undergo observation.
I vaguely remembered objecting, but the nurse had forced me into a hospital gown, then had ordered me into bed in a small, empty room. I’d been too numb to object. I didn’t even remember lying down; it was all a haze.
I did distinctly remember the flash as Hurl’s ship impacted the ground. I lay back against a too-soft pillow, squeezing my eyes shut. Hurl was gone.
Eventually I forced myself out of bed. I found my things on a stool: my jumpsuit, laundered, sitting with my light-line bracelet on top of it. My pack rested on the floor beside it, and the radio at the side was blinking. Scud . . . what if someone had answered that? Would M-Bot have been able to keep quiet?
My secrets suddenly seemed insignificant. In the face of what was happening . . . the horror of our flight slowly being consumed one by one . . . Who cared? Who cared if they found out my secrets?
Hurl was dead.
I checked the clock. 0545. I found the restroom, where I cleansed. I went back to my little room and dressed, then walked out to the hospital’s front desk. A nurse looked me over, then handed me a red ticket.
Medical leave for loss recovery. Orders: one week. It was imprinted with my name, stamped and signed.
“I can’t,” I said. “The admiral will kick me out of—”
“Your entire flight has been given mandatory medical leave,” the woman said. “On orders from Dr. Thior, head of medical. You won’t be kicked out of anything, cadet. You need a rest.”
I stared at the ticket.
“Go home,” the woman said. “Spend a week with your family and recover. Stars above . . . they push you cadets too hard.”
I stood there for a moment before I turned and walked out, dully meandering toward the training building. I took the roundabout way, past our Pocos. Four in a line. Arturo’s ship was off to the side in a little maintenance hangar, with pieces scattered along the ground.
Go home. Where? To live in my cave? Back down to my mother, whose disapproval of the DDF might finally make me lose the rest of my nerve?
I crumpled the leave ticket in my pocket and walked to our classroom, where I sat down in my seat alone. I really just wanted to think, to talk to Cobb, to sort through all of this. Hurl had said . . . brave to the end. And she had been.
Scud. Hurl was gone. In Gran-Gran’s stories they held feasts in honor of the fallen. But I didn’t want to feast. I wanted to crawl somewhere dark and curl up.
Strangely, as class time approached, the door creaked open and the others—except for Jorgen—arrived in a solemn, quiet group. Hadn’t the nurse said we all had leave? Perhaps they, like me, didn’t want to accept it.
Kimmalyn stopped by my seat and gave me a hug. I didn’t want a hug, but I took it. I needed it.
Even Jorgen arrived about ten minutes after class normally began. “I thought I might find you all here,” he said.
I braced myself for him to tell us to go. For him to toe the official line and tell us class was canceled because we were on forced leave.
Instead he inspected us, then nodded in an approving way. “Skyward Flight, line up,” he said in a soft voice. He hadn’t tried that since the first day, when we’d ignored him. Today though, it felt right. We four got up and stood in a row.
Jorgen walked to the classroom intercom and pushed one of the buttons. “Jax, will you send to Captain Cobb and tell him his flight is waiting for him, in their usual room? Thank you.”
Jorgen then walked over and joined us in line. Together, we waited. Fifteen after. Twenty after. It was 0729 before Cobb slammed open the door and limped in.
We snapped to attention and saluted.
He looked at us, then roared, “SIT DOWN!”
I started. That wasn’t what I had expected. Still, along with the others, I jumped to obey.
“If you are in an uncontrolled descent,” he shouted at us, his face coloring, “then you eject! You hear me! You scudding EJECT!”
He was angry. Like, actually angry. He pretended to be angry sometimes, but it was nothing like this: red-faced, spitting as he shouted.
“How many times did I say this?” he said. “How many times did I give you orders? And still you buy into that nonsense?” He waved his hand