Honor Among Enemies

your record, and I regret that your return to Manticoran uniform has to take place under such circumstances. But in case no one else has told you, we're all delighted to have you back.'

'Thank you, Sir.' Honor felt her cheekbones heating once more, but she met his gaze steadily and saw the approval in his eyes.

'In that case, Milady, I'll let you and Commander Cardones get started.' Cortez held out his hand once more. 'You've got a big job ahead of you, Captain, and you're facing some constraints you shouldn't have to. But if anyone can get it done, I feel certain you're the one. In case we don't see one another again before you ship out, good luck and good hunting.'

'Thank you, Sir,' Honor repeated, squeezing his hand hard. 'We'll do our best.'

Chapter SEVEN

Honor leaned back in her chair to massage her aching eyes.

She'd been quartered in Vulcan’s 'Captains' Row' until she could move aboard Wayfarer, and her cabin was spacious enough. Smaller than the one she would occupy aboard her Q-ship and much smaller than the one she'd given up aboard the superdreadnought Terrible, but large by Navy standards and ample for comfort. Unfortunately, she was finding little opportunity to enjoy that comfort, or, for that matter, even the time to work out in Vulcan’s senior officers' gym. The paperwork always piled a light-year deep when a new captain assumed command of a ship, and it was worse when that ship came straight from yard hands. Add the sea of documents, electronic and hardcopy, involved in assembling any squadron, then put it all under the pressure of a rushed deployment date, and there was hardly time to breathe, much less exercise... or sleep.

She grinned wryly, for if she had reams of paper to deal with, Rafe Cardones had more. A captain commanded a ship and held ultimate responsibility for every aspect of its operation and safety, but the exec managed that ship. It was her job to organize its crew, stores, maintenance, training schedules, and every other aspect of its operations so smoothly her captain hardly noticed all she was doing. It was a tall order, but a necessary one... and it was also why a stint as exec was usually the Navy's final test of an officers ability to command her own ship. That would have been enough to keep any officer busy, but the Admiralty hadn't assigned Honor a staff. It made sense, she conceded, given that her 'squadron' would almost certainly be split up into divisions or individual units rather than operate as a whole, yet it meant Rafe also had to shoulder the burden of an acting flag captain's role in addition to all the duties his post as Wayfarer's exec imposed.

But even though the pressure-cooker urgency of getting the squadron ready for deployment added measurably to Rafe's arduous schedule, he was doing an exemplary job. He'd taken over full responsibility for coordinating with the yard dogs, and he and Chief Archer, her yeoman, were intercepting everything they could, whether specific to Wayfarer or to the squadron as a whole, before it reached her plate. She recognized and appreciated their efforts, but she was ultimately responsible for all of it. The best they could do was to get it so organized and arranged that all she had to do was sign off on the decisions they'd already made, and, frankly, they were proving very, very good at it.

Which wasn't going to save her from the report on her display.

She finished rubbing her eyes, took a sip of cocoa from the mug MacGuiness had left at her elbow, and returned doggedly to her duty. Archer had highlighted the summaries for each section, and it was really more Cardones' job than Honor’s to deal with most of the items. He'd entered his own solutions at most of the decision points, and though one or two weren't quite the answers Honor would have chosen, she made herself consider each dispassionately. So far, they all looked workable, even if she might have done them differently, and some were actually better than her own first reaction would have been. What mattered most, though, was that they were Rafe's decisions to make. She had to sign off on them, but he had a right to do things his way as long as he handed her a ship that was an efficient, functional weapon when she needed it. Under the circumstances, she had no intention of overriding him unless he screwed up in some major way, and the chance of that happening was virtually nonexistent.

She reached the bottom of the endless report at last and sighed again, this time with satisfaction. The entire half-meg document had required only six decisions from her, and that was far better than most captains could have anticipated. She dashed a signature across the scan pad, entered the command to save her own modifications, and dumped the entire document back into Archers queue.

One down, she thought, and punched for the next. A document header appeared, and she groaned. Hydroponics. She hated hydroponic inventories! Of course they were vital, but they always went on and on and on and on. She took another sip of cocoa and cast an envious glance up at Nimitz, snoring gently on his perch above her desk, then gritted her teeth to dive back in.

But her dive was interrupted as the admittance chime sounded. Her eyes, natural and cybernetic alike, lit with pleasure at the thought of a reprieve, however temporary, from nutrients, fertilizers, seed banks, and filtration systems, and she pressed the stud on her desk.

'Yes?'

'A visitor, My Lady,' LaFollet’s voice said. 'Your Flight Ops officer wants to pay his respects.'

'Ah?' Honor rubbed her nose in surprise. Flight Ops was one slot she and Rafe had been unable to fill, and it was one of the more important ones. So if Rafe had picked her visitor for the duty without even speaking to her, the officer in question must have excellent credentials.

'Ask him to come in, Andrew,' she said, and rose behind her desk as the hatch slid open. To her surprise, LaFollet didn't precede the newcomer through it. She was quite certain she was safe from assassins aboard Vulcan, yet for Andrew to let anyone into her presence unescorted unless she specifically instructed him to constituted a shocking breach in his professional paranoia.

But then she saw the young lieutenant who stepped through the hatch, and she smiled hugely.

'Lieutenant Tremaine, reporting for duty, Ma'am,' Scotty Tremaine said, and braced to attention with Saganami Island precision. A burly, battered looking man in the uniform of a senior chief petty officer followed him and came to attention to his right and a half pace behind him.

'Senior Chief Gunner's Mate Harkness, reporting for duty, Ma'am,' the petty officer rumbled, and Honor's smile became a grin.

'If it isn't the dreadful duo!' she chuckled, moving quickly around her desk and reaching out to grasp Tremaine's hand. 'Who agreed to let you two aboard my ship?'

'Well, Commander Cardones said he was getting desperate, Ma'am,' Tremaine replied with an irrepressible twinkle. 'Since he couldn't find any qualified personnel, he figured he'd just have to make do with us.'

'What is the Navy coming to?' Honor gave Tremaine's hand a final squeeze and released it to offer her own hand to Harkness in turn. The SCPO with the prizefighter's face looked acutely embarrassed for a moment, then took it in a powerful grip.

'Actually, Ma'am,' Tremaine said more seriously, 'I was overdue for reassignment from Prince Adrian, anyway. We were in Gryphon at the time, and Captain McKeon was under orders to ship directly out to Sixth Fleet or he'd have come by in person. But when BuPers told him he had to come up with fifteen people, including an officer, for your squadron, he decided he could spare my services. As a matter of fact, he said something about getting me out of his sight and into the hands of someone he knew could 'restrain my impetuosity.'' The lieutenant wrinkled his brow. 'I don't have any idea what he meant,' he added innocently.

'Of course not,' Honor agreed with another smile. Ensign Prescott Tremaine had made his very first cruise out of the Academy with her. In fact, he'd been with her in Basilisk when it all came apart... and again in Yeltsin, she thought, smile fading. He'd been there when she learned what the Masadan butchers had done to the crew of HMS Madrigal, and though they'd never discussed it, and never would, he'd saved her career. Not many junior-grade lieutenants would have had the guts to physically restrain their squadron CO from an act of madness.

'Well,' she said, giving herself a mental shake and turning her attention to Harkness. 'I see you've