Earth Christmas and New Year’s came and went, and it became the year 2106. The Crusade of Reprisal was drawing near. Smaller skirmishes were already being fought between urgek ships and those from the coalition humanity had assembled.

Most members of Heroes for Hire had already been approached to support the effort in one way or another, and they expected to receive their official assignments any day now.

Jacob was confident that he had a fine payday in the near future, but he wasn’t happy. Tarim still hadn’t returned, and he found Becca’s clinginess less endearing by the day. He began to hate himself for sleeping well at night until his body gave in and granted him righteous insomnia once more. He slept two or three hours per night. His second sight, which Becca had dubbed Nethersight, was tugging at him more strongly, especially in the quiet hours at the dead of night.

It wasn’t the alluring scent of death essence itself that tugged at him, but rather the lack of it. Standing was too safe, too far removed from any turmoil. His body was hungry. It wanted to kill.

The war couldn’t come soon enough.

It didn’t take long for Becca to pick up on his melancholy—he wasn’t making much of an effort to hide it. She responded by becoming even sweeter, coaxing him into sex, coming up with countless activities for them to waste away the idle days with.

Jacob wished she wouldn’t, but she didn’t listen when he asked her to stop. He hadn’t been able to look at her the same after that day in her apartment. The things she’d said. It wasn’t anything nearly as bad as what he had done, the mountain of bodies he had piled up, but he still felt betrayed. She was supposed to be the good one. She should have challenged him. With every indulgent smile she gave him, he despised her more.

It wasn’t fair for him to think that way. He knew that. The things she had told him were probably only traumatic because of his memory gaps. They were things he had known about her once, an implicit feature of their relationship that he had simply chosen to ignore to preserve his perfect image of her. And that image, in itself, was an unfair projection of his own selfish desires.

He knew all that.

But it didn’t matter.

Jacob had just received a message from Thatch that he would be in Standing the following morning and wanted to meet, when Becca came into the study. She wore a beautiful black dress that showed off plenty of leg, a pair of black-and-white thigh-high stockings, and a red choker. Her golden hair was done in a loose braid that fell over the front of her shoulder.

“You’ve been cooped up in here all day,” she said with a mock pout. “When do I get to have you for a while?”

“Soon,” Jacob said, typing up a response to Thatch’s latest message on his interface.

“You’re going to get wrinkles if you keep frowning like that,” she said, rounding the desk and jumping up on the edge of it, her legs dangling over the side.

“I’m not frowning.”

“You’re frowninggg.” She put her thumbs on his forehead and pulled the skin taut. “What can I do to make you smile?”

His head was pounding. The Nethersight howled for him. Becca’s touch wasn’t making it any better. He wanted to slap her hands away, but he held himself back, closing his eyes with a long exhale.

“We’ll go out later,” he said. “That, uh, dinner place you like. Sound good?”

“Is that what you want to do?”

“Yeah. That’s what I want.”

He knew that she didn’t believe him, but neither of them commented on it.

“Is that Thatch you’re talking to?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Jacob said, and resumed typing. “He’ll be in town tomorrow. He wants to talk business. I assume that means we’re on soon.”

“Do you know if he’s heard from Tarim at all? Maybe he tried to get back to Earth, or…?”

“No. He hasn’t heard from him.”

“I’m sorry, baby.”

“Are you?” Jacob asked, finally looking directly at her. “Or is that what you think I want to hear?”

Her smile faded, and her mouth went into a thin, worried line. “You’re angry.”

“I’m not angry.”

“You are angry, Jacob. Why won’t you talk to me about it?”

He sighed. “There’s no point.”

“Why? I can help.”

“I don’t know if that’s true.”

Use me, the Nethersight urged him.

“I know you’re angry about what I said. I know I’ve disappointed you, and I’m sorry. I wish I could take it back.” She looked hurt. Her lip was quivering.

Jacob wasn’t sure if he wanted to kiss her or yell at her, and that made him even angrier. “I’m happy you said it, Becca. You were honest. I appreciate that.”

She jumped down off the desk and straddled him in the chair, rubbing insistently at his shoulders. “I’m scared, Jacob. I feel like you’re slipping away from me. That can’t happen.”

Use me, use me, use me.

Jacob glanced over at the framed painting on his desk. The cottage on the hill with a cat and a dog sitting on the porch. He felt a twinge of painful longing.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

“I don’t think it’s going to get better,” Jacob said. “I can only think of one option.”

“No, Jacob. Not that. You don’t need him. We can fix this, I promise.”

She kissed him on the lips. He let her.

Use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me, use me.

“It’s weird how much has changed,” he mused absently, letting himself stroke her hair. “Just a few months ago our lives were completely different. If I had never Snapped, neither of us would be alive now. But I still find myself wishing for that version of our lives. When things were so much simpler.”

She trailed kisses down his neck, stroked his chest. “We’ll get it back. It’ll be okay.”

“I need to talk to him, Becca. I can’t think of anything else that would help. We can’t go on like this. It can’t get to the point where I start hating you.”

At those words, she gripped tight handfuls of his shirt. “You can hate me if you want. Just don’t leave.”

“I’m going to talk to Ender.”

“Please don’t.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want you to pay that price. And I worry. That you’ll still hate me, even with your memories.”

“What should I do, then?”

“Nothing. Just let me make it better. Like I always did.”

“I already left him a message.”

More kisses. “I know. I burnt it.”

Of course she did.

Then some of his anger deflated. He let out a heavy sigh and patted her head. “You can be very frustrating sometimes.”

Use me, the Nethersight whispered, but the intensity had lessened.

“Right?” Becca said. She looked up at him with a grin, sensing the playfulness in his tone. “But you love that about me.”

“I do,” he admitted. “It’s one of my favorite things about you.”

“Heh.”

He gave a sad smile. “I’m sorry, Becca. I know this is unfair on you.”

“It’s okay. I’m being unfair, too.” She gave him a tight hug, resting her face on his chest. “What do you actually want to do tonight?”

“We should go see Bob. He got that old game console hooked up with all the fighting games.”

“That sounds fun. Can I come?”

“I said ‘we’, didn’t I?”

“Just checking. Wanna fuck after?”

“Maybe.”

“You can rough me up to work out some of that angst, if you want.”

“Deal.”

She purred happily against his chest.

Jacob wasn’t sure how he felt. His stomach churned with a roiling concoction of emotions.

*****

The director somehow looked years older than he had the last time Jacob saw him. He had gone balder and grayer, and his belly had expanded into a chubby little paunch. He was wearing a boring red tie with his black suit. Disappointing.

They met in one of the palace’s many drawing rooms after Thatch got done with meeting Lord Alfonse and some noblemen. Jacob got there first. They shook hands, and Thatch took a seat.

“It’s my birthday today,” the director said with a harrumph.

“Well, happy birthday. What are you now, eighty?”

“Fifty-eight. Do you have one respectful bone in your body?”

“I’ve got loads of ‘em.”

“Sure.” Thatch shook his head, smiling, then fell silent. After a while, he said: “What a time to be alive, eh?”

“Talking about Johnny?”

“Yeah. Who would’ve thought that kid would turn into a U-Rank?”

“Um, S+, actually,” Jacob said, inflecting a nasally nerd voice.

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Is that why you’re here? To talk about him?”

“Nah. I’m hoping I’ll be able to meet with him later.”

“Good luck with that.”

Thatch snorted. “Thanks. I’m here to talk about you, though.”

“Please say you’re hiring me. I’m so done dealing with this fucking pig baron.”

“I’m hoping to hire you, yes. It mostly depends on you.”

“Actually, I think it depends on how much flora you’re offering.”

“We’ll get to that bit. I need to give you a bit of background.”

Jacob gave a light-hearted groan. “Not a lecture, please.”

“A small one, a small one. This is something you’ll wanna know, trust me. I would have told you sooner, but I had to keep this one under wraps. You know the Red Right Hand?”

“Sounds vaguely familiar.”

“Well, they’ve been putting all their remaining resources into rebuilding infrastructure and locating survivors on Earth. Believe it or not, they’ve been a big help. Our resources are extremely limited.”

“Glad to know the genocidal villains are being helpful.”

“Shut up and listen. Roughly one million survivors have been located on Earth. One percent of them Snapped from everything they’ve gone through. The Red Right Hand has gone through all those users and selected out one percent of the one percent, the strongest, to receive training and various enhancement procedures. One hundred Users.”

“Okay?”

“They’re strong, Jacob. Very strong. And they’re arriving on Mars right now, along with the rest of the Nine, excluding Paragon. The Last Generation, they’re being called.”

“And they’re joining the war.”

“That’s right. Between them, the Nine, whatever heroes the Guild has left on Mars, and the ones the colonies can scrape together, we’re looking at a solid lineup. And that dragon you charmed, too. Good job on that, by the way.”

“All right. When do we leave?”

Thatch held up five fingers. “Five days. You’ll be going to Rust, the most heavily fortified of the minor urgek worlds, and their first line of defense. This is where we’re expecting the bulk of the fighting to take place.

“Of course, you’ll be backed up by conventional military, too. Mars is deploying two million troops and half as many combots. Aribel about a quarter of that. We’re softening them up with blackpoint bombardments before landing, but they’re pretty dug in, so we’re not expecting too much of an effect.”

“What about Paragon and Johnny?”

“Being held back, for now. I guess they want to see how well you do first. Paragon isn’t really ready for combat yet, anyway.”

“Still in bad shape?”

“Mmm, yeah. Kinda. Drakemyth did a good job on her, but it’s been a slow recovery.”

“She is a cyborg now, though, right?” Jacob prodded.

Thatch rolled his eyes. “Yes, Jacob. Congratulations, you’re the world’s greatest detective.”

“How much are we talking? Is she, like, ninety percent robot now?”

“I’m not going to answer that.”

“Whatever. You’re boring.”

“Boring and old,” Thatch said with a great big sigh, rubbing at his balding head. “Well, I thought that working with the Red Right Hand might be a problem for you, but you don’t sound that concerned.”

Jacob shrugged. “Whatever. They’re just scumbags. I’ll work with scumbags if I have to. How much are you paying?”

“I’ll get a list of assignments to you. Mostly search and destroy for you Hero for Hire folk. A few cooperative assignments with the Last Generation, too. Don’t worry, though, we’ve loosened the purse strings for this one.”

“Good. Wanna look that over at my place? Becca invited you for dinner, so…”

“That sounds lovely. I hear you have a nice place.”

“The place is nice. Becca’s cooking, not so much. You have been warned. Oh, uh, I’ll have her pick up a cake or something for the birthday boy.”

“Ooh, make it a princess cake, please.”

“Anything for you, dear.”