CHAPTER 17 KAT
KAT SET her alarm for a half hour earlier than usual. And when it buzzed, instead of lying there, she leapt out of bed, flinging on the lights.
There it sat, undisturbed in her window bay.
Her star flower.
It was as pretty and perfect as she remembered. Like the boy who’d gifted it to her. She was going to have to think of some way to repay him.
She’d padded her morning with extra time before trainings while she figured out a care routine. She wasn’t sure what sort of daily nourishing her star flower would require, but she was determined to keep it alive.
Psh. As if she couldn’t take care of a plant. It wasn’t like it was an orchard.
But as she sat there staring at its delicate sliver-like stem, she didn’t have a clue what sort of care was needed.
Plant food? Daily watering? And how much?
Just a trickle? A droplet? Lee hadn’t said anything last night when he’d walked back with her and she’d perched it in her window bay, so it seemed like starlight was okay.
She hovered over its moon-dust bloom like one of their RIM vehicles. It wasn’t like she could research the dang thing, she was pretty certain it was a one-of-a-kind by now.
She pulled her holoblock over onto her lap anyway and quickly searched “rare flowering breeds,” and clicked the first entry she saw.
“Keep the soil damp,” she read. That sounded easy enough.
She leaned up onto her knees to peer into the narrow pot.
Damp. Was this considered damp, or was the soil a little dry? Maybe it needed just a couple drops of liquid.
She scrounged up her water bottle. Unscrewing the lid, she slowly tipped it sideways. The water was almost to the lip when she righted the bottle again. What if she poured too much? A plant couldn’t die in one single day, could it?
Biting her lip, she sent Lee a quick message.
She kept an eye on her hyperband while she pulled on the newer of her all-terrain suits and tied her hair back.
She was heading into Care of Foreign Ecosystems, the irony of the training she was leading not lost on her, when Lee finally messaged her back. A single line that calmed her ecosystem.
Lee: just give it a dropper of water every couple days.
She released a very pent-up breath. She carried a fresh spring in her step as she walked into that first training.
Her morning scattered in a flurry of too-bland questions on microbes.
It seemed as if last term truly had been shelved in the past. One-year-ago-Kat—void, six-months-ago-Kat—would have been almost disappointed by how quickly everyone had gotten bored of talking about her.
As it stood, present-day-Kat was more than happy to field the fungi-microorganism-related questions and move the day along.
She was anxious to get back up to her room and see about getting herself a “dropper.”
Of course, her new plant obsession was forced to make room for a different sort of present that came in during study hour, in the form of an alert on her hyperband.
Their Placement applications had arrived.
She stared down at the tiny, all-caps lettering of the Commander’s invitation gracing the device, the words seeming to swell and shrink in time with her pulse. This was the ultimate prize. The pinnacle of their Academy achievements, and the gateway to a shiny life as a Raider.
“Hey Kat?” Jed asked, the toes of his boots swimming into her line of vision. “I had a question about crisis protocol for one of Sean’s—”
“Not now.” She waved her hand, letting it curl delicately against the back of her flex-backed chair. “I’m having a moment.”
“Something wrong?” he asked, misinterpreting her dismissal.
“Nothing’s wrong. Just—just Gamma stuff,” she said in airy tones, surprising herself when she didn’t elaborate. But Jed wasn’t the one she needed to process this with.
She flicked her eyes up. Jed stood just a hand-width closer than most cadets would have probably dared.
Closer than she would usually allow. But there was something about seeing the cadet’s face...
Seeing one of her cadets, that made it feel real.
Placement was no longer a fairy dream, it was boots by the door, she may as well start packing her bag.
In a matter of months she’d be leaving this place behind for good.
There would be no more training exercises.
No more do-overs. No second chances. Once they left these walls behind, everything counted.
“Tell me what you wanted?” she asked, as the oxygen flexed her lungs, using his face as an anchor point to hold her system accountable.
He regarded her with tentative eyes—with caring eyes—under the gelled hair hanging well below his eyebrow as she forced another steady breath down. “I just had a question on crisis protocol, the reasoning behind our post-mission surveys, but maybe it’s a bad time...”
It certainly could have been better. But she addressed him anyway, meeting his too-observant gaze. If she’d learned anything, it was that sometimes people just needed someone. Whether it was to hold their hand or just to listen.
“The surveys are meant to assess cadet health—all aspects of cadet health—to ensure that raiders are ready to accept another assignment and go back out into the field.” She shook her head.
Never mind that she’d already been back out into the field and currently questioned her mental sanity, even without the addition of the Placement application now charring a hole into her wrist and her lungs.
“And how is—crisis management going?” she asked carefully, still holding his gaze. “Would you like any further explanation on this particular topic?” Here she was, freaking out about taking the next step in her future. Jed was only a year behind her.
“I’m good for now,” Jed said quietly, and Kat could appreciate the knowing glance he spared her hyperband as he returned to his seat. And she had to wonder yet again if she had set an example she’d be proud of for her cadets to follow.
She forgot to check in with him again on her way out—instructor of the year, right here. But they’d be right back in this room later this week. Right now, she really needed to find Lee.
He was waiting for her at the doors to the Canteen, hands shoved deep into his pockets, eyes glazing right over the cadets streaming past.
“Did you get it?” she asked, a little out of breath as he fell into step alongside her.
“My Placement application?” Lee asked, still with that faraway look as they took up a spot in line. “I sure did.”
“It’s here. Yay,” she said, trying to muster some of the enthusiasm from earlier, but flailing rather spectacularly. Instead it was anxiety that threatened to crash in once more. “This is exciting, right? What we’ve been working towards for what feels like forever. We’re freaking Gammas.”
“It’s certainly something,” Lee agreed, also feigning a smile.
But he let the false cheer taper when they got to the trays, stepping towards an array of salad bowls with disinterest. “No, this is good. This is what we want,” he affirmed.
But somehow, she didn’t buy his surface optimism any more than she had her own.
This was what they’d wanted. She should be elated and brimming with pride.
The little girl with no family had built a name for herself.
She and Lee had built a life for themselves.
It came with security and connections and access to more of the galaxy than she could ever dream.
And yet, she suddenly felt like the little girl again, staring down the gigantic scary universe with its maws open before her.
She missed her invincible armor.
They filled their trays with void-knows-what, taking up a spot at their usual table. But as she stared down at her tray, she couldn’t bring herself to take a bite.
“Do you think Tonya will be excited?” Kat asked instead, pushing her food around. “More ‘space-farming’ for us, like that relative of yours.”
The corner of Lee’s lips turned up a little. Not like she was anxious and rambling or anything…
He set down his fork. “She does like to bring him up. He shares my namesake, did you know that?”
“Another Leland?” Kat asked, sighing dramatically over her untouched tomato sando.
“Yeah, yeah. Good old, Leland Waters I.” Lee huffed a laugh. He picked up his fork again, slowly spinning it between his fingers. “I don’t know yet how I should bring that topic up. She’ll know it’s coming. We just haven’t really talked about it.”
“Yeah…” Kat murmured, pretending she understood what it was like to have a caring adult in her life.
She knew exactly how this conversation would go with her aunt.
As her legal guardian, Vyna received the standard AMG Academy communications.
And when the stress overwhelmed her aunt and was buried with the majority of everyday life stressors, the conversation would go the same as every other she’d shared with Vyna as of late:
She: I’m applying for Placement.
Vyna: Oh. Can you send money?
Kat peered around the Canteen. They weren’t the only odd ones out.
She could pick out most of the Gammas by the various ranges of excitement and anticipation on their faces—with the exception of Zane.
He sat at the far table next to Neha and Marco, the Academy’s prism clearly visible from the side of his head.
But where the other two chatted animatedly with each other, Zane merely listened, somber-faced, at their side.
From what she understood, his home situation wasn’t like Neha’s or Marco’s or even Lee and Tonya’s.
Zane had always kind of been on his own.
Like her, his future and support depended on him succeeding with the Academy.
However, whereas she’d understood Zane’s dad to only care about Zane “carrying on the family name” or whatever, Vyna didn’t possess the mental capacity to actually care, let alone support her.
She couldn’t say which of their situations was preferred.
After lunch, for the joy of hanging out with Whistler, and not at all to avoid opening their Placement applications, she and Lee fled back down to the training levels to catch Whistler’s afternoon meditative practice.
About a dozen cadets were already present when they entered. Whistler was fiddling with the room settings, so she and Lee set up their mats alongside Demi.
“Hey Katy-girl,” Demi said, leaning in for a hug. Kat raised her eyebrows. Whistler was definitely rubbing off on his X-yeared beau. “I heard congrats are in order,” Demi said neutrally, gold earrings glinting under the overhead lights. “Applications, that’s huge for you lot.”
Despite wanting to avoid this exact subject, there was something about the way he’d said it—or maybe he just possessed a similar energy to Whistler—that Kat found herself relaxing into a previous version of herself. One that actually believed this was where she belonged.
Lee seemed to feel that too. He had a loose smile on his face as he tipped his head in acknowledgment. “Just making room for you.”
“I know we make it look easy, but I trust you guys will keep to our standards,” Kat winked.
“We’ll do our best,” Demi said, chuckling.
“Honestly, I think I’ll be thrilled when it’s behind me.
” His eyes stole over to Whistler as he crossed back to the middle of the room, tightening his high bun and motioning at the stragglers coming through the door to take a seat so they could get started.
Maybe it was his meditation. But Whistler seemed to have found his center with this whole graduation thing. And she knew Lee was working through it.
She thought back to the cadet health surveys and what she’d told Jed this morning about being ready to take on a new assignment. What would it take to get her confidence back in the AMG to ensure she would be ready to accept Placement? What would it take to get back her confidence in herself?
Kat glanced between Whistler and Demi again, then to Lee beside her, a different sort of sparkfly fluttering to life in her stomach and making loops about her intestines.
It seemed she was about to put that trust to the test. She’d do this with him.
With Lee, they’d always find a way to make it work, right?