Seach sat in the pilot’s nest and scrolled through the security feeds. Jorry was asleep, recovering from the night shift. Her room was dark save for the quiet blue glow of her computer monitor and he could see the shape of her under the blankets. She was on her side, one bare arm in view and her taps seemed to catch the light, bouncing it back at him. If it were Devon on duty Seach knew she would have stayed in uniform, but every other shift they tried to make sure at least one of them could relax.

He thought it was funny, the things people took for granted. They’d been in hiding so long Seach couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually felt at ease. Even during their holidays when they stayed out of Consulate space he was on guard, waiting for that moment when they were discovered. He imagined they would stay in so-called Sect Space, hauling goods between Mars and Earth if there was enough money in it, but even if they did he knew there were Consulate agents everywhere.

Hiding was the only way to guarantee their safety. He just wished they didn’t have to hide from Devon.

His gaze lingered on the smooth juncture of Jorry’s shoulder and neck and he almost smiled. Relo used to say the only time Johanna Rorry wasn’t a pain in the ass was when she was sleeping. At the time Seach had agreed with him. Jorry was nothing if not tenacious, but as he thought of it now it was that very tenacity that had kept them alive both in and out of the military. In the years he had known her Seach had come to understand something very important about Jo; her unfailing ability to rise to a challenge.

She was only a pain because the universe itself seemed hell-bent against her.

Sighing, he shifted in the pilot’s chair and shook his head.

He wondered how Johnny would handle things if he were here. Johnny would never have been relegated to a subordinate position, he would have fought tooth and nail to stay on equal standing with Jo. They would have made decisions together or split up long ago and Seach wasn’t certain which he disliked more. The idea of Relo and Jo separated, hiding in their individual ways all these years was as equally disturbing as the thought of them together. Because deep down, Seach knew they would have actually been together.

He swallowed tightly, forced the thought from his mind and moved to the next security feed. Paul Kelly was in the workout room on the elliptical machine. Seach frowned, trying to see if there were any signs of hidden malice in the man, but Paul appeared to be exactly what he seemed. He had an open, honest face – if a bit red from exertion at the moment – and his eyes were kind. Seach had never described a man’s eyes as kind before, but there it was and he couldn’t deny feeling guilty for wanting Paul and his charges gone.

Seach groaned and rubbed his face, leaning back in the chair until he could rest his head.

“Are you well, Lieutenant?” Zephyr asked.

“I’m fine, Zeph. Just frustrated.”

“Would you like to play a precision game for distraction?”

Several game tiles lit up the computer screen and Seach smiled. Jorry said she’d built the A.I. to learn and evolve, giving Zephyr a personality all her own, and on long shifts like this Seach had to admit he was grateful. Zephyr knew him and could anticipate his needs.

He picked a game at random and relaxed, letting his worries over Paul and Devon and Jorry fade to the back of his mind.

~*~*~

Devon sat at his drawing desk, music thumping through his private room, and brought up another news report covering Tapped soldiers in the war. It was dated thirty-five years prior and highlighted a massacre on Titan. According to the report this was the turning point of the war, the moment when the Consulate unleashed the Tapped Division with full force, and the photographs were staggering.

Bodies littered the ground, some of them bloody, some of them not, but all of them dead. They lay where they had fallen, crumpled over half-broken walls or inside foxholes long-past useless. An eerie silence permeated the scene, drowning out the sounds in his room and making the hair on his neck stand on end. History class had only barely covered the Consulate’s victory on Titan, glossing over the tactics that had been used in order to insure that victory.

Not even this news report explained how nine Tapped soldiers had managed to take on a unit of six hundred, and that unsettled Devon. He swiped to the next picture and froze. There, crouching beside the corpse of a freedom fighter, was none other than Seach Barlow. He looked grim, his entire focus on the corpse that Devon finally noticed was almost his age. The uniform was strange; blue with a distinct red stripe down the side and it made Seach look older somehow.

Sitting on the ground just to the right of Seach was Jorry. She had one elbow hooked around her knee and at first glance might have been at ease, but as Devon squinted at the picture he began to notice a deeper emotion running through her. The expression on her face was dazed, lost, and Devon felt the pit of his stomach lock up.

Oh, God, Mom, he thought. What happened?

Behind Jorry was another figure, a man of Asian descent who held her shoulder in what looked like an effort to comfort. The caption for the photograph named them only as Tapped Division’s Tango Five. Devon stared, wondering how he had managed to miss this article during his studies before. He typed in “Tango Five” for a deeper search, but the system brought no further results.

“That’s not possible,” he said aloud.

He typed it again, adding “Tapped Division” to the search and a new screen popped up. It wasn’t a regular web search screen, he recognized that right away. This was an internal security screen from Zephyr’s mainframe denying him further access to the web. Sᴇaʀᴄh thᴇ (ꜰind)ɴʘvel.nᴇt website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

“Zephyr,” he said, already knowing what was going on but wanting to verify it.

“Yes, Master Devon.”

“Did you just cut me off the galactic web?”

“Security protocol 119 requires that any search into Tango Five as they relate to the Tapped Division be terminated immediately and all web access revoked until the Captain grants permission again.”

Frustrated, Devon swore and leaned back in his chair. “And I imagine you have alerted the Captain?”

“The Captain will be made aware.”

“Of course,” Devon said, glaring at the security screen.

He shook his head and frowned. Why would she stop him from searching further? He’d already seen the picture, already found the name of her unit, what was the point of stopping him now? It would certainly save her the trouble of having to explain everything. He could just research them until he knew everything and then all the blasted secrets could be done away with.

“Hey,” Kenzie said from his doorway.

Devon nearly jumped. Glancing over his shoulder, he smiled at her and tried to push thoughts of his parents from his mind. Kenzie had opted to wear the standard travel uniform for haulers and he had to admit she made it look classy. She wasn’t as tall as his mother so the cuffs on her jacket had to be rolled back and she’d tucked her pants into her boots. She wore her hair down, red ringlets standing stark against the collar of her uniform.

Grey and black never looked so good, he thought.

He realized after a moment that he was staring and cleared his throat.

“Hey,” he said back. “Did you need something?”

“Oh, no,” she said. “I just …”

She sounded embarrassed so he looked back at her just as she blushed a rosy pink and took a sudden interest in her boots. Devon glanced at her boots too, his mind conjuring images of the Titan incident with sudden, acute intensity and he squirmed. Military boots looked uncomfortably similar to travel boots. He shook his head, trying to dislodge the images and focused on Kenzie.

“You’re bored,” he guessed.

She laughed. “Just a little. Your mom … I mean, the Captain … put some pretty strict guidelines on us.”

“Yeah, she’s a bit of a security nut.” Devon beckoned her inside. “I don’t think she remembers what it’s like to live outside of a hauler. It can get restless if you’re not use to it.”

Kenzie walked up to his desk, taking a moment to survey his room. Everything was cleaned and tucked away – a safety protocol in case the ship encountered turbulence – but he was still slightly self-conscious. He swept a finger across his desk, lowering the volume of his music.

“You seem well adjusted to travel,” Kenzie said.

“Well, I did grow up on this ship. I suppose I would have to be.”

“You mean … you’ve never lived on a station or a planet?” She sounded incredulous, which made him laugh.

“Afraid not.”

“Wow … that’s … that’s just crazy,” she said. “So you guys are always on the move?”

“Well, we take a month off once a year,” Devon said and shrugged. “It’s our little vacation and it’s pretty nice. But by the end of the month I’m always itching to be airborne again.”

“Where do you normally stay? For vacation, I mean.”

“Mars or Earth,” he smiled wryly. “We tend to stay on this side of Gliese.”

“Oh, trust me,” Kenzie said with a scowl, “Gliese is nothing special. It’s better that you stay away.”

Devon watched her for a moment. She leaned against his desk, lost in thought, and he swore a shadow crossed her face. His heart picked up speed with her standing so close. Her full mouth twitched downward into a frown, and at this distance he could see that her freckles stretched across her cheekbones. Her nose was slightly pert and there was a small scar near the corner of her mouth, but it was the deep green of her eyes that arrested him.

Good Lord, he thought and forced himself to look away. It’s not like this was the first pretty girl he’d ever seen.

But she was the first pretty girl he’d been forced to deal with on the ship. That was certainly new.

“What are you working on?” she asked.

“Oh, nothing,” he said and shut down the security screen.

“That didn’t look like nothing.”

“It’s just some research I’m doing,” he said. “It’s kind of a history assignment.”

“You like history?”

“Not so much. I prefer engineering.” He said, redirecting the conversation to safer ground. “I sent my application to University but haven’t heard back yet.”

Which was odd, now that he thought about it, they should have responded by now.

“When do you come of age?” She asked.

“Ten months or so,” he said, suppressing a sudden suspicion that Jorry had done something to his application. If she could bar him from the galactic web based on trigger words it was entirely possible that she could hold his outgoing correspondence.

Devon frowned and tried to concentrate on Kenzie again. She seemed different today, less grouchy, and his first instinct was to enjoy it. But then her eyes slid away from his and she turned to review his desk again, redirecting her attention the way Jorry did whenever he started asking questions she didn’t want to answer.

She sighed. “I have another year and a half.”

“What do you think you’ll do? When you come of age?”

She gave him a dry look. “Watch over my sister, of course. Just because I’m legal to enter the work force doesn’t mean I can just abandon her to Paul.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, lifting his hands in defense.

Back to Miss Grouch-A-Lot, he thought.

He wasn’t certain if he was annoyed or amused at her mood swings. On the one hand, he knew she was being honest when she was grumpy and on the other, Devon couldn’t predict what might set her off. He tried to tell himself that not everything was a conspiracy and that Kenzie might just be awkward because he knew about her religion now, but that just didn’t sit right for him.

Kenzie shifted to face him better, looking irritated but not with him. “No, I’m sorry,” she said. “Paul’s a nice guy, so don’t think otherwise. I don’t know why I get so touchy these days.”

“Well, you’ve been through a lot,” he said.

His father’s voice floated through his memory; The really beautiful ones are always crazy, Dev. Think of them like poisonous frogs and try to resist.

Maybe Kenzie was just crazy. She did believe in Grey Men, after all.

He looked up and fought for an earnest, or at least passive, expression. She might be crazy but that didn’t mean he needed to aggravate her, especially since they still had several weeks of flight left. It was best to keep things civil.

“Yeah, well,” Kenzie blushed and looked at her feet. “It’s still not a good reason to be rude to you.”

You’re damn right it’s not, he thought. But he smiled and said instead; “I’ll forgive you this once.”

She laughed, startling Devon out of his initial impression. Kenzie had a really good laugh. It bubbled out of her, lit her face, and made the green in her eyes deepen. For one unguarded moment she looked genuinely happy and Devon was struck with a desire to keep her laughing. She really had been through quite a bit and it was possible that her moodiness stemmed from too much stress.

Because he wanted to believe that he stood and offered her his hand.

“Come on,” Devon said. “I’ll show you what I do when I’m crackers from too much travel.”

Kenzie took his hand and smiled, allowing him to lead her from the room. He took her to the central chamber and was relieved to see the hub table clear. Jorry and Seach had given him complete authority over their passengers, which meant they were in charge of the pilot’s nest for the trip, which also meant that neither of his parents were going to be seen much outside of mealtime.

“Zephyr, bring up subsystem Devon Five,” he said as he positioned Kenzie on one end of the table.

A holographic Ping-Pong set illuminated the hub table and Kenzie laughed. Devon grinned and gestured to the white paddle just in front of her.

“Go on, pick it up,” he said.

Kenzie gave him an amused look. “It’s a hologram. You can’t touch a hologram.”

“Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong.” Devon moved to the other side of the table where his own paddle waited. “Granted, it won’t feel like the real thing, but you can touch it.”

He picked up his paddle, felt the familiar tingle of the hologram’s particles fit against his palm, and winked over at Kenzie. She looked startled and impressed, glancing between his hand and her own paddle. Then she slowly reached down to lift her paddle, green eyes wide with surprise.

“How is this possible?” She asked.

He flushed, pleased at her reaction.

“Well, a couple of years back the University put out a paper debating the relationship between light and particles. They were looking for a way to make holograms actually solid,” he said. “And they probably still are.”

“But this isn’t solid,” she said, swinging the paddle in a wide, cautious arc.

“No, but I believe it’s the first step,” Devon took the holographic Ping-Pong ball and prepared to serve the first round. “I programmed a specific set of particles to react to certain stimuli. In this case, a combination of light and physical commands.”

He hit the ball and sent it bouncing across the table. Kenzie reacted immediately, swinging to hit the ball back at him.

“You can program particles?” She asked.

“Well …” he paused to hit the ball back. “Yes and no. Certain particles react to specific types of light and stimulus. Every hologram has a set number of features that helps us interact with it … there’s a minute level of gas in the air to help us see it … and of course the computer itself makes a map of the hologram so it knows what we’re pinpointing when we’re working with one.”

They hit the ball several times before she missed, the ball disappearing over her shoulder only to reappear at the center of the table.

“I still don’t understand how you can program particles,” she said.

“You can’t,” Devon said, reaching for the ball again. “But if you can predict the way certain particles react to certain stimuli then you can create an environment that allows those particles to react the way you want them to.”

Kenzie smiled, understanding lighting her face. “Like this table is creating a Ping-Pong set.”

“Exactly.”

“That’s really kind of incredible,” she said. “Why isn’t it standard on all stations?”

Devon served the ball and shrugged. “I made this program as part of my entry project for University. I was hoping it would impress the Board of Directors to let me in. As far as I know, I’m the only one who has developed a system like this.”

That sounded so much like bragging that he flinched and missed the return hit. Zephyr displayed the score for the game and Kenzie prepared to serve. He watched her, wondering if he should apologize for being arrogant or if an apology would somehow make him look even more like an idiot. But she served the ball and he had to concentrate on the game again, letting the moment pass.

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