Contains some very light references to a previous fic, Leaving Jack but don't worry, you don't have to read it to understand this story. Set before COR because, like a lot of people, I didn't much like the way they destroyed Jack. So I'm doing it a different way.

As always I welcome your comments and criticisms

Carte Blanche

"Jack is dead," she whispered watching her reflection in the mirror, thinking maybe something should look different. She shouldn't have said it out loud but she needed something real, for herself, despite the risks. She needed to be able to look back and explain why she had abandoned the safety of her childhood and accepted the harsh fate that had befallen her.

She could fight it. Hell, if she knew how to do anything it was fight. Or she could run. Running had always been her fall-back and in an odd sort of way this was no different. She was already loosing herself.

Yeah, Jack really was dead.

Then she almost laughed, because she liked to laugh too.

It was one hell of a resumé, she mused. Was it any wonder she had ended up here? The whole thing smacked of fate, destiny and all that crap. That pissed her off because, well, she had had plans. They'd been really good plans too. She had always had hope, but for the first time she had looked to the future with anticipation.

But those recruiters had lifted her off Helion prime mere hours before she was supposed to join her first merc crew. Just a few damn hours and she would have been free and clear.

Now though, she had been forced to sign away five years of her life over to an army that fought for something she didn't understand and a sovereign she had never even heard of. Chances were that she wouldn't make it the five years, she thought morosely. Kids like her were nothing more than cannon fodder. She could fight but not even her impressive skills ran to dodging rifle fire.

Five years... She'd be into her twenties by the time they let her go. More or less. She had long ago lost track of her exact age. You're only as old as you tell people, right? She used to tell people she was fifteen because as far as she was concerned it was a pretty fair guess.

For some reason though, she had told the recruiter that she was seventeen. She didn't know what she hoped to gain from the lie but it was habit, self-protection and an instinct that was buried so deep she could no longer fathom it.

The truth might have saved her. The recruiters were ruthless but not cruel and under any law fifteen was too young to become a soldier. They said that the only reason they had taken her was to save her from the vicious Skohls that had attacked her as she waited for her pick up. She herself had killed the first two but no doubt more would have followed after the recruiters had knocked her unconscious and spirited her away from Helion.

She didn't dwell too much on why the Skohls had come after her because in all of this mess it was the one thing that frightened her. Skohls shouldn't have been stalking a nameless orphan in the shadows of a Helion spaceport. They shouldn't have been wasting their time on someone so unremarkable. She could only assume that they had been mistaken when they made the first grab for her.

No, she couldn't admit the possibility that Skohls actually wanted her.

But something had stirred at the sight of those terrifying markings on their necks and arms. Old memories of raids on the farms and transports she had once lived on floated to the surface.

She had been running so long that sometimes she couldn't remember why.

And now Skohls again.

She was spooked so she had done what she always did when something threatened her. She died and was reborn as someone else. Jack died the day she was taken from Helion, the day the Skohls had marked her, the day her life got hijacked by soldiers she didn't know well enough to trust.

When they asked her name she didn't even have to think. Afterwards, when she did think about it, she was glad for the eccentricities of that field doctor on Senstera who refused to let her body fail or her mind fade. She was surprised at how deeply such passing kindnesses had always touched her. Back then, later on that dark planet and now in the face of a new path that would surely lead her into death once again.

A rock and a hard place, she thought. When had it ever been any other way?

Okay, so a soldier's life wasn't what she had planned but she was adaptable, she could work with this and use it to her advantage. This could be whatever she wanted it to be and right now her instincts were screaming for a hiding place, her heart knew it needed somewhere to mend and her mind understood that there were useful lessons to be learned here.

It was the lesser of a whole bunch of evils, she smiled to herself. Then she shook her head, retreating back into denial.

"Are you coming, Cadet?"

She flinched, assuming she was being called by an officer. But when she looked over to the figure at the doorway she was relieved to see a tall, dark boy, not that much older than herself wearing a broad smile and the same plain uniform she was.

She nodded and returned the smile. "What's your name?" she asked, figuring she might as well make friends since she was stuck here.

"August Bello," he said, holding out his had for her to shake. "But people call me Gus."

How very grown up, she thought as she took it. "Desdemona Lyon."

"Looking forward to the training then Des?"

Her eyebrows flew up at the fast familiarity but she couldn't take offence. This guy was even more chipper than people told her she was.

"Sure," she said. "A girl can never know enough ways to kill someone."

Bello faltered at the bitterness in her tone and that was when she realised that he was actually here out of choice. Perhaps he thought he was doing his duty, or perhaps he was looking for a regular pay check and a roof over his head. But he definitely wasn't a stone cold killer.

"Hey," she said in a softer voice, "I was only joking."

"No you weren't. I heard Jarav talking to the other officers. He said you killed a couple of Skohls. Said you did it well too. Is that why you're here?"

She frowned, not really understanding the question. "I guess."

"Jarav said that you can't teach that sort of thing. He reckons you're a raw talent."

"I wouldn't pay that much attention to what Jarav says. The man's got a screw loose if you ask me. He's probably just trying to psych you out. Besides," she said with a shrug, "Anyone can learn to kill. You just have to have the right kind of teacher."

"And you did?"

"Yeah," she said trying to ignore the twisting pain in her gut at the oblique reference to the man who had both saved and destroyed her.

"This is great!" Bello said excitedly. "You can be my training partner."

"You want me to teach you to kill?" she stammered in astonishment.

"I'm going to have to learn," Bello said reasonably. "I'd be a pretty poor soldier if I couldn't."

"That's what the training is for," she said shortly. No way was she getting into the distinction between what she had done back on Helion and what she would probably have to do in the next five years.

"I don't just want to be a soldier," he told her. "I want to be a Crimson Guard. The elite."

She huffed. "Crimson is a colour that attracts a lot of attention. Sounds like a good way to end up dead even quicker if you ask me."

"They're the King's own bodyguard," Bello said. "They get all the best positions and they outrank everybody. My father was a Crimson Guard."

So that was it. Family tradition. "Well, my father was a priest," she said, "So I guess I'm screwed."

"Did he approve of you joining the Army?"

"I don't know. I never got the chance to tell him," she said, "I'm sure he would be happy that I'm being kept out of trouble."

Bello's eye's narrowed. "I get it. You never joined up. You got pressed, didn't you?"

"Pressed?"

"Forced into the Army under the special skills directive."

"Fancy words," she snorted. "I'd usually go with kidnapping but whatever."

"You can appeal. Your family can apply to the King..."

"No!" she snapped. "They can't know what happened to me. The best thing I can do to keep them safe is to stay as far away as possible. If those Skohls found them..."

Bello stared at her thoughtfully for a few moments before appearing to decide to drop the subject. "Okay. But that's your choice. If you're here then you're with us. You fight with us."

"I always fight, Gus," she told him. "Make a nice change to be on someone's side, believe me."

"So, partners?"

She sighed. "You aren't a killer. It's not all it's cracked up to be, you know." But he just glared back at her, his eyes as intense with concentration as they had been with curiosity. Oh, what the hell! "Partners. Fine. On your own head."

She was rewarded with an dazzling smile, white on black. "I'll make a Crimson Guard of you yet Desdemona Lyon."

Frankly, she couldn't care less what she ended up as providing she survived the five years. If sticking with Bello meant being a Crimson Guard then she'd do it. It was a small price to pay to know that someone had her back.

And when it was all over she would get on with her plans.

"So, let's get going, girl!" Bello boomed as he hustled her out of the barracks. "First day's training. Schedule says basic fitness which means running. I hope you can run."

"Oh, I can run," Desdemona assured him as she walked out into her new life, "Almost as well as I can kill."

End