Chapter 5
Once a cycle or so, Leonus insisted the flight crew take a turn on the bridge, practice malfunction and landing drills.
Stepping off the train in the corridor to the bridge he found Rufus Gaius waiting for him.
He’d barely seen the old son of a bitch, who quartered aboard Persephone, commanding the returning Marines and bringing back any explorers who changed their minds.
“Master Chief! How are you?”
“Well sir,” Gaius was a steel rod, his scarred face wrapped in the perfect neutrality of the Fleet NCOs. But underneath the rigid, perfect discipline, Gaius looked like shit. He looked the way he’d looked in the siege of Deimos. And they’d been sleeping in ten minute increments in those days.
“I’m glad to see you. I was surprised you didn’t make the jump,” Leo said, clapping Gai on the back. “What can I do for you?”
“Permission to speak freely?”
“Of course.”
“Are you happy, sir?”
Caught off guard, Leonus let the smile come. It felt like a stretch, luxurious and slow. I am deliriously happy. He brought himself to the present with a glance at Gaius’s raised brow.
“Very happy,” Leonus said, getting himself under control. “Now why didn’t you come and get Matched, jump to a new world with us?”
“I didn’t quite work up the nerve, sir,” Gai said in a low voice.
“I couldn’t imagine a match- who could possibly be matched with me?
” An abrupt gesture took in scars, eye, his body as battered as Leo’s own.
Master Chief Rufus Gaius was a hale and hardy man, silver-haired and tough as nails.
He isn’t even sixty. And so the scars and the eyepatch and the gold tooth, well…
“I’m not exactly pretty, or young,” Leo pointed out.
“It’s different for you,” Gaius said. “You’re the Lion of fucking Mars. Sir.”
Leonus wasn’t sure what to say. He thought the argument went the other way; he couldn’t imagine someone who’d tolerate the whole circus. But Gaius was hurting. Leonus didn’t want to trivialize his pain.
“I don’t know what I’m to do,” Gaius said in a low voice. “Back in the domes. I ain’t sure what my mission would be or… these last two years been a cliff face for me.”
“Jump with us then!”
“But the match…”
“Come and see me after watch,” Leonus said. He really thinks he’s too ugly to match? Surely that isn’t possible. “We will work something out.”
Gai shook himself like a dog and stepped back, his face resuming its neutrality.
“Never mind sir. Just idle curiosity. I’ll catch you at Separation.”
Leonus watched him go, wondering if there was anything he could do. There must be.
“Demeter?”
I am already working on it, dear. I believe Rufus Gaius would make an excellent addition to the crew.
“Attention on the bridge!”
“As you were,” Leo said. He took his place behind the helmsman and breathed a deep sigh of relief. Black coat or no black coat. He was at home here, in charge, and he knew exactly what he was doing.
“Mr. Barabas, report.”
“Personnel all present or accounted for. Our course and setting—”
Barabas ran through the litany, and Leonus immediately lost track. Cassius. Deadly, brilliant, merciless Cassius with his rogue’s smile and his red cock… Leonus caught himself. Pull yourself together. You are acting like a fool.
Unfair. Leading the system’s largest fighting force hadn’t exactly given him much time to himself since the end of the war.
So Leo Ares, walking wounded and political circus animal, had not had his bell rung like this since…
Venus? Given the sudden perspective of Cass’s firm little ass, Leo could now admit his life had been a frozen vacuum of loneliness.
See? Not a fool. Only touch starved and overworked.
Barabas finished his report and Leo turned to his station.
“As you were,” he said. “Mr. Barabas let’s run training plan–”
He cut off as all the lights on the two helm stations blared red a second before the collision alarm split the air.
“Report!” Leonus barked, his mind already calculating how much they could shift at this speed before they were hopelessly off course.
“Piece of debris, sir!”
“Fire the—”
The alarms cut out mid-word and every console went green.
“Correction complete. Course stabilized.”
Silence. Then a nervous laugh from the helm, quickly stifled.
“As you were.” Leonus managed, forcing an awkward smile.
The truth sat heavy: they were not spacing here. They were not even Fleet officers anymore. They were…passengers on this ship. Allowed this bridge as a sop to our egos…
“Mr. Barabas,” Leonus said quietly. “You have command.”
He walked the whole length of the unfinished corridor, past welding drones busy lifting half-sealed walls. They have more of a purpose than 1000 old spacers with no choice.
Leonus, what is the matter?
“The next time–” he cut off. Wait to save their lives so the old dog can feel better about himself? No. Of course not. “Leave me alone, Demeter.”
She must have called Cass, who was waiting at the door with a glass and a whole arrangement of food spread out on the terrace.
“Drink this, get changed, and come eat.”
Gratitude sagged Leo’s shoulders. He swallowed the shot, rum this time, and did as his match suggested.
“It’s bad enough I didn't get a say in any of this mess,” he said at last. “But to be relegated to passengers. To cargo?”
“What do you mean? You were gifted command, a big send off, on behalf of a grateful system and all that!” Marcus piled Leo’s plate as he spoke. It smelled heavenly, whatever it was, and tasting it gave Leo time to consider his answer. He didn’t want to insult Cassius.
“This may be surprising to hear, as you’re literal poster boy of the mission.”
“Oh!” Cassius dropped his face in his hands, stifling a laugh. “Yes. Well, General Sutherland’s son had to be the one taking Farm Corps to the next system, didn’t he? Right thing to do and all that…”
“Your name is third on the volunteer list,” Leo chided, reaching to pat his Match’s knee
“Of course it is,” Cassius said, rolling his eyes.
“I don’t want to make light of this mission or its obvious importance to your family-“
“Stop, Fido.”
“I didn’t want to come,” Leo confessed. There was no need to pretend with Cassius–an idea to warm any old dog’s bones.
“No!“ Cassius rolled sideways up onto his elbow, gripping Leo’s bicep. The story came out-the words falling over each other, lancing the festering anger and resentment.
“One of the articles of the treaty 1000 of our most senior officers and chiefs had to join Demeter.”
“You were ordered-“
“Didn’t even have to order us. It’s a term of the peace treaty. What I wanted, a quiet dome on my home world, which I’d never lived on more than a year? How can that rank beside peace?”
Cassius didn’t immediately jump in with his own opinions, solutions or platitudes. His face folded inwards, reflecting Leo’s own uncertainty and frustration. But his hand ran absently up and down Leo’s arm, maintained his connection.
“What will you do when we reach Luna 2?” Cass asked
“I don’t know.” Why wasn’t he ready for that question? He should be. He’d never considered past the launch, the match, past the crossing of the line. “I’ll have my allotment, like everyone. But I...” His mouth worked. “I have no idea what I’ll do.”
“Me neither.” Cass raised his glass. “Sure as shit won’t be tubers! Luckily we have three years to figure it out.”
It sounded so simple when he put it that way. Three years to figure it out. Three years before they were even in orbit. Three whole years. To get to know each other, to think of ideas, to help each other decide.
One thing Leo knew about his future, was meetings.
The problems of attaching a functioning ship around a biosphere and launching it right after the peace celebrations were tectonic in scale.
StarColony insisted on the quarters being complete by the Match.
But absolutely nothing else was done. Every meeting devolved into an argument about prioritizing.
Leonus pressed thumb to temple. He’d won wars faster than these people could approve a drainage grate. Was this really how he was going to spend his retirement?
“Demeter,” he murmured under his breath.
Yes, dearest, she replied, voice soft in his implant.
“Can Cassius really change his role? His duties? His entire life?”
Anyone on this vessel can. Most of the Venusians are cross-trained for two or three specialties. And our Terran friends even more so. Flexibility is their strength.
“Cross-trained,” Leo sighed. They’d been soldiers all their lives, and the treaty threw them away to fend for themselves? The thought curdled. He imagined the great Rufus Gaius, Custos Signi Martis, growing beans. Impossible. No wonder he didn’t make the jump.
Leo stood abruptly, the chair scraping across the tiles. “This meeting is adjourned,” he said, ignoring Basim’s protests.
Stepping off the train he yanked open the black coat. There had to be a better way. A whining whirr caught his ear, one of the bots tried to drag a cart of pipes, but a wheel was stuck. Leo caught the edge and reset the bot. As it tottered off, he paused.
“Demeter, announce to all Fleet veterans: Ocean View square, ten hundred hours. Bring your Matches.”
By mid-morning the next day, the square was full.
Martians in plain coveralls, some still wearing their Fleet patches, stood shoulder to shoulder with Terran farmers, Venusian hydrologists, the neighbors Leo and Cass had greeted each morning.
The half-built town shimmered under the dome’s pale sun; the sea whispered beyond the hill, blending with birdsong.
Leonus climbed onto an overturned crate and looked out at them.
“Martians, who among you,” he called, “has chosen your role in the new colony?”
No one raised their hands, and a ripple of murmurs grew from the others.
“Tace,” Leo said sharply. “This is my point. None of us were given a choice to join. We weren’t given training. Not even a plan.” Gasps and protests met this, Terrans and Venusins reacting to the news.