Ascension

'Wouldn't be much of a security chief if he didn't,' Jiro chuckled, getting out of bed and heading for the small shower in his en suite.

Hendel was gruff and surly, and he tended to be overprotective toward his charges, but no one could ever accuse him of being bad at his job. Still, Kahlee wasn't satisfied.

'What do you think tipped him off?' she called out, stripping off her shirt.

Jiro popped his head out from the bathroom. 'You, probably. I bet he can read you like an open book. You're not that great at keeping secrets.'

'Maybe it was you,' she countered as she unbuttoned her pants. 'You're not much good at keeping secrets either.'

'I might be better than you think,' he said mysteriously. Then he laughed and disappeared back into the bathroom. A second later she heard the shower running.

Now completely naked, Kahlee crossed the room and entered the en suite. Jiro raised his eyebrows suggestively when she opened the shower stall door and squeezed in with him.

'Forget it,' she told him. 'We need to get there before Grayson's shuttle touches down. I'm afraid of what might happen if we leave him alone with Hen-del.'

'Why does he hate Grayson so much?' Jiro asked, rubbing shampoo into her hair from behind.

Because he thinks Grayson is so prejudiced against biotics that he can only bear to see his own daughter twice a year. Because HendeVs own parents dumped him off with the ВAaT program when he was a kid, basically disowning him. Because part of him thinks helping Gillian learn to cope with her biotics might get rid of the memories of his own abandonment and childhood isolation.

'It's complicated' was all she said.

'Maybe Hendel's got a crush on him,' Jiro teased.

Kahlee let out a disapproving sigh. 'I just pray to God you aren't stupid enough to ever make that joke where he can hear vou.'

Seven

Grissom Academy was a medium-sized space station with half a dozen small docking bays built along its exterior, each capable of accommodating small- to medium-sized vessels. Most of the arrivals were supply ships bringing in necessary resources from Elysium to keep the Academy running, along with twice-daily runs of the public passenger shuttle down to the surface of the planet below.

When Kahlee and Jiro arrived, Hendel was waiting for them, staring intently out the observation window toward the docking bays. She was disappointed to see that the station was currently oriented with the observation window looking out away from the planet they orbited; she always found the image of Elysium hovering below them in space to be particularly awe-inspiring.

Most visitors to the Academy — parents and friends of staff, typically — would come through Elysium, booking passage to the planet and then transferring to the passenger shuttle. Only those important or wealthy enough to have access to personal shuttles had the option to dock their vessels right on the station itself, eliminating the time and hassle necessitated by going through the public spaceports.

This direct access also allowed them to bypass the customs and security checks found planet-side, so by law there had to be a security officer on hand to clear them on arrival. This was more a formality than anything else, and Hendel normally delegated the task to one of his underlings. But on those rare occasions when Grayson arrived, the security chief was always there to greet him in person. Kahlee knew it was Hen-del's none-too-subtle way of letting Grayson know he was being watched.

Fortunately, Grayson's shuttle hadn't shown up yet. Hendel turned to look at them as they approached, breaking his vigil.

'I was starting to wonder if you were going to make it in time.'

His comment was directed at Kahlee; it almost seemed as if he was intentionally ignoring Jiro's presence. She decided to let it slide.

'How long before they arrive?'

'Five, maybe ten mintues. I'll sign Grayson in, then he's yours to deal with. Take him to the cafeteria for a few hours or something.'

'He's going to want to see his daughter right away,' Jiro protested.

Hendel glared at the younger man as if he had interrupted a private conversation, then shook his head. 'These surprise visits are hard enough on Gillian. I'm not going to wake her up in the middle of the night just because her father's too selfish to wait until morning to see her.'

'Wanting to see his daughter right away isn't being selfish,' Kahlee countered.

'The last few months she's been getting up early anyway,' Jiro added. 'She only sleeps a few hours a night. The rest of the time she just sits up in bed with the lights off and stares at the wall. I think it has something to do with her condition.'

A sour grimace crossed Hendel's face. 'Nobody told me that.' He took his job seriously, and he didn't like it when other people knew more about the habits and behaviors of the students than he did.

He's looking for a fight, Kahlee thought. She'd have to keep a close eye on him; she wasn't about to let him ruin this visit for Grayson or Gillian.

'There wasn't anything you could do about it,' Kahlee answered coolly. 'Besides, Dr. Sanchez said it's nothing to worry about.'

Hendel picked up on the unspoken warning in her tone and let the matter drop. For a few minutes they stood without speaking, just staring out the window. Hendel broke the silence with a seemingly innocent comment.

'So, it sounds like your old friend is in the running for one of the Council seats,' he noted.

'Old friend?' Jiro asked, curious.

'Captain David Anderson,' the security chief explained, seemingly oblivious to Kahlee's reflection in the window, scowling at him. 'They served together in the Alliance.'

'How come you never mentioned him before?' Jiro wondered, turning to her.

'It was a long time ago,' she replied, trying to sound blase about it. 'We haven't talked in years.'

There was an uncomfortable silence, and Kahlee could only imagine the questions running through Jiro's head. He was a confident young man, but it still must have been unsettling to realize his girlfriend had a previous relationship with one of humanity's most well-known military heroes. When he finally spoke again, she was caught completely off-guard by what he said.

'I'd rather see Ambassador Udina on the Council.'

'Interesting to see how that all plays out,' Hendel replied, though he did raise a curious eyebrow.

Further conversation was cut off by a sharp beep emanating from the intercom above their heads, warning of an incoming vessel. Through the observation window they could see red lights flashing outside, on the perimeter of one of the docking bays. A few seconds later Grayson's ship — a small, high-end corporate shuttle — drifted into view.

The shuttle maneuvered into position, moving silently in the vacuum of space. It settled into one of the hangars, and Kahlee felt the slightest bump under her feet as a pair of large, automated docking clamps locked the ship into place. A fully enclosed platform extended out from the station to connect with the shuttle's doors, latching tight. The pressurized, oxygen-filled tunnel allowed passengers to go from vessels docked at the exterior landing bays directly into the confines of the station without having to go through the bother of putting on spacesuits.

'All right, let's go down and meet our guest,' Hen-del muttered, making no effort to hide his displeasure.

Passengers exiting their vessels would come down the tunnel into the waiting room, a large antechamber with transparent, bulletproof walls. Several waist-high poles linked at the top by heavy red rope snaked their way back and forth through the room, creating an area where visitors lined up when they arrived en masse. At the end