Louis R wrote:As already mentioned, Tom Theisman wasn't - officially - acting as a Peep when he was captured [he'd been sold to Masada along with his ship], so when he decided he wanted to go home after he was let off the hook, no one could stop him. Come to think of it, I'm not sure there was a hook for him to be on in the first place. The state of war between Masada and Yeltsin was real enough that he had done nothing that could justify piracy charges, so - again, officially - at worst he was a mercenary whose employer had just gone rather permanently out of business. Something that is no more illegal in the Honorverse than it was in early-modern Europe.
ThinksMarkedly wrote:I'd say that he was there as part of the technology transfer team, teaching the Masadans to operate the two ships they had acquired from the PRH. He wasn't in command, he was simply ensuring that the Masadans were learning. And then he got carried to the Yeltsin's Star system by those mad Masadans and thrust into the war that wasn't his.
That could have been a nice excuse, but for the fact that it was actually true. He didn't know the exact details of the payment for the two ships, but given that the PRH was getting something out of it (basing rights?), the acquisition may have been actually legal. He wasn't in command and neither was Yu. At some point, he became as much a prisoner as any one else, as the Masadans had the weapons and were responsible for security. And as soon as he could no longer hide behind the orders, he did what he could to stop the Masadans.
I will try this again after carefully checking the book; chapter 23 has this:
Theisman snarled in triumph, yet under his snarl was the bitter knowledge that his triumph would be brief. He could finish the cruiser with another salvo, but he’d already crippled her. The Captain would finish her off; his job was to damage as many Manticorans as he could before Thunder came back.
“Take the destroyer!” he barked.
“Aye, Sir!”
Principality slewed to starboard, presenting her reloaded port broadside to Troubadour, but the Manticoran destroyer saw her coming, and her skipper knew his business. Theisman’s entire body tensed as the Manticoran fired a laser broadside three times as heavy as his own into him, then snapped up to present the belly of his wedge before the missiles could reach him. Principality heaved in agony, and the plot flickered. Two of his birds popped up, fighting for a look-down shot through Troubadour’s upper sidewall, but her point defense picked them off, and Theisman swore as the Manticoran rolled back down with viperish speed to bring her lasers to bear once more.
But Principality was rolling, too, and her starboard broadside fired before Troubadour had completed her maneuver. His ship bucked again as energy blasted deep into her hull, but this time one of his laser heads got through. There was no way to tell how much damage it had done—there wasn’t enough time to tell what his damage was!—but he knew he’d hurt her.
“Come to oh-niner-three three-five-niner!”
Principality dived towards the moon, twisting to present the top of her own wedge to Troubadour while her surviving missile crews fought to reload. The single laser in her port broadside picked off a Grayson LAC that never even saw her, and then she shuddered as a Grayson light cruiser put a laser into her forward impellers. Her acceleration dropped and her wedge faltered, but the ready lights glowed on the four surviving tubes of her port broadside, and Theisman sent her rolling madly back to bring them to bear on the Grayson.
He never made it. Fearless came screaming back on a reciprocal of her original course, and a hurricane of energy fire ripped through Principality’s sidewall as if it hadn’t existed.
“Sidewall down!” Hillyard shouted. “We’ve lost everything in the port broadside!” The exec cursed. “Emergency reactor shutdown, Skip!”
Principality went to emergency power, and Theisman’s face relaxed. His ship was done, but she’d accomplished more than Franks’ entire task force, and there was no point throwing away those of her people who still survived.
“Strike the wedge,” he said quietly.
Theisman was in complete control of
Principality throughout the book until he surrendered at this point. In that capacity he fired at both
Fearless and
Troubadour. He did nothing to stop the Masadans at Blackbird, but there was nothing that he could do (except testify after the surrender).
