Ashes Of Victory

Of course, it doesn't do much to help with therapy time — except to let me get started a little faster. And thank God Daddy was right about how much easier it would be to get used to the nerves and eye this time!

Her mouth quirked at the reflection, and for the first time in thirty-four standard months, she felt the left side of her mouth move and her left cheek dimple. The sensation seemed decidedly unnatural after so long, and the contrast between the reports of the newly replaced artificial nerves and the natural ones on the other side only made it more so. But at least her face was alive once more... and this time around, she hadn't had to spend weeks with the muscles jerking and twitching uncontrollably at random intervals. She still had to concentrate on what she wanted her face to do when she chewed or changed her expression deliberately, but that was fine. The naturalness of expression would return soon enough, and she was profoundly grateful to have been spared the dreary task of learning how to control her own face from scratch all over again.

Despite her brave words to her mother, she hadn't really allowed herself to fully believe her father when he assured her that would be the case. Her memories of the first time around were too clear, and she hadn't dared risk the potential disappointment if she read too much into his assurances. But he'd been right, and now she felt a bit guilty for having doubted. Even the new eye was working smoothly, although she was still experiencing a bit of visual disorientation. The programmers hadn't hit the software exactly right, and the self-correcting features were still zeroing in on controlling image brightness and contrast and coordinating those qualities with her natural eye's acuity properly. It was getting better, though, and while she hadn't even begun mastering the eye's new features, all the old ones had been programmed to use the same muscle commands as her old eye had used. For the present, the new features were simply switched off until she felt comfortable with the old ones and with the control of her face. There would be time enough to bring the new capabilities on-line... and at the moment, she needed no extra distractions, because her new arm had been attached, as well.

Her small smile turned into something much more like a grimace at the thought of the new limb. She was delighted to have at least started learning to use it, of course. In fact, she told herself that almost hourly... every time the unwieldy thing swung wide and smacked into a door frame as she went by, or flicked sideways suddenly in response to some neural command she'd never meant to give it. Her sheer clumsiness (except that it wasn't really 'her' clumsiness) was maddening, especially for a woman who'd spent decades training in the martial arts. But at least the software contained programmable overrides. She had to leave them off-line most of the time, not just during scheduled therapy and practice sessions, because she needed to get used to the fact that the arm was there again and gain control of its unintentional jerks and movements. But the override software let her lock the arm down completely, allowing her to carry it in a sling, neatly out of the way and without endangering any unfortunate passerby, for public occasions. The next level up restricted the arm to a series of limited movements that the arm's built-in AI recognized as ones she had mastered on a conscious level. The basic package was more flexible than she'd expected, offering her several intermediate levels of override, but she wasn't sure she liked having them. No, that wasn't accurate. What she wasn't sure of was that having them was a good idea, however convenient it might be in the short term. She half-feared she would be tempted to overuse them. In fact, she'd already caught herself doing just that, and justifying it on the basis of how much she had to do and the need to keep the limb under control while she attended to it all. But at least she had caught herself, and she was working hard on avoiding that particular temptation. The possibility she was actually more afraid of in the long run, however, was that she might settle for less than the best degree of control she could obtain, and rely on the software to let her get by with an agility and coordination that were merely 'good enough.'

But for tonight, at least, she had no qualms about using the override. It would never have done for the hostess' left arm to go flailing about amid the glassware and silver, after all! That would hardly contribute to the impression of the calm, capable senior officer she wanted to project. And considering the mix of whom she was inviting to her current round of dinners, it was particularly important that she project the image of someone who knew what she was doing... and what she was talking about.

She sipped her after-dinner cocoa and studied this evening's guests as she pondered on why that was true.

Andrea Jaruwalski, her strong features no longer a haunted mask, sat to her left. Jaruwalski had made enormous strides in regaining her self-confidence since Honor had chosen her as her ATC aide. The fact that she'd been allowed hands-on participation in Honor's reshaping of the Crusher and that she'd gained the rueful respect of the current crop of ATC students for her cunning and nastiness as the opposition force commander hadn't hurt, of course. The biggest factor, though, appeared to be that she knew the rest of the Navy was coming around to Honor's view of what had really happened in Seaford Nine. She seemed to give Honor complete credit for that, although Honor felt that that was overgenerous of her. In either case, what really mattered was that the Navy wasn't going to shoot itself in the foot by depriving itself of one of its better tactical officers.

Nimitz and Samantha, of course, sat to Honor's immediate right, sharing a special, double-perch highchair MacGuiness had designed for them, but Rear Admiral of the Red Jackson Kriangsak, Honor's executive officer at ATC, sat just beyond them. If the somewhat plump, dark-haired admiral had any problem with sitting 'one place down' from a pair of silken-furred arboreals, he'd given no sign of it. More to the point, Honor had sensed nothing but amusement from him when he discovered the seating arrangements, and he was fascinated by Samantha. He'd made a point of speaking directly to her during the meal, a courtesy even many Sphinxians often failed to extend to 'cats. Honor had noticed him slipping her an extra stick of celery from his own salad plate, and the admiral had also made a point of congratulating Nimitz on his rapid recovery from his own latest round of surgery.

Six more officers and eighteen midshipmen stretched down either side of the long table beyond Kriangsak and Jaruwalski, and Mike Henke, whose ship was back in the Star Kingdom, attached to Home Fleet while she awaited assignment to one of the forward fleets, sat facing Honor from its foot. Now Honor let her eyes linger on those midshipmen — who, in a very real sense, were the true reason for this entire dinner — and saw Midshipman Theodore twitch as if someone had just kicked him under the table. Which someone almost certainly had, Honor thought cheerfully as she saw Midshipwoman Theresa Markovic frown at Theodore and then cut her eyes meaningfully to his almost untouched wineglass.

Theodore looked at her blankly for a moment, and then his face turned an interesting shade of magenta as understanding struck. He was the most junior officer present, even if a midshipman was no more than a larva in the cycle that turned civilians into Queen's officers, and that carried certain traditional obligations. One of which he'd obviously forgotten until someone bruised his kneecap. Now he rose abruptly and grabbed at his glass. It almost spilled, which darkened his blush still further, but then he drew a deep breath and visibly got a grip on himself. As a third-generation prolong recipient, he looked about thirteen T-years old, and his voice cracked just a bit as he cleared his throat, raised his glass, and announced the toast.

'Ladies and Gentlemen, the Queen!'

'The Queen!' the response rumbled back, and Honor raised her own wineglass and sipped. The burgundy tasted a little strange on the heels of hot cocoa, and she felt Nimitz's laughing amusement in the back of her brain as he shared the experience.

Wineglasses were lowered around the table, and side conversations began once again, but the formalities weren't quite finished, and Honor glanced at Midshipwoman Abigail Hearns. The young woman looked back for a moment, then stood, drawing a deep breath of her own, if less obviously than Theodore had, and raised her own glass.

'Ladies and Gentlemen,' she announced in a soft, foreign accent, 'I give you Grayson, the Keys, the Sword, and the Tester!'

There was a moment of consternation before the other glasses rose once more, and Honor hid a wicked smile as the other officers and midshipmen stumbled through the response. One or two got it right; the rest clearly hoped their imperfect efforts were lost in the general mumble, and she found it hard not to giggle at the emotions flowing back to her from her guests. With the exception of Mike Henke and, she suspected, Andrea Jaruwalski, none of the others had ever heard the Grayson loyalty toast, and it was darned well time they did. Honor's other Navy had paid for its equality with the RMN in blood and courage, and she was determined to see that it received it.

She let Hearns see just a small smile of approval, and the young woman sank back into her seat. Honor could taste the youngster's vast relief, and she set her own wineglass back down and reached over to rub Nimitz's ears, partly to give Hearns a chance to settle completely back down. The midshipwoman was a good two T-years older than Theodore, but in many ways, what she'd just done had been even harder for her than it had for the