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Everything went black.
Chapter Ten
“Let me see my man!”
Patrick shoved the medic away and forced his way through the crowd of personnel that had descended into the arena in the time it had taken him to regain consciousness.
“Sir, you need—” the medic grabbed for him, but Patrick twisted away. His ears still rang and his head felt like it had been cleaved in two, but the medic could shine that stupid light in his eyes after he’d set them on Fal’ran.
“Let me see him!” Patrick elbowed past a sapper sweeping for more goddamn live explosives in the fucking training arena. A dense group of medical corps officers gathered around where he’d last seen Fal’ran, before the ground had exploded from underneath him.
“Smith!” General Yal’rest appeared before him, flanked by Qeshian and Human generals. Their entourages followed, looking around, taking notes, documenting how seriously the Klah’Eel army had fucked up again.
But Patrick didn’t give a shit. All he cared about was that the group of doctors and orderlies had hefted a stretcher off the ground, and he couldn’t see what was inside it. “I need to check on my man!”
“You need to tell me what the fuck happened.” Yal’rest fisted his hand into the center of Patrick’s jacket and hauled him back when Patrick tried to get around him.
Patrick stopped himself from striking his superior officer and let Yal’rest shove him before the group. ‘What the fuck happened’? He needed to know what happened?
“What the fuck does it look like happened?” Patrick bared his teeth and threw his arm out to encompass the surrounding chaos. The destroyed jungle, the evacuated command tower, the sappers sweeping the area. He saw Squad L’s captain and his blood boiled over. “That bastard mined his fucking zone!”
The captain’s face paled in stricken remorse, but when Yal’rest turned to him, he forced a sneer. “And your man barreled into it like an untrained, illiterate, cannon-fodder—”
Patrick launched himself at the goddamn fucking bastard. Fal’ran was ten times the soldier of that limp gatlung. How dare—
Before Patrick’s fist smashed into the coward’s terrified face, Yal’rest’s lackeys seized his arms and wrenched him back.
“Enough!” Yal’rest roared.
“That man—” Patrick jerked his chin at the sapper, straining against the two privates pinning his arms behind him “—mined the arena with live explosives. He put countless soldiers and lives at risk.”
He’d put Patrick’s soldiers at risk.
Motion in the crowd caught Patrick’s eye. Tar parted the crowd, Bar’in and Sazahk on his heels, and Patrick swept his eyes over them. Bruises darkened Tar’s jaw, scratches covered Sazahk’s face and neck, and Bar’in’s arm hung in a sling, but he still pushed to the front of the crowd.
“Your soldier put everyone at risk by entering a hostile area in a negligent manner—” The captain jabbed his finger into Patrick’s face, and Patrick fought the urge to bite it off.
“Don’t spout textbook bullshit at me, you fucking moron,” he snarled. “We have rules for a reason.”
Yal’rest yanked Patrick around to scream at him. “And your man didn’t follow them!”
Patrick didn’t have words. Fal’ran had dulled his blades. Fal’ran had stocked their magazines with paintballs. This was not Fal’ran’s—
“Your man disobeyed your direct order.”
Fuck.
Patrick restrained his scent.
Fuck, Yal’rest was right.
He’d told Fal’ran to stop. He’d spotted the mines and ordered Fal’ran to retreat, but of course—of course—the damn hothead hadn’t been able to tear himself from the hunt once he’d smelled blood.
And then he’d disappeared in a cloud of dirt and a deafening boom, and goddammit if Patrick had reined him in harder, if he hadn’t fucking encouraged Fal’ran’s defiance, if he’d been a better leader, the man would have listened to him and medics wouldn’t be carrying him away on a stretcher without Patrick even knowing—
“—dishonorably discharged and sent back to the Moon Projects we never should have pulled him out of in the first place.” Yal’rest’s words struck Patrick like rounds from an orbital gun.
“No.” Patrick’s throat constricted around his words. “You can’t discharge him.”
