It’s the day before our turn at the War Games, and I’m finally nervous. Not in the sense of being paralyzed with fear, cowering in my room biting my nails, but rather filled with a frantic energy, driven to distraction by the fact that I simply can’t think of anything to do.


    That doesn’t mean I’m actually doing nothing. As a matter of fact, I’m on my way to do something at the moment, striding briskly down a Citadel street, trying to avoid meeting the eyes of anybody I pass. But there really isn’t anything productive left for me to be doing personally.


    Gaming out possible strategies for tomorrow’s battle was my main task, and with my copyclan’s help, in addition to some input from Kat, I’ve got that handled. No less than dozen different plans are filed away in the back of my head, constructed based on the different possible forms our confrontation with the Oxen will take. The odds of it being a siege match are strikingly low, not only because the gap between us is nowhere near as large as the gap between the Peregrines and Komodos, but because the Citadel almost never does the same match format twice in a row. It’s terrible for viewership numbers- the people want to see something fresh, if they’re tuning in for the second time in three days.


    Instead, we focused on the possibilities for deathmatch and zone control battles, then made plans for each type based on the different possible battlefield arrangements, focusing on certain general ‘archetypes’ used in the construction of Crucible battlefields. Heavy cover, minimal cover, hazardous environment, shifting terrain, et cetera. And then, within those archetypes, three different kinds of strategies. Offensive, defensive, and hybrid. Kat mainly helped me with the latter two, though she flatly refused when I suggested she handle some of the defensive strategies on her own. One day, maybe.


    All that being said, it’s not as though these plans are point-by-point itineraries of how to win. Maybe that’s how Hark does things, but it’s not my style. Locking yourself into a single path to victory is the single worst decision you can make as a tactician. It doesn’t work in chess, and that’s a game that, while complex, has infinitely fewer variables than anything happening in the real world. Instead, these plans are more like decision trees, meant to give an idea of how to respond to as many possible events as we could think of, all of which are meant to lead towards a single outcome- victory.


    It’s an achievement, yeah. Hours spent in the afternoons and evenings, after training, after watching yesterday’s match, after my date with Sofie and Niko- not to mention during all of that, since my copyclan is more than capable of working while Iza Prime is physically occupied. But now that it’s done, I’m almost at a loss. With about a day to go before the fight, I don’t have anything I should be doing. So, to prevent boredom-induced insanity, I’m gonna see what everybody else is up to.


    First stop: disinformation central. That is to say, the building where most of my intelligence group, plus Grant, are currently holed up, working on the long-awaited doctored recording of Tellis, the Ox Unit’s chief strategists, privately disparaging members of the unit who are already inclined to dislike him. With a bit of a push from us, we intend to turn that dislike into full-on hatred, powerful enough to sow dissent in the ranks of the Oxen at a critical moment.


    Now, the Oxen aren’t stupid. Given the timing, and the rather convenient nature of the recording, their intelligence people- specifically Valentin Gardinier, their chief intelligence officer, who specializes in counterintelligence -will realize it’s a fake the minute they see it. What we’re counting on is that they aren’t gonna see it until it’s too late. If our targets bring the video to Tellis immediately, the deception will be exposed, but if they choose to sit on it, to stew in their resentment but not speak out, it’ll have the intended effect.


    The Oxen are the ones with an intelligence agent who specializes in analysis, not us. But my people aren’t stupid, and in order for this not to be a total waste of time, we studied the video’s intended recipients pretty extensively. Not just them, but their Founders, too. In this case, that’s Fabian Vasile and Hudson, two members of the Ox Unit’s combat team. The former, an ambitious type who very clearly thinks he should be the one in charge of the unit’s strategy, not Tellis, is almost certain not to bring the video forward. He’ll see it first and foremost as a weapon, something to get people on his side- namely Hudson, the other person who ‘Tellis’ will be talking shit about in the video. He’ll be angry, too, because he’s not exactly a brilliant, calculating type, which is why we’re expecting him to be abrasive and uncooperative after he’s seen it, instead of doing what I’d do in his shoes, which is to say play the role of a perfect soldier, gain Tellis’ trust, and then stab him in the back when he least expected it.


    Anyway. Hudson is the wildcard. His Founder was called Djoser, the Peacekeeper. He became famous throughout the Imperium for maintaining law and order on a far-off frontier world after it was cut off from the teleportal network and resurrection system, meaning he was effectively the only representative of the Imperium’s authority for years. You’d think that someone like that would take a suspicious, conveniently-timed video directly to his superiors, even if its contents upset him. But this isn’t a by-the-book police officer we’re talking about. All of those people got killed within weeks of that frontier planet being cut off. Djoser was the type to play by nobody’s rules but his own, even if he was enforcing laws he hadn’t written. And he was known to be a pretty angry guy. You’ve gotta have something to keep you going if you’re the only cop on an entire planet, and anger’s as good as anything.


    So our best guess says Hudson sits on it, same as Vasile- and that his anger makes him do something stupid. Maybe that comes in the form of him shooting Tellis in the back when nobody’s looking, or letting himself get killed without putting up a fight, or even refusing to step onto the battlefield in the first place. But so long as they don’t take it to Tellis, Starling, and Gardinier, we’re in the clear.


    Those facts are what I turn over in my head, over and over, as I head to disinformation central. We decided at our last War Council session, yesterday evening, that our dormitory, the Hyperion Building, wasn’t secure enough for a project like this. That might seem ridiculous, considering how much work Sander and I went to making sure it was secure, but that’s basically like setting up a giant neon sign that says ‘we’re doing important secret stuff in here, it’s worth trying to get a look.’


    Instead, we decided they’d have to set up shop somewhere that, if we’ve done everything right, the enemy will have no idea ever existed. Specifically, a building in one of the abandoned areas of the Citadel, which would ordinarily be housing for the staff, were more of them required this year. They sit empty for the time being, locked tight, but not tight enough to keep us out. And inside one of those buildings, behind about a dozen layers of privacy filters and anti-surveillance tech, is the disinformation team, hard at work crafting our little psyop.


    Strictly speaking, I shouldn’t even be visiting them like this. They headed over in staggered shifts, hours ago, to make sure nobody saw them. Going there now raises the risk of the whole project being discovered. But I’m doing it anyway, because I need something to do, and because I know I’m good enough not to get followed.


    The walk takes more than twice as long as it should, accounting for all the times I double back and stop in the shadows to lose anybody who might be trailing me. Based on my knowledge of the enemy, there’s only one person in the entire Citadel who could have managed to stay on me after all of that- Ea, the Komodo Unit’s tracker. But she’s almost certainly resting up after yesterday’s match, and warning the Oxen about our plan wouldn’t even necessarily suit the Komodos’ interests either. So if she is following me, I’m not especially worried. We aren’t gonna use this place more than once anyway.


    Checking my surroundings one more time- left, right, and finally up -I push open a door that should be bolted shut, and to all appearances is. Stepping through, and closing the door firmly behind me, I cough, waving away the dust kicked up into the air by my movement. It would probably be too dark for me to see in here, if I didn’t have the standard set of genetic modifications that gives every Imperium citizen the equivalent of an owl’s night vision. It’s a pretty new splice, new enough that they don’t yet have it in the Meritocracy, though they’re certainly trying to crack it, and simultaneously trying to bargain for the information, not that they’ve got a ton to trade that the Imperium wants right now.


    If the team here, up on the fourth floor, hears me coming, I’ll probably be greeted with a bullet on entrance. Instead, I creep up the stairs, exerting as little force with each footstep as I can. Fortunately, there are no floorboards to creak, because the building is hewn from the same white stone as most of the rest of the Citadel. Besides that, however, it bears little similarity to the other buildings I’ve been inside while here- in the sense that it hasn’t been carefully curated to look ancient and majestic. It’s just bland and functional.


    At some point on my way up the stairs, I feel myself pass through the privacy field. It’s subtle, just a barely-perceptible shift in the ‘sixth sense’ that is my connection to the brainband, but it’s there. Listening devices, hidden cameras, even remote microphones, all will fail within a certain radius of this spot. The anti-surveillance tech is a useful tool, but also expensive, and time-consuming to set up, which is why we don’t use it too often. Particularly not when we can have secure conversations over the brainband at any time.


    There’s no known way to listen in on a brainband conversation, since the communication vector is an omnipresent cloud of nanotechnology that suffuses every breath of air that every human in the Imperium breathes. In theory, one could intercept a long-distance message from across an interplanetary distance, if they somehow hijacked one of the relay satellites, but not only are those satellites encrypted beyond all measure, the vast majority of them are cloaked and hardened in ghost orbits, with their locations a tightly-kept secret, revealed to only a select few if one of them ever needs repair. The idea of building them as space stations with a dedicated, permanent crew was floated, but eventually scrapped when somebody pointed out that it would give that crew a hold over the satellite, and the opportunity to exploit its function for their own gain. Letting a heavily-supervised repair crew in once every few decades for repairs or maintenance is a lot safer.


    Finally, I reach the fourth floor, and approach the door to the apartment where my team is working. Not that there’s any indication that anybody is inside- the privacy screen filters out all sound, so even if somebody was poking around this building for an entirely unrelated reason, they’d have no reason to check this particular room.


    Raising my hand gingerly, I tap out a three-two-three sequence on the door, simultaneously sending out a local brainband ping to let them all know it’s a friendly knocking. A couple moments later, the door opens slowly- on hinges, rather than the automatic sliding doors in our dormitory building. Valent greets me with a serious nod, probably assuming that I’m here to deliver some bad news or something. He ushers me inside, glances up and down the hallway to make sure I wasn’t followed, and closes the door behind me, re-engaging the locks as he does so.


    “What’s up, Izzy?” asks my intelligence officer, as I enter the apartment, looking over her shoulder at me. There’s a undercurrent of anxiety in her tone, as though my mere presence portends doom. I suppose that in their shoes, the only good reason I’d have to be here is to call the whole project off, or something equally dramatic.


    “Just wanted to check in, see how everything was going,” I tell her, trying to keep my own nerves out of my voice. The air of tension in the room decreases slightly, as they realize I’m not about to make them drop everything they’re doing and change focus.


    Though nobody’s currently living in this apartment, it’s not totally unfurnished. A thin layer of plastic covers most of the furniture, to keep it from accumulating dust or otherwise degrading while not in use. Sofie and Grant are sitting on one such piece of furniture, a beige couch, in the apartment’s living room, intently examining a three-dimensional projection in the middle of the room, which features Tellis and Starling, the Ox Unit’s commander, in conversation. Sitting on an armchair to their right is Tai, who’s got a holo-screen open in front of him, controlling the projection itself.


    It’s not exactly visible to me, but I know that the software they’re using to model Starling and Tellis is drawing on data I recorded of both men, to create a rendering of their facial movements while speaking that should be completely indistinguishable from the real thing. Indeed, the projection looks completely real to me, but then again, I haven’t seen it in motion yet. The uncanny valley between perfectly lifelike and uncomfortably alien is vast, and even the slightest imperfection could cast our fabricated recording into its depths.


    “Everything’s on-schedule,” Grant informs me, in that smooth, casual tone of his, the one that makes me instinctually distrust him. He’s a canny political operator by nature, a fact he can’t change by virtue of who his Founder was. And in much the same way, I can’t change the fact that people who talk like he does make me wary. The Deceiver Admiral knew how to play politics when it was necessary, but he didn’t care in the slightest for people who made it their way of living.


    “Glad to hear it,” I tell him, not letting a shred of that distaste show. He’s done nothing to warrant my suspicions- in fact, quite the opposite. I’m not about to let my Founder’s opinions determine how I treat somebody who’s been nothing but loyal to me.


    “We’re close to having the latest version ready,” Tai says, without looking away from his screen. Frowning, he makes a minute adjustment to some slider, and a few errant hairs on Starling’s face appear, giving the impression of a not-quite-finished shave job. After a second spent examining that, he shakes his head and reverts the change.


    Watching him, I think back to our first conversation, during our first week here at the Citadel, where he expressed his disapproval of my jokes about Bret. How does he feel about participating in a smear campaign against Tellis, I wonder? Not badly enough that he won’t help, evidently. But this is directly relevant to our success as a unit, and our individual ambitions as Nobles, so maybe he finds it easier to justify in his own head.


    Before I can sit down, Valent settles into the other available armchair, leaving me momentarily bereft. Rolling my eyes, I mutter something sarcastic about getting no respect as their commander, and drag in a chair from the dining room. It’s got no plastic cover, so a layer of dust comes off as I move it, and I waft it away with one hand, hoping none of it is clinging to my pants.


    Putting the chair down in-between the sofa and Valent’s armchair, I turn my attention to the projection, which everybody else is watching in silence. Presumably they’ve been iterating on the same basic theme for the past few hours since they got started, with none seeming quite right. Maybe I’ll be able to help them get a bit closer while I’m here. That would be justification enough for this unannounced, inadvisable visit.


    “Okay,” Tai says, after a minute or two of making changes so small I didn’t even register their effects. “Let’s give it a whirl.”


    He taps the screen, and the projections of Starling and Tellis come alive.


    “What about the combat team?” Starling asks, businesslike.


    “A promising group,” Tellis replies. “For the most part.”


    The cadence of his speech is almost pitch-perfect. If I didn’t know it was doctored, I’m sure I’d be unable to tell. His posture is more stiff and formal than it’s been in our few conversations, but that’s probably a good thing- the context of this recording is supposed to be a meeting between Tellis and his commander. It’s perfectly in-character for him to be as rigid and uptight as possible in that setting.


    “Anybody in particular stick out?”


    “Dalgaard looks to be highly competent. Unsuitable for a leadership role, but he’ll be quite the asset, if utilized correctly.”


    I don’t recognize the name, but presumably it’s a member of the Oxen who my intelligence people are familiar with. They’re trying to make this seem more like an actual conversation, rather than having them say the important part immediately, which would make it pretty obvious to anybody that the whole thing’s a fake.


    “Chen Lu seems reliable, but clearly a follower, not a leader. For the time being, I’ve decided to reserve judgement on Bedrosian. He possesses the requisite skills, but seems to lack commitment.”


    Starling nods along, offering no disagreement. If there are any flaws in this fabricated recording that might give it away, I can’t detect them. Tai’s expression is inscrutable, though, and it wouldn’t surprise me if his more discerning eye has seen some nearly-imperceptible imperfection that will require hours more work to correct.


    “I see. Is there anybody we need to watch out for, then?”


    “Vasile,” Tellis replies, his lips curling into a sneer. “He’s ambitious, but lacks the cunning to pursue that ambition properly. Given a command, he would prioritize his own personal glory at the expense of all else. And, if you’ll permit me to editorialize, that ‘flyboy’ costume of his makes him look ridiculous.”


    The simulacrum of Starling lets out a surprised laugh, as though taken by surprise by Tellis’ unexpected bit of cutting humor. They’re referring to Vasile’s tendency to wear a bomber jacket and flight goggles at virtually all times, despite being nowhere near an air or spacecraft. Sprinkling in some personal insults along with the dismissal of his capabilities is a sure-fire way to get him furious.


    “Stojanov has a temper, but that could easily become an asset if directed properly. Hudson, on the other hand… It’s clear he doesn’t want to be here. Frankly, I have little patience for any Noble who won’t do their duty to the Imperium. He’s going to require… discipline.”


    Finding a way to have him insult Hudson that wouldn’t immediately be dismissed has to have been a challenge. According to Sander, he particularly dislikes people like Tellis, who are obsessed with Nobility as a virtue, rather than actually doing anything ‘truly noble.’ But this hit all the right notes, in my book. Condescending enough to incite anger, without being so exaggerated that it could simply be ignored.


    “Understood,” Starling replies. “I’ll speak to Valentin about the two of them, make sure he knows they’re likely to be trouble. Perhaps if we have Lauren open a file on them, we’ll be able to gain some insight into what makes them so… problematic.”


    “Excellent thinking, Commander.”


    “Thank you. But, to return to the topic at hand- if not any of them, who would you recommend serve as combat officer?”


    “Well,” Tellis says, with a carefully-controlled expression that shows only a hint of satisfaction beneath the facade. “I’m afraid it seems that the best-qualified candidate is me.”


    The projection freezes, sequence complete. Valent, Sofie, and Tai turn to look at me. Silence falls over the room for a moment- until I start clapping. Relief shows on all three of their faces- although only briefly for Tai, before he goes back to his screen. Sofie relaxes visibly, and though Valent hides it a little better, I can tell he feels the same.


    “That was great. Seriously, incredible stuff. You got their voices exactly right. And that bit at the end about having Gardinier keep an eye on them? Perfect. Practically ensures they’ll never go to him about any of this.”


    “Her idea,” Tai informs me, jerking a thumb in Sofie’s direction while he continues to tinker with the projection.


    “Thanks,” Sofie says, with a cute smile that makes me want to plant a kiss on her cheek. Doing that in front of our subordinates would be unprofessional, though. We haven’t exactly tried to hide our relationship, but neither have we made any kind of formal announcement.


    “Far as I’m concerned, you’re good to go,” I tell the group, practically thrumming with excitement. This is so good it almost makes me regret not beginning a disinformation campaign against the other units much earlier- but playing our hand too early might have meant a diminished effect in a critical moment like this. “Or make whatever tweaks you need to make first, you’re the experts. But once you’re done, there’s something else I want you to do.”


    Sofie raises an eyebrow at me.


    “Start preparing a plan to protect us from getting hit with attacks like this in the future. We’re lucky that nobody’s targeted us like this yet, but that’s not gonna last forever. And who better to help inoculate us than the three of you?”


    Of course, I don’t exactly have anybody else to turn to, so if they end up being terrible at counterintelligence, I’ll be shit out of luck. But there’s no need to tell them that now, when their spirits are high.


    “Absolutely, boss. Good idea.”


    “I do have those occasionally. But with that, I’m gonna leave the three of you to it. Got the whole rest of the unit to check up on.”


    <hr>


    Sander looks relieved to see my face when we meet back up. He didn’t argue, but I could tell he was less than thrilled when I told him I’d have to go solo when I went to meet up with the intelligence team. Making sure I got there undetected was difficult enough without a shadow the size and shape of a silverback gorilla following me.


    “Was your meeting productive?”


    “Yup. Hope you weren’t too bored while I was gone.”


    “I was not.”


    Honestly, I don’t know if Sander is capable of boredom. The two of us have spent a lot of time together over the past month or so, and I’ve never seen him look distracted or disinterested. He’s got this sort of constant-alertness mode that he never seems to leave, like someone could burst in through a window and start shooting, and he wouldn’t be surprised for a second, just respond as though he’d known the attack was coming. He probably would know it was coming- or at least process what was happening twice as fast as anybody else in the room. I’ve got pretty solid reflexes, even accounting for the fact that Imperium bioengineering means that everybody’s got hyper-efficient fast-twitch muscle fibers and all of that, but reflexes are useless if you’re not paying attention. And I have a bad habit of getting lost in my own head.


    One of the nice things about having Sander as my constant companion is that he doesn’t complain when I fall silent for a long stretch while thinking. If it happens while I’m around Niko or Sofie, they’re liable to ask what’s in my mind, or in the case of the latter, poke me to get my attention. Sander simply remains silent, waiting for my next command.


    “Let’s go see the engineers.”


    Ada, Nikitha, and Bret have reserved a workshop inside of Gofannon’s Forge for the day. Apparently the other units’ little pact to reserve all the empty spots in the Crucible to keep us from training also extended to the workshops as well, but the Forge staff refused to allow them to book all those spots if nobody was actually going to show up and use it. For a day or so, they all sent people to occupy the workshops just to deny them to us, but after our staged training session, most of them decided it wasn’t worth the effort and stopped, which is why my people are in there now. Not to mention, a few upperclassmen got upset that they weren’t able to use the Forge either, and apparently forcibly evicted a few Peregrines who refused to vacate a workshop.


    Naturally, I had Ada and her people sweep for bugs first, since the very first thing I would have done if I had a person inside of every workshop in the building would be to place hidden cameras and mics, in order to get a sneak preview of whatever the enemy would build next. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    The Forge is an imposing building, all steel, no stone. It sticks out like a sore thumb compared to the rest of the Citadel surrounding it. As we approach, Sander steps forward and holds the door open for me, as he usually does whenever we encounter a non-automatic door. I incline my head gratefully and enter.


    Immediately upon walking into the Forge, I feel out of place. The lighting is harsh and bright, the design stark and minimalist. Functional is perhaps the best word for it. Whoever designed this building- maybe Gofannon himself -had little interest in aesthetics. That’s not a uniform trait among ‘builder Nobles,’ as they’re sometimes called. Plenty of them think that everything they create should be a work of art, in addition to its primary functions. But most of them are of the opinion that appearances are irrelevant, that results are all that matter.


    The Fractalsmith wasn’t a traditional builder. His area of expertise was quantum physics, and there aren’t many physicist Founders. Sure, there were plenty of groundbreaking physicists in the Founding Era, but none of them contributed to the war effort in the way that the Fractalsmith did. Of particular note was his work with fixed quantum states, something I can’t begin to understand, let alone describe beyond the most basic level, but it made the man a legend.


    Much like the tacticians and leaders among the Founders are exemplified by the Nine Titans, the engineers and scientists among them are exemplified by a group known as the Four Masters. Fewer in number, and lacking in fame, but their contributions were just as significant, if not more. Of course, the breakthroughs they made would have been useless without competent strategists to apply them on the battlefield. But then again, there would have been no use for those brilliant strategies without the scientific and technological achievements that enabled them. Round and round the argument goes, perpetuated by generation after generation of Nobles who think they’ll be the ones to finally strike the decisive blow for their side.


    In much the same way, I’m told the spies and warriors have their own feud, arguing endlessly about which group’s contributions were more vital to the war effort. Not that I’d ever let Sofie hear me say it, but I think the soldiers have the better of that debate. It wouldn’t be easy, but you could win a war with no intelligence apparatus. Winning a war without soldiers is pretty much definitionally impossible. On the other hand, if you had no soldiers but the best spies imaginable, you might never end up going to war- you could cripple your enemies without ever firing a bullet. The cyclical nature of these arguments is, frankly, tiresome to me. I’ve made a point not to get caught up in any of them.


    “Can I help you?” asks the Forge’s front desk attendant, seeming slightly perturbed by the way I spent the last several seconds staring off into the middle distance, lost in thought in the middle of the lobby. There isn’t even anything I could claim to have been distracted by, just empty steel walls.


    “Yeah, I’m just here to see some people in…” A brief pause as I call the information to mind from the brainband, where my memories are backed up for easy retrieval. “Workshop 202. They’ll be expecting me.”


    Not strictly true. It would be more accurate to say that they won’t complain about me interrupting them unexpectedly, because I’m their commander. But we’re supposed to maintain certain polite fictions, instead of actually saying stuff like that, and I’m not interested in breaking the social contract right now.


    “Go on in, then,” the receptionist, a bored-looking guy who’s kept the same body for so long his hair’s actually starting to thin, says, before returning to his palm-screen, where he appears to be playing some kind of game. He’d be having a better time if he was playing something immersive, I’m sure, but that would require entering the brainband fully, effectively leaving his physical body vacant for the duration of the session, which would make doing his job here impossible. So instead he has to while the hours away on an inferior, two-dimensional game, until his shift ends. A pretty miserable existence. If I was in his shoes, being surrounded by future leaders of the Imperium would make me want to better myself in some way, by studying government or reading history. But then again, I’m a Noble- ambition is written into my cognitive architecture. For better or for worse, he lacks that.


    Sander places a gigantic hand on my shoulder, and I let him guide me down the hall, towards Workshop 202. Apparently my anxiety about tomorrow’s battle is so bad that I’m now getting completely lost in thought for long stretches, multiple times over the course of just a few minutes. That can’t be a good sign. Hopefully whatever projects the tech team is working on will be able to hold my attention the way Sofie’s little presentation did.


    To keep focused, I press the tip of my tail into my back, just enough to be slightly painful. It works surprisingly well, providing a little something to concentrate on as we walk. Eventually Sander removes his hand. The fact that he was willing to do that at all is a good sign, I think. A sign that he’s becoming a little more comfortable with me.


    The hallway almost resembles a cell block in a traditional prison- rows of thick metal doors on either side of us. From behind almost every one of them comes music blasting at top volume, all of it blending together into an awful cacophony. Everybody’s trying to drown out the sounds of machinery while they work. My people seem to be no exception to that. I knock several times, hard as I can, and get no response, completely inaudible beneath the sound of some ultrametal singer blowing his lungs out into a mic. Sighing, I step back and gesture for Sander to take over.


    With a solemn nod, he approaches, draws his hand back, and slams it against the metal door like a battering ram, once, twice, three times. The music stops. A moment later, I hear Ada’s wary voice.


    “Who is it?”


    “It’s me,” I shout back, to ensure they can hear me through the door, and over the sound of the music still coming from every other workshop. After a pause, the door slides open, and Ada greets us, wiping a sheen of sweat off her brow.


    The inside of the workshop is hot, cramped, and cluttered. Evidently this isn’t one of the luxury suites- the three of them didn’t have much space to move to begin with, but with all five of us here, we’ll be like sardines in a can. I gesture for Sander to wait outside, and he nods.


    Nikitha’s off in one corner, messing around with some dangerous-looking chemicals. Bret seems to be adjusting the scope for a rifle, periodically holding it up to his eye to check the magnification, then fine-tuning the dial slightly. Ada’s workstation is covered in gun parts, a few prototypes half-built, the rest completely in pieces.


    “Iza, it’s good to see you,” she says, looking slightly perplexed by my presence.


    “Thanks. This is a surprise inspection. Lemme see what you’ve been working on.”


    “Oh! I, uh— we haven’t really finished—”


    “That’s fine. I just want to see what you’ve been doing.”


    We only discussed her plans for the day briefly, and she was pretty vague about the ideas she’d been toying with. The impression I get is that if I leave her to her creative process, she’ll get caught up in whatever she’s doing, start something overly ambitious, and not have anything useful ready for us by tomorrow.


    “Well, uh, I’ve told you about my Founder, right? He was a gunsmith, mainly. So I figured I’d see if I could maybe make some improvements to our guns, give us an edge on the competition, you know?”


    “Mm.”


    “At first, I wasn’t sure what I could actually do to improve these guns, though- people have been making them for a while, and it’s not like we really leave much on the table in terms of efficiency. But then I had this idea. Instead of a standard laser sight, what if we used a focused radiation tightbeam that could paint targets from a distance, then modified a scope to detect the radiation sig so we could track them through walls?”


    While she talks, Ada gesticulates nervously, clearly concerned that her efforts might not to be my satisfaction. To be fair to her, I did demand this little status report pretty aggressively. I figure it’s about time for a little confidence boost. Besides, that’s pretty clever.


    “Pretty clever,” I tell her. “Anything else?”


    “Well, we spent some time trying to figure out how pierce the armor on that one Ox girl, the one who’s got the armor grafted onto her body.”


    “Heinonen,” I supply.


    “Yeah, that’s the one. I took a scan of her armor yesterday, while she was watching the match, but it’s made from some weird metamaterial. We’ve got a few different bullet prototypes fabricating right now, and once they’re done, we’re gonna test ‘em on a replica of the armor material, and see if any of them can actually puncture it.”


    “I see. What are you working on right now, the?”


    Ada draws breath, tensing as though she expects a reprimand for what she’s going to say next.


    “I’ve been trying to get the radiation dosage right, while Bret’s been calibrating the scopes to target the signature. Nikitha’s, uh, she’s kinda been doing her own thing.”


    “Yeah, I can see that,” I reply with a smirk, glancing over to the corner, where Nikitha’s still messing around with her chemicals. “You got any idea what she’s actually working on?”


    “Um, hallucinogens, I think,” Ada answers, brushing a sweat-matted strand of blue-yellow hair out of her eyes.


    “Will she be ready before tomorrow? Will you?”


    “I… I think so.”


    My tail flicks back and forth, providing a visual indication of my frustration while I work to keep my expression neutral.


    “Ada, I can’t make plans around maybes. I know this is a small group, but I put you in charge of it. Take a break and take stock. Work out the timetable for these projects. If it looks like you’re not gonna be able to finish all of them in time, put one on pause and prioritize finishing the others. And make sure to factor in time for testing. I’m not sending people into the field with untested prototypes.”


    Part of me worries I’m being too harsh on her, but the intensity in my tone actually seems to be reinvigorating her a little.


    “Okay. I can do that. We’ll have something useful ready by tomorrow, I promise.”


    “Good. Get to it.”


    Ada gives me a two-finger salute, and I return it with a nod, before turning to leave.


    “Is everything alright?” Sander asks, as I emerge from the workshop, running a hand through my own sweat-damp hair.


    “Yeah. It’s hot in there. You wanna get something to eat?”


    <hr>


    The next stop on our little check-up tour of my Gazelles is the gymnasium, where Niko is putting the combat unit through their paces, so we decide to find somewhere to eat near there.


    It takes a little while, but eventually we settle on a Ganymedean dumpling stall that seems rather out of place on the streets of the Citadel. It, and the proprietor, an older guy with a weathered, craggy face, look like they’d be more at home in a megalopolis somewhere on a world like Naraka or Zhongquan.


    Ganymedean dumplings are a rare delicacy, mainly because they’re supposed to be quite difficult to make correctly. Conventional wisdom is that only people with genuine Ganymedean heritage can make them right, although of course that’s not entirely true. Like anything, it’s easier to learn if you start young, but given sufficient time and dedication, anybody’s capable of learning it.


    This stall’s proprietor, though, looks like an actual Ganymedean to me. Not because of any physiognomic traits- those, of course, are irrelevant in a world where anybody can look any way they want. It’s the way he prepares the dumplings, with such expert confidence and ease.


    You won’t meet many Ganymedean these days, unless you go out of your way to find them. They’re a cultural group that originated in the relatively brief period after the development of commercially-viable space travel, but before the Exodus, where the various celestial bodies of humanity’s original solar system were colonized, and inhabited long enough to develop distinct cultures, many of which which have survived in some form until today. However, those traditions are much less prevalent in the overall culture of the Imperium than ones that are associated with specific regions on Earth. The reason why is simple- they only had about two hundred years or so to develop, and far fewer people to do so with. Sure, they had a lot more land to work with, but far less time to develop that land, particularly without access to modern terraforming technology.


    For the most part, you’ll find Ganymedeans, Charonians, and other groups of the same type in small, generally insular communities within large cities on heavily industrialized planets. They’ve gotta stay insular too, if they want to maintain their cultural traditions in any meaningful sense, instead of just being absorbed into the culture at large, as has happened with so many other groups over the course of human history.


    The dumplings taste exactly like I was always told they’re supposed to- savory, and just a little bit sweet. If Sander is enjoying his, he gives no indication, nor does he react to my moans of delight as the dumpling’s juices gush out into my mouth.


    “Wow, you’re really lovin’ those, huh?”


    Startled, I nearly drop the dumpling held in my chopsticks, which would have spilled the precious liquid inside. Fresh out of the fryer, they’re too hot to eat whole, so you’ve gotta tear out an opening with your teeth and sip at the soup inside until it’s cooled off enough to eat properly. Best of all, though, is the chunk of meat marinating inside, absorbing the flavor from the soup so that it’s mouth-wateringly delicious when you finally bite into it.


    Tightening my grip on the dumpling with my chopsticks, I turn to face the woman who commented on my enjoyment of the Ganymedean delicacy. She’s tall, with a lanky, muscular build, her hair done up in a sort of dreadlocks-ponytail thing that I don’t know the exact name of. Her face isn’t familiar, but I do recognize her self-assured smirk, and her confident gait as she approaches the stall and sits down right next to me.


    “Scàthatch, right?”


    “Yup,” she replies, popping the ‘p’ as she regards me critically. “I’ll have whatever she’s having, by the way.”


    The stall’s proprietor gives no indication that her addressing him without so much glancing his way bothers him at all, just nods and sets to work preparing another round of dumplings.


    “Saw you during the War Games yesterday,” I say uselessly, a little disconcerted by her presence. Sander is staring a hole into her, his dumplings forgotten, but she pays him no mind.


    “Yeah? You like what you saw?”


    “Uh.”


    It’s rare that words actually fail me, but something about her seems to be having that effect on me. The barest hint of teeth revealed by her smirk, the shape of which seems to suggest that she’s got abnormally-sharp canines. Sharp enough to tear out my throat like I tore a hole in my soup dumpling, to drink of the warm juices inside.


    “Relax, I’m not gonna bite,” she says, as if she knows exactly what’s on my mind.


    “Not sure I’d mind if you did,” I reply, without spending even a second to consider the words before they leave my lips. For a moment, I regret it, then her lips curl up into a predatory grin.


    “Now you’re talking my language. So, Commander Izanami, what is it you’re up to?”


    “Just making the rounds, checking up on my people. Most of ‘em are in there, getting in some last-minute training.” I jerk my thumb towards the gymnasium. “And you?”


    “Ah, nothing much. Skipping out on Hark’s debrief session. I’ll get the memory off of somebody later.”


    Interesting. The Komodo Unit’s commander doesn’t seem like the type to tolerate that sort of thing, and I can’t imagine she would hesitate to employ discipline to discourage it in the future.


    “Bet she’s thrilled about that.”


    “What are you implying? That they wouldn’t be devastated not to have someone as charming as me around?”


    Scáthatch places a hand over her heart, making an expression of mock sorrow at the thought.


    “Maybe. But if you were there with them, you wouldn’t be here with me, and that’d be the greater tragedy.”


    My fairly shameless flirting makes her laugh, surprised.


    “Can’t argue with that.”


    “I take it you’re not a fan of Hark’s management style, then?”


    “No,” she replies bluntly. “But don’t go getting any ideas about turning me against her. It would really put a damper on things.”


    “Wouldn’t dream of it,” I assure her, meaning it completely. There’s zero chance we could pull the same trick on the Komodos that we’re trying to pull on the Oxen. Hark runs too tight a ship for that.


    “Good.” Scáthatch pauses, studying my face for a moment. “You still haven’t answered my question, you know. About whether you liked what you saw yesterday.”


    Again, my brain momentarily short-circuits, but luckily I’m able to recover much faster this time.


    “Absolutely. Some very sharp shooting on your part. And excellent timing with that hallway ambush. Casales’ whole squad coulda been wiped out if not for you.”


    “Well, it was Hark’s plan,” she says dismissively. “We’re all just instruments of her will. Or at least that’s the idea.”


    “Every soldier has to sacrifice some autonomy, that’s just the way it works. But there is an argument to be made for letting soldiers who show initiative make their own decisions when it counts.”


    “I’ve never been great at following orders. They called my Founder the Ronin- masterless.”


    “Explains the sword, I guess. And the revolver too.”


    She nods, pleased to see that I understand.


    “Exactly. Samurai and gunslinger. The same archetype, mirrored on opposite sides of the world. He embodied both of them at once.”


    “And you’re following in his footsteps, naturally.”


    “Naturally,” she echoes. “What about you? Planning on going the same route as those who came before?”


    She’s asking, essentially, if I plan on going crazy and killing a lot of people, or defecting to the Meritocracy, as many past Nobles in my line have done. A fair concern for somebody who doesn’t know me.


    “I’m supposed to be unpredictable, aren’t I? What do you think?”


    Scáthatch laughs again.


    “Good answer.”


    Before either of us can speak again, the stall’s proprietor puts a plate of dumplings down in front of her. She nods appreciatively and picks up her chopsticks. The message is clear- we’ve spent enough time talking, let’s eat.


    <hr>


    After a few minutes, Scáthatch departs without a word, leaving me a little bit disoriented. Though he doesn’t say so outright, I can tell Sander doesn’t like her, by the way the tension in his shoulders releases slightly after she’s gone.


    I’d be lying if I said that her whole persona wasn’t appealing to me. Gotta be careful not to get drawn too far in, though. She’s still the enemy. Leaving the stall after settling up with the proprietor, I try to put her, and that predatory grin of hers, out of my mind. It doesn’t really work.


    Inside the gymnasium, Niko is overseeing the other members of the combat unit as they practice specific maneuvers- when I come in, they’re running drills on how to disarm somebody in close quarters. As I watch, Colleen snaps her hand out, grasping the barrel of the gun in Mars’ hand and shoving it to the side a second before it discharges. It’s just a blank, but still dangerous in close quarters. Simultaneously, she uses her other hand to drive two fingers into his solar plexus, and his grip on the gun falters, allowing her to wrench it out of his grasp and turn it on him.


    “Good. Very good,” Niko says approvingly. “Take five, I’m gonna talk to the boss.”


    Kat, Mars, Colleen, and Ibrahim all step out of their respective rings to grab their water bottles, towel off, or just sit down and catch their breath. Hopping off his little soapbox, Niko waves to me as I approach.


    “What’s up, Iza? You get bored of sitting on your ass and decide to go around checking up on everybody?”


    The incisive guess makes me laugh, surprised by how easily he was able to suss out my exact reason for being here.


    “Pretty much, yeah. So how’s it going?”


    Niko shrugs.


    “S’alright. Kat’s… struggling a bit, but she seems determined to keep up with everybody else.”


    “That’s good to hear,” I reply, turning my gaze towards the woman in question, who’s talking animatedly with Mars, who seems slightly bemused by her enthusiasm, but not exactly bothered by it. “You think we’re gonna be in good shape for tomorrow?”


    “My people will be,” he answers without hesitation. “Can’t speak to the others. Or you, for that matter.”


    That makes me raise an eyebrow.


    “Oh? You saying I’m not ready for a fight?”


    “Not exactly. But if you’ve got nothing better to do, there’s worse ways to kill some time than training. And I’ve been so busy corralling these clowns that I haven’t gotten a chance to go a round or two in the ring myself.”


    That sounds like a challenge. And I’m not in the habit of backing down from those.


    “Sure, you’re on. I still owe you for putting me on my ass that one time.”


    Shrugging off my puffy golden jacket, which has a patch on the left breast featuring the insignia of the Imperial Pioneer Corps, I stretch, loosening up my muscles a bit. The stress inside my head has translated to a bit of tension in the rest of my body, but I’m able to work most of that out quickly enough, while Niko goes through a similar routine, using some of the Inner Flame techniques he had us run through while we were training the other day.


    Once we’re both prepared, we head for the nearest sparring ring. Once inside, Niko turns to the others assembled here, and pitches up his voice to make sure they can all hear him.


    “Listen up, people! Iza and I are going to show you all how it’s done!”


    Great. Now the pressure’s on. I shoot a quick glance at Sander, hoping for a bit of emotional support or something, but he’s as stony-faced as ever.


    Based on what I can remember from the last time I fought Niko, plus how I’ve seen him fight against other people since then, he’s going to be a tough opponent to take down. He fights like a wolf, going straight for the throat at the first opportunity. So I just have to make sure I don’t give him that opportunity.


    “Ready?” he asks, taking his position on the far side of the ring. I do the same, then nod.


    Not a moment later, he strikes like lightning, moving fast enough I can barely track him. Weaving from right to left like he’s dancing through a hail of bullets, he draws a fist back, perfectly timed to connect with my face as he extends it. Only I’m not there when he swings- I’m a few inches to the right and smirking. Niko threw a ton of momentum and power into that strike, with the assumption that he’d be able to slow himself down by transferring it into me via his fist. Instead, he goes careening into the ropes, and when he bounces back, I sweep out a leg to make sure he falls.


    He’s too quick for me to get an attack of opportunity while he’s on the ground- one swift roll later and he’s back on his feet, looking none the worse for wear. But hey- at least he hasn’t hit me yet.


    A probably-tasteless domestic abuse joke comes to mind, but before I can even gauge whether it would be too crass to say aloud, Niko’s already moving in for another attack, this time more cautious than before. He still pushes my reflexes to the limit, as I struggle to guard against his flurry of blows, just barely managing to block or deflect them. Naturally, Niko doesn’t let up, and he’ll overwhelm me eventually, so I flick my tail out, dangerously close to his throat, though of course I’ve got no intention of actually killing him. Still, he jerks back instinctively, giving me the opening I need to go on the offensive.


    One quick punch to the kidney on his left side softens him up, then I throw an overhand swing to jackhammer my fist into his face, hard enough to hurt, but not quite enough to break anything. Niko staggers back, but I press the advantage, knowing that he’d do exactly the same if our positions were reversed.


    Exploiting the greater distance between us, I pivot on one heel to deliver two quick kicks to his ribs. The first one, he absorbs with a grunt, but the second he intercepts, yanking my leg to try and toss me to the ground. Instead, I roll with it, closing the gap between us while I wrench my ankle from his grip, then surging upwards once I’m close enough and delivering a devastating uppercut.


    The blow doesn’t hit with nearly enough force to knock him down again, since I’m not trying to break his jaw, but it does clearly hurt quite a bit. As I hop back into a combat stance, he raises his arms in the universal declaration of surrender.


    “Okay, okay. That’s enough.” He laughs wearily, massaging his jaw, and turns to the rest of the combat unit, our audience. “In case any of you were wondering, that’s why she’s the boss and I’m not.”


    “Is it also how you decide which one of you tops?” Mars calls out, provoking a lot of laughter, and at least one scandalized expression from Kat. She calms down a bit when she sees Niko and I are laughing too.


    “No, that process is significantly bloodier,” I call back, to even more laughter.


    The two of us step out of the ring, and Niko tosses me a towel, while instructing the others to get back to their own training. We collapse onto a bench together, both exhausted, though at least in my case, actually feeling a bit better than before. Niko doesn’t complain as I scoot closer to him and rest my head on his shoulder- a display of vulnerability and affection I’d usually avoid making in front of my subordinates, but I figure I’ve earned enough badass points by kicking Niko’s ass that I can afford to.


    “Nervous about tomorrow, huh?” he asks quietly. I don’t bother asking how he can tell.


    “Yeah.”


    “Can’t blame you, honestly. The other guys have been training just as hard, and they’re probably starting from a better position than us. But I think we’re gonna win anyway. You know why?”


    “Why?” I ask, without moving my head from where it rests on his shoulder.


    “Because we’ve got you running the show. And that little twerp Tellis just can’t compete.”


    There’s a brief pause. In one of the sparring rings, Kat ducks a swing from Ibrahim and delivers a surprisingly vicious strike to his knee that makes it buckle. I tilt my head up slightly to look at Niko, who’s now holding a small ice pack to the part of his jaw where I hit him.


    “You know that’s not making me any less nervous, right?”


    He laughs softly.


    “Yeah. I know.”