Enzo jumped as a holo-pad was dropped unceremoniously onto his tray in the mess hall, the impact causing the remainder of his food to sail up and splatter against his face. He growled as he wiped the pink protein rations off of his eyelid and flicked them off onto the floor. One of the men sitting next to him snorted and he flipped him the bird.

Talon was standing at his shoulder when he turned, snickering, and Enzo knew that he had been the one to drop the pad. Enzo clenched his teeth and reminded himself that he could not, absolutely could not, afford to get in more trouble. His legs and arms had burned for weeks after the mission where he’d taken out Dorian - which, bullshit, he’d gotten the damn target - and even six months later he shuddered at the thought of how long he’d spent scrubbing the ship’s hull. He’d been a good little boy ever since, a perfect example of a permanent member of Terrance’s crew, and he just knew that no matter the provocation he would be up shit creek without a paddle if he took his tray and cracked it across that stupid smirking face as he was longing to.

“The hell do you want, you big green jackass?”

“Admiral’s got a mission for you,” Talon said, and though he was smiling there was nothing pleasant about it. Slimy, more like. “There’s the specs. You leave in an hour.”

Enzo’s ire was forgotten, completely unable to hang onto any irritation even with the man who was arguably his nemesis, because, fuck, his own mission! His heart leapt to his throat with his sudden overwhelming anticipation as he gleefully scanned the mission specs. It wasn’t just a mission - it was a solo mission, the first one he’d ever been offered, and he had known that Kade wasn’t as mad as he’d seemed, was secretly a little proud of him, but right here was the physical proof. He let out an excited whoop as he pushed back from the table, snatched up the pad, and dashed out of the hall.

When he skidded onto the deck of the Hesperia five minutes late, he was panting, his manic grin threatening to split his face in half. Kade was in the middle of talking to his first mate, Crux, who caught sight of Enzo and grinned with too-pointy teeth. Enzo held in his burning need to talk, hands clasped behind his back, but he couldn’t quite stay still and spent the next agonizing minutes bouncing on the balls of his feet. Terrance entered shortly after him, and Enzo was sure he looked just that much more restless next to his captain’s perfectly still body.

Before Crux left, when he was finally done talking with Kade, he shot Enzo a smirk that said he was really enjoying Enzo’s discomfort and made his way over. He aimed a punch at Enzo’s shoulder that was a lot harder than your average friendly tap, but Enzo barely felt it in his excitement.

“Don’t fuck up, kid,” he quipped, before waltzing out the door and leaving Enzo and Terrance alone with Kade. Enzo hadn’t been truly alone with the admiral since the day he’d been kicked out to join the rest of the crew, and it stung just that little bit, even now that he’d come to terms with their new relationship, that he wasn’t going to get that camaraderie even in this moment.

Enzo would probably never be able to shake the notion that this hardened mercenary admiral was his father; he’d raised him, after all, and Enzo knew that there had been times when the other man had felt genuine affection for him no matter how much he insisted otherwise. Even six months of bitterness and heartache later, Enzo felt that burning need to impress his once-guardian. So when Kade strode over to where he and Terrance were still standing at attention, giant boots clanking on the grates of the floor, Enzo stilled his jitters and pushed his shoulders back with a salute.

“Reporting for mission briefing, Admiral,” he said, earning an amused smirk from Kade.

The admiral gestured for Enzo and Terrance to follow him to the center of the room where there was a waist-high round table they all gathered around. Kade waved his hand flat over the surface and a green holographic model of a moon flickered to life, hovering a few inches above the table. “This one’s going to be easy. It’s a simple, cut-and-dry retrieval. This is one of the three moons orbiting Deneb, the smallest.”

Terrance leaned in closer as Kade pulled at the sides of the moon and the display zoomed into the core, revealing a vault with six guards stationed in front of the door. Enzo leaned in, too, already calculating what he’d need to program into his suit on his way to the moon, thinking about which disks he’d need to outfit it with to get the job done in as little time as possible

“There’s not usually much happening on Deneb’s moons, but right now that inhabitants of the planet are holding a very large, very valuable piece of treasure inside this vault. It’s meant to be a gift for the queen-to-be of a neighboring planet; a gift of good faith and a promise of continuing peace between the planets when the new queen takes over.” As the display flickered again and lit up with an image of a positively massive tiara, Kade’s eyes got that glean they always had when there was a particularly profitable haul in sight. In the center of the tiara was a purple gem Enzo would be willing to bet was a channeling stone, pulsing with light, each flare like a heartbeat. He pressed his hand to his own stone, hanging underneath his shirt, a warm pressure against his chest.

“The stone is what we really want, of course. It’s a raw channeling stone, extremely rare, and the person it was stolen from is offering a huge bounty for its safe return.” He flicked his fingers and the metal of the tiara fell away so that just the pulsing stone was visible on the display, washing them all in purple light. “Ordinarily something like this would be kept at the palace, but it’s in the vaults of the moon right now because someone let it slip that there was going to be a heist by someone from inside the inner city.”

Enzo smirked. “Oh, really? Gee, I wonder who that someone was.”

Terrance snorted and Kade winked at them before turning back to the display. “Anyway, we do actually have an informant inside the inner city, which is how we know where the stone is being kept. They couldn’t find out anything about who or what is guarding it, though, so part of this mission is going to be recon by necessity.”

“How did he find out? Your informant, I mean. If it’s this valuable, how did anyone know where it was being taken?” Enzo asked, and Terrance nudge him with his shoulder in a way Enzo thought might be approving.

Kade grinned. “Who said anything about a he? She is a woman of many talents, and we all know that a man with his pants down is a vulnerable one. Let’s just say that she knows exactly how to get what she wants without being suspected and leave it at that.”

“Noted,” Enzo said, nodding. “So we know literally nothing about the security other than the guards, or is this when you come out and say there's, like, a river of lava?”

The display went out, and Enzo was left staring at Kade’s face, which seemed to have aged more than a little in the past six months. “Our informant is good, but like I said she isn’t that good. That’s why we’re sending you. Your Gift is going to be paramount to this mission. Once you’re past the guards you’re on your own, and everyone here knows that when you need someone to sneak into somewhere they’re not wanted you’re our best option.”

Enzo flushed at the compliment, preening. “Well, I am pretty awesome.”

“Alright, that’s enough ego boosting for one day. The mission shouldn’t take more than two weeks.” He gestured for Enzo and Terrance to follow him, and they readily complied. “You’ll take my second cruiser. You remember, the one I borrowed from that Vegallian a few years back?”

Enzo had grown both in height and muscle mass as a result of the rigorous training Terrance and the others had been putting him through since he’d become a full member of Terrance’s crew. He relished the fact that he no longer had to jog to keep up with the admiral as they made their way to the hangar, and the fact that Kade no longer completely dwarfed him. “Borrowed, my ass. You tossed him out the airlock!”

“Semantics,” Kade said, smirking. “Anyway, I’ve had Crux working on its cloaking capabilities. It’s perfect for a stealth mission like this. You get in, you get out, you bring the stone back here so that we can collect the bounty and we’re on our way to a great payday.”

“You’ll get the biggest cut, of course,” Terrance piped in, the first time he’d said anything. Enzo wondered why he was there with them, but he didn’t have long to think about it before his question was answered.

“Terrance asked for you specifically for this job,” Kade said when they’d reached the open ramp of the cruiser. Enzo tried not to let his disappointment show, telling himself that of course Kade hadn’t been the one to seek him out for the job. It was stupid of him to entertain the idea. “He vouched for you as your captain, and I don’t need to tell you what that means for the both of you if you do mess up.”

Like the last time, they’d both be punished if Enzo screwed up again. He glanced at Terrance who didn’t really look all that worried, and vowed either way the he would not waste another opportunity to prove himself. Kade clasped him on the shoulder to draw his attention back. “We packed provisions for you this morning while you were training, and your go bag is already on the ship. You move out now.”

Enzo didn’t even have a second to wonder if he had everything he needed in his go bag, the one every crew member had stashed under their bunks for impromptu missions, before Kade was striding off in the other direction and he was left with Terrance. He reminded himself for the hundredth time that there was no point in getting hurt over Kade’s coldness towards him and turned his attention to his captain.

“You’re gonna do great, kid,” he said, and Terrance knew that Enzo hated it when he ruffled his hair but the captain did it anyway, followed by a good-natured slap to his left cheek and a shove towards the ramp of the ship. “Now get going before we all die of old age, huh?”

Enzo shoved his hurt at the admiral’s dismissal of him to the side and grinned. He clasped forearms with Terrance once before turning to jog up the ramp. At the top, as the ramp started to close, he and Terrance exchanged a salute. Just before the ramp shut he caught sight of Kade, who was hanging back at the entrance to the hangar and watching him. The admiral caught his eye and nodded at him, and Enzo felt just that bit lighter as the ramp shut and he wandered into the cockpit. He ruffled around in his go bag which had been waiting in the copilot’s seat with him and pulled out a chip, which he pressed into the controls for the ship’s intercom system. He grinned as music warbled out of the speakers, too-loud and tinny but uplifting all the same, and then he was taking off into the stars.