Date Point: 12y8m AV
HMS Sharman (HMNB Folctha), Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Sergeant Daar
Human politics had one element that was especially baffling to Gaoian—-or at least Stoneback—sensibilities, in that the military leaders seemed to have absolutely no respect for their national leaders. They respected the civilian chain of command of course, but for those who knew the men of the SOR—or could smell them—the formal reception they were giving the Prime Minister was obviously different. They were giving him exactly as much respect as his position was due and not an iota more.
For Stoneback of course there was no distinction between civilian and military, there was only career specialization. But by and large, Stoneback leaders and Fathers got where they were by being a good ‘Back and earning the esteem of their peers and Brothers. Human leaders like this ’Prime Minister’ mostly seemed to earn their position not by being popular or respected, but by being the least *un*popular to the broadest base of ordinary people. That didn’t sound like any kind of a way to run things to Daar, but it seemed to agree with human sensibilities…or at least not disagree with it.
Normally he wouldn’t have worried about something like that, but the whole affair with the Prime Minister and the demonstrations had thrown a problem he’d been chewing on for a while into sharp relief.
He managed to snag the best sounding-board in the room late in the day, long after the buffet had been demolished and the dignitaries and ranking officers had politely ushered themselves from the room to go conduct important business somewhere.
“Regaari, a word?”
Regaari had been patrolling the room looking busy and convivial without actually speaking to anybody, apparently lost in his own thoughts. He pricked his ears up at Daar’s request. “Yes?”
“Cousin, I know you’re guarding secrets but…” Daar glanced around, then quited his voice from its usual garrulous boom into something almost conspiratorial. “We really need to know what’s going on. Just ‘tween you and me? Somethin’ is…off.”
Regaari tilted his head. “Off how?”
“Clan SOR.”
“Is something wrong?”
“No, that’s the problem.”
“…Nothing’s wrong is the problem?” Regaari asked. “Isn’t it my job to worry about things going too smoothly?”
“It’s…” Daar sighed, then gestured to the pair of them. “Look at us. We thought we were good before but now look at us, look at how good we are and how quickly we got that way. You, me, all of us, way faster than the humans were expecting.”
“So we exceeded expectations. I’m not seeing the—”
“If we can be that good then why weren’t we already?” Daar interrupted “Was it, I dunno, lack of challenge? Complacency? Did we used to be and just… forgot how or somethin’?”
Regaari’s head tilted the other way, and Daar knew that look. Regaari had inherited it from Genshi, and it said that he was mulling some new piece of information over, adding it to what he already knew.
Daar didn’t care. He’d always done his best thinking out loud, and now the thought was bursting out of him like he’d cracked a rock and found a new spring underneath. “Like, you’ve said more than once that a lotta Human ‘tricks’ are really obvious once they point ‘em out. Hell, look at me!” He posed to make his point. “How in the name of everything did my Clan not figger this out? It’s simple! And we ain’t that dumb!” A bit of more genuine Daar humor crept back in. “And you Whitecrests are pretty smart, too!”
He timed the joke well. Regaari chittered and relaxed slightly. He combed a crumb out of his whiskers as he thought. “…Humans have a saying,” he said eventually. “It doesn’t translate directly, but it means ‘When you look into the past you have perfect vision.’”
“‘Hindsight is twenty-twenty.’” Daar duck-nodded. “I know it. But even so, I mean…I dunno what I mean. I feel like something’s held us back and there ain’t nothin’ natural about it.”
“…Trust your instincts, Daar. I’ve learned over the years to listen to you when they speak.”
“Maybe. But my instincts ain’t tellin’ me enough.”
It was Regaari’s turn to duck-nod thoughtfully, but he said nothing.
“…You know somethin’, I know you do,” Daar accused him.
Regaari gave him an uncharacteristically sharp look. “If I did, and if I could tell you, don’t you think I would?” he retorted.
That stung, and Daar was surprised to find himself whining like a scolded cub. “I trust you,” he affirmed. “I just—”
“These are tense times. Big changes, this new species coming along to show us up with new ideas and new ways of doing things…” Regaari flicked an ear reassuringly. “Some of the things they’re teaching us are obvious in hindsight, but we’ve taught them some things as well.”
“I dunno…” Daar growled. “I still feel like we shoulda figgered most’a this stuff out ourselves.”
“Maybe we should…but we didn’t. I can’t speculate as to why right now,” Regaari replied, and Daar caught the careful phrasing. Genshi had once taught him that Whitecrests preferred to speak the completely literal truth rather than lie, especially to their friends.
Daar looked down at his paws for a second then scratched at his muzzle. “Humans have another saying, y’know…”
“Yes?”
“Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action.”
“Hmm. Yes.”
Daar gave up. “…Thanks for hearing me out, cousin.”
Regaari flinched just a little. Daar had already turned and was walking away when Regaari spoke again.
“I’ll…look into your concerns. See what I can do about addressing them,” he promised.
“…Thank you, cousin.” Daar replied.
The second time, he meant it more warmly.
Regaari’s conscience had been nibbling at him all night, and not even nesting up with his Brothers had helped. He’d slept poorly, woken troubled, and Warhorse had actually had to scold him into eating properly, which hadn’t happened in months.
The morning routine of cleaning up the barracks, PT and his academic training managed to soothe him out, and as so often happened when he returned his attention to Daar’s concerns, he found that his brain had assembled a solution without his conscious input.
Irritatingly simple, really. He let himself into the base’s administrative block and quite unselfconsciously bounded up the stairs on fourpaw without even noticing. The SOR Commanding Officer’s office was on the top floor, three doors down from Admiral Knight’s.
In a show of consideration, the humans had put a scratching-plate on the door for Gaoians to use, knocking being a human convention.
“Come.”
Powell was sitting back in his office chair with one booted ankle crossed across his knee, reading something off a tablet in his left hand while a cup of tea steamed gently in his right. His office was an odd mix—most of the furniture was solid, unpretty, functional stuff straight out of the requisition catalog. His bookshelf however was wide, packed solid with educational literature, and made of Cimbrean Pinkwood, an increasingly rare timber thanks to the unfolding ecological disaster and transplantation that had made Cimbrean such a hub for scientific interest…and concern. In a few decades’ time, that simple and undecorated bookshelf would be unguessably valuable.
“May I have a word, Lieutenant-Colonel?”
Powell caught the look in Regaari’s eye and put down his tablet, uncrossed his leg and sat forward. He didn’t put down the tea. “Of course. Summat botherin’ you?”
“…I am aware you had concerns briefing Champion Daar. I think we need to resolve them immediately now.”
Powell’s brow furrowed. “New development?” he asked, gesturing for Regaari to sit.
“He’s dangerously close to figuring out the basic elements of DEEP RELIC all by himself,” Regaari reported, sitting down in the seat opposite Powell’s desk. “And when he does…”
“…Then he won’t be bound under secrecy.” Powell scowled, sipped his tea and then set it down firmly. Regaari couldn’t help noticing that the mug’s decoration read ’keep calm and nuke it from orbit.’ “That’s a problem.”
“You still wouldn’t consider briefing him?”
“I know he’s your cousin, Regaari, but to be perfectly fookin’ frank there’s summat about him makes it hard to believe he’s capable of discretion.”
Regaari felt he had to defend Daar there. “Arguably we’re rapidly moving past the point of discretion, sir. And you’ll note he’s never spoken about why he was on that pirate ship in the first place.”
“Aye, but he’s also the Champion of your premier military Clan.” Powell bobbled his head. “It’s not that he’s indiscreet, but he has obligations we have to consider: Once he’s briefed he’ll have no choice but to respond appropriately, and that’d be noticed.”
“He and I are both personal friends with the spymaster of the Gao,” Regaari pointed out.
“And you’re a spy yourself.”
“As you say. He’s used to handling confidential subjects. I really believe he can be trusted with this one.”
Powell sighed, pushed his chair back and ran a hand over his scalp. “…The thing about Daar is he’s bloody straightforward, which is about the highest compliment I ever pay anybody. He’s the kind of bloke that considers his word a sacred bond, aye?”
“He does,” Regaari agreed, noting the compliment and its nature, both of which said a lot about Powell. He knew Daar’s integrity personally, and was pleased to find it echoed in the SOR’s commander.
“So what would it do to our alliance if I told him a secret that could doom the Gao, and that he could not be permitted to act upon?” Powell picked up his tea listlessly. “I don’t want to force him to be an oathbreaker, Regaari.”
“That seems…untenable,” Regaari ventured as Powell took a sip of his drink. “I agree with your rationale, but he is going to figure this out himself, and when he does…”
“Hrrm. So you’re saying, what? We need to grasp the nettle?”
Only humans could have an idiom about firmly grabbing a venomous plant to avoid being harmed by it. Regaari contented himself with a firm duck-nod. “I’m quite sure it’s the only way to contain the problem, sir.”
“…Aye. You’re probably right.” Powell grabbed his tablet and swiped around it for a second, obviously double-checking something. “…Bloody hellfire, this really couldn’t have come at a more awkward moment,” he griped. “We only need another month or two and it wouldn’t be a problem. Champion Genshi and our own secret services are almost in place…and that’s all the detail I can share.”
Regaari considered this. He didn’t like being out of the loop, even if it was necessary.
“I…see. A month or two might be do-able. If you can give me suitably straightforward explanation to soothe Daar?”
Powell considered it with a scratch of his jaw. “Tell him…tell him that he’s right to be concerned and that he has my personal word he will be brought in on the details soon. Ask him to accept that and hold his peace, for now.”
Re gaari knew his ears had flattened slightly. “The moment I say that, he will know that we perceive a threat to the Gao, Lieutenant-Colonel,” he protested. “Asking him to hold his peace on that will be a big ask.”
“Please, Regaari, we need a little more time,” Powell put his tablet down again. “Does our trust mean nothing?”
“…I will see what I can do. But he will demand answers, and soon.”
“Then you fookin’ well tell him however much you have to to keep him from doin’ summat…unwise. The secrets are for a reason but they won’t matter a bloody bit if Stoneback go off half-cocked and blow the game.” Powell leaned forward, lending weight to his already impressive presence. “Contain this, Officer Regaari of Whitecrest. I know you can, and I know you know what the stakes are.”
Regaari should have felt intimidated. Powell was a HEAT operator, he was huge by any reasonable standard and packed absolutely full of the tremendous human potential for strength and violence. To have a force like that looming in his face should have scared him.
Instead, it inspired him. This force of nature was trusting him with a mission that only he could accomplish.
He sat up straight and pricked up his ears. “I will not fail, sir.”
“I know.”
Powell sat back, and somehow became smaller again. “Anyhow. While you’re here there were some things I wanted to go over with you about the training exercise with the JETS team. How long have we got now, seven weeks?”
“Uh… yes, sir.” Regaari shook his head at the abrupt change of topic. “Actually, yes, I had some questions of my own…”
Date Point: 12y9m AV
Byron Group Headquarters, Omaha, Nebraska, USA, Earth
Daniel Hurt
Stepping into a billionaire’s office was a new experience for Dan, and an anticlimactic one. He’d been seriously expecting either some Tony Stark ultra-high-tech shiny jewel, or maybe a Montgomery Burns study in olde-worlde oak, leather and portraits.
Something grand, huge and expensive, either way. Moses Byron apparently came from a different school of wealth, and worked from a generous but modest office that could have belonged to any successful lawyer or a high school principal. Dan didn’t know the man well enough to judge if his unassuming workspace reflected genuine modesty, or was a calculated display of humility.
The same went for Byron’s suit, his haircut and his general demeanor. He was well-tailored and well-groomed without seeming vain, pretty much the opposite of some other billionaires Dan could think of.
The other man in the room clearly did have a vain streak, knew about it and didn’t give a shit. He was wearing a glossy burgundy shirt with the sleeves rolled up to reveal a simple cross tattoo that had been later modified in a clear and bitter rejection of an old belief system. He met Dan’s eye and gave a friendly nod as Moses Byron rose to shake Dan’s hand.
“Professor Hurt,” Byron welcomed him warmly, and the handshake answered some questions. Nobody genuinely modest had a handshake that firm and forthright. “Thanks for coming. Your letter got Kevin here very interested.”
’Kevin’ Shook Dan’s hand too, with less crushing earnestness and more relaxed honesty. “Kevin Jenkins,” he introduced himself. “I’m Mister Byron’s no-man.”
“A no-man?” Dan asked him, intrigued. “As in, the opposite of a yes-man?”
“That’s the idea.”
“He’s actually our chief xenopolitical officer,” Byron interjected, aiming a weary but amused expression at Kevin that said they’d had this conversation before.
“Just one of many hats, boss man.” Kevin smirked, then stepped back and flung himself into a chair. “But yeah, Moses is right. That was a heck of an interesting letter you sent us.”
“It was brave of the Byron Group to own up to the whole affair with the People…” Dan suggested.
“Thank you,” Moses replied, then glanced at Kevin. “Though the crew did force our hand, some.”
“I guess that’s the problem with hiring talented pioneering sorts,” Dan mused. Byron snorted a laugh.
“Yeah…but we’re backin’ them. We sent them out there because dang it, they’re three of the best human beings you could ever find. We trusted them to handle first contact, and handle it they did. Now ain’t the time to second-guess them.”
“Not when a whole species is on the line,” Kevin agreed. “You really think you can deliver on what you promised in that letter?”
Dan calculated furiously for just a second, gauging his best approach. He plumped for brutal honesty. Anybody who had an office like Byron’s and who employed a self-described ’no-man’ probably wasn’t going to have any patience for bravado.
“Do I think I can? Yes,” he said. “But this is uncharted territory for everybody. It won’t go how we expect. There will be…challenges. We might fail some of those challenges. But I’m willing to take the blame if we fail…and do everything humanly possible to make sure we don’t.”
“Define success,” Kevin jabbed. His well-hidden accent dramatically elongated the second syllable of ’define.’
“In thirty, forty, fifty years time we have grateful allies who stand on their own two feet—or, uh, hang from their own branch I guess—and look to us as colleagues rather than as a charity,” Dan recited firmly. “They’ll be their own people, their own culture. They’ll be aliens, they’ll be different. They’ll know us for what we are, warts and all. And they’ll know that we could have destroyed them, and how, and that we put ourselves through hell not to.”
He shut up, and let the clock tick thoughtfully over them for ten seconds before Moses turned to Kevin and the corner of his mouth quirked upwards.
“I think we just found our Moon Laser engineer,” he said.
“I think we have,” Kevin agreed.
Byron nodded, and stood up. He walked round the table, and this time his handshake was warm and friendly.
“Welcome to the Byron Group, Professor Hurt.”
Date Point: 12y10m AV
Scotch Creek, British Columbia, Canada, Earth
Lewis Beverote
“…Woah.”
“Yup.” Lucy’s fingers intertwined with Lewis’ own, and she stooped slightly to kiss his cheek. “See what you’ve been missing?”
Lewis nodded dumbly. She’d promised him a pleasant surprise when putting the blindfold on, and while he’d grumbled and muttered about it as she had led him to a car and driven him somewhere then let him out again…he hadn’t peeked.
She’d picked an unassuming spot to remove it, at the end of a straight and tree-lined road of houses that ended at a yellow-and-black chequered diamond road sign. Some dude was reading a book in the midday sunshine on a garage-roof deck just a few feet to Lewis’ right. To his left, fences and trees gave some privacy to a white, shallow-roofed place with a huge lawn. The street itself was nothing special.
But in front of him, past the sign, was a narrow beach and more water than he’d seen in… since…
It was a lot of water. Calm, deep, tranquil blue Bob Ross water full of the shimmering echoes of mountains, and all of it under a sapphire sky made all the more attractive by the little flaw wisps of distant cloud and a straight white line of airliner contrail. He raised his hand to his brow and for the first time in fifteen years, Sol warmed him in a place he hadn’t noticed had gone cold.
“This can’t be real,” he muttered. “It’s fucking October.”
“Guess Mama Earth decided to play nice for you,” Lucy had that smile in her voice. The one that was always there when she knew she’d scored a win over him. “Did you miss her?”
“…Guess I should have,” Lewis conceded. He’d never experienced Earth this way, and living in New Orleans hadn’t exactly prepared him to. His memories of Earth were of hurricane-scarred suburbs where one narrow single-storey house had been pretty much like another, and where the horizon was somebody’s roof. The sounds of Earth to him had been traffic, air conditioning, rap music and cicadas.
Birdsong, the soft white noise of water in motion and the breathy sound trees made as the cold breeze caressed them were new experiences that were nevertheless known intimately to something in his bones.
Lucy let him stand there and marinade himself in it for as long as he wanted. It didn’t seem to take long from Lewis’ perspective, but when he finally sighed and turned around with a big smile on his face she was sitting on their pickup’s tailgate, waiting patiently with the help of her phone.
She looked up. “…Feelin’ recharged?”
“Yeah. Dude, I didn’t even know I needed that.”
“I know you didn’t. I’m not as dumb as I look.” She grinned and stood up, enjoying one of her private jokes. Lucy was a tall gal anyway and took her fitness seriously, meaning that she was built to Amazonian proportions in a very real way. That plus black hair made Wonder Woman her natural go-to for cosplay, which was a million kinds of hot in Lewis’ view…but of course her position on Mrwrki Station was that of metallurgist and experimental materials researcher. She understood motile-nanite forging technology better than anyone, and an intellect like that showed itself physically in the way she moved and looked at things. Nobody remotely observant would ever say that Lucy Campbell looked dumb.
That was hotter by a league.
“Think you’ll be a little easier to crowbar out of that space station from now on?” she asked.
“Shit, Luce…Sorry. I just got my head so far in the job that—”
“Hey, it’s okay.” She engulfed him in a hug. “I’m just glad something finally dislodged you.”
“It shoulda been you though,” Lewis ventured apologetically. “Wasn’t exactly cool boyfriend of me this way…”
“Maybe not,” she agreed wryly. “But…eh. I’ll take it. We got the result in the end.”
Lewis laughed and snuggled his head into her chest. “You’re too good for me.”
“Nah.” She rubbed his back for a second, then let him go. “Wanna go see your friends again?”
“Can we?”
“We can.”
Date Point: 12y 10m AV
HMS Sharman (HMNB Folctha), Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Technical Sergeant Martina Kovač
Tonight was special. It was the very first time the HEAT and the just-activated JETS Team 1 had sat down together and made friends. Military men being what they were, the Lads and the Guys (as they were now irrevocably dubbed) had formed deep, lifetime bonds in the space of about fifteen seconds and were already in the “say nothing for hours” phase of male companionship that Marty was used to, but would never quite understand.
Then again, considering how few female friends she had, she wasn’t in a position to grumble.
The silence hadn’t lasted long, though. Once the food had been demolished, they’d all started talking shop about the training exercise, and Marty had been pleasantly surprised to discover that somebody else in the regiment could hold their own intellectually against the Lads without the benefit of Crue-D.
Hoeff was quiet but his occasional remarks were insightful and sharp; he and Murray gravitated towards each other, one a comparatively tiny echo of the other. Coombes was still riding high and was uncharacteristically vocal, with much praise for the Gaoians, in particular their deep teamwork.
Walsh, however, was theorycrafting some stuff about orbital superiority and close air support in the age of FTL and jump drives that had even Blaczynski taking notes despite being painfully wrestled by Firth, who was also fascinated and permitted his friend a tiny bit of freedom from his usual fond crush to engage in the conversation; after all, a combat controller with a radio in his hand was potentially the deadliest thing in the galaxy. Firth didn’t allow him too much freedom, though. He was way too dominant.
But really, none of that was surprising. Martina was used to the huge humanoid slabs of meat she worked with and their disarming propensity for genius. And Walsh, she knew, held an Astrogeology degree from UCLA as well as having both combat control and intelligence AFSCs. The guy’s brain-cred was unimpeachable.
The surprise was Daar.
AEC had wanted an evaluation of the fledgling JETS team’s capabilities, and the result had been that the Gaoians and the JETS fought one another to a standstill. Lieutenant-Colonel Powell, it was rumoured, had looked pleased.
Meanwhile, Walsh and Daar were immediate best friends after mutually “killing” one another in the exercise. Upon being invited to the traditional post-training Bad Movie Night the two of them had hung out pretty much exclusively with one another until Rebar had revealed that he and Coombes knew each other of old from their shared time in Delta Force, and had a tradition of playing poker.
Walsh had gone to play, and Daar had flopped down in front of the TV like a cross between a wolfhound and a grizzly bear to watch the night’s truly dreadful offering, snuggled up close with Bozo and Firth—who now had Shin and Ergaan ensnared as well—and grumbled in annoyance when he saw what was on the TV. It was Regaari’s fault this time and he had pulled out all the stops. More to the point, he seemed to have made his choice specifically to fuck with Daar and had brought along a particularly awful Gaoian period clan drama called ‘Winter Moons.’
It followed the exploits of the fictional Clan Moonback, and the production values weren’t so much bargain-basement as completely absent. Most of the budget seemed to have gone on abysmal fur dye and the worst peroxide bleach job to make them look like a “Brownie” clan with a broad yellow “white” saddle-shaped patch high on their backs.
To judge from Daar’s grumbling, literally everything about it was wrong in some way. Regaari had chittered quietly to himself for a while before wisely retreating into the kitchen to help Murray cook a Salad before Daar got worked up enough to seek vengeance.
Salad 2.0 had been “upgraded” with sliced pickled egg and spam fritters, further contributing to what Blaczynski had accurately dubbed “the Horf factor.” For some reason, the Gaoians loved it, as did Murray and Butler, and even Powell had been seen to sneak a little out of the box sometimes. Clearly, Gaoians and Brits shared a specific kind of crazy.
Everybody from a sane nation was eating Parata’s sinus-melting “Death Gumbo.”
Daar meanwhile could not have been less pleased with the TV drama. [“What the] fuck [is up with this Clan!? That fur pattern is] bullshit! [We should call them ‘Pissback’ instead!”]
Bozo nuzzled against Daar and whined quietly, which earned the huge canine a reassuring scritch on his massive flank and a friendly nuzzle right back. Bozo could calm most anyone.
Akiyama, from his relaxed posture upside-down with his feet over the back of the couch and his head dangling near floor level, had raised a hand. “Or Clan Moon-Moon.”
This earned him a cascade of bass chuckles from the Lads and several blank looks from the Gaoians before they had all duck-shrugged in that unique ‘whatever’ way of theirs that only appeared whenever they encountered some impenetrable Human reference.
Daar’s vocal objections had continued along those lines for most of the episode, ebbing and flowing as Bozo demanded scritches and calm. That didn’t entirely drain Daar of his animus against the show, and his rumbles ranged from complaining loudly about the alleged laborers’ awful technique, through criticisms of their fighting styles, to the moment that produced the worst outburst.
“FUCK! [Who did the research on…? This is set in two-twenty-three sixty-three! The last time two Champions fought for the affection of a Mother-Supreme like that was four hundred years earlier when Gorn and Kirik dueled over Mother Danya in two-nineteen fifty-five!!”]
All of the Whitecrests had given him a peculiar look before Faarek finally ventured a cautious [“That’s…specific.”]
“Well of course it fucking is!” Daar had exploded in English, before reverting to Gaori. [“Didn’t you study your history?!”]
Bozo finally gave up, wagged his tail, stretched with a grunt and went to nap somewhere quiet.
“Don’t be jelly of Champion Moon-Moon,” Blaczynski had grunted through gritted teeth, and earned an affectionate nuzzle from Firth. “You know all the females got it for him.”
Firth decided he’d punished Blaczynski well enough and rolled off to his gasping relief, then flashed an evil grin. The nearby men tried to escape but he was far too fast; he caught Parata and Butler and crushed them so fiercely under his strength they couldn’t voice any objection. Shim and Ergaan meanwhile slipped free in the tussle and wisely retreated to the couch. Firth was an exhaustingly, painfully playful murderpuppy and a smart man escaped from his clutches when he got the chance. Everyone on the team knew what it meant to be Firth sore, even Arés.
Daar chirruped at the brief and violent bout of play then remembered he was supposed to be angry at something. “God, ‘Moon-Moon’ is so dumb. How does any Female want that? [he must be rolling in sweet-herb, ‘cuz deformed backfur and puny little limbs like those are great indicators of good breeding and health.”]
Thurrsto was the Whitecrest who had most mastered the Human sense of humor as well as being the most fluent in English, and he chittered with a wide grin, “Hey, that’s the rich genetic heritage of Clan Pissback you’re insulting!”
Daar finally had enough. He grumbled something hateful, twisted catlike to all four paws and pointedly abandoned the TV in favor of the poker game where Vandenberg and Coombes were stripping Walsh of every spare cent he had, having already ruthlessly eliminated Hoeff.
He leaned over Walsh’s shoulder and turned his head quizzically as he studied the big “Intel Weenie”’s cards.
“Uh… what do those two little faces mean?”
Vandenberg and Coombes promptly folded, and Walsh groaned before resignedly raking in the modest pot. “Dammit, man, I had ‘em feeding me!”
“…Oh. Sarry.” Daar glanced at the table and at everyone present, then at the chips.
“Those are money, right?”
“Yuh-huh.”
“And the cards are secret?”
Walsh gave him a calculating look. “Some of them. This is a version called Texas Hold ‘Em.”
Daar tilted his head the other way. “So this is a game based on deception, then.”
Martina sat up and watched, intrigued. Going from innocent blunder to getting the basics of the game’s rules down in one standing leap was a feat not a lot of anybody could do, of any species. ‘Horse’s grumbling protest halted as he sensed that something had caught her attention.
“Yyyup.” Rebar recovered the cards and shuffled. “I warn you now, if Regaari ever challenges you, just give him your fuckin’ wallet and save yerself the time.”
“This seems a little like a token game we play, I think. I usually beat him.”
Everybody glanced at his gargantuan ursine mitts, at the cards, and then at each other.
“…How good can he be in his first game?” Walsh asked.
Date Point: 12y10m AV
New York City, USA, Earth
Julian Etsicitty
“If I didn’t know you better, I’d think you might almost be beginning to enjoy this.”
Allison paused mid-champagne sip and then managed the kind of embarrassed half-smile that Julian usually only saw on Xiù’s face.
“I’m… there might be some perks to all this,” she admitted, but put the drink down. “Don’t make me feel guilty about it, please.”
“Why would I?”
Another TV appearance, another couch in another green room. Right now, the Misfit voyage and the People were the issue of the day, and everybody with a camera was clamoring to aim it their way. It was exhausting.
“There’s a whole species riding on us,” Allison replied. She glanced at the glass again. “I don’t wanna forget that. Feels kinda wrong to enjoy it when so much is at stake, you know?”
“I get that,” Julian agreed. He scooted over and rubbed her back. “But that means we need to not burn out, too. It’s okay to enjoy yourself.”
“…you sound like Xiù.”
“Wow, you’re gonna say that like it’s a bad thing?”
“No, no. It’s a good thing. I just feel like a dumbass now. You shouldn’t both have to tell me the same thing, and…”
“Al. Baby.” Julian hugged her. “…I get you.”
She sighed, and regained some of her usual steel core. “…Thanks. Where is she, anyway?”
“Phone call from Kevin.”
“Ugh. I swear, that guy’s a mother duck.”
“Yeah,” Julian agreed. He sat back and rested his head on the back of the couch, staring up at the ceiling. “Sure as shit wouldn’t like to do all this without his help, though.”
“Mm.”
There was the sound of a champagne glass being picked up again and sipped, and comfortable silence.
Julian actually jumped when the door clicked open. He’d been on the exact edge of falling asleep, and he lifted his head with a start.
Xiù, who’d looked so full of color and energy throughout their tour so far, closed the door slowly behind her looking wan and shaky.
She was immediately the focus of their concern.
“What happened?”
“It’s… um…” Xiù sat down between them. She was still holding her phone, cautiously. “God. Julian, I’m so sorry…”
“What? What happened?”
“It’s… the house.” Xiù handed him the phone, and opened the photo she’d been sent. “Somebody firebombed it.”