"I see," she repeated, "but what I don't see, Captain, is any reason you should blame yourself for it." She felt his shoulder twitch and gave it a tiny squeeze before she removed her hand. "You couldn't have known what was coming when you endorsed his request."
"No," he said slowly, then sighed and turned back to her at last. "No, Ma'am, I didn't know what he was up to. As a matter of fact, I did know there was bad blood between you. I didn't know exactly why," he added hastily, "and, as I say, I didn't know you were coming when I signed off on his refit request. But I should have guessed he was up to something, and it never even occurred to me to wonder what. I suppose that's what I really blame myself for. I knew him, and I should have wondered, but to tell you the truth, all I wanted was to get away from Basilisk myself."
"Now that," Honor said with a grin that was only slightly forced, "I can understand! I was none too pleased to be sent there myself, and you'd already been stuck there forwhat? A T-year?"
"Just about," he replied more naturally, and his mouth twitched in a grin of its own. "The longest year of my life, I think."
"I can imagine. But, seriously, I don't blame you or anyone but Young himself, and you shouldn't either."
"If you say so, Milady." The broad-shouldered captain surprised her with a formal bow that should have made her feel ridiculous as she stood looming a full head taller than him in her dripping unitard. But it didn't, somehow.
"Well, then!" she said, "You were on your way to exercise, and I've got to get back to my paperwork. When do you think you might be free for a match?"
"Tomorrow at twelve hundred would be good." He sounded relieved by the change of subject. "I've got a work crew scheduled to start pulling the outer hull plates under Fusion Three during the first watch, and I want to be there, but I should be clear by lunch."
"Fine! I'll see you at twelve hundred, then, Captain Tankersley," Honor said with a nod, and headed for the showers with Nimitz padding along at her heels.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The battlecruiser Invincible accelerated toward her assigned target area. Captain Marguerite Daumier sat in her command chair, outwardly relaxed as she led her temporary division's firing run, but Honor suspected she was less calm than she looked, for the atmosphere on Invincible's bridge was prickly with tension.
She rubbed Nimitz's ears, her own face carefully expressionless, as she stood at the back of the bridge, silently comparing Daumier's command crew to her own. Daumier had commanded Invincible for over a T-year, and her people worked with a smooth precision Nike's bridge crew had yet to attainnot that Honor intended to admit that to a living soul. But whatever Invincible's internal command team was like, the performance of her division had been sadly substandard.
It wasn't Daumier's fault. Nor, for that matter, was it anyone else's, really. None of the three ships had ever worked together before, and there was an undeniable hesitancy to their coordination. Intolerant had actually missed a course change and maintained three hundred and eighty gravities acceleration on her old heading for over ninety seconds before Captain Trinh realized what had happened. Honor was just as glad she hadn't been on his bridge to witness his reaction when he did, and she'd half expected Sarnow to com the unfortunate offender for the express purpose of ripping his head off. But the admiral had only winced and stood watching the display in silence while Trinh fought to get back into formation.
That had been the day's most spectacular error, but it certainty hadn't been the only one. Most of them might not have been apparent to someone simply watching the exercise, but they were painfully evident to the people trying to carry it out. Despite their size, battlecruisers were far too lightly armed to oppose a wall of battle ship broadside to broadside. They had to rely on bold, perfect handling to outmaneuver larger opponents, and the same qualities were required to catch the smaller ships which were their rightful prey, for cruisers and destroyers could pull higher accelerations and were faster on the helm. Unhappily for Sarnow's captains, their ability to act and react as a unit was far below the Navy's usual standards, however good they might be as individuals.
Except for Achilles and Cassandra, that was, which must make Captain Daumier even more unhappy, Honor thought sympathetically. Commodore Isabella Banton's veteran division had operated as a team for over two T-years, and it showed as she whipped them around in obedience to Sarnow's signals. They moved as if they were a single ship, performing with a precision which brutally underscored the other ships' clumsiness. Had it come to an actual fight, Banton's two ships could probably have whipped Daumier's three, which couldn't make Daumier a very happy woman just now.
"Entering firing range, Ma'am." Invincible's tac officer sounded a bit tense, and his spine was taut, as if he were physically resisting the urge to look over his shoulder at Admiral Sarnow.
"Pass the word to the division, Com," Daumier said. "Request confirmation of their readiness."
"Aye, aye, Ma'am." The com officer bent over her panel. "All units confirm readiness, Captain," she reported after a moment."
"Thank you."
Daumier leaned back, arms folded. There was something almost prayerful in her attitude, and Honor tried hard not to smile in sympathy lest someone misinterpret her expression. She knew Daumier would have vastly preferred to slave Agamemnon's and Intolerant's weapons to Invincible's fire control, but that wasn't the purpose of the exercise. Sarnow already knew Daumier's was a crack gunnery ship; he wanted to see how the division performed in a high-speed, short-range, short-notice firing pass without the squadron tac net, and Honor suspected the answer was going to be not very well.
"Coming to final firing bearing," the tac officer said. "Beacon search initiated. Searching... searching... contact!" He waited one more moment, eyes glued to his display as the asteroid-mounted beacons mimicking hostile warships blinked at him. "Beacon ID confirmed! I have lock, Captain!"
"Fire," Daumier replied sharply, and Invincible's waiting broadside fired in instant response.
Honors eyes turned almost automatically to the visual display. It was useless for battle control, but at such a short range
A terrible, silent tornado erupted across the display as lasers and grasers tore at the inoffensive nickel-iron of Hancock's asteroid belt. Some of the smaller asteroids simply vanished, vaporizing in explosive spits of fury; others flashed like tiny stars as the beams ripped into them, and then the first missiles began to glare like small, dreadful suns, and Honor felt something almost like awe.
She'd seen more destruction unleashed in a single broadside. Indeed, she'd unleashed it herself long ago, as HMS Manticore's tac officer. But Manticore was a super-dreadnought, huge, slow, and ponderous, clumsy with her own power and designed to survive the crushing embrace of the wall of battle. This was different, somehow. There was a sense of fleetness fused with power, an awareness of the squadron's graceful lethality.
Or, she amended with a glance at the tracking display, its potential lethality, at any rate, for someone had screwed up big time.
She kept her eyes on the display, carefully not looking at Sarnow, as the ships completed their firing pass and CIC analyzed the results. One of the shipsit looked like the unfortunate Intolerant yet againhad locked her batteries on the wrong set of target beacons.