Chapter 3
AMY
The sun hits hard out here—like a fist with something to prove.
My skin’s already screaming beneath my collar, and I’ve been in this godsdamned base less than twenty-four hours.
The air tastes like old blood and carbon smoke, and every breeze kicks up sand that grinds between my teeth like ground glass.
I should be used to this by now. I’ve filed from frontlines before, from dustbowls, dead towns, plague wards. But there’s something different about this place. Something colder than the heat.
These soldiers wear their pride like armor, but it’s not just standard-issue. It’s something deeper, more… brittle. I see it in the way they walk past the burn pit without looking. The way they laugh too loudly at nothing at all.
They’re not fine.
And I’m going to prove it.
The first interview is with Sergeant Varr—built like a brick shithouse, with a scar like lightning across his scalp and teeth filed just a little too sharp. The camera catches him perfectly, his armor glinting, jaw set, voice clipped and measured. He sounds like a recruitment ad.
“We’re proud to serve under Captain Kanapa,” he says, staring past the lens like he’s talking to God. “He leads from the front. Never asks us to do anything he wouldn’t do himself.”
But when I ask about what happened in Niveen—the ambush, the burned-out settlement—he hesitates. Just for a second. A flicker. Like someone threw a rock in his calm, still water.
“No civilians left there,” he says. Too fast and neat.
I don’t press. Not yet. I thank him, save the file, and move on.
Private Telya next. Barely out of cadet school, freckles still fighting for space on her nose. She’s twitchy, fingers never still, keeps glancing over her shoulder like someone might yank her off camera mid-sentence.
“What’s it like being stationed under Kanapa’s command?” I ask.
She swallows. “Intense. He’s… he’s a legend.”
“Is that a good thing?”
She laughs. But her laugh doesn’t reach her eyes. “Depends who you ask.”
Behind the tents, the wind whistles like a warning. I’ve cornered a quiet young recruit named Mair. Fresh ink on his rank patch. He agreed to speak off-record. I flipped off the camera and started with softballs—where he’s from, what made him join, favorite field rations.
Then I ask, low and calm, “Did you see any civilians at Rusan Pass?”
He stiffens. Doesn’t look at me. “We weren’t briefed on civilians.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
He shifts his weight. “Ma’am, I don’t think—”
“You don’t have to think,” I cut in, gentle but firm. “Just tell me what you saw.”
Then I hear the footsteps. Heavy. Deliberate.
Darun rounds the corner like a stormfront with legs. His golden eyes burn through me as he grabs Mair by the shoulder and barks, “Dismissed.”
Mair bolts like a frightened rabbit.
I fold my arms. “Subtle.”
Darun looms closer, heat rolling off him like an open furnace. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“Talking.”
“To a kid who barely knows which end of his rifle fires.”
“He saw something. I could see it.”
“Don’t dig holes you can’t crawl out of, reporter.” His voice is a growl. “This isn’t some debate hall. It’s war.”
I step up, toe-to-toe. “Then maybe you should stop acting like a weapon and try being human.”
He flinches. It’s subtle. But it’s there.
His jaw works like he’s chewing glass. “You’re a liability.”
“And you’re a coward.”
That lands. His nostrils flare. For a second, I think he’s going to yell, or punch the wall, or walk away. But he just… stares.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says finally. Low. Ragged. “You think because you read a few casualty lists, you understand what this is?”
“No,” I admit. “But I want to. And you’d rather die than let anyone see the cracks.”
We stand there, chests heaving, silence burning between us like a fuse.
Then he turns on his heel and disappears behind the next row of tents.
The mess hall smells like reconstituted salt and body heat. Metal trays clatter. Boots scrape. The hum of voices is just white noise under the buzz of overhead fluorescents.
I slide into a corner booth and flip open my holopad. Pull up a loop of the interviews. Watch Varr’s fake grin. Telya’s haunted twitch. Freeze-frame on Mair’s wide eyes.
I try to focus, but the food in front of me—some sort of protein paste on flatbread—is shockingly not terrible. I take a bite and groan aloud. “Oh my gods,” I mutter with a mouthful. “Flavor. Actual flavor.”
Someone across the room snorts.
I glance up.
Darun’s sitting with a group of grunts, his tray untouched. He’s staring at me like I’ve got a second head.
I hold up a bite of flatbread. “You gonna keep glaring, or you want a taste?”
He doesn’t answer. Just looks away, jaw flexing.
The tension doesn’t leave the room.
But it’s flavor changed.
Now it’s… something else.
Like flint. Like kindling.
I chew slower. Watch him from the corner of my eye.
He’s angry. But under the anger, there’s something else. Not curiosity or attraction. Just… hunger.
For the truth I carry like a knife in my belt.
And I think he’s starting to realize it cuts both ways.