Cadet Flight Methuselah

016

Arriving two minutes before the briefing and greeted by a few astonished stares Nim looked around the squad room and found Calli sitting in her usual spot, four chairs from the door in the front row. She walked over and stood next to her seat, prompting the shorter cadet to shoot to her feet with a worried look on her face.

“Commander Yates is going to kill you if he catches you here on inactive!” she cried in her reproving mother voice.

Sighing, Nim reached forward and hugged her around the shoulders tightly. “Thank you, Calli.”

Calli stood still for a moment, wondering what was going on, then caught on and embraced her in return. “I'm sorry I fried your VTI. I know you really liked it.”

“I'm sorry for scaring you shitless. Twice.”

“What about the rest of us?” chimed in Damien, his arms crossed against his chest with a slightly disappointed look on his face. “Or is this one of those girl-only things we don't get to take part in because the rest of us piss standing up.”

“I don't mind it being one of those girl-only things,” commented Karda with a sly grin, sitting back in his seat and kicking his feet up on the next chair over. He tucked his hands behind his head and nodded at them. “By all means, carry on, Lieutenants. Express your innermost feelings.”

Exchanging a devious smirk with Calli they walked over and stood on either side of the young man, then nodded and yanked both chairs out from beneath him simultaneously. Karda shouted in surprise as he hit the deck rear-first and dinged his tailbone, his flailing legs upending his desk and sending his datapad sailing across the room where it skittered to a halt at Leo's boots just as he walked into the briefing room. The young man hopped to his feet a second later, rubbing his backside as though he'd been kicked by a horse.

“Jeez, it was a joke!” he wailed frustratedly, grabbing his chair out of Nim's hands and straightening up his desk before going over to retrieve his pad from Leo's hands.

Nim patted Karda on his curly black-haired head reassuringly when he sat back down. “Hell hath no fury like a woman's scorn.”

“Yeah no kidding,” he muttered with a frown. “As if having half my fighter shot out from underneath me wasn't freakin' embarrassing enough now I have to put up with crap from Major Navarro about underage kids breaking her toys.”

“She just knows she can't get a rise out of Leo, so she picks on you instead,” said Calli, still using her motherly tone. Her doting on Karda was a typical thing in the flight, even if she too enjoyed picking on their youngest member right along with everyone else.

“True,” agreed Leo with a nod. “My marauder was missing both wings. And I also shot off half of Damien's to get rid of the IED substance as a precaution.”

“Really wish you'd given me a heads up before doing that.”

The cadet lowered his head slightly. “I apologize.”

“Ah, not mad at all, mate.” Damien leaned forward and hung one arm over Nim's shoulders like a coat. “Seriously, though. Commander Yates will kick your ass. Best duck out and we'll lie and say we never saw you.” He glanced over her shoulder at Leo, then corrected himself. “Well, we'll lie, and Leo will just be Leo and not say anything unless Yates is cunning enough to ask him.”

“I'm reinstated to active duty,” replied Nim, patting the broad-chested man on the back reassuringly. “But thanks, mate.”

“Doesn't sound right if you weren't born on dirt, space rat,” said the Maori man with a smirk. He turned back to his chair and began chatting with Karda and Calli about what they could have possibly be summoned to a command briefing for. Normally the Captain gave his briefing to Herald—now Sparrow, since he was gone—and then it was passed on to them from one of the members of Roughneck flight. The Captain going anywhere personally was very unorthodox, and Damien's imagination apparently needed an outlet judging by the snippets of conversation she picked up on coming from him and Karda.