When Jack came home, he hadn’t expected Nya to be there — she was sitting on the sofa chatting with Ming Meilin. The moment she saw the Fat One, she waved. “Back so soon, big baby? Come over here — I’ve got something to ask you.”

  “Please,” Jack snapped, “can you stop calling me ‘big baby’?”

  Nya bit her lip and shook her head with a grin, giggling, “Nope — I’m keeping it!”

  Ming Meilin gave her a reproving little swat and laughed. “You brat, don’t call Jack that. He’s a lieutenant now — if folks overhear, it’s hardly dignified.”

  Nya just smiled and refused to relent.

  It turned out Nya had known Ming Meilin for a while. She’d contacted her a few days earlier to say she planned to visit; Ming Meilin also knew Nya wanted to see Jack — Meadow had told her a bit about him. Ming Meilin was a traditionally minded woman: she wouldn’t meddle in the affairs of the young, and in wartime — when simply surviving was a luxury — what business had anyone to demand more?

  During the days Jack had stayed there, he and Nya had been in touch, too. Their relationship was often one of tacit understanding: most of the time, Jack didn’t have to say anything for Nya to know his thoughts.

  Living with Ming Meilin for this stretch had also taught Jack her temperament: maternal, gentle, modest, fiercely protective. Teasingly, she said, “Lieutenant? Pah — Nya’s a major. When I salute her in the field, I mean it. She told me to come here — that’s an order.”

  Ming Meilin led Jack into the dining room and shot Nya a look. “Jack, ignore this girl. Eat first — if she wants something, let her come ask. Don’t spoil her. Major, my foot — she’s the youngest in this house.”

  While Ming Meilin wasn’t watching, Jack gave Nya a leering half-raise of an eyebrow. Irritated, Nya grabbed a sofa cushion and tossed it at him.

  The two women had already eaten; after fixing a plate for Jack, Ming Meilin went upstairs to rest, leaving only Nya and Jack downstairs.

  The dining room opened into the living room — one large, one small — and from where Jack sat, he could see Nya perfectly.

  Curled on the sofa watching TV, Nya was impossible to look away from. Even in an oversized nightshirt, her shapely form showed in hints and shadows — rounded, firm in the right places; years of military training had given her dangerous lines of muscle. She lounged casually, switching channels with a languid air. Bronze-tinted skin, sharply defined cheekbones, dark hair tied back in a neat ponytail — Nya wasn’t the sort of instant-stunner that knocked you flat at first sight, but the longer you looked, the more feminine and magnetic she became.

  Wherever she was, men’s attention tended to gather around her. From secondary school onward, that thorned rose had grown and blossomed — not a fragile flower waiting to be plucked, but a flame you knew would burn you, yet you wanted to come closer anyway.

  Only Jack knew what made her truly irresistible. It wasn’t merely the face or the body that set imaginations spinning; it was that unbending character — the way she never bowed to fate.

  How had such an extraordinary woman come into his life? He remembered the first time he’d spotted her in the grass and couldn’t help smiling foolishly.

  That day, his hormones were in overdrive; the sight of Nya curled on the sofa, deceptively soft, set his mind wandering to the image of her in the bath. He turned his face away and hurriedly shoveled food into his mouth.

  Heads down, he finished eating. When he looked up, Nya was bent over the table, staring at him without blinking.

  “What?” he blurted, as if some leering hag had just assaulted him — he didn’t know whether to be alarmed or delighted.

  Nya smiled. “Word around the operations branch is they all despise you. Of the friends I know, nine out of ten call you shameless.”

  Jack rose carelessly and went to wash the dishes, but from a certain angle, he could see right down Nya’s neckline. He planted his stance like a pantomime and sauntered over, grinning. “And you? Aren’t you going to defend my honour?”

  Nya hadn’t registered his pose and was still wondering why he was acting that way. Absentmindedly: “Why defend you? Hmph — good that people look down on you. Aren’t you tired of that?”

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  “No!” Jack heard her answer, flat and definite.

  He glanced up and met his own ungainly gaze fixed on her chest, and she widened her robe in mock alarm before hastily tightening it again.

  Jack caught a flash of white — her firm breasts — and felt his nose prick. He wiped at it with his hand, and there was a little blood.

  Seeing his nosebleed, Nya laughed so hard she nearly fell over. She thrust a tissue at him. Jack’s face burned; he shoved the wad into his nostril.

  Nya watched him fumble with the tissue and, when she’d laughed enough, she folded her smile into something serious. “Okay, no more teasing,” she said as she sat up. “I’ve come for real business.”

  Jack, drying a plate, glanced back. “What’s up?”

  Nya hesitated. “Meadow… do you know where she’s gone?”

  The bowl almost slipped from Jack’s hands. He put it down and faced Nya. “How did you hear that?”

  “Nova told me,” Nya’s expression turned complex. “She said Meadow’s missing — on some secret mission. I wanted to ask you… Do you know anything?”

  Jack shook his head; his voice rough. “No. She left me a DNA capsule, but I haven’t opened it.”

  A hush followed; only the drip of the tap filled the room. Then Nya said quietly, “If you go looking for her, take me.”

  Jack blinked at the earnestness in her eyes and nodded. “Alright.”

  They talked a while longer — Nya related matters from the army, the current situation.

  Jack nodded. “I know. General Cyril says war could break out any day.”

  “So,” Nya looked at him, “teach those recruits well. They may be on the front line soon.”

  Jack remembered the training camp starting tomorrow and sighed. “A lot of greenhorns. Hope they survive.”

  Nya smiled, rose to leave, and paused at the door. “One more thing, Jack…”

  “Hm?”

  “Don’t die.” Her voice went soft. “I don’t want to go to your funeral.”

  Jack was momentarily startled, then laughed. “Relax — surviving is my specialty.”

  Nya nodded and stepped out into the night. Jack watched her back recede and thought of the training, the boys about to go to war, and of Meadow.

  Every country was on a perpetual war footing now. Who could say when the state of readiness had become the new normal? Society hung in vague panic; nobody could tell which gunshot might signal the start of the great war.

  On Epsilon II, the troops were still mustering; the Tyrene Federation’s economy was shifting into a war machine. Over seventy percent of factories had turned to military production; ministry requisitions converted into gear and were handed to soldiers.

  Garipan City Military Academy carried the weight of the age. Under army administration, all cadets — battle-scarred veterans and green recruits alike — were reserve officer candidates. Passing the final assessment meant stepping into the ranks as junior commanders.

  Instructors came in many shapes: civilian professors for academics, military research staff, seasoned line officers as drill sergeants, and even high-ranking generals lecturing on doctrine.

  Rebuilt Garipan rolled out a bombshell: Cyril himself would teach Military Command and Detailed Strategic Deployments. The news set the cadets buzzing.

  To bolster the faculty, the ministry recalled many former teachers and seconded top instructors from other academies — a deliberate effort to create a pantheon of seasoned strategists. In wartime, field officers often become the best teachers: colonels and generals returned to the lectern with a gravitas that civilian schools could not match.

  Cadet applications poured in. Some were young talents starting systematic military study; others were experienced officers and outstanding students pulled from other schools. Many already held near-complete credit and would graduate quickly to the front. In the coming campaign in the Vega cluster, they were to be the backbone of junior command.

  Jack’s training camp took in not only recruits but veteran soldiers too — the most compositionally mixed and highest-quality cohort in Garipan’s history.

  Standing at Training Ground Nine — where mech maintenance drills took place — Jack felt relieved he was only responsible for mechanical instruction. Major Hank ran the basic training; rank clearly shaped assignments, and Jack was content to remain a second-line guide while watching the special forces trainees across the field.

  Garipan had a dozen training grounds, dozens of drill yards and gyms, yet still not enough space for all the cadets. To best use resources, the special forces camp and the maintenance camp shared Ground Nine.

  These academy camps differed from army units: they existed to meet departmental teaching needs rather than to select talent. Not every mechanic trainee is suited to machinery, and not every special-forces trainee would become a spetsnaz operator.

  Jack laughed to himself.

  Among the trainees, some were clearly seasoned special ops veterans who moved with ease. The worst off were the green cadets — “special ducks” being put on the rack, so to speak. The special-ops line filed past Jack, weapon slung and packs flapping; many looked as if they might collapse from sheer exhaustion.

  Some lads’ trousers nearly fell off mid-run; others had shirts twisted into knots, straps tangled like nests. A few had their equipment lashed so tightly it resembled some twisted bondage — they’d tied themselves the wrong way and were stumbling as though about to keel over.

  Jack wiped at his eyes as if driving away tears of misery; he’d long since forgotten the raw humiliation of his first recon course, and in retrospect, he missed the clumsy, hungry days of being a rookie.

  The cadets carried a romantic bravado — the mythology of the special forces. That badge of completion would make them heroes in the eyes of young girls. But Jack knew better.

  He remembered his own first day in recon: blasted by instructors, wanting to run but not daring to. He never imagined he’d one day be an instructor, lounging and watching others suffer.

  Looking at those fresh faces, he was moved. Many might not survive the first real battle. They were still dreaming of heroism; they thought war was glorious. Jack knew the truth.

  War was not romance. War was hell.