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Patrick grabbed Mal’ik’s flesh wrist and squeezed. He knew how lucky they’d both been to survive everything they had. He knew one day their luck might run out. He might never see Mal’ik again, and the thought choked him. But it wasn’t a new realization, and he didn’t wallow in it.
Mal’ik dropped his hands and quirked his lips. “And take care of that boy of yours, too.”
Patrick’s face flamed again. “He’s not a boy.”
“I won’t judge you about his age.” Mal’ik’s smile spread in a grin as he lifted the tent flap.
“You’d better not!” Patrick yelled after him, and he was gone.
The past ten hours swirled around Patrick as he stood alone in the tent. The Trial, the explosion, his demotion, Fal’ran, the Insects, and the mobilization. He scrubbed his hands over his face and shrugged the overwhelm off his shoulders.
Go time.
He strapped his weapons and the bag with all his possessions over his shoulder and strode out into the camp.
His mind crowded with Insects and war, he didn’t notice the looks until halfway across camp.
A life as a human in Klah’Eel uniform had accustomed him to strange looks. The Empire was a multi-species state, and the army had other humans and a few qesh, but he’d still drawn stares. These were different. Pitying, wary, accusing, disdainful, and more than usual.
Word had spread. Somehow, in the handful of hours since Fal’ran stepped on that mine, and even with the greatest threat to the sector since the Humans had arrived centuries ago, word had spread about Patrick’s failings and the failings of his squad. He didn’t know what story people believed—that Fal’ran hadn’t followed his orders or that Patrick had ordered him into a trap—but neither reflected well on them.
Even officers he considered friends averted their eyes as he passed.
He clenched his jaw, lifted his chin, and refused to let them smell his shame.
Throwing up his squad’s tent flap, Patrick stopped short to see them huddled in the center with their things packed and their heads together. Sazahk, Bar’in, and Tar stood close together and Bar’in sliced his hand through the air more emphatically than Patrick had seen him do anything. Fal’ran stood apart, his head down, his shoulders in, and Patrick’s spine pulled tight with concern.
Before he spoke, the four of them turned and he recoiled at the intensity of their glares.
Bar’in stepped forward. “Captain.”
“Not your captain,” Patrick replied automatically. “You saw—”
“We won’t accept another one.” Bar’in crossed his arms and planted his feet. “We took a vote and—”
“This isn’t a democracy.” Patrick balked. “You will follow the orders of your superior officer, whoever they are, or you will be discharged.”
“I won’t be.” Sazahk shrugged his shoulder with a matter-of-fact tone. “I’m here at will and I can leave at will.”
“Okay, fine, but the rest of you.” Patrick stalked forward, his horror growing. “You don’t walk away because someone above you made a decision you don’t like.”
Did no one else understand that?
“After all the work you’ve put in—” after all the work he’d put in for them, after he threw himself on his goddamn sword for them “—you do not walk away.” Patrick jabbed his finger at Bar’in, but he glared at Tar and Fal’ran, too.
Tar met his gaze blankly, solidly, and Patrick wanted to scream.
But when Patrick’s eyes tracked to Fal’ran, his stomach lurched, and his heart seized and he looked away before he read the younger man’s expression. Oh hell, what had he done? Memories of their hands on each other and Fal’ran’s intense eyes and parted lips bubbled under his skin. He flushed and dropped his hand. Now he couldn’t even look at his soldier?
This wasn’t the time. This wasn’t the time.
“We’re not getting another captain anyway, though, are we?” Sazahk leaned around Bar’in.
“What?” Patrick blinked, trying to drag himself out of the passionate memories, shove down the fluttery feeling in his stomach, and battle the urge to look at Fal’ran all at once.
“We’re not getting another captain.” Sazahk pulled the bag at his feet—overflowing with wires and supplies and bits of leaves and bark—onto his shoulders. “You’d have brought them, or you would have never shown up. They’d have disappeared you—”
“They wouldn’t have disappeared me. We’re not the cartel.” Patrick snorted. “They’d have reassigned me.”
