Page 233 of Reaper Said Mine

The thing I feared most.

He did not know.

Not fully.

Maybe not at all.

“Show me,” he says.

I turn the compad toward Pelt’s display, letting the projection capture the intervention summary. Gnash reads in silence, eyes moving quickly. As he does, the anger between us thins just enough for fear to come through.

His fear.

Mine.

The bond trembles with it.

“Damn them,” he says softly.

“Which them?” I ask. “That’s the problem now. The Combine can say they were right about you aligning with hostile powers. The Alliance can say they’re responding to Coalition expansion. The Coalition can say they’re protecting treaty obligations. Everyone gets cleaner language.”

He looks back at me. “Would you have had me refuse and count dead children as the price of optics?”

“No.”

The answer comes immediately.

Because whatever else I feel, I will not lie to him.

His shoulders ease by a fraction.

I continue, “I would have had you tell me before you made the choice that changes every argument I’m making.”

His expression tightens again. “There was no time.”

“There is always time for one sentence.”

“Not always.”

“Yes, always,” I snap, and then lower my voice because anger is beginning to attract too much attention from the people pretending not to listen. “You asked me to come back. You told me here is where you need me. Then you changed the entire battlefield and left me to learn about it with everyone else.”

His face stills.

The silence that follows is full of alarms on his side and rain on mine.

When he speaks, his voice is quieter. “I did not think of the story first.”

That hurts more than it should.

I nod slowly. “I know.”

“Ursa.”

“No, I know. You thought of civilians, shields, medicine, evacuation corridors. You thought of Tomas and Rekk and the people you could keep alive by signing. I understand that.”

“Then why do you look at me as if I betrayed you?”

The question opens something raw.