Chapter 38 Task
TASK
SFS POLARIS
Task stands at the edge of the mess hall, hands in his pockets.
His eyes are on Kit, and his stomach flips uncomfortably as he watches her turn to Finn and laugh, her eyes lighting up and her face cracking into a smile.
He can’t stop thinking about that night after the attack, when he yanked her into his bed, the little sound she made when he finally kissed her after so many weeks of growing tension.
The air had been electric between them; he could practically feel sparks flying off them when their lips touched.
He absentmindedly touches his lips now, thinks about what Voss said to him the other night, about how much she means to him.
It doesn’t matter, really. He can’t continue with this. Under no uncertain circumstances can they do that again. Not when everything is so complicated for him, when she doesn’t know everything, can’t know everything.
She looks so happy right now, totally unburdened as she steals a piece of dried apricot from her brother’s tray, and he swats her hand.
There is nothing complicated about this moment, just a group of people who love each other easily, know each other’s deepest secrets, have been there for each other in ways Task could never possibly be.
He sighs. He needs to distance himself. She’s better off with Finn, who she’s leaning into now, still laughing, her eyes crinkled at the corners. He feels a surge of jealousy rush through him, coiling deep in his gut, even though he knows he is making the right decision in stepping back.
He turns on his heel quietly, exiting the mess before they notice his presence.
Kit
Kit steps through the vestibule that leads out of the medical bay, discarding her protective gear and making sure the biopad glows red behind her before she continues on her way.
It’s late, the ship mostly abandoned, though several Guardians wander the halls, whispering to each other.
She pretends as though she’s not looking for Task, though she is.
She hasn’t seen him in over a week. When she’s with the ambassador, he’s gone; when she’s in the mess hall, he’s not there.
She hasn’t even been lucky enough to run into him in the hallways.
Kit can tell he’s avoiding her, and she doesn’t know what to do.
Yes, they behaved recklessly the other week, but she thought he’d wanted it.
The way he had grabbed her, his lust crashing into her like a tidal wave — she’d been overcome with it.
They’d both been slightly out of their minds, adrenaline pulsing through them, but she’s certain she hadn’t been imagining the tension slowly building between them, the way his touches lingered longer and longer, until he didn’t pull away at all.
She feels a thrum between her thighs as she remembers his lips on hers, his hands in her hair, his fingers inside of her.
She’s so tangled up in the memory of that night that she’s not paying attention to where she’s going, running smack into a hard body. Strong hands grip her biceps as she ricochets backwards, and she’s looking up into Voss’ face. “I’m so sorry,” she splutters. “I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Obviously,” Voss says, a grin in his voice. “You good, Kitty?”
Kit sighs. Voss is everything Task is not, forthcoming, sociable, easy to talk to. And yet, it doesn’t make a dent in her feelings for Task. In some ways, makes her want him more.
“I’m fine,” she lies. “Just a long day.” She’s not about to bring up her and Task’s interpersonal issues with his best friend. It should not even be in the top five list of things she’s thinking about. She should be asking about Voss — he’s the one still recovering from a surge-saber injury.
He drops his hands from her and narrows his eyes. “You sure?”
“I just need to get some rest,” Kit says, avoiding his gaze as she moves around him to continue to her quarters.
She doesn’t want to talk to him right now, wants to go back to her room and wallow.
She wishes she could talk to her mother, misses how easily she used to be able to pick up her Prism and call her.
It feels like a five-mile walk to her room, and when she gets there, she throws herself down on to her bed, not bothering to remove her scrubs.
She tries to stop her brain from fixating on him, from wondering what she could have possibly done wrong.
She misses his presence so deeply it aches, and she sucks in a breath at the sudden sharpness of it.
It almost feels worse, she thinks, to miss someone that’s still with you.
That you know you could have, but is out of your reach for whatever reason.
The grief she carries for her mother, the guilt she feels — it’s different.
She’s gone and the pain of it makes sense.
But the pain of missing Task doesn’t. It’s visceral and unexpected and confusing.
She lays there, staring out the window into the inky black of the galaxy, turning everything over and over in her head.
He’d wanted her, and then completely vanished.
Maybe she should have asked Voss about Task when she ran into him, but the shame of it — of what they’d done and his subsequent behavior — was too much to bear.
So instead, she tries to think her way out of it, come up with a rational explanation for it all.
Kit has worked two night shifts in a row and she’s exhausted, feet aching, as she and Wynstann wordlessly restock the medical cabinets with syringes, needles, tourniquets, and potion bottles. She’s filling a final jar with cotton swabs as the door slides open. Wynstann glances up from beside her.
“Major,” Wynstann says, nodding his head.
Kit’s stomach sinks. She both does and doesn’t want to see him, a tug of war occurring between her head and her heart.
Of course, she’d told herself numerous times to stop thinking about him, to let it go, but now that he’s standing here, she can’t.
She won’t. He doesn’t get to be a coward about this.
He strolls in, casual, his face expressionless, icy blonde hair falling over his forehead. “Pluto. Good to see you.”
He ignores Kit entirely, as if she’s not in the room, and it makes her blood boil. It was one thing to avoid her in the mess hall, but to pretend as though she doesn’t exist when she’s standing right there? Who does he think he is?
“Hello,” she says primly, forcing him to look at her.
“Luminary Hart,” he replies, using her formal title, his tone clipped. He’s twisting the silver ring around his finger. “How is the ambassador doing?”
Kit doesn’t want to answer him, wants to be petty. But she’s a professional, and Wynstann is still standing right there. “Amaltheia and Nevis will check his vitals when they come on shift,” Kit says. “We’re just wrapping up for the evening. But hopefully improved.”
He nods once, eyes traveling over her, and she can’t help but remember it again, the feeling of his lips on hers, the way he bit her neck. She flushes, even though she doesn’t mean to, heat creeping up her neck. She needs to get it together.
He’s been cold to her, and she tries to remember that — the way he’s cut her off so completely and demolished the careful camaraderie they’d built.
She feels the familiar anger start to rise, and she holds on to it.
It feels safer than vulnerability. Wynstann bangs something into the cabinet noisily and Kit snaps her gaze towards him. “Healer Pluto, you can go.”
Wynstann looks at her, dark eyebrows raised. “I’m still technically on for another thirty.”
“I’ll cover it,” she says, hoping to usher him out of the vestibule quickly. It feels too small, the air too thick as she tries to avoid breathing in the coriander and mandarin that trails Task wherever he goes.
Wynstann’s head snaps between them, as if assessing something, and Kit thinks she sees the corner of his lip twitch as if trying to hide a smile. “If you’re certain.”
“I’m certain. Now go.” She practically shoves him out of the room, both frantic and afraid to be alone with Task. But then he’s moving as well, following Wynstann back the way he came in, and she finds herself shouting, “Task. Stop.”
She claps a hand over her mouth, hoping she didn’t wake her sleeping patients. This is what he does to her. Makes her behave recklessly.
“I was only checking on the ambassador. I need to get back to my duty station now.” He keeps walking, and in a few steps he’ll be through the door, the airlock spitting him back out into the non-quarantined part of the ship.
Kit races to follow him, grabbing his forearm and tugging.
He whirls around, fire in his eyes as she touches him.
She wonders if it’s because she’s causing him physical pain, or if it’s something else entirely.
“You don’t get to kiss me and then just ignore me.
” Her voice comes out evenly, sounding much more self-assured than she really is.
Her heart is pounding in her chest, and she can hear her blood racing through her ears.
“I had things to do, Kit.”
“You’ve always had things to do, but I’d still see you.
This past week? You’ve been a ghost. You haven’t so much as been in the same room as me.
That’s a pretty hard thing to accomplish on a ship of this size, unless you’re intentionally avoiding me.
And if you don’t want to do this with me, I’ll survive, but I deserve a conversation, at least, after everything you’ve said to me, after everything you had me believe.
You don’t get to just vanish and leave me hanging. ”
Task looks up toward the ceiling, as if asking the gods for help. He looks back at her, releasing a breath. “It’s not a good idea for us to do this.”
Kit feels vindicated in getting him to admit there is a this. “You keep saying that, but you won’t give me a reason why. I know you felt it, Task. Feel it.”