10. Leah
LEAH
The floor groans under my boots as I descend into the dark.
It’s not a scream, not a warning—just the tired bones of Spuel muttering like an old man who's seen too much and didn’t want to be woken up today. Same, honestly. The hatch hisses shut above me, sealing out the world with a sigh that feels... final.
And just like that, I’m committed.
No halfway. No exit signs glowing faint red in the periphery. Just me, Kalev, and a month of surveillance shifts in a stolen corner of the station so deep it might as well have been exiled.
The hideout’s more bunker than base: carved out from under an abandoned coolant exchanger, half the panels repurposed from scavenged med bays and forgotten cargo bays. It smells like old wires, antifreeze, and something almost medicinal—like the ghosts of hospitals past.
I step in, shoulder brushing a low conduit, and he’s already there. Quiet in that way that makes you think he hasn’t moved, but you know better. Kalev doesn’t do idle.
His back’s to me, crouched low by the terminal bank. His armor’s stripped down to the base layers, dark shirt clinging to muscle in a way I try not to look at for too long. The nape of his neck is bare. Scales like faint ridges catching the amber light from the console readouts.
I clear my throat. Not because I need to, but because walking into silence makes me feel like I’ve already failed some test.
He doesn’t turn.
“You’re late,” he says.
“Clock’s on Spuel time,” I shoot back, dropping my bag by the cot. “Spuel time’s always late.”
Now he glances over his shoulder. There’s a flicker—something like amusement, buried deep—but his expression smooths back to neutral before I can claim it.
“New patrol pattern shifted,” he says. “Coalition-aligned drones started ghosting Dock 8. Had to reroute optics to cover both sectors.”
“So we’re babysitting the quiet kids and the ones trying to sneak knives into their lockers. Awesome.”
“No one gets stabbed if we’re doing it right.”
I snort, peeling off my jacket. “Optimism. Look at you evolving.”
He goes back to the terminal. I move to the far wall, where our shared surveillance setup lives—screens patched together from three different tech eras, one of them buzzing faintly like it’s got a grudge.
Every feed shows the same thing: Spuel’s undergut. Heat-signatures. Glitched motion tracking. Timestamps blinking like dying stars.
It’s chaos. It’s home.
And it’s mine now.
Because somewhere between the moment I said yes to this mission and the second I felt the hatch seal behind me today, I realized something dangerous. Something permanent.
I’m not afraid of this anymore.
The fear’s still there—sure. Like a scar, not an open wound. It hums under my skin when the alarms test-run at odd hours or when a shift drags long enough to stir memories that shouldn’t be touched. But it’s not in charge anymore.
I’ve lived my whole life reacting. This time, I chose.
And Kalev notices. Not that he says anything. That’d be too easy.
But his presence changes.
Like when he walks past me now, checking the wall panel—he moves closer than he used to. Not enough to crowd me. Just enough that I feel the heat of him. Enough that if something went sideways, he could shield me in a second.
It’s not protective in a patronizing way. It’s… spatial. Strategic. Calculated like everything he does.
But still.
Noticed.
Later, when we’re reviewing footage—me cross-legged on the cot, him standing like the air’s not allowed to touch his spine—I ask, “How many exits did you map?”
He doesn’t blink. “Seven. Three functional. One’s sealed. Two require risk.”
“And the seventh?”
His eyes flick to me. “You’re standing on it.”
I grin despite myself. “Nice to know you’re planning my escape routes.”
“Planning both of ours.”
That shouldn't make my pulse skip. Shouldn’t make heat lick low in my stomach. But I’m learning all kinds of new reflexes these days.
We work. Eat. Monitor. Sleep in shifts, alternating without ever needing to confirm it out loud.
One night, I wake to find him standing at the entry, shirtless, tension coiled through every muscle like he’s waiting for something to strike.
I say nothing.
He doesn’t turn.
Eventually, he exhales. Slow. Shaky.
I lie back down. Pretend I didn’t see. But I do.
Every time.
Two weeks in, and I can navigate this nest with my eyes closed. I know which panel sticks, which cable throws static when it’s overloaded, which seat creaks just enough to give us away if someone’s listening.
I know how to read him, too.
Kalev’s got tells. Not many, but they’re there.
A tightening at the jaw when he’s considering cutting a feed. The way his hand ghosts toward the small of his back when something pings wrong on the scanner. The way he checks my location in the reflection of the screen before taking a step.
Always making sure I’m accounted for.
Always checking the exits.
Always between me and the threat.
I should hate that. Should push against it, pride bristling. But… I don’t.
It doesn’t make me feel small.
It makes me feel seen.
One night, we’re eating—ration bars and reheated synth-noodles, a feast by our standards—and he says, without looking up:
“You haven’t frozen once.”
My fork stops halfway to my mouth.
“What?”
“You’ve been under pressure. Surveillance breaches. Proximity alarms. You move fast. You plan.”
I blink. Swallow the lump in my throat along with the bite of dry soy protein.
“You keeping a checklist?”
“Keeping track.”
“And what if I did freeze?” I ask, sharper than I mean to.
His eyes meet mine. Unflinching. “Then I’d cover you. But you haven’t.”
I don’t know what to do with that. So I mutter, “Still time.”
He just nods. Like that’s true. Like it’s fine. Like it doesn’t matter either way because we’ve got each other’s backs and that’s not a weakness, it’s just structure.
Gods.
He drives me insane.
The worst part is, I’ve stopped pretending I don’t watch him too.
The way his hands move when he’s disarming a corrupted drone relay.
The lines of his back when he stretches after a six-hour sit.
The low rumble of his voice when he murmurs threats at the tech like it’ll behave better if it fears him.
Spoiler: it might.
But it’s not just attraction. It’s something messier. Denser.
He gets it. The silence. The shadows. The feeling that you’ve already died five times and are just waiting for the world to catch up.
And somehow, in that shared language of damage, we’ve found… rhythm.
No touch. No confessions.
But the air between us is thick.
Tonight, he sits across from me at the terminal, our knees almost touching. We’re reviewing heat signatures near a collapsed tunnel. Nothing conclusive. Just flickers of movement and thermal ghosts.
Still, I catch him glancing at me more than the screen.
“Do you think they know we’re watching?” I ask, voice low.
“They’re not careless,” he says. “But they’re not invincible.”
“Neither are we.”
He looks at me for a long beat. “That’s why we move together.”
I nod. The words settle warm in my chest. Heavy. True.
He shifts, and for a second, I think he’s going to reach out. Bridge the distance. But he doesn’t.
Instead, he says, “You’re not the same woman I met outside the coffee stand.”
“No,” I say, “She was running.”
“And you’re not?”
I look at the screen. Watch a blip fade out.
“No. I’m not.”
For a while, we just sit. Side by side. Not speaking. Not needing to.
It’s not safe. Not smart.
But it’s real.