"What I want you to do now, Aldona, is to sit down with Collin and Franklin. They'll bring along some of our own newspeople, and the three of you will work with them to come up with the most effective way to spin what happened in New Tuscany to suit our needs. Given our allegations about Green Pines, a goodsized chunk of the Solly media is going to be salivating for anything that puts Manticore in a bad light, which should help a lot, and now that you've brought us all that raw sensor data from both incidents—not to mention those nice authentication codes—we can get started on a little creative reinterpretation of our own for the Sollies. I've got a few ideas on how best to go about that myself, but you've demonstrated a genuine talent for this sort of thing, so sit down and see what you can come up with on your own, first. Thanks to the streak drive, we've got two weeks to massage the story here on Mesa any way we have to before it could possibly get to us by any normal dispatch boat. I want to use that time as effectively as possible."

"I understand."

"Good. And, in the meantime, although you really don't have the need to know this, there's going to be another little news story in about two more T-months."

"There is?" Anisimovna glanced around, puzzled by the sudden, predatory smiles of all three Detweilers.

"Oh, there certainly is!" Albrecht told her, then waved at Benjamin. "Tell her," he said.

"Well, Aldona," Benjamin said, "in about another two months, a little operation we've been working on for some time, one called Oyster Bay, is going to come to fruition. And when it does—"

Captain (JG) Ginger Lewis was not filled with confidence as she headed down the passageway aboard HMSS Weyland towards Rear Admiral Tina Yeager's office. It wasn't because she felt any worry over her ability to discharge her new duties. It wasn't even because she'd started her career as enlisted, without so much as dreaming she might attain her present rank. For that matter, it wasn't even because she'd just been assigned to the Royal Manticoran Navy's primary R&D facility when all her actual experience had been acquired in various engineering departments aboard deployed starships.

No, it was because she hadn't seen a single happy face since she'd arrived aboard Weyland half an hour before. Most people, she suspected, would have felt at least a qualm or two at being the new kid, just reporting in, when something had so obviously hit the rotary air impeller.

I wonder if it's just over here in R&D or if Aubrey and Paulo are about to get the same treatment? she wondered. Then she snorted. Well, even if they are, Paulo has Aubrey to take care of him.

The thought made her smile as she remembered Aubrey Wanderman's first deployment. Which, by the strangest turn of events, had also been her first deployment. She'd been quite a few years older than him, but they'd completed their naval training school assignments together, and she'd sort of taken him under her wing. He'd needed it, too. It was hard to remember now how young he'd been or that it had all happened almost fourteen T-years years ago. Sometimes it seemed like only yesterday, and sometimes it seemed like something that had happened a thousand years ago, to someone else entirely. But she remembered how shiny and new he'd been, how disappointed he'd been at being assigned to "only" a "merchant cruiser" . . . until, at least, he'd discovered that the captain of the merchant cruiser in question was then-Captain Honor Harrington.

Her smile faded just a bit as she remembered the clique of bullies and would-be deserters who'd made Aubrey's life a living hell, at least until Captain Harrington had found out about it. And the way she'd found out about it had been when their attempt to murder a certain acting petty officer by the name of Ginger Lewis had failed and Aubrey, who'd fallen under the influence of Chief Petty Officer Horace Harkness and HMSWayfarer 's Marine detachment, had beaten their ringleader half to death with his bare hands. She was still a bit surprised she'd survived the sabotaged software of her EVA propulsion pack, and she knew she hadn't emerged from the experience unscarred. Even now, all these years later, she hated going EVA—which, unfortunately, came the way of the engineering department even more than anyone else.

Still, there was a world—a universe— of difference between that once-bullied young man and Senior Chief Petty Officer Aubrey Wanderman.

And , she thought a bit enviously, neither he nor Paulo is going to have to report in to someone with the towering seniority of a flag officer. Lucky bastards .

Her woolgathering had carried her successfully down the passage to Rear Admiral Yaeger's door. Now, however, she bade a regretful farewell to its distraction and stepped through the open door.

The yeoman seated behind the desk in the outer office looked up at her, then rose respectfully.

"Yes, Ma'am?"

"Captain Lewis," Ginger replied. "I'm reporting aboard, Chief."

"Yes, Ma'am. That would be Delta Department, wouldn't it, Ma'am?"

"Yes, it would." Ginger eyed him speculatively. Any flag officer's yeoman worth her salt was going to keep up with the details of her admiral's appointments and concerns. Keeping track of the comings and goings of officers who hadn't even known themselves the day before that they were about to be assigned to Weyland was a bit more impressive than usual, however.

"I thought so, Ma'am." The yeoman's expression didn't actually change by a single millimeter, yet somehow he managed to radiate a sense of over-tried patience—or perhaps a better word would have been exasperation. Fortunately, none of it seemed to be directed towards Ginger.

"I'm afraid the Admiral 's unavailable at the moment, Ma'am," the yeoman continued. "And so is Lieutenant Weaver, her flag lieutenant. It's, ah, an unscheduled meeting with the station commander."

Ginger managed to keep her eyes from widening. An "unscheduled meeting" with Weyland 's CO, was it? No wonder she'd sensed a certain tension in the air.

"I see . . . Chief Timmons," she said after a moment, reading the yeoman's nameplate. "Would it happen we have any idea when Admiral Yeager might be free?"

"Frankly, Ma'am, I'm afraid it might be quite some time." Timmons' expression remained admirably grave. "That's why I wanted to confirm that you were the officer Delta's been expecting."

"And since I am?"

"Well, Ma'am, I thought in that case you might go down to Delta and report in to Captain Jefferson. He's Delta Division's CO. I thought perhaps he might be able to start getting you squared away, and then you could report to the Admiral when she's free again."

"Do you know, Chief, I think that sounds like a perfectly wonderful idea," Ginger agreed.

* * *

"Well, that was an interesting cluster fuck, wasn't it?"

Vice Admiral Claudio Faraday, the commanding officer of HMSS Weyland , was known for a certain pithiness. He also had a well-developed sense of humor, although, Tina Yeager noted, there was no trace of it in his voice at the moment.

"Would it happen," Faraday continued, "that tucked away somewhere in your subordinate officers' files, between their voluminous correspondence, their instruction manuals, their schedules, their research notes, their ham sandwiches, and their entertainment chips, they actually possess a copy of this station's emergency evacuation plan?"