Kepler One - The Choosing

Chapter 10

I couldn't swallow breakfast again that morning. The lump permanently stuck in my throat wouldn't let me. My aversion to food was only partly due to the fact that we were meant to have mid-training exams today. The results would dismiss the two cadets with the lowest scores, a fact that had everyone whispering in low voices in The Tin.

I glanced at Nathan. His eye was puffy, but his lip seemed to have recovered well enough that no one could tell, aside from a small cut, that I had split it last night. Nathan was sitting on his own today. His former clique, Sam, Simon, and Emily, appeared not to his taste any longer. He had become isolated from the rest of the cadets, too, whose already healthy fear of him wasn't helped by my reaction to the rumours he started. As much as I wanted to smirk and revel at his unpopularity while a small gathering of cadets were content to share my table, I knew I couldn't. If I wanted to stay a cadet, I would have to swallow my pride and beg him not to report me for my outburst.

I picked up my tray and walked over to him. Behind me, everything went silent.

"Mind if I sit here?" I asked quietly.

Nathan looked up at me, his hazel eyes, one now rimmed with a deep purple, narrowed. He didn't say anything for a moment, the food in his mouth still bulging at the side of his cheek. He swallowed as though his meal had suddenly gone dry.

"So long as you promise not to hit me again," he said, pointing a fork to the chair opposite him.

"I can't promise you anything," I said, sitting down, "but I'll do my best."

Nathan looked at me, studying me for a moment. I wasn't sure if he actually found my answer funny or if he thought it would just be better to smile, but he did. It hit me then that this was the first time I had ever seen him smile properly, instead of a sneer. If he wasn't such a horrible prick, he would have been quite handsome.

"Listen, I just wanted to say I'm sorry," I said, pushing my food around the tray. "I shouldn't have punched you."

Nathan dropped his fork and it clattered loudly. Everyone in The Tin looked in our direction, but he didn't seem to care.

"You're right," he said loud enough for all to hear. "You shouldn't have jumped me while I was sleeping. That's a coward's attack, and it's the kind of thing your boyfriend would do. If you want to beat on me, fine! Just do it when I'm awake."

Nathan stood, his chair screeching on the floor, and left The Tin without letting me say anything. I clenched my fists desperately trying not to slam them on the table. I was only trying to apologise, even though he deserved everything he got. If anything, he should be apologising to Tristan, but instead, Nathan managed to insult him again.

My anger wouldn't let me stay sitting, so I followed him into the hall. I wasn't perturbed by the fact that Nathan's broad frame exuded a darkness that challenged the gloomy corridor. My anger made me impervious to it as I stomped after him.

"Why are you so mean to me?" I shouted after him. "Why are you saying these things about Tristan? He's never done anything to you."

"How do you know?" Nathan shouted, stopping dead and wheeling around on me. "You've known him for all of two and a half weeks. I've known him since we were little. But I guess that makes you the expert, right? I guess you know how the world works, too, and who's pulling our puppet strings, don't you? Because you're Zoe Ruthland, all-knowing and all full of . . ."

He stopped short of swearing, but I knew what he meant to say.

"I'm not all-knowing, but I'm not stupid either. I can think for myself," I roared back. "And there's no one pulling my strings. Everything I've done has been because I wanted to. If I wanted to go home right now, I could."