“Just stay away from me, O’Neil, and we’ll be fine.” Moscow started back toward the mess.
Coda grabbed his arm, stopping him. “It doesn’t work that way, and you know it. Yes, I talked to the commander, and if we can’t get this stuff worked out, one of us is going home.”
“Then you better step up your game, Coda, because it ain’t going to be me.”
Moscow tried to pull away again, but Coda wasn’t letting go. “Look, man, I know why you hate me, and I get it—”
“You don’t know anything.”
Coda had stepped on a land mine, and he knew it. He let out a long breath. “No, Moscow, I don’t know everything, but I know enough. And for what it’s worth, I’d hate me too. Hell, I already do.”
Moscow’s eyes blazed in anger. “Who told you?”
“Nobody,” Coda lied. “And nobody else knows. Just me.”
“You’re lying.”
“I’m serious. I was doing research on my father when I came across her name on a file. I’m s—”
“Don’t!” Moscow shoved a finger in Coda’s face. “Don’t.”
“Andrei…”
Moscow’s hand became a fist, and for a second, Coda thought Moscow was going to hit him. Moscow regained control at the last moment, though, his fist falling to his side. “Stay away from me, O’Neil. If anyone finds out about this, I swear on my mother’s grave, I will kill you.”
“Fine,” Coda said.
“I mean it, Coda.”
Coda shrugged. “So do I.”
They stared at each other for several moments. When Moscow finally turned to go, Coda let out a long breath. Maybe he’s right. Maybe I just need to leave him alone.
But even as he thought the words, Coda knew keeping his distance wouldn’t be enough. He would never feel comfortable flying in a squadron where he knew someone hated him. Where someone wanted him dead. No, the commander was right. There was only enough room in the squadron for one of them. The only thing Coda could do was make sure that person was him.
32
SAS Jamestown
Alpha Centauri System, Proxima B, High Orbit
Avoiding Moscow proved to be simpler than Coda anticipated. With flights occurring every day, the squadron’s previous schedule was thrown out the air lock. Workouts and classes on Baranyk physiology and biology were still required, and they still logged dozens of hours a week in the simulator, but all of those things came in at a distant second to logging time in their starfighters.
When they did occupy the same space, mostly during dining hours and squadron briefings, Coda didn’t so much as even acknowledge Moscow’s presence. And Moscow did the same. If the commander noticed the sudden change in how they stepped around each other, he didn’t say anything.
As the days turned into weeks, Coda spent more and more time in the cockpit, flying hop after hop, sometimes as flight leader, sometimes not, sometimes as the flight with offensive objectives, sometimes as the defending force. And he dedicated himself to his training like never before. When he wasn’t in the cockpit, he was in the simulator, and when he wasn’t in the simulator, he was studying the recent flight vids, analyzing and learning from his fellow pilots. Squawks had said he needed a hobby, but that was a luxury Coda couldn’t afford. Not yet.
He won, he lost, and he was shot down, but every hour of every day, he grew more confident. As his notebook filled up, he began to understand his wingmen like never before. He leveraged the knowledge when he was flying with them and exploited it when he was flying against them. Their flight strategies became as recognizable to him as their voice, their laugh, or even their walk.
After their fourth week of Nighthawk battles, the commander unveiled his new leaderboard. Coda wasn’t surprised to find his name near the top but had to grind his teeth when he saw he was still trailing Moscow.
The commander never said as much, but Coda assumed it was because the quality of kills were weighted in the ranking. Shooting down a pilot who was in the bottom quarter didn’t count as much as shooting down someone in the top or, for that matter, shooting down the commander himself. Moscow’s kill of Commander Coleman continued to pay dividends, but Coda was gaining on him, and he knew that before long, he would knock his rival out of the top spot.
But seeing Moscow’s name atop the leaderboard proved to Coda one thing above all else—try as he might, there was no way he could avoid Moscow forever. Sooner or later, their paths would cross again. What he didn’t know was just how soon that would be.
Or that it would coincide with the first catastrophic training accident.
33
Cockpit, Nighthawk
Alpha Centauri System, Proxima B
Coda didn’t know what he enjoyed more: the silence or the stars. The brief moments between sliding on his VR helmet and the following radio chatter had always been one of his favorite moments back at the academy. It offered freedom, as if he were floating on a pristine lake nestled somewhere deep in the heart of Earth. There was no responsibility, no rivalry, no fight to regain honor. There was… nothing. And because Coda knew the silence would never last, it was something to be cherished.
But those moments, like the simulator he’d experienced them through, had been artificial. Here, though, the silence was real, and it was unique. The absence of radio chatter was new, different, and unnerving. Not like the stars. They burned like distant embers, flashing and flickering blue, white, and gold. They called to him, inviting him to join them like beautiful sirens beckoning an old seafaring captain.
But both moments had one thing in common: they were always interrupted.
“Something feels different about this one,” Squawks said. His voice was slightly muffled, cracking through the speakers of Coda’s helmet.
“Forget your lucky underwear?” Noodle asked. It was the first time Coda had flown with the two
