Fortuna Read online

  Family

  Corvus

  Monitor the radar. Check the armory. Count the supplies. Three weeks in this outpost, and I’ve started every morning with the same routine. Three weeks in the middle of nowhere, with no orders other than to hold this position and keep an eye out for anything unusual. We haven’t had so much as a glimpse of the enemy. General Altair must have stationed us here for a reason, but my patience is wearing thin, both with the situation and my stir-crazy team. Our skills are put to waste as lookouts. Not a day has gone by without them reminding me of that fact and pestering me for news. I swear, these soldiers can be worse than my little siblings were.

  Given that, this time alone would normally be a blessing. Titans have infuriatingly little regard for personal space or privacy, and over these three years I’ve learned to snatch moments of solitude when I can. That’s why I’ve gotten into the habit of waking up an hour before the rest of my team to fulfill duties like these, rather than passing the chores on to them.

  But lately, my thoughts weigh heavily on me, and now I have nothing to distract me from them. My hands stay busy as I run through the morning routine, but my mind wanders, barely aware of the gray walls around me or the dim lights overhead or my breath fogging in the air. My cold fingers punch in the passcodes to enter each doorway without pausing to think about it. Everything is the same as every other morning, and it all fades into background noise. But this time I pause, running my fingers over the brand on the inside of my right wrist, those eight numbers and squiggly lines they marked on me when I entered the service. Now, my mandatory years are over. But no matter where I go, the war will always be a part of me. What if this is where I belong?

  Perhaps this was Altair’s intent all along: to give me time to think. He knows I have a choice to make. Merely a few weeks ago, I thought it was already made. After we lost Uwe to a bomb on our last mission, with the image of the explosion waiting every time I closed my eyes, I sent a message to my family without a moment’s hesitation. All these years, I never thought anything could convince me to stay here and keep fighting in this awful war. I believed it was the desire to leave that kept me moving. It was memories of my family that gave me the resolve to do terrible things, anything necessary to survive. My only goal after enlisting was to live long enough to return to them, and protect my siblings like I always swore I would.

  When it was just the two of us on Gaia, Scorpia was always the one to take care of me, to lie and steal and do all the things I couldn’t do. I was never any good at it, so instead Momma paid for some fake papers to get me into a Gaian school, calling it an investment in the family’s future.

  Once we went to Nibiru, where Scorpia couldn’t shake her bad habits and found an even worse one in a bottle, I took that mantle upon myself. I looked after the little ones, tried to keep Scorpia from drowning in her vices, did my best to soothe Momma’s anger by being the perfect son she wanted me to be. Scorpia and I would huddle by Nibiru’s ocean, or later in the ship’s cargo bay, and whisper about our dreams for the future. We would talk about all of us having a say in the family business rather than being threatened into following orders. No more risky jobs, no more Primus technology, no more weapons. “When I’m in charge, we can be whoever we want to be,” I would always say.

  But that was before. Before I became attached to this place and its people. Before I believed that I could do something good for this system rather than returning to my family to smuggle drugs and other contraband. Altair’s offer changed everything. I’ve climbed rapidly through the ranks here, guided by the general’s hand—and now, he wants more for me. He wants me to work directly under him, learn from him, take his place as a general one day. I wouldn’t be another pawn in this war… I would be one of the people running it, shaping a better future for my people. Just like I always dreamed of doing for my family, but on a much grander scale. Here, I could make a difference.

  The door to the supply room bangs open and startles me from my thoughts. A stocky blond woman, our latest recruit after we lost Uwe, stands in the doorway. Her face flushes as she sees me. Three years on Titan, and it still shocks me how their skin is commonly pale enough to show emotion in a surge of startling color. The system has a wide range of skin tones, but this is the one planet where the majority of people are fair enough for my own tawny coloring to stand out.

  I clear my throat and turn to face her, straightening my posture so that I stand—just barely—taller than her. My height is yet another reminder that I may be Titan by birth but not by blood. Elsewhere in the system I stand above the average, but not here.

  “Sergeant Kaiser, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to intrude. Everyone’s looking for you, and it’s—they sent me,” she says, the words coming out in a jumble. She’s still new enough to be nervous around me, and new enough that it takes me a few moments to remember her name. I would feel bad about it, but I’ve seen far too many new faces come and go.

  “Ivennie,” I say, remembering. Ivennie Smirnova. “I’ve told you, Corvus is fine.”

  “Yes, sir, Corvus, sir,” she says. Her face turns a deeper shade of red, which I didn’t think was possible. I suppress a sigh. It always takes recruits a while to accept that they’re part of a team now and don’t need to follow the same rigidity as during training. Our army has a strict hierarchy, and we’re always expected to show deference to superiors, but within a team, things are different. We’re encouraged to be close. Intimate, even.

  So I lay a hand on Ivennie’s shoulder. The act still feels odd to me after all these years, too familiar given we’ve only known each other for a few weeks. But the new recruit leans into my hand despite her earlier anxiety, relief crossing her face. All of the Titans complain about being touch-starved after basic training.

  “You don’t need to be so formal with me. Here, we’re”—the next words stick in my throat, as they always do, but I finish the phrase I learned from the general—“a family.”

  She stares up at me with wide eyes. I can’t bring myself to force a smile, but I give her an encouraging nod. Family. That’s what we’re supposed to say, anyway. Altair taught me that physical touch is so deeply ingrained in Titan culture that they don’t bother trying to stamp it out in the military. He said it’s good for them to feel that closeness, when many of them have lost their blood relations to the war. But I suspect he knows the truth: that nobody would fight as long or as hard as we do without something to care about, even if that something is a lie.

  I step past the still-blushing new recruit into the dim underground hallway. As much as I’ve tried to make myself believe it these last few years, and as much as I’ve grown to care about them, I’ve always known deep down that my team could never truly be family. I already have one waiting for me—a family bound together by blood.

  Titans, who often grow up in large, blended families with multiple sets of parents to fill in any gaps left by the war, don’t place much value in blood. But I wasn’t raised as a Titan. I still remember the time I dared to ask about who my father was at dinner, and the taste of copper in my mouth after Momma hit me—one of the few times she raised a hand against me. My siblings were just as shocked as I was. “You have no fathers,” she told us in the silence, using that tone of hers that brooked no argument. “Forget about them. Forget your birth-planets, too. The blood you share is the only thing that matters. No one outside this room is ever going to accept any of you, so you need to look out for each other.”

  I shake off the memory. The past has been haunting me far too often these days, and the distraction could get me killed out here.

  “Take me to the others,” I tell Ivennie. She rushes to obey, leading me to the stairwell. This outpost was built to house a much larger unit than ours if necessary, and it takes a while to traverse the stairs. I can feel Ivennie’s eyes on me as we walk, practically hear the questions on her tongue.

  We haven’t spent much time together, just the two of us, since she arrived. Moments of one-on-o
ne time, like solitude, are rare here. Our team is expected to spend every moment together: eating, training, showering, sleeping. We’re expected to share everything. Privacy leads to secrets, secrets to jealousy, and jealousy is a disease of the soul, a common Titan saying goes. I try to respect Titan customs, I truly do, but some I can’t bring myself to follow. Just as Momma always told me, no matter how hard I try, I’ll never truly be a Titan.

  Though I suspect I’ve been avoiding Ivennie for other reasons, as well. Knowing I may be leaving soon makes me loath to add another name to the list of people I care about here. Especially so with Uwe’s loss still so fresh. The rest of my team has been hesitant to welcome the rookie as well.

  The shock of Uwe’s death lingers in all of us. Before that, it had been over three months since we lost someone. We had fallen into a rhythm, a strong team dynamic, and now everyone is struggling once again to figure out where they fit, trying to adjust themselves around the missing piece my off-worlder customs leave.

  We shouldn’t have lost Uwe. It was a stupid, senseless death. I’ve replayed the day a thousand times over, running through all the ways I could’ve prevented it.

  We were in Niivya, a border town freshly liberated from the enemy. Drunk on victory, newly armed with information Daniil had extracted from a captured Isolationist sergeant. The townspeople were eager to celebrate with us. Feeding us, filling our mugs when they were empty. Putting us at ease.

  Everyone but me was very intoxicated when word arrived that a child had fallen into a sewer. I should have gone alone. But I couldn’t carry both a child and a light in the darkness of the sewers, and so someone needed to come with me. Since Uwe lost the hand of cards, it fell to him. He was drunk—staggering, singing drunk. He nearly fell on his face when we dropped down into the sewers to look for her.

  When we found the child, she wasn’t injured at all. Instead, she was clutching an explosive device in her hands. When Uwe raised the light, she ran at us.

  I had a gun. I should have used it. But she was a child, and in her face I saw Scorpia, Lyre, Andromeda. I froze. Drunk though he was, Uwe still reacted before I did, and his first thought was to shield me from the worst of the blast. He tackled me to the ground with his armored body on top of mine. My only injury was a gash on my cheek where my face hit the concrete floor. There wasn’t enough left of Uwe for a proper funeral. When I emerged from that tunnel, covered in the remains of both my teammate and a little girl, I was ready to leave Titan, despite the love that I’ve gained for both the planet and its people. I sent the message to my family the next day, when I was still so sure, before Altair made his offer and the doubt set in.

  But Ivennie doesn’t know any of that, and none of it is her fault. She’s a quick learner with exceptionally high potential, perhaps even for leadership, according to Altair’s recommendation. I should be doing a better job of teaching her how a team operates. If there’s one thing I can do for the others before I leave them behind, I should at least give them the ability to rely on each other.

  I clear my throat and lower my hand as I realize I’m touching the scar on my cheek. It would have been an easy thing for Titan doctors to fix, but I asked to keep it as a reminder. My eyes shift to Ivennie, who immediately glances away as if she hadn’t been staring.

  “You can ask, if you want,” I tell her. “I’ll answer any questions you have. I know you must have heard plenty of rumors.” A sergeant who was raised off-world is no small thing on Titan. I know the things they say about me, both good and bad.

  No doubt Ivennie would have asked the others about me already, if they weren’t as reluctant to accept her as I am. She hesitates for barely a moment before she gives in to curiosity.

  “Is it true you’re an off-worlder?”

  “No. I’m a Titan. I was born here.” The response is automatic. Confusion creases her forehead, and after a moment, I relent. “But, yes, I’ve spent most of my life off-world, though I’ve always been Titan at heart. I returned when duty called me.” A mouthful of lies. When I was growing up, Momma always reminded me that blood came first. The last thing she said to me was “You’re a Kaiser, not a Titan. Don’t forget that.” But the truth would not serve me well here.

  “So before coming here, you lived… where?”

  “I lived on a ship. But I grew up mostly on Gaia, then a few years on Nibiru.”

  “Ah. Gaia.” Some of her confusion clears up. “So that’s why you’re”—she fumbles for a word—“abstinent?”

  They always ask about that.

  “I’m not. It’s just different for me.”

  It’s clear she doesn’t understand, but this is an issue I’m not eager to provide more explanation about. I’ve tried it with Titans, many times, but our attitudes are too deeply ingrained, and too different. Maybe it is the years in Gaia’s conservative culture affecting me more than I like to think. Or maybe it was one too many lectures from Momma about avoiding unplanned children on any of the planets. With those concerns, she was always more strict with Pol and I than with our sisters, even after she gave us all birth control shots from Gaia, where they’re mandatory.

  Either way, I’ve never been able to make myself comfortable with Titans’ extraordinarily casual attitude toward sex. I don’t judge them for their own dalliances—though constantly being woken up in the middle of the night drove me to demand having my own room, despite it being against Titan custom—but the lifestyle doesn’t suit me.

  I tried during basic training, when my loneliness was a raw wound I was constantly trying to sew shut. It didn’t work. And here, where I’m in charge of these people, tasked with ordering them to fight and die as I see fit, attachment is too dangerous. I know I wouldn’t be able to be objective. If only knowing was enough to keep my heart from wanting.

  The conversation ends as we travel higher in the stairwell, drawing close enough to the cafeteria that the voices of my team bounce off the walls around us. The sound of their laughter and easy chatter makes my guilt heavier with every step. Ivennie is still barely more than a stranger, but the others have been with me for a long time. Secrets lead to jealousy… and I haven’t told them of the upcoming end to my service, or the message I sent to my family, or the possibility this could be my last mission. Though I’ve never been able to view them as my kin, my team has always seen me as a part of their family. No matter what choice I make, I’ll be leaving someone behind.

  CHAPTER THREE

  A Warm Reception

  Scorpia

  As Fortuna punches through the atmosphere, I realize a rough landing was an ambitious goal. Judging by the flashing emergency lights bathing the bridge neon green, it’s too late to hope for anything better than a graceful crash. As the whole ship rattles and shakes around me, I grip the control wheel with both hands, fighting to prevent a nosedive. The craft groans and whines with the effort, audible even through the panicky wail of the alarm. We’re still locked on the landing zone, as far as I can tell, but it’s up to me to ensure we don’t arrive as a flaming ball of bent steel and crushed limbs.

  Not that there’s much to do at this point. I’ve pressed all the buttons, pulled all the levers, and activated all the fail-safes. I’ve sprayed my mouth-guard with compressed air, the chill hardening it enough to prevent my teeth from shattering on impact. Now, I do the last things left to do: hold on tight and watch the surface of Gaia come closer, and closer, and closer.

  The ship slows by the time she hits, but not enough for the crash to be anywhere close to graceful. I slam back against my seat as Fortuna bumps and skids and slides across the planet’s surface, metal screeching and scraping against rock. The vessel collides with something big, spins sideways, and grinds to a stop. The world leans left.

  My chest strains against the safety straps. My knuckles are white around the wheel. I stay still, wrestling with my churning stomach. By the time I’ve subdued the urge to vomit, the alarms have quieted, and the lights have faded to a dim yellow. Nothing in the bridge
is emitting flames or sparks or any other signs of impending danger. And, given the fact we haven’t been blown to pieces by Gaian air control, it seems we made it into the landing zone. A sliver of the sandy stretch of ground is visible through the viewing panel, along with one rusty old ship that must have been abandoned here when the borders closed. That’s probably what we hit earlier.

  One hand peels off the wheel, then the second. I rub my mouth-guard until the warmth softens it into rubbery goo again and spit it into my palm. With my heart still thumping in my chest, I let out a breathless laugh.

  The ship’s banged up and the cockpit reeks of alcohol, but we’re still in one piece. As far as I’m concerned, that makes this a great success. The world is spinning, my systems are fried, and Momma’s surely going to chew me out for this, but we survived. I grin as I pocket the mouth-guard, unclip myself from the safety belts, and let my forehead fall to rest on the wheel.

  “You did it, baby,” I say, rubbing the control panel. “You got us here.”

  My stomach bubbles again. I shut my eyes, listening to the familiar creaks and grumbles of the ship as it settles. Given the rough landing, Momma will probably check on the cargo before she barges in here, so I have a few minutes to relax. But a steady, insistent beep soon draws my attention. I raise my head and glance at a screen on my right. Bold letters blink at me: New Transmission Received. Receiving a transmission after landing usually means a client is contacting us now that we’re within range, but when I see the source, my stomach drops.

  Titan. The message is from Titan. We haven’t visited that war-ravaged rock in three years, because the only goods worth smuggling to Titan are weapons, and not even Momma is cold enough to sell bombs into a war her own son is fighting in. There’s no reason for us to receive a transmission from Titan unless it involves Corvus.

  A lump forms in my throat, making it hard to swallow. Corvus hasn’t contacted us once in the three years he’s been gone. He’s made it damn clear he’s done with us. But if he was killed in action, one of his superiors might pass the word to us as a favor to Momma. Taking a deep breath, I reach out, my hand hovering over the button to play the message. All transmissions are supposed to go straight to Momma—but if my brother is dead, I don’t want to hear it from her mouth. I hit the button.