“Any idea what this is about?”

“No.” Tessa pushed back against the corridor wall, slid down into a sitting position and hugged her knees against her chest. Thoughts of Davidson, of other pilots she had lost in other sorties, of all the crap that her squadron, her fellow pilots from the Von and the Hok had gone through played though her mind in a dull mishmash of pain. “The Admiral has something important she wants to say.” She curled further into herself, tightened the ball of misery and desperation her body was all too willing to collapse into. “That’s... all I know.”

Izzy looked on for a moment longer, glanced absently across the hall at Cordova, at eyes that didn’t see hers, that watched the eyes of other pilots, darting back and forth, from one pair to another, taking them all in. The pack of technicians that had come running out into the bay to meet them had caught and briefed every pilot and LC in loose, unsorted packs, had brought them up to speed on the situation as it stood, even as the lights flickered and died back to the minimal red glow of emergency power for the final time. Now, every pilot who flew for either the Hok or the Von was crammed into the corridor outside the Admiral’s office, awaiting some new, secondary briefing that felt extraneous, pointless in the face of the orange alert and the steady approach of the Coralate warships. Izzy breathed a loud sigh through frustrated lips, pushed back against the wall and sunk to her haunches beside Tessa.

“I’m sure he’s alright.” Izzy said weakly, glanced at the woman she loved, the woman who led her squadron, who had weathered so much pain, so much responsibility. “After all... Cordova made it back...”

“You heard his report.” Tessa managed. “He was lucky. We were lucky.” She swallowed, tried to put voice to the words that haunted her mind, fought to be released. It was a different situation. Davidson... “Even if...” She paused. “Even if by some miracle he is still floating out there, if he did survive the battle, I doubt he’s still alive.” She buried her face deeper into her knees. With those warships as close as they are, I doubt we’ll live to find out.

Izzy looked away, tried to hide the bitterness that rose to haunt her features. Slowly, unfolding with all the grace of a coiled snake, Izzy dropped the rest of the way to the deck, bent one leg at the knee to support her outstretched arm. As silence descended, washed through the room like a heavy curtain, someone at the far end of the corridor coughed, cleared their throat.

Tessa breathed a tired sigh, forced herself to look up, to move beyond the brooding darkness of her knees. Eyes rose, tracked across the opposite wall. “I was...” She hesitated, swallowed in the pause. “I was really worried about you out there.”

“You... weren’t the only one.” Izzy managed, eyes falling to the floor, studying shoes, the lines between sheets of deck plating. “When I saw that move, the way those bastard blueskins caught you like that, so quick and so completely...” She looked up, met Tessa’s eyes for the barest instant within the pause before eyes dropped away again. “And... after what you showed me, the...” She paused hesitated. “The thing you saw, the vision... I thought I’d lost you.”

“We were lucky.” Tessa said again. In her mind, fragments of the vision played in broken succession, fragmented images of a wake of the mind that mingled with the wakes of reality, wakes she had stood and spoken at countless times before. She squeezed her eyes against budded tears. You never really get used to it. Any of it.

“Yeah.” Came Izzy’s tired response. “If you can call coming back to this bullshit waiting game luck.” She sighed, shook her head. “I can’t believe they’ve got us just sitting here,” She gestured loosely. “Us, this ship, all of it...” Teeth ground together, muffled a frustrated growl. “Give me a clear shot at a Cygnan any day over this, over just sitting around waiting to do the nicey-nice with the bureaucratic bullshit while fucking death just hovers around out there.” She forced out the edge of an irritated exhale. “I wish they’d just blast us or board us already.”

“Hell of a thing to wish for.” Tessa shook her head, glanced sideways at the floor.

“Like I said, better than just sitting around waiting for it.” Izzy leaned forward into her raised knee, stared at the opposite wall. “Death’s ready to dance, and I know all the moves.” She cocked her head, looked pointedly at Tessa. The other woman looked away, shook her head despite the cracking edge of a smile that broke to play across her lips.

“Always one step ahead of the reaper, eh, Iz?”

“You know it.” Izzy nodded confidently. “And the Coralate better hope you’re always one step ahead too.” She watched Tessa’s eyes as they came back, met her gaze again, slowly, almost reluctantly. “Because I swear to all that’s holy and to God himself above that if anything happens to you, anything at all, I am going to rain so much divine justice onto those blueberry bastards that there won’t be anything left but a few pieces of burning chrome and little a spot of shit to mark where their leader was standing when I vaporized his worthless ass.”

“I appreciate that, Iz.” Tessa’s smile spread, still soft with uncertainty, with worry and the turbulent sea of hurt that bubbled in her chest. “But, I mean, do I really have to die for you to go nuts like that?” She grinned. “You know, if you can end this war by turning into a one woman army bent on the annihilation of all things Coralate, why not just go do it right now.”

“Not enough incentive.” Izzy said absently. “I need a good reason to go totally batshit insane.”

Tessa opened her mouth to say something, closed it again as the door to the Admiral’s office slid open. Some nameless, grease-stained technician stepped into the red light, glanced at the bright screen of a noteputer, looked up to regard the silent eyes of a crowd of tired pilots.

“Okay,” he cleared his throat nervously. “Eisenherz, the Admiral wants to start with your squadron, uh...” He paused as Tessa looked up, his eyes flicking back to the noteputer again in nervous reflex. “Jenkins, Cordova, Copperfield, plus also–” He looked up, tried not to meet the eyes of the pilots that watched him, aloof and detached, hungry for information. “Mondego and Beaumann, Erin Mondego and Daniel Beaumann, from Isis Squadron.”

“Come on,” Tessa managed, climbing slowly to her feet, glancing back at Izzy as she rose. “Lets get this over with.”