“Since they’re based here for the time being, it’s probably time to change that.” Fallon supposed she might be overstepping, but didn’t give a damn.
“Yeah. Probably.”
“I’ll introduce you around. Don’t worry.” Fallon reached across the table and patted Hesta’s hand.
“It’s not that. I was wondering if people around here think I’m a hardass.”
“Well, yeah,” Fallon admitted. “But all of my friends are hardasses. If they weren’t, I don’t think they’d be my friends.”
Hesta smiled. “Makes sense. All right.” She lifted her glass. “To hardasses.”
A familiar voice came from behind Fallon. “Now that is a toast I can get behind.” Hawk nudged Fallon over and sat beside her. “I’m not intruding, am I?”
“Yes,” Fallon answered.
“But it’s fine,” Hesta added. “Please join us.”
Fallon let Hawk take over the conversation, as he so loved to do, and watched her captain expertly engage with his robust personality.
Seeing Hesta let herself become a part of the crew would be fun.
“I should have met with you sooner, but it’s been one thing after another.” Fallon sat across from Arin in her office the next day.
“Is something wrong?” Arin shifted nervously.
“No. Well, yes. Obviously, things aren’t right when PAC command is hiding out. But that’s why I want to talk to you.”
“Okay.”
“You know from what happened after my memory loss that I’m not just a security officer.”
He nodded slowly. “Yes.”
“Have you ever had any interest in being more than a security officer yourself? Going classified?”
“You mean intelligence? Of course. But intelligence officers start that track right out of the academy. I clearly didn’t make that cut.”
“You’ve made the cut now, as far as I’m concerned.”
His eyes widened. “You can do that?”
“Well, there are some details I’ll need to explain, but first I have to know that you’re all in. Because this is one of those choices that means no going back. So be sure.”
He pursed his lips. “I don’t need time to think about it. I’m in.”
“Good. Let’s dig right in. First off—have you ever heard of an organization called Blackout?”
Three hours later, Arin looked shell-shocked.
“Still glad you opted in?” Fallon asked.
“I think so. Ask me in a week.”
She appreciated his attempt at humor. Overall, he’d handled her revelations awfully well. “You’ll have questions. You can talk to Avian Unit, Ross, Captain Nevitt, and Captain Jerin Remay. I’ll have a meeting for everyone soon, to gel the team. We must take all due precautions when discussing sensitive topics, of course. We’re working with classified and off-book intel.”
“Right. I will. Of course I knew things were going on, but the reality of it all is something else.” He shook his head. “And I thought that once my people escaped Atalus, we’d be living in a free and progressive society.”
“We are. We will be. We just have to take out the trash.”
“You make it sound easy.” He scratched at his ear distractedly.
“It isn’t. The goal is clear-cut but the means are anything but. Speaking of which—I have two things I want you working on.”
“I’ll do whatever I can,” he promised.
“Kellis needs training. Security, hand-to-hand combat, weapons. Basically, a crash course in everything you learned in security school.”
His voice rose in surprise. “Kellis?”
“She knows about Avian Unit, but we haven’t discussed details. Mostly she’s aware that we’re at odds with the PAC and trying to right what’s going wrong. She accompanied us for the attack on the Tokyo base, but it really rattled her. She’s not going to be any use to us until she has some training.”
“I can start working with her this evening, if she’s available,” he said.
“Good. I’ll talk to her, let her know what’s going on. Then you two can work out the schedule on your own.” She paused. “Now the second job. I’ve left a stone unturned, and I need you to help me flip it over and inspect it.”
“What do you mean?”
“I need information about events on the station that occurred in the year before I arrived. Maybe even two years. First, we’ll search the official records, then we’ll need to dig deeper. I’ll need your personal recollections so we can search personal logs and communications. I may need you to question people about that time. Do not mention any of this to anyone else.”
Arin wore the look of a man who was about to stand in front of a firing squad, but was prepared to meet his fate. “Okay. When should we start?”
“Now.”
Sometimes you go looking for something you don’t want to find, and then you find it. It only took a few hours for Fallon to unravel this particular knot. But now that she had, she needed some time to think about her next steps.
She gave herself the night to mull it over. The next day, she’d have to act on what she’d found. It would have both personal and professional ramifications. She wanted to be alone to give it some deep thought, but she didn’t want to be in her quarters or her office. Going to the boardwalk was out of the question. But she knew the perfect place, with no risk of interruption.
Her serious expression and brisk pace kept anyone from sidelining her as she walked through the station, and she avoided areas likely to be well populated. On Deck Five, she bypassed the crew quarters to head straight for the center of the deck. Several layers of security later, she stood alone in crisis ops control. It seemed like a fitting location, and absolutely no one would come here. She’d run training drills in crisis ops, but a situation had never arisen to warrant using it for real. It would have been exciting if one had, but she cared deeply about this community, and was glad one hadn’t.
Crisis ops had half the space of the regular ops control and was stocked with emergency medkits and rations of food and water. Weapons too. Stingers, low-grade projectile weapons that weren’t a risk for hull puncture, and edged
