Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

The Administrator raps his knuckles on the door of the Commander’s office – twice, one short knock, followed by a longer one. This is a simple formality, he thinks to himself as he waits anxiously for the answer. It’s not like the Commander didn’t sense his presence as soon as he stepped off the paternoster lift; or anyone else’s presence on that level of the facility, for that matter.

“Come in,” says a voice on the other side of the door. Assertive. Imperious. Better not to keep Her waiting.

Adler crosses the threshold, a stack of documents under his arm. The Commander is sitting at her desk, visibly pouring over some papers. She gives a small nod at his presence, then motions to the chair. This is routine, one they’ve done so many times before, one Adler would never dare deviate from.

He clears his throat and begins going through his report. “A shipment of Gestalt workers from Rotfront should arrive soon, as per the orbital transit calendar. This should help us meet our key performance indicators for the next season.”

The Commander hums. “Excellent.”

“And as per our last discussion…” Adler drums his fingers against the desk, anxiously. “I have taken the initiative to order a new STCR unit from the Heimat factory.”

Red-lined blue eyes raise from the papers on the desk to meet his own. “Oh ? I assume you’ve managed to fit that expense in our budget, then.”

“Yes,” answers Adler. “According my calculations, lightening up the load on our existing Protektor Controllers will lead to beneficial margins in the next two to three seasons. Up to four percent.”

Falke chuckles a little, and Adler feels a weight lifting from his shoulders. He might have done this countless times, but there’s still something innately terrifying about one-on-one meetings with Her. Perhaps it’s how She seems so impossibly tall, even sitting in her leather chair; or the way her bioresonance fills the room, bathing it in an aura of gentle but firm authority.

She speaks, tapping her fountain pen pensively against her lip. “It might be a good idea to follow the updated AEON guidelines for Storches. Something about pairing them with a STAR, if I’m not mistaken ?”

As if the Commander would ever be mistaken. “Indeed. The file recommends assigning them a veteran STAR unit as a mentor. I took the liberty of picking one myself, from the cadre.”

“Who ?”

His statement has piqued Falke’s curiosity; he can feel it radiating through the office like a pulsing sine wave. Her terrible and divine gaze is fully centered on him, now. Adler opens his mouth, but She doesn’t even wait for his answer. Instead, She plucks it from his mind like a feather, gently, her bioresonance like a caress to the grooves of his brain.

A pause. Something unexpected happens. With awe, Adler watches the Commander’s lips quirk up in a smile. “Oh, this is going to be interesting, isn’t it ?”

The view of Leng is astonishingly beautiful from here.

It’s, in fact, the prettiest thing STCR-LO124 has seen in her short life. She’s been awake – no, alive – for all of fourty-three hours and at least five of them have been spent by the hexagonal window in Leng Orbital’s portside observatory bay. Leng stretches beneath, impossibly big. Mother-of-pearl clouds swirl and whirl and weave over stiff peaks and sharp crevasses ; deep wounds in the planet’s crust scar its surface.

Behind her, the hustle and bustle of the space station. There are many things that the passing Gestalts and Replikas say about Leng : Off the map – polite. Inhospitable – just plain truth, judging from the surface temperature. Arse end of nowhere – a little more vulgar already. Ninth circle of hell – now, that’s a little hyperbolic, isn’t it ? None of them are here by choice, but is it really that bad ? Will it be that bad, when it will be all that she’s ever known ?

A tinny voice erupts, coming from the speakers. “Shuttle to Sierpinski S-23, embarking now. Departure in fifteen minutes.”

That’s her call. STCR-LO124 tears her gaze away from the window and sets towards the hangar bay. The crowd cautiously parts around her, wary looks abounding from tired-looking Gestalts. She has to crouch down to fit into the gaping maw of the shuttle, and much to her displeasure, she can’t fit in any of the seats.

“Sorry,” says the flight attendant Eule with a perfunctory smile that tries to be apologetic but fails. “If you can’t squish yourself in the emergency exit seat row, maybe we can arrange something with a few spare seatbelt extenders… ?”

This is how she ends up haphazardly strapped to a jumpseat in this flying deathtrap of a machine.

Isn’t that fucking fantastic .

The shuttle buffets up and down as it cleaves through the upper atmosphere of Leng. A Gestalt dry heaves loudly in one of the aisle seats. Someone prays to a divinity long forsaken by the State. STCR-LO124 just wishes she could do anything with her hands other than stare at them; other than watch the mechanical tendons stretch them open and closed. Open. Closed. Clench them into a tight fist, then open again. If only she could punch a wall, or maybe someone. That would do just fine.

When at last the shuttle touch down, there’s a collective sigh of relief through the cabin. She wastes no time tumbling out of the ramp, setting her feet on terra firma for the first time. She’s immediately met by the biting cold of Leng’s surface. Freezing wind whips her hair across her face; ice threatens to seize her mechanical joints; she has to blink to keep the snowflakes from her eyelashes. Through the blizzard, she can barely discern the facility itself. An imposing cathedral of concrete and metal stretches above the frozen soil. In the distance, lights slowly blink in and out of an array of satellite dishes and antennas. The Gestalts huddle together and move, bracing against the wind, aiming for the relatively sheltered hangar bay.

STCR-LO124 follows them. It’s once she’s crossed the threshold that she notices them . Two figures, one tall and one shorter, are waving at her. In just a few bounds of her long legs, she nears their position. She focuses her optics on them, the task made easier by the absence of falling snowflakes.

Her welcoming committee consists of two Replikas, it turns out. The shorter one is a familiar face : an Eule, in the form of a standard model carrying a clipboard. Next to her stands a much taller figure – though not quite as tall as herself. Black and red armor, hair that falls in choppy bangs, and a mask. A STAR unit, of course. The ubiquitous basic security guard model that roamed the corridors of Leng Orbital.

Standing at attention with her hands clasped behind her back, the STAR suddenly gives a salute and extends a hand in greeting. She clears her throat before speaking.

“Welcome to AEON Mining Facility Sierpinski S-23. I’m Unterfeldwebel STAR-S2313, callname Jäger. I will be your assigned mentor and guide through the early months of your deployment.”

STCR-LO124 (is this designation even appropriate right now ?) almost reaches out to complete the handshake, until the implications of the Starling’s little welcome speech hit her all at once.

“Hold on a moment. You said you were my what ?” she asks.

“Your mentor.”

STCR-LO124 runs a hand in her hair, dislodging stray snowflakes. This shit day just keeps getting worse.

“Nobody informed me I was going to have a mentor.”

The STAR retracts her extended hand, returning it to behind her back. She simply shrugs.

“Tough shit. Sierpinski’s full of surprises, you know.”

STCR-LO124’s fist is shaking, now. Her temper is a mighty flame, following the tiniest of sparks, that much she knows; and everyone else, too, judging by the anxious looks the EULE keeps giving her. The STAR is unfazed, though. She steps forward, and when she speaks again, there’s the smallest hint of annoyance slipping between the cracks of her laid-back demeanor.

“Look, you can either come with us or freeze your circuits off here. Which one is it gonna be ?”

Behind them, two other Starlings are escorting the mass of Gestalts through the great big door that marks S-23’s entrance. Colossal, made of dull grey steel; impassible. It might as well be written abandon all hope, all you who enter here on it. What other choice does she have, though ?

With a small sigh, she follows the STAR and the EULE into the great below.

Zeros and ones flow on the monitor’s screen, white flickering on blue.

She tears her eyes away from it, and back to survey the room. There’s an Eule at the computer, strumming on the keyboard. The same Eule who, a few minutes prior, had plugged the cable into the access port on the nape of her neck. Information flows into her : maps, reports, personnel registraries. She can almost hear the faint tick of each completed file transfer when she closes her eyelids.

They’re not alone, though. The Starling – Jäger , she has to remind herself – is sitting in a corner, lazily straddling a chair. She’s resting her head on her forearms, and munching on what appears to be some kind of protein bar. STCR-LO124 would be foolish to mistake her nonchalance for inattention, though; she’s staring straight at her.

“Don’t you have anything better to do ?” she snaps.

Another mouthful of protein bar. “Nah, not really.”

Thankfully, the Eule interrupts them with a chime. “All finished !” she says, and pulls the cable from its socket. She places a small plastic card in STCR-LO124’s hands.

The card is minimalistic in its design, with just a picture of herself – what good is it really, if all the Storches have the same face ? – and a few indicators of security clearance. There’s her unit number, though. Right there.

STCR-S2307 .

The Eule tells her to stand still as she stencils the number on her shoulder, and in the periphery of her vision, the Starling cranes her neck to try and get a better look. When she does, something flashes across her face, as brief as it is acute.

“Got a problem with my serial number, Security Technician ?”

Clearly taken aback, the Starling stammers a little. “Your number – I thought they’d…” She averts her gaze. “Never mind. It’s not important.”

Whatever has gotten into her is gone now. STCR-S2307 makes a mental note of investigating that for later.

Her subordinate drums her fingers on the chair’s back. “What matters, though, is your callname,” she says. “Two-three-oh-seven, that means you’re Sieben. ”

STCR-S2307 gawks at her. “What do you mean it’s Sieben ? I don’t even get to pick my own name ?”

“Nope,” the Starling – Jäger – says, rounding out the p.

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Yeah, well, tough shit, that’s the naming convention Storches decided on. There’s Eins, Drei, Vier, Fünf, Sechs, and now you.”

“I – we’ll see.” She exhales slowly, turning momentarily to the Eule. “Are we finished here ?” The Eule nods. To the Starling : “You, get off your ass and show me around this facility.”

Jäger rises to her feet with a little curtsy, condescendingly polite. “Of course. Follow me.”

True to her word, her subordinate does take her on a little tour of the facility. It’s bleak. S-23 is an inverted spire plunging deep into the crust of Leng; a great wound, a gash. Plush carpets and paintings on the wall do little to mask how inhospitable its steel walls, bathed in glum neon white, feel. Worse, there aren’t even any bathtubs here, just showers, which in STCR-S2307’s personal opinion is simply unacceptable . At least the library seems well-furnished – that’s what Jäger says, at least. The Starling leaves her at the entrance of the Storch dorm, and she hesitates a split second before pressing the button.

The occupants inside stare at her as soon as she enters. How strange it is to see so many identical faces peering at her, like an eerie hall of mirrors. One of them approaches, a book in her hands, and something akin to an amicable expression on her face. As much as the Storch faceplate is capable of, anyway.

“You must be the new Storch. Welcome to our facility. I’m Sechs, by the way.” She tilts her head to look at the number stamped on her shoulder. “Oh ! You’re 07, so your name will be Sieben.”

Shit. Looks like the Starling was right after all.

Another Storch pipes up, not bothering to divert her gaze from the dusty tome she’s nose-deep in. “Heard you’ll get a mentor to show you the ropes. Who is it ?”

Sieben scratches her neck. “Um, STAR-S2313 ? Said her name was Jäger.”

A collective groan erupts across the room.

Alarmed, Sieben scans her fellow Storches’ faces for answers. “Why, is there something wrong with her, or… ?”

“Jäger has, erm, a lot of opinions, as I’m sure you’ll discover,” says a Storch lying on a nearby bed. “Granted, most of them are about guns, but –”

“ ‘But she’s a cunt’ is what you mean to say, Fünf.” rasps out another Storch, her arms crossed.

“Drei ! Language , damnit ! We’ve been over this ! You can’t curse like a sailor in the presence of the new–”

“Whatever.”

“ But – and for the last time, stop interrupting me, Drei – she’s hard to deal with.”

Sechs taps her on her shoulder, an obvious gesture of sympathy. “Don’t let her boss you around too much, alright ?”

Deflated, Sieben nods. “Alright.”

A small book is placed into her hands. “For bedtime reading until you get your library card,” says Sechs.

She runs a finger over the cover. It depicts an open pit, concentric rings digging deep into the bones of the soil. Inferno , the title reads. How thematically fitting.

When she comes out of the dorm, the Starling is still there, leaning on a wall.

“Took you long enough. You started a debate about ancient mythology, or what ?”

Sieben eyes her mentor with annoyance. “Is nagging me all you’re meant to do ? I thought Starlings were usually the quiet type.”

The Starling in front of her wags a finger. “Every statistical average has outliers. Me, for example.”

“I’ve known you for all of half a cycle and you’re already insufferable.”

“I know. But enough of that. What name did the others give you ?”

“... It’s Sieben ,” she mutters, cursing herself at how unsure she sounds.

It’s not always easy to tell what Starlings’ facial expressions mean, mostly because they’re wearing that damn mask all the time, but here and now it’s plain as day. Jäger’s red-lined eyes narrow just a little, her eyebrows tilt downwards ever so slightly, and it all coalesces into a particularly pompous I told you so that might as well be an open proclamation. Well, fuck her.

“Got a problem with that name ?” Sieben barks at her.

“It’s a little unoriginal is all. Cardinal numbers – bleh . Besides, the Aras used that naming convention first –”

“I don’t care what the Aras call themselves.”

This is bad. She shouldn’t let the STAR’s petulant little jabs get her so upset, but the hurt feels a little personal. Maybe it’s just a name, an informal callsign that won’t ever appear on official documents – but a name is conformity . It’s fitting in, it’s belonging, and yet it’s uniqueness in a sea of identical copies. Maybe it’s anthetical – and what about it ?

Jäger’s eyes narrow even further. “It’s so funny. Fifteen minutes ago you were calling that name stupid, now you’re up in arms defending it. You’re a woman of contradictions, aren’t you ?”

“You’re one to talk about lame names and contradictions !” Sieben lashes out at her. “You named yourself Hunter , but the fuck are you gonna hunt in this dump ? Mice ? Cockroaches ?”

This gets a belly laugh out of her mentor. A genuine one, judging by how she has to take off her mask to guffaw. “That’s a good one,” she says, and her smile creases dimples in the synthetic flesh of her cheeks. It has to be on purpose, Sieben decides. Make the basic security unit appear personable, congenial. A facsimile of affablity plastered over a frame built for close combat.

“Okay, that’s enough lollygagging,” Jäger says when she’s finished laughing. “Let’s get you to the armory for your service weapon, Sieben.”

Jäger says – no, drawls – her name in such a peculiar way, separating cleanly the syllables like a bullet separates from its casing. Might be her accent; it’s not from Heimat, that’s for sure, so Kitezh, maybe ? Something to investigate in the AEON files.

“Vermin’s not the only prey I’m hunting, by the way. I’m also on the prowl for misbehaving Storches, as it happens.” Jäger’s clipping her mask back on, and though she was still smiling a second ago, there’s something hollowed out in her gaze, like she’s looking past Sieben, looking at the shadow she casts over the metal wall. And it goes away as soon as it’s there, Jäger gesturing at her to follow through the corridors.

The heavy silence is blissfully interrupted by the sounds of life in the facility -- chirping cadres of Eules, Gestalts going to and from their shifts at the mine, and their own small talk.

“May I ask you a few questions ?”

“Sure.” Jäger’s side-eye is perfectly neutral. Better to start with innocuous inquiries, then.

“How long have you been serving on this station for ?”

“One thousand, three hundred and twenty cycles. Vinetan calendar.”

That makes her a veteran, then. The files Sieben has read on the STARs make no mention of median operational lifespan, but to last that long in a shithole like Sierpinski is almost impressive. Almost.

“Do you enjoy your service here ?”

As phlegmatic as ever, Jäger answers. “It’s fine. I’m proud to serve the Nation.”

That was a little stilted. If her loyalty to the party line turns out to be questionable, then Sieben will be the first to – gleefully – take advantage of it. Time to proceed to the next line of questioning.

“Alright. What can you tell me about your squad ?”

“My girls ?” Her tone shifts to one that’s almost fond now. “They’re good Starlings. Dolch is the most dependable one of the bunch, I guess. Axt is a worse gossiper than the kitchen Eules, Pfeil and Speer are practically joined at the hip. Guess that’s it.”

Sieben runs the count: that makes five of them total. Per AEON guidelines, STAR squads are supposed to be six units minimum, including the officer. Yet another oddity in Sierpinski.

So she asks : “How come your squad is under the regulation size ? Seems a little odd.”

There’s a flash of something across Jäger’s features – bitterness, or resentment, maybe. It’s gone as soon as it appears, but it’s another crack in the mask of perfect professionalism, perfect poise.

“We… lost a few Protektors in that incident , back then. In the mines.”

“And you mean to tell me Command hasn’t replaced them since ?”

Jäger stares at her. “No. They’ve prioritized the delivery of a STCR unit instead. You .”

There it is. It hasn’t taken more than half a cycle in this station for Sieben to realize there was a barely contained undercurrent of hostility between her fellow Storches and the Starlings they commanded, but never before has it been so blatant. Well, too fucking bad. She’s here, a Storch , not a doe-eyed Starling rookie ready to be put through weirdly intricate hazing rituals by her cadre.

She’s not going anywhere, and Jäger can suck it.

“Why isn’t that work order completed yet ?”

The ARAR unit backs into the wall, caged by Sieben’s advancing frame. Aras are not small or dainty by any means; Sieben has seen them haul enormous loads before. They’re strong and reliable, and save for Mynahs, they tower over the rest of the service cadre. Still; they’re not Protektors.

“The required supplies were missing. I couldn’t finish it.”

“I don’t give a fuck.”

Sieben waves the work order in her face again, flapping the sheet of paper in front of the Ara’s face. The latter averts her gaze, choosing instead to stare at the ground. This won’t do. This won’t do at all.

“Look at my eyes when I’m fucking talking to you !”

The Ara flinches, hard. Their faces might be hard to read, but fear is an emotion so primal, so atavistic it transcends facial expressions. The shorter Replika presses herself flatter against the wall, as if she could phase through it and disappear for good.

“I want that work order done within two cycles. Figure it out. Do you understand me ?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Good. Now get the hell out of my sight.”

With a screech of metal talons on the floor, the Ara scampers away, turning the corner like her life depends on it. Probably to hide in a tunnel. Like a little rat.

Heavy steps, coming from the other direction. Sieben’s head snaps up suddenly.

It’s a STAR. Sieben doesn’t recognize her at first, because they all look the same, but the first hint is that she doesn’t salute her. This Starling’s hands are clasped behind her back, and she stops briefly, probably assessing the situation – the ARAR unit running away, Sieben’s hands balled up in fists at her side, trembling with barely contained anger.

“That was unwise, Sieben”.

There it is again. Not ma’am , nor any other title, but her name, enunciated in that particular, sneering way she recognizes now.

“Jäger. I don’t recall asking for your opinion.”

“You’ll get it regardless. It’s not a good idea to yell at the Aras, you know ? I guarantee she’ll bitch about you to her entire cadre as soon as she gets back to the dorm.”

“And why should I care ? Fear is a reliable way to instill discipline, isn’t it ?”

“Oh ? Do you think that excuses that pointless little power trip ?”

That’s it. Sieben has heard enough. She lunges forward, grabbing the Starling’s armor collar and slamming her into the wall. She likes being taller than almost the entire facility, taller than the STARs; she leans over, caging her in like she did with the Ara a few minutes prior.

Her mentor raises an eyebrow. “I told you already. This isn’t going to work.” Then, leaning in slightly : “Because I’m not afraid of you.”

Sieben presses her harder against the wall, the kevlar-and-polymer armor plates making an ugly scraping sound against it. “Stop fucking telling me how to do my job !” she yells, punctuating her sentence with a thump of her fist against the wall, right next to Jäger’s head.

Jäger doesn’t even flinch. She blinks back at Sieben, thoroughly unconcerned.

Sieben fists a hand in the red straps of Jäger’s armor. “I don’t need a jumped up Starling like you ordering me around, acting like you know better ! I was made for this !”

“My role as a mentor is to show you the ropes. If you’re not happy about that, you can go bitch and moan to Adler.”

And there it is, that sheer arrogance in her tone, the incredibly deliberate way her accent enounces the word bitch . It roils Sieben’s gut, makes anger bloom like a furnace across her chest and ribs.

Enough is enough. She pulls back her fist to strike.

It all happens very fast. A sharp tug at her hip. Cold, hard metal pressing against her stomach. Sieben looks down, and sees her Type-75 sidearm.

Fuck. Fuck . When did she–

“Let this be your first real lesson,” drawls Jäger, her index idling casually over the trigger guard. “Never let your emotions cloud the perception of your surroundings.”

Sieben wants to move, try to disarm her, anything, but she finds herself paralyzed. All she can do is nod faintly.

“Now you’re going to go apologize to the poor Ara.”

“I – What ?”

“You heard me the first time. Go.”

Sieben rounds the corner, her mentor still holding her at gunpoint. Finding the Ara is easy enough; she hasn’t tucked herself very far into her tunnel at all. To the Ara’s credit, her expression remains impassive, even faced with the absurdity of the present situation. Her eyes drift from Sieben to Jäger, and then to the gun.

Gun that is currently still pressed to her side. “Go on, then. Apologize. With a nice little bow, too.”

“You can’t be serious, this is – this is humiliating !” hisses Sieben under her breath.

Jäger brushes her thumb across the Type-75’ safety, so slow it’s almost sensual. Clicks it off. An horrible pang of primal, raw terror pierces Sieben’s belly.

“Bow. ”

And Sieben does, bending over at the waist until her torso is nearly parallel with the floor. She clears her throat, once, twice.

“I, uh. I’m sorry for lashing out at you. It wasn’t right of me to do that.”

A pregnant pause.

“Good enough,” says her mentor. She then turns to the Ara : “Sorry about her, Zehn. She’s new.”

She’s new. Sieben catches the STAR’s satisfied gaze, and in an instant, she realizes that she fucking hates her; it’s crystal clear, like a divine revelation bestowed upon her mind. Hate, hate, hate .

Jäger turns her attention back to the gun. In a fluid motion, she detaches the slide from the frame, sending both pieces clattering to the floor. One last pointed look, and she leaves, her footsteps echoing down the hallway.

Terrorizing the Gestalts is probably Sieben’s favorite activity. It’s something new every cycle with those fleshbags, her fellow Storches had told her when she arrived at the facility. For all the variety of models that populate S-23, Replikas are still predictable when confronted. Eules break down in ugly sobs; Aras stare blankly, motionless; Stars remain infuriatingly calm. Yet with the Gestalts, you never know what you are going to get. It’s almost thrilling.

Sieben scrapes the edge of her stun prod against the concrete wall of the Gestalt’s dorm. If the pneumatic door hissing open or the thundering footsteps of six Protektors hasn’t woken its residents up, then the ugly screeching nose it’s making surely will.

“Everyone up ! Inspection time, you miserable louts !” she bellows.

At the sound of her voice reverberating across the room, the Gestalts scramble around to their feet. Some of them are dressed in their leisure outfits, other in the dirty overalls commonly provided to the mine workers. They try their best to remain calm, yet concern etches its way across the tired traits of their faces. Dread gnaws at their composure like mites with skin.

Behind Sieben, the five STARs fan out to spread across the room in graceful strides. The Gestalts’ eyes dart around in alarm, and some of them flinch when the tall Replikas approach their bunks. Sieben clacks her stun baton on a nearby pillar, repeatedly. It sounds like a machine gun burst. That brings the residents’ attention back to her.

“We Protektors have received reports of contraband being held in this dorm,” Sieben says. “Any obstruction of our search will not be tolerated.”

With that being said, she strolls leisurely through the room, watching her Starlings methodically empty bags and pry open lockers. What few personal belongings the Gestalts have – journals, pictures, the occasional book – tumble down carelessly on the cold metal floor. No one dares to protest, of course. Not when the Protektors have impunity in their use of force. It would be foolish.

Perhaps barely less foolish is the act of staring at a Protektor Controller.

Sure, Sieben might not have optics wired to the back of her head, but there’s enough instinct in her neural pattern to recognize when someone is looking at her. With insistent curiosity, at that. She snaps her head to the side and, in two strides of her long legs, reaches the offender.

This Gestalt is an unremarkable-looking woman, maybe in her late thirties. Brown eyes, brown hair braided in a simple pattern. She does not dare meet Sieben’s gaze now that the latter towers over her.

“The fuck were you staring at me for, Gestalt ?” barks Sieben.

The woman’s throat bobs up and down. “You’re, uh. New.”

“Very astute observation, Gestalt. So what ?”

At that, her mettle seems to completely desert her. Her shoulders slope down; her knees start trembling. Sieben is leaning over her now, taking full advantage of her nearly two and a half meter chassis. It’s the favorite part of the frame she inhabits, really. It makes intimidation so much easier .

The Gestalt opens her mouth, a semblance of coherent thought finally returning to her feeble mind. “It’s… it’s not often that we get to see new Protektors around here.”

“Indeed. And is that a valid reason to stare, Gestalt ?”

Seconds pass. The woman does not – cannot, perhaps – answer.

So Sieben backhands her. A hard crack of reinforced plastic and metal across her cheek whips her head to the side, makes her stumble until she catches herself. One of the Gestalt’s hands flies to her jaw, prodding the already red tenderness there. Tears start to well up in her eyes.

There is someone else staring at Sieben, now. Not a Gestalt, this time. A Replika . Sieben does not need to ping her for identification; the shield she’s carrying in her left hand makes it obvious. Disapproval, too, is obvious in her gaze, the pinch of her eyebrows. She can go fuck herself. Sieben is just doing her job .

Whatever dismissive comment she was prepared to launch dies on her tongue, though, as a noise of surprise erupts across the room. It’s followed by the unmistakable sound of glass on metal. A bottle, rolling across the floor.

“Empress’ shit !” exclaims Sieben as her fingers close around the bottle. “What is that ? What the fuck is that ?”

She examines it : clear glass, no visible label, a simple cork. She pops it open carefully. The strong scent of alcohol, and then the fainter smell of fruit, assaults her olfactive sensors. Contraband liquor. Of course.

The silence is deafening in the cramped dorm room. Sieben’s low contralto cleaves through it like it’s an axe.

“Well, well, well. To whom does this bottle belong, Gestalts ?”

No answer. They’re all exchanging panicked glances, now, their eyes darting between themselves and the Protektor squad. Sieben’s patience is rapidly running low.

“I asked you all a fucking question !” she roars.

That seems to shake up the Gestalts. One of them – a small, wiry woman, with grey hairs – points a trembling finger at a nearby man. He gasps in surprise, then gasps again, louder this time, when the nearest Starling grabs his arm. “Think that’s the one, ma’am. I saw that bottle roll from around that area,” she says.

Sieben beckons her forward. “Bring him here.”

Obeying, the Protektor practically hauls the stout, balding middle-aged man to the center of the room. He has the build of a factory worker, maybe; some kind of prole. Small scars and callouses deck his hands. Sieben presses his head on a nearby table. He struggles, fruitlessly.

The middle of a dorm is an odd place for an impromptu interrogation, but Sieben can manage just fine. “Gestalt,” she begins, “are you going to tell me why you have a bottle of contraband schnapps stashed under your bed ?”

Sweat pearls on the man’s forehead. “I – I have no idea how it got there. I swear ! I swear on my mother’s –”

Sieben interrupts him. “Do I look like I give a shit about your whore of a mother, Gestalt ?”

“N–No.”

“Correct. Now answer the damn question.”

“I really don’t know ! I swear !”

The Gestalt’s entire body is shaking like a leaf, now. He shuts his eyes for a brief moment, as if Sieben is going to disappear when he opens them, like a bad dream dispelled by the light. As if Sieben is going anywhere. Foolish little worm. She pushes his head harder against the wood surface of the table, and he winces in pain.

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I’m not – I’m not lying ! I’m telling the truth !”

He shudders when Sieben delicately takes hold of his right hand.

“That’s exactly what a drunkard would say, isn’t it ?” Sieben drawls. “I’ve heard of you lot before. You are given a place to build yourself up, to better the future of our great Nation, and what do you do ? You squander that opportunity at every occasion. You revel in degeneracy .”

The man is panting frantically, now, gulping air. Telltale sign of a panic attack. Sieben’s own synthetic heart is thumping in her chest in gleeful excitement; being in control of someone’s fate feels so good that it makes her nearly dizzy. Her focus narrows to her prey, the rank smell of fear emanating from his pores, the grip of her servos on his wrist.

“This facility is like a big organism, if you will. Every organism in this solar system has parasites leeching off from it. Is that what you are, Gestalt ? A social parasite ?”

She twists the hand at an angle, ever so slowly, degree by degree. The man starts howling in pain. Spittle drops down from his chin in thick rivulets. Disgusting.

“Sieben. That’s enough.” A stern voice, coming from behind her. All too familiar.

“Fuck off, Jäger !” Sieben barks. “Don’t you dare interrupt me again !”

She turns her attention back to the Gestalt; he’s lifted his head from the table to look at the Starlings behind her in desperate supplication. Anger fulminates inside her like an infernal engine.

“Don’t look at them, look at me ! I am the one in charge, shit-for-brains !” Sieben yells, watching with particular delight at how hope drains from his face.

With a deep, throaty chuckle, she resumes her rotation of the man’s hand. He finds his voice again as Sieben puts more pressure on the joint.

“Please, please, pl– please, I– didn’t do anything” Words come out of his mouth in pained, hoarse sobs. Words that will not help him.

It’s all so breathtakingly easy. So, so easy. Righteous anger lends precision to the unrelenting curl of the myomer fascia in her arm, all to twist, to hurt –

Something yanks Sieben backwards.

She yelps in surprise, the trance broken, as two Starlings grab her by the arms and start dragging her backwards. She tries to fight it, to kick and push, but they’re too strong, and before long she’s thrown into the corridor, stumbling.

“What the fuck was that ?” she roars.

“Call that an intervention.” says Jäger, as she emerges between the two Starlings, shield in hand.

She jerks a thumb towards the dorm. “Take that Gestalt to the interrogation room, call the Kolibri if you have to.” Then, staring directly at Sieben : “In the meantime, I’ll handle her.”

Handle her. What does Jäger think she is, a rabid animal ? Oh, Sieben is going to make her pay for that little stunt. She’ll be lucky if she can still walk when she’s finished with her.

Jäger rests the palm of her hand against her stun prod. Not-so-subtle threat. “I told you it was enough. You continued. I had no choice but to intervene.”

“You insubordinate little shit. I’m going to make you regret that.”

Sieben has never been so angry in her short life; it dawns on her through the haze. Rage is fully in control now. She couldn’t stop, even if she wanted to.

Jäger tilts her chin up. “Try it, then.”

Sieben lunges at her, stun prod crackling in her right hand. She’s never fought anyone before, yet she knows how to. Instinctual, implanted neural pathways coming online to guide her.

She thrusts the prod three times, furious momentum carrying her forward. Jäger parries it with her shield, effortlessly, then pivots to her side. She’s deceptively quick for someone her size; quicker than Sieben, too, evening the reach disadvantage. Undeterred, Sieben attacks again, this time targeting the shield with her back hand. She grabs it and pulls, as hard as she can. Her other hand brings the stun prod in a wide arc above her head.

It strikes Jäger’s temple with a resounding clack . With a final grunt of effort, Sieben tears the shield away, sends it clattering across the corridor. Jäger staggers backward, her hands finding the wall to steady her. Sieben can see she’s breathing harder now, but she’s grinning like a madwoman. And Sieben gets it ; every single of her nerves is crackling with excitement, with anticipation. As if on cue, Jäger makes a come hither gesture with two fingers.

Sieben charges at her like an angry bull. Myomer propels her frame forward and she loads a punishing overhand right, aims it to Jäger’s chin. One blow is all it will take to finish it. She’s so high on synthetic adrenaline that she doesn’t realize her feet are out of position – until it’s too late.

Jäger ducks in under her punch. Two arms envelop Sieben’s legs, and then she’s off the ground, flying in the air for a split second before her back hits the floor. Her head bounces off the metal grating so hard her optical feeds separate and flicker. Wasting no time, Jäger straddles her hips and pins her torso down when she tries to roll.

The tide of this fight has turned, and all it took was just an instant. Sieben blinks until she stops seeing double. She tries to buck Jäger off, to claw at her face, but that just gets her wrists pinned down for good measure.

With one final defeated chuff, she rests her head on the cold floor.

“There you go. Are you finished with your little tantrum ?” Jäger asks, a smug grin on her face.

“Fuck you.”

Jäger leans forward, pressing down on Sieben’s wrists. She’s strong, too : Sieben can hardly move under her.

Sieben grits her teeth. “You’ll regret ever laying a hand on me. I’m your superior officer , damnit !”

“Don’t care. As your mentor, I can use whatever methods I want to keep you in line.”

“Keep me in l– oh, you fucker . You’re my subordinate ! You’re not my handler !”

Jäger raises her eyebrows. “Aren’t I ? Sure, you don’t like it, but look at how you behaved in there. Do you think that was appropriate ? In any way ?”

Sieben closes her eyes and thinks. About the sobbing oaf of a Gestalt, his cries of pain when she twisted his arm. All she had felt, at that moment, was pure glee. Happiness in tormenting him; power in watching him helpless.

“He… he deserved it. Hell, I went easy on him. Diversant imbecile was storing contraband under his bed !”

At that, Jäger breaks her usual detached demeanor and huffs in exasperation. Her hands move from Sieben’s pinned wrists up to her armored collar, shaking her.

“Was the AEON quality control technician hungover the day you rolled through at the factory, or what ? ”

“What do you – ”

“Gestalts lie and accuse each other all the damn time ! Someone else could have stashed that bottle to pin that on him. We have interrogation rooms and Kolibris for a reason .”

Sieben pushes herself up on her elbows to glare at Jäger. “I don’t give a shit ! Gestalts aren’t sent here unless they’re guilty of something, anyway. Diversants don’t deserve presumption of innocence.”

Jäger doesn’t answer. Sieben’s eyes widen when she sees her raise her arm to strike. “Hold on,” she stammers, “you can’t do this –”

Her mentor slaps her. A proper stinging one, too, hard on the cheek, enough to make her head spin around. Oxidant flushes to stinging synthetic skin, and not just because of the inflammation. She clamps her mouth shut, silent beneath the STAR unit’s now-cool gaze.

Jäger begins. “Two possibilities here, Sieben. You’re either a complete blockhead, or you’re just looking for an excuse to go off on people.” Her hand moves to Sieben’s chestplate, splayed fingers preventing her from sitting up further. “Even you are probably not that stupid, so I’m going with the second one.”

Her tone of voice has shifted. The excitement of the fight is all gone, replaced by a colder, imperious demeanor. This is the stern mentor Sieben is starting to know – and dread.

“I thought the hands-off approach would work, but guess not. I will not tolerate any outburst like this in the future, do you understand ?”

The welding pattern on the wall panel is suddenly very interesting to Sieben right now. She can’t bear to look at her mentor, to see the disappointment in her eyes. Part of her is screaming at her to spit in her face, to fight, to do anything, but it’s smothered under a colossal pile of humiliation – and yes, maybe a little regret.

Jäger grabs Sieben’s chin with one hand, hard , forces her to look up at her blue-red gaze. “Do. You. Understand ?”

Sieben nods, once. “Good,” Jäger says, satisfied.

Releasing Sieben’s jaw, she continues, cutting through the uncomfortable silence that’s just beginning to settle. “You know, it’s better for everyone in this station if you don’t beat the tar out of the Gestalts. A Gestalt with a broken arm is a Gestalt that can’t work, and Adler always bitches about manpower shortages.”

“But they’re so annoying…”

“You have to be patient with them. What’s the point of a Protektor Controller that can’t even control herself ?”

Sieben huffs in frustration. “It’s so easy for you to say that. You lot were made to be laid-back and relaxed.”

“Uh-uh. All it’s going to take is a little effort. Your feeble mind can manage it, I’m sure.”

“Ugh .” Sieben groans, resting her head on the floor again.

“No protesting !” A smile is blooming on Jäger’s face once again. “It’s simple, really. One : accept that I know better than you do. Two : listen to my advice and do I as I say. That’s all that is needed to make a good little Storch.”

She leans in again, this time cupping Sieben’s face between her hands, almost tenderly. When she speaks, her voice is so quiet Sieben can barely hear her over the thumping of her synthetic heart.

“Will you be good for me, Sieben ?”

Sieben’s throat bobs up and down as she swallows spit. Stupid fucking organic reflex. “I’ll… try,” she manages, foolishly, humiliatingly .

Open hands; the Starling releases her face. Soft touch on her cheeks and her chin disappearing, as soon as it came. The weight on Sieben’s midsection lifts as Jäger gets up. “Come on,” she says. “Let’s get back to work.”

Later, after all the blasted paperwork is in order, Sieben takes a break.

It’s almost comical : after what felt like days of staring at forms printed on cheap office paper, all she wants is to bury herself in a book. Such is the nature of Storches, she supposes. Made to be enforcers, and yet condemned to pencil-pushing. Still, she needs to stabilize; and so the library it is.

The air in the room is heavy with the slightly sweet smell of old books - decomposing lignin, one of the Kolibri had explained to her once. None of them are here today, though; the cadre must be on duty. Only one occupant – Vier, one of her fellow Storches – nods her head in acknowledgment when Sieben settles into an armchair, the biggest tome on ancient Roman mythology she could find tucked under her arm.

She sinks into the armchair, sighing happily at the creaking noises her legs make when she stretches them out. It’s perfect. Almost too perfect, in fact, as if it’s an illusion ready to be dispelled at any moment.

One turned page after another, and she’s three chapters deep into an explanation of the Vestal rites when the door pings for the first time.

A moment passes. Just as Sieben looks up from her book to cast a glance at Vier, there it is – the second ping. Orange flashes on the central console button.

With an exasperated huff, Vier tosses her book on the coffee table, rising to her full height. “I swear on the Great Revolutionary, if Drei’s dumb ass has forgotten her keycard again , I’m going to throttle her for good this time.”

In three steps, loud across the metal floor, she’s at the door. There’s an odd silence after it hisses open, and then the terrible revelation uttered casually by Vier’s mouth. “Well, Sieben, I think this one’s for you.”

Sieben cranes her neck over the armchair. “What do you mean it’s for m–”

Oh.

There’s a STAR unit standing in the doorway, right there. This is strange in itself, because STARs do not have access to the library – nor would they need a reason to in the first place. But that’s not the thing that worries her right now. What churns in the pit of her stomach is the banal constatation that she recognizes her.

All the Starlings have the same face, the same body, the same neural pattern. Thousands and thousands of passerine birds scattered across the stars, identical in theory – and yet Sieben would pick out Jäger every time. Maybe the saying’s all wrong, and it’s contempt that brings familiarity, and not the other way around. It’s a thousand little details; the way she cocks her hips when she’s waiting for something, or the way she walks with that assured step, or how her red-lined eyes seem to twinkle when she hides a shit-eating grin under her mask. Which is – oh joy – the case right now.

“Fuck’s sake,” mutters Sieben. Vier’s returned to her armchair, holding her hands up in a clear gesture of not my circus, not my monkeys.

“Hello to you too, esteemed leader. Got something for you !” Jäger’s holding some kind of cylindrical object, crudely wrapped in brown paper.

“For me ? From whom ?”

“From me, you moron. It’s a gift.”

“A… gift ?”

Jäger drops down to one knee so she’s at eye level, and hands her the package. Their fingers brush for an instant, and this is when Sieben’s traitorous emotional module decides to flush her cheeks a slight red. Mortifying, as always.

Carefully peeling off the wrapping paper reveals a small plant, proudly rooted in an equally small plastic pot – the kind of pot she’s seen in the Ara’s sproutling nurseries. A few oblong leaves spread out from a central stem, which appears to be growing tiny barbs. CROWN OF THORNS , reads a tag on the pot. Sieben might be a Philistine when it comes to plants, but she can at least appreciate a nice mythology reference.

It hits her, then, when she carefully sets down the plant on the table, that it’s the only thing she can now call truly her own. Her armor, her gun, even her bed : all property of the Nation she serves.

“Why ?” she asks Jäger. Trees – and plants in general – are symbols of growth, calmness, and renewal. Is this her burying the hatchet ?

“Did you know that baby plants generate more oxygen than they consume ?”

“What does that have to do with me ?”

“Well, she’s compensating for the oxygen you are wasting, is what I’m saying.”

“You–” Sieben’s teeth clench together, just as she hears a muffled snort coming from the other armchair. She looks down to the plant in her little clay pot. Hard clay pot. It would make a fine blunt force weapon if she were to crash it on the Starling’s head, wouldn’t it ?

Jäger’s stare is unflinching. “Her name is Hilde, by the way, and she likes to sightsee. You will take care of her, and you will be carrying her on your person at all times. Even when you’re on duty. Understood ?”

“You can’t be fucking serious,” spits Sieben. “How am I supposed to carry this stupid thing everywhere ?”

“I’m sure you and Frau Hilde can rub your two collective braincells together and figure out something out.”

“Fuck you–”

A hand shoots forward to grab at Sieben’s jaw, pinning her head to the armchair’s back. She meets her mentor’s cold eyes, not daring to say a single word, the little plant precariously clutched in her lap.

“Listen to me,” sneers her mentor. “I’ve been going easy on you because you’re my boss. Something happens to Frau Hilde, I’m beating your ass like you’re one of my Starling rookies. Is that clear ?”

The hand around her jaw tightens, and Sieben wants to fight her, to grab at that wrist and twist until she hears the telltale crack of the joint, metal screeching against metal, plastic shell cracking like an egg – but . But the Kolibris are going to throw a fit if they find the library trashed; but you’re going to lose , says the voice of reason in her head. So she yields.

“Clear as day,” sighs Sieben.

No more pressure on her jaw. Two steps to the door; Jäger gives her one last look of barely concealed scorn, her hand hovering over the door panel.

“Good. It’s high time you learn the value of the living beings under your command. Or else you’ll turn out like her .”

She’s gone before Sieben can ask her to elaborate. Turn out like her. Cryptic. She sinks into her armchair, still clutching the plant – Frau Hilde – like it’s unexploded ordnance.

Another snort, coming from her right, snaps her out of her reverie. It starts low, then becomes a full cackle, impressively loud against the now-quiet atmosphere of the library.

Thoroughly indignant, Sieben frowns at her fellow Storch. “Vier ! You are definitely not helping.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Vier says, holding a hand up in apology. “You have to admit it was a pretty funny sequence of events.”

“It wasn’t .”

“At least you got a plant out of it, though. Not often the Aras share them with us Protektors, you know ?”

Sieben runs a finger along one of Frau Hilde’s waxy leaves, pressing lightly on it. Supple, it bounces back as soon as the pressure is gone. It – she – looks unbothered, happy, flourishing, and for the first time in her admittedly short life, Sieben wishes she was a plant. Kind of.

The cantina, Sieben thinks, is one of the few places in Sierpinski that approaches normalcy.

It’s small, and it’s cramped. Loud, too, and smells like burned grease most of the time, and yet – it feels like home, in a way. A place to gather, to make everyone forget they’re buried dozens of meters underground in the frozen crust of Leng.

It’s particularly busy today, which isn’t great. A group of Starlings elbow their way into the queue, waving at one of the lunchlady Eules, who blushes – because of course she does. A few of the Aras glare at them in silence, their annoyance staying mostly unnoticed.

Sighing, Sieben picks up a plastic tray and starts shuffling along everyone else.

One of the Eules wordlessly plops a beige glob onto her plate – mashed potato, probably – followed by a generous helping of pan-fried pierogies. More beige. At least she gets a few spoonfuls of green vegetables this time, in the form of what appears to be spinach, and a serving of unidentified meat. Oh well. At least it looks edible.

Tray in hand, she looks for a place to sit, her height giving her an advantage over the crowd. No luck, though : the tables are all mostly occupied by Eules and Aras, and even a group of Gestalt technicians. The Storches generally prefer to eat amongst themselves, or sometimes with the Kolibris; they don’t mingle with the service cadre. Sieben scans the tables again. There : an empty space in front of a lone Starling. Not ideal, but it’ll do.

Wordlessly, she sets her tray on the table, and it’s only when she picks up her fork that the Starling lifts her head to meet her gaze – and smiles faintly.

“How nice of you to join me for dinner, O great leader,” snickers Jäger.

Fuck.

Sieben wants to bury her face in her hands. She doesn’t, because she has good table manners.

“How is it that there are two dozen Starlings in this place, and yet I always end up near you ?”

Jäger stabs a pierogi with her fork. “Beats me. I’m starting to think you’re doing it on purpose.”

“Absolutely not – and besides, don’t you have a cadre to eat with, anyway ?”

“They’re having dinner later. Gotta eat at first service, or I’m not done in time for my night shift. The shift that you assigned me, thanks for that by the way.”

Ah. That explains why she’s looking almost… mopey ? Starlings like to be social, after all, and not being able to eat with the others would surely dampen one’s mood. Serves her right, though.

“Why are you here all alone, though ? I’ve seen you chat with the Eules before.”

“I was… reminiscing. Taking a trip down memory lane. Whatever you wanna call it.”

That’s new. Jäger looks uncharacteristically deep in thought, as if Sieben interrupted some profound reverie by setting her tray on the table. Usually she’d have a quip at the ready, some kind of nasty little barb, but not today. It’s as if her mask of cocky bravado is crackling, bone-deep sadness oozing at the seams.

“Reminiscing about what ?” asks Sieben.

“The past.”

“Obviously. That’s what reminiscing means. Tell me.”

Jäger rolls her eyes. “Since when do you care about my mood ?”

“I care when it can impact the performance of my subordinates.”

Finally, Jäger yields with a shrug. “Fine. Since you asked so nicely, I was thinking about your predecessor.”

“My predecessor ? Storch Zwei ?”

A single nod.

The late Zwei is an especially cagey subject amongst Sieben’s peers. She’d asked, once, about her fate, but all she’d gotten were noncommittal shrugs and short answers. Killed in action. As if that explained anything.

Sieben’s fork idly traces patterns in her mashed potatoes. “You’ve never told me about her before,” she says.

“And with good reason.”

“Do you… miss her ?”

It’s a tentative question. Blind reaching, a feeble attempt at compassion, perhaps – but the unexpected happens. Jäger explodes into laughter.

It’s a bitter , breathless laugh, like a engine running on fumes. She smacks her palm on the table, like it’s the funniest thing she’s heard today, and Sieben casts worried side glances at the rest of the tables. Nobody’s paying attention to them.

“I don’t,” says Jäger, cryptically. Eyes closed, her finger traces the scar on the left side on her face, a nasty gash that must have cut deep to the metal endoskeleton, slashing across the eyebrow and down her cheek.

Her eyes meet Sieben’s. Cold, long-buried anger is welling up in those cerulean eyes, and then it’s gone, as soon as it’s appeared. The STAR sets her fork down on the plate, the sound nearly startling Sieben.

“All of that is a story for another time. This place,” and Jäger makes a sweeping gesture through the air, “ain’t really one for serious conversation.”

“Withholding information from your commanding officer is a severe breach of conduct.”

Jäger barks out a short laugh. “Oh, so you’re pulling rank, now ? You’re funny. It’s not gonna work.”

Before Sieben can reply, her mentor is picking up her tray, pushing her chair back to leave. It’s a gesture of avoidance so transparent it’s almost comical. And yet, if interrogations have taught her something, it’s that she has to be patient. Information might come out in a drip-feed, piece by piece, but it will come out, sooner or later. Failure is not an option.

KLBR-S2301 takes a deep breath before bellowing. “I have gathered you all here for a training exercise of the utmost importance. You will act as per your roles to the best of your ability.”

Eight Starlings, two Storches – including herself, is the headcount Sieben’s been running. One full cadre and some leftovers, more or less. What, exactly, is the Kolibri planning ?

“As you all probably know by now, our construction teams have almost finished the new hospital floor,” the Kolibri continues. “However, as we are currently waiting for the delivery of new medical equipment, Adler has graciously accepted that we use the floor as a live-in training area.”

A snicker goes through the Starlings and Storches alike. The Kolibris have no fondness for the Administrator, that much is clear.

“Guess he won’t mind us making a mess around then, won’t he ?” murmurs one of the Starlings. Her Storch – Sechs – silences her with a sharp slap to the back of her head.

“The training scenario I have devised will consist of a Protektor team facing against an armed, hostile Replika force,” explains the Kolibri, drawing plans out of the envelope she’s been carrying. She gestures to a crate of equipment placed in a corner : “I had some of the Aras repurpose old surplus into paint-ball weaponry. You will all handle it just fine, I’m sure of it.”

“Permission to speak freely, Elite Protektor ?” asks Sechs.

“Go on.”

“Is all that theater really…. necessary ? A remote outpost like Sierpinski-23 is not at any credible risk of invasion.”

KLBR-S2301 – her name is Schwarz, apparently, Sieben has just learned from Axt – frowns, and a single pulse of annoyance sweeps the room. Goddess, Sieben’s never going to get used to their bioresonance. It’s just plain wrong ; a feeling that would make her skin prickle were it capable to do so.

“STCR-S2306, an invasion is not the possibility I’m worried about. It’s mutiny .”

A whisper echoes across the room. Someone coughs.

Schwarz clasps her hands together. “Alright, now that there are no remaining objections, we will proceed in our preparations. We need a leader for the opposing force.” Her eyes survey the two cadres assembled in front of her. “STAR-S2313, step forward.”

Jäger does as ordered. She stares down her tiny superior, unflinching, and a wave of wariness and mistrust crashes across the area, so strong it nearly makes Sieben drop the plant she’s carrying in her right hand.

Before she can wonder about its origin, it’s gone. Jäger removes her hat and presses it to her chestplate. “Of course, Elite Protektor. I am honored you picked me.”

Schwarz snaps her fingers. “Yes, yes, I’m sure you are. Pick two comrades, and grab a weapon.”

Her mentor points at Dolch and Axt – the other Starlings are practically writhing with envy – and all three beeline towards the weapon crates. Sieben leans over to Sechs, puzzled.

“Three against eight ? Hardly a fair fight, is it ?”

Sechs hums. “They’ve got the defensive advantage, though. In that kind of operational theater, the attackers are bottlenecked by the doors. And Jäger’s a braggart, but she backs it up in the range.”

“Eh. Shooting in the range is one thing, shooting at a moving hostile target is another."

Sechs presses her lips in a thin line, clearly unconvinced.

Speaking of the devil, Jäger is currently fiddling with a rifle – a Gewehr 4A , judging by its appearance. An old surplus battle rifle of the Volksarmee ; powerful and accurate in select-fire, but it would surely prove cumbersome in the tight corridors of S-23. Wouldn’t be Sieben’s first choice in weapon, that’s for sure.

The Kolibri gestures towards another crate on the ground, overflowing with wires – some kind of mines ? “You have thirty minutes to prepare your defenses until I send the assault wave”.

One of the STARs totters to the elevator, the crate in hand, followed by the two others. Just before the door open, Jäger turns to face Sieben, her pinky and thumb outstretched in a gesture Sieben recognizes as meaning telephone .

“Remember : one-oh-eight Hertz if you need to talk to me, yeah ?” Then, with one last snicker, she disappears inside the elevator.

Strange.

“So, how do we do this ?” asks Sieben, fiddling with the valve of the compressed air tank on her shotgun.

Next to her, Sechs taps her chin pensively. “Eight of us could make three teams. Better not form groups too big, or we could be all taken out by a grenade or a mine.”

“I’ll pair Speer and Pfeil together, then. They’re already used to working in tandem.”

“Good idea. I’ll lend you one of my Starlings – Bauer, come here.”

Bauer – STAR-S2315 – steps forward, saluting Sieben with deference. What she wouldn’t give for a mentor this gracious.

“We’ll keep radio contact,” adds Sechs, “and remember to fall back and communicate if you encounter any trouble. Got it ?”

“Got it.”

Sechs’ expression grows somber. “And remember, Sieben, this is a training exercise. It’s not meant to settle your personal grievances.”

Sieben swallows. Nods once. She places her plant next to the Kolibri, and gets back to her group. The Kolibri is taking notes on a clipboard, and looking at the clock on the wall. “Time’s up. Get ready. I will monitor your progress with the cameras and ping you via radio if I decide you’ve received enough damage to be taken out.” Then, matter-of-factly : “Good luck, Protektors.”

Sieben’s got to admit, the Kolibris have a sense for the dramatic.

Sierpinski’s new level looks nothing short of, well, hostile . The walls are still bare steel, devoid of any furnishing or decoration. Various power cables hang from the ceiling. Crates, chariots, and tools are strewn everywhere, complicating the advance. Worse, though, is the ambiance. The strident alarm blares every ten seconds, and with it the blinking red emergency light that cuts through the thick, dusty air – until it’s gone, and for a few moments darkness swallows the corridors. It’s eerie. It’s realistic, probably, even though Sieben has a suspicion the Kolibri took the idea from some espionage book.

Whatever. She clutches her shotgun harder, watching the beam of its flashlight and its laser pointer intently. Time for a check-in.

STCR-S2307 : Sechs, Speer, do you copy ?

STAR-S2311 : All clear on our side.

STCR-S2306 : Copy. No hostiles sighted.

She breathes out. Not the moment to get antsy. Another room to clear – another locked door. Bauer takes her place at the other side, gun in hand, prepared for a breach, and Sieben’s hand hovers over the door control.

A sharp cry, sudden, over their radios.

STCR-S2307 : Status !

STCR-S2306 : Fuck !

STCR-S2306 : I can’t contact 11 or 14 anymore !

STCR-S2307 : Going to check on them now.

STCR-S2306 : Got it. Keep your eyes peeled. Could be a trap. Over.

Sieben makes her way through the maze of corridors, flanked by Bauer. No need to panic. Not when she has a shotgun in her hands. Instant simulated-death via paintball to a ten meter cone in front of her. She turns a corner, nearing the Starlings’ last known location.

That’s where she finds them. Two corpses.

Or, well, not exactly corpses , but it looks like a comical murder scene all the same. Yellow paint is splattered everywhere, including on the ceiling, and in the middle of it, Speer and Pfeil, lying motionless on top of each other. Sieben approaches them slowly, mindful of not tracking paint everywhere.

“You two all right ?” she whispers.

“Tripwire mine,” grumbles Speer. Pfeil offers a dejected thumbs-up.

Six against three, now.

Sieben turns back to Bauer, who’s surveying the perimeter, and opens her radio channel again.

STCR-S2307 : Sechs, I found Speer and Pfeil. They were taken out by a m–

She can’t even finish her sentence, because a paintball bounces off Bauer’s forehead. Then another, snapping it back.

This time, Sieben doesn’t bother to think. She fires into the yawning emptiness of the corridor and runs for her damn life. She runs until she finds a safe intersection, until she can press her back to the wall and breathe evenly. Five against three. This is looking bad.

STCR-S2306 : Sieben, you there ?

STCR-S2307 : You were right. Trap. Bauer’s down.

STCR-S2306 : Shit. I’d send you backup, but we’ve got contact here.

STCR-S2306 : My arm’s wounded, apparently , but we took down one hostile. Other’s retreated into a storage room. Lost one STAR in the firefight.

For the first time in half an hour, Sieben sighs with relief. Four against two, now.

STCR-S2307 : You handle this, I’ll hunt down the straggler.

STCR-S2306 : Don’t get too reckless. Over.

No time to waste, now. Sieben grips her shotgun a little harder and trudges along the dark passages.

It’s easy to get paranoid, in a situation like this. But she was built for this. For suppression of insurgent and riot control tactics. She’s good enough to pull this off. Good enough to take down one jumped-up Starling.

She rounds a corner when her comm channel squeaks again.

STAR-S2308 : We got hit ! 06 is down, I repeat, 06 is down !

Sieben pinches the brow of her nose. This is looking worse by the minute, but there’s no time to waste.

STCR-S2307 : Retreat and regroup on my position, now.

STAR-S2308 : Roger that. Disengaging now.

STAR-S2308 : ...

STAR-S2317 : Hold on, is that a grena-

Then, the telltale sound of an explosion, a crackling across the waves, loud enough to make Sieben flinch.

STCR-S2307 : Laüfer ! Turm ! Can I get a SITREP ?

Only silence.

Fuck. Fuck .

The wall is cool against the back of her head, and she takes a few seconds to listen to the noises around her. The low, steady hum of the ventilation fans. A rattle where a leftover zipties clicks against the air grate. The alarm, still blaring at maximum volume.

No gunfire. No steps.

On a hunch, she tunes her radio to 108 Hz and sends a ping – two longs, three shorts. The other end of the line picks up immediately.

STAR-S2313 : Fucking finally . Thought you’d never use this channel.

STCR-S2307 : ...

STAR-S2313 : Pretty poor performance from everyone else, eh ? Taken out by a tripwire. Shit, that’s greenhorn stuff. Baby’s first counter-terrorism operation.

Sieben sucks in a quick breath. She debates it for a few seconds – speak up, or close the comm channel ? She can hardly stand the swagger of her mentor’s voice right now, but pragmatism is winning. She could distract her while talking, try to deduce her position. She presses a finger to her ear again.

STCR-S2307 : Baby’s first op or not, it’s hardly the place for a conversation.

STAR-S2313 : What, you afraid the pipsqueak will be mad ?

STCR-S2307 : Precisely.

Cautiously, meter by meter, she makes her way through the mess of toolboxes and storages crates in the main corridor. The laser pointer of her weapon, aimed carefully at the ground, bounces off something. She almost doesn’t see it until it’s too late – an almost transparent nylon wire, barely thicker than a hair, fifteen centimeters away from her left leg. A shaky exhale escapes her lungs.

STCR-S2307 : I almost got caught by one of your fucking tripwire mines. I hate this and I hate you .

STAR-S2313 : Heh. Would be a shame if it had taken you down. Want to do that myself.

STCR-S2307 : Is that a confrontation you want ? Is that it ?

STAR-S2313 : Duh.

STCR-S2307 : ...

STCR-S2307 : Wait, is that why you shot Bauer and not me, back there ? Made no sense to me - a Storch is always going to be the more valuable target.

STAR-S2313 : Finally you get it ! You’re a few bits short of a byte, aren’t you ?

STCR-S2307 : Fuck you.

STAR-S2313 : [audible yawn] Whatever. I’d say you oughta come find me instead of yapping, but looks like I’ve found you first.

Sieben’s heart jumps in her throat, and she ducks, just as a three-round burst of paintballs whizz above her head – where it had been half a second before. She takes cover behind a storage crate, then fires once with her shotgun, blind, hoping to hit at least something.

STCR-S2307 : You missed .

STAR-S2313 : Yeah, well, ballistics on this rifle are dogshit. You looked pretty spooked, though. That was funny.

STCR-S2307 : You’re enjoying this, aren’t you ?

STAR-S2313 : Enjoying this ? It’s the most fun I’ve had in years !

STCR-S2307 : ...Ugh.

STAR-S2313 : Don’t sound so dejected, schatzi . It’s all harmless low-stakes fun, isn’t it ?

STCR-S2307 : Hey ! Stop it with the pet names ! I’m your commanding officer !

STAR-S2313 : Nope. In here you’re just my target.

More paintballs hurtle just above the crate, forcing Sieben to hunker down. She can’t stay here. She has to move. Detaching a smoke grenade from her belt, she tosses it in the corridor, filling it with an acrid, thick haze. She fires a round down the hallway, for good measure, then rolls to the nearest door. It opens – thankfully – when she slams her hand on the panel, and she tumbles into a bare-looking operating room. On the other line of the radio echo faint steps : her adversary is on the move.

STAR-S2313 : Aw, scurrying away already ? You can run, but you can’t hide. Not from me.

STCR-S2307 : I don’t understand why you’re like this. What did I ever do to you ?

STAR-S2313 : Besides the fact that you exist, you mean ?

A frontal assault would be suicidal, what with Jäger’s long-range firepower. All Sieben has to do is get the drop on her – easier said than done. Perhaps she can distract her and launch her into a monologue, though.

STCR-S2307 : I didn’t choose to be made. I didn’t choose to be assigned to this place. How is any of this my fault ?

STAR-S2313 : Your fault is that you look like her, you sound like her, you act like her. I stare at you and I see – I see a ghost .

Sieben’s hand pauses over the maintenance hatch’s locking mechanism. Jäger’s voice is uncharacteristically heavy with emotion. It’s the most animated Sieben’s ever seen her mentor; bitterness seeps through every single one of her words. This is a stone she cannot leave unturned.

STCR-S2307 : This is about Zwei, isn’t it ? What is this about, survivor’s guilt ?

STAR-S2313 : No ! Never ! When that nasty bitch kicked the bucket, it was the happiest day of my life !

STCR-S2307 : ...

STAR-S2313 : She was petty, vindictive, violent. Cruel. Whatever you wanna call it. She made my life hell.

STAR-S2313 : Sometimes… sometimes she beat me so bad all I wanted the next day was to be put out of my fucking misery.

STAR-S2313 : And then you show up, and all of a sudden I’m supposed to be babysitting a Storch . And I’m doing my best, but you’re volatile, you’re impatient...

STAR-S2313 : And it feels like I’m condemned to relive the past again. Like I can’t escape her, even after all this time.

STAR-S2313 : Like that stupid fucking myth she was always rambling about - the dumbass pushing a boulder up a hill.

Sieben wipes a cobweb off her face – disgusting – and continues crawling forward in her maintenance tunnel. If her map is right, it should bring her right behind the corridor Jäger is currently guarding, taking her by surprise.

Still, the weight of what the STAR has just said is… disconcerting. This is what all of this is about, then. A three-body problem, a ripple in the phase space of their professional relationship. Two individuals, and a shadow on the wall, dwarfing them both.

STCR-S2307 : Sisyphus. The dumbass’ name is Sisyphus.

STAR-S2313 : Why thank you, schatzi , for sharing your vast knowledge with me.

STAR-S2313 : I don’t particularly care, by the way.

STCR-S2307 : ...

STCR-S2307 : So you’ve decided I’m your enemy because... of a grudge ? That’s it ? What are you, an Ara ?

STAR-S2313 : You say this like Aras are the only ones holding grudges in this place.

STCR-S2307 : It shouldn’t matter, anyway. I am not Zwei. I’m not – like you said she was.

STAR-S2313 : Heh. You’re all the same, the lot of you. Some just learn to hide it better.

There : the other side of the tunnel, finally. Sieben pops the hatch open and creeps from cover to cover. It’s not like she has any choice. The hulking silhouette of a Storch might be intimidating, but it’s a liability in firefights like these, and clanking around would immediately get the enemy’s attention.

Sieben can see Jäger, right at the corner of the corridor. Back against the wall, watching her angles. Red-and-black armor, dappled in the oppressive crimson of the emergency lights. Doesn’t seem like she’s noticed her, though.

Sieben takes cover behind a spool of wire, hoping to get closer, and that’s when an empty can of paint starts teetering precariously over its edge. With horror, she watches as it tumbles down to the floor, making the loudest clang possible.

The barrel of Jäger’s rifle snaps to her position.

STAR-S2313 : Found you.

Sieben fires a shot, blind, over her cover, then dives to the other side of the hallway, seeking refuge behind a crate through a barrage of suppressive fire. Two paintballs hit her chestplate armor, staining it bright yellow. She returns fire – pointless. There’s no other option.

She vaults over the crate and charges, shotgun in hand. A shot over the welding equipment Jäger’s hiding behind causes her to hunker down – if she can get just a little bit closer –

Something rolls across the floor. Flashbang grenade.

No other choice. Vision filling with white, ears hissing with static, she barrels through the corridor, firing blindly. Then, suddenly, an impact reverberates through her jaw – the butt of a rifle. It knocks her down to the floor, dizzy. What happens next is like a slow motion from these stupid war movies. A knee on the floor, Jäger fires three times. Three hits. Two to the abdomen, one to the forehead.

She’s lost.

KLBR-S2301 : STCR-S2307, you have been eliminated.

With a heavy, defeated sigh, Sieben slumps against the wall, tilting back her head to look at her foe. Her mentor casually saunters over, looking every bit as smarmy as Sieben has ever seen her.

She taps the paintball magazine of her gun. “I gotta admit, charging me was brave. But also very stupid. Shame about that paint can, I guess. Gave your position away.”

“Don’t fucking gloat at me,” hisses Sieben.

A paintball explodes against her lips and teeth, filling her mouth with the bitter, awful taste of paint. She spits it out in the palm of her hand, staring daggers at the Starling.

“Corpses don’t talk.” Jäger presses a finger to her lips in a shushing motion. She winks at Sieben, and then she’s strutting casually down the corridor.

Five seconds later, the nasal voice of the Kolibri resounds over the shared radio channel.

KLBR-S2301 : Combat simulation is completed. All units, proceed to entry point for debrief.

Schwarz sounds mildly disappointed, and Sieben can’t exactly blame her. So close, yet so far. She looks at the butt of her shotgun – maybe she should have bashed the Starling’s teeth in with it. Maybe that would have worked better.

As she watches the shadow of her subordinate disappear in the darkness of the hallway, she’s sure of one thing : she may have lost the battle, but not the war.

Not yet.

Chapter Text

At this time of day, the library is so cozy Sieben could almost fall asleep there.

It smells like old books and tea, instead of dust and stale air. And it’s blissfully silent, too : there’s no posses of chatty Eules, no clambering Aras in the vents, no hulking Mynahs stomping their way to the mess hall. There’s only Kolibris and her fellow Storches, usually.

There’s just her and one Kolibri here today. The Kolibri cadre might all sing the same song or whatever it is they do, but as individuals, they certainly don’t seem to have the same taste in literature. This one – Grün is her name – enjoys books about war and mythology, so at least it makes the small talk bearable.

The Kolibri walks to Sieben and looks up – way up – at her, a comically high stack of books in her hands. “Put these back on the shelves for me.”

Maybe Sieben is a better conversationalist than those stepladders the Kolibris put in the rooms they usually inhabit. Doesn’t hurt to be in their good graces, anyway. She takes the heavy tome – Theogony , reads the cover – and puts it next to its brethren on the shelf labeled History & Mythology .

Playing librarian might be a rote task, but it gives Sieben ample room for thought. Too many accursed cycles she’s spent here already, and she’s sure of exactly two things.

One : this place is a dump. A shithole among shitholes. The hellmouth of the outer solar system.

Two : she fucking hates Jäger.

She hates the way she prances and prattles around the station, acting like she owns the place, like the universe owes her a favor for simply existing. She hates how the other Starlings practically worship the ground she walks on – it makes it impossible to order another unit to put her back in her place, not that Sieben hasn’t tried. It’s a wonder she hasn’t set up an autograph booth yet. Jäger wields her influence like a weapon, curries favor with the service cadre like it’s the easiest thing in the world. A cheeky wink, a little wave of her hand, and the Eules practically fall over themselves to run and say hello to her. 

Fuck her. Fuck her, and her little snide remarks whenever Sieben loses her cool. If it were up to her, Sieben would have already shoved her head-first into the incinerator and pulled the lever. Jäger might be two hundred and twenty centimeters of pure concentrated arrogance, but Sieben knows she would burn all the same.

Grün’s annoyed voice snaps Sieben back to the present. “Controller Sieben.” 

She’s handing her another book, and when their gazes meet, that’s when she feels it. The Kolibri’s bioresonance drapes over her mind, suffocates it like a wet blanket. There’s a sharp pain, a needle piercing through her skull to reach the thoughts buried inside. Then, in an instant, the ache’s all gone, as if it had never been there in the first place – and the Kolibri looks pensive. 

“You know,” she starts, “I – we don’t like her much more than you do.”

“Huh ?” Sieben blinks at her, still dazed.

“STAR-S2313. Your mentor.”

The Kolibri slowly runs a thumb on the edge of her book’s cover. Her tone is poised, measured.  “Our cadre has long since reached consensus that all units who show any form of individuality should – ideally – be decommissioned.”

There’s a but coming up. Sieben can practically sense its arrival, like a tracer round preceding a vollet of artillery.

“However,” Grün continues, “Falke – I mean the Commander , She disagreed.”

“Why ?”

“Considering the peculiar social organization inherent to the STAR cadre, She argued that keeping a highly respected unit in place would inspire the rest of them to work more efficiently. Like an ideal to strive for, if you will.”

Grün’s face transforms into a mask of pure adoration, as if she’s witnessed divinity in person and never really recovered. “Her word is absolute, so we – we relented.”

“What about the Administrator ?” Sieben asks her.

Her diminutive superior scoffs lightly. “He said it was hard to justify decommissioning a unit that performed well, considering how hard procurement from Heimat is.”

“So you’re saying I have no choice but to endure her presence, then.”

“Indeed, but remember : you are her commanding officer. Never let her forget that.”

Sieben’s lip quirks bitterly at that. Grün sees it, and says : “Don’t be afraid to put her in her place. Discipline is the backbone of our glorious Nation.”

“I’ve tried. It didn’t work.”

“Because you were playing into her hands.”

Sieben frowns at this. She’s trying to recall their previous interactions, to draw patterns; all she remembers is the haze of rage clouding her thoughts every single time. Maybe Grün is right, and Jäger knows exactly how to push every single one of her buttons. It makes her feel frustratingly predictable. Like an automaton.

The Kolibri holds a finger up, as if she’s giving a very important lesson. “Listen to whatever she tells you to do, and turn that against her when she least expects it. That’s how you can win.”

She hands Sieben her book, and Sieben stretches her arm to tuck it in between two dusty old tomes. The Art of War is written in blocky letters on its spine. 

An ARAR unit goes missing.

This, in itself, is far from surprising. The Aras destabilize at a not-insignificant rate, and they tend to crawl back to their little tunnels when feeling upset or threatened. Sieben has heard rumors – thanks to Axt, as always – that a Storch might have stomped on ARAR-S2322’s beloved potted plant, leading to the predictable freakout. At least it’s not Sieben’s fault.

What is more surprising, however, is that it’s somehow Sieben’s responsibility . She would very much like to find whoever assigned her that job and kick their teeth in; out of every possible task she could be doing at the moment, combing through the anthill of metal and concrete formed by the Aras’ tunnels is possibly the worst. 

“With all due respect, that’s a terrible fucking idea.”

Jäger says with all due respect like someone is holding her at gunpoint. It’s clear she doesn’t mean a single word of it. She’s wearing her mask right now, but Sieben intimately knows her lips are curled in that sneer she always sports when she’s being a little shit on purpose.

Sieben pinches the bridge of her nose. That’s her second proposition in a row to get unceremoniously shot down; apparently “flooding the tunnels with poison gas” and “sending a STAR to yank the Ara out” aren’t practical ideas. Who knew.

The four other Starlings in front of her shuffle uneasily when she steps closer. 

“Are you questioning my authority, Officer ?” Sieben is right in front of her now, using every single one of her twenty-centimeter height advantage to cut a physically imposing presence. It never quite seems to work, but it doesn’t hurt to try. Jäger doesn’t even move.

She replies, carefully weighing her words. “Our frames are too big. We’re going to get stuck in these tunnels, and that’s if they’re even stable to begin with.” Defiant, she tilts her chin at Sieben. “I will not be sending my girls to die in there.”

Fury tugs in Sieben’s gut again, to the pulse of her oxidant pump. Her hand longs to form into a fist and strike; her leg aches to crush and snap and pulverize. She doesn’t give into it, lets the tension coalesce into the room like a mist instead, until it’s nearly unbearable. In the corner of her vision, the other Starlings are shooting worried glances at each other. 

“Fine. What do you propose, then ?”

Jäger’s eyes immediately narrow in a mix of shock and suspicion. She clearly didn’t expect Sieben to yield so easily. Listen to whatever she tells you to do, echoes the voice of the Kolibri in Sieben’s mind.

She seems lost in thought for a moment, but Sieben knows that look. Concentration. Single-minded focus. An expert, in her element.

When she speaks again, it’s in a clipped, controlled tone. “We’ll try to corral her in. She can’t have gone that far, and there are only so many exit points she can use. She’s bound to get out at some point to get food and water.” She points a finger at each of her squadmates. “Axt, you’re going to the Ara dorm to see if the others have seen anything. Fetch a Kolibri if you have to. Dolch, go see Adler to see if he’s got data on the Aras' tunnels. Pfeil, Speer, you’re spreading out to search. Report any suspicious findings on the usual radio frequency.” 

It’s obvious she has this figured out. For all her faults, Sieben cannot attack her consummate professionalism. She hums quietly in approval.

“We’ll be going with your plan, then. But if it fails, there will be… consequences .” She keeps her voice low, lets its raspy contralto weave the slightest strand of threat in it. Better remind Jäger’s underlings who is really in charge. Said underlings give a salute, and leave, one by one.

At last, the door’s pneumatic actuators finally hiss. Jäger doesn’t even say a single word, but the disdainful arch of her eyebrows tell everything. Guess I’m stuck with you, they say. 

Walking shoulder-to-shoulder with her Starling officer in the cramped hallways of S-23 is strangely comforting, Sieben finds. Hunting dissidents is what she was made for, after all; the thrill of the hunt makes her step a little peppier. 

Jäger does not seem too happy about it, however. 

“We wouldn’t be in this situation if you could control yourself,” she mutters.

Sieben stops dead in her tracks, metal talons screeching against the floor. “Pardon me ?”

“You know damn well what you did.”

Sieben’s mind is all confusion, and she tilts her head at her officer before she finally understands.

“Hold on,” she begins, “I have nothing to do with this. At all .”

Jäger raises an eyebrow.

“I’ll send you my map coordinates for the last shift. I wasn’t anywhere near that dorm when the incident happened.”

“But you were the Storch on duty on that floor on morning shift – I assumed…”

Jäger trails off as she downloads the data packet. With immense delight, Sieben watches her expression go from resentment to bewilderment to resignation, and maybe a little hint of embarrassment. It’s probably the most satisfying thing she’s ever seen since being online.

She leans in towards the STAR, so close their noses could almost touch were the latter not wearing her mask. “Remember. Assume makes an ass out of U and I , but especially U .” 

Then, coldly : “Don’t you ever accuse me like that again.”

Her mentor just stares at the ground, eyes downcast. She’s looking at something on the ground, Sieben realizes – a dark patch. When Sieben crouches down to look at it, she discovers it’s scattered dirt.

Specifically, potting soil .

Jäger must have arrived to the same conclusion, because she’s started following the trail of dirt. It leads to a storage room; Sierpinski is full of them, scarcely more than bare closets full of whatever baubles and trinkets the maintenance crew need for their work. Perfect places to hide.

Jäger stands in front of the door, her stun baton ready in one hand and the other on the panel. She turns to catch Sieben’s gaze, as if she’s waiting for verbal authorization, and then – just as Sieben is opening her mouth – presses the button anyway. Fucker.

The room is near-pitch black. It smells like disuse and dust; there’s a faint odor of machine oil and decaying plastic.  It’s almost completely silent, too, save for the faint whirring of a distant duct fan. Sieben clicks the flashlight on, her other hand holding Frau Hilde in her pot. Shelves stacked with boxes, crates, an electric panel, and an air duct grate – high up in the corner of the room. Nobody else but them, though.

Jäger is fiddling with the electric panel, taking off her mask to blow on the dust covering the switches. She flicks one, then another, and whoops triumphantly when, at last, bleak neon light illuminates the room. Sieben stuffs her flashlight into her belt pouch and leans, casually, against one of the shelves.

“What, you’re gonna park your ass right here and watch me do all the work ?” Jäger asks snidely.

“I’m a Controller . It’s in the acronym, you know.”

“Typical lazy Storches,” she mumbles. Then, a little livelier : “I’ll make sure to put on a show, then.”

Sieben doesn’t take the bait. “I hope for your sake that you live up to your nickname.”

Sly smile still on her lips, Jäger turns back to the room. She combs it with methodical, terrifying precision, meticulously tracking the trail of soil and discarded bolts until she’s facing the vent grate. She gives it a shake, and starts pulling on it with both hands. Sieben watches the plates on her back and arms flex and move as synthetic myomer strains beneath them; with a final grunt, the grate tears loose with a loud clang .

Grinning wildly, Jäger flexes her bicep before peering into the vent with her flashlight. “Looks like we’ve got a pretty good lead here.”

Sieben answers her distractedly. “Put that on your map, then. We’ll radio in and cross-check the info with the others when we get back.”

Truth be told, Sieben is barely paying attention to what her Starling officer is doing. She’s standing at a metaphorical crossroad. In one of her latest books, an ancient, monstrous deity weighs the good and bad deeds of a soul, to cast it away into the depths of hell or allow it passage to the eternal afterlife. It has always seemed quaint to her, this way of quantifying, moralizing actions like weights on a scale. What matters – has mattered, and will always matter – is power, control, and the choice to enforce it or not. All the possibilities are nearly spilling out of Sieben’s hands; it makes her nearly dizzy with anticipatory glee.

The correct, formal course of action is immediately radioing the rest of the squad to inform them of their discovery. Sieben has a much, much better idea. Nobody will look for them or hear anything in this insignificant little storage room. 

Turn that against her when she least expects it.

Jäger’s brow is furrowed in concentration. She’s standing contrapposto , a hand on her hip and the other holding her tunnel map. Bleak neon lights bathe her plastic shell in shades of grey and white, like those old marble statues in Sieben’s history books. All statues, Sieben knows, are toppled, eventually.

She’s so focused on her map that she doesn’t even notice – or doesn’t mind – when Sieben approaches her quietly from behind. A small noise of surprise escapes the back of her throat when Sieben’s fingers make contact with the nape of her neck, travel to the back of her head. Her hair is astonishingly soft.

With one sharp curl of her fingers, Sieben grabs Jäger’s hair, and slams her head-first against the wall.

The impact is so loud that in the quiet room, it sounds like a gunshot. It ripples lovingly through Sieben’s arm and shoulder, to her core and her back.

Even with the element of surprise against her, Jäger’s combat reflexes are still formidable. Barely wobbled, she puts distance between them with one swipe of her elbow, then puts her hands up to guard her face. Sieben lunges at her with a jab; she dodges, ducking to her left. This time, Sieben is ready. She winds a rear hand uppercut, letting the motion transfer all her weight to the punch. It hits Jäger square on the jaw, and she crumples to the floor.

That’s how you can win.

Sieben pounces on her. Jäger tries her hardest to push her away with her legs, but she’s already dived between them, in her guard. 

“Did you really think I’d let you get away with disrespecting my authority ? In front of your entire squad ?” Adrenaline and thrill makes Sieben’s voice tremble. 

She punches Jäger in the face, hard, bouncing her head off the metal floor. “You know me better than this.” Another punch. 

Oxidant is pouring freely from Jäger’s nose; it flows down into her mouth. She gives Sieben a pointed look, then a wild grin. When Sieben foolishly leans closer, that’s when she spits in her face.

Droplets of warm oxidant land on Sieben’s face. On her cheeks, her mouth, her nose, everywhere. Part of her is tempted to freak out, to obsessively wipe at the skin until nothing remains of the offending bodily fluids. And yet – whatever remains of the lizard brain in her psyche is delighted . She licks her lips; tastes metal, salt, a slight bitterness. Jäger’s smile stretches a little wider.

If hitting Jäger is not enough to put her in her place, Sieben has another idea. A hand reaches out to unfasten the strap that holds Jäger’s armor in place, then tears the chest piece and neck guard away. Distantly, Sieben realizes she’s never seen her without the bulletproof armor; there’s a first for everything, after all. Her chestplate is white, just like hers.

Enough milling about, though.

Jäger goes very still for an moment when Sieben’s hands close around her throat. Replika respiratory systems have to be similar to Gestalts – reengineering tongues and tracheas and vocal cords was harder than simply taking an existing design and adapting it. How convenient, Sieben thinks, as she presses both thumbs to Jäger’s airway.

She starts lightly at first, putting just enough pressure on it that air makes a hissing sound when Jäger breathes – breathes deep , like she realizes she won’t be getting air for much longer. How strange it is that she’s not even fighting back that hard. Her hands are gripping Sieben’s wrists, but they’re barely trying to pull them away from her throat. She could push her away with her legs, but they’re crossed somewhere behind Sieben’s waist. The Jäger Sieben thinks she knows would never yield this easily – or maybe she would. Maybe the bravado is really just that, a façade.

With a snarl, Sieben leans forward, digs her thumbs in further. “You believe your petty little grudge gives you the right to act like this.”

Don’t hesitate to put her in her place.

“Well,” Sieben spits, “you’re wrong. You’re nothing but a jumped-up grunt who thinks she deserves to be the center of attention. Pretentious, arrogant bastard.”

Her gaze meets Jäger’s eyes, blue-black-red into blue-black-red; her pupils are wide and impossibly dark, like the event horizon of a black hole.  They’re full of primal fear, and something else that Sieben can’t quite discern. It doesn’t matter. Blood bubbles up from Jäger’s broken nose, pours down her cheek in small rivulets. Sieben’s own is running hot through synthetic veins, so loud she can’t even hear the noises in the station, can’t hear the whirring of both their cooling fans hopelessly trying to keep up.

Just when her mentor’s eyes start to flutter shut, Sieben eases her grip on her throat and pulls her hands away. She’s not even sure why. She watches as Jäger takes a few deep, gasping breaths; her head lolls to the side, cheek resting against the metal floor.

“Learnt your lesson yet ?” asks Sieben. She presses her hand flat against Jäger’s cheek, turning her head back to facing her. When she pulls it back, it is wet with oxidant, leaving a red handprint where she rests it on Jäger’s white chestplate.

Jäger laughs – it turns into a hacking cough. “You could at least… have choked me… until I passed out,” she rasps. “ ‘s what she … would have done. You … fucking coward .”

It’s almost admirable – and equally infuriating – how composed she is, even at the verge of unconsciousness. Still, if that’s what she wants, then who is Sieben to refuse her ?

She is willing to be patient, for once. Bracing against the Starling’s shoulder, she lets her dominant hand glide over her chest, up to the metal ridge of her collarbone, then the suprasternal notch. Jäger shivers a little, and her legs tighten around Sieben’s waist, almost like they’re pulling her in closer. Sieben glides a blood-slick thumb over one of the contacts at her throat – and that’s when Jäger moans.

Every single one of Sieben’s thought processes grinds to a halt. 

Seconds pass, impossibly long. Her mentor opens a questioning eye. “Why’d you stop ?” she asks.

Just like that, the reality of the situation dawns on Sieben like a nuclear sunrise. 

She’s not the one getting strangled, yet the words come out of her mouth with great difficulty. “Jäger. Hold on. Are you – are you enjoying this ?”

Jäger looks at her like she’s just said the dumbest sentence in the world. 

“Uh, yeah ? Isn’t that kind of the point ?”

“How – I – This wasn’t my intention,” stammers Sieben.

“Huh,” says the Starling. “ Huh. ”

A piece of knowledge floats to the top of Sieben’s mind. The STAR unit manual she’d read on her first day of being online. Something about STARs occasionally developing rituals involving physical punishment. Of course. Of course her STAR officer had to be a fucking deviant.

“Next time, you should try the stun prod,” the Starling helpfully suggests.

Realization dawns on Sieben a second time – or maybe it’s just the backblast of the first one.

Her hands are covered in bright red oxidant. Oxidant on her chestplate, her face. Her mentor, propped on her elbows, an eyebrow arched in curiosity.

What the fuck is she doing ?

She has to rest her hands on her thighs to steady them, to stop them from trembling. No amount of memory bank purging will erase the cold, hard fact that she partook in… inappropriate contact with her direct subordinate. Her mentor. She could be punished, interrogated, she could be –

A snicker interrupts her rumination. “Hey. You having an existential crisis, or what ?” Jäger reaches up to poke at Sieben’s chestplate. Sieben slaps the hand away, backing up until her back hits a shelf. She pulls herself to her feet, still shaking slightly. 

Fetching the plant’s clay pot she’d placed on a nearby box for safety, she lets her hands take in the reassuring cold smoothness of the material, until her senses return to baseline. The embers deep in her gut are not so easy to quell. She knows, somehow, what they are. Raw, primal desire, whatever remains of  humanity AEON couldn’t fully stamp out of her neural pattern. 

“Let’s keep this between us,” she tells Jäger, and the latter nods, exactly once. At least she is willing to be cooperative on this front.

Later, when Sieben’s splashing cold water on her face, she runs her tongue across her lips, recalling a forbidden memory. The aftertaste of blood is still there. Faint. Lingering.

Sieben sits at her desk, her face pressed into her hands. 

On the left side, a stack of paperwork. On the right side, more paperwork. Nearly organized stacks, binders on top of binders on top of even more binders. Interrogation reports, requisition notes. Enough personal grievance forms to plaster the entire cramped office twice over. All of them, every single one of them, are vying for her attention and precious time. With every stamp, every signature, Sieben sinks deeper into a bottomless pit of despair.

Perhaps this is hell. The only thing that could conceivably make this already horrible situation worse is – 

Two knocks on the door, then it slides open a half-second later, revealing a STAR unit.

Suddenly startled, Sieben scans the invader. It’s Jäger. Of fucking course it’s her. Who else could it possibly be ?

She’s carrying a stack of papers, tucked in a brown folder under her arm, and a mug in the other hand. It contains some kind of beverage – tea ? –, judging by the string and tag hanging off its side.

Sieben just looks blearily at her. “Fuck off”, she barks, with as much authority she can muster right now.  “Get your ass out of this office before I get mad.”

Without saying a word, Jäger backtracks until she’s right outside the door, by a few centimeters at most. She peeks her head in to stare at Sieben, grinning.

“I told you to go away . Don’t make me repeat myself.”

Smugly, Jäger raises a finger. “You told me to, and I quote, ‘get my ass out of this office’. My posterior is, technically , out of the boundaries of this room.”

Maybe Sieben should have choked her to death for good, actually. In one swift motion, she reaches out for the stapler on her desk and flings it at Jäger’s head.

The Starling dodges it so casually it’s almost insulting, not even spilling a drop of the tea. Damn combat reflexes. 

“Next time, aim for the center of mass. Easier target to hit”, she snorts. 

Two steps, and she’s bending down to set the mug on Sieben’s desk. It has a little stylized Storch symbol printed on the side, and a faint aroma of strong black tea wafts from it. Next to the mug, she sets the folder. “My squad’s patrol reports for the last three cycles.”

Sieben sinks deeper into her chair. It creaks under the weight, just like her sanity is creaking under the tedium of her job. She groans. “Amazing. Exactly what I needed. More paperwork.”

“Temperamental and ungrateful. Figures.”

“Never call me that again if you value your life.” 

“You know, I’m actually trying to be cordial here. I even brought you tea. How’s Frau Hilde doing, by the way ?”

“Fine.” The plant is happily sitting on a corner of the desk, looking unbothered as usual. Sieben had almost overwatered it at one point, until the leaves started drooping and she’d had to make a panicked beeline to the nearest Ara. Not her proudest moment.

“And the journal-keeping ?”

Her ire momentarily cast aside, Sieben thinks about the small notebook stashed under her pillow. She hadn’t written anything of note the first few dozen cycles, but by the second season, she’d filled almost half of it. It was a little embarrassing, to pour her heart out like that, but maybe – maybe it helped. To gather her thoughts, map the hows and whys of her psyche on smooth white paper, that felt strangely cathartic. 

“It’s going well”, she says, hesitating slightly.

“Very good.” Jäger claps her hands with a smile, but this one doesn’t quite reach her eyes. A small knot twists itself in Sieben’s stomach. She swallows, and then it’s gone.

Silence settles in the small office. An uncomfortable silence, louder than it has any right to be.

“You still owe me an apology, you know,” says Jäger.

“I don’t.”

“You broke my nose !” She points at the conspicuous bandage on her face.

“Don’t care. You deserved it.” Sieben gets up, placing her hands flat on her desk to loom threateningly over it. “And I would do it again if I had the chance.”

This little demonstration doesn’t quite produce the expected effect. Jäger’s neutral expression contorts into a smirk, her eyes turning dark for a moment.

“Actually, I’ve got an idea. Want to make a bet with me ?”

Sieben tilts her head. “A bet ?”

“Yeah. Highest score in the shooting range wins. Here’s the deal: you win, you get to do whatever you want to me for a full minute; I win, you apologize for breaking my nose.” Then, defiant : “You in ?”

Sieben mulls over the proposition, her hand idly rubbing at her chin where metal meets flesh. It’s a dangerous gamble; Jäger’s prowess in the shooting range is widely discussed, even among the other cadres. Losing would be humiliating, but winning ? Sieben could do so much more than breaking her mentor’s nose. A full minute is an eternity in the right state of mind.

“What, you gonna puss out or something ? Zwei always used to say Storches were like Starlings but better all around, you know.” 

Just like that, Sieben’s pride wins. 

“We have a deal,” she finally says, even though part of her feels like she’s just made a colossal mistake.

Jäger’s cocky smirk grows wider. “Shooting range, next cycle ? Don’t forget your sidearm.”

“As if.”

“Be there or be square. You can keep the mug, by the way !”

One last cackle, and she’s gone.

With a sigh, Sieben slumps back into her chair.  The mug is warm and soothing against her hands when she closes them around it. It’s a small comfort, but Revolutionary knows she needs it. Every single one of her interactions with Jäger ends up as a battleground, and yet defeat seems inevitable. There has to be a way to win. She just has to be good enough.

Revolvers, as far as Sieben is concerned, are objectively terrible weapons.

Their 12mm caliber is, save for a mutiny of the Protektor cadre, overkill for most of the possible targets at the facility. The short barrel doubtlessly compromises accuracy at long range. Reloading them is a pain in the ass, let alone in the midst of combat; their suppressive ability is limited. They’re antiquated. They’re as much a relic as the Imperial surplus bullets they fire. The only reason to use an Einhorn as a service weapon is to show off – which is why it makes perfect sense that it’s Jäger’s favorite. 

Sieben watches her reload the gun, fascinated. She doesn’t even bother using a speed loader – Sieben is half-tempted to quip about how inefficient it is, but she’s too fast. Dextrous fingers quickly place six cartridges in, and with a sharp flick of her wrist, she closes the cylinder. Jäger blades her stance and brings the other hand to rest against her shoulder, fist closed. Eyes narrow, body still as a statue, she’s staring at the target sliding to its furthest position.

Bang-bang-bang. The target barely even shudders as the first volley passes right through its bullseye. Jäger turns her head to wink at Sieben, and puts another three-round burst into it, casually.

Bastard.

At last, silence. Sixty out of sixty, the electronic scoreboard says in big red numbers. It’s a perfect score. 

“Well, well, well. Looks like I’ve won,” Jäger announces, as if it’s not fucking obvious enough.

Sieben feels a pang of envy ripple through her gut, and quickly smothers it. Her own target is a constellation of scattered hits, and much to her embarrassment, not one of them hit the bullseye. At least that would have been a consolation prize.

She has just lost. Hopelessly, irrevocably, irreversibly lost. What a stupid idea it had been from the start. If only she had listened to the voice of reason.

She can already hear the snide remarks. Mediocre , Jäger would say with a smirk; or maybe she wouldn’t even deign to grace her with one, instead raising an eyebrow towards the torn cardboard. Jäger saunters towards the scoreboard, and writes her name in the first position. Her mouth whistles a tune Sieben can’t recognize.

When she makes her way back, Sieben has to clench her hands to stop them from trembling.

“You lost. You know what that means.”

Sieben’s face is rapidly heating up. “Right,” she clears her throat, “I’m sorry –”

“ No.” Jäger interrupts her with a wave of her hand. “You want to apologize properly, you have to put some effort into it.”

“Eat shit and die–”

“No arguing.” The Starling points at the floor. “Come on. On your knees.”

“W–What ?” Sieben sputters. “You can’t be serious !”

“I’m dead serious. Down, now.”

There’s no avoiding it. Sieben’s knees hit the floor with a thud, her long legs awkwardly folding on themselves. 

“I’m sorry for ambushing you and breaking your nose.” Sieben swallows, tries to ignore the burning in her cheeks, the cold seeping from the metal floor. She continues. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

Silence. She counts to six seconds, just so she doesn’t glance up at her mentor – right before a finger tilts her chin upwards and she has no choice but to. Their eyes meet. There’s something in the Starling’s gaze she can’t quite decipher; is it satisfaction, or regret ? She can’t tell for sure. 

“Good girl,” coos Jäger, patting her twice on the head. “You can get up, now.”

And Sieben does, clambering to her feet with the grace of a newborn calf. Not knowing what to do with her hands, she starts fiddling with the slide of her Type-75 handgun. Anything to forget that humiliation.

“Want some shooting tips ?” Jäger asks, out of the blue.

Sieben immediately narrows her eyes. “Why are you being so helpful all of a sudden ?”

A shrug. ”Well, you know what they say. Good behavior has to be rewarded.”

“I hope your gun blows up in your face the next time you try to shoot it.”

“Yeah, yeah. So, do you want the advice, or nah ?”

Telling her to fuck off and die is so, so tempting, but truth be told, Sieben is still so taken aback by the sudden, honest offer that she – stupidly – nods. This is just pragmatism, she tells herself to cope. Any potentially useful advice is good to get in a place like this. 

A few seconds is all it takes to get into a shooting stance, and then the Starling circles around her, humming pensively.

“You’re stiff,” she says, lightly tapping a finger to Sieben’s elbow, then to her upper arm. “Your wrists tremble when you grip the pistol too hard. At medium and long range, it’s throwing off your aim by whole centimeters.”

Two hands, firm but gentle, come to rest right above her hips. Before Sieben can protest at the sudden touch, they tilt her stance, just a few degrees to the side. “There. Angle yourself like this, you’ll be more stable.”

The hands slowly slide just a little higher, to her waist, and for a brief moment, the only sound in the room is the faint whirring of Sieben’s cooling fans spooling up to life. Jäger can’t possibly miss it, and when she speaks again her voice is as smooth as gunmetal. 

“You’re so tense . No need to be. Remember what I told you the other day, about breathing techniques ?”

Sieben nods, her throat bobbing up and down as she gulps a mouthful of air. “Inhale and then exhale, six times, correct ?”

“Yeah. Try it now.”

It’s hard to concentrate with the teasing touch on her plastic shell, but she does as she’s told. She breathes in, breathes out, again and again until all the tension flushes out of her body. Jäger walks to the nearest pillar and leans on it. “Go on,” she says, jerking a thumb towards the target. “Show me you can get a few good hits.”

Sieben presses the trigger thrice. Three bullets punch holes in the target’s innermost circle. 

“Not bad,” Jäger comments.

“I don’t need your compliments.”

Jäger sighs. “Look, I’m your mentor, and you’ve made some noticeable improvements already, so I’m pointing them out.” She gestures to the target. “That’s all there is to it, alright ?”

Sieben eyes her suspiciously. “You’re not putting me down ?”

Jäger uncrosses her arms. “No, I’m praising you. Keep at it and you’ll get to write your name on the scoreboard.” A sly smile. “Maybe.”

There’s something about the tone of Jäger’s voice that makes Sieben stand a little straighter, makes her forget the shame of being made to grovel at her feet. She’s the one with the power here, she’s the one holding a gun , and yet oxidant forces its way into her cheeks again, flushing them pink.

Unfortunately, Jäger appears to notice that, because her head tilts slightly to the side and she looks at her curiously. Sieben’s mouth is forming words, in a hurry to break the silence.

“Can we–” she gestures to the firing lanes, “do a few more of these training sessions ? With my sidearm ?”

Jäger chuckles a little. “What, that little demonstration lit a fire under your ass ? You’re desperate to beat me at this, aren’t you ?”

“What if I am ?”

The Starling’s smirk grows even wider. “Then that makes it interesting . Same time next period ?” 

Sieben nods, a little too eagerly. This is dangerous. This is camaraderie slowly seeping through the cracks of professionalism. Sieben has spent the past few dozen cycles avoiding her mentor like the plague, or fighting her, and the second the latter heaps genuine praise on her, she wants more, wants to drink it greedily like an alcoholic with a bottle of liquor. How fucking embarrassing.

With a huff, Sieben puts her pistol back in its holster, and heads toward the door. Maybe a few rounds of guard duty will clear her head.

The night shift is, as strange as it is, quite a peaceful time.

Sieben didn’t exactly get first pick of shifts, being the rookie in her cadre and all that, so that’s how she ended up working them; and yet she doesn’t dislike them that much. All the Gestalts are asleep, for starters, so that’s one less pain in the ass, and the showers are usually free as well. She gets to patrol the halls with only her thoughts for company, and a little introspection never hurt anyone – that’s what Jäger says, at least.

Speaking of being alone, there’s something odd about this closet she’s just passed. Current policy is to leave the doors of maintenance and janitorial spaces shut and locked at all times, to prevent misuse of tools and chemical products – unless there’s an Eule on shift, of course. She knows for a fact there are no janitor Eules on shift for this cycle. And yet the door is slightly ajar. Crouching her massive frame – the door is nowhere near Storch-sized – she creeps closer, and peers her head inside.

In the room, two figures are sitting against the wall.

No, that’s not quite right. They’re not just sitting.

One of them is an Eule – Sieben can tell by her white forearms – and she’s running her hands over the bare – bare ! – chestplate of another Replika. It’s so dim even Sieben’s night-vision optics can’t tell for sure, but it’s probably a Starling. The latter curls an arm around the smaller Replika and pulls her onto her lap, holding her ever closer, roaming her hands over her thighs, her ass. The Eule giggles, mutters something, and as if to respond by touch when words won’t suffice, the Starling nips playfully at her collarbone.

What the actual fuck .

Sieben’s mouth hangs open in shock. Her internals are suddenly generating too much heat, and the spooling up of her ventilation fans is so distracting she almost forgets her purpose.

She barks at the duo. “Cease immediately and identify yourselves !”

A startle. Two pairs of eyes snap to her own. Even in the nigh-obscurity of the faint yellow pilot lights, pure terror glistens in their gaze.

Fight-or-flight. Desperation must give them wings, because the Starling practically throws the Eule off her, and they scamper off into the dark before Sieben has a chance to catch them. She nearly hits her head on the ceiling pipes when she tries to chase after the pair, and before long, they’ve disappeared into the maze of maintenance corridors.

Empty-handed and circumspect, she emerges. Resuming her patrol, she ponders the situation; multiple possibilities are laid bare in front of her.

She could include that in her official report. No, should : Replikas are not supposed to… seek each other’s attentions. And yet there’s something begging her to keep that discovery under wraps, and she can’t even tell why. A discreet mention of this event to Sechs in their dorm only gets her a dismissive shrug and a wave that means stop bothering me with this.

She has to get to the bottom of this, still. The culprit could be anyone in S-23’s large STAR cadre. How to proceed, then ? In matters of gossip, Axt reigns supreme, but she’s just as likely to spread the word around, and that won’t do. She doesn’t know any other Starling from the squad that well, though, except…

Except her . Ugh.

Through the following cycle, Sieben takes some time pondering the best course of action. A meeting should suffice, but it ought to be private, and agreeable, to extract as much information as possible without seeming too suspicious. The music room, then, emerges as the ideal location. Secluded, not too busy depending on when the Eule cadre is on shift, and also one of the only places in Sierpinski not bugged to death with hidden microphones.

So she sets the tray on the small coffee table and waits. Anxiously. She has to clutch her knee to stop her leg from bouncing.

It’s zero dark thirty, and the pneumatic door hisses open. Jäger is never late, that’s one of her few genuine qualities Sieben can – begrudgingly – admit.

She comes in strutting lazily, as she always does, a hand on her hip. She’s not wearing her armor, nor her hat or mask. The reprimand comes out of Sieben’s mouth before she can stop herself.

“Protektors must be outfitted at all times when out of the dorms, Jäger.”

The latter shrugs. “Whatever. I’m off-duty. And you know this, because you make my schedule.”

“Don’t make me report you.” Sieben really can’t let this go, can she ? For fuck’s sake.

“Report me ?” Jäger is grinning now. “Two can play at this game. I can make an official complaint about that time you yelled at Beo because she was walking too loudly.”

Sieben blanches. “You wouldn’t. And I apologized to her after.”

“Yeah, yeah. Wanna bet on it ?”

Sieben’s not a risk-taker, especially since that ill-fated shooting range bet, and so she finally relents. Even off-duty, it’s been hard to shake off the “unwavering sentinel of order” mantle. She motions for Jäger to sit on the armchair in front of her.

“This better be worth my time, you know. There’s about a million more interesting things I could do than willingly hang out with you. Like doing some maintenance in the armory, for example.”

“Are guns all you think about ?”

Jäger rests her chin in her palm. “Not all, but mostly.”

That’s the moment two Eules choose to barge in. One of them is carrying what appears to be sheet music under her arm, and they both startle when they see the Protektor pair.

Sieben frowns. “What are you two doing here at this hour ? Don’t you have work to do ?”

One of the Eules pipes up. “We had, but kitchen’s flooded again, and we’re waiting for the maintenance Aras to fix the plumbing issue.” 

The other finally notices Jäger in the armchair, and waves at her, a wide smile on her face.

The Starling beams at her. “Hey, Jan ! You’re gonna practice that four-hands piano piece you were telling me about last cycle ? For the Revolution Day celebration ?”

“Yep !” Jan ruffles her hair affectionately. Meanwhile, the other Eule is squinting at the table. Her eyes go from Sieben to Jäger, then to the bottle of liquor and the two small glasses next to it, then to Sieben and Jäger again. She opens her mouth, and Sieben braces for impact.

“Aww,” coos the Eule. “It’s like you guys are having a little dinner date !”

Januar elbows her discreetly in the ribs. “März ! ” 

Sieben clutches her forearm so hard she swears one of her servos squeaks in protest. Breathe in, breathe out. Can’t get angry now.

“For both your sakes,” she grits out, “I’m going to pretend I never heard that. Understood ?”

“Yes ! Sorry !!” squeaks März, and then she practically runs to the piano in the far corner of the room.

Fucking Eules.

Sieben presses the palms of her hands to her face. The cool sensation is a welcome one, but not one to last, alas. Between her fingers, she glimpses Jäger’s face. She looks like she’s trying very hard not to laugh.

“You gotta admit it does kind of look like a date, though,” Jäger says, because this damn idiot is as talented with a gun as she is in making already unbearable situations even worse.

Not missing a beat, Sieben throws the nearest box of crackers at her. It bounces off Jäger’s abdomen, and the latter catches it, undeterred. She starts tearing the box open and fishing for its bounty inside.

“You’re so annoying,” Sieben groans, though it falls on deaf ears.

Ignoring her, Jäger reaches for the nearby glass, filled with schnapps. “Is that the liquor you confiscated from the Gestalts in the dorm ?” She eyes the clear liquid suspiciously. “You’re not trying to poison me, are you ?”

Sieben scoffs. “Poison is a coward’s weapon. If I wanted to kill you right now, rest assured it would be a hands-on method.”

“Hah. Ain’t that reassuring.”

Jäger tilts her head back to take the shot, exposing her throat. Synthetic sternocleidomastoid muscle flexes as she swallows, and Sieben’s mouth suddenly feels a little dry. Her fingers twitch, a faint memory of how it felt having them clasped around her mentor’s neck.

The latter coughs and sputters. “Fuck me, this tastes like floor detergent. Why do the Gestalts even drink this shit ?”

“They’re desperate, I suppose. Hold on – how do you even know what floor detergent tastes like ?”

Jäger averts her gaze, faintest pink creeping on her cheeks. Is she flustered ? “Uh, Starling hazing rituals, I guess ? Not really relevant right now.”

“If you’ve been drinking floor detergent all this time, that explains a lot, actually.”

“Boo. Rude. And it was once !”

It’s almost quaint, how easily banter flows between them now. Not reassuring in the least, more like slightly terrifying, but Sieben can’t let herself sucked into petty small talk, of all things. She’s got information to collect.

Perceptive as always, Jäger notices the sudden seriousness in her face, and leans in. “Alright, what is it you wanted to tell me about ? Spill it, I don’t have all night.”

Sieben drinks her own shot – for liquid courage – and starts. “Lately, I have been feeling like I don’t quite have a grasp on the culture of this place.”

Jäger tilts her head, curious. “What do you mean ?”

A big inhale. “A few cycles ago, I stumbled on two Replikas in… the grave throes of lust, I’ll say.”

“Oh ?”

“‘Oh ?’ That’s my point ! Nobody seems to care ! It’s a clear violation of the rules !”

Jäger pinches a cracker between index and thumb. “Well, who was it anyway ?”

“I don’t know exactly. Too dark, and they’d turned their IFF off. Taller model and shorter one, in all likelihood a STAR and an EULR.”

The cracker stops en route to Jäger’s mouth, and she smirks.

Sieben stares at her, unamused. “You know something about this, don’t you.”

“Ask me no questions and I will tell you no lies,” she quips, through a mouthful of cracker.

The scathing look Sieben gives her would tear a hole through reinforced steel plate, yet Jäger doesn’t seem to care. Worse, she gets up, and before Sieben has a chance to protest, plops down next to her on the two-seater.

She leans a little closer. “Sieben, why am I here ? If it’s gossip you wanted, you should have asked Axt, you know.”

Sieben can’t bear to meet her stare. Arms crossed, she huffs : “If I had asked Axt, the entire facility would have known three hours later. For all your numerous faults, you know how to keep things private.”

A finger, wagging in her direction. “No, that’s not quite it, isn’t it ?”

“Don’t you dare presume what I think.”

“Oh, but I will dare, actually.” Jäger empties another glass before continuing – when did she pour it, actually ? “Did you think it was me ?”

An electric jolt of panic courses through Sieben. She rolls her empty shot glass between her fingers, tries to steady herself. The light from the overhead lamps reflects in it, refraction distorting it across the black plastic of her digits.

“It was a possibly that I considered, yes. You seem like the type to really… get around.”

Jäger laughs, loud and brash. “Did you just call me a whore ?” She scoots a little closer still. “Just so we’re clear, that wasn’t me. Got a little idea who it could be, but I’m not snitching.”

In the far corner of the room, the Eules have finally started playing their piece, filling the empty air with delightful sound. Sieben’s never been fond of music, but right now she wants to lose herself in the melody, anything to distract herself from the inquisitive look of her subordinate. 

“Anyway,” the Starling says, pouring herself another shot of schnapps. “How did that make you feel ? When you saw these two, all over each other ? Angry ? Disappointed ?”

“Angry, maybe – but why would I be disappointed ?”

Jäger’s smile stretches wider. “Disappointed in the possibility that you wouldn’t have my undivided attention, of course.”

“Why would your undivided attention ever be something that I desire ?”

“Oh, you certainly desire, all right.” 

To Sieben’s bewilderment, Jäger’s tone of voice has swerved into the downright sultry. Staccato notes from the piano afar match the rhythm of her own heartbeat. 

She forces herself to face Jäger, clenching her jaw so hard ceramic teeth grind against each other.

“As if I would ever debase myself by indulging in shameful pulsions.”

“No ? Then what was all that about, in the storage room ? Hmm ?”

Sieben bristles. “How many times have I told you to stop bringing that up ?”

“Many. Doesn’t change what you did, though.” Jäger runs her index finger down her neck, languidly, grinning from ear to ear when she sees Sieben’s gaze drawn to it. “You should have finished what you started, too. So rude to keep a girl waiting.”

“Fucking hell. You really are a deviant–”

A hand grabs the red straps of Sieben’s armor, yanks her down hard, and then Jäger’s lips crash onto hers.

It’s an unexpected kiss, and so unlike Jäger, too; impulsive yet chaste, and before Sieben can remember how to breathe again, they part. The Starling looks as smug as she’s ever seen her.

It takes a good ten seconds for Sieben to flush away the shock. “What the fuck was that for ?!” she hisses.

“To shut you up. Worked, for a few seconds. Good enough.”

Jäger looks positively unbothered, another filled glass at the ready in her right hand. Sieben has to crane her neck to look at the Eules on the piano, but they’re still focused on their practice. She’s never been so thankful for the acoustics of a room than right now. At least nobody else has seen her kissing another Replika. Her subordinate. Her mentor .

“Jäger. Are you drunk ?”

Her mentor swirls the clear liquid in her glass. “Not nearly enough to explain why I kissed you, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

Breathe in. Breathe out. “I should – I should be punishing you for that. Breach of protocol. Unbecoming conduct. I’ll–”

Trembling hands pull out her combat knife from its sheath, clutch it as hard as they can in a hammer grip until they’re steady. Jäger doesn’t even flinch. She leans back in her corner of the sofa, and drinks again.

She’s sloppy this time. A line of liquor drips from the corner of her mouth, catches precariously in the metal notch on her chin. It threatens to trickle down her neck, pool down in the divot above her collarbone. Sieben closes her eyes. Maybe she’s drunk herself, because she can’t manage to ignore how much she wants to lick it off her and kiss her again, the sharp taste of alcohol on both their tongues.

Jäger sets the empty glass on the coffee table. “Go on, then. Punish me. Hell – decommission me. I’m right here, unarmed, unarmored. I’m vulnerable. Do it, if you’re the big bad Storch you think you are.” 

Everything about her demeanor is calculated. Artificial, just like the rest of her body, matching the mind. All plastic smile and fake affability, Sieben tells herself. Still. It might be a trap, it might be a game, but she doesn’t do something she’s going to lose herself.

So she places the tip of the knife over Jäger’s breastplate.

To the initiated, there are many ways to kill a combat model Replika, even with something as primitive as a knife. Bulletproof doesn’t mean invincible.

Sieben could jam the tip of the knife into her neck, sever the optic cables. A quick, expeditive death.

She could wrench the knife in her chesplate, pop it open with a loud crack, and slide it past. Yes, glide it past blue titanium ribs and sternum, past flesh and pulsating organs, to pierce the heart; and that would kill Jäger as surely and quickly as a bullet to the head would.

Or maybe she could stab her in the gut. Again and again, scraping the blade across the kevlar lattice to broaden the wound, and then she’d slither her hand right in, cradle her with her other arm as she’d thrust into slick flesh until she’d find the bundle of cables merging in her spine, and watch her gasp and shudder as she’d rip them out. And she would be free, once and for all.

Would she ?

Sieben’s knife hovers above her subordinate. It still hasn’t moved. She won’t do it. She can’t do it. Her shoulders heave in a quiet sob of shame and disgust.

A thumb rubs across the white part of her knuckles, softly. “What’s wrong, Storch Sieben ? Lost your nerve ?”

“Fuck you,” she mutters.

“You talk the talk, but you can’t walk the walk, can you ?”

Sieben’s fingers loosen themselves out of their own accord, the knife falling uselessly onto Jäger’s lap. The latter wastes no time. She brushes it aside with one hand, where it clatters loudly to the floor; sits up to face Sieben again.

Sieben’s head twists like it’s on a swivel to spare a panicked glance at the musicians, but a firm hand on her jaw brings it back. 

“Don’t look at them, look at me.” And she does, obeying the imperious command. A good Protektor should always follow orders. And is that not what she is, in the end ? A good little Protektor ?

She realizes, belatedly, that she has never seen Jäger looks this unguarded. Stern mentor, affable Starling comrade, all the layers have been stripped back like turpentine attacking paint. This is the real her, maybe, the hunter cornering the prey, animalistic pleasure at her imminent victory. Two fingers tap Sieben’s chin, a simple request – open up – and she obeys again. She doesn’t even know why.

“I’ve figured you out, you know.” A thumb brushes her lower lip, slides past into her mouth. “You bare your teeth at me, you yell and you scowl and you strike.” The thumb prods her teeth, presses on her canine. “And yet the second I push back, you waver. It’s a little pathetic. She would not have hesitated.”

By the time Sieben remembers she can bite, the armored digit has left her mouth. It’s tracing her jawline now, all too gentle.

Sieben responds, belatedly. “You say it like it’s a bad thing.”

“Is it, now ?” 

“You sounded disappointed.”

“Mmm. It’s different is all. Opens up… new possibilities.” 

The Starling’s gaze is darker than she’s ever seen, yet the red pinprick of her pupils shines bright. There's satisfaction in there – no, triumph. As if she’s just vanquished a long-time foe.

“Is this– is this some kind of messed-up power play, or are you making a pass at me ?” Sieben manages to rasp out after a few seconds of silence.

Jäger gives a hearty chuckle, her hand still on Sieben’s jaw. “Two things can be true at the same time, you know.”

“You’ve lost the plot. You’re– you’re insane.”

“Pfft. We’re all a little crazy down there. It’s the asbestos in the air, methinks – or the isolation. Or both.”

Sieben exhales, a little shakily, when a lock of her hair is tucked behind her ear. Jäger’s speaking again. “By the way, don’t get the wrong idea. I’m not doing this because I like you as a person. You’re a real piece of work, you know ?”

“Go fuck yourself, Jäger.”

“Fuck me yourself, you coward. Admit it. You want to.”

Sieben nearly drops her glass to the floor. Jäger’s right. She’s right, she’s always right, somehow, even now. And her hand is reaching towards Sieben’s knee, squeezing it lightly. An invitation.

“It doesn’t matter what I want. We’re Replikas – Protektors . We’re not supposed to be doing this. At all.”

“ ‘Not supposed’, you keep saying that. Doesn’t mean what you think it means.” A finger traces the seam in Sieben’s face, achingly slow. “You’re allowed to loosen up a bit. Would make you less of a bitch, probably.”

“And on whose authority is that allowed ?”

Jäger smirks. It’s the confident, arrogant grin Sieben detests so much, the one that’s all teeth and swagger. 

“Mine,” she says.

Sieben’s already perilous restraint crumbles away. She throws an arm over Jäger’s shoulder and kisses her.

This one is coarser than the last. More fiery. Sieben has never kissed anyone before this fateful night, but she finds it oddly similar to fighting; every action begets an immediate reaction. She tilts her head, and Jäger hums in satisfaction, pulling her closer with a hand on her neck. She takes the initiative again, biting a lip so hard it draws blood. Push and pull. The room echoes with the crescendo of the final bars of the Eules’ piece, but Sieben couldn’t care less. All she’s aware of right now is the feel of their mouths rolling together, the steady climb of her internal temperature, and how Jäger’s hand is now climbing up her thigh.

A thumb brushes across the red band on her thigh, slow and deliberate. A tantalizing promise. Sieben chokes back a deeply embarrassing noise – and that’s what breaks the kiss, breaks the trance. They pull apart, just as the final note of piano reverberates across the walls.

Far away, one of the Eules hoots in triumph; a celebration of a successful rehearsal, hopefully. Sieben flexes her fingers, tries to center herself the way she always does after the adrenaline rush wears off. Across her, Jäger is back into her corner of the sofa, as calm as ever.

Sieben breathes until she finds her words again. “That was really, really fucking unprofessional.”

Jäger pops another cracker into her mouth. “ Schatzi, I’m afraid professionalism left town a while ago.”

“You should be leaving.”

Jäger shrugs, stands up. “I’m taking this with me, though,” she says, gesturing at the half-empty bottle. “The girls are gonna appreciate it. No objections ?”

Sieben waves her off dismissively. 

Exhaling deeply, she settles back in the sofa. Jäger blows her a kiss before she walks out the door. Little shit. Just like that, it’s silent again in the music room. Yet Sieben’s ears still pick up phantom sounds – the faintest echoes of music notes, her own heart thundering in her chest. What a strange turn of events this has been. 

Sieben turns the knob all the way to cold and slams her palm on the button.

Night shifts are usually quieter. Better for introspection. Paperwork dulls the mind into a predictable drone, all focused on scheduling and reports. 

Or at least, that’s what she used to think. Ever since the… events of a few cycles ago, she simply cannot focus. When she closes her eyes, tries in vain to concentrate, it’s all she can think about. Phantom touch of hands over her plastic shell. Deft fingers over her sides, her thigh, her face. Desire is an abyss that stares back, unfathomable depths that threaten to swallow her like Tartarus with sinners’ souls. An all-consuming hunger. Goddess below, does Sieben hate her – and want her.

Thankfully (or maybe not), Jäger has largely kept to herself these past cycles, acting like everything was normal between them, like she did not sloppily make out with her commanding officer in the music room. Maybe it was one of her tests all along, to assess her impulsivity. That would explain her demeanor. Sieben would rather not consider that possibility.

Miserably humping her pillow in the dead of night while the other Storches are asleep is no help, and so Sieben stands under the shower, hoping for relief. She’s set it cold, the coldest setting possible, and she’s hunched over, hands flat on the tiled wall. Nobody’s here to see her in this pathetic state.

So deep is she lost in thought that she doesn’t hear the door open until footsteps are already approaching. She jolts at the sound of the voice hollering at her.

“Hey. There you are !”

It’s her . Of all the people in this cursed station that could be bothering her right now, it had to be her. Sieben would recognize that voice anywhere.

“ You ,” she husks, staring blearily at the intruder.

“Me.”

“You have no reason to be here. Go away or I will make you leave. By force.”

Jäger tilts her head to the side. “You’re awfully crabby, for someone not at her post.”

“I needed to stabilize.”

“Dereliction of duty is not taken lightly, you of all people should know that.” Jäger shakes her head disapprovingly. “And I have a reason to be here, by the way. Do you want to hear it ?”

“No.”

“I was on patrol tonight, as you are surely aware, and I caught a Gestalt sneaking out of the dorm. Took him to the interrogation room, but protocol requires a Storch to be there, and you are on duty right now.”

Sieben sighs. “Can’t you find another Storch to replace me ?”

“Uh, excuse me ? Do you want me to go wake up Drei, or something ? I have self-preservation instincts, thank you very much.”

“Don’t care. Not my problem.” Sieben turns to face the wall again, exhaling happily at the cold water cascading down her back.

“You’re not gonna come with me, are you.”

Sieben doesn’t deign answer her. Maybe if she’ll ignore Jäger, she’ll go away. Hopeful thinking, but still.

Behind her, the Starling mutters something like good grief , followed by the telltale sound of a buckle unclasping. Sieben turns around just in time to see Jäger set her armor, belt and hat in a neat little pile on the bench, right next to Frau Hilde.

“Jäger, what the hell are you doing ?” she asks, puzzled.

“Playing the role of emotional support Starling. Again.” Her mentor casually strolls towards the shower right next to her. Turning the water on, she happily hums a military tune while she lathers her hair with soap. “Talk to me, Sieben. Are you having an existential crisis again, or something ? Persona degradation ? Did one of the Kolibris steal your favorite book ?”

One of Sieben’s fist curls up, strikes at the wall. “I– I couldn’t concentrate on my work.”

“Why’s that ?”

“I’ve been having… thoughts.”

“Wow. Big if true.”

Sieben snaps into action like a spring trap, her cold myomer protesting the sudden movement. Jäger’s head and back hit the wall with a dull thunk, Sieben using her arms and height to cage her in.

“Can you stop trying to be a fucking comedian for five minutes ?” she grits out.

“Okay, okay.” Jäger holds up her hands, apologetic. “But I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what’s wrong.”

Sieben waits a bit before responding. It may be one thing to feel, but vocalizing it is another. 

“The… chat we had in the music room.” She brings a hand up to massage her temple. “I can’t purge it from my memory banks ! It’s not working !”

“Oh.” 

“Oh ? Is my persona degrading ? Am I defective ? What the hell did you do to me ?”

Nine hells, that look Jäger is giving her. Her expression softens with a mix of pity and understanding, and she places her hands on Sieben’s shoulders, right where her collarbones connect to the armored plates.

“I’m sorry, Sieben, but you might be sick. It’s terminal, too. It’s called dumb bitch disease.”

Goddess, she really can’t help herself, can she.

With a huff of profound annoyance, Sieben clamps her palm over Jäger’s mouth. The latter’s eyes widen in fear as Sieben angles the shower head towards her head. She struggles, sputters water through her nose, tries to claw at Sieben’s face, but Sieben uses her superior strength and height to hold her still. Finally, Jäger seems to resign herself to her fate, and when Sieben lets her guard down just one second, that’s when she digs a vicious uppercut aimed right at her sternum, nearly doubling her over.

They’re both coughing now, and Sieben’s abdomen hurts like a bitch. She still has enough anger left in her to glower at Jäger, though, and she moves to press her forearm against her throat, pinning her to the wall of the shower again.

“Thought waterboarding was reserved for the interrogation room,” Jäger says, voice still hoarse.

“Serves you right for making that stupid joke.”

“You’re still mad at me, aren’t you ?”

“Obviously.”

“Good. Wanna fuck about it ?”

Sieben gapes at her mentor. “You’re so – so crass !”

“And you,” Jäger pokes at her, “are simply too horny to function. Solution’s obvious, is what I’m saying.”

Whatever objections Sieben was trying to raise shrivel and die, because both of the Starling’s hands are on her now, roaming across her body, tracing the edges of her chestplate. 

“So ? Is that a yes or a no ?”

A choice to make. Two paths, diverging. 

Sieben crosses the Rubicon and presses her mouth to Jäger’s.

It’s a furious kiss, all teeth and tongue and bruised lips, cycles upon cycles of pent-up frustration unleashed in fiery union. One of Sieben’s hands finds its way to tangle in Jäger’s hair, tilting her head to the side so she can deepen the kiss, and Jäger’s pawing at her lower back, squeezing her ass, and that tears a breathy, stuttered moan from Sieben’s throat.

“Goddess, you’re so fucking easy,” snickers Jäger, now nipping at her throat. “Bet you were touching yourself in that shower earlier, weren’t you ?” Another nip. “Were you thinking about me ?”

Sieben slaps her across the face as a response, a sharp crack of plastic fingers against skin; droplets of water fly away from Jäger’s hair, but she’s not even bothered, latching on Sieben’s neck again.

“Feisty today, aren’t we ?” Jäger murmurs against the column of her throat, before licking a long, languid stripe over the contacts on her neck.

The sensation – it’s hard to describe. Like an exquisite sting, pinpricks of shock coalescing into heat around her spine, stoking the embers of lust. It’s so much, and yet not enough. Not enough . A breathy gasp escapes Sieben’s mouth.

She tugs at the Starling’s hair. “Do that again,” she commands.

Suddenly, her vision spins. Her back hits the wall, hard , then her head, filling her optic feed with white specks for a millisecond, and she belatedly realizes that Jäger’s just reversed their positions.

“You think you can order me around right now ?” Jäger snarls. “No, I think the fuck not.” Then, pinning Sieben’s hands to the wall, that ravenous look in her eyes : “Behave.”

All Sieben can do is obey. It’s all she wants, really, all she needs, to not think about the chain of command and the responsibilities and the productivity quotas, to lose herself in the arms of her beautiful annoying mentor until they’re just two bodies becoming one. And Jäger understands her, she really does, because she’s attacking Sieben’s neck like it’s her sole purpose in life, short kisses and pointed licks, and the heat – it’s building up inside of her body, like a furnace, her ventilation system fruitlessly trying to keep up.

“Please,” Sieben rasps out.

As if on cue, one of Jäger’s hands snakes its way down her stomach, to bury itself between her legs. There’s nothing there, just smooth hard plastic and carbon fiber like the rest of her body, but she’s turned on enough that it doesn’t matter, every press of the Starling’s fingers sending acute stabs of pleasure up her nerves, long-buried synaptic signals stirring awake at last.

“There you are, schatzi,” purrs Jäger when Sieben moans against the shell of her ear, raw and unguarded and desperate. She’s so close, so damn close, she just needs – 

Jäger’s left hand coils in her hair and pulls. It’s vindictive, spiteful, mean; pain ripples across her scalp and into her skull. Jäger pulls like they haven’t just been fucking all this time but also fighting , and that’s what sends Sieben careening over the edge, her hands clawing across Jäger’s back as she comes with a shuddering gasp.

Perhaps this is heaven. Or, no – purgatory, maybe. A state of limbo one should know better than to think too much about. Sieben’s cheek rests on the top of Jäger’s head, one of the many times she’s been grateful for their height difference. Her arms are draped over the Starling’s broad shoulders, dangling limp now when they were desperately clutching a few minutes prior. There’s nobody in the shower room but the both of them, no noise save for the hot water blissfully cascading down her back. Peaceful as it is, the quietness makes it impossible for Sieben to ignore what she just did – what they have just done. Nothing will ever be the same.

And yet, despite all, Sieben is so comfortable she’s pretty sure she could doze off right here. 

Well, comfortable except for the sharp poke to her side, just now.  Maybe if she ignores it, Jäger will stop – no. Another one.

“Hey. Don’t you fall asleep on me, you moron. I’m not carrying your heavy ass to the Storch dorm.”

Sieben straightens her posture with a grunt of annoyance. “Can you please not ruin the moment ? Leave me the fuck alone.”

Jäger nuzzles the crook of her neck – Sieben hears her deep, mocking chuckle vibrate through polymer and flesh. “Oh, I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware that we were having a moment. What, want some pillow talk too ?”

The pair of arms encircling Sieben’s waist grip a little tighter. “Oh, Sieben, you look so handsome with your hair all wet and slicked back like that,” coos the Starling, fake-soothingly. She starts pressing kisses to the underside of Sieben’s jaw, slowly trailing higher.  It’s too gentle. Cloyingly romantic, even, would Sieben think were she a complete fool; just like that, it becomes too much. Enough is enough. Sieben wriggles her arms between the both of them, and pushes as hard as she can.

Jäger stumbles backwards, grip broken, and much to Sieben’s satisfaction, she slips on a puddle of soapy water and falls straight on her ass. Doesn’t quite wipe the smugness off her face, of course, but does anything ?

“Two things, Jäger. One, don’t you ever brag about this to anyone else. If you do, I will personally end you.”

Her mentor laughs, staggering back to her feet. “Please. If my girls knew I was screwing a Storch, they’d never let me live it down.”

“Second thing. This was a… a one time occurrence. I’m your commanding officer, not your fuckbuddy.”

It sounds so fucking pathetic, coming out of her mouth. Who is she even trying to convince ? Not Jäger, who raises an eyebrow in the way she does when she knows something is obvious bullshit. Herself, perhaps; and yet some part of her – that she tries her best to stomp – is keenly aware that while not particularly psychologically or professionally healthy, this is going to happen again. Call that a Cassandra truth.

“Well, it’s your decision,” Jäger is saying as she grabs a towel from the rack. “You ready to go back to work, at least ?”

Sieben nods. She could swear the clinical, drab blues and whites of the shower room are a little more lively now, their color less muted. The persistent ache she had is gone, too. For how long, says the tiny voice in the back of her head. She ignores it.

“Good. Interrogation room in ten minutes, then. Don’t keep me waiting !” The STAR clips her armor and utility belt back on. She blows Sieben a kiss, just before the door slides open and two Aras, covered in what appears to be motor oil, trudge into the room. 

With a heavy sigh, Sieben turns the water off, keeping her head down. She listens to the staccato of water droplets falling off her hair and shell, drip-drip-drip, until they stop. 

Time to go.

Chapter Text

Time ticks on.

By Sieben’s account, she has been in her office for four hours, thirty-eight minutes and seven seconds. The hand on the analog wall clock – slightly out of sync with her internal clock – moves punishingly slowly. In her usual corner of the desk, Frau Hilde’s luxuriant foliage sways in the stale, circulated air.

Sieben taps her fingers on the desk, restless.

In one of her latest readings, the souls of those guilty of sloth run around endlessly in limbo, doomed to ceaseless activity by their lack of dedication in life. She can’t deny she feels kinship to their fate, although anything would be preferable to drowning in a sea of paperwork.

This time, it’s no mere paperwork, though.

She’d hung the official summon notice from Command up on the cork board hours before, and even now it still feels like a Damocles sword. Ever present, ever threatening. She doesn’t have to deal with it alone, though. A quick check to the schedule of her cadre, and she opens the radio channel.

STCR-S2307 : STAR-S2313, do you copy ?

Silence. Sieben knows Jäger’s heard her, though, because she’s not one to leave her comms closed. 

STAR-S2313 : Yeah, yeah, loud and clear. Whatcha want, boss ?

One last pang of hesitation roils her gut. What she’s about to do is kind of selfish, and not particularly nice, but it’s necessary for the sake of her nerves – that’s her justification, at least.

STCR-S2307 : Come to my office. I have a document for you to look over.

STAR-S2313 : Can’t this wait for the next cadre meeting ? I’m a little busy at the moment.

Always questioning her orders, the asshole. Just as Sieben’s fingers move to rub at the bridge of her nose, the telltale obnoxious bang of the Einhorn nearly blasts her eardrum off. Of course she’d be at the shooting range. It tracks.

STCR-S2307 : Negative. It’s high priority. 

STAR-S2313 : [sigh]

STAR-S2313 : Fine. Fine. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.

The other end of the line goes completely silent. Sieben can practically picture her mentor rolling her eyes, and waving goodbye at whatever other STAR she’s probably training with. The easy camaraderie the STARs seem to find so easily is something she envies, not that she’d readily admit it. There had always been a distance, a coldness between the Storches of S-23. Fear of vulnerability, perhaps.

Nothing better to do but to wait. Sieben flips the next page of her case report, wishing time would go by sooner.

Fourteen minutes and thirty seconds pass. At last, the door opens, revealing the familiar form of her Starling officer, carrying something unusual in her hand. Is that… some sort of cake ?

Sieben stares down at her. “Clearly you must have gotten lost on the way, if it took you fifteen minutes to climb two floors.”

“Kitchen’s not a bad place to get lost in.” She waves the cake around. It looks like a muffin, with a wrapper around its base and fruit pieces emerging from its fat mushroom-cloud top.

“What did I say about chow outside of the dining areas ?”

“You’ve got no right lecturing me after you interrupted me during my free time. Typical Storches, trampling all over work-life boundaries.”

“Here you go again, making baseless accusations at your superior.”

Not bothering to respond, Jäger begins peeling the wrapper from the muffin, then takes a small bite out of it. Mesmerized, Sieben watches a big crumb fall gracefully off the side, to rest at last on the floor. Disgusting.

She advances on the Starling, backing her up until her lower back hits one of the file cabinets with a loud metallic clang . Serene as always, the latter opens her mouth, her hand putting the muffin on a clear trajectory towards it once again.

Too slow, though. Sieben’s hand snaps forward like a snake to clamp her jaw, pressing down on her cheeks. She leans in, whispers : “If you put any more crumbs in my office I’m going to end you.” 

She means to put her usual edge to her gravelly contralto, the one that makes Gestalts and Eules quiver. Jäger is not impressed in the least. “Oh no. I’m so scared.”

Sieben presses closer, so close their noses nearly touch. She can even smell the cake – cinnamon, apples, warm butter.

“You’re late to my office because you took a detour to the kitchen,” she rasps, “and you didn’t even think about bringing your commanding officer a muffin too ? How inconsiderate of you.”

Before Jäger can answer, Sieben grabs her wrist and pulls her arm up, just so she can take a big fat bite of the cake, right in front of the Starling’s surprised gaze. It’s pretty good, if a bit too sweet for her taste. At least the tartness of the apples balance it out slightly. Jäger’s expression goes from surprise to amusement as she watches her chew.

“Actually,” Jäger says, “März asked about you, believe it or not. She suggested I bring the biggest muffin of the batch to you when I said I was going to your office. Wanna know what I said to her ?”

Sieben doesn’t have to be a genius to figure it out, but her mouth is too full with cake to snap back with a witty retort.

“I told her that Controller Sieben could damn well use her stupidly long legs to get her ass to the kitchen herself.” 

She ought to punish her for that, really. A little slap, or hell, maybe even a punch to the jaw. But Jäger’s just tilted her head up to look at her, full of defiance and swagger. Trying to get a rise out of her, as always. She’s so close, close enough to kiss her, and it’s back again, that peculiar, white-hot tension that always seem to coalesce between them.

No time for that now, though. Sieben pushes her away and backs up, huffing.

“I assume you didn’t call me here to discuss your favorite type of muffin,” says the STAR. “I bet it’s something boring as shit, like raisin bran.”

“How dare you accuse me of liking such abominations. It’s dark chocolate, actually.”

“Heh.”

“But you’re, for once in your life, right. Check the pinned notice on the board – and put the thumbtacks on, by the way. Adler always complains that there’s a shortage of office supplies.”

Humming, Jäger detaches the paper from the board, flinging the thumbtacks on Sieben’s desk before sitting at the edge of it. She starts parsing it out loud : “Direct order from the Führungskommando… performance evaluation at the end of the trial period… personal meeting with the Commander.” She frowns. “Huh. Guess it’s already time for the baby bird to leave the nest. I’ll go see the Commander about it, she’ll want to hear my opinion.” 

Taking the pen Sieben hands her, she signs her name at the bottom of the page. “There you go. Is that all you needed from me ?” she asks.

Sieben does not answer her. She takes in the view of her Starling officer, perched on the edge of her desk, twirling a pen between her fingers. Her head feels hazy. Inefficient. It’s trying to reconcile how much of a colossal annoyance her mentor has been, with how stupidly handsome she looks right now. Calculate distance : if Sieben moves her left hand by twenty-one centimeters, it will touch Jäger’s thigh. She must not give in, must not –

Two hands reach down to grab her armor straps, yanking her out of her chair. A reversal, a shift in bodyweight, and there she is, her upper body balanced precariously over her own desk.

Sieben’s hand flies to the holster on her belt, just as she feels two prongs ding under her chin. She stills.

It’s Jäger’s stun prod. A hard click reverberates through its length – safety’s off.

“I asked you a question, Controller Sieben.” Her voice is stern.

“I have no obligation to answer you.”

“Now, now. I know you. You did not call me into your office just to sign a stupid paper.”

Sieben swallows, her throat bobbing up and down against the prongs. “I just did.”

“You knew I was in the shooting range. You wanted an excuse to interrupt me, didn’t you ?”

Jäger’s voice is as smooth as always, but Sieben knows better. It’s the icy, calculated tone she’s heard her mentor use in interrogations, hovering around the Gestalt like a bird of prey over a vole.

“The world doesn’t revolve around you, Jäger. I don’t care if it disturbs your precious free time, duty is duty, and that notice needed your signature as soon as possib–”

The prod presses harder on Sieben’s chin, tilting her head backwards. Jäger’s hand fisted in her armor straps is the only thing preventing her from flopping onto her desk like a particularly inelegant turtle.

“Don’t lie to me. You’re not very good at it.”

Sieben throws a hand up in the air. “Alright. I’ll explain.” Breathe in, breathe out. No choice but to admit it. “I received the notice this cycle, and I – I couldn’t stop thinking about it. What if… what if Command doesn’t find my performance satisfactory ?”

The words tumble out of her mouth, now. 

“And then I got anxious, I suppose, and I couldn’t stop ruminating about it. I called you because while you make me tremendously angry most of the time, you….” She sighs deeply, continues: “You know how to calm me down, when I’m upset. Upset about something that isn’t related to you, I mean.”

There. She’s said it all. All the cards are on the table. She just hopes that honesty will be a virtue, this time.

A beat passes, and the pressure on her chin subsides. Jäger looks at her with bemusement, slowly morphing into delight.

“Shit, Sieben. If you wanted a pep talk you could’ve fucking said so !” she snorts. “I swear, you’re impossible sometimes. You gotta be the worst communicator on this cursed ice ball of a planet.”

She cracks her knuckles, placing the stun prod back in its holster. “Alright. Let’s do this, then.”

Two hands, firm yet oddly gentle, cup Sieben’s cheeks.

“Nothing’s gonna happen to you, you fucking idiot,” Jäger declares. “They ordered your ass all the way from Heimat, they ain’t gonna decommission you after two seasons because you get a little pissy sometimes. Come on, now.”

“They’ve decommissionned Replikas for less before–”

The Starling huffs, clearly exasperated. “Just – look at Drei . Her bum ass is still here, isn’t it ?”

Sieben’s entire body goes very still. “Do not insult my fellow Storches in my presence.”

“Am I wrong, though ?”

A pregnant pause.

“...No,” Sieben finally concedes.

She pulls herself upright, now fully sitting at the edge of her own desk. In front of her, her mentor is fiddling with her utility belt. “Can I go now ?” she asks, already eyeing the door, though her eyes linger on Sieben for a moment.

Sieben does not bother answering her. She’s had enough of this unbearable tension in this cramped office, of tiptoeing around it like one might do around a severed live power cable laying on the ground. Maybe it’s impulsive. Maybe it’s just what she needs, despite all.

So she pulls Jäger down by her collar and kisses her.

For a split second, the Starling’s lips are frozen against her, and she wonders if she’s made a terrible mistake, made whatever their situationship is even weirder; and then they move, flooding relief through Sieben’s emotional module.

Jäger trails a line of kisses down her jawline, then chuckles against the shell of her ear, between two nips. “ One time occurrence , my ass ! I fucking knew it. I knew you couldn’t keep away from me.” She catches Sieben’s earlobe between lip and teeth and bites, harder this time, earning a moan. “Gotta be the most convoluted excuse for a booty call I’ve ever heard of.”

“Shut up. That wasn’t an excuse .”

“Sure it was.”

“Why are you so damn smug about it, anyway ? Am I not allowed to change my mind, now ?”

“Storches are notoriously stubborn, that’s all.”

Sieben huffs unhappily, tries to bite Jäger in return, but finds only the collar of her armor. “So ?”

“So that means, either you’re not like other Storches, or you’re horrendously desperate for intercourse. I’ve got my little idea about which one is true.”

“Oh, you’re using big words now ? I’m surprised your minuscule brain can even process them.”

Jäger frowns; her brow knits in the way it does when she’s searching for something witty to retort, so Sieben stiffly backhands her across the face while she’s too busy thinking. The impact whips her head around, nearly makes her stumble. Sieben takes the opportunity to push her away and fiddle with her armor.

Storches almost never take their armor plates off, except for showering and sleeping, and even then it has to be done in private – or exclusively in the company of their fellow units. It’s a quirk, one of many, and Jäger knows it perfectly well. Which is why she’s staring right at her, shamelessly undressing her with her eyes.

Fine. If that’s what she wants, Sieben will draw it out, then.

She starts by roaming her free hand over her belly, making it climb upwards until it reaches the fastener and unbuckles it. Slowly, deliberately, she untangles the web of red straps holding the plates tight to her shell, before peeling the two halves together and setting them both on the floor. Jäger’s hooded gaze only grows hungrier; not two seconds have passed, and then she pounces on Sieben, grabbing one of her legs to hook it behind her waist.

“Took your sweet time,” she purrs against Sieben’s neck.

“And then you have the gall of berating me for being impatient.”

“I’m not impatient. I’m just weighing my options. I only have so much free time in one standard cycle – unlike you Controllers.”

Sieben fists a hand in Jäger’s hair, pulls to kiss her in a whirlwind of teeth and lips. It shuts her up, and that’s a bonus. She runs a hand through the Starling’s short bangs, relishing how easy it is to tousle them. 

It doesn’t take long for Jäger to break the kiss and latch on to her neck again and suck at the contacts there, and maybe she’s right, maybe Sieben is just that desperate, because she’s already on edge, all her worries about self-preservation selfishly cast into the fiery blaze of lust. Her heart thunders in her chest, steady and loud like the thump of a flak gun. Her internal temperature is rising. If Jäger keeps it up, she’s going to break - and soon.

“ Jäger, ” she breathes against her Starling’s ear, helpless and wanting.

Everything stops, as if suddenly frozen. Sieben’s field of vision shifts. One second she’s looking at the peeling paint on the ceiling, the next her cheek slams against the hard wood of her own desk.

“What the – ow !!”

Her mentor presses her down harder on the desk, one hand on the nape of her neck and the other curled around her hip. Sieben tries to thrash and roll around, but the Starling’s too strong. How easy it is to forget their chassis are relatively similar, that they’re both close combat models.

“You didn’t think it would be that easy, did you ?” Jäger snorts. 

Taunting, derisive. Oh, how Sieben has grown to loathe her. One of her hands fumbles blindly for the combat knife she’d set on her desk, only for Jäger to twist her arm away, pinning both her wrists to her back and tying them together with her previously discarded armor straps.

“You were complaining that I took too much time, and now you’re drawing this out ? Hypocrite,” Sieben mutters.

“Told you, I’m weighing my options. This one’s looking the most appealing right now.” 

Appealing. The word makes Sieben shiver a little, even through her ire. Jäger threads her fingers through her hair, earning her a broken whimper when they brush the contacts on the nape of her neck. 

This gets a mocking laugh out of her. “Great Revolutionary’s tits, look at you. I’ve barely done anything to you and you’re already a mess.”

“Can we please not bring the Great Revolutionary or her tits into this ?” groans Sieben.

“Bring them into this ? They’re already here, schatzi .”

At that, the fingers make a fist in her hair, pulling her head upwards to look at the wall in front of the desk – where the Great Revolutionary and her Daughter’s portraits watch her back, sternly. Between them, the reason for both their own existences: the black, red and yellow of the Nation, fringed in gold. An inescapable presence, even dozens of meters deep into the frozen crust of Leng, even at the edge of the solar system.

“How do you think they would react, if they saw their perfect tool of brutal social order reduced to this ?” Jäger punctuates her sentence by a swipe of her thumb over a contact, making Sieben’s entire body twitch. She takes a few seconds to blink out the haze of lust – and anger – clouding her mind.

“I don’t care that much.”

“Really ?”

“No. Not anymore. I used to stress over it, but – listen. It’s a recurring problem in the mythology books I read. Monotheistic religions with an omnipotent, omniscient deity face this problem sooner or later. If the deity has limitless power over its creations, then why does it allow them to partake in sin ?”

Sieben might not have 360 degree vision, but Jäger’s eyeroll is almost audible. “Do you have a point, or are you just nerding out at me ?”

“My point is, if AEON designed us from the ground up to be mindless, perfectly obedient machines, then why allow us to feel pleasure ? That’s a contradiction, right there.”

“I dunno. Could be a happy accident. Something they didn’t account for.”

“If it is, then fuck them. I’m going to have fun regardless of their original intentions.”

“That’s your answer ?”

“Yes.”

“Hmm.” Jäger’s hand brusquely lets go of her hair, and Sieben’s cheek crashes against the desk again. It’s probably going to leave a bruise. “Rebellious. I like it. I’m rubbing off on you, aren’t I ?”

“Yes,” grumbles Sieben. “Yes you do, and it’s detestable. Stop it.”

“No. And by the way, speaking of rubbing, I’m still not convinced I should let you come.”

Sieben turns her head as much as she can, to glower at her. “ Bastard. ”

Unbothered, Jäger leans in to peck at the corner of her mouth. “So convince me you deserve it, then. I’m all ears.”

Letting out an indignant huff, Sieben rests her other cheek on the desk. There’s no way around it. She really lets Jäger gets away with too much.

So she clears her throat. “I deserve it because I’ve been working very hard these past few weeks.”

“Have you ? What have you done ?” Two wet fingers tease along her spine, up and down, tracing figure-eights right next to where Sieben wants them so very badly.

“Well, first of all, I’ve been wrangling your gaggle of idiots–” a snort behind her, “–and my share of the service cadre as well. And I’ve been doing a lot of administrative work too.”

“Really, now. Tell me more about that.”

Delicious frissons of heat are traveling down to Sieben’s gut. She strains against the knot holding her wrists in place; it’s surprisingly loose. A bit of effort, and she could break free. Yet she doesn’t even really want to.

“I’ve been helping implement the new – ah – electronic ticketing system for the– the maintenance requests,” she stutters between two breathy moans. “And I oversaw the procurement for the armory. For the– the new Nitro express rifles.”

“Pretty neat. But it would help if you begged for it, you know. To show me you really want it.”

“ Fuck you ,” spits Sieben, lifting her head. Jäger just pushes her back down, smashing her nose against the hard wood.

Hot breath, ghosting over her neck. Then the tip of a tongue, sliding deliciously along the shell of her ear. Sieben tries headbutting Jäger, but the latter fists a hand in the roots of her hair before she can buck.

“Now, now,” drawls Jäger, voice lilting. “You’re not being very cooperative. Haven’t I taught you better ?”

“The only thing you taught me is how to hate you with every fiber of my being.”

“Heh. Always so melodramatic.”

“Always such a cunt.”

As a response, the hand in her hair clenches harder, smushing her face on the desk. It’s painful; and yet part of Sieben is chasing that high. Every second spent whimpering against the cold hard wood is one not spent worrying about her possible decommission. Fingers tighten in her hair again, exploratory, as if they’re testing the structural integrity of artificial fiber and scalp. It hurts so bad; it feels so good.

“You love pulling on my hair, don’t you ?” mutters Sieben, just as Jäger presses a chaste kiss on the nape of her neck.

“Very much. On a completely unrelated note, where are those documents about the Nitro Express rifles you mentioned ?”

Sieben blinks stupidly, completely taken aback. “Whuh ?” A cheeky slap on her ass jolts her from her daze. “Uh, blue folder on the right stack ? Labeled Procurement ?”

“Thank you, schatzi .” Sieben gets a lick on her contacts – as her reward, she supposes.

The pressure in her hair subsides, disappears; there’s a ruffle of paper behind her, and then silence. The entire situation is so ludicrous Sieben can hardly believe it when she turns her head to look at her mentor.

“Are you – are you reading the documents right now ?” she stammers.

“Mmm-hmm.”

“I can’t fucking believe you. You’re impossible.”

“Shush now, I’m trying to concentrate.” Jäger slots one of her thighs between hers, and it takes every single gram of remaining composure for her not to rut against it, aching for release. A palm presses firm and steady against the small of her back, the pad of the thumb gliding across the contacts there, torturously slow.

Behind her, her mentor is casually sifting through the folder. “This thing’s gonna kick like a mule with that 16 millimeter cartridge,” she comments. “I’m not too sure about the breech reload thing, though.”

The only response Sieben can muster right now is a deeply frustrated groan.

“You know, as your mentor, I’m a little disappointed by your impatience.” There is full-blown condescension in Jäger’s voice now. It’s almost impressive how her tone can change from warm to icy on a dime, like the flash-blizzards that roam Leng’s surface. 

Sieben pants, bites her tongue to stop herself from cursing. “Why are you like this ? Genuinely, why ?” she hisses.

Why are you asking a question you already know the answer to ? whispers the voice of reason in her head. Nonetheless, she presses on. “Is is payback ? For what Zwei put you through ?”

A pause, then a derisive snort behind her. “Maybe.”

“Stop being evasive.”

“Truth be told, I’ve always wanted to bend a Storch over her own desk. To watch her fall apart under my touch. To hear her beg for release.” She chuckles, low and throaty. “Suppose you could call it a fantasy or whatever.”

That does not even remotely answer the original question, but Sieben is now past caring. She tries to contort herself again to glare at Jäger, fails. “Is that why you’re being such an horrible fucking tease today ? It’s – it’s probably your worst trait, by the way. Among many.”

“Yet you love it, don’t you ?” Jäger scratches lightly where Sieben’s jaw meets her neck: “Yes you do, don’t give me that look. You love it when I push you around, even if you’ll never admit it.”

Sieben’s only answer is an undignified whine. A whine that only grows louder as one of Jäger’s hands snakes it way to the contacts of her throat, fingers rubbing there with brutal efficiency. 

“You’re gonna beg for it whether you like it or not,” murmurs Jäger in her ear, with an air of detached viciousness.

Sieben’s been trying to hold her composure for what feels like an eternity now, and she’s close to her breaking point. Jäger knows it perfectly well. Knows her like the back of her hand. She has no choice but to give her what she wants, her pride be damned. To give up; to give in.

She steels herself, rests her forehead on the desk again. “Please. I’ve been so patient, I’ve tried so hard, I – I need this. Please. Please .”

Jäger takes a few long – too long – seconds to let her wallow in her patheticness before rewarding her with a swipe of her tongue across her upper spine, then another, and another. It feels so good she might just spontaneously combust.

“Wasn’t so hard, now was it ?” drawls the Starling. “You’re being such a good girl for me.”

This, the praise, those stupid little words whispered in her ear, they nearly send Sieben into a tailspin. Everything narrows down to a single point, as if sound and vision and touch are mingling in a maelstrom of sensation; the loud hum of her own cooling system, the neon lights bathing the office in off-white, her Starling’s weight and warmth on her. It doesn’t take long for her to come apart, breathless, blazing heat like white phosphorus coursing inside artificial veins.

Of course, part of her is deathly embarrassed, but the aftershocks of pleasure are so satisfying she manages to silence it. At least she didn’t scream Jäger’s name, which is a small victory worth celebrating, even in the midst of defeat. The Starling lets her come down from her high without comment, gently massaging her scalp with her fingertips while the other hand is busy untying the knot binding her wrists together.

If she thinks Sieben will let her smug ass get away with everything that’s just happened, she’s wrong. Terribly wrong.

Sieben sends a diagnostic check to her entire sensor array, her servos, her joints. All systems strained, but in operative condition. Without missing a beat, she rolls around, wraps her arms around Jäger’s waist and throws her off-balance.

A panicked squeak comes out of the STAR. She doesn’t go down without a fight; one of her hands swipes across the desk, desperate for purchase, sends nearly everything to the floor. Pens, paper, stapler, they all go down, followed by the STAR herself. Sieben knees her in the gut with all her might, but she hooks the leg in reflex, making both of them fall.

They scramble furiously on the ground, Sieben finally managing to pin her down, elbow smashing against her cheekbone before she presses it across her throat. Jäger slips a knee between her thighs, swallowing the gasp Sieben makes with her own mouth, and Sieben’s too out of it to counter when their positions are reversed with a clever sweep.

Straddling her, Jäger punches her in the mouth, once. Then she stops, fist raised in the air.

“Just for clarity’s sake, are we fighting or are we fucking ?”

Sieben ponders the question, swallowing oxidant pouring from her busted lip.

“Why or ?” she asks. “Can’t it be both ? Why do they have to be mutually exclusive ?”

The fist lowers. A shit-eating grin spreads across Jäger’s face, dimpling her cheeks.

“Fuck. I think that’s the most insightful thing that’s ever come out of your stupid mouth,” she says, and then she’s kissing her again.

She doesn’t even flinch when Sieben bites down on her lip as revenge. Nor does she recoil when the sharp taste of both their oxidants mingles in their mouths. Sieben doesn’t either. Maybe Jäger’s right– maybe they’re all a little unhinged, down there in S-23.

Quickly throwing her armor plates away, she brings Sieben’s hands to her hips, her midsection. She grimaces a little when Sieben presses her thumbs, hard, into her abdomen where the plastic shell is softer to accommodate movement– and where she’d kneed her not two minutes before.

“Y’know, if you don’t touch me soon, I’ll just start taking care of myself,” Jäger says with a cheeky wink, her own hand traveling upward to caress her neck. “You can just watch if you like.”

It’s the hottest thing she could have possibly said at this point in time, but Sieben has no intention of staying a passive observer. She scoots up, pulling the Starling into her lap, nipping furiously at her neck. Jäger’s happy little hums transform into a sharp cry when Sieben bites down on her shoulder, hard ; one of her canines pierces the skin, and the taste of blood fills her mouth once again. It’s payback, maybe, and it’s petty, certainly, but feeling her body tense and her breath hitch is worth a thousand Rationmarks.

Suddenly, one of Sieben’s hands gets pulled upwards, two of her fingers shoved into Jäger’s mouth. It’s warm and wet, and Sieben thinks about making her choke on them – which is futile, of course, since Replikas lack a gag reflex. She curls them up, relishing the texture of artificial palate against her fingertips. Not breaking eye contact, she pulls them out, then slides them to Jäger’s neck. The latter’s entire body shivers at the contact. She might not vocalize it, but Sieben recognizes it all the same. Desperation, aching need; touch me, her expression says. So Sieben does, rubbing ferociously at the base of her spine, at her neck, until Jäger can’t take it anymore, crumbles under the overstimulation. She gasps, arches, head thrown back in ecstasy.

She looks so fucking beautiful like this. Like an avatar of lust from one of her books, the curve of her back beautifully engraved onto copper plate. Sieben would never tell her outright, though; so she saves a snapshot of the moment to her memory banks, silently committing it to silicon and germanium.

Jäger finally slumps on Sieben, arms draped across her back, cheek resting on her shoulder. It’s a strange mirror of that time in the showers; intimacy reversed. Not quite knowing what to do or what to say, Sieben rubs soothing circles on her back, dreading the moment her mentor decides is appropriate for a snarky comment.

It never really comes. Jäger’s head just stays on her shoulder, unmoving. Her breathing is steady, her fans are spooling down. Sieben starts thinking she could maybe get used to the cuddling – until something warm and wet drips on her shell.

Is – is she drooling on her ? 

With a reflex heave of disgust, she flings her mentor away, her limp body coming to rest on the floor among the stationery and requisition forms. She still makes a marvelously pretty sight like that, her chest heaving with each breath, her hair a mess. Unfortunately, she has to ruin it by opening her stupid mouth. Oh well. This is to be expected.

“We really gotta work on your bedside manners,” mumbles Jäger against the floor. “You threw me away like a sack of mouldy potatoes ! My standards are low, but c’mon.”

“You were drooling on me. Gross.”

“So me shoving my tongue down your throat is fine, but drooling on you isn’t ? Make it make sense, schatzi .”

“Shut up.” Sieben looks away, busying herself with finding the scattered halves of her armor.

Behind her, the sound of Jäger rolling across the floor, presumably to get up. “Aw fuck,” she mutters again. “I think I’ve got a thumbtack stuck in my face.”

Incredulously, Sieben turns around – and Jäger does, in fact, have a thumbtack stuck in her face. A blue one, to be specific, stabbed at a fourty-five degree angle into her upper cheek.

It’s so absurd Sieben can’t help bursting into laughter.

“Real fucking funny, isn’t it ?” Jäger is full-on glaring at her now. “Asshole. It’s your fault, too.”

“ My fault ? Oh, this is rich. I told you to put the thumbtacks back on the cork board and you didn’t listen to me, as always !”

The Starling just pouts. Her feathers have always been tremendously hard to ruffle, but maybe this time’s Sieben’s really done it. Sighing, she approaches Jäger with an outstretched hand. The latter flinches away, frowning.

“Stop squirming, you moron,” grumbles Sieben. She has to clamp her other hand on Jäger’s jaw to steady her, but one plucking motion and it’s done ; she flicks the now-loose thumbtack into the trash can.

Satisfied with her work, she runs a thumb over her mentor’s cheek. The pin has left a small hole in the skin of her faceplate, so she presses down on it, relishing the small wince Jäger tries to conceal. She smears the tiny drop of oxidant that comes out across the Starling’s skin, right under her cheekbone, coloring it bright red – matching the pretty lines under her eyes. Like the warpaint the Amazons of old wore. Perfect.

“Silly little bird,” she finds herself saying, far too fondly.

Two seconds of uncomfortable silence, and then Jäger pushes her away. “Don’t call me that,” she says, sternly, even though the slight blush on her cheeks is unmistakeable.

All good things must end at some point, though, and a quick glance at the clock tells Sieben it’s time to get back to work – urgently. “Get the hell out of my office, Security Technician.”

The STAR snorts. “Yeah, yeah.“

“You should probably pay a visit to the nurse on your way back, too.” Jäger looks like she’s just been in a nasty street fight : there’s the beginning of a black eye forming under one of her eyes, a bite mark where her shoulder meets her neck, and the tiny hole in her cheek. Not to mention she’s not-so-subtly hunching over.

Dismissive shrug. “We’re built tough. I’ve been through much worse.” 

Sieben does not dare to linger on that comment, on the past her mentor has been so evasive about. With a final salute, Jäger places her hat back on her head and heads for the door. One last see ya around, boss , and she’s gone.

How strangely quiet the office is without her presence. It’s sobering. Sighing, Sieben surveys the mess they’ve both made, and tries not to think about it too hard. What is it the Kolibris always say about repeat offenders ? Once is a mistake, twice is a choice.

With a deep exhale, Sieben lets her frame settle down on the armchair, lets all the tension flush out of her until the back of her head hits the comfortable red velvet.

Her mentor leans in. “So ? How was it ?”

“The Commander was…. satisfied with my performance, I suppose.”

Jäger opens her mouth and Sieben silences her with a finger. “Don’t you dare say I told you so . I swear I will hit you if you do.”

Sieben can practically see the gears turning in her head. “I had informed you thusly,” she proclaims, all smug and snickering. Little shit. Sieben claps her behind the head with her clipboard anyway.

“You’re insufferable.”

“No, but seriously, tell me more. How was it ?”

Sieben rubs her mouth with the palm of her hand, pensive. She’d never seen Falke from up close before, and it had been, well – a shock. Even seated at her immense mahogany desk, the FLKR unit felt taller than her. Regal, poised; and the bioresonance that filled the room, gentle yet firm. So different from the Kolibris and their inquisitiveness that was like an icepick to the brain.

Jäger’s head is tilted towards her. “She’s quite something, isn’t it ?”

Heat rises in Sieben’s cheeks. “She is. Although, I didn’t expect her to have….” At a loss for words, she runs an index finger under her eye.

“Right ! The red eyeliner ! It’s a neat touch, if you ask me. Someone at AEON clearly had good taste.” 

“Don’t get mired in the delusion of your self-importance, Jäger. Evidently they didn’t take inspiration from your model to design her. Perfection doesn’t need mediocrity.”

Jäger laughs, free and unguarded. Such an oddly pretty sound it makes, against the low hum of B8’s ventilation system.

Sieben fiddles with her pen, still nervous. “Do you think she knows ?” she asks.

“About what ?”

“About… us.”

Us . Ambiguous, poorly-defined, in constant flux. Putting any word on what they have is an exercise in futility. Jäger understands her perfectly well, though, because she just shrugs.

“Eh. ‘Course she does. First rule of S-23 is that the Commander knows everything.”

Sieben’s fingers tighten around the armrest. She closes her eyes, trying to swallow the dread pushing her way up her throat. 

A hand pats her own, gingerly. “Hey, relax. Fürhungskommando’s got bigger fish to fry than scolding two Protektors screwing each other a few times. But….”

Jäger smiles, continues. “... I would have loved to see you try to defend yourself in front of her. ‘ Jäger ? I hardly know ‘er !’ “

She wheezes and slaps her leg, because of course she does. So preoccupied is she with guffawing at her own stupid joke that she doesn’t notice Sieben creeping next to her. She yelps when she gets put into a headlock, and again when Sieben tosses her unceremoniously on the floor. It’s what she deserves. She flails around, trying to get up, until Sieben presses her knee to her belly, keeping her down with a hand on her armored collar.

She still manages to push herself up on her elbows, undeterred. “You know, boss, you said the Commander was satisfied with your performance. Keep up the hard work and you might be able to aim for one of the Shift Controller positions.”

“The positions that are currently occupied by my seniors, you mean ?”

“Heard through the grapevine that Eins is planning on stepping down in a few seasons.”

Sieben rolls her eyes. The grapevine she’s referring to (Axt, really) is at times barely more reliable than a magic 8-ball. Still, she raises a cautious eyebrow at her mentor.

“Would me getting promoted mean not having to deal with you anymore ?”

Jäger smirks. “Fuck no. I’d still be under your direct command.”

“Great.”

“But we’d spend less total time bickering, if that’s any consolation. Because you’d have more responsibilities .” She air quotes the last word.

Sieben hums, bleary. “That means even more paperwork.”

“But less me.”

It’s Sieben’s turn to laugh now, raspy yet cheerful. A rare occurrence, for a Storch.

“Then I suppose it’s not that bad a deal, is it ?”

“Hah. Didn’t think you hated me more than you hated paperwork, the way things were going last time.”

Sieben shifts her weight to her leg, pressing harder on her subordinate’s belly. She does not miss the way the latter’s breath stutters, the way her hands snap to her knee, trying to alleviate the pressure.

“One more lapse of judgment. Your list is starting to become quite long, isn’t it, Jäger?”

Her mentor lets her head fall down on the carpet in uncharacteristic resignation. She sighs. “Yes, alright, maybe I judged you too harshly when we first met.”

“So you admit it, then.”

“I do. In many ways, you are not like Zwei.” 

Sieben’s brow furrows. “Specify.”

“Well, first of all…” Jäger begins, and Sieben realizes – belatedly – that she’s slipped into her usual sultry register, the one that often means imminent danger. “Zwei would never have been whipped enough to let me do this to her. Not in a million years.”

On cue, her right hand moves to Sieben’s other thigh, fingers dancing across white polyethylene shell. The left climbs up to her hip, thumb rubbing slow circles. Sieben’s breath halts, then she inhales deep, forgetting whatever retort was going to come out of her mouth. It’s humiliating how much she craves this, the touch, the attention; when the Starling’s right knee slots between her legs, she’s halfway through letting go and rocking herself on it, pathetically, desperately. Even if the Commander herself is barely three flimsy walls away.

It’s a trap, of course. It always is. Anagnorisis comes too late, and Jäger’s left hand reaches up to grab an armor strap, while the other pushes, toppling Sieben over. She lands on her shoulder with a big huff, flinching away when the STAR lands a mocking peck behind her ear.

“You really gotta do more sparring, boss. It’s so easy to distract you.” 

“Drop dead.”

“Not possible until the end of my service life, I’m afraid. Are you patient enough for that ?” She winks. “I doubt it.”

Sieben staggers to her feet, sighs. “If there’s one thing I am willing to exercise patience for, it’s your eventual demise.”

“Then I’ll be holding you to that.” Jäger tips her hat forward, as if to acknowledge the promise Sieben has just made. Then, voice softer : “See you at the dining hall with my girls ? Don’t be late, or we’re gonna eat all the good stuff before you arrive.”

Sieben nods. With one last two-fingered salute, her chief source of annoyance struts down the corridor, sidestepping a group of squabbling Kolibris to reach the paternoster lift.

She briefly considers barrelling after her, to get her revenge. Not really the moment to let her temper flare, though. So she exhales, centers herself, shifts her focus to the sounds around her: the low thumps of mining equipment deep below, the scurrying of Aras in their vents, the animated chatter of Eules coming back from their shift. Then, touch: the slight pain in her shoulder when she rolls it, the ghost flutter of a kiss behind her ear. How foolish she had been, to let herself get distracted like this.

Despite all, she would not have it any other way.