Chapter 8
She is more than a vessel; she is our companion, our compass, and our home.
Every system aboard the Demeter is guided by her intelligence — a network of awareness designed not only to sustain life, but to nurture it.
Crafted for Care?, she watches over every breath, every growing leaf, every heartbeat that calls her name home.
Leonus paced the bridge, ignoring the training drills.
He needed to apologize to Cass. His match had been distant for days—polite, but slipping away, always with some new excuse.
And Leo knew why. The frightened Venusian they’d caught had nothing to do with Phobos—just a scared boy trying to survive.
Yet Leo had seen red, heard the ghosts of his dead men, and had the boy dragged away in chains. The memory curdled in his stomach.
“Administrator Ares?” the ensign asked. “There is a message for you on the secure channel. It’s Fleet.”
“Play it,” Leo said absently, still scrolling through the log. How had the Venusin eluded them so well? Demeter must have helped him. But didn’t that violate her parameters? Its parameters, he reminded himself as a toneless, deeply familiar AI came over the comm:
This is to inform you that you are carrying a stowaway.
“Yes, we know,” Leonus said. “We are sending him home with the Persephone.”
Since Cassius Sutherland will be unable to join you, would you like us to proceed with his court-martial?
The room filled with confused murmurs.
“Silence on the Bridge!” Barabas’s command voice stilled them cold.
“Fleet, please clarify?” Leo asked. “We have a deserter named Luvio Teneci.”
Luvio Teneci is listed as a member of the Persephone’s crew.
“So who is the stowaway?”
Marcus Ali Sutherland is aboard Demeter, posing as his brother Cassius.
“Turn that off!” Leo said, coming slowly to his feet. Detached and floating somewhere above the floor he went to the comm and connected his implant. The AI’s voice resumed, but not before Leo heard the murmurs and muffled laughter around him.
The Sutherlands are twins. They traded places. Marcus Ali Sutherland must be remanded to the Debtors Court. Ensure he is aboard Persephone and inform us of your wishes regarding the court-martial of Cassius Sutherland within—
“Shut up.”
I fell in love with a stranger.
The world went soundless. Leonus moved through it like a diver under pressure. By the time he reached the train, humiliation was a living thing under his skin.
Leonus your heart rate is too high, your cortisol levels—
“Did you know?” Not a question. A strangled demand.
I knew about Marcus Sutherland.
“Out, Demeter! Now!” Three tones-did they sound sorry? Can an AI be sorry? Presumably it never had to be, since it was never fucking wrong.
In their quarters Cassius bent over the table, writing furiously, frowning in concentration, completely absorbed.
“Cassius,” Leonus said. Maybe it wasn’t true; he clung to hope.
There was no response.
“Marcus.”
The tired shape at the desk looked up. And hope was gone.
“Demeter?”
Yes, Leonus.
“I want a squad of Persephone’s Marines to my quarters.”
He didn’t watch them drag Sutherland away.
Hearing the story didn’t help, didn’t even matter.
Leo made his way to the bar, barely feeling his steps.
If anyone deserved a drink of three hundred year old whiskey it was him.
Except when he went to the bar, their glasses sat side by side, washed and left front and center, ready for their evening tasting.
He sank against the edge of the bar, hands trembling.
The pain was worse than any wound he’d suffered.
A betrayal as agonizing as it was illogical.
A lie? Every single laugh, kiss, story, every breathless gasp? Impossible. His mind wouldn’t catch on, replaying moments with Cassius, flickering through them faster and faster.
I let him…
I showed him…
Demeter’s three notes brought him sharply to the present, the room wavering in and out.
Leonus, please
“Did he mean it? Any of it?” His voice rattled under the squeal of his tinnitus.
You want to know if Marcus was lying to you about more than his identity?
“Yes. Is there a way you can tell? His vitals, or maybe his logs—anything.”
I can answer with a scientific precision that would destroy all your doubts.
“Thank God. Please—I need to know.”
You will have to ask him. And choose to believe what he tells you, even though he doesn’t deserve it.
“Stop!”
No ground under his feet, he sank to the floor, propped against the wall, staring at his hands.
Silence. He wiped his face with both hands. Choose to believe? Sutherland’s excuses had made sense, were even sympathetic in a way. Brothers…
“Bring up biographical footage of Cassius Sutherland.”
The feed was full of Farm Corps events. The real Cassius didn’t seem to smile much—careful, meticulous, dutiful.
“Show me biographical information of Marcus Sutherland.”
There he was. Unmistakably his Match. Tabloid headlines flicked by. Marcus Sutherland racing a silver car down the Champs-élysées, sneering at a red-faced judge. And, Marcus and Cassius at their father’s funeral, fearful and dry-eyed. Side by side it was clear as day.
He didn’t even pretend to be his brother. Leonus let his face fall into his hands.
The tablet chimed softly.
“What now, Demeter?”
He was writing this when you found him.
My dearest Leonus,
I have lied to you. I am not Cassius, but Marcus, his twin. I’m writing this while there is still time to send me away, so you can have a choice.
I was wrong, and I can’t imagine how much I hurt you. I am so sorry. This has been the best time of my life—and you are the reason why. In person I will explain everything, and I will beg you to forgive me.
Leonus stared at the letter until the text blurred. The words burned through him—grief, tenderness, fury all tangled together. Lied to, manipulated. Just like with the stowaway.
Leonus froze.
“He saw how I reacted to that Venusin boy.” It explained Cass’s silence of the last week. “How could he think I’d treat his brother the same?”
To protect Cassius he had to be certain. He could not think or hope or wish you would be merciful. Demeter’s voice was a gentle breath of air. Sorrowful, but warm.
“And so little fox,” Leo sighed. “Couldn’t lie anymore.”
Persephone’s brig was an improvement on most of the jail cells Marcus Sutherland had occupied.
The early ones had been almost fun—drunken escapades, public foolery, the kind of nights he could bribe his way out of.
Later, when the money ran low, the cells grew smaller, darker.
His efforts to elude them only made better headlines.
Persephone’s brig, however, was immaculate. The air smelled faintly of sanitizer and cold metal, sharp enough to sting. Even the hum of the drives was subdued, a polite sort of captivity. He’d run out of things to count. Only the ache behind his eyes and the hollow in his chest kept him company.
“Demeter?”
Marcus, I am so sorry. I had hoped your secret would come out some other way.
“You knew?”
Of course I did. But you were such a better match for Leonus.
“Is he alright?”
No. He is considering returning to Mars.
Marcus pressed both hands to his face, the sting of salt and metal filling his mouth. “Can you give him a message for me?”
You may tell him yourself.
The door slid open.
Light knifed through the dim cell, thin and cold from the corridor.
Leonus stepped inside, every line of him too composed, too contained.
The door sealed behind him, shutting out the hum of the ship until all Marcus could hear was their breathing—his own too shallow, Leo’s steady and deliberate.
Marcus stayed seated, afraid if he stood, his knees would give out.
“I wanted to see you,” Leo said at last. His voice was rough—gravel dragged under boot, exhaustion ground into sound. “See what kind of man could do this.”
“I deserve whatever you decide,” Marcus said, his voice shaking. “But please—don’t punish Cass. The whole thing was my idea. My fault.”
“Is that all you have to say to me?”
“My love,” Marcus began.
“Don’t call me that!” Leo said. “I don’t know you, you’re a stranger!”
“You know me better than anyone!” Marcus didn’t mean to shout, couldn’t help himself. “You knew me better than I knew myself, on the day we met!”
Leonus didn’t move, but his throat worked once, a swallow hard enough to hurt. The shadows beneath his eyes looked carved there, and his jaw trembled once before locking into stone again.
Marcus tried again, quieter. “I am so sorry, Leonus. I have no excuses—I make none. I can only beg for your forgiveness. I wrote it all down—everything. I wanted you to know while you still had a choice.”
“I’ve read it,” Leonus said. He sat, slow and deliberate, the chair creaking under his weight. His big hands hung loose between his knees, fingers twitching against each other as though debating whether to clench. “Demeter said I had to decide whether to believe you or not.”
Marcus finally looked up, properly seeing him: red-rimmed eyes, the deep lines etched by sleepless nights. The sight broke something open in him.
“I love you, Leo,” Marcus said softly. “That can’t change.”
Leonus’s breath caught audibly. His hands twitched once more, steadied. He looked up, and for the first time since the revelation, their eyes met without armor.
“You lied,” he said, voice low and shaking, “but you’re also the first real thing in my life since Phobos. The first thing I chose. I loved you. I still love you, more fool I. Damn it, you made me feel like a man again.”
Marcus swallowed hard, fighting the sting behind his eyes.
For a long moment Leonus only stared at him—motionless but for the faint rise and fall of his chest., slowly, he reached out. His fingertips brushed the back of Marcus’s hand, testing, unsure. The contact sent a shiver through them both.
Leonus’s fists uncurled. His little smile cracked.
Leonus Ares, do you accept a Match with Marcus Ali Sutherland?
Leo gave a breath that might have been a laugh, might have been a sob. He took Marcus’s hand in both of his—large, calloused, warm despite everything. His thumb traced over Marcus’s knuckles, one slow circle, grounding him back in the moment.
“I believe…I already did,” he said.
Marcus’s breath hitched. Leo leaned forward and closed the distance between them. The kiss wasn’t desperate or wild this time—it was steady, slow, a homecoming. Leo’s hands framed Marcus’s face, rough palms against the stubble, and Marcus let out a sound halfway between relief and surrender.
When they broke apart, Leo rested his forehead against his, their breaths mingling in the cold cell. The lights seemed softer somehow, the air less sterile.
They have accepted the Match! Demeter let the music fade as they made their way out.
“I love you Leo,” Marcus said. He paused by the hallway, spotting a familiar pair leaving the ship.
I took the initiative and released Luvio Teneci. Will he and masterchief Rufus Gaius be allowed to join us?
Leo gave a low, shaking laugh.
“Yes. Gai deserves his fresh start too.”
“And us?” Marcus asked, nudging Leo with his shoulder.
“We have three years to figure it out,” Leo said.
“Speaking of, I have a great name for your taverna…” Marcus said.