Echoes Of Honor

She killed the com and reached for the bedroom light switch, and excitement burned within her.

Honor missed James MacGuiness even more than usual as she dressed. The fact that she had only one hand made things awkward at the best of times; when she tried to hurry herself, it only got worse. And what made her particularly irritated with herself was that she knew it did... and tried to rush herself anyway.

Nimitz chittered in amusement at the taste of her emotions, and she paused to shake a fist at him, then resumed her efforts more deliberately. She knew LaFollet, for one, thought she was foolish not to have selected another steward from among the prisoners her people had liberated, and she more than suspected that several of her senior officers agreed with him. McKeon certainly did, although Honor regarded Alistair's judgment as just a little suspect where the concept of her "pushing herself too hard" was involved. More than that, however, she knew most—not all certainly, but most—of the enlisted or noncommissioned perso

Yet despite her frustration with things like fastening the waist of her trousers one-handed, or sealing the old-fashioned buttons the GSN had insisted on using for its uniform blouses—and which Henri Dessouix, after discussions with LaFollet, had insisted with equal stubbor

Rear Admiral Styles was one reason, and she grimaced even now as the thought of him flickered across her brain. He continued to feel she had improperly usurped the authority which was rightfully his. And however inept he might be as a tactician or strategist (and she was coming to suspect that her original caustic estimate of his probable capabilities in those areas had been entirely too generous), he was obviously a genius at bureaucratic infighting. He reminded her irresistibly of a plant Grayson's original colonists had, for reasons none of their descendants could imagine, brought with them from old Earth. The vine, called kudzu, made an excellent ground cover, but it was almost impossible to get rid of, grew with ferocious energy, and choked out all competing flora with ruthless arrogance. Which was a pretty fair metaphor for Styles.

She found herself compelled to cut the Admiral back to size at least once per local week or so. The fact that he possessed far more bluster than backbone helped on those occasions, and he never persisted in attempting to undercut her authority twice in the same fashion once he'd pushed her to the point of bringing the hammer down on him for it the first time. Unfortunately, he'd played what McKeon scathingly called "pissing contests" for much too long to stay crushed. He either didn't believe she really would squash him once and for all, or else he was so stupid he genuinely didn't realize how much grief he was storing up for himself. Whatever his problem, he seemed capable of learning only one lesson at a time, and he was endlessly inventive when it came to finding new ways to goad her into the sort of temper explosions she hated.

She disliked admitting it even to herself, but that was one of the more ignoble reasons she refused to select a steward. Styles obviously wished to return to the lifestyle to which he had become accustomed as an RMN flag officer, with all the perks and privileges attached thereunto. The fact that he had done absolutely nothing to earn those perks or privileges was beside the point; he had the rank for them and so he was entitled to them. Except that if Honor chose not to claim them when her missing arm gave her such a good pretext for doing so, then he could hardly insist upon them without looking utterly ridiculous, and she took a spiteful pleasure she knew was petty in denying them to him.

And he should be grateful it's the only pleasure I allow myself where he's concerned, she thought grimly as she managed to get her blouse's collar buttoned. If I did what I'd like to do to him, they'd never find the body!

Nimitz yawned, baring sharp, white canines in a lazy grin while he radiated approval of that thought. Then he concentrated hard, and Honor smothered a sudden, sharp bark of laughter as he radiated the image of a Sphinx chipmunk with an unmistakable, if very chipmunkish, caricature of Styles' face, fleeing for its wretched life. She looked down at the 'cat in astonishment, for this was the first time he'd ever attempted to send her an image which obviously was not something he'd actually seen and simply stored in memory. But her astonishment turned into a helpless, fiendish giggle as the chipmunk vanished out one "side" of his projected image... and a brown-eyed treecat with bared claws, an eye patch, an RMN beret, and the red-and-gold shoulder boards of a commodore went bounding past in hot pursuit.

She half-sat, half-fell back down onto the edge of the bed, laughing delightedly, and Nimitz bleeked his matching delight at having gotten her to laugh. He sat up as straight as his crippled limb permitted, curling his tail primly around his true-feet, and groomed his whiskers at her with insufferable panache.

"You," she said severely, as soon as she could master her voice once more, "are a dreadful person and no respecter at all of rank or position, aren't you?"

He nodded complacently, and she smiled and reached out to caress his ears, then bent to pull her boots on. Despite Nimitz's opinion of Styles, however, she knew he was more dangerous than she cared to admit. Not because she thought anyone but him took him seriously, but because whatever else, he was the second-ranking Allied officer on the planet. Which meant that unless she was prepared to officially remove him, she couldn't cut him out of the chain of command, and he was quite capable of doing something outstandingly stupid in a fit of pique just to show her he wasn't to be taken lightly. Which probably meant that rubbing his nose in her opinion of him, however obliquely, wasn't the smartest thing in the entire universe that she could do. Unfortunately, just this once, and despite what Machiavelli had said about doing enemies small injuries, she couldn't help it. He was such a poisonous, irritating, pompous, stupid, officious, toad-like nonentity of an incompetent that she simply had to do something about him, and the fact that this particular response was almost as petty as he was made it so appropriate it was inevitable.

Besides, she told herself, whatever pleasure she might find in denying Styles the luxuries he coveted, there were other factors, as well. One was that she would have felt pretentious... which was also her less spiteful reason for refusing Styles. She had little doubt that most of the liberated POWs would have considered a steward her due. But she had no intention of building any walls between her and the people under her orders. It was bad enough that she'd been forced to claim her fleet admiral's rank to keep Styles in his place without assembling the sort of personal staff which would insulate her from the people who depended upon her leadership.

And there was a final reason, she admitted as she stood and collected her necktie. MacGuiness was her steward and she was his admiral, and she refused to allow anyone else to intrude into that relationship even temporarily.

Nimitz bleeked another laugh behind her, but it came with a wave of approval. MacGuiness was his friend, too, and, like Honor, he missed the steward badly. Besides, MacGuiness knew exactly how he preferred his rabbit roasted.

Honor looked back at the 'cat with one of her crooked grins, then crossed to her bedroom door and hit the open button with her elbow. It slid quietly aside and, as she had known she would, she found Andrew LaFollet already waiting, immaculate in one of the Harrington Guard uniforms Henri Dessouix had produced for him.