Chapter 15 Kaz
KAZ
I’m not flying.
I’m fighting.
Every stick pull, every pitch, every burst from the simulated pulse cannons—I’m throwing punches at shadows. Not formations, tactics, or drills.
I’m trying to hit something I can’t name.
The sim pod shudders as I bank too hard. The inertial dampeners lag a half-second behind, sending a jolt through my gut. On screen, Yoris's blip climbs above me, tucking neatly into the blind spot I left wide open. I curse. Too slow. Too loud. Too exposed.
He doesn’t hesitate.
The HUD lights up red.
Target locked.
“Missile away,” he says in the comm, voice all smug satisfaction.
The sim flashes white.
KILL.
I slam my palm into the console hard enough to sting. The screen fades to the black-and-blue of mission review mode. My stats crawl in beside the footage: one kill, three near misses, one simulated death.
Trash.
“Debrief in five,” Trozius’s voice barks through the overhead. “And someone remind Candidate Calderon this isn’t a back-alley brawl.”
The hatch hisses open and I drag myself out of the pod, sweat plastering my shirt to my spine. My fists won’t unclench. My pulse won’t come down.
Yoris climbs out of his pod with the subtle swagger of a man who thinks he’s just been knighted.
“You’re slipping, starboy,” he says as he passes me. “Maybe keep your head out of the clouds—and her quarters.”
I freeze.
I could kill him.
Right here. Right now.
Tray to the face. Fist to the throat. Something quick and final.
But I don’t.
I just breathe. One. Two. Three.
I turn.
“I’d say kiss my ass,” I mutter, “but I’m afraid you’d enjoy it.”
Yoris snorts, disappearing into the locker bay.
Swan appears at my elbow like a ghost.
“You gonna tell me what the hell that was?” he whispers. “Or do I have to start guessing?”
“It was a sim,” I snap, too harsh.
“No, Kaz. It was a meltdown.”
I don’t respond. Just grab my flight jacket off the hook and follow the others into the debrief room. The lights feel too bright. The air too still. My body’s still vibrating from the sim—like I haven’t landed.
Trozius waits at the front, arms crossed, face carved from disappointment.
“You flew like your throttle was stuck at one-oh-five,” he says, eyes locked on me. “Which would be impressive if you hadn’t left your wing open like a hatchling with a cracked visor. You wanna be First Ray, Candidate?”
“Yes, sir,” I say through clenched teeth.
“Then fly like it. Not like you’ve got something to prove to whoever you think’s watching.”
He moves on. Tears into Yoris next, but it’s perfunctory. Everyone knows who the real disaster was today.
I sit through the rest of the session with my jaw locked tight and my hands jammed into my sleeves so I don’t do something stupid. Like break my stylus in half. Or cry.
Because gods help me, that’s what I feel building in my throat. Not weakness. Not regret.
Shame.
The kind that stains.
Lunch is noise and chaos and recycled air. My tray clatters onto the table harder than I mean it to. I stab at the synth-meat like it insulted my ancestors. Across the mess, Yoris is laughing too loud. Telling a story I don’t want to hear.
Then I catch it. A single line. Tossed casually into the space like a grenade.
“—guess some people get their missions confused. Chasing tail instead of flight trails—”
The table erupts in laughter.
He doesn’t even look at me when he says it.
But everyone else does.
I stand. My tray in my hand. Knuckles white.
He wants a reaction.
He’s baiting me.
And I’m damn close to giving it to him.
I drop the tray harder than necessary onto the counter, food untouched. Walk out. Fast.
I hear someone mutter “temper tantrum” as I pass.
Let them talk.
Let them all talk.
The rest of the day is a blur of movement and numbness. Training logs. Tactical review. Physical conditioning. It all folds into a haze I can’t claw out of. Every second, I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop.
For Nova to look at me like I’m a mistake. As well as Trozius to call me in and say I’m cut. Lastly, the world to tilt and spit me out.
But it doesn’t.
It just keeps spinning.
That night, I lie in my bunk staring out the porthole.
The stars are merciless tonight.
Bright. Cold. Distant.
I wonder what she’s thinking. If she’s lying in her bunk with the same churn in her stomach. If she regrets it already. If she watched me spiral in the sim room and thought, I should’ve known better.
Because I did spiral.
I couldn’t think.
Couldn’t breathe.
Because every second of that flight, I kept seeing her face when I left. The kiss that tasted like a goodbye. The way her voice cracked when she said she didn’t know how to do this.
And I believed her.
Because neither do I.
But I want to.
Gods, I want to.
I press my forehead to the cold glass. My breath fogs the edge of the window.
What if I already lost her because I never really had her?
And that she was right?
What if this can’t work?