Chapter 9

Kostopoulos preferred to stay in the MACO Barracks when on duty, but she often took her meals in the main tower's mess halls with her troops. She liked to get familiar with the men and women under her command, make her presence known, while still maintaining a professional distance. She thought of herself as a mother shark (in keeping with the MACO name) watching over her pups; cold but deadly protective.

Normally, when she dined in the tower, it was in one of the staff-only mess halls, but today she had opted to take her lunch in one of the public ones. Several of the Orion refugees filled the hall, and Kostopoulos couldn't help keeping a keen eye on them after the incident in the SGQ.

Carrying her food tray in search of a space to eat, she spotted Tiro sitting at a table alone. While she had dismissed yesterday's pheromone-induced giddiness towards the young man, that was no reason to shun him. With a small smile, she made her way over to his table.

"This seat taken?" she asked, alerting him.

He looked up, flashing her a charming grin. She was relieved to feel no overwhelming physical reaction this time. "Please…" He indicated the vacant chair across from him.

"How are you settling in?" she asked as he sat herself down.

"Very well, thank you. Much better than what I'm used to. I slept through the night for the first time in years." He resumed finishing off his breakfast.

Kostopoulos picked at her own meal, regarding Tiro with a degree of sadness at his past. "You've come from such a difficult life," she said softly.

He nodded, looking back at her with a new depth in his eyes that made him seem older. "Not as difficult as others. I was only a slave for four years. My parents were Free Traders - one of the non-Syndicate Orion factions. They were killed by raiders and I was sold into slavery."

"I'm so sorry," said Kostopoulos. "I shouldn't have brought it up…"

Tiro waved a hand at her. "It's alright. It's been on my mind a lot lately. But I'm finally free again, thanks to Vyla. With your people's help, I can find a new life for myself and move beyond my past."

Kostopoulos nodded, smiling faintly. "What will you do? If you're granted asylum, I mean."

Tiro returned her small smile and looked off into the distance. "Some of us have talked about continuing our cause. Getting a new, better ship, and liberating more slaves."

"You'd do that? Risk your freedom by going back up against the Syndicate?"

Tiro shrugged at her. "I just don't think I could sleep through many more nights knowing that there are others like me out there."

Kostopoulos now smiled warmly at Tiro. "I know the feeling…"

A puff of smoke suddenly caught her eye over Tiro's shoulder. She glanced over to see three Orions - two women and a man - sat around a table sharing some sort of thin, metallic tube, from which they inhaled, then blew out smoke.

"Excuse me," she said to Tiro without taking her eyes off this sight. She rose and made her way over to the others.

Clearing her throat as she stood over them, the trio of smokers looked up at her with disinterest, the long-haired male unleashing a cloud of vapour towards her. It had an acrid, earthy aroma.

"I'm afraid you can't smoke in here," she told them. "Or anywhere on the base."

The man, not much older than Tiro, snorted at her. "Calm down, Human, it's just some horx. Want a drag?" He held up the metal tube, and the young women with him giggled.

Kostopoulos maintained a rigid posture. "Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to extinguish your device."

The young man seemed to take offence, now holding the tube more firmly, pointing it at her. "It's called a horgl. It's been in my family for generations. It's part of my heritage."

From his relaxed posture, dulled speech, and deep green bloodshot eyes, Kostopoulos could clearly see the man was intoxicated, and his companions were similarly affected, giggling away.

"Sir, smoking of any kind is prohibited on the base, as is the use of narcotics," she said firmly. The two women became nervous at this, although the man remained indignant.

Another voice cried out. "See how they suppress us?" Kostopoulos turned to see a small Orion girl with blood-red hair pointing at her.

The girl continued. "They try to control us by taking away our culture!"

Several Orions were starting to gather, and some of the other mess hall patrons were taking notice. Kostopoulos had no desire to escalate the situation further than necessary.

"Miss, please stay out of this," she said to the Orion girl in an even but authoritative voice. "It doesn't concern you."

"If you harm one of us, you harm all of us!" the redhead shouted, a mischievous expression on her face. She was enjoying this.

"No one is being harmed," Kostopoulos retorted. "You are welcome to your culture and traditions, but you still have to comply with base rules."

"Your rules favour Humans and destroy the Orion way of life!" the girl shouted. Cheers went up in the crowd, which quickly devolved into jeers and taunts directed at Kostopoulos.

The colonel knew she needed to avoid making a tricky political situation even worse, and there was no way to pacify the crowd that she could see, so she simply left the mess hall as calmly as possible. Since she was the focus of their outrage, hopefully her absence would quieten them down, but she would not let the events go unreported.

In the corridor outside, she silently seethed. She had only been trying to do her job, to enforce the law as she would have with any species, there was no need for it to become a bigger issue. She had even intended on letting the smoking threesome away with a warning if they had simply done as she asked, in the interest of diplomatic relations.

"Ana!" Tiro followed her out. "I'm sorry about all that."

She shook her head. "It's alright, Tiro. Your friends are just unfamiliar with our ways."

Tiro sighed. "That's still no excuse for… that." He gestured back at the double doors. "If they have problems on the base, they should bring them up legitimately, not take them out on you."

"Don't worry about it. I'll discuss it with Commodore North, maybe we can work out a compromise while you're all here."

"First Damoth yesterday, now this… Things always seem to kick off when we're together." He laughed.

Kostopoulos joined in with his laughter, relaxing herself again. It was, in fact, the most genuinely relaxed she'd felt in years.

"Listen," she said, "would you maybe want to finish breakfast together? Somewhere… quieter?"

Tiro smiled. "I'd like that."