Looks

The two of them looked nothing alike.

Oh, a vague similarity in coloring, maybe, until a closer look showed that Helmi's hair was fairer, without the wiry kink that always showed in Fisk's no matter how close he cropped it.

Any passing resemblance ended there. Helmi might have been tall for a woman, but Fisk could see straight over the top of her head without trying. She was lean, wiry, stronger than she looked. He was stronger than he looked too, thanks to some of the most expensive custom upgrades in the Cluster, but broad enough across the shoulders to break up a bar fight just by getting to his feet.  She might make half his weight, if she was soaking wet and he was wearing the clone that didn't have tempered metal instead of bone, and today he was wearing the body that could twist a man's head off. Helmi knew that if she'd told him why he should come he'd have jumpcloned down, been there right away in the clone that's just a standard body, that can lift as much as a strong man can and no more. That can talk in complete sentences.

Pilot needs to see the Fisk she knows, though. Stammer and all.

They walked in step, two very different figures with the same posture and gait. Straight backs, not too stiff. Ready to salute if an officer passes.  Ready, too, for something worse, if it came.

His eyes were blue to her grey, but both their gazes scanned the hangar in the same pattern, noting everything that moves, each patch of cover, sightlines and vantage points.

They both had scars.

His were more obvious.

Hers just might be deeper.

Neither of them said a word aloud, as they strode side-by-side across the hangar deck, but there was a conversation going on all the same.  Helmi preferred her implanted comm for privacy's sake. Fisk used his by necessity: some things can't wait five minutes for him to force a sentence out.

What do the doctors say? he asked, voice coming to her mind as intimate as a lover's whisper.

Helmi snorted aloud, replied silently. Fucked if I know. I'm not in the need-to-know loop on that. Try the XO.


Did. I'm not CTO, not even crew. You know what she's like.


Helmi did indeed know what Luisa Kamajeck was like. Well, shit. 


He glanced at her. You said to get back here. Fast. Why?


You'll see, when you talk to Pilot.


Fuck that, Alpassi. What's going on?


Doc's gone, Sarge. Chief's dead.  Pilot's sick.


Sick?


Real fucking sick. You'll see.


They stopped at the door to the secure container that held Pilot's hab-unit. Helmi punched keys, put her hand on the scanner, led the way inside.

The climate changed to crisp winter as they stepped over the threshold. Helmi could see her breath as she strode up the path to the front door. 


Knocking would have been manners, normally. But with things as they were  ... making Pilot come to the door would be worse than cruel.

Helmi pushed the door open and stepped inside, feeling Fisk as close behind her as a memory. "Pilot? You there?"

"Helmi? In here."

Helmi followed the voice to the living room. "Got a visitor for you, Pilot."

Pilot was lying on the couch, stockinged feet hanging over the edge, her dark uniform a stark contrast to the cream cushions and the porcelain perfection of her makeup. Pretty as a picture, if I hadn't seen the blisters that makeup covers when she hit the alarm at two this morning because she couldn't stop vomiting long enough to make an ordinary comm call to medical.


Pilot shook her head, carefully. Helmi could see even that slight movement start a trickle of  blood where her collar touched her neck.  Spirits.  Doctors better fix this, and soon, or I'm going to start interpreting 'Personal Protection' a little more fucking broadly. "I don't think so, today, Helmi."

"Yeah, I think so, though, Pilot," Helmi said.  "Sarge. Get in here."

Like always, he moved quietly, for such a big man. Helmi only knew he was in the room when Pilot's face changed.

Looked from Pilot to Fisk and saw something else she didn't want to see.

Well, shit, Helmi. It's not like you didn't know.


"I'll leave the two of you to visit," she said, not expecting an answer, not getting one.

Fisk moved aside for her as she headed for the door, the only sign he even knew she was still in the room.

Helmi'd long since calculated the spot in the garden that kept her close enough for an emergency and far enough away to respect Pilot's privacy.  She went to stand in it now, hearing the murmur of voices inside, a familiar halting baritone, Pilot's slight Gallente slur, two voices more familiar to her now than her own mother's.

None of the words were distinguishable, and Helmi was careful not to strain to make them out.

Not like I didn't know.

Not like I lost him, to either of them.  


Never was mine, was he?  And not like I wanted him to be.


Not how most women would count it, that was certain.  No fucking roses and lingering looks and dancing under a holographic fucking moon.


He'd broken her ribs. She'd broken his nose, twice.

Neither Pilot nor that hauler he's taken up with can say that.


They had parts of him Helmi'd never wanted.

She had things neither of them were smart enough to know mattered.

She had a sparring partner who'd kill her if she made a mistake, an NCO first through every door they'd taken together.

And one more thing no podder'd understand.

Small room, cheap furnishings, because the hotel manager knows that the teams for the Haadoken Summit take full advantage of the unofficial licence they get for the night following the last day of the competition.


People hollering and running in the halls. Laughter, somewhere.  


Four Home Guard team members who just lost to Ishukone again and think maybe a SuVe cadet is just the thing to make them feel like they're at least tougher than someone.


Four Home Guard plus one. Last man down to Ishukone today, half his face purple from the blow that put him on the mat, the one eye that isn't swollen shut blue and cold and steady as the barrel of the gun he's pointing at his team-mates.  


Helmi's shirt's torn. She's more than a little drunk.  


She's more than a little scared.


The four guys are between her and the door and they aren't moving.


"Cadet! Secure their weapons. Move!"


First time he'd looked at her.

First order he'd given her.

First time she'd realized there was a way to shove fear and shame and everything else down into a box inside her and do her job just as cool and calm as a man who could make Ishukone Watch break a sweat.

Not something a podder would understand, sure as sure not something a sweet-faced Vherokior hauler pilot or a sentimental Gallente could ever comprehend.

Never was roses and moonlight, for me and the Sarge. 


Never will be.


He'd broken her ribs. She'd broken his nose, twice.

He might kill her, if she made a mistake.

She had killed him, when someone else had.

They looked nothing alike, except maybe a vague similarity in coloring.

Helmi glanced down at herself, pretty blue shirt hiding the body-armor and the gun.


But me and him both know that looks ...

Looks are deceiving.