He turned the clipboard toward her, showing a set of readings that were literally off the chart.
“The Writellum section of her brain,” Rikolfr said, “went crazy with activity when she was around the Krell. Dr. Halbeth is certain this is proof of the defect, though Iglom is less certain. He cites the lack of evidence except for this one engagement.”
Judy grunted, watching the coward’s ship loop around, then fly into the very bowels of the falling shipyard.
“Halbeth recommends immediately removing the girl from duty,” Rikolfr noted. “But Dr. Thior . . . well, she is going to be trouble, as you would guess.”
Thior, who was unfortunately head of Alta Base medical, didn’t believe that the defect was real. Even the history of the thing was controversial. Reports of it dated back to the Defiant itself—and the mutiny on board the flagship that had ended with the fleet crashing here on Detritus.
Few people knew about the mutiny, and fewer still the fact that a defect in some of the crew had been the cause. These things weren’t clear even to Judy. But some of the most important—and most merited—families in the lower caverns traced their lineage to the mutineers. Those families fought against acknowledging the defect, and wanted to keep rumors of it secret. But they hadn’t seen what it could do to someone.
Judy had. Firsthand.
“Who is supporting Thior this time?” Judy asked.
Rikolfr flipped a few pages, then displayed the latest round of letters from prominent party members. At their head was a letter from NAL Algernon Weight, whose son, Jorgen, was in the coward’s flight. Jorgen had spoken highly of the girl on repeated occasions, so now came the questions. Wouldn’t it be for the best to hold this girl up as a sign of true Defiant redemption? A symbol of how any person, regardless of heritage, could return to the fold and provide service to the state?
Damn it. Judy thought, pausing the hologram as the coward hit her overburn in a near-disastrous attempt to escape. How much proof is Algernon going to require?
“Orders, sir?” Rikolfr asked.
“Tell Dr. Halbeth to write a condemnation of Thior’s explanations, then see if Dr. Iglom can be persuaded to offer strong support of the defect’s existence, particularly in this girl. Tell her I’d consider it a personal favor if she could strengthen her stand.”
“As you wish, sir.”
Rikolfr retreated, and Judy watched the rest of the battle, remembering a similar fight long ago.
Thior and the others could call the defect superstition. They could say that what had happened with Chaser was coincidence. But they hadn’t been there.
And Judy was going to make damn sure nothing like that ever happened again. One way or another.
30
“So I’m pretty sure she won’t ever kick me out,” I said, working with Rig to apply new sealant to M-Bot’s wing.
“You can infer more from a look than anyone I know,” Rig said. “Just because she didn’t kick you out this time doesn’t mean she won’t in the future.”
“She won’t,” I said.
“She won’t,” Doomslug said with a fluting trill, imitating the inflection of my voice from her perch on a nearby rock.
Rig had done an amazing job with M-Bot’s broken wing. Together, we’d torn off the bent metal, then recovered the usable parts. Then somehow, Rig had persuaded his new supervisors to let him practice on one of the manufactories.
With new parts in hand, we’d been able to repair the entire wing. The next week had been spent removing the old layer of sealant. Today, we were going over the entire hull with a new coat. Now that I’d entered my third month of training, we’d earned occasional R&R—so today, our flight had only a half day of classes.
I’d come back early and had met Rig to work on the ship. Rig painted the sealant on with a small spray device, and I followed behind with a two-handed machine that looked kind of like a big flashlight. The blue light from it made the sealant firm up and solidify.
The process, though slow and grueling, filled in scratches and dents on M-Bot’s hull. The slick, air-resistant sealant also filled in and smoothed out seams, leaving behind a sleek, shiny surface. We’d chosen black, to match his old color.
“I still can’t believe they let you borrow all this stuff,” I said as I slowly positioned the light behind where Rig was spraying.
“After how enthused they were by my atmospheric scoop designs?” Rig said. “They seemed ready to promote me to head of the department on the spot. Nobody even batted an eye when I asked if I could bring this stuff home to ‘disassemble it and see how it works.’ They think I’m some kind of prodigy with eclectic methods.”
“You’re not still embarrassed, are you?” I said. “Rig, this technology could single-handedly save the entire DDF.”
“I know,” he said. “I just wish . . . you know, that I really were a prodigy.”
I set the light on the ground to give my arms a break. “Seriously, Rig?” I waved toward M-Bot’s wing, which now glistened with a new black sealant job. “You’re telling me that fixing a technologically advanced starship’s wing, practically on your own, in the middle of an uninhabited cave with minimal equipment, isn’t the work of a prodigy?”
Rig stepped back, raising his goggles and inspecting the wing. Then he grinned. “It does look pretty good, doesn’t it? And it will be even better when that last part is sealed. Eh?” He hefted the spray.
I sighed, stretching, but picked the lighting device back up. I followed behind as he started spraying the last section of the hull, near the front.
“So, you going to spend more nights in the bunks now?” he asked as we worked.
“No. I can’t risk getting the others involved. This is between me and Ironsides.”
“I still think you’re reading too much into what she said.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Ironsides is a warrior. She knows that to win this fight, she can’t just defeat me—she needs to demoralize me. She needs to be able to say I was a coward, like the lies she tells about my father.”
Rig continued to work in silence for a few minutes, and I thought he was going to let the argument pass. He sprayed a careful line of sealant under the part of the hull that locked into the cockpit. Then, though, he said in a more subdued tone, “That’s great, Spensa. But . . . have you ever paused to wonder what you’ll do if you’re wrong?”
I shrugged. “If I’m wrong, she’ll kick me out. Nothing I can do about that.”
“I wasn’t talking about the admiral. I meant your father, Spensa. What if . . . you know . . . what if he did retreat?”
“My father wasn’t a coward.”
“But—”
“My father was not a coward.”
Rig glanced away from his work and met my eyes. The glare I gave back would have been enough to silence most people, but he held my gaze.
“What about me?” he asked. “Am I a coward, Spensa?”
My fury sputtered, then died.
He looked back to his spraying. “You say if you drop out, it will prove you’re a coward. Well, I dropped out. So I’m a coward. Basically the worst thing you could imagine.”