Lady Elissa Dalkeith was one of the officers who had joinedCorona a little over a month ago on Zanshaa, and was considered old to have gone so long in the Fleet without promotion, a fact that argued either incompetence or a lack of patronage among her superiors. Martinez hadn’t found her incompetent, but uninspired: she performed every task well enough, but without any particular enthusiasm, and without volunteering anything new, efficient, or interesting. He had hoped to have someone younger and more energetic, someone who would relieve Martinez of some of his work, but youth and energy both had been beaten out of Dalkeith over the years of neglect by the Fleet, and Martinez’s workload remained daunting.

 “The maneuver’s over, my lady,” Martinez told her. “We will resume command of the ship.”

 “Very well, lord elcap. We are prepared to relinquish command.”

 “Stand by.” Martinez shifted his channel to broadcast to the crew in Command. “We are taking control of the ship…now.” His gloved hands tapped his display, and the screens on every board in Command shifted to showCorona ‘s true situation.

 “You may stand down,” Martinez told Dalkeith.

 The crew in Command all reportedCorona ‘s situation as it was reflected on their displays, and then Martinez heaved a sigh against the gravities that weighed him down. There was no alternative to Kamarullah and the debriefing.

 He told Vonderheydte to patch him into the intership channel and set his display to virtual. The square command room, with its suited figures hanging in their accelerations cages, vanished from his sight, to be replaced at once by Kamarullah’s square, graying head. Fortunately Kamarullah was not alone—most of the other captains had joined the link in the meantime, as well as Lord Squadron Commander Do-faq, who commanded the two squadrons that made up Faqforce. Do-faq was a member of the Lai-own species, flightless birds taller than a human. Their hollow bones couldn’t stand the heavy accelerations that were possible for humans; but because their ancestors had flown through the sky, their brains were supposed to be better configured for three-dimensional maneuvers, and they were considered a race of master tacticians.