Welcome to stories from Among the Stars. You're listening to The Last Watch by J.S. Dewas.

Chapter 6

What must have been moments after second shift ended, Griffith arrived at Adequin's door with the bottle of Malila whiskey in hand.

They proceeded to put away half of it during the evening's events, discussing the last batch of much delayed headlines that came in from the core, watching a bootleg film she'd confiscated from an Oculus's bunk and playing over an hour's worth of poker at which

she'd handily destroyed him.

Now she sat on the stiff couch in her quarters wallowing in the warmth of an oversized gray-titan sweatshirt,

while Griffith lay on the floor beside the couch.

Adequate tucked her legs up underneath her and nursed the remainder of the whiskey in her glass.

More?

Griffith waved the bottle at her.

No way, Centurion.

Are you trying to kill me?

He grinned.

His cheeks flushed with slight intoxication.

We should probably stop, she said.

You have to captain a ship in a few hours.

Yeah, yeah, the thing basically flies itself.

Speaking of, you wanted to finish talking about crewy vows?

She spun the last few sips around in her glass, then took another drink.

No, I wanted to talk about stepping down.

The swig of whiskey stalled at the back of Adequin's throat, and

she almost choked. It blazed a fiery path into her stomach before she managed to croak out

...