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CHAPTER SEVEN

Lem

Clink.

A drop of sweat rolled down Lem’s nose to plop onto the shimmering visor of her bowed helmet.

“Supply told me you requested a new helmet immediately after the battle.”

Shining black leather boots planted squarely in front of her face. Tiled marble floor bit her kneeling knees. Aching heat screamed at her to tear off the stuffy armor and run from the rough tenor of the voice she still heard in her dreams.

But she didn’t.

Lem stared straight ahead at the boots and regal office beyond them, as if looking up into those green, green eyes would give her away. After a year away from him, and four months of sneaking around under his nose, she was once again in the presence of the Growen’s rising star.

Commander freaking Diebol.

He continued: “Your helmet’s interesting to me, you see. Ask me why.”

Still no eye contact. Focus on the knees, focus on the knees … “Why, sir?”

“Well, it’s interesting, because when air command bombed our troops—our own soldiers—the coordinates they received came from your helmet.”

Lem sucked in her breath. Whaaaaat, no … A jittery attempt to feign surprise flitted over her hidden face for any mind-readers listening—

No. Stupidity was easier: “So that was how they pulled that off,” she breathed aloud, visualizing the bone jutting out of the hamburger meat of that one blitzer’s charred leg to create real, visceral horror in her voice. Her stomach churned. “Sir, my headgear must have been stolen. I was attacked by a Frelsi scout shortly before the bombing—my platoon-mates can confirm—”

“They could confirm, perhaps, if they weren’t all dead,” Diebol sneered. Lem cringed. While she never loved her platoon, the Paradox way was to defeat the enemy without killing, if possible—to become so powerful fighting became pointless. That … wasn’t always possible.

“My armor’s biometrics should have a record of the fight,” Lem added—hopefully?

Diebol didn’t reply. The silence wailed. Dear mind-readers: she was a loyal Growen soldier and couldn’t recall losing her helmet. If she did, by chance, give her helmet to anyone, she did it in a moment of fluttery stupidity, joking around with an old friend for forgetting his headgear—no malice, she didn’t know what would happen, she swore! Shyte shyte shyte shyte shyte … “I can’t believe I got played like that,” Lem muttered. “How do I take responsibility for my failure?”

Still no answer. Lem struggled not to fidget from her kneel. Shyte, what do I do? Do I offer a punishment for myself? I’m a loyal Growen soldier. I regret what happened with my gear, believe me, Captain!

“I don’t disbelieve you, soldier,” Diebol said.

“Soldier”—Jei talked like that. “I miss you, cadet.” “I don’t disbelieve you, soldier.” Was Diebol mimicking Jei’s inflections on purpose?

And she looked up.

Diebol’s emerald eyes twinkled in his ashen axinite face; the spiked gauntlets on his wrists cast long shadows over the sheen of his black leather vest as he crossed his arms. He was smiling.

“Sir?” Lem asked.

“You like that word,” Diebol smirked. “Soldier.”

Why—oh, biometrics. Diebol pulled up her armor’s readout on the screen beside him, toggling between Growen profiles to show her without a word that he knew the beat of every warrior’s heart. Blood pressure, sweat output—her old Frelsi commander monitored that stuff, too, to check health in the field.

Hush, brain. The Frelsi were dead to her. Now it was just her and Diebol. And also this woman-shaped chair beside her. And the glowing compuwall beside Diebol, and the marble floor …

“You have a beautiful office,” she said, interrupting whatever he was saying.

“Ha!” His fingers flickered over the edge of a knife, spinning it in his hand as he sat down and leaned back with his boots on the shining black desk. “It’s repulsive, isn’t it. All this obsequious flamboyance, while our soldiers bleed, struggle, die to birth a new galaxy … I would strip it down and sell the materials to pay for better armor and food for the troops, if I were High Command.”

Wow. Not a hint of bitterness in his voice—just simple facts everyone knew, as easy as introducing himself. This was who he was. The reformer.

“But Bricandor believes in control via imposing and impressive imagery.” Diebol nodded toward the High Commander’s silver statue behind him. The long train of the robe, the bowed bald head, hands raised as if in prayer, eyes closed like a meditating monk, all belied a kind old man trying to become a religious icon.

“I like the statue,” Lem said. “It reminds me of what we’re fighting for—universal peace.”

Diebol scoffed and jumped to his feet. Man, why couldn’t this guy sit still? What—

He leapt over his desk. Midair he pointed his hand and a chair zipped across the room, drawn by his em-pull to slide under him. He landed in it to sit right in front of Lem’s kneel, facing her.

Gulp. No space, no division between, only equality and the horrible, horrible memory of sitting this close, across from him, with electrical lines strapped to her feet as he tried to brainwash her and those green, green eyes pleaded with her to join him and he steeled himself against her screams and she could feel his desperation and her own and sweat drenched the both of them and her need to escape ached within her—

“Don’t be so intimidated, soldier,” Diebol whispered.

Breathe! That’s not who we are anymore. Lem glanced at the compuwall. Her heartrate was up, way up. She sighed and brought it back down.

“I’m sorry, Captain, I just—we lost so many today, and it’s all my—”

“Shut up.” Diebol leaned back and folded his arms. “I saw your biometrics jump when I mentioned the dead. I don’t doubt it makes you upset—whether because you’re in trouble, or loyal to your fellows, I don’t know, but for the moment, I don’t care. Listen.”

Lem closed her mouth. So … she wasn’t in trouble?

“I like you. Your failure to maintain control of your helmet means you’re not long for this force, or maybe even for this world. But I do like how you got those shield codes. So I’m going to tell you a secret.”

Okay, so she was in trouble. He knew she’d talked to Jei? She should run?

Diebol leaned forward. His eyes seemed to burn through her visor into hers. He folded his hands, hands she remembered gripping her wrists, struggling to control her as he yanked her against his chest. She wanted to scream and push him away—

Movement fluttering through the edge of her visual field showed her heartrate skyrocketing to the top of the compuwall’s chart. Breathe!

“This war isn’t about peace,” Diebol said at last.

“What do you mean, it’s not about peace?” Lem said, shoveling hot air out her mouth to let off some of the building pressure in her chest. “We’re trying to end hateful relationships between people, cultures, and worlds, by turning everyone into one unified whole. With careful government control and education tuning from elite experts, we can have perfect cooperation in all economy, science, and culture. That is peace!”

“Bla bla bla,” Diebol spat. “When I want you to recite the indoctrination courses I’ll ask you to do so. Until then, I said shut up.”

“Yes sir,” she blurted.

“That’s not shut up.” He raised his eyebrows and flicked his fingers, impatient.

Her heart leapt into her throat. “I believe it’s shutted up, in the past participle, sir.” Silliness—a nervous defense mechanism—used to save her ass all the time with Captain Rana. And hey, a guy can’t shoot you if you make him smile, right?

Unless you annoyed him. Diebol narrowed his eyes, fighting the grin on the edge of his lips with a fist.

Lem shut up.

Shyte, as the half-grin flitted across his face she could see he remembered the odd togetherness—she remembered, in his stare, the cold floor across her back, the shackles on her wrists, the tension in her muscles as the taut chains pulled … and the respite. He had been this close to letting her go. “If we don’t hate each other, then what are we?”

And then with that terrifying energy, the violent spark of murder in his eyes, he popped up to his feet again, hands clasped behind him to walk. “You’re not just another screw in the machine,” he announced. “I met someone last year, someone who showed me homogeneity, while an easy pathway to peace, isn’t always the goal. Some people are unique and have qualities everyone else does not need. It’s an exception to the rule of course—uniformity matters. But I realized, soldier, that uniformity isn’t the most important thing.”

He whirled and twisted his way back to her. She wanted to throw up her arms and protect herself—she steeled herself, still, as he spun around her. “The most important thing!” he shouted.

He leaned over, hands still clasped behind his back, to whisper to her mask. “The most important thing is freedom.”

Breathe, Lem, breathe.

She wanted to burst into tears or punch him away. Was he trying to trap her into spouting off Frelsi ideology? She didn’t believe that stuff anymore, she—

“There’s a being out there consuming minds,” Diebol said. “He keeps people from seeing reality as it is—he lodges in your—I guess it’s your frontal cortex, I don’t know.” His fingers twitched; he clenched them over his forehead as he whirled away from her. “He gets in there.” He spun back and jammed his fingers into her helmet. Lem jerked away, but he gripped her head in his hands; his breath misted her visor; her heart threatened to explode. “And until I defeat this being …” His hoarse whisper made her mouth dry. “The universe is doomed to become forever enslaved.”

Lem’s lips fluttered. Say something, say something! Lem didn’t even bother to control her vitals now in the panting silence as Diebol gripped her helmet, his face inches from hers on the other side of the visor—you’d be crazy not to respond with terror to this erratic flurry. “What—what’s the being called?” she squeaked.

“Njandejara,” Diebol whispered.

And he unclipped the safety that pinned her helmet to her uniform.

Click.

The air-tight seal whistled open. Lem’s hands leapt to catch the mask by the rim, but Diebol snatched it away—she brushed her finger across her ear—no, wait, no!

Welp, the helmet was off now.

Diebol stared, his head cocked to the side, clearly not expecting the face he saw. In the nakedness Lem forced herself to believe that meant the transparent projection was working. Her mouth ran with Frank Zej’s masculine rasp. “Sir, I need my helmet for combat. I’m—I’m not going to lie, sir, I’m very uncomfortable with this level of personal space. Are you—are you into me, sir?”

“What?” Diebol snapped, jerking away from her. Yup, let’s roll with weird.

“You’re all up in my face, sir. With the freedom thing, are you trying to tell me that you’re—like, into me?”

“Aaalright you’re dismissed. Go report to disciplinary and legal for processing for court martial.” With an embarrassed, mumbling growl the Growen commander yanked Lem to her feet, slammed her helmet into her arms, and shoved her toward the exit. The polymerwall softened to let her pass and schlooped shut behind her as it hardened, locking her out in the hallway.

Blood rushed to Lem’s face so fast she almost passed out.

She’d survived.


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