Slade stepped up behind Jack and watched him stare after Nya’s fighter as it vanished into the sky.

  “Quit gawking—she’s gone,” Slade elbowed Jack, half-mocking, half-envious. “Well done, you big lug. Didn’t expect you to actually pick the Air Force’s hottest girl. Come on, spill it—how’d you pull that off?”

  He put an arm around Jack’s shoulders and gave him a hearty shake, then leaned in, lowering his voice as if sharing a huge secret. “Fatso… Loki.”

  Jack felt his stomach drop and went pale. “Don’t talk nonsense. I’m not—”

  “Still playing it coy?” Slade raised an eyebrow, his grin turning that smarmy old-soldier smile. “I’m not going to report you. But—next time you score any rare ‘Beast’ parts from the Forge, save a set for my Warhounds, yeah? Or I can’t promise there won’t be a ‘Loki Tactics Manual’ that mysteriously leaks to the whole unit.”

  That wasn’t a hint. It was a naked trade.

  Jack shrugged Slade’s hand off, climbed into Thor without a word, and the junker coughed a plume of black smoke as it charged off like a scolded tomcat.

  From down the way came Slade’s coughing and a muffled string of curses. “Fatso, you—cough cough—Loki, you wait ’til I catch you!”

  ———

  Terran Commonwealth, Orion Belt — Front Headquarters

  By the time Jack escorted Cyril onto the shuttle for the return trip, the artillery in the Low-Ridge jungle had thinned to sporadic bursts. Imperial pursuers were breaking under Federation strikes; the main force was pulling back from the field.

  Jack walked into the command center to find not medals and solemn nods but a storm of jubilant shouts. Generals and staff crowded the huge living-data holo-map, slapping backs and whooping.

  “We did it! We won!”

  Jack’s eyes went to the star map. The massive red data stream representing the Imperium’s fleet was collapsing and dispersing at unprecedented speed. A piece of false intelligence, combined with Cyril’s defection, had finally spooked the suspicious Imperial court—they’d ordered every fleet off Epsilon Prime to return and defend the core systems.

  The First Combined Fleet paid dearly—over sixty percent casualties—but shattered the enemy’s mixed fleet. The Second Combined Fleet and the Orion Fleet, barely scratched, shepherded the Imperium’s six-carrier battle group out of the system and seized the jump node to the Vega Cluster.

  Epsilon Prime was secure. Epsilon II—occupied for months—had been retaken.

  Smai Hotel, Garipan City

  A few days later, Jack found himself rechecked into the Smai, only this time he felt more like an expensive item under guard. The military had booked the whole hotel, nailing down his “hero” status and Cyril’s safety as the official reason.

  On the room’s holo-TV, President Valerius was delivering a rousing nationwide address, announcing General Cyril’s “turning” and the Commonwealth’s decisive victory in retaking Epsilon II.

  The feed cut to the streets of Garipan: crowds in festive dress, red-and-blue Terran flags everywhere, faces crying and cheering.

  Jack killed the display and let the thunderous celebrations outside remind him, through the soundproof glass, that none of this felt like his. He knew the filth, luck, and blood that had bought this victory.

  A knock broke his reverie. Rashid, Kincaid, and Slade burst in, laughing.

  “Jack! Don’t rot in here alone—tonight’s the victory party and you’re buying!” they shouted.

  They drank until the world spun. Jack came in and out of half-sleep: someone tugging off his boots, someone wiping his face, someone dosing him with a sobering potion. Soft touches and gentle voices drifted like a dream.

  It turned out the hotel’s pretty young staffers had quietly formed a “Fan Club for the Fat Guy.” They’d decided he was adorable and heroic and utterly comforting. Jack woke up in the morning to an awkward stain on the sheets, memories of the dream-visions—Nya, Nova, Meadow—one after another—and the fleeting warmth of a not-yet-realized quartet.

  “Damn,” he muttered, covering his head with the blanket. The Commonwealth’s new hero had spent his first night of peace like a horny teenage kid, tripped up by a wet dream.

  —The irony made him laugh bitterly.

  He showered, dressed, and went down to the dining room to find a lavish breakfast waiting: eggs, bacon, hot coffee, fresh juice—and a small bouquet of wildflowers.

  “Good morning, Lieutenant Jack!” a chorus of bright-eyed waitresses called, stars in their eyes.

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  Jack scratched his head. “This… isn’t necessary, is it?”

  The head server, a young woman in her early twenties, blushed and said, “We just wanted to say thank you. My brother serves in the Second Combined Fleet—if not for you, he might not have come home.” She bowed deeply. “Thank you, Lieutenant.”

  Jack froze. He tried to say “I didn’t do anything,” but all he managed was a clumsy wave. The girls’ smiles were warm and sincere.

  After breakfast, Jack remembered something important: Nova had booked a dinner at the Smai that night. He rushed to the manager to check, only to be told that under martial control, all reservations had been canceled—Nova’s candlelit dinner and the presidential suite included.

  Hearing “presidential suite” set off Jack’s imagination; his blood boiled when he realized his dream had been denied because of Cyril. “Shit, Cyril!” he cursed.

  Back in his room, thinking about all the near-death stretches he’d been dragged through lately, he found himself weeping—partly from relief, partly from anger. He wanted to thrash Cyril all over again just to feel better.

  He decided to call Nova.

  The line picked up quickly. At the sound of his voice, her calm tone held a faint note of surprise. “Jack, when did you get back?” Before he could answer, she rushed on: “I’m not leaving. The front’s secure, and my father has lifted the lab evacuation order. I’m staying to run a crucial AMS upgrade based on Thor’s combat data.”

  “Wait—what? You’re not leaving?” Jack swore under his breath, then tried to sound suave. “So…where will we celebrate?”

  A few seconds of silence, then her voice chilled. “Jack, do you know how complex the AMS core algorithms are? I’m sleeping less than four hours a night, and you’re worried about a dinner reservation?”

  She softened a bit. “When I finish this upgrade, pick any place you want.”

  Click. She hung up. Jack slapped his own cheek and moaned: Why’d I say dinner? Why not something subtle? Why the suite?

  He hung up and realized the door was ajar.

  Cyril was standing there.

  Seeing the famous Imperial general, Jack’s anger flared. “You can’t just eavesdrop on people’s calls!”

  Cyril walked in, sat on the sofa, poured himself a drink, and lit a cigar. “You know, Lieutenant?” he exhaled smoke slowly. “In the Imperium, my men call me mad—a reckless gambler.” He looked out at the celebrating streets. “But I never make blind bets. This time… I lost, and I accept it.”

  He turned with a sharp glance. “I didn’t lose to a Commonwealth general; I lost to another gambler.”

  Jack took him in—gambler? A lonely, bookish aide and a lieutenant who’d seen through the old fox’s trick—Jack thought it almost anticlimactic, but he stayed silent. No point arguing with a man you despise.

  “Ask General Carrick yourself,” Jack muttered.

  Cyril said nothing. He watched Jack the way you watch a child who doesn’t understand the world, then stubbed out his cigar with slow, forceful hands. The ember flared and went out.

  “General Carrick,” he repeated, then added softly, “Alright, Lieutenant. I’ll ask him.”

  He downed his drink, set the glass down, and went to the door. He paused with a hand on the handle. “Lieutenant,” he said, his back to Jack, voice flat, “you’re young.”

  That was it. Then he left, and the door clicked shut.

  Jack stared at the closed door with a sudden, inexplicable prick of irritation. “You’re young.” It sounded like comfort, but he felt it more like a verdict—like someone telling him he still had the right to hate, that he could hate now because he hadn’t been burned yet. Someday, he’d be like Cyril. Or worse.

  He shook his head. No—he told himself—he wouldn’t become that. He was a coward; he only wanted to live. He would never become someone who gambled other people’s lives for tomorrow.

  He wouldn’t. He absolutely wouldn’t… right?

  ———

  Two days flashed by. On the third dawn, Jack was still in bed while Cyril’s grand motorcade waited outside the Smai.

  Jack watched the entire ceremony in the room’s holo-TV. President Hamilton presided with full pomp, giving Cyril maximum face—and, in the process, slapping the Imperium across the airwaves. Commentators tore into how Cyril’s “defection” would shake the Imperial court and set off political storms.

  Jack felt nothing. He only thought it mildly ridiculous to see a man he’d kicked and beaten standing so composed on camera. He hadn’t expected that his small move would tip so many dominoes.

  With no more business to tie him down, he slept in, changed into civvies, and took a hotel car out into Garipan to get a feel for civilian life. After so long at war, he had nearly forgotten what the world felt like.

  Standing at a busy intersection, he watched a giant truck full of building supplies roll by. The sight of mangled Kong wreckage flashed before his eyes—the parts he’d smashed. Workers moving about reminded him of prisoners digging in the underground bunkers.

  A holographic pop star smiled down from an ad and sang. Kids chattered beside her. Jack heard their laughter and, beneath it, the taut, repressed wails he’d heard in the prison camps.

  He wanted that life: a job, a spouse, kids. But the war had left him as a stranger to both gunfire and normalcy. Looking at the ordinary lives around him felt like an ache—he wanted to be one of them but wasn’t sure he could ever fit in.

  Still, he took comfort in their ease. If their faces held hope, then maybe everything he’d done had been worth it.

  He inhaled the rain-sweetened air and let the world be quiet for the first time in a while.

  A white car slowed at the corner and eased into the shade. The passenger window lowered halfway. The assistant was about to say something when the woman in the driver’s seat waved him quiet.

  From the car, she could see Jack standing on the curb: a solitary statue, awkward and vulnerable.

  Nya Griffin unclipped her seatbelt, stepped out, and walked to the sidewalk. She stood behind him for a long time, watching the man who had somehow become hers.

  She should have left—flight training started in a few hours and her Nightshades were still aboard the Valkyrie—but her feet were nailed to the pavement.

  These past months had revolved around this fat, ridiculous man. He hadn’t changed. He simply didn’t belong in the war. Yet when someone like him was forced into it, he became dangerous—because he fought with everything he had to claw his way out.

  These were the longest days of Nya’s life. She’d been asking after Meadow, waiting desperately for Jack to return. She had a thousand things to tell him, a thousand small cares to pass along.

  Standing behind him now, she felt how lost he seemed. She wanted to speak, to soothe him—but she didn’t know how to start.

  They stood like that, one behind the other, as crowds flowed past them.

  Then Nya snapped back to attention and saw the ridiculous sight: Jack, with those lascivious, starry eyes, was staring fixedly at a voluptuous woman approaching from the opposite direction, practically drooling, his neck craned almost 180 degrees.

  Then he saw Nya behind him and heard a breathy, intoxicating call that made the bones tingle:

  “Darling—my big baby! What are you doing—!”