"She did?" Honor sat straighter, her chocolate-dark eyes brightening suddenly. "She's early."
"Yes, My Lady."
"Thank you, Spencer. Simon," she leaned forward, looking past Hawke to the armsman in the pilot's place, "contact the escort and turn us around, Simon. We're going to the spaceport to pick up my parents."
"Now, then, Honor Stephanie Harrington," Allison Harrington said sternly, "what in the world has your panties in such a knot?"
Honor, Nimitz, and her parents were alone together for the first time since their arrival. Allison and Alfred Harrington sat in Honor's office while she stood facing the crystoplast wall, arms crossed, with Nimitz on her shoulder, but she had no attention to spare for her favorite view of Jason Bay. The twins had been handed off to Jennifer LaFollet, Allison's Grayson-born personal maid, and Lindsey Phillips, their Manticoran nanny, after properly affectionate greetings, but Honor had tasted her mother's concern as Allison watched her with Faith and James. She'd often thought Allison had a lot in common with treecats, and her ability to read her daughter's mood and body language so acutely was one of the reasons.
"What makes you think anything has my underwear tangled, Mother?" Honor replied now, turning back from the bay to face her. She unfolded her arms and reached up to scratch Nimitz's chin soothingly with her right hand.
"Oh, please, Honor!" Allison rolled her eyes, then waved at Nimitz. "That furry little henchman of yours is as tightly wired as I've ever seen him. Certainly since the day the two of you snuck off for that first trip to his home range which I'm sure you both continue to fondly imagine your father and I knew nothing about." Honor's eyes widened, and Allison snorted. "And as for you, young lady! I've never seen you as skittish around the kids as you were this afternoon. So, what is it?"
"Oh, nothing much." Honor's voice wavered slightly around the edges, undermining her attempt at nonchalance. "I just got a little... unexpected medical news this morning."
She looked back out at the bay, then faced her mother's eyes.
"I'm pregnant, Momma," she said quietly.
For a moment, Allison-and Honor's father-both seemed as totally clueless as she'd felt when Frazier informed her. Both of them recovered from the instant of total non-comprehension much more quickly than she had, however. Probably, she thought, with a flicker of half-bitter amusement, because they weren't the ones who were pregnant!
The quick, bright flare of their emotions once the news truly registered upon them was too powerful and complex for her to sort out clearly. Astonishment. Consternation. A bright flash of joy, especially from her mother. A sudden surge of concern, tenderness. Protectiveness, especially from her father. And wrapped around all of it an abrupt spike of concern as their reaction to the news took them to the place it had already taken her.
"Hamish?" her mother said, and Honor nodded, feeling her eyes brim with tears. She'd never discussed her relationship with Hamish with her parents, but both of them were highly intelligent and knew her altogether too well.
"Yes," she said, and Allison opened her arms. Honor stepped into her embrace, hugging her mother's small, immensely comforting form tightly, and her father reached out to stroke her hair as he'd done when she was a very small girl.
"Oh, my," Allison sighed. Then she shook her head ruefully. "You simply can't do anything the easy way, can you, dear?"
"Apparently not," Honor agreed with a slightly watery chuckle.
"The timing could have been better." Her father's observation was totally unnecessary, but she chuckled again at the dry, tender amusement in his tone. "What about your implant?" he asked after a moment.
"Ran out," she said. She gave her mother another squeeze, then stood back and shrugged. "We haven't had time to figure out exactly how it happened, but there was a glitch in my records. Neither Doctor Frazier nor I realized that it had run out months ago."
"Honor," Allison said reproachfully. "Your parents are both doctors. How often have you heard us say it's the patient's responsibility, as well as the physician's, to keep track of things like that?"
"I know, Mother. I know." Honor shook her head. "Believe me, you can't scold me for that any harder than I've already scolded myself. But there was just so much going on...."
"Yes, there was." Allison touched her forearm remorsefully. "And you don't need my scolding you about it on top of everything else, either. I suppose it's just the shock of discovering I'm about to be a grandmother."
"Are you, Allison?" Alfred Harrington asked gently, and his wife's head snapped around abruptly. Allison Chou Harrington was a Beowulfer by birth. More than that, she was a daughter of one of the great medical "dynasties" of Beowulf. For her, the termination of a pregnancy was unthinkable, except under the most unusual possible circumstances. Something out of the barbaric era before medicine had made so many alternatives available.
She started to open her mouth, then visibly stopped herself, and Honor could actually feel her throttling her immediate, instinctive protest. Then she inhaled sharply and turned back to her daughter.
"Am I, Honor?" she asked quietly, and Honor felt a deep, sudden surge of love as Allison asked the question without a trace of pressure either way.
"I don't know," Honor said, after a moment. Despite all Allison could do, hurt flickered in her eyes, and Honor shook her head quickly. "I'm not going to have it terminated, Mother," she said. "But I may not be able to acknowledge the child."
Allison frowned.
"I realize this could be very awkward for you, Honor. Both personally and politically. But you and Hamish have responsibilities."
"I'm fully aware of that, Mother," Honor replied, just a bit more sharply than she'd intended to. She heard her own tone, and made a small, quick gesture of apology. "I'm aware," she continued, her voice calmer than it had been. "And I intend to meet them. But I've got to consider all of the possible consequences, not just for the child, or for me and Hamish, or for... anyone else, on a personal level. And it may be that placing the child for adoption would be the best alternative."
She met her mother's gaze steadily as she said the last sentence, and Allison looked back for a long, still moment. Then she shook her head.
"That's the last thing in the universe you want to do, isn't it, Honor?" she said very, very softly.
"Yes," Honor admitted, equally softly. She inhaled deeply. "Yes, it is," she said more briskly, "but I may not have a choice."
"The one thing you can't do," her father said, "is decide too quickly. If you make the wrong decision here, it will haunt you. You know that."
"Yes, I do. But it's a decision I can't take too long making, either. I'm due to deploy in two weeks, Daddy, and not aboard a passenger ship. Even if Regs didn't completely prohibit shipboard pregnancies, it would be criminally negligent to take a fetus into that sort of environment."
"Even so, there's no medical reason you have to rush things," he argued gently. "You've already ruled out simply terminating the pregnancy. Obviously, that means tubing or a surogacy. And if you're going to have the child tubed, you're talking about a routine out-patient procedure. Your mother's a geneticist, not an OB, but she could perform the procedure in a half-hour."
"You're right," Honor said. "I am going to have to have her-or him-tubed. And," her voice wavered again, very slightly, as she looked at her mother, "you were right, too, all those years ago, when you told me I'd understand why you didn't have me tubed when it was my turn. I don't want to. God, how I don't want to!" She pressed a palm gently to her flat, firm belly and blinked hard. "But I simply don't have that option."