FIVE
CAIDEN
I stare at him for a second, fighting the urge to say, ‘You’re aware that other people exist, yeah?’
“You’re heading that way, right?”
I literally wasn’t. “No sir, I—”
“Great, take this,” he says, ignoring what I was saying, pressing the folder into my hands before disappearing back into the office like a man escaping consequences. Bastard.
By the time I cut across the base toward supply, most people are either already clocked off or moving quickly between buildings, trying not to freeze to death before dinner.
The floodlights have started coming on around the outer roads, washing everything in that ugly yellow-white glow that makes the entire place feel even more depressing than usual.
Supply is half-shuttered by the time I get there. One of the lads inside points me around the back toward the loading bay without even looking up properly from whatever paperwork he’s pretending to care about.
The loading area behind the building is quieter. A lorry sits backed into the bay with its rear doors hanging open, metal cages stacked nearby waiting to be moved inside. The whole place smells faintly of diesel, wet concrete, and cigarette smoke.
That’s what makes me notice Mason.
He’s standing off to the side under the security light with a cigarette between his fingers, shoulders hunched slightly against the cold. He sees me at the same time I see him. A look flickers across his face before he can stop it. Surprise, maybe. Or calculation.
“Alright?” he says, keeping his voice light.
“Thought you’d vanished,” I say. “I was starting to think you’d finally annoyed someone important enough to make it permanent.”
“Tempting fate, mate,” he snorts.
We stand there for a moment, close enough now that I can see him properly.
I’m close enough that the small things start to stand out.
The black eye isn’t obvious. It’s not a dramatic black mark or something that would draw attention.
It’s old. Yellow around the edges and mostly faded into his skin.
If you didn’t know Mason’s face, you might miss it.
“How long have you been working in the dark?” I joke, keeping my tone playful.
He blinks. “What?”
I tilt my head slightly, his hand comes up, fingers brushing the skin under his eye before he seems to catch himself. Then he drops it straight away. “Oh. That,” he says. “It’s nothing.”
“Does this nothing have a name,” I say, “or should I add it to the list of things no one’s mentioning?”
He exhales, glancing past me like he’s checking who might be close enough to overhear. “It happened a while back,” he says. “Dropped something. Slipped. You know how it is.”
I don’t press him, but I don’t quite buy it either. “Funny,” I say. “Because I can’t remember the last time I stood close enough to you to notice you being clumsy.”
He stiffens, then eases again. “I’ve been busy. They’ve had me doing odds and ends.”
“Odds and ends,” I repeat. “Right.”
He looks at me properly then. “Are you interrogating me now?”
“No,” I say. “I’m just asking.” We stand there a moment longer in silence. “Are you waiting for someone?” I ask, pushing brightness into my voice.
“Yes,” he says. “They’re late.”
“Shame, I’d have said grab a coffee otherwise. Another time?”
He nods, quickly, as if he’s glad that he can’t take me up on it. “Catch you later then.”
“Yeah. Later,” I reply, walking off without looking back and leaving him to his evening.
The next day we’re in the auxiliary gym.
This isn’t a place for talking things through.
You get it right, or you get your arse handed to you.
Mason’s already on the mat when I arrive, sleeves rolled up, expression set into that neutral focus he uses when he’s concentrating.
He’s paired with one of the larger men from logistics — Harris, the CO’s son.
Solid build, heavy through the shoulders, in short, a human bulldozer.
They square up at the signal. Mason moves first; he’s quick and precise, angling in to take the arm. The grip is clean, and the setup is textbook. Harris drops his weight early, driving forward instead of stopping, forcing Mason to absorb the impact rather than redirect it.
Mason goes down hard, his back hitting the mat flat. “Again,” the instructor says.
No correction, and they reset.
The second pass is faster. Harris crowds Mason’s space, closing the distance too aggressively. Mason adjusts, pivots, and gets the hold anyway. It takes longer than it normally would, but he keeps it controlled, then releases on the count.
“Again.”
By the third run, Mason’s breathing has changed. He’s bracing now, conserving energy where he can, and Harris is smiling like this is entertaining for him. I glance at the instructor. His arms are folded, watching closely but not intervening.
The fourth pass starts rough. The initial collision is sharper, shoulder-to-shoulder, and more force than the drill calls for. Mason stumbles, recovers, and keeps moving. He almost has it under control when Harris brings his elbow up.
The point of contact is ugly, and Mason’s head snaps sideways with the impact.
It’s a sharp, hollow sound echoing off the walls. He drops down on one knee, one hand braced on the mat, the other instinctively coming up to his face.
“Hold,” the instructor says, belatedly, and the room goes silent. Mason stays where he is for a few minutes, breathing through his nose, his shoulders rising and falling in a careful rhythm. When he looks up, there’s already swelling beneath his eye, the red deepening fast under the harsh lights.
“That was unnecessary,” the instructor says, tone flat.
“Momentum,” Harris says, shrugging.
“What the fuck was that?” I hear myself almost shout, the words cutting across the room sharper than I intended. Heads turn, and the instructor looks at me for the first time; his expression is unreadable.
“Stand down, Varrik,” he says.
“I’m asking what that was,” I say, already stepping forward. I stop myself before I cross the mat, but it’s close. Too close. “That wasn’t part of the drill.”
The instructor looks at me, his brows raised. “You’re running this now?”
“Might as well. You aren’t running shit.”
Mason pushes himself upright slowly, still not looking at anyone. “I’m fine,” he says, voice steady.
The instructor’s gaze flicks to him. “You good to continue?”
“Yes,” Mason says, hesitating for a few seconds.
That’s enough for the instructor. “Switch partners.” Harris steps away without comment, and Mason rotates.
He’s paired again and again with people who don’t quite pull their weight back when they should. There’s nothing as blatant as the elbow. Extra force here, late releases there, and holds that linger longer than necessary.
“Watch your timing,” the instructor says at one point, after someone else botches an entry and Mason compensates to keep it from falling apart. Mason nods, adjusts, and takes it.
By the time they reach the grappling sequences, the bruise under his eye is dark and he’s favouring one side slightly now. It’s subtle enough that you’d miss it if you weren’t looking for it.
I’m absolutely looking for it.
On one rotation, a lad hooks Mason’s leg and drives him down harder than required. Mason hits the mat with a sharp exhale; the air is knocked clean from his lungs, and the release comes late again.
“Enough,” I say, louder this time. The room goes quiet in a different way.
The instructor turns fully toward me. “You want to step outside?”
“Sure,” I say. My voice is controlled slightly better now, but it takes effort. “Let’s have a chat, shall we?”
There’s a second of silence, then the instructor looks back at Mason. “Reset.”
The drill continues cleaner now, superficially. There are no more blatant strikes, no more elbows, but the damage is already done.
Mason’s movements have tightened, the efficiency sharpened to the point of rigidity. He’s compensating for pain by reducing every margin he can.
When the session finally ends, the dismissal is brisk. People break off into small groups, stretching, talking, and avoiding looking too closely at Mason’s face. He moves to the edge of the mat and sits, elbows on his knees, head slightly bowed as he steadies his breathing.
He doesn’t look at me.
The instructor passes him on the way out without stopping. That’s when I realise it’s not a single incident or a mistake. It’s a pattern. It’s something rehearsed enough that everyone knows how far they can push without crossing a line that would force intervention.
Mason stands eventually, slower than usual, and gathers his things. When he walks out, he does it alone. I stay where I am, against the wall, eyes tracking the room as it empties. I note who avoided Mason afterwards, who watched too closely, and who looked relieved when it was over.
When I finally leave, I’m already adjusting my own position, thinking about angles, about where to stand next time so I don’t miss it when it happens again.
Because it will.
I get to comms that evening; the room is dim with low-lit screens and the steady hum of equipment. I’m halfway through logging a routine update when a line lights up on the phone. It’s not an internal line, not one of ours.
I stare at it for a second, thinking it’s a fault.
Then it rings.