The Serrano Connection (6 page)

"Where did you develop that kind of control, then, if you don't mind my asking? Usually our intakes from colonial planets are all too easy to read."

It sounded like genuine interest; Esmay wondered if it was, and if she dared explain. "The admiral knows about my father . . . ?" she began.

"One of four sector commanders on Altiplano; I presume that means you grew up in some kind of military household. But most planetary militia are less . . . formal . . . than we are."

"It began with Papa Stefan," Esmay said. She was not entirely sure it had really begun there, because how had Papa Stefan accumulated the experience he passed on? "It's not like Fleet, but there's a hereditary military . . . at least, the leading families are."

"But your file says you were raised on a farm of some sort?"

"Estancia," Esmay said. "It's—more than a farm. And fairly big." Fairly big hardly described it; Esmay didn't even know how many hectares were in the main holding. "But Papa Stefan insisted that all the children have some military training as they grew."

"Not all military traditions value the absolute control of facial expression and emotion," the admiral commented. "I gather yours does."

"Mostly," Esmay said. She couldn't explain her own aversion to unnecessary display of emotion, without going into the whole family mess, Berthol and Sanni and the rest. Certainly Papa Stefan and her own father valued self-control, but not to the degree she practiced it.

"Well . . . I wanted you to know that you have my best wishes in this matter," the admiral said. She was smiling, a smile that seemed warm and genuine. "After all, you saved my favorite niece—excuse me, Commander Serrano—and I won't forget that, no matter what. I'll be keeping an eye on your career, Lieutenant; I think you have more potential than even you suspect."

Esmay had time to meditate on those words as the long arm of the Fleet's judicial branch separated her from the other junior officers, put her aboard a courier-escort, and whisked her to Fleet Headquarters a full eight days before the others arrived. She met her defense counsel, a balding middle-aged major who looked more like a bureaucrat than an officer; he had the incipient paunch of someone who avoided the gym except in the last few weeks before the annual physical fitness test.

"It would've made sense for them to link the cases," Major Chapin grumbled, poring over Esmay's file. "Starting at the back end, you are the hero of Xavier; you saved the planet, the system, and an admiral's niece's ass. Unfortunately—"

"It was explained to me," Esmay said.

"Good. At least none of the records are missing. We'll need to prepare separately for the Captain's Board of Inquiry and for each of the main threats of the court martial. I hope you have an organized mind—"

"I think so," Esmay said.

"Good. For the time being, forget military protocol, if you can; I'm going to call you Esmay, and you're going to call me Fred, because we have too much work to let formalities slow us down. Clear?"

"Yes, sir—Fred."

"Good. Now—tell me everything you told the investigators, and then everything you didn't tell them. The whole story of your life isn't too long. I won't get bored, and I don't know what's useful until I hear it."

In the next days, Esmay found that Major Chapin meant what he'd said. She also found herself increasingly comfortable talking to him, which made her nervous. She reminded herself that she was a grownup, not a child who could throw herself at any friendly adult when she needed comfort. She even mentioned the nightmares, the ones connected to Xavier.

"You might want to consider a psych session," he said. "If it's bothering you that much."

"It's not now," she said. "It was those first days after . . ."

"Sounds normal to me. If you're sleeping well enough to stay alert . . . there's an advantage in not going for a psych evaluation now, you see, because it might look as if we're going to plead mental incompetence."

"Oh."

"But by all means, if you need it—"

"I don't," Esmay said firmly.

"Good . . . now about this petty thievery you said was plaguing the enlisted lockers . . ."

Circumstances conspired to shift the date of the court martial so that the Captain's Board met first. Major Chapin grumbled about this, too.

"You don't take counsel to a Board of Inquiry, so you'll have to remember everything we've talked about by yourself. You can always ask for a short recess and come ask me, but it leaves a bad impression. Damn it—I wanted you to have experience before you went in alone."

"Can't be helped," Esmay said. He looked mildly surprised, which almost annoyed her. Had he expected her to complain when it could do no good? To make a useless fuss, and to him?

"I'm glad you're taking it that way. Now—if they don't bring up the matter of the damage to the nav computer, you have two choices—" That session went on for hours, until Esmay felt she understood the point of Chapin's advice, as well as the advice itself.

The morning the Board hearing began, Chapin walked her into the building and all the way to the anteroom where he would wait in case she asked for a recess and his guidance. "Chin up, Lieutenant," he said as the door opened. "Keep in mind that you won the battle and didn't lose your ship."

The Board of Inquiry made no allowances for the irregular way in which Esmay had arrived in command of
Despite
, or so it seemed from the questions. If a Jig commanded in battle, that jig had better know what she was doing, and every error Esmay made came up.

Even before the next senior officer died of wounds, why had she not prepared for command—surely that mess on the bridge could have been cleaned up faster? Esmay, remembering the near-panic, the need to secure every single compartment, check every single crew member, still thought there were more important things than cleaning blood off the command chair. She didn't say that, but she did list the other emergencies that had seemed more pressing. The Board chair, a hard-faced one-star admiral Esmay had never heard anything about, good or bad, listened to this with compressed lips and no expression she could read.

Well then, when she took command, why had she chosen to creep into one system—the right move, all agreed, given what she found—and then go blazing back into Xavier, where she had every reason to believe an enemy force lay in wait? Didn't she realize that more competent mining of the jump point entry corridor would have made that suicidal? Esmay wasn't about to argue that her decision made sense; she had followed an instinct, not anything rational, and instincts killed more often than they saved.

And why hadn't she thought of using a microjump to kill momentum earlier, when she might have saved two ships and not just one? Esmay explained about the nav computer, the need to patch a replacement chip from one of the missile-control units. And on and on, hour after hour. They seemed far less interested—in fact, not interested at all—in how the
Despite
had blown the enemy flagship, than in her mistakes. The Board replayed surveillance material, pointed out discrepancies, lectured, and when it was over at last Esmay went out feeling as if she'd been boiled until all her bones dissolved in the soup.

Major Chapin, waiting in the anteroom where he'd watched on a video link, handed her a glass of water. "You probably don't believe this, but you did as well as you could, given the circumstances."

"I don't think so." She sipped the water. Major Chapin sat watching her until she had finished that glass.

"Lieutenant, I know you're tired and probably feel that you've been pulled sideways through a wire gauge, but you need to hear this. Boards of Inquiry are supposed to be grueling. That's part of their purpose. You stood up there and told the truth; you didn't get flustered; you didn't waffle; you didn't make excuses. Your handling of the nav computer failure was perfect—you gave them the facts and then dropped it. You let Timmy Warndstadt chew you up one side and down the other, and at the end you were still on your feet answering stupid questions in a civil tone of voice. I've worked with senior commanders who did worse."

"Really?" She wasn't sure if it was hope she felt, or simply astonishment that someone—anyone—could approve of something she did.

"Really. Not only that, remember what I told you at the beginning: you didn't lose your ship and you made a decisive move in the battle. They can't ignore that, even if they think it was blind accident. And after your testimony, they're much less likely to think it was accidental. I wish they'd asked more about the details; you were right not to volunteer it, since it would've sounded like making excuses, but . . . it annoys me when they ignore briefs. I put it all in; the least they could do is read it and ask the right questions. Of course there will be negative comments; there always are, if something gets as far as a Board. But they know—whether they're willing to admit it or not—that you did well for a junior in combat for the first time."

The door opened, and Esmay had to go back. She returned to her place, facing the long table with the five officers.

"This is a complicated case," Admiral Warndstadt said. "And the Board has arrived at a complicated resolution. Lieutenant Suiza, this Board finds that your handling of the
Despite
from the time you assumed effective command after Dovir's wounds rendered him incapable of taking the bridge, to your . . . precipitous . . . return to Xavier, was within the standards expected of a Fleet captain." Esmay felt the first quiver of hope that she was not going to be tossed out on her ear, just before being imprisoned as the result of the court-martial.

Admiral Warndstadt went on, this time reading from notes. "However, your tactical decisions, when you returned to the Xavier system, were markedly substandard. This Board notes that this was your first experience of combat and your first time in command of a ship; the Board makes appropriate allowance for these circumstances. Still, the Board recommends that you not be considered for command of a Regular Space Service vessel until you have shown, in combat situations, the level of tactical and operational competence expected of warship commanders." Esmay almost nodded; as Chapin had warned her, and she already understood, they could not ignore her mistakes. Such Boards existed to point out to captains that luck, even great good luck, was no substitute for competence.

Warndstadt looked up at her again, this time with one corner of that lean mouth tucked up in what might almost be a smile. "On the other hand, the Board notes that your unorthodox maneuvers resulted in the defeat of an enemy vessel markedly superior in firepower and mass, and the successful defense of Xavier. You seem well aware of your shortcomings as commander of a ship in combat; the Board feels that your character and your deportment are both suitable for command positions in the future, as long as you get the requisite experience first. Few lieutenants junior grade command anything bigger than a shuttle anyway; the Board's recommendation should have the effect of giving you time to grow into your potential. Now—a complete transcript of the Board's recommendation will be forwarded to you and your counsel at a later date, should you wish to appeal."

She would be crazy to appeal; this was the best outcome she could have hoped for.

"Yes, sir," she said. "Thank you, sir." She got through the rest of the ritual, the dismissal of the Board and the necessary individual acknowledgement of each member, without being fully aware what she said. She wanted to fall into a bed and sleep for a month . . . but in three days, her court-martial would begin. In the meantime, she had to record her initial statements for the other courts-martial, including Commander Serrano's.

"Everything's unusual about this," Chapin said, as one who disapproved on principle of the unusual. "They had a time finding enough officers to sit on this many different boards and courts at once, and they're short of space, too. So they're shuffling people and spaces, and decided that since you're in such demand they can, after all, accept recorded testimony for some of it. With any luck, you won't actually have to appear in person in all of them . . . they certainly can't yank you out of yours just to answer two questions in some other jig's trial. It rushes you right now, but then your defense is simple anyway."

"It is?"

"In principle. Were you a conspirator, intending to commit a mutiny? No. Were you a traitor, in the pay of a foreign power? No. Simple. I expect they'll ask all the awkward questions they can think of, just so it looks good, and in case the original investigators forgot to check . . . but it's clear to me, and should be clear to them, that you were an ordinary junior officer who reacted to a developing situation—luckily, in the best interests of both Fleet and the Familias Regnant. The only problem I see . . ." He paused, and gave her a long look.

"Yes?" Esmay finally said, when waiting produced nothing but that steady stare.

"It's going to be difficult to present you as the ordinary junior officer—although your fitness reports support that, putting you right square in the middle of your class—when you became the very unordinary youngest-ever captain to blow away a Benignity heavy cruiser. They're going to want to know why you were hiding that kind of ability . . .
how
you hid that kind of ability. Why were you denying Fleet the benefit of your talent?"