Work Text:
There were no footfalls to give him away. No telltale snaps of fallen branches or skittering rocks.
Good.
There shouldn’t be any obvious signs. His tail shouldn’t be an amateur. That would be an insult.
Instead, it was the sound of birds upset that their routines had been disrupted. Low, heavy-footed departures in the underbrush.
Steady did have moments—time to run or hide—but why would he?
Instead, he turned toward the not-sound of approach, arms crossed and expectant.
He had already ruled out Ransom—he would enjoy coming on from the flank, trying to sneak in a cheap tackle. Jolly would have already been laughing. Jolly was also at the limmie match the other Fours put on, not to play, but to scowl and pout.
Wink wouldn’t try it, not without one of the others with him.
“What are you going to do when it gets dark?” The very reasonable question preceded Bean’s face poking around a slim tree trunk.
Steady had only spoken with the other cadet in passing. Spoken with might be overstating—nodded at in group situations where Bean made a point of speaking directly to him and using his full number in deference to Jolly’s correction.
Steady help up a glowrod. A leftover from an excursion with the Twos. He wouldn’t need it for the walk back, but it was good enough for the workspace once the sun set.
“I heard the others saying you took a name.” Bean hadn’t approached, only rested a shoulder on the tree and directed his attention to the work Steady had done around the site.
That was true. More people were using it now, mostly because Jolly just keeps calling it out. “Steady.”
It was never meant to be a secret anyway.
“Steady,” Bean repeated with a nod. “I’m sorry we got off to a rough start.”
Did they? Steady hadn’t been holding anything against the vod. Naht he thinks, but doesn’t say, because Bean is a vod. “Limmie?”
“Cancelled limmie for the tenday. Tipper, Rik, and Ash got into it at the lateshift midmeal, over nothing, and then half the fours in the room jumped in to pull them apart.” Bean rolled his eyes. “They are all either working off punishments, too mad to play, or too busy embellishing the fight.”
Steady pins ‘embellishing’ in his mind. He will look that up later. It might be good to listen more to the others when they speak. Jolly is too conservative in his language around him, so Steady hasn’t learned many new basic words lately.
He nodded at Bean’s explanation and returned to setting a notch into the end of the thick branch on his makeshift worktable.
“I might be wrong,” Bean said as he pushed away from his spot to take a better look at Steady’s work. “But I think you’re responsible for Jolly coming out to watch the limmie matches now.”
Steady stilled the vibroblade and waited.
“He’s still not playing, but it’s nice he’s watching. Spending time with all of us.” Bean stays outside of Steady’s reach, and Steady isn’t sure if that’s for his benefit or Bean’s. “Your whole bunk is invited, you know that, right?”
He didn’t, not really at least. Jolly had been invited, and complained about it. A lot. Ransom wouldn’t, and Wink wouldn’t because Ransom wouldn’t. Jolly, well, it was something that he was showing up at all.
Bean was still looking at him, like he needed an answer. Steady nodded once, unsure he could explain that he hadn’t considered going, and he knew practically nothing about playing limmie. With his training history, team sport was not feasible.
“Can I ask…?” Bean gestures to the site.
To be fair, Steady wasn’t sure how it hadn’t been the first question. The others used their free time once a tenday to play limmie, or watch the others play, in the big field. Once the Twos were settled, Steady went into the woods and did, well, this. He took a moment to consider the least concerning phrasing in basic.
“A fallback,” he settled on, and by the way Bean’s eyebrows jumped, it was not as reassuring as he’d hoped. “A shelter.” Steady corrected, and hoped that would be less alarming.
It only took a heartbeat for Bean to school his expression.
“It looks good.” Bean nodded to the solid line of supports, the wall half filled out. “You’ve done a lot.” He moves closer to see the work, not touching anything, still outside Steady’s reach. “Who’s it for?”
That was the question, wasn’t it? Steady returned his focus to his work, finishing the notch and moving on to the next piece. “The Twos. If they need it.” Us, with them, he doesn’t say, but that would be the plan.
He does not doubt Rancor and Lightning. Their men are true, and strong. He does not doubt the Vod’alor and what he is building. But—
But.
Steady could not do nothing and expect others to protect everyone. He might be ordered elsewhere, but he could direct any responsible CC cadet—no, his eyes land on Bean—any responsible older cadet to the shelter with the younger ones. The fortification will be defensible when he’s done with it. There would be thermal shielding to protect from HUD scans. The site would blend into the terrain from most angles.
“Two squads, you think? Three?” Bean considered, casting one look back at Steady. “Don’t think you could fit more without them getting unruly.”
Steady had learned that word shortly after they had arrived on-planet. “Two squads,” he agreed. “More shelters, after.”
There were a lot of Twos in the school. Logistically, the Ones would need the most attention and supervision, but Steady wasn’t failing his marksmanship courses; he could see there were fewer and fewer Ones in the school. Rancor and Lightning were doing their jobs, making sure the littlest ones were going to homes where they could be cared for. He and Jolly hadn’t said goodbye to any of their Twos yet, but it was only a matter of time. Their Twos were attentive and clever; they deserved that future. The littler cadets would be safer that way too, supervised and cared for with a lower cadet-to-trainer ratio.
“What will you do with them?” Bean asked, bringing Steady back from his thoughts. “The shelters. Until they are needed?”
It wasn’t that Steady hadn’t considered. He knew he would have to make time to inspect them for damage and add upgrades if he could. It would be easier in a rotation—some building, some repairing, some upgrading. But he hadn’t told anyone his plan.
Jolly believed he used these free hours to walk the woods. He’d jokingly asked if Steady had walked out to Bacara’s house to go fishing with him or to Hound’s to pet Grizzer.
“Keep them ready.” That was his answer to the question. It did seem hollow now, said out loud. Steady considered again. He didn’t know much about Bean—he was a CT, he was alarmingly well-liked, and he played limmie.
And he attempted conversation with Jolly more than any CT, maybe more than any vode not of Jolly’s squad. There was motive then, Steady would always assume, but Bean had also been far less of a bother than Steady would have expected for anyone joining him at the worksite. Bean had been thoughtful, interested, and respectful. Steady would take the chance. “What do you suggest?”
“Use it.” Bean smiled, easy and guileless. “Not all the time, obviously. Would have to be careful about developing footpaths, or breaking too many branches. But now and then, maybe a few of you, come out. Spend some time away, make it cozy.”
Cozy.
It wasn’t a bad idea. It might become their version of a hunting cabin. But, there was more to it. “Why?”
“Why?” Bean repeated, tapping his fingertips lightly on one of the posts. “Because if you, and Jolly and his squad, have a secret hideout, just think how many Fours and Fives would build their own. Each one, trying to be better equipped, better hidden.”
Steady blinked, silent and impressed. That was. Yes. It was good work.
“Nothing a CC cadet likes better than some friendly competition.” Bean shrugged.
Steady would have groaned out loud if he wasn’t so well-trained. “Limmie.”
Bean nodded. “It’s good for them. Us, really. Needed to break down some of the old divisions. Make sure we were all working together.”
Steady wondered what it was to be a CT cadet. So many just like you. So difficult to prove yourself beyond better and better scores. There were some CTs in Command these days. His—in his training, CTs had been considered a valuable resource. Those he should know how to command, those he should look to for specialized knowledge.
“Can I ask you a question?” Bean did not continue until Steady nodded. “Why doesn’t he play limmie with us?”
Jolly and Ransom had different feelings about CTs. Wink aside. Or because of Wink.
“We have never talked about it.” That was factually true.
“But you have an educated guess,” Bean filled in for him.
Steady nodded again.
“He thinks we’re not good enough? We can’t hack it because we didn’t have our own trainers. Specialized work from our second cycle…?”
The scar around Wink’s eye. The violence in the Fanatic’s cadets.
Steady shook his head. “He may worry.”
“Worry?” Bean echoed, light and biting. “We don’t carry CT germs.”
“He may worry.” Steady shouldn’t be talking, speculating, about Jolly’s thoughts. Especially to a stranger. “That he may hurt you.”
Steady didn’t know what Jolly and the others had done in their training. Been forced to do. But he understood the thought that they might no longer be fit to mix with the Vode. For him, that was easier; he was not a vod. Had no memory of being a vod, if he ever was.
For Jolly and the others, it was different. More complicated. Worse.
“I’ll think on it.” Bean flashed a quick smile, but there was none of the sunlight in it he’d had before. “Thank you for telling me. I’m sorry if I pushed you to say more than you wanted.”
Steady opened his mouth to object, to protest. Bean hadn’t pushed him into anything. He wasn’t one to be easily led.
“I’ll leave no trail back, but think about the idea.” Bean was weaving through the trees on the light feet of a cadet already coded a scout. “I’d like to see the hideout all done someday.”
Steady watched him go before starting up the glow rod and getting back to work.
A hideout. A cozy hideout for each bunk.
The CT had good ideas. Jolly would love him.