Any engineer worth their salt knew their ship better than they knew themselves. Bodies and minds were fickle and mysterious entities, disobeying the rules of doctors and psychologists when it suited them, enduring beyond expected limits or faltering when they should have stood tall. Starships were different. The average crew might be surprised if a system failed or the hull endured against hardship, but it was never so for an engineer. The engineer knew how much her ship could take, because they learned to listen to the groans in the metal, the power fluctuations, the dips in processing speeds that all told secrets in the space between the cold, stark, unforgiving diagnostic reports.

Which was all why Valance came into Cortez’s quarters to find the Chief Engineer on her hands and knees, ear pressed against the deck. The XO stopped short. ‘Did you drop a stylus?’

‘Shh.’ Cortez didn’t move. ‘Something’s wrong.’

Valance looked around the room as if that would give answers. ‘How unfortunate this has happened just as we’ve docked at the most well-staffed starbase in the sector.’

‘There’s a tremor in the deck plating. And before you say it, no, it’s not because we’ve docked. We’ve been docked for three hours.’ But Cortez rose, brow furrowed. ‘I don’t know what it is.’

‘Are you cancelling breakfast?’

There was one way Cortez was not like other engineers, because she heard the tension in her partner’s voice. With a sigh, she shook her head. ‘No. You’re right. It’ll be nothing urgent. I’m sorry, I didn’t get anything laid out.’

‘Then it’s also unfortunate we’re stood about six feet from a replicator,’ Valance pointed out.

They’d settled down at the breakfast nook with plates and a steaming pot of coffee before Cortez’s mind tore away from the tremor she’d felt underfoot, and she stabbed her eggs with a squint. ‘What’s wrong with us; we could have eaten on the station.’

‘I don’t know SB Bravo very well,’ Valance admitted. ‘I don’t know where’s good.’

‘You could ask Dav,’ said Cortez, and watched for her reaction. At the silence, she grimaced. ‘You are going to see him, right?’

‘He knows Endeavour’s here.’

Again, nothing more was forthcoming, and Cortez bit down a wry comment or a joke. To her, there was no reason Valance couldn’t initiate contact with the man who had been her closest friend aboard. But she knew Valance was slow to trust, and that Airex’s sudden and unexplained departure had hurt deeply. So she gulped coffee while she rallied. ‘You know,’ Cortez said at length, ‘I think there’s a refit officer here I served with on the Albright. I’ll try to get a recommendation that’s not that fancy bistro you need to be an admiral to get into.’

‘That’s a good idea,’ Valance allowed and, perhaps realising she’d gone terse, she straightened up and pressed on. ‘We have some new transfers aboard, some outgoing personnel. I’ll need to work with them and the department heads to get them settled. But if we’re here for a few week or so while Captain Rourke resolves… whatever it is he thinks he needs to do here… then we should make the most of the base.’

Cortez gave a gentle scoff. ‘Vacationing on Archer IV feels like a hell of a long time ago now, huh. We’ve only been back out a few months and we already need a break.’

‘A pretty unprecedented few months.’

‘I’m just glad this crisis didn’t involve the ship getting the hell beaten out of it. So I had a pretty easy time,’ Cortez lied languidly. But she still leaned forward, hands wrapping around the coffee mug, and gave Valance a smirk. ‘What’s this, you suggesting we take some time for us, actually do stuff?’

‘I suggest we “do stuff!”’ Valance said indignantly. ‘Breakfast was my idea when you said you’d have a late shift last night.’

Cortez bit her lip to smother a comment and a delighted smirk. ‘Replicated breakfast in my quarters. You know how to show a girl a good time, Commander.’

Valance tilted her chin a defiant inch. ‘I’m not rising to this. I just suggested we enjoy Bravo. I agreed to visiting Archer IV, meeting your parents, without argument; I’ve done all of the reflexivity exercises Carraway’s asked for after we’ve worked together. I am communicating and scheduling time for us to spend together, and I will absolutely not -’

‘Okay, okay!’ Cortez reached to catch an indignant hand, tone going appeasing. She’d heard the edge of tension that was perhaps sincere; that suggested Valance knew she was being teased but thought it unfair. ‘I’m kidding.’

Valance settled only a little. ‘I just think I deserve a little more credit; you criticised my communication and I made adjustments. I’ve been making changes and working on this relationship.’

That next waver in her voice was one Cortez was less sure of. ‘Hold up. Are you saying you’ve been pushing this relationship forward and I’ve been dragging my feet?’ There were a lot of problems with Valance’s natural terseness. One of them was that Cortez could now absolutely not read her deadpan, guarded expression.

Which of course meant Cortez’s combadge chirruped before she could push the point. ‘Forrester to Commander Cortez. Could you meet me in the lounge at your earliest convenience?’ There was a faint clatter in the background of the engineer’s voice, but Forrester could give Valance a run for her money in the stoic races, which meant not only did Cortez have no idea what was wrong, but she couldn’t tell if the request was Forrester wanting coffee with her boss or if she’d just found a hull breach and was about to be sucked into the vacuum of space.

‘You should head down there,’ said Valance, finishing her coffee and standing. ‘Maybe it’s the cause of the deck tremor.’

‘A deck tremor means a plasma flow fluctuation or a structural -’ Damn it. Cortez also hopped to her feet. ‘This conversation isn’t over.’

‘I have to join the captain in a meeting with Admiral Beckett. Let me know if you speak to that old shipmate and find somewhere good for breakfast.’ But Valance didn’t make eye contact, and took advantage of the fact she didn’t have to tidy the table to escape before Cortez could stop her or leave with her.

It was with a dissatisfied clatter that Cortez tossed the empty plates and mugs in the replicator. ‘Coño,’ she muttered to herself, and set off for the lounge with a stomp in her step.

Forrester was a young and talented engineer and Cortez knew the paperwork for her promotion to lieutenant was gumming up the pipes of bureaucracy at that instant, but none of this made her easy to work with. She thus expected some incidental inconvenience to await her at the lounge, and instead arrived to find the whole chamber gutted out by a work team of engineers. Carpet had been stripped, fixtures torn out, furniture removed, and finally Cortez realised what had caused that faint tremor in the deck plating a while before.

She found Forrester face to face with a tall, broad, craggy-faced petty officer in gold, a Bajoran man who looked like he’d rather be working than getting a strip torn off him by an ensign. But Forrester turned at Cortez’s arrival, flat expression somehow flatter. ‘Commander; this work team started this about an hour after we docked, and I don’t see your authorisation anywhere on this work order.’

Cortez lifted a hand to Forrester and turned to the other engineer. ‘Morning, Chief. I’m Commander Cortez, Chief Engineer. Who sent you over from Bravo?’

‘Pleasure, Commander,’ the big man rumbled. ‘Master Chief Lann. Got my work order right here.’ He handed over a PADD, and shrugged. ‘Sorry about bugging your staff, but you can see the authorisation’s right there and we’ve got a lot to get on with.’

‘I’m not bugged,’ said Forrester testily. ‘I have to conduct a full hull and systems stress diagnosis ahead of our maintenance and found this.’

Cortez squinted at the PADD. ‘You got authorisation from Thawn?’

Lann shrugged again. ‘Ops manager of a ship green-lights a ship project that doesn’t touch propulsion or energy systems, I don’t as a rule question it.’

‘What’s Thawn doing getting underfoot?’ Forrester demanded.

‘Lieutenant Thawn is going to have to explain that to me, yes,’ said Cortez, gently trying to correct Forrester’s attitude while she was wondering the same damn thing. ‘Anyway, why’s the lounge got to be stripped bare? Other than it might give it character?’

Chief Lann chuckled. ‘Whole redecorating thing. We’re stripping out the standard fittings and we’ve got a custom design. Next page on the document.’

Cortez projected the PADD’s display, Forrester stepping close to see the picture. Both women raised eyebrows. ‘That does look better.’

‘Listen, I don’t want any senior staff arguing over my head,’ Lann pressed on. ‘Or for my head if it comes to it. But when the Ops Manager green-lights a refit job fast-tracked by the Diplomatic Service, I don’t ask questions, yeah?’

Cortez and Forrester exchanged looks. ‘Why’s the Diplomatic Service refitting our lounge, Commander?’

‘Another really good question,’ Cortez mused. ‘Don’t worry, Chief. Forrester doesn’t bite, new people just make her nervous and you were touching her things.’

‘I think my daughter got like that when she was little,’ Chief Lann agreed with the kind of courteous smile and tone that helped senior enlisted get away with comments aimed at junior officers. ‘Still, apologies for causing a disruption, sirs. Not how I wanted to arrive at a new posting.’

‘Oh.’ Cortez smacked her forehead. ‘I thought you were a work team from Bravo. You’re my new structural engineer?’

‘Then you really should have reported to the Commander -’

‘Leave the Chief out of it, Forrester,’ she chided. ‘I’ll have my turf war with Thawn without dragging any of you into it. Besides.’ Cortez pointed at the displayed picture. ‘We don’t want to delay our lounge looking like this, do we?’

Forrester folded her arms across her chest. ‘It does look better.’

Lann smirked. ‘Then I’ll get back to work.’

‘Forrester can help you,’ Cortez decided. ‘Make sure you know your way around, wrangle any staff you need.’

Forrester raised an eyebrow. ‘I will?’

‘You will. Because I have a more important job.’ Cortez’s lips thinned. ‘I need to go have a turf war with Lieutenant Thawn.’

As one of the largest starbases in the Federation and the most significant hub of the spinward borders, SB Bravo was more like a floating city than the cramped outposts where Rourke had previously lived and worked. While many civilians preferred to live and work on the colony world of Mellstoxx III below, those aboard still enjoyed the most comfortable life in space Starfleet could provide. He had not been surprised to learn Admiral Beckett’s offices were thus in close enough proximity to the arboretum that he expected he’d find a window overlooking the greenspace.

Rourke met Valance there ahead of the meeting, his first officer tense and quiet even by her standards. He’d brought them cups of real coffee from one of the establishments he’d found on a past visit, which she took with a nod that suggested summoning gratitude took work.

‘Don’t borrow trouble, Commander,’ he chided gently. ‘Admiral Beckett won’t want to hang us out to dry. He’d get taken down with us.’

‘I expect Admiral Beckett still needs to answer to people, and I never underestimate a politician’s capacity to find a scapegoat,’ Valance admitted, turning her gaze to the treetops brushing close to what had to be the edges of the holographic sky that, from here, looked endless. ‘We’re also reliant on First Secretary Hale’s protection. And she’s not here.’

Hale was on Bravo, but the moment they’d arrived she’d disappeared into offices of the Diplomatic Service for meetings Rourke expected would be more intense than a deep-cover agent’s debriefing. ‘She’ll be fine, but we won’t need her help here,’ he insisted. He had not yet told Valance of Hale’s ambitions for Endeavour’s next step. It did not yet feel real, but like the wistful thinking of two dreamers, even if they were both influential enough to make it happen. Caution told him to prepare for the worst, to enter this meeting covering his back in case Hale swung for her choices, but for once, he disliked listening to that small, paranoid voice.

Hope was a slippery thing.

Admiral Beckett had kept the same yeoman since at least when Rourke had been his XO on the Achilles, and the pencil-thin chief petty officer had not improved in demeanour or warmth since. ‘They’re waiting for you inside, Captain, Commander,’ the yeoman said when they arrived in the foyer, his tone suggesting they were running late. Even though Rourke knew this wasn’t the case, his throat tensed anyway, and he was relieved to have Valance’s unflappable coolness by his side, even as he wondered: who’s ‘they’?

Beckett himself loomed large in the office, which, as predicted, boasted a wide window overlooking the arboretum. Otherwise it had all the same touches Rourke had come to expect from the admiral’s space: the old-fashioned wooden desk, the shelves stacked with voluminous texts in unnecessary hard copy, the paintings on the walls. ‘Captain Rourke, Commander Valance. Welcome back to Federation space.’

‘Admiral. I hear congratulations are in order.’ Rourke nodded to the fresh bar of pips at Beckett’s breast as he and Valance sat across the desk. But before the newly-minted vice admiral could respond, his eyes fell on another man in the room, and he couldn’t help the broad, somewhat condescending grin. ‘Pete.’

Commander Petrias Graelin looked as unhappy at the nickname as he’d been when they’d last met five years ago. He was a lean, dark-haired Ardanan in science blues, the kind of man who obsessively kept his swimmer’s build and Rourke suspected had coloured his hair to keep any grey out at the temples, as he knew they were of an age. Graelin drew a slow, dissatisfied breath. ‘Sir.’

‘Valance, this is Commander Graelin. We served together on the Achilles. Might be the third-best science officer I ever met?’ Rourke gestured between them with an airy ease, gratified by the flash of irritation in Graelin’s eyes. ‘Pete, this is Commander Valance, my XO, best second I ever had.’

Graelin’s eyes flickered to Valance, whom he gave a terse, polite nod before he looked back at Rourke. ‘Good to see you found a replacement for Halvard.’

So you’re still a weasel, Rourke thought as he swallowed the surge of frustration he knew Graelin intended to provoke, but Admiral Beckett lifted his hands before a rebuttal could come.

‘That’ll be quite enough, boys,’ he said with that superior tone he’d always used when his senior officers bickered before him. Beckett liked it, Rourke knew; forcing his officers into a rat race was how he managed a ship. Rourke’s increasing refusal to play had driven the wedge between them, but he suspected Graelin had yet to quit chasing the cheese. ‘Petrias just arrived here from SB17, where his team finished the analysis on the latest Argus Array readings.’

‘It’s amazing,’ Rourke drawled. ‘You can see almost the whole galaxy from behind a desk now.’

‘Matt and Endeavour will be here at least a week,’ Admiral Beckett continued as if he hadn’t spoken, reading from a PADD. ‘You have some new transfers, standard repairs and maintenance, and I see there’s a request here from the Diplomatic Service for your ship and crew to be assigned to an upcoming mission. That has not yet been confirmed.’

‘First Secretary Hale is ironing out the details right now,’ said Rourke with a shrug. ‘If we can be spared, her upcoming operations in the Neutral Zone would benefit from Endeavour’s help.’ It wouldn’t do, he knew, to look too excited. Beckett would leap on anything Rourke wanted and use it against him. But if Hale had her way and the diplomatic mission to the region formally requested Endeavour, it would cost Beckett to deny them.

Beckett’s nostrils flared. ‘We’ll address that if this posting of Ms Hale’s is confirmed. No point wasting time debating decisions the Diplomatic Service haven’t made yet.’ He turned a page on his PADD. ‘I see some personnel updates about your crew, pending promotions and commendations, all that. We’ll see how things go this week there, too, I suppose.’ Rourke tilted his head, but before he could press that point, Beckett spoke on with a gesture to Graelin. ‘Regardless, I’m assigning Petrias as your new Chief Science Officer.’

Rourke looked at the other man and swallowed bitterness. ‘Welcome back to the front lines, Pete. Ready to get your hands dirty?’

‘Hopefully not as dirty as you’ve been getting them, Matt,’ Graelin said levelly.

‘Still “Captain” to you.’

‘With Petrias’ seniority,’ Beckett said smoothly, ‘he can also succeed Commander Airex as second officer.’

‘Airex.’ Rourke looked between the two of them. ‘Surprised you didn’t bring Pete in for his job. Senior scientific advisor to the Director of Fourth Fleet Intelligence? Would have thought that would be right up his alley.’

‘Commander Airex has earned his place with the recent crisis,’ Beckett said easily, leaning back in the chair, and alarm bells sounded in Rourke’s head. He was right: Graelin should have been desperate for a job like Airex’s, but not only was Beckett sending one of his creatures into the field, but Graelin looked satisfied with it. ‘And I’d rather have Petrias on Endeavour. Which brings me to the next business: your after action report.’

Rourke shifted his weight and glanced to Valance. ‘I’ve submitted all of my reports, sir.’

‘Of a very contentious mission you’ve just had,’ Graelin interjected. ‘Admiral Beckett wants me to debrief your crew before Endeavour goes… anywhere, really.’

Valance’s chin tilted up. ‘That’s an irregular assignment for a new member of the senior staff.’

‘Commander Graelin’s been fully briefed,’ Beckett said indifferently. ‘And has seniority on you in rank, Commander Valance, which of course won’t matter once you’re underway but means he’s perfectly within his rights to review your work until then. If the Diplomatic Service is so very keen on taking Endeavour for their own operations, I want to be sure the ship we’re sending to the Neutral Zone is sturdy in every possible way.’

‘I took the liberty of making some staffing recommendations for your new transfers,’ Graelin said, far too happily for Rourke’s liking. ‘After all the disruption of recent ops, you’ll see you’ve been assigned a new Command Master Chief, Master Chief Petty Officer Lann Olvar, who’s taking up a specialist position in engineering. And your new yeoman, Petty Officer Nestari. Highly recommended from Fleet Command’s own admin pool here.’

Rourke looked at Beckett. ‘If there’s any dissatisfaction in my decisions these past weeks, Admiral, I’d rather have it from Fleet Command than my science officer.’

‘This isn’t about Fleet Command’s judgement,’ Beckett said amiably. He had to be loving this, Rourke thought. ‘But if the Diplomatic Service wants the assistance of a ship that’s been embroiled in some of Starfleet’s biggest recent controversies, well. You have my confidence, Matt, but after how long you and I’ve worked together, I don’t want anyone accusing me of playing favourites. We’ll have you properly debriefed, dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s, and then once the DS knows what they want, you’ll be ready.’

Petrias Graelin leaned back in his chair with a self-satisfied smirk. ‘I’ll report aboard this afternoon. I’ll send a list of files requests to you ASAP, Commander Valance; your cooperation will help this go smooth and fast.’ His eyes fell on Rourke. ‘Looking forward to working with you again, Matt. It’s been too long.’

Rourke waited until the meeting was done and he was storming back into the arboretum, fists by his side as Valance kept pace, before he truly spoke his mind. ‘Self-satisfied prick!’

Valance said nothing until he’d stomped to a halt by a water feature. A short distance away, a trio of Bolian parents gently ushered a pair of children further around the pond, a mother giving Rourke a somewhat scandalised look for his outburst and language. ‘I’m not going to assume I understood all the politics at play here, sir,’ she said at last.

‘Graelin’s always been an ambitious piece of shit and he’s always been Beckett’s creature. But he’s too arrogant to recognise the old man could give him what he really wants – he’d give his right arm for the job he gave Airex – and instead is sending him to a job he’s frankly over-qualified for just so Beckett can keep his fingers in Endeavour.’

Her gaze had flickered at the mention of Airex. ‘Graelin is highly qualified. If he’s a loyal asset for the admiral, he’s a valuable asset. Isn’t sending him to us a waste? And why does Beckett want us further debriefed on the recent mission, when it risks uncovering things that’ll make him look bad?’

Rourke heard the question she hadn’t asked, and sighed. ‘Because we’ve been asked for by the Diplomatic Service. Beckett wants to know what’s going on there, and he wants more people he can trust involved to observe and influence it to his benefit.’ He turned to her. ‘Everything Hale promised Lotharn at Ephrath? She wants to run it. More negotiations with the Empire and Republic, more humanitarian support, more involvement. And she wants Endeavour as the Starfleet ship backing it.’

Valance straightened at that. ‘Which is why she’s buried deep in meetings with her superiors right now.’

‘It’s not a done deal. But if she’s given the project, Beckett would need reason to refuse her Endeavour. Perhaps he wants Graelin to find grounds for that. Or he wants his creatures reporting back on it.’

‘Do you want to do it, sir?’

‘I do.’ He watched her, brow furrowing. ‘I don’t know how MacCallister stopped Command using Endeavour as a big stick to be used or implied. But we can go to regions Starfleet’s never been, or hasn’t been in years, and help. Build connections with new powers. Our weapons become how we protect ourselves to do good in dangerous places, not a threat. I’m sorry I didn’t mention this sooner, Commander, but I didn’t want to get hopes up if Hale can’t pull it off…’

‘I understand.’

He tilted his head. ‘Then I thought you’d be more excited. What’s wrong?’

Valance sighed. ‘Watching our backs against the new staff isn’t something I’m looking forward to.’

‘Don’t worry about them. Be polite and cooperative like you would with anyone. I know how to deal with Beckett’s spies, and the first point is to remember we’ve nothing to be ashamed of and nothing to hide. Leave the rest to me.’ But his frown deepened. ‘There’s something else on your mind.’

She hesitated, surprise tugging at her expression. ‘It’s nothing, sir.’

‘Nah, come on. We’ve got a breather this week, even with Graelin crawling up our arses. It’s time for boring work and taking stock.’

‘It’s personal, sir…’ At his expression, she sighed. ‘I argued with Commander Cortez this morning. That’s all. She…’ Valance hesitated again, gathering words. ‘I’ve worked hard on this relationship. I take it seriously, not least because she’s in my chain of command. I’ve tried to be more open with her; I met her family when we were on leave. But she still makes jokes like I’m withholding emotionally, while often acting as if we’re just casual.’ She drew a slow breath and looked him in the eye. ‘And with Commander Airex gone, I realise I have nobody to talk to about this.’

Rourke bit down on his first instinct to joke about being the last resort. It had to take, he suspected, a good deal of frustration and trust for his XO to open up about this with him. ‘That does sound unpleasant,’ he said plainly. ‘Working on yourself like that and being treated like you’ve made no progress. Cortez is a good person, but she likes to chew on boot-leather. She might not realise her jokes hurtful.’

‘I suspect she knows something’s wrong.’

‘Are you ready to talk about it with her yet?’ At her hesitation, he gave a wry smile. ‘It’s okay to spend some time being angry about this and figuring out your feelings and your words. Go back too soon and all you’ll do is be unclear and pissed off and start an argument.’ He tilted his head. ‘Let’s have a drink some time this week, Commander, while we’re here. Every officer needs to visit Downtime if they stay at Bravo.’

She nodded, subsiding a little. It helped, Rourke thought, to do this stood on a crisp path before crystal-clear waters under the shade of gently bowing tree branches, however artificial most of the arboretum was. Thoughts felt less closed off in open spaces, and they had spent most of the last months aboard their modestly-sized ship.

‘A drink,’ Valance agreed after a moment. ‘And in the meantime, sir, I’ll make sure our newest assignment of spies are settled in.’

The Operations offices of Endeavour were not normally where Thawn was found. She was a creature of the bridge, a distant manager running the ship through messages and missives while she kept her thumb on the pulse from the hub of all activity. But they were docked now, and there was little work to be done on the bridge.

Cortez knew she’d guessed right when Ensign Athaka slid out from behind his desk the moment she arrived in the bullpen. ‘Commander! Can I help you?’

‘Okay, so Thawn is in the back.’ She jabbed a finger at the closed door to the Operations Manager’s office. ‘Or you wouldn’t be so quick to intercept.’

Athaka froze, betrayed by his own obsequious protection of his superior. ‘She’s very busy right now. Is this urgent, or can I…’

‘Listen.’ Cortez lifted a hand. ‘I’m not the kind of officer to go on the warpath. So believe me when I say you don’t want any of this today. I’ve got my shit-kicking boots on and they’re about to go up the ass of someone, and if I kick you it’ll be so hard it’ll go through you and into Thawn anyway. You can’t save her from this, so you should try getting out of my way.’

He wilted at that. ‘She said she wasn’t to be disturbed unless it was important.’

‘It’s important.’ Cortez squinted at him. ‘You’re the assistant head of the department, not her yeoman, for God’s sake, Athaka. You know that, right?’ She didn’t wait for Athaka’s inevitable defence as she passed him for Thawn’s office, and barely waited a moment beyond her hammer on the door-chime before she entered.

Thawn had put as few personal touches on the office as Cortez expected of someone this prim and proper, and jumped up with a nervous air as the engineer burst in. ‘Commander! Is this important, I’ve got -’

‘Hell, yeah, it’s important!’ Cortez protested. ‘What’re you doing giving a work order to a team of my engineers without passing it by me?’

‘Oh. The lounge.’ Thawn brushed a springy lock of hair behind her ear with a self-conscious air. ‘We had the opportunity to start work the moment we docked and you were off-duty when we arrived – asleep, I assume – and so I went ahead.’

‘You didn’t even drop me a message to wake up to. I found out from my engineers being sent to a job I didn’t order.’ Cortez folded her arms across her chest. Territorialism wasn’t her usual habit, but this one had stuck in her craw.

‘I thought you’d be more focused on the diagnostics ahead of our maintenance.’

‘I was. But you’ve got my new structural engineer and a bunch of his guys ripping the lounge apart, when I could have used them for checks on our hull integrity. Anyone else you’re going to press-gang into your projects?’

Thawn’s nose wrinkled. ‘No, Commander. And Chief Lann came aboard with a new team from Bravo; I didn’t think you’d have duties allocated for them yet.’

‘No, you just allocated my staff to tasks before I could.’ Cortez stuck her hands on her hips and let out a slow, calming breath. ‘I shouldn’t have found out about this from Forrester, because she stumbled on Chief Lann’s gang.’

‘I’m terribly sorry, Commander.’ Thawn didn’t sound sorry at all. ‘But there are significant refurbishments to Endeavour’s facilities we need to get on with.’

‘There’s more than the lounge?’

‘Some of it is pending authorisation from the captain, but he’s asked me to at least get the project work done so we can start as soon as we have the green light…’

Cortez smothered the small, betrayed fear that Rourke had sanctioned this. She suspected the captain had not expected Thawn to go around her. And she suspected Rourke was not the real source of any of this. ‘Why are the Diplomatic Service interfering with anything aboard, let alone fast-tracking things?’

Thawn hesitated. ‘I’m not sure,’ she said, and Cortez thought she was sincere – anxious because she didn’t know, rather than deceiving. ‘But I’m not in a position to question it.’

Is it that you don’t want to question it, or is it that you want to crawl up the ass of Hale or whoever’s pushing this? Cortez thought with an uncharacteristic lack of charity. She gave an aggravated sigh. ‘I’m going to need to see this planning you’ve had done.’

‘Of course, Commander. But I’d rather there are no hold-ups once the captain gives the go-ahead…’

‘There’ll be hold-ups if you try to requisition staff I need for the maintenance work,’ Cortez warned. ‘I don’t care if Hale or Rourke or Admiral Ramar himself damn well asks for my engineers; if it’s not an emergency, nobody gets pulled off my schedule without warning for no good reason.’

‘There’s very good reason to -’

‘Thawn. Rosara. Come on.’ Cortez’s expression flattened. ‘Don’t pretend you’re not screwing me on this. You realise if you said that Hale had some requests you wanted to move on, and you’re curious about why, but you don’t want to bother her, you could have told me?’

‘I didn’t expect you to be intransigent -’

‘But I could have tried to wriggle gossip out of, I don’t know, our XO?’ Cortez raised her eyebrows pointedly. ‘Figure out why the diplomats are still sniffing around the ship?’

Thawn deflated at that. ‘I don’t need to know the reason -’

‘But you want to know the reason. Now, are you going to work with me on scheduling these further refits, or am I gonna have to take this turf war up with Valance or the captain?’

It was always going to be a cheap move to threaten Rosara Thawn with the disapproval of her superiors. But Thawn’s eyes widened with more apprehension than Cortez had expected, the young officer going ramrod straight. ‘No! No, Commander, that’ll be – it’ll be fine.’

Cortez made a face. ‘I wasn’t going to suggest they tar and feather you.’ She tilted her head. ‘What’s got into you about this, Rosara?’

‘I don’t…’ Thawn wrung her hands together. ‘I don’t need even the slightest bad feedback on my personnel reports right now. Not from the captain, not from Commander Valance, not from the Diplomatic Service. That’s why I tried to fast-track those requisitions.’ At Cortez’s level look, she winced. ‘I’m up for lieutenant at last. It’s all in the consideration and paperwork stages. I don’t want to even breathe wrong or…’

‘You think Rourke’s going to torpedo your advancement because you had a spat with the CEO?’

‘I think if the captain has to note down that I undermined the second officer’s department then that might look bad, yes – look, I’m sorry, Commander…’

‘Okay, okay. Chill out, Rosara, yikes.’ Cortez rolled her eyes. ‘Glad you realised that screwing me was wrong because it might inconvenience you.’ Thawn went to object, and Cortez sighed again. ‘Fine. Whatever. Let’s get this scheduling sorted, and I won’t kick up a stink.’

‘Thank you, Commander.’ Thawn practically shrank with relief, and went to her desk to grab a few PADDs. When she turned, her gaze had gone more coy, and Cortez was reminded of how young she sometimes was, even for her age and experience. ‘I don’t suppose you know why the Diplomatic Service is getting involved?’

‘I don’t,’ said Cortez, a little frosty. Once, she would have happily conspired to dig up gossip. But she wasn’t sure she trusted Thawn when she was hyper-vigilant for new boots to lick. ‘Let’s see if we can do a good job and then someone will reward us by being chatty, huh?’

An hour later, she was leaning over a cramped bar table and had to speak up to be heard over the blaring jazz music that was on a particularly long and virulent saxophone solo. ‘…so now I have to deal with Thawn somehow even more neurotic than usual!’

Kharth didn’t answer as she shoved bar snacks in her mouth. They’d committed to lunch the previous day, but with the lounge suddenly out of action had ventured to Starbase Bravo. Frustrated and unfamiliar with the station, Cortez had urged them off the beaten track, only for them to venture into a jazz bar on the lower decks that seemed to exclusively cater to clientele on a body-clock of late night entertainment. The cocktails were belters, the live music actually pretty good, but all Cortez had been able to order to eat was a bowl of chicken wings and a side of nachos.

‘She’s going to be insufferable if she gets promoted,’ Kharth sighed as the music subsided to a more mellow level. ‘She’s been on the cusp of it since we got here, and it’s at least kept her insecure. Now she’ll be confident. Imagine.’

‘I’d rather not.’ Cortez picked at the nachos. ‘But she’s pretty bad now. I’d avoid her, but she’ll take over my damn department if I let her, and I’ve got a slew of maintenance work.’

‘Get the staff here on Bravo to do it.’ Kharth shrugged. ‘Then take the week off. Help -’ But she stopped herself, making a face. ‘Just have a break.’

Cortez narrowed her eyes. ‘What were you gonna say?’

‘Nothing!’

‘“Help Valance unwind,” or something along those lines?’ She cocked her head. ‘You never held back ragging on Karana for my sake before. Don’t tiptoe, Sae, it’s weird.’

‘I’m not…’ Kharth grimaced and shovelled in a handful of peanuts. ‘Okay.’

Cortez sighed. ‘I’m never going to have ambitions beyond you two peacefully coexisting. But have you had so much as a conversation since Teros?’

‘Sure. In the brig.’

‘What about since the brig? Or did you even talk to the captain?’

Kharth stared at her drink, stirring it needlessly. ‘No. No, not really. Truth be told, I was expecting a transfer order once we got here. Still might be coming.’

‘I get this is a whole awkward thing. But Rourke kept you at Tactical for Ephrath. He let you work with Hale. Nothing there went wrong. He’s not a perfect man, but I don’t think he’d leave you dangling like this. You helped Hale negotiate the deal that saved his ass, even.’

‘Sure. But he also ignored all of my tactical solutions for how to engage the Kalvath and was a hair’s breadth from surrendering to the Star Empire.’

‘How confident were you in those plans?’ Kharth made a face, and Cortez rolled her eyes. ‘He didn’t take those options because the situation sucked. Not because he didn’t believe in you. And if you think I can take a break this week, you can definitely take a break. What’s Security got to do while we’re docked? Talk to Rourke. Maybe even talk to Karana.’

‘I’ll talk to the captain.’ Kharth shifted in her seat. ‘It’s awkward with Valance. I refused to carry out that order, so she had to do it. And I’m pretty sure she blames me for Airex leaving.’

‘Have you talked to him? I’m assuming he’s on board if he’s on Beckett’s staff.’

‘He is,’ Kharth murmured into her drink with the guilty air of someone who’d checked and hated themselves for it. ‘But I can’t convince her that him leaving isn’t my fault because I don’t know why he left.’

‘I’m really,’ Cortez sighed, ‘thinking of kicking that guy’s ass.’

‘Sorry I’m in no rush to make up with your girlfriend,’ Kharth said, not insincerely. ‘Pretty sure she and I will just go on hating each other forever.’ She had an awkward sip of her cocktail and looked at the band as they swung into the next mellow tune. ‘You two alright, though?’

Cortez bit her lip. ‘I think I pissed her off this morning.’

‘Were you being funny?’

‘I was, I’m very funny. Thanks for noticing.’ She picked at the bar snacks. ‘I think she’s afraid – or pissed off – she’s done all this work to commit and improve, and I’ve either not noticed or I’m holding back.’

Kharth gave her a sidelong look. ‘Are you holding back?’

‘Look, you of all people aren’t going to give me hell if I point out Karana Valance is like a locked vault when it comes to emotions. I’ve been trying to not scare her off, that’s all.’ But Kharth didn’t look convinced, and Cortez had a swig of her sickly-sweet cocktail. At least it was synthehol she could will away once they were done. ‘Do you have any idea why Hale’s been sticking her nose into Endeavour even with the mission over? You worked with her, I just had a really awkward dinner. What’s her deal?’ It was an evasion, and Kharth looked like she knew it. But while Cortez was sometimes deeply frustrated by this enmity between the two people aboard she was closest to, right then it played into her hands; a self-conscious Kharth would not dig into her relationship.

Besides. The gossip of why First Secretary Hale was sniffing around the ship, even if it was driving Thawn crazy, was much more fun to focus on over lunchtime cocktails in a Starbase Bravo lower decks jazz bar.

‘You’re still working on that?’

Nate Beckett turned to the door to Endeavour’s archaeology lab and gave Lindgren a lopsided grin. ‘Until I get its secrets or it’s taken away from me.’

Lindgren advanced on the ancient Romulan transponder, hovering within the protective forcefields to keep it in place while scans continued. ‘The captain did promise Doctor T’Sann we’d look into the Koderex. But T’Sann stayed on Arcidava. Maybe he found something there?’

‘I haven’t heard from him,’ Beckett admitted self-consciously. ‘But he wouldn’t leave this behind. He went through hell to get it. Now the crisis is over, surely the captain will make good on his promise?’

‘If we can. I wouldn’t be surprised if Endeavour’s not allowed anywhere near the Neutral Zone after all that.’ He sighed and she pressed on, clearly realising that wasn’t what he’d wanted to hear. ‘Hey, anyway, I came down because we’re going out tomorrow night.’

At once his attention was piqued, and he tilted his head with a lopsided smirk. ‘We? Finally you’ve decided you and me should forget what everyone else thinks and -’

‘Me, Rosara, Tar’lek, Athaka, Tes, Harkon. The usual people who have fun,’ Lindgren said with a wry, self-aware air.

‘Wait. Arys and Thawn have fun?’

‘Well. Rosara’s right now insisting that she’s way too busy for this, but I’m working on her. And you know, it’s possible for you to come clubbing on Bravo with us and not mock everyone.’

‘See, you say that…’ Beckett snapped his fingers. ‘Alright, I’m in. Got to raise the average level of “capable of feeling joy” in that mob.’

Lindgren tilted her chin up, visibly smothering amusement. ‘Harkon and I are very joyful.’

‘Athaka feels joy. I saw it when he got that software upgrade to increase his PADD’s LCARS customisation options.’

‘Then how can this party fail?’

The doors beyond her slid open anew, and Beckett turned with a scowl for whoever was interrupting. But he hesitated at the arrival of the tall man with a commander’s pips he didn’t recognise, and Lindgren’s amusement slid away for polite professionalism, too. ‘Can we help you, sir?’

The commander looked between them with a level gaze. ‘You must be Ensign Beckett. I’m Commander Graelin, your new department head.’

‘Oh. I guess someone was going to get shipped in some time,’ said Beckett, trying to ignore the itching on the back of his neck.

Lindgren stepped forward, smile perfect. ‘Welcome aboard, sir. I’m -’

‘Lieutenant Lindgren, of course.’ Graelin’s serious gaze faded for his own smile, and he extended a hand to shake. ‘Chief Communications Officer. Don’t worry, I did my homework. It’s a pleasure to meet you, and I’m sure it’ll be a pleasure to work with you.’

Beckett didn’t know if he was mollified by or suspicious of the sudden wave of warmth his new boss had turned on Lindgren, and she was much too good at masking her emotions for him to know if her smile was sincere. ‘If you need anything while you’re getting settled in, sir,’ she said, ‘do let me know.’

‘I appreciate that,’ said Graelin. ‘My first point of business is debriefing the staff on the recent operation, to be frank. Don’t worry,’ he pressed on at Beckett’s visible tension. ‘It’s just Starfleet making sure we’ve done our due diligence. If I was here for a witch hunt, they wouldn’t have assigned me aboard. So I’d appreciate your help, Lieutenant, in getting familiarised with the staff and ship?’

‘My schedule’s open, sir. Find some time for me.’

Graelin’s smile broadened. ‘That shouldn’t be hard.’

Oh no, thought Beckett, but Lindgren simply inclined her head. ‘I’ll let you get settled in, sir. See you later, Nate?’

‘Course,’ said Beckett, and resisted the urge to shove his hands in his pockets as Lindgren left and Graelin turned to him. ‘Uh, welcome aboard, sir. Sorry I wasn’t more prepared…’

‘This all happened quickly,’ said Graelin with a dismissive wave of the hand. Then he looked Beckett up and down and tilted his chin. ‘You do look like your father.’

There it is, said the nagging suspicion that had been worming in him all along. ‘If he lived healthily and morally, then maybe he could look this good, yeah.’

Graelin didn’t comment on that, and turned to the stored transponder, gaze raking over the display. ‘I’ve been sent here for some specific reasons, Nate. Obviously, to serve on Endeavour as Chief Science Officer. To make sure she’s fit for the jobs ahead. But your father asked me to take on another duty.’ He looked at the younger man. ‘You graduated the Academy, what, eighteen months ago now?’

‘Slightly less.’ Beckett shrugged.

‘You should be looking to your lieutenancy soon.’

‘I think soon is pushing it.’

‘And by all reports, you did an excellent job stepping in after Commander Airex left. Even over more senior officers.’

Another shrug. ‘I’m the archaeologist. We had an archaeological mission. Did my dad send you hear to give me a pat on the back? If so, top marks, sir. My back’s patted.’

Graelin’s expression flickered. Beckett was used to this reaction in people who had assumed he thought well of his father. ‘I don’t expect this to be a long-term assignment for me, Nate. Get Endeavour in good shape, get back out. What your father also wants me to do is to make sure you’re in a position to properly take the department head job once I go.’

Beckett made a face. ‘Bit of a tall order for someone of my rank and experience, permanently running a Science Department on a ship this size.’

‘It’d be a coup. But it looks like it’s one you’re more than capable of,’ said Graelin.

‘What’re you basing that on? My glowing Academy grades and personnel reports?’

Graelin gave a tight, slightly awkward smile. ‘Okay. I see we’ll be better of picking this up another time. But I’m here to help you, Nate.’

‘I really don’t need my father sending me any more help. In fact, I’d rather he didn’t.’

‘Either way, I’m your new department head. And we’re going to have to work together. ‘But first, I’ve got those debriefings.’ He glanced to the door. ‘By all accounts, Elsa Lindgren’s the one to ask about everything going on aboard. She seems friendly.’

Beckett’s eyes narrowed. ‘She is.’

Graelin gave a thoughtful nod. ‘Then I look forward to working with her closely.’ He turned to the door, waving only a vague hand over his shoulder as he left. ‘Write up the full report on this transponder. I need to know everything about it, not just what you thought Rourke needed to know. If you’re not going to work with me, Nate, you still have to answer to me.’

Then he left, leaving Beckett grinding his teeth together. It seemed no matter where he went, his father was never as far away as he wanted.

Entering the office that had once belonged to Davir Airex set a tension to Valance’s throat she wished she could banish. He had kept his decorations minimalist, tasteful; the discreet suggestion of class and culture without working too hard to demonstrate his education and interests. All of that had been taken with him, and young Nate Beckett hadn’t brought in more than a novelty coffee cup. Still the archaeologist’s mug sat on the desk, ‘My career lies in ruins,’ stencilled on the side, the only decoration until Petrias Graelin made his mark.

The new science officer sat behind the desk, sipping from a glass cup of green tea. ‘Commander Valance. Glad you could swing by.’ He waved a hand at the seat opposite. ‘Don’t think there’s much need for us to stand on ceremony.’

Valance cautiously drew up the chair. ‘If this is meeting is for the debriefing, Commander Graelin, I’d rather we did this by the book.’

‘It is the debriefing. But I’ve read your reports. Unless there’s anything to add, we don’t need to go over events again.’ He tapped a PADD on the desk. ‘You enforced order on the bridge when Captain Rourke ordered the destruction of the Erem and assumed Tactical when Lieutenant Kharth refused. The rescue mission to Tagrador was your decision and your design. And on Ephrath, you rescued the Kalvath’s away team.’

She felt the silence as he watched her; knew what he was doing. The absence of a question invited her to volunteer whatever was on her mind. At length, she said, ‘I don’t think there’s anything I want to add, no.’

Graelin gave a slow nod. ‘Teros and the Erem must have been difficult for you.’

‘Of course.’

‘I mean, for the last three years you served under Leo MacCallister. I don’t expect he’d have ordered the destruction of a defenceless ship.’

‘I’m not privy to what classified data informed Captain Rourke’s decisions, so I’m not going to theorise what Captain MacCallister would or would not have done.’

‘They’re still very different men. Very different commanders. I’ve met MacCallister, he was a fine officer and a fine diplomat.’

‘He still is.’

Graelin gave a self-conscious smile. ‘Of course. But Matt Rourke’s a peacekeeper, which is a polite way of saying he hunts down bad guys. You’ve seen him in action against the Wild Hunt, against the D’Ghor. He doesn’t shy away from shooting first, asking questions later. That had to be on your mind when he ordered the Erem’s destruction.’

‘Captain Rourke might not shy away from violence, but he has my full trust. He thinks through his options and doesn’t make his choices lightly. And I know this, because he discusses those decisions with me.’

‘Except for in the recent crisis, with those classified orders. And a snap-second decision to make about the Erem.’ Graelin picked up his PADD and flicked to a new screen she couldn’t see. ‘His decisiveness seems to have rubbed off on you, looking at Tagrador.’

‘The rescue mission to Tagrador was my decision. Not his.’

‘I don’t doubt that. But after reading your personnel record… I must say I’m surprised you did it. Especially without consulting Command.’ He shrugged. ‘Your assessments under MacCallister and as far back as the Paris all highlight your patience, your respect for the chain of command, your sensible caution. Unilaterally taking Endeavour into Romulan territory to assault a prison camp is the sort of brash action that got you in trouble in the past in your career.’

‘You’re talking about Plutark.’

‘You ordered a dangerous rescue there, and things went wrong,’ Graelin said simply. ‘People died. It looks like you changed as a result, learned from that brashness. Then you’re Rourke’s XO and… this happens.’

Valance drew a slow breath. ‘If you’re suggesting he’s a bad influence on me, Commander, then that’s very thoughtful of you. But until I’m reprimanded for Tagrador, I’m not going to consider the rescue mission a bad decision.’

He lifted his hands. ‘I’m not suggesting it was, not at all. I’m curious about who I’m going to be working with, that’s all. Your records and your behaviour paint different pictures. It makes me want to understand you.’ And he was learning more about her with every button he pushed, she knew, with every reaction he provoked. ‘I’m glad you’re satisfied with Rourke’s leadership. Like I said, I bet he was a bit of a shock to the system after MacCallister.’

‘I had to adjust,’ she admitted. ‘But it’s good for an officer to be pushed. Captain Rourke pushes me.’

‘It looks like he’s been pretty supportive,’ Graelin said, gesturing to the PADD. At her curious look, he gave a smile that made her back tense. ‘I mean, not every CO would be happy with their XO being in a relationship with their Chief Engineer, especially since Commander Cortez is so high in the chain of command. It clearly put him in a bind, considering he made a junior lieutenant like Thawn second officer, and not her, after Commander Airex left.’

‘I think he was also in a bind with Lieutenants Kharth and Rhade in the brig.’

‘But Cortez still had seniority.’ Graelin tilted his head. ‘Was he apprehensive of your relationship getting in the way of your duties?’

Valance had to force herself to not shift. ‘I led the away team to Ephrath II, and there was no suggestion from the captain that Commander Cortez wouldn’t be my second there. Before Ephrath, I believe he wanted a bridge officer as second officer.’ But the last came a little weaker. Whatever excuses and apologies Rourke had given for keeping her at arm’s length, the fact remained Thawn’s appointment over Cortez could only have been motivated by their relationship, and protecting himself from the two of them being a united front against him.

Graelin watched her with an infuriatingly calm air, and she knew being taciturn still spoke volumes. If there was a good explanation, she’d have doubtless given it. ‘It’s still a difficult line to walk, professionally. For you, I mean, Commander. Dating a subordinate.’

She’d straightened before she could stop herself. ‘Is this relevant to your debriefing? I wasn’t aware there’d been any reason to make note of my personal relationship with Commander Cortez in our operations at Teros, Tagrador, or Ephrath.’ She was playing into his hands, she knew, but Cortez was a sore enough spot right then that she couldn’t bite down on the resentment that raised its head every time someone suggested she couldn’t keep her feelings and her duty separate.

Once again, he’d lifted his hands in surrender, as if she was jumping to bite off his head while he was merely asking questions. ‘This isn’t a grilling. Endeavour’s been through some heavy things recently. If I’m going to help the crew with what comes next, it’s useful for me to understand the context – your context.’

‘Then if you don’t need anything else for your formal debriefing, Commander Graelin,’ she said coldly, ‘I have work to do. And I should let you get settled in here.’

Graelin gave a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, though she saw no trace of dissatisfaction. ‘Then thanks for your time, Commander Valance. Looking forward to working with you.’

It was hard to keep her body language measured as she left. He’d assessed her for her loyalty to Rourke, tried to rattle it by suggesting his influence was bad for her professionalism and career, then tested the waters on how both she and her captain viewed a personal relationship that could undermine her capacity to do her job properly.

Worse, Valance knew she’d given him plenty of answers.

With the lounge out of action, Thawn had to pop into the officer’s mess for a cup of tea to start her day. Normally she might have stayed her quarters, but many of the crew had disembarked onto Starbase Bravo, leaving Endeavour quieter and calmer, and it was useful for her to start her day in the company of small crowds. She could sit at one of the stark metal tables, sip her tea, and calmly, methodically establish her telepathic barriers against the buzzing of thoughts and feelings around her.

This meant she felt the walking ball of tense apprehension that was Adamant Rhade before he walked in, and her eyes were on him as he arrived at her table. Wordlessly, she pushed out the chair opposite with her foot.

‘I hope you’ve got a moment for me,’ he said quietly. ‘I understand you have a lot on right now.’

‘There’s always a lot on,’ she pointed out as levelly as she could. ‘Is that why you’ve not been around?’

‘I felt you’d made it clear you didn’t want to talk during the crisis.’ He watched as she said nothing but sipped her tea. ‘Rosara, I never meant to hurt you.’

‘I believe you,’ she said, and not only because she could feel the awkward sincerity rolling off him. It reminded her to clamp down more on her own feelings, lest they betray her. ‘That would have taken you considering me at all.’

‘I think that’s a little harsh.’

‘Is it? I don’t expect you to think of me when you’re on the bridge making a stand. But you made a vast decision about your entire future without so much as speaking to me. Then changed your mind again, for reasons which had nothing to do with me.’

His jaw tightened. ‘The mission to Tagrador needed me.’

‘Endeavour needed you at Jhorkesh – Chief Kowalski almost died there – but that didn’t stir you. Nor did the disruption on Teros.’ Her throat tightened with that grief she was so busy packing in a box, because she was exhausted by its bitter familiarity.

He looked confused for a minute – then his expression cleared with dawning horror. ‘Rosara, I cannot imagine how hurt you are about the loss of Connor Drake, but you can’t suggest that he would have lived if Lieutenant Kharth and I weren’t in the brig.’

‘We don’t know that,’ she said, sipping her tea to mask her expression. ‘But none of that – not Connor dying, not Kowalski nearly dying – motivated you. No. It took the captain getting captured. It took Lieutenant Dathan being captured.’

Rhade straightened. ‘Lieutenant Dathan is only a friend -’

‘Great Fire, Adamant, I’m not jealous,’ she snapped. ‘Not like that. You might be able to get away with doing whatever you like until our arrangement is formalised, but what bothers me is -’ Thawn stopped herself, hearing the words she was about to say, hearing how petty they sounded. She took a deep breath. ‘I think it was naive of you to assume you could stay in the brig and nobody would be hurt by your absence. I’m not angry you wanted to save the captain and Lieutenant Dathan from death at the hands of the Romulans. I’m angry you didn’t think ahead, and I’m angry you didn’t listen to me.’

He looked away as his brow furrowed. ‘You’re not the first person to call my behaviour naive here,’ he admitted. ‘I’m not accustomed to that.’

Her gaze dropped, and she fidgeted with the mug. ‘I just – either we’re working out how and what a future together would look like, or we’re not even trying and we’re just waiting out the clock until our families can politely forget the whole arrangement. You’ve been behaving like it’s the latter.’

Now he looked back, the frown still there. ‘I’m not going to defend my behaviour – but what did you mean, I can “get away with doing whatever I like”? I’ve never asked you to hold back or stay celibate or anything like that on my account.’

The fizz of anger that shot through her veins at that was unexpected, and strong enough she saw him sense it at once. Her grip on the teacup tightened. ‘Then I suppose our families aren’t the same, Adamant,’ Thawn said through gritted teeth. Then she slammed the cup down and stood. ‘You know what? Do whatever you like. Carry on as you have been. I don’t know how to explain to you that you should at least pretend to care about me, or my wellbeing, or my future.’

He’d turned to stop her, but she’d spoken too loudly in the quiet officers’ mess, and too many pairs of eyes were watching for him to do anything that might make it more of a scene. She felt his mind reach out to hers, a gentle, pleading touch to stop, listen, communicate through thought where there was no misunderstanding. But she brushed it off as she stalked out the door, not trusting her own self-control.

The Communications Department offices were next door to the Operations Section, and nobody stopped her from busting into Lindgren’s office with barely a tap on the door-chime.

‘Fine,’ Thawn spat once the doors shut behind her. ‘I will go clubbing with you and the rest.’

Lindgren’s eyes widened a little. ‘What on Earth has happened?’

‘Nothing!’ Thawn said unconvincing vitriol. ‘I’ve just… been working. A lot. It might be nice.’

Lindgren tilted back in her chair. ‘Is this the kind of thing where I should wait and let you drink and get weepy or angry, or should I definitely find out first so I can stop you from drinking until you’re weepy or angry?’

‘I don’t -’ Thawn shut her mouth. ‘It’s nothing new. I spoke to Adamant. It was as awful as you’d expect. That’s all.’ Lindgren looked like she didn’t know what she expected, but Thawn waved a dismissive hand. ‘We’ll talk when we’re two bars in. Anyway, who’s this new Chief Science Officer who wants to meet with me?’

‘Oh, Commander Graelin booked in time with you?’ There was an unusual edge to Lindgren’s voice which Thawn might have better understood had she been less furious. ‘When?’

‘Not for a couple of days.’ Thawn frowned as Lindgren looked relieved. ‘What’s going on?’

‘He’s been sent to debrief us. But I think it’s fine; why would Starfleet also assign him as our new second officer? It’s clearly procedural. Anyway, why are you assuming I’d know anything?’

Thawn blinked. ‘Because you always know anything remotely gossipy. It’s not deep, Elsa. Except you’re now being weird about it.’

‘I’m seeing him soon,’ Lindgren said rather too lightly, ‘so I’ll let you know if there’s anything you need to worry about. You shouldn’t worry, though.’

‘That’s easy for you to say,’ Thawn murmured. ‘But fine. You can warn me over drinks. Do we have to bring Beckett?’

‘Nate’s fun,’ Lindgren chided gently. ‘And he’s not here, Rosara, you don’t have to pretend you hate him.’

‘I’m not pretending. Some of us have to work hard for what we have. I don’t need him swanning around while I have to be on my best behaviour.’

‘Then we can complain about that, too, over drinks.’ Lindgren pointed at the door. ‘If you’re not going to gossip yet, then you need to work. Or you won’t do anything when we’re out except for fret about how you’ve not got everything done yet.’

Thawn tilted her nose up as she left. ‘Bold of you to assume I won’t do that anyway.’

‘Oh, this is… cute. Sir.’

Rourke tried to fight a grumpy expression as he looked at his new yeoman. ‘It’s not – this is your desk. Not my desk. You sit out here.’

There were two entrances to his ready room: the one from the bridge he used all the time, and what was technically the ‘main’ door in the small Deck 1 foyer where his yeoman could act as threshold guardian. Arys had booked a staff meeting with his new department at what turned out to be the same time as his successor boarded for her induction, and Rourke was beginning to regret his insistence he could show Petty Officer Nestari around himself.

She was now looking at him like he’d sprouted a second head. ‘I know, sir. It’s smaller than I expected. But it’s fine. I’ll make it work.’ She swept to the desk, which Arys had kept meticulously, somewhat depressingly bare. ‘With a spot of decoration.’

Admiral Beckett had plucked her, he reminded himself, from the administrative pool on Starbase Bravo. She was used to a station and its expansive offices, not the tight confines of a ship like Endeavour. And still he was sure he could hear a sneer in her voice. ‘We’ll be operating beyond Federation territory, receiving local leaders and foreign officials. We should keep it businesslike.’

Nestari looked back with a smile he was sure was patronising. ‘None of the ambassadors visiting SBB complained about how we kept the place, Captain. Don’t you worry.’

Rourke had been in Starfleet a long time. He knew better than to annoy the administrative staff, even when they were young enough to be his daughter. Treat the admin right, he’d learnt, and they’d help you bury the body. So even though Nestari was young and pretty and unassuming in build, don’t you worry still meant leave me alone, sir and he wasn’t going to argue.

Perhaps he would return to find his foyer redecorated. Perhaps he would find her ruling access to his office with an iron fist. Either way, he wasn’t going to linger as she settled in.

A check-in with the computer told him Sadek was in Sickbay, and he made his way there with some confusion; his medical officer was not prone to lingering on board when there was shore leave of any form to be had. He found her there stood before the biobeds, speaking and gesturing as she showed around an officer who had his back to Rourke when he came in. Tall and lean, he wore a blue uniform, and it was only when Rourke drew closer that the other man turned and he was confronted with a Cardassian face.

Rourke stopped short and Sadek side-stepped, her voice going up a pitch he knew meant she was managing him. ‘…and this is our captain. Captain Rourke, meet Doctor Elvad. He’ll be replacing Doctor Awan down here.’

Doctor Awan had ably served as Endeavour’s assistant chief medical officer since before either of them had come aboard, and Sadek had grumbled all the way through recommending her for an advancement that had finally come. But Elvad was news to Rourke, who had to steel his expression as he faced the new arrival. ‘Doctor. Welcome aboard.’

If Elvad noticed Rourke’s discomfort, he didn’t show it. Square-featured and straight-backed, his hair had more of an artful tousle than Rourke expected of a Cardassian, and when he spoke it was with a languid, detached drawl. ‘Captain. Tidy little ship you have here.’

This was the second new arrival in ten minutes who had made his ship sound quaint, and Rourke’s temper was already fraying. ‘We do enough real work that we’ll keep your busy. You’ve got big boots to fill if you’re taking over from Awan.’

‘Worry not, Captain.’ Elvad’s eyes raked across Sickbay, which suddenly felt rather small under his imperious gaze. ‘I have large feet.’ He turned back to Sadek. ‘I thank you for the tour, Doctor Sadek, but I think I’ve rather grasped the measure of the place and space. I’m sure I can take it from here.’

Sadek looked like she was going to say something more – then shut her mouth and shrugged. ‘If you say so. I’ve got lunch with the captain anyway. Enjoy settling in.’

Rourke let her grab his arm and lead her out of Sickbay. ‘We’re doing lunch?’

‘I’ve been with him for ten minutes and I already know I’m going to need every possible excuse to not be around that man. He’s insufferable,’ she hissed. That, she seemed prepared to say when feasibly in earshot of someone, because only now did she check the corridor to make sure the coast was clear. ‘Are you alright with him aboard?’

‘Me?’ He winced. ‘Yeah, yeah, fine. A Cardassian face took me by surprise, that’s all. Can’t say he’s the first thing I want to see after coming to on a biobed, but, modern age and all that. Is he an arse, though? I thought you were getting that shit-hot epidemiologist?’

‘He got headhunted out from under me, went off for a more plum assignment. So instead I get Elvad, cardiothoracic xeno-surgeon someone in Starfleet Medical thinks needs more front-line experience, or some crap like that. Obviously he thinks he’s too good for the likes of us. We’ll see how he feels when the Hazard Team’s day goes wrong.’

‘You’re not supposed to sound eager about that happening,’ he pointed out. ‘But speaking of complete pricks, did you hear who Beckett’s foisted on me in science?’

‘Petey Graelin?’ She rolled her eyes. ‘You weren’t being enough of a good dog to the admiral, so he sent Graelin to teach you how to yap?’

‘To spy on us, I expect. Joke’s on him; I’m not running a den of lies and secrets like he would. I’ll manage Graelin, but expect him to come simpering up to you soon, acting like you were best mates.’

‘He’s not that self-important. Last we spoke, I told him I hope his dick drops off. Don’t forget to hide the young and pretty junior officers.’

Rourke stopped at that, again glancing up and down the corridor. ‘Wait, what?’

She tilted her head at him. ‘He’s a flirt with young women. Regardless of rank disparity. He was never off-off, but he’d use them for attention or information. Did you really not know about that? He was one of those known quantities on the Achilles…’ Her voice trailed off, and she winced as they both heard the unspoken words. Graelin had been a known quantity for the women.

Rourke squared his shoulders. ‘Well. I expect he’s already got my new yeoman – who’s, like, twelve and seems to think I’m an old man put out to pasture – as his spy. Thawn’s too uptight for him to get anywhere, and Elsa’s too smart. But I’ll keep an eye on him.’

‘I’ll keep my ear to the ground,’ Sadek promised. Then she padded to a halt and looked up and down the corridor they’d wandered along. ‘We’re not going anywhere. I made us walk to get away from Elvad. What did you actually come down here for?’

‘Oh.’ Rourke scratched his beard as he contemplated how much of a problem Petrias Graelin would be, then shoved the thoughts to one side. He respected his officers to look after themselves. ‘I saw the arboretum on Bravo’s doing this play in the park thing on evenings. “Open air” performances, book ahead and you get a whole picnic setup. It’s Arsenic and Old Lace tonight; I thought we’d bring something from your stash of real wine and laugh ourselves sick.’

She narrowed her eyes. ‘That’s dangerously normal of you, Matt. What’s going on?’

‘I’m suggesting we spend time together. I didn’t realise that was odd.’

‘Admiral Beckett’s crawling all over your arse and Petrias Graelin’s been assigned to your ship, not to mention the myriad reasons you have for being stressed and upset.’ Sadek poked him suspiciously in the chest. ‘Hm. Probably not a hologram.’

‘I’d still be solid if I were, what, a happy hologram of me?’

‘Happy’s a strong word. It’s still suspicious.’ She looked him up and down. ‘Fine. A play in the park sounds nice. But try to get real wine from somewhere else. My stash is for special occasions. If you’re cheering up, you’ll start inventing more of those, and then where will my emergency supply be?’

‘Drunk, like wine should be?’

‘Not good wine. It’s there to sit on my shelf so I can show off how cultured I am, and only crack it open for people I want to impress. I’ve known you for twenty-five years, Matt, I don’t need to impress you.’ But she sighed, smile turning wry. ‘This looks good on you.’

‘Drinking your wine? I thought so.’ He smirked. ‘We’ve got a break, Aisha. I’m trying to take them when they happen. They’ll be gone before you know it.’

‘Thank you for those reassuring words,’ said Sadek, pretending to sober. ‘That cynicism is much more like you.’

The arboretum on Starbase Bravo was perhaps its most particular treat for anyone who’d been living on a ship for months. Everything else was still part of the spacer’s life; even the most opulent establishment still didn’t have windows to a real view, or it could be emulated on Endeavour’s holodeck. But however much the skies and borders of this green space were a holographic lie, everything else was real enough to make it count.

But then, Saeihr Kharth had grown up in a city and then on a sandy refugee world, so her grasp of real greenery was skewed. It made the arboretum a good place to go for a run, regardless. The dirt underfoot. The steady thud of each pace. The sound of her breathing mingled with the rustling of leaves and the distant chirrups of birds. It felt right. The brig had dampened her enthusiasm for being alone, but finally that sense of reconnecting with herself when nobody else was around was returning. At length her circuit took her back around to the path out of the arboretum, and she slowed as she approached the gate beyond which its illusions would fade. That sense of reconnecting with herself faded, too, at the sight of the tall, wiry figure of Commander Graelin waiting for her.

They had never met, but even with many of Endeavour’s crew on shore leave, news of his arrival had spread through the ship like wildfire. Kharth knew enough to be cautious, approaching with her hands on her hips, gaze challenging. ‘Here to interrupt my run, Commander?’

Graelin had been leaning against a fence, and straightened. ‘I was waiting until you were done. Saw you heading in, so thought I’d take a turn about the pond while I still could. You got a minute, Lieutenant?’

‘What if I say I don’t?’

‘Then it’ll turn out my asking was just a courtesy and you’d be making me awfully rude.’ His unapologetic smile did not reach his eyes. ‘I need to talk with all the senior staff before we’re underway, after all.’

‘You couldn’t have invited me down to your office, or let me shower first?’ She ran a hand through her hair, the back of her head slick with sweat.

‘Thought it’d be best if our talk at least starts off-the-book.’ Graelin gestured down the path to the pond. ‘Let’s walk.’

If he wanted to catch her off-guard, she had to acknowledge it was effectively done. Still she followed with tense shoulders. ‘Is there something you need that my reports didn’t cover?’

‘How’re you feeling about getting thrown in the brig for not slaughtering a ship in cold blood?’

Kharth fixed her gaze on the horizon. The arboretum was less of a welcome illusion all of a sudden. ‘Captain Rourke must have had his reasons for giving those orders.’

‘You say that now. At the time, you refused.’

‘You weren’t there, Commander. Everything happened fast. And I’ve taken the JAG arrangement accepting I was in the wrong.’

‘Yeah. Captain Rourke doesn’t seem to have finished deciding what he’s gonna do to you about that.’ Graelin scratched his chin. ‘That sounds stressful.’

‘The captain will get to it in good time,’ she said, trying to sound more convinced than she felt.

‘You still didn’t answer my first question.’

She stopped and turned to face him. ‘The situation’s over. Either Captain Rourke can choose to keep me, or he can choose to ship me off. Is my opinion really relevant?’

‘It’s not just Captain Rourke’s decision to make.’ He tilted his head. ‘So maybe my opinion is relevant, Lieutenant, and you should indulge me. Admiral Beckett recommended you for this posting, and I should let him know if his faith is misplaced.’

Her mouth went dry. She hadn’t formally turned her back on Beckett, but they hadn’t talked in some time, she hadn’t forwarded him her thoughts or reports, and she’d dared to do so only because of Rourke’s assurances of protection. If Teros had cost her that, the situation was worse than she’d feared. She tilted her chin up and tried to not sound small. ‘What’s your question, Commander?’

His smile made her neck itch. ‘Captain Rourke ordered you to shoot down a ship of your own people in cold blood, then threw you in the brig for it and said you could fight a losing public battle or acknowledge fault and probably eat a reprimand. The crisis is now over. Why are you still here, Lieutenant?’

Where else would I go? Her shoulders squared. ‘Chief of Security on a ship like Endeavour is pretty good for my rank and experience.’

‘And record. So is that it? Careerism?’

‘I’d like to think my relationship with Captain Rourke is more than one bad day.’

‘I don’t know if Rourke thinks that.’ Graelin’s gaze softened, though she didn’t trust it. ‘Admiral Beckett spoke highly of you to me. He’s always taken an interest in your wellbeing, not just your work, you know. He’d like it if I looked out for you.’

‘You can look out for me by not suggesting you’ll pull me off this ship.’

‘Then work with me, Saeihr,’ he said, stepping forward, and her back went tense at his sudden familiarity. ‘With my support, neither Admiral Beckett nor Captain Rourke will think of shunting you along. It’s good that you’ve trusted Rourke, but you’re more pragmatic than that, aren’t you? Relying on trust and goodwill is dangerous. Those can disappear at any moment.’

Her eyes narrowed. ‘You read my records and now you think you know me?’

‘I know you because we’re more alike than you think. My world’s come a long way, but it takes more than some Federation mandates and a hundred years to do away with centuries of haves and have-nots. Nobody ever expected anything of me, nobody ever gave me anything for free, either. You get what you have through skill and bartering.’ He tilted his head at her. ‘You did that with Beckett. But he’s not on Endeavour. I am.’

Her throat had tightened as he spoke, and for all of his manipulations, for all he’d gone to great lengths to demonstrate the power he held over her job and prospects, worst of all, she didn’t think he was lying. She knew hunger in someone’s eyes when she saw it. It was not something she’d ever seen in the eyes of Matt Rourke when he kindly insisted he would protect her against Beckett, whatever the cost to him or whatever she did.

‘You’re right,’ she said at length. ‘Nobody does anything for nothing. So what does your support cost?’

His smile was tight, satisfied, and however predatory it was, it was sincere. ‘Just remember this conversation, for now. I’ll make my report, and point out you upheld Starfleet morals in a tense and unprecedented situation. I’ll recommend you not just stay in your post, but also that you don’t receive a reprimand. After all, your record could do without another one of them if you want to make Lieutenant Commander some time this decade?’

It was not rank that held an allure for her in itself, but rank and status brought with them security and safety. Her jaw tightened as she nodded. ‘I’ll remember this conversation.’

‘Good.’ Graelin’s smile finally changed for sunshine and charm. ‘It’s good to have friends, Saeihr. It’s good to treat your friends well.’

He let her go at that, and she was relieved she’d talked her way into using the nearby security station’s lockers and bathrooms. She needed to shower off more than the sweat of her run before she changed back into uniform.

She returned to the security office on Endeavour and with some dissatisfaction found the very few officers in the bullpen included Commander Valance, stood at Lieutenant Juarez’s desk in a conversation she could tell was just killing time.

Valance turned at her arrival, eyebrow arching. ‘Lieutenant. You were supposed to be back here five minutes ago.’

Kharth tried to not grind her teeth. ‘Commander Graelin wanted a word. I’m supposed to cooperate with him in his review, no?’

That dimmed Valance’s expression even more, and Kharth realised all she had achieved was to put the XO in a worse mood. ‘Your office,’ she said curtly and led the way.

Kharth rolled her eyes at Juarez, aware his smile was the cheerful politeness of a junior officer who didn’t want to get involved, and followed into the next room. ‘I didn’t know we had anything so urgent it couldn’t wait five minutes while we’re docked.’

Valance stopped before Kharth’s desk and rounded on her with tense shoulders. ‘I expect all officers, but especially senior staff, to be punctual in all affairs. Especially the Chief of Security manning the security office.’

‘Sure. Let’s see if that duty roster you need me to sign off on has combusted because I got waylaid heading back.’ Kharth sat behind her desk and tossed a random PADD to the side. ‘Oh look, it didn’t.’

‘I need you to take this seriously, Lieutenant.’

‘No, you need something to hold over me because you don’t like me.’ Sparring with Graelin had not only thinned her patience, but it had reminded her that Valance’s disapproval was very, very low on the list of things she had to worry about. ‘Why is that, again, Commander? Did you take against me that badly because I was late to your first morning briefing?’

Valance folded her arms across her chest. ‘I expect this crew to meet certain standards, and you routinely disappoint me.’

‘Or you nitpick my mistakes and jump down my throat because… I’m still not sure why.’ Kharth gave an exaggerated shrug, and resisted the urge to glare. ‘Look, Valance. Teros sucked. For both of us. And I guess I’m sorry that I made it messier for you, and I don’t think you did anything wrong there. But you’ve not tried to beat Rhade with a stick about it, so I’m kind of done being in the doghouse when you’re so clearly making this personal.’

‘Rhade isn’t the Chief of Security.’ Valance’s shoulders squared. ‘You’re responsible for this ship’s safety, this crew’s safety; you have to act in a crisis, above and beyond anyone else. This ship has suffered losses, and then you came aboard with a seeming disinterest in anyone else’s idea on how you should do your job. Nothing I’ve seen since has convinced me you’re the team player we need.’

‘On Lockstowe I saved Airex and Carraway,’ said Kharth, counting off on her fingers. ‘I led the Hazard Team to rescue civilians from the Wild Hunt, I manned Tactical at Elgatis, at Haydorian, at Taldir…’

‘You almost left Captain Rourke to die to the Wild Hunt, the D’Ghor boarded at Elgatis and almost killed Commander Airex, who after working with you on Teros suddenly demanded a transfer -’

‘There it is.’ Kharth straightened, feeling anger begin to fizz in her veins. ‘Davir Airex. He left and you blame me. I’d say sorry, but I gave up a long time ago taking responsibility for anything that man does.’

Valance’s gaze subsided with a surly edge, and Kharth knew she wasn’t wildly off the mark. ‘I disliked you long before he left, Lieutenant.’

‘Sure. But you know what? If Captain Rourke’s happy with my work, then that’s good enough. And if it’s not good enough, Commander Graelin’s happy with my work and Admiral Beckett’s happy with my work.’ Kharth tilted her chin up, eyes blazing. Valance didn’t need to know how much she’d toyed with an admiral’s support, didn’t need to know Graelin had just forced her hand. If the new science officer wanted her to back him, then he’d made it clear that went both ways. ‘And, you know, Cortez likes me right now…’

Valance went stiff in a way which made Kharth suspect she’d gone too far, but after being blamed for Airex’s behaviour, she wasn’t sure she cared. ‘You’re out of line, Lieutenant.’

‘Right.’ Kharth leaned back. ‘You’re allowed to smack me with personal business, but turnabout’s not fair play? Perks of rank?’ She stood, and extended a PADD across the desk. ‘Get me that duty roster. I’ll sign it. And stop coming down here to kick me around when you’re in a bad mood, Commander. I’m done being your punching bag.’

She wasn’t sure if it was the mention of Cortez or Graelin that had pushed Valance off-balance enough to make her take the retort, take the PADD, and leave without further comment. But Kharth suspected she was going to pay for it from someone anyway.

Kharth gritted her teeth. ‘It’s good to have friends,’ she echoed to herself, and wondered how good a friend she was being by kicking Cortez’s partner around because she was in a bad mood. She glared at the wall. ‘Damn it.’

‘Damn it.’ Nate Beckett kept muttering to himself as he hurried along the upper promenade of SB Bravo, fidgeting with the shirt collar he desperately wanted to loosen. This won him a steely, suspicious look as he crossed the threshold of Vandorin’s Bistro and came face-to-face with the receptionist, stood as a sentinel at the front desk of the station’s most high-class and exclusive dining establishment.

‘I really am supposed to be here,’ Nate blurted. ‘I’m just late.’

The receptionist’s gaze did not ease. Being late for a reservation at Vandorin’s often meant finding somewhere new to eat. ‘Name?’

He sighed inwardly. ‘Beckett.’

The receptionist didn’t even need to check his list. ‘The admiral is -’

‘Already here, sure, for a party of two? I’m the two.’

Now the other man faltered. ‘Oh, Mister Beckett, of course – right this way…’

Nate let himself be ushered in. He didn’t know if the pivot to obsequiousness was better or worse than the hint of sneering disapproval, but there was no time for such concerns as he followed. Vandorin’s Bistro prided itself on the best food and best service in the system and a waiting list for a table a mile long. Of course, the Director of Fourth Fleet Intelligence could get a dinner reservation with the snap of his fingers.

Still, it would have cost Alexander Beckett at least some capital with Esterra Vandorin to get a table at a day’s notice, and the message was not lost on his son. It was the same message Alexander always issued: Remember that I am important. Remember all that I’ve done for you.

‘I got it from here, thanks,’ Nate said bluntly as he spotted his destination. ‘You’re alright, pal.’

Vice Admiral Alexander Beckett had already ordered wine and had two glasses filled by the time Nate slid into the chair across from him. He was silent for a moment, taking a long sip, and smacked his lips with an air of calculated indifference before he set the glass down. ‘I assume there was a delay on Endeavour, some urgent business for Petrias, or trouble at the airlock?’

No, thought Nate as he fidgeted. I just didn’t want to come. ‘Hi, Dad,’ he said instead. ‘Wow, we’ve not seen each other since I graduated; how’ve you been?’

Admiral Beckett arched an eyebrow. ‘It was very good of Esterra to make a table available for us. I would hate to repay that favour with rudeness.’

‘I’ll just be double-charming when she inevitably comes out to fuss us herself, because it’s such an inconvenience for a gossip-monger like her to host the father-son show of Fourth Fleet Intel.’ Nate shrugged and grabbed his wine. ‘Betazoid wine, I assume? You’re getting predictable.’ He had a slug, because a little wine went a long way soothing his fizzing nerves.

‘It’s a Betazoid establishment. But yes. From a surface-side vineyard.’ Admiral Beckett gave an affected sigh. ‘If I’m keeping you from important duties, you should say.’

You’re keeping me from a night out with Elsa and the rest, Nate thought resentfully, though in truth the others wouldn’t be heading out for a couple of hours and he could easily catch them up by the second bar, if this went with the brevity he expected. But he knew that wasn’t his father’s point. ‘Commander Cortez and I are elbow-deep in collating our findings on Ephrath for publication,’ he said. This was an exaggeration; he and Cortez probably would put something together, but there was the unspoken commitment to quietly recovering from the last month first. ‘But I can keep my schedule open for one evening.’

Admiral Beckett’s lips thinned. ‘I expect Commander Cortez has closely studied the security guidelines regarding publication of any findings around the Tkon these past weeks.’

‘Yeah, Dad, don’t worry. I know you told me for years that archaeology was a pointless career choice, only for me to be the only one aboard Endeavour with the knowledge to help save the galaxy, or whatever we did. But I can’t publicly brag about it, so nobody can tell you that you’re wrong,’ Nate said soothingly.

He was saved from any sharp rebuke by the predicted arrival of Esterra Vandorin, who was, indeed, delighted to receive the Becketts at her restaurant. Nate assumed a seasoned hostess and a Betazoid would have no difficulty seeing through the sudden veneer of amiability both he and his father assumed the moment anyone else was on the scene, but if so, she didn’t show it.

Wasn’t he a fine young man, didn’t he look so much like his father, wasn’t she delighted to have them here, what a lovely opportunity for a family catch-up and how could she not recommend the oscoid, it’ll pair perfectly with that wine…

The Becketts, in turn, played their parts perfectly. Admiral Beckett was just happy to get an evening with his son after so long; gosh, wasn’t Nate relieved to get a break after his exciting front-line service? The wine was, indeed, good enough that Nate didn’t choke on this theatre, and he gave his father a level look when Esterra finally left with their order, because he was so important she of course had to attend on him herself.

‘Like I said, Dad. Don’t worry. I wouldn’t dream of making a public scene.’

Admiral Beckett’s smile did not reach his eyes. ‘You seem to be under the impression that I’m annoyed by how well you’ve done. The last few years have done you good. An exceptional final year at the Academy, settling down at Starbase 514, and now the last three months on Endeavour…’

‘Yeah,’ Nate said brightly. ‘Captain Rourke’s been a great influence.’

‘Mn. It was good of him to give you that opportunity after Commander Airex’s departure.’

Despite himself, Nate felt his throat tense. He knew what Rourke had been doing, he knew he’d been made acting chief science so Rourke could keep the senior staff under control, and he’d called him out for doing it. It had been entirely about their relationship, mentor and pupil, and almost nothing to do with Alexander Beckett. But even the implication that Rourke had favoured him to please the admiral stung, like it was supposed to sting.

‘Guess he needed an archaeologist,’ Nate said simply. ‘Guess I pulled it off.’

‘It’s why I’m happy you’ll be working under Petrias Graelin. He’s a very good officer.’

‘Yeah, he’s made it clear you sent him to groom me. I guess now you have expectations for my career again, after giving up?’

‘Petrias has many duties ahead of him,’ said Admiral Beckett, ignoring the gibe. ‘Of course they include supporting you; it’s what a good department head should do. And if you want your career to progress, if you want to capitalise on your successes of these past months, you should listen to him. Not solely for his guidance, but because you might want to think twice about keeping yourself tethered to Matt Rourke’s star.’

Nate flexed his hand. ‘Rourke took me under his wing at the Academy. Everyone else set me ridiculous expectations for being your son and then gave up when I didn’t meet them, because they didn’t understand that I didn’t want to be your carbon copy, and they didn’t want to risk pissing you off by letting me do my own thing. He’s the only instructor who helped me find a place for me, instead of trying to shove me into a place for you. And then as soon as he could give me a real job, a real assignment, he got me one. So why the hell am I turning my back on him now, Dad?’

Admiral Beckett’s expression had not offered an iota of emotion through this outburst. ‘I dare say we haven’t seen the fallout for Teros and Tagrador yet,’ he said levelly. ‘And Rourke’s next moves are… ambitious. One step wrong and I expect he will have to answer for a good deal.’

‘You say that like you couldn’t protect him if you wanted to.’

‘Choices have consequences.’ Admiral Beckett’s steely gaze met his son’s. ‘You might feel righteous for loyalty, Nathaniel, but you’re a young, unproven officer. The Tkon incident has given you a feather in your cap, but that alone won’t keep your career moving forward. If Rourke falls, right now, he’ll take you with him, and as you seem so intent on not wanting my help, worry not. I won’t lift a finger to save you from returning to a backwater like Starbase 514, spending the next ten years doing anthropological studies of barely post-warp worlds of absolutely no consequence.’

In hours, days to come, Nate would think of a hundred different defiant responses to excoriate his father’s cynicism. He would sit at his desk and think of the right cutting, insightful words, or inspiration would strike in the shower on how to deflect and defeat. But in the moment, with those cold eyes on him, he was twelve years old again, reminded of how he’d not done well enough in his latest school test or sports game, and to say the wrong thing was to invite the fall of the hammer of Alexander Beckett’s quiet anger.

He swallowed, and when his voice came, it was quieter than he could stand. ‘What do you suggest, then? I forget him and crawl after Graelin?’

‘That you listen to Petrias, Nathaniel, and to me. That’s all I ever asked of you.’ Somehow, Admiral Beckett said this with a straight face. ‘You want your own career, your own place? You have to make it. Be the consummate, well-rounded officer, with the right contacts. Service on Endeavour might be exciting now, but if you rest on your laurels, commit to studying ancient relics on a gunship like her under someone like Rourke – Rourke, who was nowhere two years ago, a defeated has-been who got his command staff killed…’ Admiral Beckett shook his head with a click of the tongue. ‘You want to be your own man, Nathaniel? Then be it. Don’t be a child who acts just to spite me.’

Nate didn’t know if he was spared or not by their first course arriving, and at once his father’s expression had moved from cold steel to that mask of controlled courtesies, where he could spare a quick word of approval for the staff and the food like this wasn’t a mere interlude in slicing through all of his son’s defence mechanisms.

And once the waiter was gone, it was as if none of this had happened as Admiral Beckett picked up his first shell of oscoid. ‘You’ll be pleased to hear,’ he said in a cool, condescending tone, ‘that your brother has settled in rather well at the school here on Bravo.’

He’s not my brother, Nate wanted to spit with a venom that eight year-old Alistair absolutely did not deserve. If Alexander wanted his sons to be close, wanted his eldest son to be part of the family, he could have invited him to his opulent quarters, sat him down to dinner with Alistair and his young, second wife Iona in a quiet, private space. Instead they were here, Vandorin’s, where Admiral Beckett could be seen casually having dinner with his eldest son, who’d be an up-and-coming young officer if he followed his father’s endless wisdom.

‘I’m glad,’ Nate said instead, voice still rather low. And reached for the wine.

Lindgren was still tackling the buckle on her shoe when her console blatted at her, and she had to hop across her room to see the screen. ‘Oh, come on, Rosara,’ she muttered as she read the message. The plan had been for Thawn to stop by her quarters and for them to head to Bravo together, but the inevitable work-based delay had struck. Lindgren wouldn’t have minded, but she’d been prepared for Thawn to not show at all, and the zig-zagging was frustrating.

Some of the junior officers were heading to a bar ahead of the club, but she’d intended to start with Thawn somewhere else, applying drinks and thumbscrews and finding out what was wrong so it didn’t bring the whole party mood down. Lindgren tapped a quick message of acknowledgement and an instruction for Thawn to catch up, finished checking her shoes and hair, and headed out. She could drink with Harkon and the others for a bit first.

When she turned the corner, she saw the turbolift doors ahead begin to shut. ‘Hold up!’ A hand stuck out to stop the lift, and she hurried in to find Petrias Graelin holding the doors. ‘Thanks, Commander.’

He was out of uniform, too, smart-casual in a blazer and patterned shirt. ‘Date night?’ he asked as he looked her over with a grin.

She gave a light laugh as she hopped in the lift and let it carry on its way, both of them heading for the airlock. ‘I wish. Blowing off steam with the junior officers in the No Lieutenants Allowed Club. You?’

‘Dinner and drinks with some friends whose ship just put in.’

She nodded. ‘It’s easy to forget how many ships come through here.’ At his grin, she laughed again. ‘Give me a break, Endeavour’s been away from civilisation – out of Federation territory – the last few months. You forget how busy the core worlds get.’

‘And Bravo’s hardly the core worlds. Just what kind of yokel crew did I join?’ His eyes danced.

‘We’re highly sophisticated, with our one lounge – currently out of action – and two holodecks – permanently booked for departmental training.’ She tilted her nose up, but couldn’t keep the affect for long before she smiled. ‘Meeting the senior staff’s been that bad?’

The turbolift slowed to a halt, and they stepped out together. ‘Not at all. I had some good meetings with Commander Valance and Lieutenant Kharth.’

‘Really?’

‘They’re both very affable women,’ he said with the same grin. ‘Gentle souls, I think.’

She smothered another laugh. ‘You might be the diplomat we need on this ship, Commander.’

‘I’m trying. Tell me the staff gets more mellow from here.’

Lindgren met his gaze, thinking of Cortez and Carraway, but also of Thawn and Arys. ‘I’m not going to lie to you, sir,’ she said, and said nothing more as they reached the airlock, the long corridors of Bravo spilling out beyond.

He was chuckling when they stopped, and jerked his head down one way. ‘My bar’s just off the arboretum, so I’m on the lift up.’

‘We’re scraping the bottom of the barrel on deck forty-five,’ Lindgren said with a smile. ‘Have a good evening, Commander.’

‘You too.’ He took a step back. ‘Drop me a line if you want a night-cap later.’

She made sure to smile and promise nothing as they parted ways, because long nights out tended to have too many twists and turns for anyone to commit to anything after midnight. But it was pleasant to leave the door open and not be left with the hopeful eyes of the young men she usually flirted with, whom she suspected would respond to a prospect like this by going home early and waiting in their quarters with ardent longing for her message that never came.

And she wasn’t going to flirt that hard with the ship’s new second officer.

Lindgren found Harkon and the others in a rather bland lounge on Deck 45, which she suspected they’d ended up in because nobody had made any constructive decisions. There was no bar, just a replicator, and the furnishings shared the same colour and upholstery of the rest of the station. It might as well have been a waiting room for staff between meetings or travellers pausing between shuttles.

Arys brightened up at her arrival more than she wanted to deal with, so it was a relief when Harkon dragged over a young Orion woman. ‘Elsa, this is N’Rana Zherul, Medical Department. I told her we’re the fun gang, so don’t let me down.’

Zherul gave a chirpy grin that filled Lindgren with relief. There were enough sourpusses among the junior officers that she didn’t want another. ‘More fun than the new doctor, who tried to get me to pull an extra shift tonight. When we’re docked and I just got here. As if.’

‘We are the fun gang,’ Lindgren agreed, and looked around. ‘So what are we doing here?’

‘Tar’lek suggested it as a meeting point,’ said Harkon with tired eyes. ‘I say we fix this and the others can catch up.’

Zherul shrugged. ‘There’s a good cocktail bar the next section over. My last ship passed through a few months back.’

This proved a good recommendation, and within ten minutes Lindgren had fired a message to Thawn with the update. Once, she thought wistfully, she’d not felt like the grown-up on outings like this. She’d always been senior staff, always Comms Chief, and it wasn’t as if people stood more on ceremony since she’d made lieutenant. But most of the ensigns who’d arrived on Endeavour with her had moved on, climbing the ranks when she’d already started out a rung up, and Thawn had never been the most sociable of creatures, and now there was a younger generation of new officers to hang out with, even if she was only a couple of years older at most.

But the cocktail bar promised to hide all sins. Dimly-lit but peppered with sparks and dangling threads of neon light, it was a luminescent jungle with low and wide tables that could accommodate them all on short stools. The cocktails had exotic names like a Vorkish Viper and a Black Targ which promised mystery, hangovers, and no insights into what went into them. Athaka fretted about the lack of synthehol, Forrester dragged him because they didn’t have a shift until the following afternoon, and Zherul won extra points by getting the first round in. A wide mix of cocktails balanced on the tray she brought out, which she spun on the table before instructing everyone to grab the first glass in front of them, and this broke most of the anxieties and tensions of young officers who hadn’t been able to relax in far too long.

‘I hear the new doctor’s a bit of a character?’ Lindgren said to Zherul once they were sat down with curved, impractical glasses of brightly-coloured liquids.

‘He’s one of those practitioners who’s clearly got no idea what it’s like to work medical on a front-line ship,’ the Orion officer grumbled. ‘I like Doctor Sadek, though.’

Harkon leaned in from the other side. ‘Sadek’s solid. She acts grumpy but she knows what’s what; she’ll sort him out.’ She looked over to Lindgren. ‘Forget the new doctor, though; isn’t our new science chief supposed to be a complete asshole?’

Lindgren faltered at that, thinking of their perfectly pleasant chat on the lift down. ‘He’s been nice when I’ve talked to him,’ was all she managed to say, wrong-footed by the question. Had she been more prepared, she might have pivoted to get Harkon to explain further, but the pilot seemed to think she’d misstepped and changed the topic.

But the mood was settled, at least, and soon Lindgren finished her drink and headed for the bar. In the gloom she didn’t notice Arys following until he arrived beside her. ‘Did you want another?’ he said a little formally, pointing to her glass.

No, I came to the bar for my health, she didn’t say. Arys was a sweetheart, but he was sometimes hard work. ‘Alright,’ she sighed with a smile. ‘You can get a girl a drink.’

‘I wasn’t – I’m out, too,’ he faltered, gesturing with his glass that he must have downed to join her, because it hadn’t been empty when she’d left the table.

She’d given him an opening, and it had just made him panic. With another sigh, she leaned against the bar. ‘How’s Flight Control treating you, anyway, Tar’lek?’

‘It’s good,’ he said, brightening once he could talk work, which was the last thing she wanted to do. ‘Obviously it’s different to working for the captain, but it’s a small team and I’m enjoying putting in some new drill routines, some new protocols. There’s always a split in these departments between starship pilots and shuttle pilots, in terms of preferences, but I’m trying to get them to mingle…’

She let his words wash over her, smiling politely, but either he was particularly anxious or he noticed she was drifting once he’d ordered the drinks. He straightened. ‘Do you have much of, uh, tips? On being the most junior person in the senior staff?’

It was technically asking for her input. ‘Be ready to be wrong, and don’t take it personally,’ she said levelly. ‘You’ll make suggestions and you’ll get overruled. You’ll learn to avoid the pot holes and they’ll learn to trust your judgement.’

‘That’s good,’ he said with too much of a thoughtful frown and nod. ‘I’m glad we’re on the staff together now. I didn’t see as much of you as I – when I was a yeoman. But now we’ll have meetings and the lot. It’ll be good.’

Just as he drew an awkward breath to press on, she saw a flash of red hair at the door, and her hand shot up with a palpable wave of relief. ‘Oh, Rosara’s caught up!’

The grumpy shape of Rosara Thawn tromped straight to the bar and, with her usual lack of awareness, elbowed in between the two of them. ‘I want whatever cocktail has the most colours in it,’ she said sulkily.

Lindgren gave him a pointed look across her back, and with a rather dissolute wince he handed her drink over and returned with his own to the others. ‘So.’ She drew the word out. ‘The work delay was… annoying?’

‘I don’t want to complain about it near the others, Athaka will fall over himself apologising and this is why I don’t usually drink with your little gang,’ Thawn said in a superior way which Lindgren wasn’t sure she’d earned. ‘Cortez is making me jump through hoops to use her staff. Her refit isn’t superfluous, but we have to get this lounge done.’

When Rosara Thawn was tense about anything, she became tense about everything. Lindgren slid onto the bar stool next to her. ‘Have a brightly-colour cocktail,’ she said soothingly, ‘and then we can chill out.’

‘Yes.’ Thawn frowned at the bar, then at the others, then at Lindgren, who sighed internally. Even if she was oblivious when in a bad mood, sometimes her better judgement caught up. ‘Did I interrupt Tar’lek there?’

‘It’s fine.’

‘Was he finally doing something or did he decide to gently pine up close?’

‘Don’t be… we were getting a drink,’ Lindgren sighed. ‘We are friends, you know.’

‘Not if he had his way,’ Thawn muttered, and snatched up her arriving cocktail with relief. ‘He’s so transparent, why don’t you put him out of his misery one way or another?’

‘He’s never said anything,’ Lindgren said with indignation. ‘Why should it be on me to say, “Sorry, Tar’lek, I know you’ve never acted on your desperately obvious feelings, but I’m afraid I don’t return them”? Why do I have to volunteer to be the baddie?’

‘Not that there needs to be any deep and meaningful reason for you to not reciprocate,’ said Thawn, shoving the straw in the corner of her mouth. ‘But what’s wrong with him?’

‘Sometimes there’s nothing wrong with people, you just don’t feel it, too.’ Lindgren sighed again at the level look she received. ‘He’s always been like this. Ever since he came aboard. It’s like he saw me and just decided on me, you know? And that’s never faltered, not as we’ve gotten to know each other better; nothing.’

‘You think he doesn’t like you, but that he’s besotted with an idea of you. Yes, alright, that sounds like how our lives would go.’

‘Your turn. What did Rhade do?’

‘Nothing. Nothing new.’ Thawn shrugged. ‘He chose to come to Endeavour, he chose to get closer to me so we could figure out if we want a life together before we commit, and he doesn’t seem to understand that involves some modicum of commitment now.’

‘Is he still not talking?’

‘No, he came to talk. He said he was sorry, and that he wasn’t going to defend his behaviour.’ Thawn grimaced as Lindgren tilted her head at this baffling lack of offences. She sighed. ‘I don’t… I get the impression he’s not been all along living like someone expecting to get married.’

Lindgren’s brow furrowed. ‘You mean generally, or… hook-ups and relationships, or…’

Thawn looked down at her cocktail and fiddled with the straw. ‘You and I never… we weren’t really close before this year. But I know you see pretty much everything, so you surely saw how… I mean, you had to guess how Noah and I…’

‘Could have gone somewhere, but didn’t?’ Lindgren said gently.

‘Because I didn’t let myself. Because I’m some day going to marry Adamant Rhade, and Betazoid marriages can be open arrangements but that’s not as common in my family, and I didn’t think I should let myself fall wildly in love with someone else,’ Thawn said in a rush, still looking into her cocktail. ‘And I… it made me miserable, and then Noah died and all I have left is regret and guilt and I hated myself for how I felt…’

‘And you think the person you put yourself through that for… isn’t as committed as you? Didn’t make these sacrifices? Might have not even minded?’

‘It’s not about him minding; I held back for me, not for him,’ Thawn spat, brushing a lock of hair back with the artful trick Lindgren knew of making sure no tears were about to escape in the middle of a bar. ‘But yes. Maybe it matters a little that Adamant’s not been going through that.’

‘That sounds difficult,’ Lindgren said, and winced at Thawn’s glance; she sounded more like Counsellor Carraway. ‘Okay, okay, that sucks. And I’m going to tell you that you should try to talk to Adamant about it. But first.’ She grabbed her cocktail. ‘We have a stupid night of no responsibilities. Let’s finish these, then tell the others we need to go dancing.’

Getting everyone to finish their cocktails in good order was difficult, because Forrester had just ordered a particularly exotic one and resented the idea of necking it, but half an hour later the pack of young officers burst into the biggest dance club on Bravo.

Music and dancing had the capacity to push anything, any problem, thought, or crisis, light-years away. Perhaps the next morning they would have duty shifts and personal problems and professional challenges, but for a few hours they could surrender themselves to the thudding beat, the jubilant music, the pulsing lights and the sway of bodies and the rhythm of movement.

Lindgren and Thawn had been on the dance floor for a while before they made it back to the booth the crowd had grabbed. Lindgren’s eyes brightened as she spotted a new figure there. ‘Nate! You made it!’

‘What are you wearing?’ Thawn demanded archly.

Nate Beckett tugged at the collar of his shirt and gave a lopsided, self-effacing grin. ‘What? I came down from dinner, didn’t stop to change. Got away as soon as I could.’

‘Of course,’ Thawn said flatly, her disapproval audible even over the rousing beats of the next song. ‘You must have been desperate to get away from dinner at Vandorin’s.’

‘I was, actually. Would have much rather been here with you lot. Surprised you’re here, Thawn; I thought you were allergic to fun?’

Thawn scoffed and rolled her eyes. ‘If I’m that inconveniencing, Beckett, you’ve just had dinner with your father; I’m sure he can get you a better assignment far away from me.’

These two sniping was something Lindgren had grown used to, but there was an unusual flash in Beckett’s eyes at that gibe, and she stepped forward to grab his arm. ‘Come on, Nate,’ she said with an airy tone. ‘Dance?’

It worked as an interception, but whatever cloud Thawn had summoned didn’t dissipate. Dragging him off to dance made Arys look like he’d sucked on a lemon. And even after dancing, Lindgren found herself running interference on all three with another round of drinks in case any one of them upset the other.

In a quiet moment, she stepped to one side and tapped her wristband to bring up her message display. There was nothing new, which was in itself something of a novelty. For once, it was on her to open communications, and she scrolled through the senior staff roster to find the name she wanted, then tapped the quick message.

What about that night-cap?

‘Don’t tell me you’ve never been here,’ Rourke chided as he slid onto a stool at Downtime’s bar. ‘It’s an institution.’

‘The base hasn’t been here that long,’ Valance pointed out, gaze unimpressed as she looked about the no-frills bar with its smooth metals and plain furnishings.

‘Wash your mouth out, Commander,’ declared the Tellarite bartender. ‘Moved this place over from the original spacedock, and Downtime was there since we barely knew what Romulans looked like. What’ll it be?’

‘Pint of whatever’s not disgusting for me, Skal,’ Rourke said cheerfully. ‘And to wash the commander’s mouth out, what… martini?’

‘Dry,’ she said with a level look, and the bartender nodded and went to his bottles. She glanced back to Rourke. ‘Of course you know what my drink order is.’

Rourke smirked. ‘Makes life easier if I know how to get my senior staff drunk quickly.’

‘Or you pay attention to what people like so you can charm or disarm them better. And please, sir, don’t pull that salt-of-the-earth act with me; not any more and not tonight.’

He straightened, eyebrows raising. ‘I don’t believe it. You’re calling me out and calling me “sir,” and in Downtime of all places. I might be your captain, but we’re here for a drink because we’ve had a hell of a time out there and need a breather. This is not the time or place to stand on ceremony.’

‘Alright. Don’t pull that salt-of-the-earth act with me, Rourke.’

He laughed. ‘Fair enough. I’m impressed, Valance, most people are happy to keep assuming I’m just a slobby brute and thief-taker for months after meeting me.’

‘Then you’re lucky I’m not most people, or I’d have probably left you to die in the Azure Nebula,’ she said wryly, and nodded to the bartender as a pair of glasses were set in front of them. She picked hers up. ‘Cheers.’

‘To Endeavour,’ said Rourke, hefting his pint glass. He hesitated. ‘And absent friends.’

She thought of Drake, and of Pierce before him; of T’Sari and Gorim and Otero and others still. ‘Absent friends.’ It was not, it transpired, a particularly good martini. ‘You really want this mission of Hale’s.’

To her surprise, his distant gaze brightened. ‘I do. And you will, too, once we’re past this circus with Graelin. I know you never wanted the sort of operations we’ve had this year; the Wild Hunt, the D’Ghor.’

‘Exceptional circumstances.’

‘But a ship like Endeavour easily becomes the one sent to exceptions,’ he pointed out. ‘You started your career on missions of exploration and diplomacy. You stayed here for the crew, even though with MacCallister gone, you knew things would change like they have.’ He met her gaze. ‘This is a chance for something different. A chance to be the officers we should be.’

Valance thumbed condensation off the glass. ‘I didn’t know you were tired of security operations.’

He didn’t answer for a moment, gaze sinking to his drink. ‘Back at Ephrath, when Lotharn wanted me to surrender, I argued with Aisha. She told me that I don’t trust people, that I never have in all the time I’ve known her. Maybe professionally, but not personally.’ He drew a slow breath, lips twisting as he tasted and dismissed words, before he looked at her. ‘I would like that to change. Because it’s irrational that I would trust you with my life, my ship, and my crew, but that this…’ He gestured between them, then to the bar. ‘That this is odd.’

‘I don’t know,’ she said in a dry voice. ‘You brought me and Isa to dinner as a buffer against Hale. That felt like a gesture of trust.’

He chuckled, then groaned. ‘What a shuttle-crash that was. I need to make that up to her; I was bloody awful. Thank God for Cortez.’ He must have seen something in her expression, his gaze flickering. ‘She hasn’t come to you yet, then?’

‘No.’ Valance had a tense sip of martini. ‘I’m not sure how to explain it to her without sounding… needy.’

Rourke sighed. ‘You mean vulnerable. Telling someone how they’ve hurt you and what you need from them. Yep, that one stings.’ He looked her over. ‘Do you know what you need?’

She bit her tongue, mind sinking back to the long conversations with Carraway where she didn’t know how to describe feelings that had become tight snarls she couldn’t untangle. It was a skill, he’d told her; something that came with practice, to have the vocabulary to comprehend and express your problems. Sometimes a practice run helped. ‘This isn’t exactly normal for me. A relationship like this. I’m going to do it right, I’m going to take it seriously.’

‘And it feels like she’s not. Do you think she’s taking it less seriously, or are you just afraid she’s taking it less seriously?’ Rourke watched as she didn’t reply at once. ‘What made her the special one, anyway? If you’ve not really dated shipmates before, or not for a while.’

‘I can blame you a bit. Telling me I should trust my instincts, and that the galaxy wouldn’t end if I did. But Isa…’ She faltered. ‘I’m not used to being pursued, either.’

‘She got you into this,’ Rourke said with a wistful twist to his smile, ‘and she doesn’t get to screw around now you’re serious about it?’

‘Something like that.’

‘I hate to say it, Valance. There’s nothing for it but the good old honest plunge.’ He grimaced. ‘Trust me. I know exactly what those look like; I’m a pro at avoiding them.’

She thought about that, of the things she’d seen of Matt Rourke’s life she suspected was a mystery to most, if not all, and her brow furrowed. ‘You’ve never said much about your daughter.’

‘Ellie?’ Just as his eyes had lit up at the thought of Hale and her mission, now they brightened again. ‘She’s a good kid. Turned fifteen when we were on shore leave after the D’Ghor, so I managed to stop by. Being near her a couple years was one of the only good things about working at the Academy.’ Tension crept back into his brow. ‘I think she was getting used to having me around for once. She loves reading, hates hard science, has absolutely no interest in joining Starfleet, wants to be a journalist…’ He drew a deep breath, and she saw that mask slip back over him, the affable fool again. ‘Smarter than me and she’ll go further, anyway. Another drink?’

Valance watched him, and thought of her own father and the vast distances between them. She drained her martini glass and set it on the bar. ‘If you insist, Rourke.’

‘I do, Valance.’ They spoke like they were still trying each other’s names without ranks out for size, but it was jocular, self-aware. He drained his own pint, which was a bit more work, but when he put the glass down his gaze had sobered and locked on her. ‘I couldn’t do this job without you. You know that, right?’

‘Of course. You’d be terrible without me.’

They had to make Skal wait before they could order another round, laughing too much at something that wasn’t that funny. But however long the night went, however much Valance was apprehensive of what came next with Graelin, or Hale, or Isa, there was, for now at least, warmth and light in her life.

Engineering felt wrong with the warp core powered right down while they were docked. The background hum of the impossibly powerful engine was a soothing drone Cortez only thought about when it was gone. She’d spent enough time in R&D and in refit work that she thought she would be used to it, but the principle was different when it was her ship.

She stopped at a console, the officer before the screen slumped with their chin in their hand. ‘Good afternoon, Forrester,’ she said too loudly.

Forrester jumped and winced. ‘…good afternoon, Lieutenant Commander.’

‘That’s some top class restraint. I’d have told me to piss off.’ Cortez patted her on the shoulder. ‘Fun time last night? Should have had more synthehol?’

‘I’m fine.’

‘You look it, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.’ She turned and flagged down the figure entering Main Engineering. ‘Chief!’ The broad-shouldered shape of Master Chief Petty Officer Lann sauntered over, and Cortez gestured to the console. ‘Take over from Forrester. She’s on EPS recalibrations down Jefferies Section 9-3 today.’

‘I don’t need -’

‘I need you more attentive. Shoo.’ Cortez would have told her to nap down there, but she suspected Forrester would take the suggestion as an indignity. Even if she did it, she’d never let on. ‘We’re on a Level 2 diagnostic of the power grid. Think you can monitor surges, Chief?’

‘Should be within my thirty years of experience,’ Lann said wryly, sliding into the seat reluctantly evacuated by Forrester. ‘You really need eyes on this in real time, Boss?’

‘Ten months ago, a close-range explosion of a ship Endeavour had in a tractor beam caused an overload of the power grid. It shouldn’t have happened, and people died. I’ve since rerouted a lot of our EPS systems and added redundancies, but testing it’s a continuous project.’ Cortez leaned over his shoulder and brought up the damage report from Endeavour’s first encounter with the Wild Hunt, the catastrophe that had brought so many of them here.

‘Right.’ Lann clicked his tongue, then looked up at her. ‘You get that things sometimes just happen, right, Boss? You miracle workers can’t stop acts of gods.’

‘About to get spiritual on me in the engine room, Chief?’ said Cortez, amused.

‘Engineers are the most spiritual people in Starfleet, Boss. We bleed and sweat into these decks and make ourselves part of the ship, and that suffering sets us apart from the crew like we know systems and metal better than they do. That’s sure as anything not science.’ He gave an amiable shrug and turned to the screen. ‘Believe me, I get it. But we do it so we think we have control over things we don’t.’

‘Reminds me, I’ve got a question for you, Chief.’

‘Shoot, Boss.’

‘Are you a spy sent by Admiral Beckett and/or Commander Graelin to rat me out for every mistake I make so politicians can play games with it?’

‘Oh, blast, you caught me, Boss. I am a super-secret operator but now you directly asked me, I can’t wriggle out,’ Lann deadpanned.

‘I’m wily like that.’ She clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Do a good job and be a team player and bleed and sweat into the ship, and I don’t care where you’re from or who your other masters are, Chief.’

He chuckled and she left him to his work, going to her office to monitor the overall maintenance progress while keeping a weather eye on the power systems diagnostics. That was Adupon’s job to directly oversee, but she couldn’t help herself from sticking her nose in. The catastrophe could not be allowed to strike twice.

The door-chime sounded a good half-hour after her shift finished, and Cortez sighed. Work wasn’t so urgent she needed to pull extra hours, but she wanted to see it through and, more importantly, she didn’t want to go back to her quarters. In the months after she and Valance had gone on leave together, they’d barely spent a night apart on board, separated only if work kept them late. But now they were docked, with duties light and opportunities for leisure plentiful, and still she kept away.

So Cortez couldn’t quite dismiss the flicker of disappointment when Kharth came in, her shoulders somewhat hunched. ‘Isa. Drink at the officers’ mess? You look like you need pulling away from here.’

Cortez looked her up and down. ‘Let’s make it dinner.’

Guilt trickled off Kharth all the way, and Cortez didn’t wait a moment longer than she had to once they were sat in the gloomily-lit, stark but comfortable surroundings of the officer’s mess. ‘Alright. Spit. What’s happened now?’

Kharth looked up from her food, eyebrow raised. ‘What do you mean, what’s happened?’

‘You’re walking around with that “weight of the world,” crap, like you’ve done something, or something’s been done to you and you’re mad but a bit defeated about it.’ Normally, Cortez did a better job of presenting sympathy to her friend, but the day had been long.

‘Sure. Sort of.’ Kharth rubbed the back of her neck. ‘What the hell are you doing, Isa?’

‘Trying to get out of you the reason you came down in all this fuss insisting we talk. Is it Graelin?’

‘No, I mean, what the hell are you doing about you and Valance?’

‘Oh.’ Cortez hesitated, then frowned. ‘I figure she’ll properly explain what’s wrong when she’s calmed down. Something’s bugging her, sure, but she’s lashing out at me right now and until that stops, we can’t really get anywhere.’

‘Okay.’ Kharth scrubbed her face with her hands. ‘I’m here because you said this last time, and it was bull then, and it’s bull now, but last time I gave you a pass and that was a mistake.’

‘A pass?’

‘Isa, come on. You don’t think she has a point?’

Cortez tensed. ‘Not like you’re in on all our conversations, Sae.’

‘But if I’m saying maybe Karana Valance is in the right, you should perhaps listen. Come on, Isa, less than eighteen months ago you were in a relationship that was serious enough you tried to marry the girl. Who then broke your heart and drove you out here, where you pretty much immediately started flirting with the emotionally-unavailable XO.’ Kharth grimaced. ‘Almost like she’d be a safe bet.’

‘If you think pursuing and flirting with Karana has been any kind of safe anything -’

‘Real safe if you don’t want it to go anywhere,’ Kharth said with a wince. ‘If you look at her and think, “there’s someone who’s not deep relationship material,” so then you can get involved and there’s no cliff to fall off. Trust me. I’ve got pretty good at seeking out people with too many barricades between them and the cliff.’

‘The cliff of, what, this metaphor’s getting -’

‘The cliff of serious feelings, commitment, all that.’

Cortez tensed. ‘I’ve not been with Karana because I wanted to avoid a serious relationship. We’re not fighting because I don’t want a serious relationship.’

Kharth watched her for a moment, gaze level. ‘Okay. Are you holding back, though? Because it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing for you to be apprehensive after getting screwed over as badly as you were.’

To avoid answering right away, Cortez shovelled in a mouthful of food. At length she said, ‘Where did this come from?’

‘I cut you slack before even though I thought you were lying either to me or yourself.’ Kharth shrugged. ‘But I realised that was making me a lousy friend and you needed calling on it.’

‘Wow. Keep that up and I might have to start challenging you on your shit,’ Cortez said wryly, then she sighed. ‘Never thought I’d be the standoffish one in this relationship. Maybe I have been, maybe I didn’t notice because I kept acting like it was impossible for me to be the cold one.’

‘Maybe.’

‘What do I do now?’

Another shrug. ‘Damned if I know. Unscrew your head and talk to her? Then maybe she’ll stop savaging the rest of us.’

‘That’s just how she is with you,’ Cortez pointed out. ‘And anyway, I meant, what’s my vengeance against you? Why the hell did Airex leave?’

Kharth flinched and looked down. ‘I really, genuinely, don’t know. I know Valance blames me. I was… I was difficult with him on Teros, sure. We disagreed and he pulled out all the stops to me from doing what I did. Low, manipulative stuff; he threw away our relationship like it was garbage three years ago and then suddenly he was using that intimacy, the things he knew about me, to bring me in-line. So we fought, and it was bitter, but looking back I think we did a good job of wronging each other. I don’t know why he left.’

Cortez softened, leaning in. ‘Do you know why he left all those years ago, either?’

Kharth gave a rough shrug. ‘No. One day he was Davir Hargan, telling me things would be different but that some things wouldn’t change. The next he’s Davir Airex, telling me he needs to take some time, and sending me a letter weeks later, after absolute silence, to say it was over. That we were over.’ She looked away, and Cortez watched the emotions play out on her face, the bitterness and grief. ‘It was easier, for those years, to think and feel like he was dead. Then I came here and I had to see that parasite wearing his face, which was bad enough, but then on Teros he made it so clear that he remembers…’ Her hands came to her temples with a groan.

‘I don’t know about any of that,’ Cortez said softly. ‘But I know what it’s like when people we let in, people who got into the deepest parts of us, hurt us from the inside.’

‘Makes you not want to let anyone else in,’ said Kharth, lifting her gaze with a pointed glint in the eye. ‘Right?’

Cortez’s jaw tightened. ‘See, I thought I didn’t have to put up with this kind of bullshit insight from you.’

The faintest of smiles tugged at Kharth’s lips. ‘Sorry, Isa. Turns out we’re more alike than you thought. And today you’re the grumpy and stand-offish one.’

As Officer of the Watch, Lieutenant Rhade didn’t have his own office, so Nate Beckett had to do a certain amount of hunting to find the Hazard Team’s leader without scheduling a meeting. In the end he had to lurk on the officers’ quarters’ deck section when he knew the Betazoid’s duty shift had ended, pretending to be very preoccupied by a wall display to justify loitering.

Five minutes later than he’d hoped, Rhade emerged from a turbolift, and Beckett turned. ‘Lieutenant! Fancy meeting you here.’

Rhade was both a Betazoid and not stupid. He frowned for a moment, but plastered a smile quickly enough. ‘Ensign. What can I do for you?’

‘I wanted a, uh, minute of your time.’

Rhade looked him up and down, assessing this was no conversation for the middle of the corridor. ‘Come in for some tea, then,’ he said, and ushered the young officer down the row of doors and into his tidy quarters. ‘What’s on your mind?’

Beckett made himself go to take a seat, because it was that or fidget. ‘It’s about the Hazard Team, sir. I know you’ve been working on reforms since about the time I came aboard, but then… everything.’

‘Everything indeed.’ Rhade’s politely confused frown remained as he ordered them two steaming mugs and joined him at the tall table. ‘I do want to broaden the team’s skills. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to begin those training sessions with you and some of the other junior officers before Teros.’

Beckett bit his lip. ‘Were you planning on restarting those?’

There was a long pause as Rhade sipped his drink. ‘You’re asking me to consider you for the team, I take it? I must admit that I’m surprised. Obviously Commander Cortez spoke well of your conduct on Ephrath, and while Captain Rourke did likewise of Jhorkesh he did mention…’

‘That I froze, yeah.’ Beckett cut him off because despite the embarrassment and guilt flooding him at the memory, it would have been worse to watch Rhade try to be delicate about it. ‘I wasn’t used to a real fight and I froze up and – look, I can learn.’

‘I’ve no doubt.’ Rhade’s thoughtful frown didn’t dissipate, though, and his sincerity made Beckett’s teeth itch. ‘I don’t think some people are born with more talent for violence or anything, but balking at a dangerous situation like that isn’t something you should be ashamed of. You and the captain were in a tight corner. You don’t have anything to prove to anyone.’

‘I’m an ensign at the start of my career. Respectfully, sir, I have to prove everything to everyone.’

Rhade sighed. ‘It’s hard to give this talk without sounding self-aggrandising. But ultimately: the Hazard Team is about going into dangerous situations. Most of them are violent. I don’t believe every officer should be prepared to face and enact violence.’

‘That’s fine if I want to just be a lab researcher my whole life,’ Beckett said hotly. ‘But if I want to be a senior staffer, have a serious career, this isn’t the Starfleet of fifty years ago or whatever, sir. I have to be ready to pick up a phaser.’

‘There’s a difference between being ready to pick up a phaser, and making it your job to be the one who picks up a phaser first.’

Beckett gave an irritable sigh. ‘You had me on the shortlist when I first arrived. Has Jhorkesh taken me off that list? If so, just tell me and I’ll stop wasting my time.’

‘Nobody’s been taken off the list. But you didn’t seem that enthused initially anyway, and I’m surprised the last few months have encouraged you.’ Rhade clasped his hands together. ‘Where’s this coming from, Ensign?’

My father making it clear I have two choices if I want a decent career: to rely on him more, or do everything in my power to buff up my personnel records. The Hazard Team was the most obvious way Beckett could think of to stand out from the crowd, and he already had a foot in the door. ‘I had a taste of responsibility and stakes during the Tkon situation as Acting Chief Science Officer. I don’t want to go back to just being the A&A Officer,’ he lied.

Rhade didn’t look convinced, but he gave a slow nod. ‘Academy records suggested you had decent scores in covert movement and marksmanship. Not amazing, but you weren’t that heavily trained and still showed promise. I’ll put together some sessions for you. Get your scores up, and between that and your science qualifications, there might be a space for you when I announce the new Hazard Team selection.’

Beckett knew Forrester and Athaka had both been in similar training, as Rhade brought in young officers with more well-rounded skills over some of the more specialised ratings of the team’s original line-up. ‘Thank you, sir. I won’t let you down.’

‘Nobody’s in danger of letting me down,’ said Rhade gently, but a moment later his brow had furrowed. ‘You were out on the station last night, right?’

The too-casual tone made Beckett’s back tense. ‘Sure.’ Suspecting where this was going, he spared the lieutenant another awkward segue. ‘With a bunch of the other HT candidates. And Lieutenant Thawn.’

He grimaced. ‘I’m sorry, your business is your own, and this has nothing to do with what we just talked about. On an entirely personal basis, I wondered if you knew how she was.’

Beckett was accustomed to Thawn being prickly. Thawn jumping down his throat the moment he’d arrived at the club had been a whole new level of unpleasant, and one he’d been in no mood to manage after ten rounds with his father. It had rather ruined his night – or, at least, stopped him from using going out with his friends to un-ruin the night. He’d been in a black mood for the first hour until Lindgren bailed, transparently sick of the lot of them, and that hadn’t improved anything.

But if Rhade had provoked Thawn, that explained both her behaviour and some of his own evening going badly. ‘Oh, I reckon she’s still pissed at you, sir,’ Beckett said with a forced airiness. ‘On an entirely personal basis.’

Rhade grimaced. ‘I had hoped she would calm down and think about what I said.’

Beckett frowned at that. ‘Are you listening to what she’s saying?’ The other man straightened, and, with a sizzling in his gut, he pressed on. ‘You don’t have to wait for her to calm down and all rationally realise you were a very sensible hero, sir. You need to make her feel like she’s important. In case you didn’t notice, Thawn’s pretty sensitive to the idea she’s overlooked or doesn’t matter.’

Rhade worked his jaw for a moment. ‘That’s… rather insightful of you, Ensign.’

Beckett gave a rough shrug. He wasn’t sure where the insight had come from and Thawn was the least of his worries if she became happy enough to leave him alone. ‘If you were asking: no, she didn’t say anything to me. That’s just what I get from being in the same vague orbit as her. It’s not hard.’ He drained his tea and stood. ‘Sorry if that doesn’t help with the whole Hazard Team thing -’

‘Ensign.’ Rhade stood, too, hands raised. ‘I asked, I made this conversation personal. Thank you for bringing your interest to me, and thank you for speaking sincerely. It’s the least I deserve for asking in the first place.’ He met his gaze. ‘I think you have initiative, confidence, and creativity. I’ll put those training sessions together, but no matter what, I don’t think you should doubt your prospects in Starfleet.’

Beckett didn’t know how transparent he’d been, especially in front of a Betazoid, or if he simply wasn’t that different than any other young officer eager for recognition and glory. He forced a more polite smile. ‘Guess you’ll get used to my speaking sincerely if it goes well,’ he said, and left.

He’d already said more than he’d wanted to.

‘Oh, hey, this must be why you left,’ said Cortez by way of greeting as she sauntered through the doors to the main offices of Admiral Beckett’s staff. ‘The replicators here look like the newest model so they must give you the good coffee.’

Davir Airex looked up like she’d not only appeared suddenly but sprouted a second head while she was at it. ‘Commander. I didn’t expect to see you here.’

‘I can tell by your expression of sheer delight. The yeoman out front heard I served with you on Endeavour and thought you might like a visitor.’ Cortez swaggered through the bullpen with her mug of coffee. At this time of day most of the desks were empty, but she still looked around with an assumed air of superiority, just to be annoying. ‘And yet, back home you had your own office.’

Airex sighed, seeming to realise his former comrade was not going to be dissuaded. ‘I can give you ten minutes.’

‘Oh, with the galaxy no longer in immediate danger you can spare me that much, huh?’ She pulled up a chair. ‘Come on, Airex. I saved your life on Teros. Fifteen minutes.’ Without waiting for a reply, she tilted the chair back. ‘How’ve you been anyway? For real.’

‘For real,’ he echoed in an arch tone. But after a moment he subsided. ‘There are a lot of worse jobs than serving as a scientific advisor to the Director of Fourth Fleet Intelligence. My opinion here can have a galactic impact.’

‘A lot of worse jobs,’ she echoed in turn, tilting her head. ‘You sound giddy.’

Airex met her gaze. She had never been able to get a good read on him; would have figured him to be another uptight bureaucrat had he not from the beginning been Valance’s friend. But they hadn’t worked together much until the crisis at Teros, when he’d had one foot half out the door. ‘I don’t think you came here to ask about my wellbeing, Commander,’ he said at length.

Her brow furrowed. ‘I think your wellbeing’s pretty damn important to everything that’s going on. Of course I’m here because you left suddenly and people are confused and upset. That doesn’t mean I’m here to wriggle truths out of you with no care for your feelings.’

He leaned back with a sigh, but she caught his gaze flicker around the quiet bullpen, clearly noting who was or wasn’t in the room. ‘You want to ask why I left. Is it so difficult to believe that I was stifled by an assignment like a Manticore?’

‘Speaking as another officer accused of slumming it on Endeavour – no. But let’s not screw around, Dav, you left out of the blue, requesting transfer after a nothing assignment. If you were sick of the posting you’d have left after the Wild Hunt, or after the D’Ghor.’

‘Dav. We’re on first-name terms?’

‘I thought we were, after Teros. Or does that change depending on your mood?’ Cortez cocked her head. She didn’t normally have to strong-arm people, but either Davir Airex was a deeply damaged man or he was a deeply manipulative one. Either way, he’d slip through her grasp if she used a light touch. ‘Or is it just easier to act like you didn’t care about the ship now it’s out of sight?’

His eyes narrowed. ‘Which sent you?’

‘You mean, am I here for Karana or am I here for Saeihr?’ She made sure to watch his reactions to either name, and wasn’t much enlightened. ‘Why can’t it be both? Okay, let’s not dive into the whatever the hell with you and Sae. But you and Karana were thick as thieves for years and all of a sudden you don’t just ditch Endeavour, you ditch her.’ Cortez hesitated. ‘She won’t say it, but you hurt her by leaving like this. And she misses you.’

Airex looked away again, gaze flickering. ‘Is there any explanation I can give which would satisfy you?’

‘I don’t think satisfying me should be the goal so much as trying the truth. Or are you trying to figure out what words will make me go away faster?’

‘This is rather irregular, Commander; barging into my place of work and -’

‘Oh, we’ve pivoted to professionalism.’ She snapped her fingers. ‘Don’t act like it’s not weird to leave your post with no notice and not reach out to your best friend when her ship’s docked at your station right after a crisis I know you were following. I read your reports from Abnia.’ She made sure to catch his gaze as she pressed on. ‘I’m pretty sure having that information from you saved our lives. Definitely saved Karana’s.’ Without all they’d known of the Tkon outposts, she wasn’t sure they could have talked the Portal down from the sandstorm that might have buried them all.

She watched the tiniest of flickers in his brow, the war raging in deep waters she could barely see a hint of. At length, Commander Airex straightened. ‘Honestly, I’m surprised you’re reaching out like this on Karana’s behalf. She’s a difficult person to be close to. You’ll make all of these emotional efforts and get nothing in return.’

Cortez frowned. ‘That’s a damned cold way of describing a friend.’

‘It means that I know her,’ he said, and met her gaze. ‘And I know that she’s not really capable of reciprocating such gestures and sacrifices. You can bend over backwards for her, and she’ll never be able to reach back in kind. If you think I owe you my life, Cortez, then let me do you that kindness: emotionally investing in Karana Valance is like venting warp plasma into a black hole. Your patented fixation with seeing and thinking the best of everyone will lead you to nothing but misery.’

‘I don’t -’ Anger had tightened her throat before realisation sank in, and her jaw set. ‘Oh, hell. You’re trying to play the bastard to drive me off.’

‘Or I’m free of Endeavour,’ said Airex bluntly, ‘and I don’t have to lie to you any more. Saeihr Kharth’s a similar sort of parasite. Her emotional needs will tie you up in knots, but don’t expect her to ever be there for you.’

‘I’m not rising to this,’ Cortez said, even though she fancied shaking him by then. ‘I’m not going back to them and telling them you’re a stone cold son-of-a-bitch they should give up on.’

‘As you wish.’ He shrugged. ‘Then tell them I was strange and evasive. Leave them dangling in agonising uncertainty that will never be answered. The simple truth, Cortez, is that I’m long gone, I’m not coming back, and they should forget about me. It’s up to you on if you want to torment them with hope. Perhaps I was just a bastard all along.’

She stood, aggravation coiled through her gut and up to her throat. ‘Fine. Have it your way.’ But she hesitated, and scowled at him before she turned. ‘I get the feeling you don’t have people in your life. Not any more. Forget, for a moment, about my relationships with Karana and Saeihr. I know you’re a good man, Dav. If you need me, if you need help, if you need an ear, just – just call me, okay? I won’t even tell them. Because if you’re who I think you are, then you’re hurting. A lot. And people shouldn’t hurt alone.’

Their gazes locked, and she fancied he faltered for a heartbeat too long than he would if he was the stone cold bastard he was pretending to be. But at last all he said was, ‘Good day, Commander.’

She left the cup of coffee behind on his desk. It wasn’t that much better a brew after all.

Karana Valance was right when she’d accused Rourke of downplaying his education and class, and he knew it. He was born, raised, and schooled on Earth, the shining light of Federation civilisation, opulence, and opportunity. He’d trained at the prestigious San Francisco campus of Starfleet Academy, later taught there, and in between he’d served on high-profile assignments the length and breadth of the Federation. He had dined with admirals, rubbed elbows with foreign ambassadors, and debated with leading minds of multiple governments. His tendency to play this down was not out of discomfort or shame; rather, he found it telling to assess how others, especially Starfleet officers he perceived as establishment souls, treated him if they thought he wasn’t half so privileged as them. All the time in between such experiences of culture and opportunity had been spent in some of the darkest and most fraught corners of the Federation, and he had no time for officers and officials who thought less of those who lived there.

This was all to say that his nervousness as he was shown to his table at Vandorin’s Bistro was not an affectation. ‘I’ll just have a still water while I wait,’ he said to the waiter a bit more brusquely than he meant as he sat down, then added, just as the man had begun to turn so he felt like more of an inconvenience, ‘Could you get a bottle of that sparkling emerald on standby, though; bring it and some glasses once she’s here?’

The waiter was clearly more accustomed to nervous guests than the guests were accustomed to the simple opulence of Vandorin’s, and soon enough Rourke found himself trying to not fidget with a glass, or cutlery, or his shirt collar while he waited. He was early, he knew that from the look he’d received at the front desk, but it didn’t make the delay any less nerve-wracking.

‘Captain.’

He had to fight to not bounce to his feet at the arrival of First Secretary Hale, and she made it easier for him by sliding into her seat before he’d fully processed her arrival. While he was wrong-footed by the whole establishment, she looked as at-ease in Vandorin’s as she had on his bridge, or in tense negotiations with a warbird commander, wearing the atmosphere of sophistication as comfortably as her cocktail dress.

Rourke grinned more than he should have. ‘First Secretary. Welcome back to Bravo. I don’t -’

Of course, that was when the waiter appeared, as if summoned by a dark and inconvenient force. ‘Your drinks, sir, ma’am,’ he declared, and at once popped the cork on the sparkling emerald to pour two delicate flutes. He left the bottle in the ice bucket before he vanished.

Hale’s eyebrows raised. ‘Esterra must be in a particularly prompt mood.’

Rourke was tempted to keep his mouth shut, but he reached for the glass. ‘I asked for it, but he was quick off the mark. I was hoping you’d have a chance to, well, breathe first.’

Her expression lightened. ‘And confirm if we have something to celebrate?’

‘We could drown ourselves in expensive emerald if not, I figured,’ he said with a shrug that belied his nerves.

‘Don’t worry, Captain.’ Hale lifted the flute. ‘This dinner isn’t goodbye. But I dare say the Diplomatic Service doesn’t expect me to celebrate being dispatched to the gloomiest border the Federation has.’

‘You got the mission? We’ve got the go-ahead?’ His grin went even broader as he lifted his glass to hers. ‘Then, uh. I should have had something pithy planned to toast.’

She tilted her glass. ‘To paying the devil.’

They drank and perused the menu, and Rourke let his heart rate slow with the news and the tart fizzing of the drink and the soothing strings of the live music flowing across the restaurant. At last he could let the opulence of Vandorin’s bring the comfort it was supposed to, instead of the tense apprehension that had laced him since his arrival.

Hale swept her gaze up from the menu. ‘You must have the right friends to get a table here within only a few days of arrival. I’ve never got in at such notice unless I was with a more important ambassador.’

‘Must have been lucky,’ he said, choosing to not mention he’d put himself down on the waiting list the moment they’d been in comms range of Starbase Bravo. ‘Or maybe I’m more notorious than you, First Secretary.’

She gave the smile he’d noticed could disarm an irate Romulan delegate. ‘If I’m going to run this diplomatic mission off your ship, and we’re going to represent the Federation out there together, we might do well to stop standing on such ceremony, Matthew. Or is it Matt?’

Almost nobody ever called him by his full name, but Rourke found himself not minding. ‘Matthew’s fine. Sophia,’ he said, his grin softening to share her smile, before he smothered it all with a timely gulp of emerald fizz. ‘I hope the Service didn’t drag you over the coals too badly for Ephrath.’

‘They weren’t thrilled I forced their hand,’ Hale admitted. ‘We’re more on the back foot with the Star Empire than anyone wanted. But with everything that happened in the crisis – not just Endeavour, there were multiple tensions on the border as Starfleet shut down supply lines – we were going to have to compromise.’

‘Is that going to be a problem for the Republic? They spend years wanting a close relationship with us, and now they worry we’ll abandon them to cosy up to the Star Empire that would destroy them?’

‘The Star Empire might be the biggest power talking to us,’ said Hale, her brightness not at all fading in the face of shop-talk, ‘but we can be frank here at dinner: the Federation wants the Republic on top in the region. They’re the democratic future who will treat with us, and we still expect them to reopen reunification talks with Vulcan once they’re more secure.’

Rourke blew his cheeks out. ‘You don’t think the Star Empire will still be here in ten, twenty years, do you.’

‘That’s common wisdom,’ sighed Hale. ‘But common wisdom was surprised they lasted this long. I think it depends on what the Free State does next, and now the Federation would much rather the two balanced each other out. Dealing with the Free State was always playing with a snake that might bite us; it just turned out they poisoned us longer ago than we knew.’

The waitstaff proved to have excellent timing, cutting off any maudlin consideration of the Attack on Mars by arriving to take their order. Rourke had to fight to keep himself from making any dismissive comments of anything he ordered, or anything he asked about, and when the waiter finally left, he found Hale’s level, assessing gaze on him.

He gave a slightly abashed smile. ‘I thought we could eat here to celebrate, and… so I could make up for that dinner on Endeavour.’

She gave a light, amused shrug. ‘I admit that wasn’t what I expected. I’ve had captains invite me to dinner with their staff, but that was usually so they could prove themselves masters of everything within their bulkheads. But you’re not the first to try to wrong-foot a diplomat.’

She’d had as much chance to assess him, he suspected, as he had her, and Rourke was reminded of his second motivation in dumbing himself down: it made it hard to disappoint people if you controlled their expectations. Hit with a sudden shame of the childish insecurity of his antics, he straightened. ‘How did you end up in diplomacy, then?’

A wistful look entered her eye. ‘My father was in the service, and was the Federation Ambassador to Qo’noS in the 60s,’ she explained. ‘So I grew up all over, and always around the life of a diplomat. I don’t think I wanted to do anything else.’

‘But you’ve always worked with the Romulans,’ he recalled.

‘My first job with the service was with the staff picking up the pieces of Federation-Romulan relations after the Shinzon Incident. At that time, not a lot of the Diplomatic Service had much experience of cooperating with the Star Empire; there were a lot of older diplomats much more used to the cold relationships of previous decades, so coming in at the ground floor then was… useful. Fewer preconceptions.’ Hale shrugged. ‘But y mentor was a big opponent of ending the evacuation after Mars, which made him a lot of enemies, so the rest of the service wasn’t lining up to offer anyone associated with him much work elsewhere.’

‘So that nailed your fortunes to the Romulan factions and kept you out there all that time?’ Rourke shook his head with a marvelling air. ‘That’s an astonishing commitment.’

She hesitated. ‘Not all that time. I took some Earth-based work after Mars; the service was fretting in that time about internal stability.’ But there’d been a further flicker to her expression, and she seemed to realise he’d noticed, the corners of her eyes creasing. ‘I was married, for about seven years. And then I wasn’t.’

Again he shook his head. ‘This wasn’t meant to be prying. Though believe me, I understand trying and failing to balance a marriage with a job like this.’

Her expression twisted ruefully. ‘I was trying to not bring the mood down. You misunderstand; I could work on Earth and be married to Henry. But he and our son were killed in a shuttle crash in ‘92, and a year later I came back to the frontier.’ As he rallied, he saw her expression steel, and he felt the sincerity as she leaned forward. ‘Which means we’re at the part of the meal where it gets awkward, which isn’t fair because you have a robust personnel file I’ve been able to read. So I have you at a disadvantage when it comes to knowing about each other, and I forbid you to turn dinner into feeling sorry for me.’

He felt the deft assurances; the insistence that they didn’t need to linger on old griefs, the inference that she knew he had at least some understanding of her loss if she’d read about the Firebrand. Rourke inclined his head. ‘Pity was the last thing on my mind, Sophia.’

‘Good.’ Her smile returned, a little strained at the edges but, he thought, sincere. ‘Or I’d have to remind you that you agreed this dinner is supposed to make up for the evening with your senior staff.’

Rourke gave a wry frown. ‘You should know I didn’t expect Valance to be that weird.’

‘She was compensating for you,’ Hale said gently. ‘So you might want to think about that next time you sell yourself short to make people underestimate you. It embarrasses your XO.’

He had to laugh, even as he felt himself flush. ‘Or I’ll bring Cortez instead.’

‘Of your staff, she might be the one I’d trust most to talk with people,’ Hale agreed. ‘Though I was surprised your recommendation of Lieutenant Kharth came so… measured.’ At his expression, she tilted her head. ‘She pushed very hard on that deal with the Star Empire. I’m not sure I could have hammered out the details without her.’

He straightened. ‘I didn’t know she did more than feed you information.’

‘If you sent her to me to keep her out of the way during Ephrath,’ said Hale with that same wry smile, ‘it not only failed, but you tried to bench one of your more insightful and loyal officers. I understand she was in a situation at Teros. But are you the only one allowed to feel disillusioned by Starfleet and have doubts, Matthew?’

That stopped him short, and Rourke worked his jaw for a moment. ‘I’d hope my crew don’t have their doubts about me,’ he managed, knowing it sounded weak. That was a poor counterpoint when they were all embedded in an institution whose flaws he was never going to dismiss or defend. He glanced away. ‘I guess a Romulan member of my crew has all the reason in the galaxy to be wary.’

‘You can want a better galaxy, believe in a better way of unity and cooperation, and still be cynical about the reality in front of you.’

He gave her a sidelong look. ‘Is this how our mission’s going to go? You’ll play diplomat not only with the Romulans, but with my crew?’

Sophia Hale’s smile widened with genuine amusement as she regarded him, and behind her the waitstaff approached their table with the first course. ‘Only if you need my help building bridges, Matthew.’

It was no small relief to feel the hum of Endeavour’s deck beneath her feet again. They’d been underway for ten hours now, departing Bravo that morning for the remnants of the Neutral Zone, and despite the station’s many comforts, space, and changes of scenery, Valance was glad. Endeavour was not a big vessel, and after spending most of the last few years in her narrow corridors she’d expected to enjoy variety more.

But Rourke was right. As her mood levelled out, as the shadows of Teros and Tagrador began to fade, their next mission was setting a spark in her veins she hadn’t felt for some time. For so long, Endeavour’s duties had been grim necessity, preventing serious threats to life and limb. This was about building something. Yet Valance couldn’t breathe freely, because it was their first night underway, the new lounge had been installed, and Captain Rourke had insisted on a party for the senior staff and anyone who could square away their duties to baptise it. A party she was in absolutely no mood for.

But she knew the XO couldn’t get away with not attending, she knew these instincts were ones she’d stayed on Endeavour to fight in the first instance, and she knew Rourke would frown on showing up in uniform. So she was stood before her wardrobe in pressed trousers and a vest, studying her shirts without much enthusiasm, when the door-chime sounded. ‘Come in!’ she barked, not looking back.

The doors behind her opened and closed. ‘Oh, uh… hey.’

Valance turned, eyebrow raised, and hesitated when she saw Cortez stood in a party dress – but more pressingly, fidgeting with a small bouquet of flowers. Valance’s shoulders squared. ‘Are you – is that…’ Are you here to sweet-talk me so I forget why I’m mad at you? she wanted to demand, but the flowers had, as was probably their intention, taken her aback.

‘This?’ Cortez waggled the bouquet. ‘Yes. These are for you,’ she said, advancing a step with flowers outstretched. Valance did not move, and she winced. ‘They come with an apology.’

‘Really,’ said Valance flatly. ‘What are you apologising for?’

‘Oh, we’re not screwing around here, huh.’ Cortez grimaced. ‘I’ll start with this: I’m sorry for making a joke of you suggesting we spend time together. I’m double-sorry doing that meant we didn’t spend any time together on Bravo.’

It would be easy to give in then, because if she held her ground she knew she was going to have to explain herself. Valance folded her arms across her chest. ‘And?’

Cortez’s shoulders slumped. ‘Okay. Really not screwing around.’ She looked about the quarters, and with a sigh set the flowers down on the high-top table. Turning back to Valance, she twisted her fingers together with unusual self-consciousness. ‘I got out of a serious relationship not a million years before I came to Endeavour. You know this.’

‘You asked me out,’ Valance said before she could stop herself. ‘If you weren’t interested in a relationship, why the hell did you do that?’

Cortez lifted her hands. ‘Woah, hold up. You’re jumping to Warp 10 there. Is that what pissed you off? You think I’m only interested in keeping this casual? We almost died in Archanis and I suggested we take weeks of leave together on the planet where I grew up. You met my parents.’

Valance hesitated. Anger had surged quicker than she liked, and she knew this was why she’d avoided this conversation. She disliked it when her feelings eluded her vocabulary, but she disliked it even more when they ran away from her. Her jaw tightened. ‘I don’t know what you want,’ she said at length, forcing her voice level. ‘You’ve called me out for being stand-offish, you’ve called me out for not navigating professional boundaries well, and every time I have tried to listen and improve and still it’s…’ Not enough, she didn’t dare say, tilting her chin up and trying to find anger again, because anger was less vulnerable.

‘Oh, cariño,’ Cortez sighed, expression softening with something approaching horror as she watched, and Valance tensed at the sense she was being seen through. ‘I’ve been screwing this up, but you’ve got it all wrong. You’ve been working hard, and I’m grateful – but I didn’t want to push you.’ At Valance’s nonplussed expression, she took an awkward step forward – then stopped. ‘I thought I was letting you set the pace on the relationship, because I didn’t want to spook you or pressure you or anything. And then I let that turn into me not making enough of an effort.’

Valance felt herself simmer down, and tried to not look surly. ‘What does that have to do with just getting out of a serious relationship?’

‘It made it pretty seductive for me to not try,’ Cortez admitted bashfully. ‘I was telling myself it made me a good and thoughtful girlfriend to move at your pace, but it also gave me an excuse to hold back. To protect myself.’

‘I’m not Aria,’ Valance said at length, because she wasn’t sure what else to say. ‘I’m not cheating on you.’

‘I know. I know.’ Cortez sighed, but drew a deep breath and straightened. ‘I didn’t come to this ship too broken-hearted and messed-up to commit, but seduce you anyway and convince you to try to work on a relationship I had no intention to get serious about. I promise that’s not going on, and I’m sorry I made you feel like that.’

Despite herself, Valance shifted her weight. ‘Okay.’ She hesitated, not quite ready to accept the apology, not so unappeased she wanted to throw Cortez out. ‘I don’t know what you need from me.’

The corners of Cortez’s eyes creased. ‘To accept that I’m gonna screw this up sometimes, but I’m… sure, I got out of a serious relationship not long before we met, but you get that means I fell for you real hard, right?’ She advanced slowly, and Valance didn’t pull back or stop her from coyly reaching out to take her hand. ‘And maybe I work on this and we go to that party together. Once I pick your shirt.’

Valance worked her jaw, her defences feeling like sand shifting underneath her, scrambling away at Cortez’s closeness. She didn’t know if she wanted to lay the issue to rest, or if surrender was just easier. ‘Alright,’ she decided after a moment. ‘Except for the shirt part.’

Cortez gave a more ready grin as Valance pulled away, the atmosphere shifting, and Valance took her time to rummage through the wardrobe, took her time to finish dressing. It let her settle her racing heart and racing thoughts, bitterly contemplating that she’d want to talk to Carraway about this. The aftermath of arguments were difficult, she reflected; there was nothing more to say, nothing more to do, but the hurt hadn’t completely faded.

But a thought still struck her just as she finished buttoning up her shirt, and she turned to Cortez with a startled, guilty air. ‘Oh,’ she said, falteringly. ‘I forgive you. I’ve not been perfect either.’

Cortez had been watching thoughtfully, but she blinked at this – and then beamed that bright, sunshine smile that always made Valance’s days seem lighter, and that alone made forgiveness ten times easier. ‘Guess we’re just two imperfect people figuring this out. But I’m here, okay? I’m in this. Being apart these last days has been crap, I hated it. I miss being around you.’

Valance reached for her hand as she headed for the door. ‘I missed you too.’

‘So I… don’t think I’m over-compensating. And let’s just enjoy the party tonight. And we can talk about this later.’ Cortez tilted her chin at Valance’s querying look, and her smile softened to become more sincere, more apprehensive. ‘It’s just, my quarters suck, and yours are so much bigger…’

It was smart to not make commitments fresh out of an argument about commitment, to not try to soothe deep problems with big gestures, so Valance didn’t give more of an answer than a wry shake of the head and a sincere smirk. But she tightened her grip on her hand as they headed off to the party, which suddenly wasn’t so unpalatable after all.

‘You get your wish, Matt,’ Admiral Beckett had said that morning when Rourke stopped by his office, his last duty on Bravo before Endeavour got underway. ‘Attachment to a Diplomatic Service mission that could scuttle your independence and your prospects.’

Rourke had hesitated at that. While he understood the risks and sacrifices, it had not occurred to him that Admiral Beckett might have been motivated, even in some small way, by the belief he was making a mistake. ‘I know what I’m doing, sir.’

Beckett harrumphed. ‘Apparently. There was talk of giving Hale a different ship. The Tianwen’s finishing shakedown and someone thought an Obena would be better-suited. But Operations can’t agree who should captain and crew her.’ He shifted his weight. ‘I told them to stop wasting time and give Hale the damned Endeavour.’

Rourke’s chin tilted up. ‘I take it Graelin didn’t find anything to hang us over, then.’

‘Petrias is a weasel, Matt, we both know that,’ Beckett said bluntly. ‘That’s useful, because now I know your crew’s weak points if anyone comes for you, and his fate is tied to yours. You have this mission, and we can’t afford to let it fail.’

After all these years, Rourke still wasn’t sure if Admiral Beckett was lying, delusional, or simply possessed hidden depths when he made such protective assertions. While Beckett looked after his creatures, Rourke had seen the ruthless decisions he’d make when it came to cutting them loose, and he had long ago given up trusting the admiral to be his safety net. He supposed Beckett’s loyalty was motivated self-interest, with his name attached to Hale’s mission.

Rourke had made sure he was on the bridge when they got underway, even if departing space dock was a routine operation the like of which he’d normally reserve to let a junior officer get some command chair experience. But setting off this time hadn’t come with the usual apprehension, the familiar tension of what dangers lurked in the dark between the stars or the shadows behind them. This was something new, a journey to distant lights.

So when he walked into the lounge that evening, with most of the crew encouraged to attend if possible, it was with a swagger to his step that made him feel like he was positively floating. The refit had cast the lounge in warmer shades of brass and burgundy than its previous stark design, a promise of Federation opulence and comfort in contrast to much of the rest of the ship. If Endeavour was to play host to diplomats and delegates, it would be needed. Organising the party that evening had been Petty Officer Nestari’s first proper task as his yeoman, and he took in the bouncing music, the inviting lighting, and the already-building buzz of an atmosphere with a tight, satisfied smile.

‘Good work,’ he told her as he passed where she sat, out of uniform but with a PADD to hand to make sure everything was organised properly.

She gave that airy, easy smile. ‘Thank you, sir! I worked out how to make-do with the space,’ she said, and Rourke’s heart again sank. His new yeoman really did think this was a backwater gunship.

Crew filtered in at a steady rate to join the gathering throng, but Rourke’s chest tightened at the latest arrival, all thought of Nestari’s judgement fleeing at the sight of Lieutenant Kharth. He pulled up a stool at the bar and ordered a drink before tilting back to catch her eye and beckon her over. The flicker of apprehension in her eyes told him all he needed.

‘Sir.’

‘Sit down and have a drink, Kharth, this is meant to be a party,’ Rourke grumbled. She did not look at all reassured as she obeyed, but he waited until they had glasses in their hands before he pressed on. ‘I’ve seen Graelin’s recommendation. No further action to be taken for Teros. That holds weight above my head.’ He watched as her expression flickered with uncertainty. ‘You wanted to talk before Ephrath, I told you to focus on the mission. I don’t have a right to be pissed off if you didn’t sit around waiting for me to be ready for me to discuss things.’

Her gaze was closing down, and all he got was a rough shrug. ‘I don’t expect you to coddle me.’

‘No. But loyalty goes both ways.’ He tried to meet her eye, but she didn’t look to him. ‘I told you if you stuck with me, you wouldn’t have to rely on the likes of Beckett.’ He wasn’t sure what had happened for her to win Graelin’s stamp of approval, but it was likely not a good sign.

‘Then came Teros.’

Her voice was toneless, and Rourke realised how badly he was in danger of letting her slip through his grasp, how badly he was in danger of becoming another authority figure to pick her up and discard her. He twisted on the stool. ‘And then came Ephrath,’ he pressed. ‘Hale told me how much you did, how much you fought for me. And that’s after Tagrador. Saving my life twice over, going above and beyond. It’s not right for me to keep you in the doghouse for the bad but not thank you for the good.’

Kharth’s gaze flickered again. ‘Teros wasn’t personal, sir,’ she said at length.

Even the slightest fizz of bile on his throat was enough to take him back to that moment on the bridge, when he’d given that order and she’d not obeyed. ‘It was, because I failed if you didn’t have enough trust in me as your captain at a moment like that.’

Now she winced. ‘Sir – Captain.’ A muscle twitched in the corner of her jaw. ‘I froze at Teros. I didn’t obey, but I didn’t fight you, I didn’t physically get in Valance’s way, I didn’t try to stop your orders from being carried out. You’ve known me long enough by now that I don’t normally… not act. For good or ill.’

He frowned at that. In his mind’s eye, all he saw of moment on the bridge was Kharth refusing, Rhade refusing, and all of his control and authority collapsing around him until Valance saved the day. It hadn’t occurred to him that Kharth’s resistance had been of uncharacteristic inaction, not opposition. ‘I take your point.’

‘I could have pulled a phaser, I could have fought Valance, I could have…’ She shook her head, eyes going distant, and he saw her struggle with everything she hadn’t done. ‘You gave me an order I couldn’t follow. I didn’t disobey you because I didn’t trust you, Captain. Because I trusted you, I didn’t fight you.’

He heard how much that admission hurt. She was no stranger to fighting if she didn’t know how to do anything else. He leaned in. ‘I want you with me on this mission, Kharth. I want you to keep working with Hale, I want your insights as we go to the Neutral Zone and try to build better lives for people there, I want you watching my back, watching the crew’s back, our crew.’

Their eyes met, and she gave a slow nod. ‘I’m still here, Captain. I’ll do my job.’

But there was something in her voice that echoed in him as she left the bar, some disconnect that rattled inside, and as he watched her walk away, Rourke had to wonder how badly he’d fumbled the delicate loyalty of Saeihr t’Kharth.

He was still frowning when Hale joined him at the bar, her eyebrows raised. ‘I was going to compliment you on the new lounge, but I feel I should be asking if there’s bad news?’

Rourke blinked away his expression, and forced a wry grin. ‘No news. And wouldn’t a compliment on the lounge go to yourself? I know the Diplomatic Service fast-tracked these modifications.’

‘I gave only broad parameters to the request,’ Hale said airily. ‘I left the rest up to your operations manager, who clearly made fine decisions.’

‘Don’t tell her that,’ Rourke sighed. ‘Her head’s about to over-inflate tonight anyway.’ He watched as more crew filtered through the door, and smothered a smirk at the arrival of Valance and Cortez together. Not all mistakes forged impassable rifts. He glanced back to Hale, feeling himself relax as thoughts of Kharth were pushed aside. ‘I hope you’re settling, and that your quarters will suffice for the long term?’

‘I might be a ranking member of the Diplomatic Service, Matthew, but I’ve done my time on missions in a lot of places. I was on Nimbus for a while. I’m hardly roughing it on Endeavour, and I’m not a delicate flower,’ Hale pointed out with an amused look. ‘I’d rather those VIP quarters are available for guests we want to keep happy. Officers’ quarters are fine.’

‘We’ll make sure to find something comparable for your staff when they join us,’ Rourke insisted, but then the shadow fell over him of a new arrival, and his heart sank as he saw Graelin approach.

‘Captain, good evening.’ With that swagger that usually made Rourke’s teeth itch, Graelin inclined his head to him before turning to give a deeper nod to Hale. ‘First Secretary; I’m Commander Graelin, Chief Science Officer.’

If Hale picked up on Rourke’s discomfort or somehow sensed Graelin’s inherent lack of virtue, she did not show it, shaking his hand with her usual affable air. ‘Commander. I look forward to working with you.’

‘Likewise. It’s an impressive operation you’ve proposed. I’m excited to be a part of it.’

‘Now you found nothing you could screw us on, hey, Pete?’ Rourke said, eyebrows raised.

Graelin’s mask barely flickered, and in fact compensated with a smirk like he was part of the joke, and not the joke itself. ‘You’ve got a good crew, Captain. I’ve put them through their paces and I’m impressed with them and all they’ve endured.’ He gave Hale another nod. ‘You’ve chosen your ship well, Ma’am.’

Hale’s smile remained intact even as Graelin moved on. ‘Anything I should worry about there?’

‘No,’ said Rourke quickly, eager to keep her out of the Starfleet politics if possible. As he watched, Graelin crossed the crowd to intercept Lindgren as she detached from a knot of junior officers, and he fought a scowl. Sadek’s warning rang in his ears, but Lindgren was a smart girl. She’d see through his fake charms.

‘No,’ he said again, and drained his glass. ‘But I should get the obligatory bits of this party out of the way, and then make sure you meet everyone properly.’

‘Obligatory bits?’

‘I’m the captain. I have to be the centre of attention for a bit, but it’s alright,’ he said, straightening his shirt and turning to the lounge’s new, short stage. ‘What I’m about to do is one of my favourite parts of the job.’

‘I could get used to this,’ Nate Beckett drawled as he and Athaka wandered into the lounge while the crew were still milling. ‘This place was sterile as hell.’

Athaka beamed with unusual confidence. ‘The Diplomatic Service was very clear on its requests,’ he said proudly. ‘They wanted a space we could use to host, so it had to present the best of Federation aesthetic; we used a lot of designs from some of the halls on places like Bravo and Starbase 1, and -’

‘I get the inspiration,’ Beckett said with a smirk. ‘You’ve been itching to show this off all week, haven’t you?’

‘Lieutenant Thawn deserves most of the credit.’

‘Of course she does.’ Beckett sighed. ‘Alright, come on, let’s go congratulate her on her hard work, and you can bask in her radiance or whatever.’

Athaka’s puppy-like devotion to Thawn was a frustrating feature in a roommate, but Beckett followed with a good-natured groan through the crowd to where Lindgren looked like she was trying to talk Thawn down off the wall.

‘Lieutenant, this work looks great,’ Athaka gushed.

Thawn looked stricken at the sudden arrival, and Lindgren had the wary eye of someone managing a volatile situation. The Ops Manager straightened. ‘Is it? I don’t think the carpets are the right shade; the lighting must be different -’

‘It looks fine,’ Lindgren said long-sufferingly. ‘Better than fine. It looks great.’ She gave Athaka a warning look.

He wilted. ‘I thought we’d done a good job. Everyone seems to like it.’

‘Yes,’ said Thawn, twisting her fingers together, ‘but does the captain like it? Does First Secretary Hale? Does Commander Valance?’

‘I can guarantee,’ Beckett drawled, ‘that Commander Valance doesn’t give a shit about the carpet.’ That won him an outright glare from Lindgren as Thawn stiffened, and he cleared his throat. ‘You look great, by the way.’

That stopped Thawn dead. She was in a dress with more floral accents than he’d come to expect of her usual look, which he’d never out-loud describe as ‘feminine and deeply self-conscious.’ She brushed a lock of red hair behind an ear. ‘Oh. Thank you. Elsa picked something out for me.’

But her tension felt different, more natural, and he gave a lopsided smirk as he shrugged. ‘You should keep listening to her. Looks great. As it should, if this whole damn room’s your baby.’

‘Well, it was Chief Lann’s teams who did the work, we just sorted out the design…’ She rolled a shoulder as she straightened. ‘Yes. It looks good, doesn’t it?’

Athaka gave another over-eager nod, and dove into further analysis of the minute details Thawn had added he felt were particularly masterful. With her thus mollified, Lindgren grabbed Beckett’s arm to steer him towards the bar.

‘Thank you,’ she hissed. ‘She’s been climbing the walls all day. I don’t know what she expects is going to happen here, but something’s got under her skin. It would have been easy for you to tease her, so I appreciate you not lighting the fuse on that bomb for me.’

‘Her fuss levels were too high for my tricorder to read,’ said Beckett, watching as the doors slid open and in walked Lieutenant Rhade with Counsellor Carraway. ‘But I get she’s going through some stuff right now. I’m not here to upset anyone, she just winds me up and I push back.’

Lindgren followed his gaze. ‘I really can’t imagine the mess of working with someone I’m maybe supposed to marry some day.’

‘Is it really that maybe?’

‘It’s not like anyone can be forced.’

‘Sure,’ said Beckett flatly. ‘That’s how family expectations work. Especially when you’re so obsessively eager to please as Rosara Thawn.’ He shrugged, then looked at her. ‘I didn’t say. You look great, too.’

Lindgren gave an airy laugh. ‘Don’t give me that, Nate.’

‘Give you what?’

‘Rosara isn’t used to nice compliments so she doesn’t see through your charms. I, on the other hand, know exactly what you’re doing.’

He cocked his head, the initial flash of indignation fading for a playful smirk. ‘And what am I doing?’

‘Trying to annoy Tar’lek.’ She tilted her head to the bar, where Tar’lek Arys sat with Harkon, looking like he was desperately trying to not look at them.

‘I don’t need to flirt with you to annoy Arys,’ Beckett pointed out.

‘But you don’t mind the package deal. Play nicely, Nate,’ she said, squeezing him on the arm before pulling away. He watched her, hands on his hips, but he’d expected her to join back up with Thawn, or the corner where Zherul sat with some of the medical staff.

His smile collapsed when he saw her saunter up to Commander Graelin and take his arm in the same companionable way she’d taken his moments ago.

Before he could figure his next move, Captain Rourke stepped on the stage, hands lifted before his spoke, voice amplified around the crowded lounge. ‘Good evening, Endeavour!’

A low murmur met him as all conversation died and all eyes turned on their captain. ‘I’ll keep this short and sweet,’ he promised, hands now in his pockets, voice going to that conversational manner Beckett remembered from his lectures at the Academy. ‘We’re heading for the Neutral Zone. In a week, we’ll be meeting representatives from the Romulan Star Empire and the Romulan Republic to discuss terms of a treaty to conduct research in the zone itself; regions no powers could enter since the dawn of the Federation. We’ve had a lot of hardship, a lot of difficulty these past months, but we’re turning a corner.’ He gave a firm nod. ‘Building bridges, not blowing them up.

‘But that’s next. Tonight, I want to welcome you to our new lounge. Give a hearty congratulations to our Operations and Engineering teams; they’ve worked hard to outfit this place while you were all taking leave on Bravo. Put your hands together for Commander Cortez, Lieutenant Thawn, Chief Lann, and all their people.’ Rourke clapped enthusiastically, the thunder of applause rippling through the lounge in response. Beckett looked to the three. Cortez was with Lann, and amiably lifted a glass, soaking up the attention with a jocular, self-aware air, but Thawn was next to Athaka, awkward and self-conscious again.

So Beckett frowned when Rourke’s eyes landed on her, and he said, ‘Lieutenant, you masterminded this; come on up.’ He wondered if she was going to explode at the attention but, gait careful, Thawn crossed the lounge to join Rourke up on the stage.

The captain put a reassuring hand to her shoulder. ‘I’m not singling you out to steal credit from the rest. You worked hard on this, but you work hard on everything. Since I’ve come aboard, you’ve been perhaps the most dedicated member of my senior staff, the most committed to your work and to this ship. You know every inch of this ship; you know who and what goes where, and it all happens under your watch.’ Rourke straightened as she began to turn red. ‘And you’ve saved my life. Not just as part of the command team rescuing me and Lieutenant Dathan from Tagrador, but months ago, in the Azure Nebula, you – and you alone – figured out how to transport me off that station. Nobody else did that.’

Realisation dropped in Beckett’s gut, and he slid sideways through the crowd, towards where Carraway and Rhade stood, but Rourke spoke on.

‘So I wanted to make my admiration and respect for you public,’ said the captain. ‘And I wanted everyone to be here for this moment. Because it is my greatest pleasure and privilege to promote you, Lieutenant Junior Grade Rosara Thawn, to the rank of Lieutenant.’

Cheers and applause broke out across the room, starting with a jubilant whoop from Cortez that rippled through the crowd, and Beckett slid in next to Rhade. ‘When this is over,’ he hissed at the burly Betazoid, ‘you should go over there and congratulate her. But also – and this is really important, you great walking reject from an Austen novel – you should compliment her not just on her work, but how she’s looking tonight.’

Rhade frowned at that, and glanced over at Carraway, who shrugged. ‘He’s not wrong,’ said Carraway. ‘About the advice or the description.’

‘You wanted my help without asking for it?’ said Beckett. ‘There it is. Be charming at her. You can make people feel like they’re the most important person in a room. Don’t bloody well hold back.’

Normally he wouldn’t have spoken to a lieutenant like that, but he was embittered enough at Rhade trying to weasel information out of him the other day and a party was the best time to get away with it. So he clapped him on the back as he walked away, and a glance over his shoulder confirmed Rhade was heading to the stage to intercept Thawn as she stepped down. He had the presence to make the crowds part before him, let him be the first to get to her, and if he couldn’t turn his considerable charm, then he was beyond Beckett’s help.

Beckett reached the bar just as Rourke told them to get back to partying, and the only space he found was next to Arys and Harkon. ‘I need a drink.’

Arys was scowling when Beckett turned back with his bottle. ‘What do you have to complain about?’

‘Oh.’ Beckett glanced past him to Harkon, who rolled her eyes, before his gaze swept the crowd. ‘You’ve spotted that Elsa’s flirting with our new second officer.’

‘Flirting,’ scoffed Harkon. ‘Who do you think she ditched us for at the club?’

Both men looked at her with expressions of horror. Beckett took a swig of his beer to try to swallow down the surprised bitterness. ‘God damn it.’

Arys visibly deflated. ‘She said she had work in the morning.’

Harkon arched an eyebrow at him. ‘That’s what people say when they’re ditching you at the club,’ she pointed out, then grabbed her drink and left them.

Beckett’s gaze followed her, and he watched as she headed for Thawn to give congratulations, only to veer away as Thawn broke from the crowd with Rhade, the two of them headed for a more cosy corner of the lounge. He had another bile-defeating swig of beer, then clapped Arys on the shoulder. ‘Chin up, pal.’

Arys gave him a flat look. ‘Don’t mock me.’

‘I’m not,’ Beckett sighed. ‘Look, I don’t – I flirt with Elsa because it’s fun. Because she’s fun to flirt with. There’s nothing to it, and we both know that, and we’re messing around.’

Arys’s shoulders slumped as he looked towards Lindgren and Graelin. ‘A vast comfort now.’

‘Yeah, well. Screw around too long and the girl will move on to someone who’s not screwing around. Especially if they’re this charming and heroic senior officer.’

‘I suppose.’

‘But that works in your favour. Trust me.’ Beckett drained his bottle in record time and turned back to the bar for another. ‘It’ll blow up before too long.’

Those probably weren’t his exact words, but they were the words Nate Beckett would remember saying in that moment. It would have been too prescient, too pithy, for him to say that when a heartbeat later there was a low, rumbling boom from deep in Endeavour’s belly, when the deck surged up under them and the lights went wild and the whole world span and sent them flying.

He’d remember that amidst the screaming, the darkness, the jolting impact of hitting the deck, he could feel that they’d dropped out of warp, feel that somehow, suddenly, Endeavour had been seriously, mortally wounded as if from nowhere. Of course, in truth, he couldn’t have possibly known; couldn’t have known anything but the concord turned to chaos, the party turned to terror, his world turned literally upside-down before he could ever know it had happened figuratively, too. He would not learn for minutes how bad it was, and not learn for hours what it even was, and not learn for days, months, exactly the how or the why. But in his memory, one moment everything was light and casual and he was making an off-hand comment to a heartbroken Tar’lek Arys – and hiding his own bitterness, to boot – that was accidentally perfectly prescient.

And in the next moment came the explosion.