Starfighter Command

Prologue Lieutenant Kassius Remeas, Planet Velerion, Eos Ground Station, Private Quarters My fingers slid over the keypad with expert precision. Yeah, I knew they could throw me in the brig for this. My commanding officer, Captain Sponder, underestimated me, which was fine. I didn’t give a s**t. If he wasn’t going to add me to the Starfighter Training Academy as a potential recruit, if he thought he was going to deny me the chance to become a pair-bonded Starfighter, he was wrong. I didn’t need him to approve me. If he was going to be an asshole, then I was going to hack into the system and do it myself. The Starfighter swirl popped up on the holographic monitor in front of me with a list of newly added candidates qualified for training. There were hundreds—people from Velerion, the Arturri moon base, every battleship and hex port. Everyone but me. Captain Sponder hated me with a passion I completely understood. But if I had to do everything over again so that he wasn’t my nemesis, I would change nothing. I focused on the display and analyzed the code my cipher implants allowed me to see. Connecting directly with the computer systems was a rare skill, one the Starfighter Mission Command Specialists, or MCS, coveted in their recruits. As long as a certain captain didn’t hate them, this skill would guarantee anyone a chance to enter Starfighter training. Which was great… for everyone else. I entered yet another password, hoping to crack the final layer of security on the program. The complex system interacted directly with the alien races the rulers of Velerion were counting on to save us. Aliens training to be Starfighters on other worlds. An orange string of code flashed across my vision before turning red and hovering there. ACCESS: DENIED “Asshole,” I breathed but wasn’t deterred. I’d been at it for two hours, trying to hack into the new training program’s back-end system. I’d get there. I was deep in the code. I just needed to crack one final level of security. There would be no stopping me. I had motivation and defiance driving me. Shuttling Starfighters from mission to mission was a solid job. Worthy. I did it with pride and skill. But it wasn’t front-of-the-lines. It was support and damned important to ending the Dark Fleet once and for all, but I was underutilized. Captain Sponder knew it but wanted to see me suffer. Perhaps I deserved his wrath for all the s**t I’d pulled. No doubt I was cocky. No doubt I didn’t show the proper amount of respect for a superior officer. I’d done enough to earn Sponder’s raw hatred, and I’d ignored the consequences until he’d rejected me and kept me from the one thing I wanted: to be an MCS. He was holding not only me, but potentially other Starfighters back, and that didn’t sit well. I could have already been paired with a graduate of the new program and be out there kicking Dark Fleet ass. I had no idea who my potential match would be. f**k, I wasn’t past the last firewall. I slowed my fingers, stared at the data before me, and considered why I’d been denied access so far. The new password system had been added to keep Velerions like me out, but specifically to ensure the Dark Fleet didn’t hack in, which meant there was a double parse code. My quarters were typical for a low-ranking officer on the ground station. I was a pilot in the shuttle fleet, had been for several years thanks to Captain Sponder and the rod he had shoved so far up his ass I didn’t know how he could sit in a chair. After a long day of shuttling crews and supplies between the surface of Velerion and the Battleship Resolution, returning to find yet another denial of promotion into the Starfighter Training Program—signed by Sponder, of course—had filled me with ice-cold determination. He’d denied me what I wanted for too long. I’d played by the rules—okay, maybe not all of them. But I’d done everything I was supposed to do, never putting what I wanted above the lives of the fighters I shuttled. Now I was tired of waiting. Everyone but critical personnel was asleep. Just like I was supposed to be. After pulling a ten-hour flight shift, I was required to rest. It was the rule. I would, but it wasn’t going to come until— ACCESS: USER UNIDENTIFIED I groaned but pushed on because I was getting somewhere. I could feel it. My fingers flew again. “I’m going to get in and get matched to my pair bond. Nothing—not even a stupid triplex-split pass code—is going to stop me,” I said to myself. I held my finger over the last key as I stared at the holographic data, the line of numbers and letters. This was it. The hair on the back of my neck stood up. My fingers itched. I had it. I knew it. I pushed the button. ACCESS: GRANTED WELCOME CAPTAIN SPONDER I almost cackled. Not only was I going to enter my data into the training system, but I was going to make it look like Sponder himself had done it. I spoke my command. “Enter new candidate.” I waited less than a second. WELCOME TO THE STARFIGHTER TRAINING ACADEMY PORTAL. ENTER CANDIDATE DATA. “Yes!” I shouted, the one word bouncing off my quarter’s thick walls. The holographic screen filled with instructions about what I needed to do next. I pulled in my service record. “Lieutenant Kassius Remeas, shuttle pilot.” I found my data file and confirmed its accuracy before submitting the file. I would need to complete my bio and survey, but first I had to stand and allow my body to be scanned to create my avatar. Cool. Next, the training computer would use my voice and my image to interact with my potential partner. She would see a real version of me, just as I would see a real version of her. I stood, listened to the voice tell me what to do as every inch of me was visually imported into the training program. I would hope for a match, then train beside her. She would be a fierce, beautiful female. One who was my equal, my other half. She’d have to be skilled to train as an MCS. We would endure the simulations and welcome victory together. When the scan was done, I dropped into my seat and got to work, eagerly giving answers to the program’s questions. The avatar looked exactly like me, except it had converted my standard shuttle pilot uniform into the dark black of a Starfighter’s, complete with the metallic swirl worn only by the elite. “Damn, that looks good on you, soldier.” I chuckled, answering the survey and personality questions. I didn’t hold back the truth about myself. Arrogant. Aggressive. Defiant. Disobedient. I was who I was. I would be a Starfighter MCS. And Captain Sponder could go f**k himself.