The training only grew more intense, and Jess wasn’t the only one to let her attention wander. The Raiders operated at only one level, which was far more intense than even the Vipers had prepared for. All day, and into each night for several weeks, the students felt like they were trying to drink from a fire hose. Meanwhile, the instructors worked like they did not have to worry about weaknesses like fatigue or mental saturation.

After basic offensive and defensive driving, the Raiders moved on to cover vehicle-borne operational concepts. The classes covered long distance expeditions, road ambushes, breaking through checkpoints, and more. To finish each section, the Rangers hopped in their vehicles to practice against the opposing force.

Per Valkyrie’s standard practice, they shot rubber bullets to simulate real fire. Kayla thought back to Ranger school, and the painful punishment she had often received whenever she and the others made a mess of basic tactics. Training with the Raiders was much the same, except most of them were expert snipers, or lightning-fast assaulters. They had no interest in taking things easy on the Venomous Vipers, who were, after all, supposed to be the best Rangers in Valkyrie.

Before long, everyone was covered in sores, while their hands and feet were blistering and bleeding. Fortunately, their bodies healed quickly, and they were left with only the psychological scars that being hunted by a relentless, merciless and totally superior enemy inflicted.

Kayla did her best to support Jess wherever she could. The resilient young woman had only recently passed Valkyrie’s gut-wrenching selection and training course. While her former classmates were enjoying a more sedate rookie experience in their new units, she had been thrown into a new challenge that even the hardened veterans found intense. Kayla was impressed that she was just about managing to keep up, though she took more than her fair share of hits.

During a briefing for a building assault, Kayla glanced over at the young private. Her face wore the blank, stoic gaze that boot camp had instilled in her, though Kayla could see the subtler signs. Her eyes glazed over more frequently as the days dragged on. She made small mistakes, while her general appearance and tidiness began to fray at the edges. Even though Ray stuck close to her, keeping her spirits up and patiently correcting her movements, she was barely staying above water.

After the briefing, the platoon geared up once again, loaded into vehicles and began a fast drive down a tarmac stretch towards a mockup warehouse. The plan required them to surround the building while neutralizing guards, then dismount to breach inside.

Kayla drove her vehicle, carrying Jess, Ray, and Tian, at breakneck speed right up to the building, before slamming the brakes hard. She swerved sideways at the last second, presenting a side on profile so that the car could provide her fire team more cover. Even before the vehicle had come to a complete stop, the doors flew open as the other Rangers stepped out and began engaging targets. Kayla fought to hold back the nausea the sudden deceleration had brought, before yanking on the handbrake and grabbing her rifle.

She jumped out to see the last of the Raiders hit with rubber bullets drop to the ground and lay still. The fire team fell in behind her as she raced towards the warehouse’s side door.

Working quickly, Kayla prepped a breaching charge on the door, then stepped back and blew it, absorbing the thump of overpressure like a punch to the head. Ray stepped into the breach, followed closely by Jess. As she scrambled over the door frame, the private tripped, cursing sharply as she fell face first onto the concrete. Behind her, Tian hesitated and leaned down to pull her back out. In the background, the snap of gunshots told Kayla that Ray was now fighting alone, inside the warehouse.

Furious, she grabbed Tian by her suit’s strap and shoved forward.

“Move!” she yelled. “Leave Jess—push in, go!”

Tian jerked and shot upright, stepped over the private’s body with Kayla close behind. The two of them managed to get into the hallway, where they caught sight of a Ranger boot sticking out of a doorway. Tian kept moving, and they managed to shoot the two Raiders who had been waiting in the room.

Jess caught up with them, and they were able to clear the rest of the rooms, then make contact with the other squads before the exercise finished. When they regrouped outside, Kayla saw that Jess had gone bright red and was refusing to make eye contact while rubbing her hand across her face.

An unimpressed looking Ray marched out of the warehouse.

“Uh… sorry Ray,” Tian said.

“Why are you apologizing?” Ray said patiently. “Dead women can’t hear you talking.”

“It’s my fault,” Jess blurted out breathlessly. “I accept responsibility for screwing everything up, and I promise it will never happen again.”

“No, no,” Tian said tiredly as she rubbed her eyes. “I froze up and got confused when I saw you go down. I’m the screwup here.” She shook her head. “I’ll get it right next time.”

“Alright take a moment to think it through,” Kes said. “Go over your actions and make you sure you understand everything that happened.”

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The squad leader’s eyes and body language showed she was as exhausted as the rest of them, and more tired than annoyed. But Jess was not listening.

“God I am so sorry for letting you all down,” she blurted, almost on the verge of tears. “I’m not pulling my weight, I—”

“Private that’s enough,” Kayla snapped.

Jess went quiet, though her expression was one of misery. Her reaction had become alarming, and Kayla needed to help her get control.

She turned to Kes. “Please tell me this was the last run of the day? Everyone’s dead on their feet.”

“Yeah, I think so,” Kes said. “But I’ll go check. After twelve hours it’s just becoming an exercise in stupidity.”

The others collapsed into the vehicle seats and shut their eyes while the squad leader stalked off towards the Raiders gathered near the warehouse. Jess started to pace back and forth in obvious distress.

“Hernandez, step over here with me,” Kayla said.

She threw an arm around the girl’s shoulders and moved her around the back of the car, for a moment of notional privacy.

Jess’s eyes were red rimmed as she wiped away tears. She kept her eyes to the ground.

“Look at me Hernandez,” Kayla ordered. “Now take some deep breaths, okay?”

Jess did so, and Kayla saw with relief that she began to calm down.

“What is going? Why are you freaking out?”

Jess swallowed and switched into the robot tone Kayla knew all too well. She believed she had committed a major failure.

“I tripped up during the entry and my failure got Ray killed. I was not paying enough attention to my feet. I’ve been failing to keep up with the rest of the squad, and I have no excuse for my poor performance.” She sniffed. “I’ll run around the strip, like you said, Lance corporal.”

Kayla stifled a laugh and grabbed the girl’s shoulder as she started to move away. “Stay here private hard case. Hey, didn’t you notice that the whole squad is in zombie mode? It’s been a long day, everyone is braindead. Tripping happens—it’s not a big deal.”

Jess shook her head. “If I hadn’t blocked the stack, Ray would—”

“Tian blocked the stack. She knew better than to stop. And so what if Ray got shot? It’s training. It’s meant to go wrong.”

“I just…” Jess gulped back a sob. “I’ve been making a lot of mistakes, I can’t keep up with you all. It’s obvious. I’m just making a fool out of myself. You’ve already had to caution me once, and I accept that.”

Kayla took a deep breath and thought as quickly as her overworked mind would allow. “Jess, everyone in the squad is an experienced Ranger, and you are brand new. We are only learning how to work from vehicles, while you are having to learn everything else on top of that. Yes, you are making mistakes, and yes, I have to push you to stay focused. That’s just… the new girl experience. But you’re doing fine.”

Jess said nothing, but stared at her with wide, confused eyes.

“Okay, I get it,” Kayla said with a smile. “The Raiders are all ten feet tall and walk on water. You want to believe that they were born kicking ass, and it sucks to screw up in front of them. But I promise you, they all started off as dumb privates who screwed up and got yelled at. Hell, in my first week in this squad, Rudaski nearly threw me off a cliff because she’d had enough of my bullshit.”

Jess blushed and looked down.

Kayla laughed and pointed. “Look, some of them are even shorter than us! Whatever you have been told, they are not magic space witches. They’re just…” She paused and winced. In fairness, it was hard to express a down-to-earth opinion about them. “…freakishly driven and focused with years if not decades of better training,” she finished.

“It’s not the Raiders,” Jess said quietly.

“Huh? Then what is it?”

The private shrugged and refused to make eye contact again.

“Jess, I can’t have you beating yourself down like this every time something goes wrong. We all need to show up the same time tomorrow and kick ass again. So, come on, out with it.”

“Well… it’s you, Lance-corporal.”

“Me what?”

“Um… your Kayla Barnes. You saved Caldera. Everyone knows that you took on Rayker alone. Everyone in Ranger school was talking about nothing else. And here I am trying to act like I belong in the same squad as you.”

Kayla had to bite back a snarl. How had grown-ass instructors let this become an issue? “What?” she snapped. “Did I do everything myself? There wasn’t a whole company of Rangers fighting desperately, while my best friend—”

She cut off her voice as bile rose up her throat. Anger was not going to do her any good. Kayla took a breath, swallowed the hurt, and tried to be more patient.

“I tell you what, Jess, if I ever found out who started those kinds of stories, I will beat the… I will express my sincere displeasure to that individual. But tell me this. Why do we tell you and other recruits to pull your head out of your ass so often?”

“To keep me paying attention?”

“The expression means that you are consumed by your own egotistical concerns whilst being distracted from a job that requires rising above them. Egotistical—meaning that you are so focused on what I think of you, because you believe that my ‘fame’, or whatever, has some kind of bearing on your reputation and character. Like, if Kayla Barnes thinks I did a good job, that means I’m a really good Ranger. But if she’s angry, that means I’m completely worthless, right?”

Jess nodded.

“But Kayla Barnes is only a Lance-corporal. Her opinion is not that relevant. I mean, they didn’t make her a freakin’ officer, did they? Meanwhile, you were selected ahead of your peers to enter one of the organization’s highest performing units, on the eve of one of the toughest missions they have faced. Someone who knows you better than I do believes that you belong here. Am I right?”

“I… guess so.”

“Don’t guess, Private,” Kayla said sternly. “We are preparing to hunt the most dangerous woman in this galaxy. She is waiting for us on terrain she has prepared in advance. This is our job, and it is very likely that not all of us will make it through to the other side of this. So, if you are a quitter, and a failure, I need you to tell me right now, because we can’t afford to waste time. Do you belong here, yes or no?”

Jess took a deep breath. “Yes, Lance-corporal.”

“Excellent. It is my professional opinion that you are doing a good job despite the immense pressure we are all under. I would like to keep you in my squad. I would like for you continue performing as well as you have done today, without letting that chatterbox Tian distract you. I would also like you to make a note somewhere of the following principle: Celebrity is a cancer that must be rooted out and destroyed by all decent women, wherever it is found, even if suspected bearers may be endowed with stunning black hair and a charming smile. Got that, Hernandez?”

Jess giggled. “Yes, Lance-corporal.”

“Great,” Kayla said, and put her arm around Jess’ shoulder again as she led her back to the squad. “Let’s get some freakin’ food and water.”