Well, that bullsh*t happened.

I know I live in a liberal area of the US, but I didn't realize it was so liberal as to be an anomaly. Colorado went for Hillary Clinton--not by much, but by enough--but almost all of our neighbors didn't. The big swing states didn't.

I don't know what it says about me, that I am so surprised at how many people could support a person like Donald Trump, who exemplifies so much of what I despise. It's certainly motivational with regards to standing up for what I believe in. I'm still hopeful about the future, though. A Trump presidency won't be an easy presidency for him, no matter what the makeup of Congress is. He doesn't have a mandate in this country, and his coalition is as fractured as ever.

My father, a veteran, voted for Hillary. My mother, a southerner, voted for Hillary. My brother, who works in oil and gas, voted for Hillary. My sister, a doctor, voted for Hillary. I voted for her. And none of us are going to turn tail and cozy up to our new president-elect just because people are wagging their fingers at us and saying "Unity!" in the face of the dirtiest, most racist, misogynistic, homophobic, anti-POC and anti-Muslim election in modern American history.

We're not done working. We're not done fighting. We'll never be done striving for what we believe in.

/end rant

If any veterans are reading this, thank you for your service to our country. I respect you greatly.

Reformation: Chapter Thirteen

Notes: More Reformation! Back to Miles and Garrett, because they like to be in the thick of things. It isn't the longest one (lots on my mind today--omg it's election day, I wish it was over already) but interesting, I hope.

Title: Reformation: Chapter Thirteen

***

Chapter Thirteen

“What do you mean, he’s missing?”

“I mean exactly that.” Miles wasn’t sure what it meant that his son could look so calm talking about Cody’s disappearance, but given the way his kid tended to repress, it couldn’t mean anything good. “He’s gone missing. Or rather, I know where he is at this point, but there’s no way I’m going to get him back short of dragging him out of a very precarious situation by abusing my authority, and I’m not going to compromise him or Ten like that.”

“I wondered where Ten was when I came to get the boys,” Miles said.

Garrett laughed. It wasn’t a good sound. “They’re inseparable. It could have broken a thousand regulations and laws and Ten still would have found a way to stick to Cody. That’s literally the only bright spot I’m seeing right now, apart from the fact that at least you got Darrel and Grennson. How are they?”

Miles leaned back in his ready-room chair and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Confused. Unwillingly excited. Afraid. Curious. You name it, they’ve probably felt it.” He was leading three thousand cadets so green they’d barely even sprouted into a battle he had nothing but bad intel for, and their youthful, endearing and stupidly optimistic outlooks were the only thing keeping Miles from giving his personal sense of foreboding more room to flourish.

“Not surprising. And your officers?”

Miles shrugged. “No one I’ve worked with before. They look good on the screen, but not many of them have active combat experience. I’m going to be doing a lot of live drills and handholding on the way to the Fringe.”

“When do you estimate you’ll get there by?”

“We have a twenty-one ship armada, ranging from two fifteen-person Quicksilvers to my seven hundred-person Annihilator. Not all of them have the same power, and while normally I’d send some of the fleet ahead to scout, something about this…” He tapped his fingers on the console. “It bothers me, beyond the extreme circumstances that brought it about. We have fluctuating data on the pirate fleet that makes anything we think we know suspect, and so little of it that it’s virtually useless regardless of numeric values. They could have anywhere from five to fifteen to fifty ships, and all I’m sure of with regards to weaponry is that it’s more intense than anything most Fringe planets are able to handle. Has there been any word yet from Pandora?”

“None,” Garrett said. He sounded like he was gritting his teeth. “I know their shield is holding, and I know if it’s still up then they’re still experiencing problems. Also, I can tell you that there are twenty-nine vessels in orbit above Pandora that have no recognizable Federation digital insignia.”

Miles frowned. “How do you know that?”

“I have my ways. I’m going to set up a link between my live data stream and your personal implant. It’s heavily encrypted, and should only be accessible by you. If it goes dead suddenly, you’ll know I either had to shut it down to prevent us being spied on, or I’ve lost the mechanism for getting the data in the first place.” He tapped a few things on his console, and a moment later Miles’ implant let him know he was receiving data. He opened it up to project in front of his eyes, and inhaled sharply.

“Satellites? I didn’t think there were any Federation ones that close to the planet that had survived the initial attack.”

“They didn’t. Everything emitting a Federation signal was incinerated within the first five minutes of battle. I used a few Fed satellites further out as bouncers, but this one is personal.”

Miles blinked. Even for Garrett, that was extreme. “You set up a personal satellite to orbit Pandora?”

“Disguised as a meteor,” Garrett confirmed.

“How long ago?”

“Years.” His son smiled grimly. “You can call me a lot of things, but you can’t say I’m unprepared.”

“That’s true.” Miles shut his eyes and examined the ship signatures for a long moment. All mid-sized, from the look of things, but that in and of itself didn’t really make any sense. This wasn’t how pirates operated. “Interesting that they managed to target Federation satellites so specifically. Those signals are supposed to be unhackable.”

“One more item for the list of ‘interesting’ things about this whole shit show,” Garrett said. “You see what’s going on now, of course.”

“I do.” Miles opened his eyes. “We’re going to have to recalibrate our shields if they’re going to stand up to heavy fire from our own weapons. I’m going to raise a lot of eyebrows in the engineering departments.”

“Let them rise. If your officers refuse to comply, you can always throw them in the brig or out an airlock, whichever is closer.”

“Garrett.”

“I’m serious. Don’t let your own people endanger your life because they don’t have their priorities straight.” He sat up in his chair. “Dad, if you happen to find evidence of a Drifter ship in the vicinity of Pandora, I need you to do your best to ensure that it survives, okay? This is really important.”

“This is about Cody, isn’t it?”

“I can’t say that for sure.” But there was surety in his son’s voice, in the cold glint of his eyes, in the way he clasped his hands together like if he didn’t, they’d be squeezing someone’s throat. “Just look out for them. Please.”

“I’ll do that.”

“Thank you.”

“Anything for you, kid, you know that.”

Garrett nodded. “I know. Claudia and the girls are safe, by the way. I made sure of it.”

“Yeah, she messaged me.”

“Okay.” Garrett looked down at his hands for a second. “Keep me updated.”

“I will.” Miles ended the call without ceremony—more emotion wouldn’t do his son any good right now. He took a moment to himself to read between the lines: Cody and Ten had run off with Drifters headed toward Pandora, there were twenty-nine ships that were far too big to be pirates waiting for them once they arrived, and those ships were armed with plasma cannons. Probably standard torpedoes too, but the cannons were the thing that would cut through their shields without too much effort. Normal countermeasures didn’t work on them, and in fact, they’d only begun installing the cannons in Federation ships within the past five years. Miles called for Shen Lin.

His personal secretary opened the door a moment later. “Sir?”

“Do me a favor and run an inventory analysis on all the public data we’ve got for Federation shipyards. I want to see where supplies have gone, more particularly which ships have been upgraded to plasma and which haven’t. I’d also like to see raw numbers for orders, if possible. If a shipyard received eighty cannons and only installed sixty, I want to know it.”

If she wondered why he was giving her what probably seemed like busy work, she didn’t mention it. “Yes, sir.”

“Forward all of your findings to Garrett. File it under ‘interesting.’”

“And if I don’t find anything amiss?”

“Then we’ll still know something important.” Namely, that Raymond Alexander has managed to get his hands on enough funds to privately, and quietly, build a fleet of his own, which almost certainly means he’s stealing money from somewhere. Either way, it would give them a lead. If Miles knew how Garrett’s mind worked, he knew that his son was already building a file of incriminating evidence. Anything Miles could do to thicken it, he would.

“Yes, sir.”

“Also, set up a group comm with all the captains in the rest of the fleet. I need to pass along some technical details.” There were sure to be dissenters when he proposed his strategy, but he could phrase it as a way to keep idle hands busy for the next few days, and a learning experience for the cadets. In the end, too, he could simply tell them to get it done and expect that they would. And if someone didn’t, well…

That would also be…interesting. Sabotage within the ranks should have been a minor threat, but the way things were going right now, and with so many unproven cadets under his command and care, Miles wasn’t going to take anything for granted.

“Anything else, sir?”

He shook his head and reactivated Garrett’s stolen data feed. “Dismissed.”

Reformation: Chapter Twelve

Notes: This is for my poor sick darlin', who needs something happy in her life. Have some Cody and Ten!

Title: Reformation: Chapter Twelve

***

Chapter Twelve

Not my ship, not my ship, not my ship...

Sometimes, in dreams, Cody thought he relived his early childhood on a Drifter ship. He would walk down endless, twisting corridors made from mottled patches of metal, rusty scraps scraped just clean enough to catch a bond with newer polymers. Sometimes he was running toward his father, sometimes he was running away from other people, but Cody was never still when he dreamt of Drifting. He and his dad had left the clan when he was only five, but occasionally he would catch a whiff of burning solvent or thick, ancient oil and stop in his tracks, his head turning to track the smell despite himself.

Cody knew that leaving had been better. He’d been a liability on a Drifter ship; his dad had never said it, but Jack had uncomfortably intimated as much more than once. Kids who couldn’t heal fast were burdens, and nobody had time to take care of a burden when you were expected to start working as soon as you could walk. Instead, Cody and Jonah had made a new family with Garrett, and Cody wouldn’t trade it for the world. Still, there were times when he felt like a bird trapped not in a cage, but underwater, in a place it shouldn’t be able to survive. He couldn’t be a Drifter because he was a natural, but he would never really fit in with the glitz and glamour that came with Garrett’s lifestyle either, for the same reason.

Ten, on the other hand, would thrive anywhere. It was evident from the moment they caught sight of the enormous Drifter ship, well beyond the orbit of Olympus, where it would have had to pay docking fees. Jack eased them in toward what sort of, kind of looked like a port that would work for a little skip ship like his, and Ten actually twisted hir head to follow the motion. “How will we—oh, of course, at an angle. So you can cluster ships around a central intake. Clever. Very ungainly, but clever.”

“Don’t matter how elegant you look when all you’ve gotta worry about’s livin’ in space,” Jack muttered as he delicately guided his craft into the cradle. “No gravity to break you down. Now look, this skipper’s mine, but that don’t mean other people ain’t gonna come in here. You got a way of locking that bike?”

“Why don’t we just stay in here?” Cody said. He already felt like his skin was crawling at the thought of going onto the enormous ship. So many people who he didn’t know, who hadn’t wanted him…

“How do you mean?”

“I mean, we can make our quarters here, can’t we? So we’re out of the way?”

“Can’t contribute as easy when you’re out of the way,” Jack said. “’Sides, everyone’s gonna want to see you. I’ve been talkin’ you up for a while now.”

“Even to Grandma?”

Jack clapped Cody on the shoulder. “Let me worry about your Grandma.” The little ship docked with a faint clunk. “She shouldn’t kick up too much of a fuss. Like I said, we’re headed there anyway. Just makes sense to take you with us.”

Ten was frowning. Cody cut in before ze could say anything to Jack. “Thanks.”

“I’m going to lock the bike,” Ten announced. “Cody, come with me so I can show you the code.”

Cody frowned, but followed Ten back to the storage bay of the ship. “There is no code,” he pointed out once they were alone. “It’s DNA-keyed, I remember because you pricked my finger for hours before you got it to work right.”

“You’re not going to freak out on me, are you?”

Cody blinked. “What?”

“You aren’t going to suddenly decide that you wish you had been a Drifter all along and dive into assimilating their culture and forgiving them for all the awful things they did to you just because you’re lonely and looking for a connection?”

Cody parsed Ten’s breathless question out bit by bit. “Okay, first off, I’m not lonely. I’ve got you.”

Ten rolled hir eyes. “What about when I’m not enough for you?”

Cody actually laughed. “When have you ever been not enough? Do you even remember our time on Perelan? Who was the one who took time out of hir busy schedule to come back inside and do martial arts that I know you hated with me?”

“I don’t hate them, I just find them inefficient,” Ten defended hirself. “There are so many more practical ways to prevent someone from messing with you. Poison comes to mind. A mild poison,” ze amended when Cody raised his eyebrows. “Just enough to make them fall down and not be able to get up and exact vengeance, which would give you time to really make them regret it.”

Well, that sounded disturbing. “Do you actually have something like that?”

“We’re getting way off subject here.”

“Right.” Cody took a breath. “I don’t wish I was still a Drifter. I might sort of wish I’d been able to find a place here when I was a kid, but I didn’t. They didn’t want me, and they didn’t give my dad much of a choice, and we left and it was the best thing for both of us. I wouldn’t have met Garrett otherwise, which means I wouldn’t have met you, and I can’t imagine my life without either of you.”

Ten looked a bit shocked. “That’s…good.”

“And I do want to assimilate as well as I can while I’m here, but I don’t really give a fuck whether they like me or not as long as they get us where we need to go. My dad is what matters now, not me having a bunch of friends. I don’t need to make friends anyway, I brought my own.”

“Ha,” Ten muttered. “You mean I brought myself, that’s what you really mean. And it’s a good thing I did, because—”

“I know,” Cody said. “I already know. I always know exactly how lucky I am whenever I’m with you. That’s how I feel, okay? We’re here and I’m going to be polite, but the only person whose approval I need is yours. Got it?”

Ten’s mouth silently opened and closed a few times, the way it often did when ze was trying to think of a way to be verbally affectionate that didn’t make hir also feel over-exposed. Cody took pity on hir.

“Let’s say it’s done and get back out there, okay? We’ve got some meeting and greeting to do, I bet.”

“Right. Yes.” Ten’s hands twitched, but ze kept them at hir side. “You’re still in uniform. We both are. Should we change?”

“Why bother? If they can’t handle us like this, they probably aren’t going to be any better if we’re in civvies.”

“Who would ever have thought that of the two of us, you’d be the one to screw convention?”

Cody took Ten’s hand and smiled. “Can’t have you getting bored. Come on.”

It turned out, the term committee was a drastic understatement. There had to be fifty people waiting for them in the little docking bay once they were out of the ship. Jack swore quietly. “Let me do the talkin’, okay?” he murmured to Cody before stepping forward to face a woman with short, storm-gray hair and a face like an angry walnut.

“Corva, I can explain.”

“Explain a pair of strangers on board my ship?” Her voice was as dry as dust. “I’d hope so.

“Cody’s no stranger.”

“Cody’s been a stranger since before he was born.” Cody was really glad he was holding Ten’s hand, because it was oddly comforting to feel Ten’s nails dig into the back of his palm with barely-restrained emotion. It was nice that he wasn’t the only one.

“He’s got news about Pandora. He needed a lift there. Ain’t like we don’t have the space.”

“And what makes you so sure we’re still headed that way, eh?” she taunted him. “Why not find an easier drop for our goods?”

“Because the price on Pandora’s the best for five systems and you know it,” Jack replied. “You ain’t gonna give up that kind of profit without a fight.”

“Don’t mean we need useless people on board, taking our resources without giving anything back.”

“They’re mechanics. Engineers. They can work on the ship, get some of the dark parts lit up again.” Jack was incredibly persuasive when he wanted to be, Cody had to admit. “And they’ve got credits to pay their way.”

“Credits only spend on Central planets, and we don’t deal in places like this for long.” She glared over Jack’s shoulder at the two of them. “Or with people like them.”

“Corva. I gave ‘em my word.”

She glared at Jack. “Keep this up and your word won’t be worth the price of space junk.” She turned to shout at the watching crowd. “Get back to your stations! I want the stench of Olympus out of my nose before another hour passes! Get us up to speed toward Pandora.” She turned back to Jack. “As for them? They’re your problem. Put them to work. Feed them from your share. I don’t want to see them. I don’t want anything to do with them.” She turned and stalked off down the hall.

“Bye, Grandma,” Cody muttered.

Yep, this was going to be fun.

Reformation: Chapter Eleven

Notes: On we go, back to Pandora and Jonah and being in the thick of things. Poor guy, I'm just fucking with him over and over and over again. *sigh* I kind of love it. Enjoy!

Title: Reformation: Chapter Eleven

***

Chapter Eleven

The ship still moved.

Jonah wasn’t surprised. He’d only managed one tether, and the shuttle was perched on her back—it would be stranger if she didn’t move, the way the storm was raging out there. He’d been expecting a few shimmies, a little slip and slide here and there. What he hadn’t been expecting was the consistency of their movement, a constant grinding back and forth across the stony precipice, making the ship shudder and pitch against the harpoon. If he hadn’t landed a solid hit in the rock, they would have already been in the sea. As it was, Jonah didn’t feel too optimistic about their chances of staying where they were for long. They needed to move. They needed a rescue.

“Need a fuckin’ miracle,” he muttered to himself, one hand pressed to his forehead, the other laying gently on Lacey’s shoulder. She was easy, at least, none of her vitals giving him any cause for alarm. Not again, not yet. It wouldn’t last, though. Easy never lasted.

He went through his options yet again. They never changed, but at least it gave his mind something to do now that his hands were idle. “Stay here and wait for rescue.” Well, that wasn’t gonna be an option for much longer. Not that he knew that for sure, because he didn’t, but it was safer to hedge that bet than bluff with nothing in his hand. The longer they sat still, the likelier it was that they wouldn’t get out of this.

“Try to send out a better signal.” Yeah, they had the emergency beacon, but who knew who was listening for that? What if there was no one to listen? Jonah shook his head; he couldn’t operate under the assumption that Pandora City was lost. If that was true… Anyway, it didn’t matter, because he’d used up almost all of the spare power.

“Try and get to the underground.” He knew the location of the big shelters, like all residents of the Box did. He had no idea how to get to them from here, though. There were back doors, but those were hidden, and anyway, those shelters were a long ways off, if they were even still viable. Nope. Not happening.

“Try and find another shelter.” Except there was nothing out here. Nobody had ever homesteaded out this far—why would they, when most of the population was made up of naturals who needed the nearness of the infirmary to give them a regular boost, and when the landscape was so desolate and brutal? What was there out here to entice a person? According to Garrett, this area was one of his personal hells. And he would know; he’d spent over a day holed up in a concrete bunker when his shuttle had been washed away while he was trying to set up a climate modelling experime—

“Holy shit.” The bunkers. Jonah hadn’t thought about those in close to a decade. They were leftovers from the original colony mindset, one that had included pushing out of the canyon the Box was located in and making a go of it in other places. The bunkers had been installed along the edge of the cliff, about ten of them, waystations between what would have been villages before folks gave it up as a bad idea, because the weather was simply too violent.

The bunkers…as far as Jonah knew, those hadn’t been touched in a long time, but after Garrett had gotten back from his ill-fated little expedition, as miserable and bedraggled as a wet catterpet, he’d insisted on upgrading their capacities. “So that no one else who has to weather a storm out there does it knee-deep in freezing water without a fucking light to see by,” he’d said. There would be a generator. There would be basic facilities. There would inevitably be a Regen unit, because Garrett always, always planned for the worst outcomes, and the last time he’d been out there his natural pilot had almost succumbed to hypothermia. It had scared the shit out of him. Jonah hadn’t paid much attention to that story, more interested in the marriage proposal that had come right after the tale of woe. Now, though…

Jonah struggled to his feet, feeling unaccountably woozy before he remembered that he hadn’t eaten in God only knew how long. He dug a ration bar out of the locker by the defunct Regen unit and bit into it as he rummaged around for the map of the area. They were old-fashioned, these maps, pretty much useless when you were in a working shuttle, but that was another thing that had been included as a “just in case” measure, since the planet was so unpredictable. “C’mon,” he muttered, pawing through the flight log—printed out and stored by the shuttle itself, so it was nice and easy to maintain. The map had to be in here somewhere…

“Gotcha!” At the back, of course. Jonah spread it out on the ground and squinted at it in the dim light of the emergency beacon. There they were, the bunkers marked as little circles along the edge of the cliffs. Two of them had X’s through them, a sign that they were now defunct and hadn’t been maintained. Neither of those were the closest to him, though…were they?

Jonah wracked his aching brain, trying to come up with the answer. He knew where they’d crashed, he could see the display burned onto the backs of his eyelids. They were about twenty klicks out from the Box, north thirty-four degrees, west seventy-five or close enough, he could get into the fractions if he needed to but…Jonah followed the course in his mind and found their likely landing spot, then looked for the closest bunker.

There it was. Less than two kilometers away, if he was right. If he was right. If he could get there through this storm―or should he wait it out, then go? And should he go by himself first, to make sure he was right, or should he bring Lacey along right away? He’d have to carry her, rig up some sort of sled to drag her along. It wasn’t gonna be easy, and he was tired. Jonah didn’t know if he had the energy in him for more than one trip, much less dragging Lacey along behind him, but he didn’t know what other choice he had. The ship was still wriggling like a living thing, and if they went into the sea after all the goddamn work he’d done to keep them in one place, he’d never forgive himself. Or live, but that was another issue.

He’d need to bring food. Sanitizers. As much power as possible in the form of batteries. The beacon…no, not that. The bunker might have its own, and given that he didn’t know who was listening, well…it was just safer this way.

Not safe. What was safe anymore? But safer.

Jonah didn’t let himself think about it too much, just packed as quickly and methodically as he could, trying to remember all the things he’d been told were important back when he’d taken that outdoor survival class. It had been a requirement for every colonist of Pandora, but Jonah had never re-upped it after the first time. Call it the Drifter in him, but he was more comfortable inside—a home, a ship, a city—than he ever was outside. All that space, all that strange openness…frankly, it gave him chills. Garrett had never teased him about it, sweetheart that he was, and after the first few camping expeditions he and Robbie had organized, he’d taken Jonah’s reluctance to heart and not tried to talk them into any more. And Jonah had been glad. Glad.

Fuck. He was a goddamn selfish son of a bitch, was what he was. And now he was going to trek across rocky, unstable terrain in the middle of a downpour, trying to navigate under a pitch-black sky. Robbie could have done it blindfolded. Hell, Garrett could probably do it with both hands tied behind his back, for all that he was a city boy at heart.

“Next time I see you, we’re going camping,” he promised his absent husband. “Sleeping outside, starting fires with matches, all that crap. We can take the kids.” Cody and Ten, Darrel and Grennson…Jonah couldn’t let himself think about them, not right now. “Anything you want, darlin’.” Anything, as long as we’re together.

He glanced out the porthole at the back of the shuttle. The grinding wasn’t so bad now, and he could actually see through the rain. It was an ebb, he knew, not an end, but Jonah would take it.

He knelt down over Lacey. “Okay, honey. Sorry in advance about the cold, but if this goes right, I’ll have you warm again soon.” Warm, and better taken care of. He shifted her onto the stretcher he’d cobbled together, then bundled the both of them up in all the weatherproof equipment he had, then made sure the rest of the supplies were tied securely to the base.

“All right, then.” He slung the fabric supports over his shoulders, then knotted them around his waist. “Time to get out of here.” Opening the back door manually was a pain, but he managed it, and was greeted by a blast of icy rain right to the face.

Lightning flashed, illuminating the puddle in front of the shuttle, and the thin, jerking tether that looked frailer and frailer by the second.

“Great,” Jonah said with a sigh, then started their descent, the route fixed firmly in his mind.

He’d get them to the bunker if it was the last thing he did.

New Release: Changing Worlds

Omigosh, guys! Guys! Changing Worlds is out! A new edition with a new cover and a new lease on life, and I'm so freaking excited about it!

Their love will either inspire change in the world or tear it apart.

Former starship captain Jason Kim and his lover, Ferran, are starting a life together on Ferran’s native planet. The Perel matriarchs reluctantly allowed their marriage in the hopes of securing better diplomatic relations with humanity, even though the decision ignites anger from traditionalists. Ferran’s family accepts Jason and the love the two men have found, but other influential families are less accommodating and much less willing to welcome an outsider to their isolated, subterranean world. Some of their enemies are willing to go as far as eliminating Jason permanently. Tensions are quickly building toward a breaking point that might push Perelan into a bloody civil war.

If Jason and Ferran have any hope of surviving the coming conflict, they’ll have to rely on their devotion to each other more than ever before. But that won’t be easy when a figure from Jason’s past reappears to make them question everything.

If you've read it before, thank you, I love you. If you haven't read it before or want to grab it again, let me give you some links!

Dreamspinner Press: https://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/books/changing-worlds

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Changing-Worlds-Cari-Z

Kobo: https://store.kobobooks.com/en-us/ebook/changing-worlds

ARe: https://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-changingworlds

A Love Letters Snippet

Hi guys!

So, a while ago (last week, or so) I ran a preorder contest, and one of the winners requested that I give her a little follow up to Love Letters. I finally complied, and she said I could share it, so! Story snippet for you!

***

 A heavy, hardback copy of Codes, Ciphers and Secrets: The Spycraft of the American Revolution lay on the bedside table, almost but not quite knocked off of it during its author’s rather energetic celebration of the news that the book had hit number one on the New York Times bestseller’s list. The bed wasn’t shaking any more, and the lights were out, but the silence was still punctuated with soft conversation and the murmur of bodies shifting under blankets, moving against each other with gentle acceptance that they belonged close enough to touch.

“Seriously, congratulations,” Ryan said again, pressing his lips to the side of Ben’s neck. Ben tilted his chin up a bit, and his lover slotted his head into the proffered space with ease.

Ben wanted to shrug, but he couldn’t with Ryan lying on top of him. “I think it was more a matter of timing than anything else.” The History Channel had just run a miniseries on the same topic, and they’d invited Ben to be interviewed for it. He was, Ryan and Heather had assured him, ridiculously hot during his five minutes of fame. Mostly Ben had felt awkward, but—hey, whatever worked.

“That helped, sure, but the book is great. You make the subject fun.”

“Spies are always fun.”

“Not unless they look like Tom Cruise.” Ryan laughed suddenly. “You know Linda is trying to pitch your book as a potential movie, right? What if he got the lead role?”

“Linda is crazy.” Ben loved her, but she was crazy. “There’s no single main character in the book, if you don’t count George Washington. It’s a history, not a thriller—there’s no way to cast anyone because there’s no leading role for any one person to play.”

“I know, I know, but…”

Ryan’s voice was weirdly tentative, which Ben hated to hear. “But what?”

“But maybe…you should consider turning it into a novel. Or a part of it, at least. What about the Culper Ring? Or Lydia Darragh?”

“Lydia Darragh’s story isn’t well substantiated,” Ben said automatically, but his mind was already turning the idea over. The truth was, it was a thought Ben had had before, to take some of his extensive research and turn it into something more approachable, more focused on human relationships. He’d actually written a few chapters of a story about Avery Toth and Charles Lancaster, but the idea of writing a romance that was destined to end in tragedy had made him put it aside. It was just too sad. He might be able to handle things like that when they were from real life, but more and more Ben found that if he was reading for pleasure, he wanted a happy ending.

“Not her, then, but someone like her. Or you could make up a new character altogether, a spy and patriot working for Washington against the British and having all sorts of daring adventures and narrow escapes.” Ryan picked up speed as he got into the idea. “There are so many ways you could go with this, and think of the supporting cast! And the tricks and methods you’d get to put in there, and it could all be so historically accurate that even the loudest critics couldn’t deny it. It would be so much fun.”

“It probably would be.”

“You should think about it. Just…something to consider.”

“Or,” Ben offered, “maybe we should think about it together and then collaborate on the writing.” Ryan was on the sixteenth volume of Janie and the Phantom now, and while he still enjoyed the story, Ben knew that the sameness of Ryan’s work was starting to get to him. “You have more experience as a storyteller, after all.”

Ryan sat up and looked at Ben, his dark blue eyes wide. “Are you serious? You’d actually want to work together with me on something?”

“Of course.” In fact, the more he thought about it… “We can talk it out when we’re in Hawaii.”

“We’re going to Hawaii?”

“Linda promised you, remember? If this book made the list, she’d send us on vacation there. Now you get to collect, and we get to go somewhere warm in the middle of winter.” And maybe Ben could finally ask the question he’d been meaning to ask for the past year, too. He thought of the little box in the back of his desk drawer and was grateful it was dark, because he knew he was blushing.

“Wow.” Ryan’s grin was brilliant. “Great news, a new project, and the promise of a vacation, all in one day? This is gonna be hard to top for, like, the rest of my life.” He leaned down and kissed Ben, and his mind went from rings in boxes to the man in his arms with barely a skip.

The book fell to the floor a few minutes later. Neither man noticed.

Reformation: Chapter Ten

 Notes: Ah, rush rush rush! But here is a new, and hopefully different, perspective for Reformation for you today. It's about time we got back to the boys, isn't it? I mean, the other boys.

Title: Reformation: Chapter Ten

***

Chapter Ten

Darrel felt like the klaxon that had sounded over the Academy campus half an hour ago was still ringing in his ears. Emergency declaration. Emergency declaration. Proceed to your towers for orders. Proceed to your towers for orders. It had been broadcast over their implants too, and the flashing red and yellow indicator in the corner of his vision would stay there until Darrel reported to his superior officer for duty. The thing was, he didn’t even know who his superior officer was supposed to be yet.

“This is a non-standard emergency mobilization,” Sergeant Bowers had explained to him and the rest of the cadets in Apollo Tower. “There are confirmed reports of a piracy attack on a planet in the Fringe, and the admiralty has decided to take this opportunity to improve the wartime capabilities of our student body.”

“But most of us haven’t even done a mock deployment before, sir,” Darrel had spoken up before he could talk himself out of it. He didn’t have to be Grennson to feel the apprehension rolling off his fellow cadets. This wasn’t just non-standard, it was unprecedented. Grennson couldn’t stop shifting on his feet, quills vibrating with little shudders that only Darrel was really close enough to see. “Is there something wrong with the fleet that’s already deployed out there?”

“Our navy has downsized dramatically in recent years, cadet, but regardless, this is an executive order. Kit up, and follow the directive sent through Hermes to get your personal mission plan.”

Well, that was a fucking non-answer if Darrel had ever heard one. He’d wanted to press the point, but Grennson’s discomfort and the sergeant’s obvious dismissal decided against it for him. Instead he took Grennson’s hand and radiated as much calm and comfort as he could when he wasn’t really feeling it himself, and led his friend back to their quad. Their currently empty quad.

“Where are Cody and Ten?” he muttered, looking around. He waited for his personal directive to start scrolling across his mental screen, but nothing came, just the indicator to wait, wait, wait.

“They’re not here.”

“I know they’re not, it’s annoying.” And a little disturbing. Darrel would never admit it out loud, but he always felt a little better when the four of them were together. More like they could handle anything that was thrown their way, instead of worrying about unsolvable science or a personal interaction that he wasn’t prepared to deal with.

“No, I mean they’re not here at all.”

Darrel turned and faced Grennson. “What, on campus?”

“No,” Grennson said breathlessly, like he couldn’t quite believe it. “On the planet.”

“What?” How could that be? Had they deployed early? Why hadn’t they send either of them a message to let them know? “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” Grennson’s eyes were huge, and bright with an emotion Darrel didn’t want to see in his best friend. It looked suspiciously like fear. “I can’t feel them anymore. I could, for a while, but now they’re moving away and I can’t feel them!”

“Okay, c’mere.” He led Grennson over to the couch and pushed him to sit back on it, but Grennson wouldn’t let go of his hand.

“Stay with me,” he insisted, and Darrel couldn’t say no.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he promised, all while sending out a ping for Cody and Ten. His implant echoed dully: no response evident. He checked his messages again, but there was still nothing. What the hell were the two of them doing, leaving the planet but not leaving a note?

An incoming call light flashed on the holo screen in the center of the living room. Darrel activated it instantly. “Hello?”

“Darrel?” The face that materialized in the vid was…Garrett Helms? Darrel felt himself relax a little. “Are you okay?”

“Grennson and I are fine. Do you know about the deployment?”

“I’ve heard about it, but I don’t have all the details yet. Is Cody there?”

Darrel’s tension ramped up so tight that he heard Grennson squeak in reaction next to him. “No,” he said slowly. “He and Ten are…I thought maybe they were with you? I haven’t seen either of them all morning.”

“No.” Garrett’s voice had lost all inflection. “They’re not with me. Do you have any idea where they could be?”

“Off planet,” Grennson whispered. Garrett’s eyes focused on him like a laser. “I felt them leave perhaps a quarter of an hour ago. I don’t know who they’re with, if not with you.”

“Ah.” That was it, just ah. “Give me a moment.” His face vanished from the screen, and Darrel and Grennson exchanged a blank look.

“What the hell?”

“If Garrett doesn’t know where they are, then they’ve—they’ve probably run away.”

“Why would they run away?” Darrel demanded. “Neither of them is afraid of something like a deployment. At the worst it would be an inconvenience for Ten, but Cody wouldn’t just…abandon his responsibilities like this.” He wouldn’t abandon us.

“I don’t think it’s about avoiding conflict,” Grennson said slowly, like he was still working it out in his head. “I think it might be about—approaching it from a different direction. Do you know where the pirates are attacking?”

“They haven’t announced it yet.” Darrel felt his heart stutter a little in his chest. “Do you think…”

“I think we’re going to Pandora.”

“Then why wouldn’t they want to go?” Darrel exploded. “You wouldn’t be able to keep Cody away from Pandora if it’s under attack, not with his dad there right now. It doesn’t make any sense!”

“I know.” Grennson’s voice was quiet. “Which makes you wonder, doesn’t it? What would pull them away from the opportunity to travel to Pandora and be part of its protection, without giving them black marks on their Academy records? What would make them leave without telling us? Why would they have to be so secret? Why wouldn’t they even contact Garrett?” He gestured toward the frozen holoscreen. “Cody has never been careless of his fathers’ feelings. Garrett is greatly distraught.”

“How can you even tell that?”

“It’s very clear to an empath.”

The holoscreen flared to life again before Darrel could reply. “Stay in your quad for the time being,” Garrett said without ceremony. “You’re going to be personally escorted to your individual deployments.”

“How do you know that?” Garrett wasn’t a part of the Academy’s administration, he shouldn’t be able to know these things. He just shook his head.

“Will we be together?” Grennson asked.

That got the first fresh hint of emotion from Garrett since they told him Cody and Ten weren’t around. He smiled, and now Darrel could see what Grennson must have been sensing all along: it was the most fragile, careful smile he had ever seen. “Yes, you’ll be together. I promise.”

Grennson exhaled heavily. “Thank you, Garrett.”

“It’s the least I can do. Take care of each other, all right?”

“What about Cody and Ten?” Darrel pressed.

Garrett shook his head. “Try not to worry about them. They’re all right.” For now, the subtext screamed. Garrett ended the connection before Darrel could ask any more questions.

He looked at Grennson, who seemed calmer now. “I still don’t understand.”

“It’s okay.” Grennson reached out and patted his head, the same way Darrel would stroke Grennson’s quills when he needed to be soothed. “I don’t think anyone does.”

Five minutes later, a knock sounded at their door. Darrel dashed over to answer it, Grennson at his heels. He opened the door—

And immediately brought his hand up into a salute. “General, sir!” Holy shit, what was General Caractacus doing outside their quad? What was he doing in active uniform at all? Darrel didn’t know him well, but the man was Cody’s grandfather, and a war hero. He’d retired years ago, though.

“Gentlemen.” The general looked between Darrel and Grennson, who had crept up beside him. “At ease. You two are under my personal command until further notice.” Sure enough, Darrel’s notification icon had stopped blinking. “I was here anyway, and I thought I would escort you to my ship.”

“We…um…we should be escorting you, not the other way around,” Darrel insisted. “You’re the general.”

“Call it whatever you like, but we’re on a schedule. Are your kits ready to go?”

“Yes,” Grennson said. They’d made sure they had their emergency kits prepped after getting off the holo with Garrett.

“Grab them and fall in. I’ll explain more once we’re on board the Masterful.”

Grennson looked around curiously. “Where is the rest of your entourage, sir?”

“They’d better be busting their asses getting our ship ready,” the general replied with a hint of humor. Darrel hoisted up their duffel bags and returned to the door. The air still smelled a little acrid with the scent of Ten’s last failed experiment. Darrel had never thought he’d miss something like that, but the prospect of leaving it behind had him nervous all of a sudden. What were they walking into? What had happened to their friends?

Grennson placed a steadying hand on Darrel’s elbow. “We’re ready, sir.”

And they were still together. Darrel’s unease steadied a bit. They were together, and wherever they were, so were Cody and Ten. He was grateful for that.

He just hoped things stayed this way.