Elizabeth Moon - Once a Hero

But his silence dragged another sentence out of her. “I loved the thought of going into space,” she said. And felt herself flushing, the telltale heat on her face and neck. She hated her fair skin that always showed her emotions.

“Ah,” he said, touching his stylus to his datapad. “Well, Lieutenant, that will be all.” For now , his look said. It could not be the end of questioning; that wasn’t how things worked. Esmay said nothing except the polite formula he expected, and went back to her temporary quarters.

She had not realized until the second or third shift aboard the flagship that only she, of the young mutineers, had a private compartment. She wasn’t sure why, since there were three other women, all crammed into one compartment. She’d have been happy to share—well, not happy, but willing—but the admiral’s orders left no room for argument, as Esmay found when she asked the officer assigned as their keeper if she could change the arrangement. He’d looked disgusted, and told her no so firmly that her eardrums rattled.

So she had privacy, if she wanted it. She could lie on her bunk (someone else’s bunk, but hers for the duration), and remember. And try to think. She didn’t really like either, not alone. She had the kind of mind that worked best alongside others, striking sparks from her own and others’ intransigence. Alone, it whirred uselessly, recycling the same thoughts over and over.

But the others did not want to talk about what bothered her. No, that was not quite honest. She did not want to talk to them about those things either. She did not want to talk about how she felt when she saw the first casualties of the mutiny—how the smell of blood and scorched decking affected her, how it brought back memories she had hoped were gone forever.

War isn’t clean anywhere, Esmay . Her father had said that, when she’d told him she wanted to go into space, wanted to become a Fleet officer. Human blood and human guts smell the same; human cries sound the same .

She had said she knew it; she had thought she knew it. But those hours in the orchard, looking up at the distant stars, clean light on clean darkness . . . she had hoped for something better. Not security, no: she was too much her father’s child to wish for that. But something clean-edged, the danger sharpened by vacuum and weapons that vaporized . . .

She had been wrong, and now she knew it in every reluctant cell of her body.

“Esmay?” Someone tapped on her door. Esmay glanced at the timer and sat up hurriedly. She must have dozed off.

“I’m coming,” she said. A quick glance in the mirror; she had the flyaway sort of hair that always needed something done to it. If it had been acceptable, she’d have cut it a centimeter long and let it be. She swiped at it, both hands, and palmed the door control. Peli outside, looking worried.

“Are you all right? You weren’t at lunch, and now—”

“Another interview,” Esmay said quickly. “And I wasn’t really hungry anyway. I’m coming.” She wasn’t hungry now, either, but skipping meals brought the psychnannies down on you, and she had no desire to be interviewed by yet another set of inquiring minds.

Supper sat uneasily in her stomach; she sat in the crowded little wardroom not really listening to the others talk. It was mostly guesses about where they were, and when they would arrive, and how long it would take to convene the court. Who would sit on it, who would represent them, how much trouble this would cause them in the future.

“Not as much as being under Captain Hearne if she’d gotten away with it,” Esmay heard herself say. She hadn’t meant to say anything, but she knew she was the only one really at risk in court. And here they were chattering away as if all that mattered was a possible black mark that might keep them from promotion ahead of their group.

They stared at her. “What do you mean?” Liam Livadhi asked. “Hearne couldn’t have gotten away with it. Not unless she took the ship straight over to the Benignity—” He stopped, looking suddenly pale.

“Exactly,” Esmay said. “She could have done that, if Dovir and the other loyalists hadn’t stopped her. And we could all be Benignity prisoners.” Dead, or worse than. The others looked at her as if she had suddenly sprouted a full suit of battle armor with weaponry. “Or she could have told Fleet that Heris Serrano was the traitor, that the accusations were false, and she had fled to save her ship and crew from a maniac. She could have assumed that no one could defeat a Benignity assault group with only two warships.” And even Heris Serrano had not done so; Esmay had recognized the peril even as she ended it. Without her own decisive entry into battle, Serrano would have perished, and all witnesses to Hearne’s treachery with her.

Peli and Liam looked at Esmay with more respect than she’d had from them yet, even in battle. “I never thought of all that,” Peli said. “It never occurred to me that Hearne could have gotten away with it . . . but you’re right. We might not even have known—only those on the bridge actually heard Captain Serrano’s challenge. If one more bridge officer had been a Benignity agent—”

“We’d be dead.” Liam rumpled his Livadhi-red hair. “Ouch. I don’t like the thought that I might have disappeared that way.”

Arphan scowled. “Surely they’d have ransomed us. I know my family—”

“Traders!” Liam said, in a tone that made it sound like a cognate of traitors. “I suppose your Family does business with them, eh?”

Arphan jumped up, eyes blazing. “I don’t have to be insulted by people like you —”

“As a matter of fact, you do,” Liam said, leaning back. “I outrank you, trade-born infant. You’re still just an ensign, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“No quarreling,” Esmay said. This she could handle. “Livadhi, he can’t help who his family is. Arphan, Livadhi is your senior; show respect.”

“Whooo,” murmured Peli. “The ex-captain remembers the feel of command.” But his tone was more admiring than scornful. Esmay was able to grin at him.

“As a matter of fact, I do. And keeping you juniors from messing each other’s uniforms is easier than fighting a battle. Shall we keep it that way?”

Expressions ranging from surprise to satisfaction met her gaze; she kept the smile on her face and eventually they all smiled back.

“Sure, Esmay,” Livadhi said. “I’m sorry, Arphan—I shouldn’t have chosen this time, if any, to slang your family. Lieutenant Suiza’s right. Friends?” He held out his hand. Arphan, still scowling, finally shook it, muttering something about being sorry. It did not escape Esmay’s notice that he had chosen a combination of address which claimed her as a friend, while emphasizing her authority to Arphan. She could do that sort of thing if she thought of it, but she had to think; Liam Livadhi, and the others born into Fleet families, seemed to do it as naturally as breathing.

The conference room had been swept and garnished, ensuring that it was empty of the security demons whose probing eyes and ears, and busy tongues, would have had a field day. Outside, two offices away, an efficient receptionist would deal with any calls; the rest of the staff were busy on assigned projects. The three partners who had formed Special Materials Analysis Consulting looked at the moment more like business rivals than old friends. Arhos Asperson, short, compact, dark-haired, leaned forward, elbows on the polished table, as Gori Lansamir reported on the results of clandestine research. Across from him, Losa Aguilar lay back in her chair, consciously opposing him in gesture as in attitudes. The lounging posture did not suit her; with her lean body went an energy usually expressed in action.