Elizabeth Moon - Once a Hero

“But Bar—Ensign Serrano is surely more important than any feud.” Even as she said that, she knew it was wrong. Family was family, but a family would not jeopardize its standing for a single individual. Hers hadn’t.

Pitak shrugged. “He’s one ensign, on a ship with over 25,000 personnel. The captain can’t let concerns about Serrano affect his primary concern: the safety of his ship.” Her gaze sharpened. “You’ve spent some time with him recently, haven’t you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Mmm. Something going on there?”

Esmay felt her face heating up. “Not really . . . we’re just friends.” It sounded as lame and false as it felt. What had she been feeling, around Barin? She hadn’t done any of the things that regulations prohibited between senior and junior officers in a chain of command, even though they weren’t in the same chain of command. But she had . . . if she was honest . . . wanted to do some of those things. If he did. He had never indicated that he did. She forced herself to look Pitak in the eye. “After he helped me at that briefing for the senior tactical discussion group, we talked a few times. I liked him, and he knew a lot of things about Fleet which they never taught us in school.”

“I’d noticed some changes,” Pitak said, without specifying their nature. “Coaching you, was he?”

“Yes,” Esmay said. “Admiral Serrano and others had mentioned that I . . . confused, I think was their term . . . people because of mannerisms which are normal on Altiplano. Barin was able to define what I was doing wrong—”

“I wouldn’t say exactly wrong,” Pitak murmured.

“And show me what the Fleet customs were.”

“I see.” Pitak rocked back and forth in her chair for a long moment, staring past Esmay’s elbow. “Suiza, everything in your record says you’re level-headed and not a troublemaker. But you’ve never had a partner, that anyone knows about. Have you?”

“No.” Direct challenge had gotten the answer out of her before she realized she was giving it. The blush came afterwards. “No, I . . . I just didn’t.”

“Umm. And you’re not on any medication that would explain it. Are you?”

“No, sir.”

Pitak sighed heavily. “Suiza, you’re ten years too old for this advice, but in some ways, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you were ten years younger. So try to take it as well-meant. You’re ripe for a fall, and Barin’s the only male you’ve spent more than a work-shift with. Whether you know it or not, you’re on the slide now . . .”

“No.” That came out in a low whisper. “I won’t . . .”

“There’s nothing wrong with it, Suiza,” Pitak said sharply. “You’re only a lieutenant; he’s an ensign—that’s a fairly common level of difference. You’re not his commander. The only problem is . . . he’s now in enemy hands, and we’ve got an emergency. I need your brain clear, your emotions steady. No racing off to do useless heroics and try to rescue your lover.”

Lover? Her heart pounded; her stomach was doing freefall into her boots. “He’s not . . .”

Pitak snorted, so like a lead mare that Esmay was startled into a grin. “Young woman, whether you have actually been skin to skin or not, he is the first man you’ve cared about since you were grown. That’s clear enough. Admit it, and you’ll deal with it better.”

Could she admit it? Was it true? She had had those vague wishes, those inchoate fantasies . . . Barin’s hands would not be like those other hands. The uniform was different. She dragged herself away from all that, and fought down the flutter in her diaphragm. “I . . . do care . . . a lot . . . what happens to him. I—we hadn’t talked about—anything else.” She almost said “yet” and saw that Major Pitak had added it without hearing it.

“All right. Now you’ve faced it, and now you have to face this: you and I have nothing to do with the search for Barin, for the intruders, for anything else. It’s our job to get Wraith back in service before a Bloodhorde battle group pops out here and blows us all away—or worse, captures us. Whatever happens to Barin Serrano cannot be as bad as the capture of this ship by the enemy. Is that clear?”

“Yes, sir.” It was clear, in the part of her mind that was free to think clearly. The word “capture” rang in her mind with the finality of steel on stone. If they did not do their work, they might all be captives . . . and she knew she could not handle that. The vision sparkled in her mind—the quiet, competent, ordinary Lieutenant Suiza going completely and irrevocably crazy, the moment she became a captive again. However much she cared for Barin . . . she could not let that happen.

“Good. I didn’t think you’d do anything foolish, but the little I know about Altiplano suggests that you might have triggers set which would push you into some stupid rescue attempt.”

“They are going to try one, though, aren’t they?” Esmay asked.

“I don’t know.” Pitak looked away. “The most critical thing is to find the intruders before they do any significant damage. Rescuing one ensign has to be a lower priority. What’s really twisting the captain’s tail is the fear that they’ll disable the self-destruct.”

“The self-destruct?”

“Yes. The captain is not about to let us be captured by the Bloodhorde—they could build cruisers with this facility and the expertise of our people. He’s told the admirals that he’ll blow us up first.”

“Good,” Esmay said, before she thought. Pitak looked at her oddly.

“Most of us aren’t happy about that,” Pitak said. “We admit the necessity but . . . you like it?”

“Better than captivity,” Esmay said. The tremors were gone; the fear receded.

“Well. You never cease to amaze, Suiza. Since your brain seems to be working well enough, I’ll answer some questions you’ll no doubt ask in five minutes if I don’t. We aren’t jumping out of this system, because we can’t. I don’t know why. It might be that the intruders sabotaged the FTL drive . . . it might be that the fast-sequence jumps we did coming in shook something loose. Drives and Maneuver is on it. I need you to do a search, since you’re good at that: if we assume that the fast-sequence jumps caused some structural damage or shift, what would it be?”

“Yes, sir.”

“If you come up with anything, buzz me. We’ve got those Wraith structural supports coming over the line, and I need to be there for the installation.” She started out the door, and then turned back. “Oh yes: the new procedures are that no one goes anywhere alone, and that includes the head. We know that at least one of the intruders now has a current ID badge—no doubt they’d like more. The captain may decide to firewall the ship, but right now there’s not enough security personnel to man the access points. We’re supposed to be alert for any strangers, anyone we’re not used to seeing around, though on a ship this size that’s not much use. I certainly wouldn’t know half the instructors over in T-1 by sight, let alone the students.” She sighed. “This is going to be a real bitch to implement. Rekeying thousands of IDs every day, and rechecking all personnel they’re given to. All of us wearing tagtales, all of us going around in bunches.”

“Are we all going to move into open bays for sleeping?”

“I hope not.” Pitak scrubbed at her head. “I can’t sleep like that anymore; I’m old enough to be wakened by snorers. But it may come to that, though it means leaving a lot of compartments vacant—which can only help the intruders. Anyway, the captain’s asked the flags for more personnel for security—and I understand there were words exchanged about that between our admiral and Livadhi. But we’ve got to get Wraith back in action. If, as we suspect, there’s a Bloodhorde battle group coming here to pick us off, we’ll need every bit of help we can get.”