Because people are whining over the fact that a small portion of my last post had already been snippeted, I hereby append the following:
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Even as she did, though, she couldn’t avoid the reflection that Mayhew, who was twenty years her junior, looked at least ten years her senior. That was the difference between the third-generation prolong she’d received as a child and the first-generation prolong he’d received when he was already adult. And even so, he looked far younger than his older brother, Benjamin.
“It’s good to see you,” Mayhew continued, then grimaced. “I know — I know! We see each other a lot, either on the com or in person, but that’s always official business. I suppose this is, too, in a way, but at least the two of us don’t have to talk shop tonight!”
“That will be something of a relief,” she acknowledged. “There are times I find myself forgetting I’m an honest spacer, given all the time I spend in conferences, discussions, planning sessions, worry sessions . . . .”
She shrugged and Mayhew nodded.
“I know. And it’ll get even worse after the Beowulf referendum is certified. Getting them integrated into the Alliance is going to take some doing.”
“With all due respect, My Lord, not as much as you might be thinking,” another voice said, and Honor turned with a smile as a blue-eyed man in the uniform of a Grayson rear admiral joined the conversation.
“Michal!” she said. “I was wondering where you were?”
“Well, I wouldn’t want to say anything about the heirs of a planetary ruler short-circuiting proper military etiquette or anything like that,” Rear Admiral Michal Lukáč, commanding officer of First Battle Division, Sixth Battle Squadron, GSN said dryly. “But as I’m sure you and Commodore Brigham understand perfectly, the correct procedure is for you to be greeted by Captain White first.”
Honor looked around quickly, then back at Lukáč.
“At least you waited until that poor ensign wasn’t around to hear you,” she said severely. “It wasn’t his fault Michael here short stopped me!”
“Excuse me,” Mayhew said with a smile, “but unless I’m mistaken, I’m the brother of a planetary despot. That means I get to jump the queue when I feel like it.”
“The fact that you’re in a position to abuse your authority doesn’t make it right,” Honor told him. “And Michal is completely correct.” She craned her neck, looking for Captain Zachary White, Protector Oliver’s commanding officer and Lukáč’s flag captain. Since White was easily six centimeters taller than she was, he was seldom hard to spot. This time, though —
“Where is Zach?”
“Actually,” Lukáč said, “at this particular moment, he’s helping Misty deal with a slight emergency. Edward and a tray of canapés were in a head-on collision.”
“Oh, my!” Honor shook her head. “I am so not looking forward to Raoul turning eight!”
“Young Edward is actually very well behaved, especially by the standards of Grayson males,” Michael Mayhew told her.
“Yes, and this wasn’t his fault,” Lukáč said. “Despite Zach’s centimeters, Edward’s still not very tall, you know. The steward just didn’t see him. In fact, the real reason Zach’s helping deal with it is that Edward’s upset. He thinks he ruined his dad’s party, so I told Zach to nip off to reassure him and that I’d hold the fort until he got back. I think I remember reading somewhere that a good flag officer always has his flag captain’s back.”
“That’s what I’d heard, at any rate,” Honor said. “But what was this about ‘not as much as you might be thinking’? From where I sit, getting Beowulf fully integrated’s going to be something like Hercules and the stables.”
“I don’t think so,” Lukáč disagreed respectfully. “Oh, it’s going to take a lot of work, and a lot of details will need hammering out, but the truth is that Beowulf’s already effectively part of the Alliance. I mean, who’s ships do you think are out there helping rebuild after Yawata? And unless I miss my guess, Beowulf’s also who’s building the Mark 23s in our magazines. So what we’re really going to be doing is regularizing something that’s been going on on a de facto basis for months now.”
“That’s actually true, in a way,” Michael Mayhew acknowledged. “It’s the regularizing and the hammering out I’m not looking forward to.”
“No reason you should, My Lord,” Lukáč told him. “And, in fairness, it’ll be a lot easier for us ‘honest spacers’ who only have to worry about shooting at the enemy. Besides —”
“Is Michal already bending your ear, My Lady?” another voice asked, and Honor turned as Captain Lenka Lukáčová joined the conversation. Lukáčová was about four centimeters shorter than her husband. She wore GSN uniform with the four golden cuff bands of a captain, but she also wore the Chaplains Corps’ crosses on her collar, not the sword insignia of a line officer.
“He promised he wouldn’t do that,” she continued, gold-flecked green eyes dancing.
“And he isn’t, Lenka, as you know perfectly well!” Honor told her. “In fact, he’s hardly started making his points forcefully at all yet.”
“Give him time,” Lukáčová suggested.
“I’m sure. And how are you? Any problems adjusting?”
She’d tried to stay in the loop as Task Force Three, the Grayson component of Grand Fleet, settled into place. It helped that Manticorans and Graysons had been serving — and dying — together for two T-decades. But there were still differences between them and a much larger percentage of the entire Grayson Space Navy had been permanently stationed here in Manticore following the Yawata Strike and the emergence of the Grand Alliance. Despite the enormous strides Honor’s adoptive homeworld had made, Grayson remained a highly religious, theocratic society. The Manticore Binary System as a whole had less experience than the RMN’s officer corps with Graysons, and quite a few thousand Grayson civilians and dependents had arrived in Manticore to help support TF 3. Sliding them comfortably into a society whose basic constraints were sharply at odds with those of the society which had produced them was a nontrivial challenge. Lukáčová, as the senior officer of the Chaplains Corps assigned to TF 3 had a ringside seat for that sliding.
“Quite well, actually,” the captain said now. “Archbishop Telmachi couldn’t have been more helpful, although I think that most of your fellow Manties are still a little . . . bemused by the entire notion of official shipboard chaplains. Fair’s fair, though. Most of our people are still having problems with the notion that the Archbishop is only the senior prelate in a society which specifically rejects the notion of a state church. Some of my chaplains seem to have a little trouble understanding that he can’t simply wave his crucifix and make all of our stumbling blocks go away. You really are a deplorably secular bunch, aren’t you?”
