That night the nightmares recurred, as bad as the worst she’d had. She woke gasping from the battle for Despite only to find herself in the body of that terrified child, helpless to beat off her assailant . . . and from that relived the worst of the time in hospital. Dream after dream, all fire and smoke and pain, and voices telling her nothing was wrong even as she burned and writhed in pain. Finally she quit trying to sleep, and turned the light on in her compartment. This had to stop. She had to stop it. She had to get sane, somehow.
The obvious move presented itself, and she batted it away. She had enough bad marks on her record, with the Board of Inquiry and the court-martial and then that ridiculous award from Altiplano . . . let her get a psych note in her record and she’d never get what she wanted.
And what was that? The question had never presented itself so clearly before, and in that bleak night she looked at it straight on. She wanted . . . she would have said safety, awhile ago. The safety Fleet could give her from her past. But the man was dead, the lie exposed . . . she was safe, in that way. What did she really want?
Fragments popped into her mind, as brief and bright as the fragments of traumatic memory. The moment on the bridge of Despite when she had given the order to go back to Xavier system . . . the moment when she’d given the order to fire, and the great enemy cruiser had gone up. The respect she’d seen on the faces of those at her briefing, when even the admirals—even the captain, in spite of himself—had admired the way she presented the material. Even the admiration of the juniors, which she half-hated herself for enjoying. The friendships she was beginning to have, fragile as young plants in spring.
She wanted that: those moments, and more of them. Herself in charge, doing the right things. Using the talents she had shown herself were hers. Recognition of her peers; friendships. Life itself.
The critical side of her mind pointed out tartly that she was unlikely to have many such moments as a technical specialist, unless she made a habit of serving on ships with traitorous or incompetent captains. She wasn’t as good at the technical bits as others; she studied hard, she achieved competence . . . but not brilliance.
You’re too hard on yourself. She was not hard enough on herself. Life could always be harder; it was necessary to be hard first. You’re locking down what you could be. What did he think she could be, that Serrano ensign? He was only a boy—a Serrano boy, her critical self reminded her. So . . . he thought she wasn’t using all her talents. If he knew anything. If, if, if . . .
She could hardly apply for command track now, this many years into technical. She didn’t even want command track. Did she? She had hated combat, from the first moment of the mutiny through to that last lucky shot that burst the enemy cruiser like a ripe seedpod. She pushed down the memory of the feeling that had accompanied the fear, the sick disgust with the waste of it . . . that feeling entirely too seductive to be reliable.
Who knew what they felt at such times anyway? Perhaps she could go into teaching—she knew she was good at presenting complex material. That history instructor had even suggested it. Why had she fled from that offer into the most unsuitable specialty? Her mind thrashed around like a fish on a hook, unable to escape the painful reality that she had trapped herself stupidly, blindly. Like a fish indeed . . . she, who was meant to swim free. But where?
The next morning, she was tired enough that Major Pitak noticed.
“Late night, Suiza?”
“Just some bad dreams, Major.” She made it as dismissive as she could without rudeness. Pitak held her gaze a long moment.
“Lots of people have post-combat dreams, you know. No one will think less of you if you talk them over with someone in Medical.”
“I’ll be all right,” she said quickly. “Sir.” Pitak kept looking, and Esmay felt herself flushing. “If it gets worse, sir, I’ll keep your advice in mind.”
“Good,” Pitak said. Then, just as Esmay relaxed, she spoke again. “If you don’t mind telling me, what made you choose technical instead of command track?”
Esmay’s breath shortened. She hadn’t expected to face that question here. “I—didn’t think I would be good at command.”
“In what way?”
She scrambled to think of something. “Well, I—I’m not from a Fleet family. There’s a natural feel.”
“You honestly never wanted to take command of a unit until you ended up with Despite?”
“No, I . . . when I was a child, of course I daydreamed. My family’s military; we have hero tales enough. But what I really wanted was space itself. When I got to the prep school, there were others so much better suited . . .”
“Your initial leadership scores were quite high.”
“I think they gave me some slack for being planet-born,” Esmay said. She had explained it to herself that way for years, as the leadership scores dropped bit by bit. Until Xavier System, until the mutiny.
“You’re not really a technical-track mind, Suiza. You work hard, you’re smart enough, but that’s not where your real talent is. Those briefings you gave the tactical discussion groups, that paper you wrote for me . . . that’s not the way a tech specialist thinks.”
“I’m trying to learn . . .”
“I never said you weren’t trying.” From the tone, Pitak could have intended the other meaning; she sounded almost annoyed. “But think of it this way: would your family try to make a draft horse out of a polo pony?”
For some reason the attempt to put the problem in her culture’s terms made her stubborn; she could almost sense her body changing, long dark legs and hard hooves sinking into mud, leaning backwards, resisting. “If they needed a load hauled, and the pony was there . . .” Then, before Pitak exploded, she went on. “I see your point, sir, but I never thought of myself as . . . as a pony mismatched to a load.”
“I wonder what you did expect,” Pitak said, half to herself. “A place to work,” Esmay said. “Away from Altiplano.” It was the most honest thing she could say, at that point, without getting into things she never intended to discuss with anyone, ever.
Pitak almost glared. “Young woman, this Fleet is not ‘a place to work away from home.’ ”
“I didn’t mean just a job—”
“I should hope not. Dammit, Suiza, you come so close . . . and then you say something like that.”
“Sorry, sir.”
“And then you apologize. Suiza, I don’t know how you did what you did at Xavier, but you had better figure it out, because that is where your talent lies. And either you use your abilities or they rot. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir.” Clear as mud in a cattle-trampled stock tank. She had the uneasy feeling that Barin wouldn’t be able to explain this one, in part because she would be too embarrassed to ask.
“I put the bug in her ear,” Pitak said to Commander Seveche.
“And?”
“And then I nearly lost my temper and pounded her. I do not understand that young woman. She’s like two different people, or maybe three. Gives you the impression of immense capacity, real character, and then suddenly flows away like water down a drain. It’s not like anything I’ve seen before, and I thought I’d seen every variety of strangeness that got past the psychnannies. She’s all there . . . and then she isn’t. I tried to get her to go talk to Med about her combat experience, and she shied off as if I’d threatened her with hard vacuum.”
“We aren’t the first commanders she’s puzzled,” Seveche reminded her. “That’s why it was such a surprise . . .”