreover that he wouldn’t say it if it was. But only moments later he met her gaze again and said firmly, “But no. No, you shouldn’t have.”

When Leta just stared at him, lost for words, he sighed again and said, “Look, you want my opinion? You always expect the best out of people because you always give the best out of yourself. And sometimes, for a lot of us, myself definitely included–” He grimaced. “–it’s really hard to meet those standards. But. That’s on us. Not you. Stick to your guns, they’re all you’ve got in this shithole of a Span.”

Catching Leta a little off-guard, Fiearius brought his fingers up to her chin and lifted her head to face him. “Don’t you ever change for anybody, okay?”

She provided him a weak smile, but couldn’t conjure an appropriate response. She wasn’t even sure what an honest answer would be. She couldn’t place what she was feeling in that moment, let alone vocalize it. So he stepped in for her, reaching past her to grab that tablet again. “Oh and fuck this guy. He doesn’t deserve you.”

Leta snorted a laugh as Fiearius got to his feet. “So I shouldn’t fuck him then?”

Fiearius paused and looked down at her curiously before letting out a sharp laugh and shrugging dramatically. “Who am I to tell you what to do?”

Suddenly, the COMM on Corra’s wall lit up and its owner’s voice asked, “Hey is Fiear still up there?”

“Whatcha need, princess?” Fiearius called back.

“Not sure, but this hail we’re getting? We–uh–think it’s for you?”

——————-

As it turned out, the strangely masked signal was for him and once Fiearius got to the bridge and heard the message himself, he was unsurprised. “Bit of a rude way to say hello,” Finn had remarked and Fiearius had simply shook his head. It was just like Dez.

The whole lot of them (Leta, Corra, Finn, even Cyrus and Addy who they’d passed along the way) joined him as he watched Dez’s sleek black ship dock in the Beacon’s hangar from the viewport above, curious as to what this was about. Leta knew, Fiearius got the feeling. She’d mentioned she had spoken with Desophyles briefly when she’d given him the Verdant CID back, but insisted he hear the rest of the story from the man himself. Fiearius hadn’t sought him out on purpose. He’d show up on his own eventually.

And here he was, marching down the ramp into the pressurized hangar with all his usual pomp and circumstance, acting as though nothing was out of the ordinary. Fiearius and his entourage met him halfway across the bay and gave no word of greeting. He crossed his arms over his chest and waited.

Dez stopped a good three meters away and seemed to size Fiearius up with his gaze. “You’re looking better than when I last saw you,” he surmised at last.

Fiearius responded with a tight, humorless smile. “No thanks to you.”

If Dez cared, he didn’t show it. Instead, he moved on, business-like as ever. “I have much to catch you up on.”

“I bet.”

“Shall we speak privately?”

Fiearius glanced to his side at Leta. She looked straight back at him and frowned dully. Don’t you dare try and send me away, he imagined her saying. So he turned back to Dez and shrugged. “Nope.”

Dez hesitated for a moment, examining the gathering one by one, perhaps wondering how each was going to affect whatever it was he had to say. If Leta didn’t shut him down immediately, Cyrus probably would. Finn and Corra were notorious for pointing out anything that was illogical and Addy, though typically polite and kind, didn’t have the time or patience for bullshit. He was outnumbered and he knew it.

Still, he didn’t have a choice so finally he relented. “Very well. I suppose I should start by clearing up what happened on Ellegy.”

“You somehow convinced the rebellion to betray Carthis and blow up the city for you,” Fiearius put in helpfully.

“Blow up the city for them,” Dez corrected. “But yes. Essentially. We needed leverage to bargain the return of the planet once Carthis’ invasion was complete.”

“Sure, sure, stupid plan, but I got that part.” It was all over the news, how could he not? They didn’t know it was Dez behind it, of course, but putting the pieces together was easy enough. What he cared more about was the incident that had gnawed at him for the past two weeks. Those two words that had been the last thing he’d heard before he slipped into the cold embrace of death.

“Tell me about Varisian.”

Dez’s stony exterior faltered for only a moment. Had the question surprised him? Had he forgotten about that piece of the puzzle? Or was the sound of her name just something he wasn’t prepared for?

A half second later, his answer was typically collected however. “She wasn’t meant to kill you,” he clarified. “That was an unfortunate side effect of bad timing. You weren’t supposed to even be there when she arrived. Her mission was to gain access to the Councillor’s chambers under the guise of protecting her and–”

“So I was right,” Fiearius cut him off. “She was working with you.”

Dez blinked at him. “Yes.” As though this was obvious and required no additional explanation. Fiearius barely stopped himself from gaping.

“What. The fuck.”

“Yes, she was working with me,” he confirmed again, apparently confused by the apparent need for elaboration.

Fortunately, Leta stepped in before Fiearius’ frustration got the better of him. “Since Vescent, right?” It sounded like a guess. “The two of you captured her on Vescent and you took her–somewhere. And convinced her to work with you?”

He nodded. “I had her in my custody for some time. We found that we agreed on many things. But we both knew she was still more useful in her current role, staying close to the Council. We parted ways, but remained in contact to collaborate on operations from either side.”

“Wait a minute,” put in Cyrus, stepping forward from behind his brother. “If she was working for you, why the hell did she keep trying to set everyone on fire?”

“She wasn’t. Her tasks were to assist the missions. She lead us to the Ascendian Councillor in the bunker. She convinced Calimore to provide his research. She–”

“She burned half my arm off!” Fiearius snapped suddenly, raising his gnarled forearm for all to see.

Dez just shrugged. “She didn’t know you were going to stick around once the base was burning down. She was just trying to direct you to where you needed to be. The fire thing was her idea, I don’t know where that came from.” Fiearius eyed him skeptically until he admitted, “Alright, I may have told her the Pieter Roland story. And she still never liked you.”

“Hell of a way to show it…” Finn muttered behind him.

“She was, however, somewhat singular in that opinion,” Dez went on briskly, which was perhaps the weirdest way anyone had ever told Fiearius that he was likeable, a strange statement in and of itself. “Amongst defectors and doubters, you are quite popular.”

“Well,” Fiearius snapped, unimpressed. “I’m flattered.”

“You shouldn’t be. It has little to do with you and more to do with what you represent,” Dez corrected and it was all Fiearius could do to keep himself from slapping his palm to his forehead. “Regardless, those amongst the Society are looking to you. Which is exactly why I did what I did on Ellegy.”

Finally, they were getting to the meat of it. “And what, exactly, did you do?”

“I used your Verdant chip to send out a message in your name to anyone within the Society willing to listen and consider joining the defectors.”