Page 35 of Fought and Found

Raw, unprocessed, animal fear in the eyes of a male who has walked into combat with a 98% compliance rate and never flinched.

My sternum contracts. The thing behind my ribs that has been expanding since the dust belt, since his arms around me, since I have stopped trying to kill it — it goes tight and cold.

“What happened.”

Not a question. Morrison’s voice coming out of my mouth — the flat, certain register that says I already know something is wrong, give me the shape of it so I can fix it.

“Nothing has —“

“Your tail is telling me something your mouth won’t.”

He looks down. The tail is wrapped around his calf so tightly the tip is white — the fuzz compressed bloodless — but the last three inches are trembling against the inside of his knee. A fine, involuntary vibration. Reaching. Toward me. Despite every inch of discipline telling it to hold.

He stares at his own tail like it has committed treason.

“The tactical analysis is comprehensive. The route is —“

“I don’t care about the route right now.” I turn my chair to face him full on. Legs planted. Hands on my knees. The posture Morrison drilled into me for interrogations — not aggressive, not soft, present. Immovable. “Something changed between the tea and now. Something you’re not telling me. And you are the worst liar I have ever metwhen your tail is involved, so you can either tell me or I can sit here and wait for it to tell me itself.”

“I am not —“ He stops. His jaw locks. The marking along the hinge floods dark — the heat response, the one that means his body is doing things his brain hasn’t sanctioned. His claws drive into his thighs, ten points denting the fabric of his trousers, and I watch the crescent shapes form beneath the cloth and my fingers twitch with the reach I have been folding behind my sternum for days.

“Xor.” Softer this time. Not the blade. The other version — the one I used when I said you’re very warm and pressed my body back against his and let him feel my pulse. “Whatever it is, I need to know. Not because I want to. Because I fly this ship and I make the calls about my own life, and you don’t get to take that from me by deciding what I can handle.”

The silence holds for six seconds. I count them against the pulse in my wrist.

“The Merik transmission.” His voice is stripped. Not clinical. Not operational. The register underneath, the one that has no training and no architecture. “There was a secondary channel. Encrypted. Routed simultaneously.”

“From Merik?”

“From Trell.”

The name lands. Not Merik — the mid-tier handler with limited analytical capacity. Trell. The director. The male Xor talks about the way former soldiers talk about commanding officers who shaped them: with respect that has roots growing through it, the kind you can’t pull out without tearing up the foundation.

“Show me.”

He doesn’t want to show me.

Every line of his body is broadcasting refusal. The rigid spine. The locked jaw. The claws cycling — extend, retract, extend — the metronome of a male whose conditioning and choices are fighting in real time. His tail has unwound from his calf but it’s not reaching. It’s hanging. Limp. The discipline gone but nothing replacing it.

“I deleted the notification indicator. Archived the channel.” His voice is careful, each word placed like ordnance on a table. “The message is not on the primary display.”

“Then pull it from the archive.”

“Flossie —“ My name. Not the courier. The name he gave himself permission to use in the bunk and has not stopped using since, and the sound of it now, cracked down the middle, is worse than anything he could do with his claws. “The content of the message is — I have already determined the appropriate —“

“You have already determined.” I repeat it back. Flat. Let the words sit in the air between us until he hears what they sound like. “You’ve already determined the appropriate response to a message about me. Without telling me the message exists.”

His throat works. The tendons cord beneath the dark markings.

“Pull it up, Xor. Now. Or I ask Sprout to find it, and Sprout will find it, and Sprout will not be gentle about it.”

“I can confirm,” Sprout announces from the ceiling, orb cycling a hard, bright white I haven’t seen since battle mode, “that I have already located the archived transmission. I was waiting for one of youto arrive at this conversation. The Xarthian’s encryption is adequate, but my patience is not infinite.”

Xor’s hand moves to the console. Slowly. Like a male reaching into fire. Three keystrokes. The archive opens. The secondary channel decrypts.

Nine words on the display.

Courier designated non-recoverable asset. Eliminate courier and secure container.