Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

August 23, 2154 [0944]

Paz banked, trying to keep the banshee in her line of sight. The creatures swarmed the floating mountains, clinging to sheer cliffs and dropping out of the sky like acorns. As Paz watched, four of them alighted upon a Samson flying a little ahead of her. Two of the beasts went for the gunmen, snapping them up in their jaws and flinging them like dolls into open air. The other two banshees landed on the tail and nose. The craft careened, and the dragons leapt into the air before it spiraled downward. Paz caught a glimpse of the pilot’s wide eyes through the cockpit.

People were dying all around her, whether by poisoned arrows or alien beasts or the human traitors’ weaponry. Down below, a large fire burned where the Valkyrie shuttle-bomber had fallen. Paz’s heart pounded in her chest. She knew any breath might be her last.

At first, the banshees had all carried riders. These were expected, manageable—Paz could shoot them dead, send them careening to the forest floor below with her far more advanced weaponry. No problem. But suddenly, the oversized lizards began to attack them of their own accord. Thousands of them, all unmanned, swarmed their aircraft and sent their pilots hurtling into the treetops.

With a final burst of gunfire, the banshee hounding Paz relented, disappearing behind a chunk of floating rock. She spun to focus on the next threat—already, two more beasts were diving for her.

A burst of static on her radio, followed by a command—almost too quiet to hear over the fluxed comms: “Retreat.”

Paz’s brow furrowed in confusion. She banked again, narrowly missing the banshees. She reached down for her communications system, but another buzz interrupted her.

“This is Lieutenant Colonel Clancy. I repeat, all units retreat. The Valkyrie and Dragon are down. Your mission now is to defend Extra-Solar Colony Zero-One.”

The world seemed to slow down. Miles would never allow Clancy to call a retreat—the only reason that would pass was if…

Searching the trees below, Paz found another smoking hole in the trees. The Dragon Ship lay on the ground, flame licking up its metal flanks.

Something landed on top of her Scorpion, and the world tilted. Shocked out of her stupor, Paz pushed on the throttles. For a few terrifying moments, she thought the banshee would flip her, and she’d leave her son to grow up on this alien moon alone with neither parent to look out for him.

But, by some miracle, she shook the banshee. Going full speed, Paz flew for the other craft, which were retaking formation as they flew for Hell’s Gate.

Much smaller in number than they were at the start of the battle, the fleet would be humanity’s last defense on Pandora. They’d lost the assault and were now in danger of losing the only place Paz’s son would have to call home.

Determination flared up in Paz like a blazing fire. Her son would grow up without a father. He would not lose this, too.

.

January 3, 2170 [1100]

A thick blanket of fog shrouded the landing strip that morning. Gray smoke from the industrial zone’s smokestacks poured into the gray sky above. Grunts jogged from station to station, escorting cargo or stray personnel. Spider stepped out of the path of a Hell Truck that loomed out of the fog, its large metal walls towering over him as it rolled past.

He crossed his arms. The murky shape of a Valkyrie shuttle approached on the horizon, fuzzy Seawasp escorts buzzing around it.

By the time Spider could make out the point of the aircraft’s nose, it was upon him, the roar and downwash of its rotors buffeting him. The glass visor of his mask shielded his face, but the whipping wind still tugged at his tank top and hair and pelted his shins with pebbles. The ramp dropped open like a gaping mouth. Its occupants came spilling out onto the tarmac.

At first, it was nothing but a bunch of new recruits. They hurried past him, toting their lumpy, gray packs, the guy in charge shouting after them to “Go, go! Get moving, do not stop!” One recruit slowed slightly as they were coming out to stare at Spider. Spider returned their gaze, slightly surprised to find masculine features framed by what he’d thought was a girl’s long, black hair. Wide brown eyes held Spider’s gaze until the head officer paused in his steady stream of instruction to berate the recruit, who sped back up to rejoin his group.

Spider scowled at him as he passed. Fresh meat.

The officer ignored Spider, as most people on base were used to doing. He wasn’t in the way, and that was what mattered.

He looked back into the cargo hold and found what he’d been waiting for. Behind the last of the recruits, something large and blue lurked. Spider locked eyes with the creature and held its gaze as it approached. Heavy steps boomed on the metal ramp before becoming inaudible over the roaring of engines on the tarmac.

Spider had seen Na’vi in pictures and videos. He’d studied their anatomy, their primitive lifestyle. It was something different to have large, yellow eyes peering down at him, all nine feet of carbon-fiber bones and superior muscle and blue skin towering over him.

He didn’t back down. The Recombinant—identical to a Na’vi except for dark eyebrows, close-cropped hair, and five-fingered hands—pulled the breathing mask from his face to reveal sharp teeth bared in a grin. Muscle rippled beneath a tight green tank top. His camo-patterned pants must have been custom-made to account for the tail swaying behind him. A long section of hair had been left uncut where it hung in a thick braid from the base of his skull, wrapped protectively around the extension of his nervous system—a queue.

“Miles?” the alien spoke.

Spider uncrossed his arms to let them hang at his sides. “Colonel Quaritch, I presume?” He kept any emotion out of his voice. Mockery was dangerous, and he wasn’t interested in faking any sentiment.

The man seemed to pick up on the false courtesy anyway. His smile tightened.

“Well, aren’t you a chip off the old block?”

Spider’s stomach twisted. He spun on his heel, turning away to escape the Recom’s unnerving yellow gaze, and started walking toward one of the transport carts peppering the strip.

“Come on,” he called over his shoulder. “I’ll take you to meet the general.”

.

[1138]

Ardmore waited in the Grinder—which some called the 3D printing facility or the Stereolithography Plant, depending on how far up their ass the stick was—to which Spider’s keycard had been granted special access for that day. He felt a thrill go down his spine when the lock indicator for the airlock flashed green. He’d been there before, as he had most places in Hell’s Gate, but it was one of the few places he only visited on occasion. He tugged his mask off to hang around his neck while the compression sequence hissed and beeped around them.

The Recoms’ steps boomed over metal walkways. Scaffolding filled every inch of the plant not already taken up by current projects, built to be taken apart in order to make room for the next big ship or dozer. The metal frames were in a completely different arrangement from the last time Spider had been there, a few weeks prior, but he easily navigated to where the general overlooked the printing of what looked to be a large Wing-in-Ground-Effect ship. He stopped a few feet away from her to stand at attention.

“General, this is Colonel Miles Quaritch and Lieutenant Lyle Wainfleet.” Spider had learned Wainfleet’s name, somewhat against his will, on the ride over. The man had only paused for breath once they’d dropped the other Recoms off in SecOps housing, then went for the galactic record on yammering the whole ride to the industrial zone.

“You’re a lot bigger than you were the last time I saw you,” the lieutenant had told him, his smile so wide it pushed his ears up on his bald head.

“So are you.” Spider had shot back, which only prompted the man’s uproarious laughter in response.

“D’you remember me?”

Obviously not. Spider must have been an infant. “I can only dream of forgetting a mug as ugly as yours.” More knee-slapping. Quaritch had smirked.

Ardmore turned, taking a sip from the coffee mug clasped delicately in the mechanical hand of her Skel Suit.

She nodded down at him. “Dismissed, Recruit.”

With a salute, Spider spun on his heel and started back toward the door he’d buzzed in from. He didn’t turn back to look at the alien Recoms, but let his gaze linger on the large, mechanical arms of the printers. They glided over the machinery, leaving fresh, red-hot metal in their wake where they built up frames and hulls and proprotors.

Something glowed deep in Spider’s chest as he pressed his keycard to the reader. Stepping into the airlock, he let his lips quirk in a grin.

Recruit, Ardmore had called him. Because that was what he was, now that sixteen years had passed since the RDA began growing Quaritch a brand new body—a process that happened to begin around the same time that Spider was born.

As a recruit, it wasn’t long before he’d start basic training. Not long after that, he’d be brought out on his first SecOps mission.

For the first time in his life, Spider would see—really see—the forest.

.

[1815]

Mom was out when he got back to their apartment, so he settled sideways on their lumpy couch and contemplated the possibility of doing his homework.

Professor Willow, the unfortunate man who’d been roped into tutoring Spider for the last eleven years, had assigned him an essay on the photosynthesis of Pandora’s bioluminescent flora two weeks ago. Currently, Spider’s progress on the assignment consisted of a doc on his datapad that he’d titled “Chlorophyll and Luciferin: How Plants Recycle Light” and was otherwise blank.

Spider thought it unfair that he was expected to write essays on plants he’d only seen in greenhouses and as vague, greenish shapes on the other side of the barren, two-mile-wide Kill Zone. Unfortunately, Terran laws still applied on Pandora—at least in the parts under the jurisdiction of the RDA—so Spider was required to receive a minimum high school degree. Even disregarding compulsory education, Spider was nothing if not obedient under the threat of his mother’s disappointment.

He started writing the essay.

He’d gotten through three paragraphs by the time the magnetic lock on the door buzzed, indicating Mom’s arrival. He didn’t switch off the datapad. It was better to look busy for the coming conversation.

Mom hummed as she flicked on the lights. Small and windowless, their apartment was illuminated by a single LED flush with the ceiling. Their furnishings consisted of a pullout couch, a table, two chairs, and a cramped kitchenette. An array of colorful magnets on their fridge memorialized the dozens of national and state parks Mom had visited as a kid. Their guitar rested lovingly in the space between the couch and kitchen. Spider’s exopack hung in the charging station installed by the door, its indicator light blinking green. A door across from the charging station opened to a bathroom with a toilet, standing shower, and sink.

Mom’s mask detached from her face with a hiss. She made short work of separating spent battery from exopack, which had been clipped to her belt, and putting them up to charge and hang, respectively. She rubbed at her temples, where the seam of the mask always dug into her skin, before reaching up to her ponytail. A cascade of glossy brown hair spilled down over her shoulders. “Sitting in the dark?” she asked him, like she always did.

“I hate the lights. They’re too bright.”

Mom hummed again. She slumped into the space Spider had left for her at his feet, sinking into the limp cushion. Her eyes wandered across the dull, gray walls, which she’d filled with old-fashioned printed-out photographs. Most of the pictures were of Spider, as a smiling baby or grumpy elementary-schooler or self-entitled thirteen-year-old. One of them showed him squinting through the sight of a rifle at eleven years old—his first time shooting at the gun range.

Mom glanced at the pad, where she could see the display through the transparent screen. “Is that homework?” she asked him.

“No, I’ve picked up creative writing in my spare time,” Spider said dryly. “Yes, it’s an essay.”

“When’s it due?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Hm.” She twisted to face him, bringing her legs up to mimic his curled position. The white LED fixed into their bare ceiling turned her skin sallow and threw the shadows under her eyes into stark contrast. “How did today go?”

Spider tapped his fingers along the edge of the pad. He wished he’d picked an assignment that required less focus—it was difficult to appear busy when he couldn’t write and maintain this conversation simultaneously. “It went fine.”

Mom watched him for a moment longer. When he didn’t elaborate, she reached over to squeeze one of his bare ankles. “Miles.”

She was the only person Spider liked hearing that name from. Most of the commanding officers around base used it, too, when addressing him by his full name, but Spider had always hated it from their mouths. It meant something different from Mom.

Soldier, she’d once told him. Your name means soldier.

“It really wasn’t anything,” he muttered, shrugging. “I saw him and brought him to the general. We didn’t talk. We didn’t have some weird, instinctive connection just because he’s the clone of my dad or something, you know.”

Mom sighed slightly, leaning back and releasing his ankle. “You’ll warm up to him. You might be spending a bunch of time together, anyway, since you’re starting ground missions soon .” She stood and padded over to their cramped kitchen, where she pretended to busy herself looking through the fridge.

Spider rolled his eyes at her back.

“I’m sixteen now. I’m allowed,” he reminded her pointedly.

“I know,” Mom sighed. “I just don’t see why it has to be Ground Ops. You love flying—you’d make a great pilot.”

“I’m not you.”

“I know,” she repeated. “I get it, really. Ground Ops will get you out of the Mods, up to those fancy, new apartments they’re building near the walls. There’s nothing wrong with wanting more. I just wish it didn’t come at the expense of your safety.”

“That’s not it.” Spider couldn’t help the frustration that leaked into his voice. “Yes, I want to get out of the Mod Cluster, but not so I can trade one prison for another. I want to be out there. I’ve seen the forest from a cockpit a hundred times, but that’s nothing compared to being in it. It can’t be!”

Mom sighed again. “Well, I wouldn’t know anything about it, apart from the fact that it’s what killed your father.” The fridge started to beep. She took out a tub of leftovers and pried off its lid before putting it in the microwave.

Agitatedly, Spider typed out a nonsense sentence and deleted it. Mom downed a glass of water while the microwave emitted its low, torturous hum. “Have you had dinner yet?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Spider replied shortly. “I stopped by Hell’s Kitchen on the way back here.”

The microwave gave a screeching alarm. Mom refilled her glass at the sink before taking the food out. She sat back down on the couch with the leftovers, setting the glass on the floor. Stabbing a piece of what looked to be mess hall tapirus, she shoved the meat into her mouth before promptly spitting it back out.

“Ow, shi– crap, that’s way too hot. I left it in too long.”

“If you’re so interested in Dad, why don’t you go see him yourself?”

Mom turned to stare accusatorily at him with her fork poised in front of her mouth, lips pursed as she blew on the meat to cool it. “You know our relationship isn’t like that,” she said. “And technically, the new guy isn’t really your dad. I don’t have any good reason to go see him.” She put the fork back into her mouth and grimaced. “Still too hot.”

“You had a child with him,” Spider deadpanned.

Mom pointed a finger at him and raised her narrow eyebrows in warning, though her open-mouthed chewing somewhat ruined the effect as she attempted to air out the still-steaming tapirus. “Don’t you start with that. We were work acquaintances, things just got a little… frisky.”

“Gross,” Spider wrinkled his nose at her.

“Hey, you started this conversation. Anyway, it’s weird. I’m not gonna go see him.”

“Whatever.” Spider fiddled with the datapad.

“You’d better be finishing that essay.”

Spider groaned, but closed out of the game he’d been booting up and went back to bullshitting his way through the intricacies of plant cells’ capacities for chemical reactions.

.

January 4, 2170 [1356]

“Don’t forget those calculus modules tonight!” Professor Willow called after Spider, but he was already gone.

He swung around a corner and nearly crashed into Max, who pushed a clattering cart of sample trays. The man shouted in surprise when Spider lurched to a stop in front of him before hurrying around him, throwing an apology over his shoulder as he sprinted down the long, metal-paneled corridor.

“No running in Scimod!” Max scolded.

Spider glanced down at the digital watch strapped to his wrist. Lessons had gone longer than they usually did, but if he ran, he could make it to Habmod 2 on time for his first training. He buzzed through door after door, taking the modlink path so he didn’t have to go through any airlocks. The number on his watch flashed to 1400 just as Spider made it through the doors to the training center.

“...Basic training,” Lieutenant Lermon was saying. “I’ll be training you mentally and physically to shape up into something resembling a team of actually competent individuals.”

Spider sidled into the lineup of recruits as silently as he possibly could, still panting slightly. Lermon paced slowly before them, the heels of his boots clicking on the linoleum floor.

“We are on an alien moon. The gravity here is twenty percent lower than that on Earth, and the air is twenty percent denser. Twenty seconds breathing the atmosphere and you’re unconscious. Four minutes and you’re dead.

“Do not take Pandora lightly.” Lermon paused directly in front of Spider. The man leaned forward so Spider could feel his breath on his unmasked face and smell the sharp, musky scent of his aftershave. “No matter how long you’ve lived here, you will always be alien. You are not welcome. Given the chance, this place will snap you up and swallow you whole.”

Spider stared straight ahead, his hands clasped behind his back. He refused to be intimidated. The recruits beside him didn’t drop the “at attention” position to look, but Spider felt them watching him with everything but their eyes.

When Spider gave him nothing, Lermon leaned away from him and continued his pacing along the line.

“All thirty-six of you make up Platoon 1010. Endurance, combat, shooting—I am going to teach you to move the way you need to move, to fight the way you need to fight. You will learn, or you will die.”

Lermon stopped at the end of the line, and his voice rose sharply to a yell. “Am I understood?”

“Yes, Sir!” they shouted.

And so it began.

.

[1425]

It was during their second lap around the Mod Cluster, sweat pouring down the sides of Spider’s face and pooling under the seam of his mask, that one of the other recruits attempted conversation.

“You got beef with Lermon or somethin’?”

“What?” Spider forced out between pants.

“I mean, why’d he dig into you back there? ‘Snap you up and swallow you whole,’ and all that.”

Spider glanced at the other boy, who’d increased his pace slightly to jog beside him. He looked about the age of the youngest recruits, which made him two or three years older than Spider. The slight drawl to his voice was what Spider had learned to be indicative of roots in the Southern United States, though the boy warped it into a poor imitation of Lermon’s West Coast accent to mock the man.

Looking more closely, Spider recognized him as the recruit from Quaritch’s shuttle who’d nearly stopped in his tracks to stare at Spider. It was difficult to mistake him for anyone else—the long, curly cut of his hair, currently tucked back in a braid, was considered impractical by most men in SecOps, making it a rare sight around base.

Annoyance flickered in Spider’s chest. He was the youngest on base, and had looked it for most of his life—he was used to stares. But now that he was old enough for recruitment, it was just unfair.

“That’s just how the instructors are,” Spider muttered. “He was only being pissy because I was last to show up. There’s no ‘beef.’”

The boy fell silent. Their feet pounded the packed dirt that ringed the Mod Cluster. The old chain-link fence marking the original borders of Hell’s Gate had long been torn down and replaced by the much bigger and sturdier Perimeter Wall. Living quarters had been erected in the fence’s place, and they towered above the recruits as they jogged, looming structures of concrete that grew taller with every shipment of personnel to the base.

“Liar.”

Spider looked at him again, a little too quickly. He must’ve made a face, because the other let out a short burst of laughter. It was slightly breathless, muffled and hissing behind his mask, but the sudden sound was loud enough to make Spider cringe.

“I’m Fernando Flores, but everyone calls me Fern. I guess we’ll be stuck together for a while, yeah?”

Spider stared at him a moment longer. “I guess so.” He looked back to the long, concrete track stretching out before them. “It’s Miles. But everyone calls me Spider.”

Spider didn’t look, but he could feel Fern’s eyes on him for the rest of the run.

Chapter Text

January 4, 2170 [1820]

Among the many bodies crowding the long, gray tables of Hell’s Kitchen, the huddle of Platoon 1010 had managed to carve out a space for themselves. Spider toyed with the edge of his tray and considered the small, quiet space waiting for him back in the apartment, where he wouldn’t be elbowed or scrutinized for his too-young face.

A head of long, curly hair bobbed between two taller men in the platoon’s section of the hall, its owner gesturing emphatically with the force of their words. Spider sighed, and resigned himself to navigating through the narrow space between tables that had been pushed together five years before to make room for several more.

Fern glanced back when Spider appeared behind him, and his face lit up in joyful recognition. “Spider!” The boy elbowed one of the men beside him, who obligingly crammed down the bench to make room. “I was wondering where you’d gone. We missed you in the barracks.”

Spider set his tray down in the scarce space left on the table. It took him a moment to maneuver himself onto the seat, approaching sideways and kicking his way into something resembling legroom. It was times like this he loathed Pandoran gravity, which had caused him to sprout up to six feet tall despite the shorter statures running down both sides of his family.

The recruits poked suspiciously at the alien food on their plates. Spider dug a fork into his food—hexapede, shredded and tossed with chopped ovushroom in a bland, slightly slimy stir fry. It was one of the ten items on the Hell’s Kitchen PM menu, which made it one of the twenty available meals Spider had been eating his entire life.

“I don’t live in the barracks,” he told Fern. “I’m down in the studio apartments.”

“Aren’t those for the techs and mine workers?” A freckled woman broke in from across the table. “I didn’t know they allowed SecOps.”

“They don’t. Usually,” Spider said. “I was born on base. They let my mom stay in the apartments so she could raise me.” Everyone knew about Spider—there was no point in hiding. Gossip in Hell’s Gate traveled faster than the ISVs shooting across countless miles of space to reach Pandora.

“Born here?” a bald man asked from across the table. “I thought…”

“She was sterilized,” Spider confirmed. “It didn’t work.”

“So you grew up on Pandora?” Fern smiled at him. Out of its braid, his hair hung over his shoulders in dark ringlets, still slightly damp from his post-training shower. “That explains Lermon.”

“Yeah, well. He was right about one thing—I’m an alien. Just as human as the rest of you. It’s not like I’ve ever been out in the rainforest or anything. I grew up here on base: Resources Development Administration Extra-Solar Colony 01,” Spider mocked. “It's really just a load of glorified metal and concrete.” He waved his fork demonstratively around at the plain walls and ceiling of the mess hall. “I’ve never even seen a real Na’vi.”

Fern hummed. “You were running pretty well out there. It’s super weird here—the gravity makes you feel a little lighter, like you could run for miles, but the density of the atmosphere means it’s a lot harder to move. The air out there’s like… hard.” He gestured vaguely.

“Yeah, I hear that from a lot of new arrivals. They’ll have us running outside a ton to get you used to it.” Spider eyed the plate of one of the younger recruits sitting across from him. She picked the yovo fruit out of her salad, leaving the small, purple slices in a pile in the corner of her tray. “Are you gonna eat that?” he asked her.

She looked up quickly, as if startled at being addressed. “Uh, no,” she mumbled. “…Do you want them?”

“Sure,” Spider speared one of the pieces on his fork and shoved it into his mouth. The scaly skin gave way to pulpy insides beneath his teeth, textured with small seeds that stuck in Spider’s molars. A tangy aftertaste spread across his tongue.

“Is that stuff good?” Fern asked. He eyed the slices with interest.

Spider shrugged. “It’s fresh, which makes it better than the Terran fruit we sometimes get on shipments. Anyway, food is limited around here. It’s better not to waste any.”

Fern reached across Spider to take one of the slices for himself. He chewed it thoughtfully. “Not bad. A little like a blackberry right after you brush your teeth.”

The girl plucked another slice from her salad and dropped it in the pile. “I don’t even like blackberries. You can have them.”

.

January 5, 2170 [0500]

Spider received instruction via his commwatch to meet the platoon in an empty gym adjacent to the briefing area they’d occupied the day before. Lermon had them complete a warmup that involved laying flat on their backs and, starting on one side of the gym, work their way to the opposite wall via a combination of pushing off the floor using their shoulder blades and twisting with their torso, no hands allowed. By the end of the exercise, Spider’s shoulders, back, and tailbone all ached in a way that was sure to precede bruising.

“Once you’re all done acting like a bunch of sissies,” Lermon told the groaning recruits, “get up off your asses and pair up! We’re learning hand-to-hand.”

Forcing himself to his feet, Spider caught himself looking around, though he wasn’t sure what for.

“Hey, Extraterrestre!”

Spider spun to find Fern standing directly behind him. This time, the boy’s hair had been tucked back into twin braids, which started at the top of his head and ended in two plaits thrown over his shoulders.

“What’d you call me?” Spider asked.

“Extraterrestre,” Fern repeated. “It’s Spanish for ‘alien’. Get it?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“You wanna be my partner?”

Spider glanced around, eyeing his options. The rest of the recruits were still pairing up, some of them crossing back toward the other side of the gym to make more room.

“You sure you can handle it?” he asked.

Fern’s grin widened even further to display two rows of almost-crooked teeth, bright against brown skin. “Don’t worry, I like a challenge.”

“You’re gonna face one another with your hands up by your faces,” Lermon hollered over the chatter. “In fists, Woods. Dominant hand and leg go behind you.”

Fern swept his left leg behind him. He grinned at Spider, who put his right behind himself.

“One of you throws a jab,” Lermon continued. “That means you use your lead hand, the one in front of you. The other blocks it with their rear. Repeat this until the action feels familiar.

“To save you the decision, I’ll go ahead and say that the shorter partner will be punching first. Begin.”

Spider grinned. He had an undeniable four or five inches on the other boy. “Go right ahead,” he goaded, tilting his chin at Fern in invitation.

Fern’s gaze hardened, though the grin didn’t leave his face. “You only look taller because of your curly-ass hair.”

Spider kept his hair short enough that it couldn’t add more than an inch to his height, but he let the comment slide and brought his right arm forward to catch the boy’s punch.

“Ball up your fist, like this.” Stark demonstrated, curling his hand up into a ball. “No, thumb outside.” He reached over and corrected the position of Spider’s fingers. He tapped the flat part of the boy’s fingers in the space below his knuckles. “You’ll hit me with this part.” His large, black hand dwarfed Spider’s tiny fist.

“Now, right leg behind you. Turn your body, too. A good punch is about more than your fist—it starts in your legs. Bend your knees a little. Not that much. Alright. Gimme all you got, little dude.”

Fern punched like he’d thrown punches before, even if his form was a little scrappy. Lermon walked around the gym, inspecting each pair and correcting improper forms. He paused before Spider and Fern, watching the repetitive motions of their respective blocks and punches. After a moment, he moved on to yell at some other unfortunate recruit about the placement of her rear foot.

“He really hates you,” Fern murmured in between blows, his mouth twisted in a subtle smile.

“Shut up.”

Just when Spider was beginning to think his right arm couldn’t take any more abuse, Lermon called: “Switch!”

Fern backed off, and immediately brought his own left arm forward in anticipation.

Spider didn’t hesitate to hit back.

.

[1130]

Following hand-to-hand combat, the platoon was made to run a few more laps around the Mod Cluster. By the time they were dismissed, Spider’s entire body felt like one big, sweaty bruise.

After a quick shower back in the apartment, Spider dragged himself up to the sixth floor for lunch. The familiar chatter of Hell’s Kitchen washed over him as he filed into the meal line, rubbing a hand over his face tiredly.

“A Spartan wrap is fine,” he told Imani without looking up at the menu.

“You look like death,” she responded. She plucked one of the wraps from where they were stacked in rows behind the glass partition. “You want a double serving?”

“Just tired. Yes, please.”

Imani placed another wrap on his tray, then gave him side servings of episoth seeds and celia berries before sliding the tray down to the register. There were orange cups, too, but she’d stopped asking Spider if he wanted them sometime eight years before.

The man working the register barely glanced down at Spider’s tray before tapping tiredly at the screen propped up before him, inputting the double serving. The name tag pinned over his breast pocket labeled him “Rav.”

Rav didn’t bother to look up as Spider scanned his pay card. In the five years the man had been working the Hell’s Kitchen register, Spider hadn’t once seen his eyes focus on anything in particular. He was probably the only long-time resident in the Mods who didn’t know Spider’s face.

This time, Spider elbowed out his own space among the platoon’s section of the table. Fern crammed onto the bench beside him a few minutes later, his own tray carrying the same kind of grilled tapirus Spider’s mom had reheated two eclipses before.

“Ready for afternoon training, Araña?”

“What’s that one mean?” Spider asked, taking a bite out of his first wrap. Good old Spartan leaves—just on the edible edge of waxy.

“Spider. Like, it literally translates to spider.”

“Hmm,” Spider chewed thoughtfully and raked his brain for the scattered knowledge of Terran languages he’d picked up from the cultural mixed salad that was Hell’s Gate. “Isn’t it, like, feminine if it ends in an ‘A’?”

“I mean, it’s a feminine noun, yeah, but you wouldn’t change it in that context. A male spider is still una araña.” Fern peeled the plastic lid off of his fruit cup and speared one of the orange slices on his fork. He shoved it into his mouth. “Oh gross, these are totally mushy.”

“They get that way after six years in space. They’re meant to be ‘perfectly preserved’, but something about the way they freeze them makes them gross.”

Fern hummed. He began stealing celia berries off Spider’s tray. “I’m totally exhausted from hand-to-hand this morning,” Fern lamented. “Oh gross, these have pits. I mean, not gross, but I wasn’t expecting it.” He spat the pit into his forsaken orange cup. He bit the next red-orange fruit in half and pried the pit out before popping the rest into his mouth.

Spider made a vague noise, taking a swig from his water, and hoped the boy took it as an agreement.

“Hey, Socorro!”

Spider glanced up. He lowered the bottle and let it hover in the space over his tray. A recruit from further down the table was half out of his seat to look at him, propped up by a hand over his tray. Pale skin looked sickly under the artificial lighting, the dark shadow of buzzed hair doing nothing to help the man’s unfortunate appearance. His smile widened as he met Spider’s gaze.

“So it is you!” His voice was raised to practically a shout to be heard over the din. “Is it true that you’re Colonel Quaritch’s son?”

The chatter around them died down slightly, a few of the recruits pausing their conversation to listen in. Spider’s chest tightened. The plastic of the bottle crinkled in his grasp.

“It is,” he said, just loud enough to be heard by the other recruit.

The man whistled lowly. “And your mom was a Scorpion pilot?” He didn’t wait for a response. Falling back into his seat, the man turned to another recruit sitting beside him and, still speaking loudly, said, “Must’ve been one hell of a bitch.”

Spider set the bottle down. “Fuck did you just say?”

The conversation around them hushed even further, rippling outward through the crowd until the mess hall had gone dead silent. Heads turned in their direction, people craning their necks at the scent of a fight.

The man raised his eyebrows in exaggerated surprise. Amusement danced in his eyes. “Just that your momma must’ve been one hell of a chick, you know. To catch the Colonel’s attention.”

Spider stood. The man on his right leaned away from him, as if afraid he’d become involved through brushing Spider’s shoulders. Spider stepped one leg over the bench, then the other. He started in the man’s direction. His heart pounded in his rib cage. His skin burned, hot all over.

Then, as the entire hall watched, Spider stalked past the man, and kept walking until he was out of the automated double doors and standing alone in one of the Habmod’s blank-walled, rickety elevators.

He took deep, heaving breaths, clenching and unclenching his shaking hands into fists. By the time the elevator made it to the second floor, the burning anger had already simmered down into something cold and hard in his gut.

He pushed open the door to their apartment to find the lights on and a mask on the hook.

“Miles?” His mom looked up from her datapad as he entered, a Spartan wrap lifted halfway to her mouth. “I thought you were having lunch with your platoon.”

Spider opened his mouth, then closed it. He stepped fully into the apartment to let the door shut behind him.

“I wanted to eat with you,” he said finally.

His mom frowned and paused the video playing on her pad’s display. She made a show of looking him up and down.

“You didn’t bring any food.”

“I was thinking leftovers.”

“We have no more leftovers.”

Spider sighed. “Something happened with another recruit. I don’t wanna talk about it.”

His mom studied him. She watched him unhook his mask and exopack from his belt and deposit them at their station, cross the short distance to their too-small dining table, and sag tiredly into the seat across from her. He met her gaze, trying to project his sincerity through his eyes alone.

“Are you in trouble?” she asked.

“No.”

Silently, Spider’s mom tore her remaining wrap down the middle. Spider’s appetite had abandoned him, but he reached over to take the proffered food anyway. They ate together in comfortable silence, the white light of the LED tracing dark shadows down their faces.

.

[1250]

Spider made himself walk the path back to the elevators, going down one floor to the training center. The message on his commwatch led him into a hall that branched off of the briefing room and led to a plain classroom. The plaque on the wall beside the door read “MISC 102” in blocky lettering.

Most of the recruits had already arrived, and they all stared at him as he walked in and slumped into one of the available classroom-style chair desks. Spider did a subtle sweep of the room, but the recruit from earlier hadn’t yet arrived. Also distinct was the lack of a certain head of curly black hair.

By the time their instructor—a stern face with which Spider was only vaguely familiar—walked through the door, Spider had counted thirty-three recruits other than himself occupying the room. Fern and the boisterous man were the only two absent.

“My name is Sergeant Ricardo Thompson. Today, and for the duration of your basic training, I will be instructing you in first aid, company history, and SecOps values. This will be the most boring part of your training, but the knowledge I give you could end up saving your life one day. Try not to fall asleep.”

A few of the recruits chuckled, but Thompson looked over them all severely, his expression dead serious, and the laughter petered out. Someone stifled a cough in their fist.

The following hours consisted of a grueling lecture that Spider found more taxing than the physical training that morning. He spent most of the time fighting the drooping of his chin and eyelids, trying to find a position in his seat uncomfortable enough to keep himself conscious.

Spider’s eyes had glazed over by the time Thompson turned away from the databoard, where he’d been writing out a textbook chapter’s worth on RDA history Spider’d learned years before, and clapped his hands together. The sharp sound caused Spider and a few other recruits to jump in their seats.

“Basic first aid. Everyone find a partner—we’re learning to splint broken bones.”

Disoriented, Spider stood from his seat and searched the recruits around him before he remembered Fern was missing. He furrowed his brow at the dull disappointment that blossomed in his chest.

“Your friend’s in disciplinary.”

Spider turned. A girl stood behind him, her arms crossed over her chest. Coily hair tucked back into a tight pony at the base of her skull, just a shade darker than her black skin. She looked familiar, and after a moment Spider recognized her as the girl from dinner the night before—the one who didn’t like blackberries.

“What?” he said dumbly.

“Fern Flores, the guy you’re looking for. He got sent to disciplinary. That's why he isn’t here now.”

“He isn’t my friend,” Spider corrected her. Then, as her words registered he blurted “Wait, disciplinary—what’d he do to get sent to disciplinary?”

“Broke Wilson’s nose.”

“Wilson?”

“The asshole from lunch who called your mom a bitch. Anyway, no one wants to pair up with you because they don’t want to get involved, and no one wants to pair up with me because I’m weird and quiet. Wanna be partners?”

Spider stared blankly at her. Glancing around, he saw that, indeed, everyone else had already paired up. A few of them glanced away as he looked at them, feigning conversation with their partner or studying Thompson’s scribbles on the databoard. He turned back to the girl.

“Sure, whatever.”

“Cool,” she said tonelessly. “I’m Madge Woods, by the way. Please be careful not to break my bones when you splint them.”

Spider did not break any bones. When Thompson called “Switch!” and they swapped places, Woods wrapped up Spider’s leg in a matter of seconds. The bandages were neat and secure without being too tight, and her work earned a nod of approval from Thompson as the man passed by. They were mercifully dismissed after a short lecture on constructing a makeshift splint. Spider was the first out the door.

.

[1613]

Spider found Fern cleaning windows in the seldom-used corridor circling the fifth-floor rec center. The boy turned slightly at his approach and opened his mouth to say something, but closed it when Spider forced him against the window, planting a hand on the just-polished glass. Fern’s eyes widened.

“Don’t fight my battles,” Spider said.

Fern’s expression turned calculating, studying Spider as if he was a particularly intriguing math problem. “What do you mean?” He asked calmly. He let his head rest on the window behind him, as if it was a place he’d decided to be instead of somewhere Spider had caged him.

“You know exactly what I mean. Are you implying that you sent Wilson to the infirmary just for shits and giggles?”

“Maybe I did.”

“Don’t bullshit me. I don’t need your help.”

Fern looked back at him steadily, slouched against the glass where he’d slid downwards when Spider shoved him.

“You’re not used to having friends, are you?”

“What?” Spider stared at Fern.

“I mean, growing up there was no one else your age on base. So, you didn’t really have any friends.”

“I really don’t get you. I thought you were nice. How could you break someone’s nose?”

Fern’s mouth quirked. “You think I’m nice? Usually the name ‘Flores’ is enough for people to write me off as some street rat.”

Spider’s brow furrowed while he struggled to process Fern’s meaning. “What, because you’re Mexican?”

“Uh, just ‘cause I speak Spanish doesn’t mean I’m Mexican.”

“Hell’s Gate isn’t like that.”

Fern scoffed. He pushed Spider off of him, the humor draining from his face. “You’re really naive if you believe that.” Sighing, he said “I punched Wilson because I wanted to. He was pissing me off. Sure, I was pissed off on your account, but what difference does it make? What I don’t understand is why you didn’t hit him.”

“And why would you be pissed off on my account?” Spider demanded.

“Because I’m your friend.”

They stared at each other, Spider’s heart still pounding in his chest from the anger burning in his throat. Fern breathed shallowly, but no emotion showed on his face.

“Look,” Spider said. “My mom gets enough shit as it is. She doesn’t need me getting into fights and adding to that.”

Fern’s face softened. “Well, that makes me feel a lot better about getting into trouble on your account. Any time you need, I’ll send someone to the infirmary. No effect on your reputation, no problem.”

“I’m not sure it’s that simple,” Spider countered, but his mouth betrayed him by curving with a smile.

Fern smoothed his uniform camo-patterned shirt where it’d been bunched up around his shoulders. They watched each other for a moment.

“Who’s overseeing your punishment?” Spider asked.

“Langley.”

Spider glanced over his shoulder down the deserted hallway. “He’ll turn a blind eye to almost anything for chocolate. Stuff’s hard to come by on base. He’s obsessed with it.”

The corners of Fern’s mouth twitched up hesitantly, a shadow of his wide, infectious smile. “Do you have chocolate?”

“I keep it on me at all times. Useful for bartering.” Spider turned and began walking back down the corridor. “Come on,” he said. “I’ll show you how to break into the swimming pool.”

Laughing, Fern jogged after him. They left Spider’s handprint on the glass, a whitish streak of fingers and palm.