There was a moment, the smallest fraction of a second, where I couldn’t imagine Leena making that sound.

I couldn’t picture her making such a noise. The pure terror, the anguish, drove me into a blind rage. Not even the trees were safe as I tore a path through the dense undergrowth to reach her.

I didn’t understand it. Yes, I had orders to protect her, and regardless of how much of a pain in the ass she was, I was going to fulfill those orders. I’m not going to pretend I’m easy-going; I’d just as likely shoot something before talk to it.

But this aggression, this blood-boiling rage, was irrational, even by my standards.

If it was anyone else, I would have scoffed. It was their fault for being careless. I warned them, and they should have listened to me.

Of course, I’d help them, but I probably would have been a bit of an ass about it. But not with Leena. All I wanted was to find her and get her somewhere safe.

Leena was caught in a spring-trap cage with a force field keeping her in. I shook my head in disgust. I’d seen this too many times.

Leena clawed at the invisible barrier frantically, still trying to reach for the child—rather, the holographic projection of a child. Each time, the energy feedback crackled and pushed her back.

Quickly, I looked and found a rock, throwing it into the force field. Energy shards went in all directions, lighting up the surroundings. Still, the force field stood.

I took my blaster and began to unload on it. It flickered furiously. I continued my firing until the force field finally winked out.

Leena was still shrieking, her eyes wide, but not fully seeing what was happening around her. I pulled her into my chest, trying to stabilize her.

For the second time that afternoon, we were incredibly close. And for the second time that day, I realized she was not as indestructible as she made herself seem to be. The living ice statue of a person I’d been bickering with was just a cold exterior—I didn’t have a clue what she was really like.

“Make it stop! Make it stop!” she moaned, trashing against me and pounding on my chest with her almost comically small hands.

The hologram was still activated, the false child still crying for help. Still keeping Leena close, I kicked away at the layer of dead twigs and rotting leaves until I found the small hologram generator. It made a satisfying crunch when I smashed it under the heel of my boot.

It had been a while since I’d seen a hologram lure like that. If I hadn’t been trained to recognize them, it would have fooled me the same way it did Leena.

“It’s gone now,” I said, wrapping an arm around Leena’s small shoulders. She wasn’t fighting against me anymore, but her breathing was rapid and shallow, and her eyes still darted around like she was still searching for the human child.

I reached up and gently caught her face in one of my hands, forcing her to look at me. It was easy to forget how small she was when she had such a large presence. She put so much effort into making herself seem bigger and scarier than she actually was.

“Leena, listen to me,” I said gently but firmly. “That child wasn’t real. It was a hologram.”

“What?” she rasped.

“It was a Xathi hologram lure,” I explained. “So right now, we have to get moving. If there are any Xathi in the area, they’ll be heading this way to see what set it off.”

That seemed to snap Leena back into it. She nodded once before stepping out of my arms.

“Which way?” she asked.

I jerked my chin vaguely towards the path of destruction I’d left behind me when I rushed to help her. She nodded again but didn’t start walking until I was in step with her.

We walked quickly and quietly for about a mile. When I was sure the Xathi were no longer an immediate threat, I reached out and touched her arm.

She flinched at first, fixing me with a cold stare that didn’t have its usual bite behind it.

“I just want to make sure you’re okay,” I told her, lifting my hands in a surrendering motion. She softened a bit.

“You said that thing was a Xathi hologram,” she started to speak, not answering my question. “How did they make it?”

I didn’t say anything at first. The answer to her question wasn’t a pleasant one.

“Axtin,” she said, the annoyance I’d become used to rising in her voice, but now it was tinged with dread.

“They record them from real people,” I responded, looking at the ground.

She’d stopped walking. I didn’t want to see her expression. It was rare for me not to want to look someone in the eyes.

“What happened to the child they took the image from?” she asked further, her voice low and quiet.

I had a feeling she already knew the answer, so I remained silent. She didn’t like that. I heard the sound of her stomping towards me, closing the distance between us.

I lifted my gaze to meet hers.

Her eyes were brimming with tears that she was using every ounce of her willpower to stop from falling. She was working her hands again, opening and closing her fists. Her jaw was set in that stubborn way of hers, but I could see her lower lip trembled.

The urge to kiss her rose up in me once more, but now was not the time. I could see that she wasn’t going to let it go. For whatever reason, she wanted to hear me say it out loud.

“When the Xathi target a species, they use these lures to break a population—a psychological form of torture, if you will,” I explained. It was easy to say if I thought about it like I was reading a mission dossier. Forewarned is forearmed, or some crap like that.

“They target the offspring of the species,” I went on, “knowing the adults will go to extreme lengths to keep their children safe. It disrupts organization, demoralizes spirits, and troubles minds. They can traumatize a whole population by threatening the children.”

“That’s horrible,” Leena gasped. She wrapped her slender arms around herself and shifted uncomfortably. “How do you know all this?”

“I’ve seen it before,” I replied, looking down at the forest floor once more. “I’ve seen it more times than I can count, actually. It’s never easy to see. The holograms are incredibly lifelike, but there’s always something just slightly off about them. That’s the only way to tell if it’s real or not.”

“Did,” she started, but then she stopped herself, second-guessing her words.

I don’t think I’d ever seen her second-guess anything before. I could have guessed where she was going with this.

“Did it happen to your people?”

“Yes,” I answered directly. There was no point in dancing around it. It wasn’t like I could change what happened. “We stole all of the holograms we could find once we figured it out, but by that time, they’d already done a lot of damage. We studied them and eventually used them for training.”

“Training?” Leena clarified. She struggled over the word as if she had a million other things she wanted to say—and knowing her, she probably did—and that was the first word to make it out of her mouth.

“Desensitizing, mostly,” I continued. Most of the other Valorni aboard the Vengeance had been through similar training. It wasn’t something we talked about under any circumstances.

“One soldier lost his mind because the hologram image was taken from his sister’s child. But the rest of us became adept at telling the real children from the holograms. So I guess, overall, it was a good thing. Saved a lot more lives on both ends.”

Sometimes I could even convince myself it was all just some profoundly fucked up dream I’d had. But now that I’d started talking about it, I realized I didn’t want to stop. It was like slicing open a wound to let the poison seep out—painful, yet oddly relieving.

One look at Leena’s face made me wish I hadn’t said anything. She looked five shades paler than usual.

I quickly glanced down at her hands. She was digging her nails into the palm of her hand again. I reached out to grab one of her hands, to make her stop, but she pulled away.

“What happens to the children the Xathi take the holograms from?” she pressed on, her eyes burning so intensely it would have made a lesser man recoil.

“Leena—”

“Tell me!” she shrieked loud enough to startle a flock of colorful birds out of the trees above us.

I was tempted to shush her but instantly thought better of it. If by some miracle she didn’t attract some insane monster to rip us to shreds, I suspected she would tear me apart herself.

“The child in that hologram is probably already dead,” I stated bluntly. I hated telling her something so awful, but I knew she’d hate it even more if I tried to sugarcoat it.

I realized that Leena liked dealing with simplified information, much in the same way I did. It was easier to digest things when they were stripped down to their bare bones and less messy.

I thought she couldn’t get any paler, but I was quickly proven wrong as she turned as white as a sheet. Her legs began to shake as the horrible truth of this stupid war closed in around her. I suspected she’d been trying to emotionally distance herself from everything, a good tactic for a soldier, but she wasn’t one.

“Leena, you’re looking unwell,” I told her gently, taking a slow step towards her.

“I’m fine,” she snapped, but she was swaying on her feet. This was really hitting her hard.

“No, you’re not,” I sighed. “How about you swallow that pride of yours and let me help you before you end up with a mouth full of dead leaves.”

“Touch me and I’ll break your wrist,” she threatened.

I laughed. “How about this?” I said, taking three big steps backward. “If you can walk to me, I’ll let you try to break my wrist.” She glared at me, which I took as a good sign, before taking one step. She wobbled.

“That’s what I thought,” I said, closing the distance between us and scooping her up in one swift movement. “I’m starting to believe you would literally rather die than ask for help. That’s going to get you killed long before the Xathi ever find you.”

“Next time you ask someone for help, let me know and I’ll take notes,” she grumbled.