We head back as the sky darkens and the base settles into a different rhythm. Lights flick on one by one as the sounds change from shouting to muted conversation. When Niko leaves us back in the accommodation block, Hall releases us with a few last instructions. “Don’t wander off. Don’t drink anything offered by a bloke who won’t taste it first. Don’t start fights. Don’t sleep with anyone in uniform, and that includes each other, before anyone gets ideas.”
His gaze flicks theatrically over us, then lands on me, and heat prickles at the back of my neck. “Why are you looking at me, Sarge?” I say lightly.
“Because you’re trouble, Varrik,” he replies. “Have been since you walked into my platoon.” He leaves before I can decide if that was an insult or not.
The room slowly fills with low chatter as everyone claims their bunks properly. Boots are kicked off, and the ritual of settling in begins. The photos come out, followed by tins of contraband biscuits, then someone’s hidden Walkman.
I drop onto my mattress and stare up at the underside of the bunk above. The springs sag interestingly. If the bloke above me moves too much, I might end up with the entire thing in my face. “Oi.” Mason’s leg thumps my foot. “What do you think of them, then? Our brave comrades.”
“They seem alright,” I say. “Didn’t arrest you on sight. That’s a good start.”
“Niko’s alright,” Collins says from across the room. “A bit serious, but alright.”
“Serious is good,” Bennett adds. “You want the bloke leading you round an unfamiliar base to have a brain.”
“What about you, Varrik?” Mason asks, dropping onto the bunk opposite. “You seem to have made friends already.” He mimics my earlier tone. “‘Just Caiden.’ That’s what you said to him? You’re shameless, kissing arse already.”
“Shut up,” I mumble. I’m too tired for Mason’s mouth right now. Too tired to unpack the weird flicker of awareness when Niko said three months. I’m definitely too tired to examine why I remember the exact angle of that scar on his jaw, or do anything more than acknowledge that he made an impression.
The thing about being not completely straight, in this job, is that you get very, very good at hiding things away. You notice a bloke — his hands, his mouth, the way he laughs and the way he moves — and you let yourself look for one second before you lock it all in a box in the back of your skull and sit onthe lid. You call it professional respect, admiration even, and you laugh at the same jokes as everyone else, making sure you don’t let anything show.
Especially not in a foreign barracks, where it’s literally a death sentence.
“I reckon he’ll be a bastard on the assault course,” Mason continues. “He’s got that look.”
“What look?” Collins asks.
“The ‘I’m going to make you run until you throw up’ look,” Mason says solemnly.
To be fair, he’s not wrong.
“Shut up and sleep,” Bennett says. “Before Sarge comes back and finds us still talking. He’ll cry, then he’ll make us all pay.”
The lights go out, and I close my eyes.
Murmansk, three to four months, snow coming, and a Russian Senior Sergeant called Niko, who jokes about cigarettes, broken ankles, and looks at us like we’re a puzzle he’s mostly solved but not quite.
I’m here to work, train, and not fuck anything up.
That’s the plan.
I fall asleep before I can think too hard about how often my mind drifted back to the way he said my name.
Two
Arseny
You can tell a lot about a unit from the way they stand in a briefing. Some formations are tidy on paper and chaotic in person. Some are all swagger, no discipline, and so uptight you can practically hear their assholes clenching.
This group? Too neat. Six British uniforms in a row, spaced with deliberate regularity. They’re not parade-ground stiff, they’ve seen shit, you can tell from the way their weight sits on the balls of their feet, but there’s that subtle extra effort. The ‘we’re visiting a foreign base, don’t embarrass the flag’ posture.
I lean against the back wall, hands behind my back, and expression bored enough that the CO will assume I’m listening.
I am listening. Just not to him.
They’ve cleaned the dust off the projector for this joint exercise. Someone’s even straightened the laminated map on the wall. All very official. Very cooperative. Very tedious.
Niko’s near the front, of course. My brother treats briefings like stage calls. He’s bright-eyed, shoulders relaxed, and everything about him says ‘I know exactly what I’m doing and you’re all safe because I’m here.’