for every detail whenever she was home. She had felt from the day he was born that the Corps was his destiny, but now—twelve years later, watching him tread the line between stringy little boy and thoughtful young man—she knew she was right, in ways she had never imagined. He would be part of all this soon, and he would be the one bringing home fantastic stories for her.
She stowed her rescued equipment under the table and sat next to Raban, flashing him a grateful smile. He often reminded her of her son, although he was twice the boy’s age: effortlessly handsome, with dark, thick hair and serious gray eyes. When Greg had been a baby his eyes had been blue, but time had drained them of color, and left behind a stormy shade streaked through with black. Exotic eyes. Tom’s eyes. Greg had her fine features—and her mercurial temper—but he had his father’s eyes.
“You okay?” Raban asked.
He was perceptive like Greg, too. She gave him a tight smile. “I feel like I’ve just abandoned my childhood home.”
“You could have said no,” he reminded her. “It had to be unanimous, remember?”
“It’s worth it,” she said. He kept looking at her, and she made herself smile more easily. “Besides, it never hurts having a man like Andy Kelso owe you a favor, does it?”
“He already owes you,” Raban pointed out, but he smiled back, letting her off the hook.
“Twenty seconds to detonation. Please evacuate the area.”
Raban clutched the edge of the table, frowning as he looked around the room at people spinning in their chairs, running around and changing places in the last seconds available. “We work with idiots, did you know that?”
Kate watched the people she served with, the people who knew her better than her own family. “We work with people who know when to have fun,” she corrected. On impulse, she put her hand over his, and gripped it hard.
“Ten seconds to detonation.”
In the distance, she heard the heavy bulkhead creaking as it lurched closed. She wondered if it would hold; as far as she knew they had never used it before.
“Nine.”
There was a comforting thunk as the bulkhead locked into place, and she took a breath.
“Eight.”
She realized, belatedly, that along with her infirmary, the gymnasium was on the wrong side of the bulkhead as well. It was going to be a very long trip back.
“Seven.”
So many missions she had been part of, in her years with the Corps. So many causes, so many battles.
“Six.”
So many missed opportunities. So many mistakes.
“Five.”
But not this time. This time … they had been soon enough.
“Four.”
This time, they were right.
“Three.”
She thought of Meg, her daughter, her beautiful young woman, and what she looked like with the sun silvering her wild, dark curls. She thought of Greg, still mostly a boy, and the twinkle in his eyes when he was trying not to laugh.
“Two.”
She thought of Tom, her husband, her soul mate, who watched her leave time after time and still waited for her, patient and constant and full of love. Sometimes she missed him more than life.
This time, when she got home, maybe she’d stay a little longer.
One.
Volhynia
Another round, please,” Elena said to the bartender.
The man’s expression did not change, but she thought he looked at her a moment longer than necessary. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes at him. She knew what he was thinking; she was thinking it herself: They’ve had too much to drink already.
Her eyes caught a familiar face in the mirror behind the bar, and she turned, singling out Jessica. Her friend was in her element: surrounded by rowdy, cheerful strangers, red curls bouncing as she laughed and joked with the crowd. Jess thrived as the center of attention. Elena wished she had more of Jess’s confidence, wondering again why she had agreed to spend her meager shore leave in a crowded place where her dearest wish was to be ignored.
Because it was better than staying home.
She had to admit that Jessica had done her research. Volhynia’s capital city of Novanadyr was crowded with tourist traps, but Byko’s, despite the crowd and the noise level, had an air of sophistication. The bar served not just the flavored beers so often favored by tourists, but also a wide variety of subtler brews the colony did not export. Indeed, there were a number of local patrons, and even one man in a PSI uniform, drinking quietly at a corner of the bar, as serene as if he were the only customer in the place.
There were plenty in the crowd who were loud and stupid at this hour, but the atmosphere seemed upbeat, the music was bluesy and seductive, and the smell of fresh hops filled the air. Elena had spent interminable evenings in environments far less inviting, but the environment hadn’t put the knots in her neck. No, it was not the fault of the bar that her nerves were so frayed.
Sitting here, amid the amiable chaos, she found herself wondering for a fleeting moment if she shouldn’t have taken Danny up on his invitation to spend the evening with him instead. He had broached the subject just that morning, approaching her nervously after breakfast, palpably relieved when she had agreed to listen.
“There’s this scientists’ bar,” he told her. “Eggheads and weak drinks. Quiet, they say, although they’ll rip you off like everywhere else in the Fifth Sector.” She had laughed at that, and almost said yes. But she did turn him down, albeit gently and with some regret. Now she thought he would at least have been someone she knew.
The locals, of course, had come out in force when Galileo had taken up orbit. Jessica hadn’t warned her, but Elena realized she had been foolish not to figure out for herself what would happen. Volhynia was a well-populated colony world—there were nearly four thousand in Novanadyr alone—but there was nothing like new blood.
They knew we’d be here, Elena thought irritably. And they’re hunting us like wildebeest.
Not that it didn’t go both ways. Most Corps starships had downtime every twenty days, sometimes more often, but Galileo’s crew had been six weeks without formal shore leave. Ordinarily they encountered something to shake up their
