TheAdvisor29

==Chapter 29 - The Advisor==
New Syrtis Combat Training Centre
New Syrtis Star System
Federated Suns
3156
[New Officer Tactical Training, Cycle 1...]
From the gallery overlooking the lecture hall, Vice Admiral William Hasek watched the convict-cadet, and seethed.  He seethed because she was a criminal, a murderer, a starship thief, a transporter of pirate scum, a smuggler of contraband, and a convicted felon.  He seethed more because her answers made it apparent that her capture had not been 'luck'. It had not been 'good work' by the mercenaries, except in bringing her in alive.
When a man is shown the answer to the question, and can consult the math. Even if he doesn't fully understand the math, he has only two directions of recourse.
Direction one, is to try to refute the laws of science, to appeal to fantasy or to authority (really the same thing, in William's opinion).
Direction two, is to accept the review and check the figures, and when they work out, acknowledge fault and wrong.
Tera Lukassi's arrest showed only minor resistance. The resistance shown could be more closely attributed to what she was doing immediately prior, when she scrammed the coolant in the core and 'accidentally' vented the command deck of the ship.
Killing eleven co-conspirators and one hostage...who might have been dead when she did it.
The kidnapped civilians trapped in the hold got her the human trafficking charge, and the 'negligent killing' on the command deck got her the death penalty.
He seethed, because the competency she'd been showing in these remedial classes supported her own claims in the first three appeals, claims he had seen good officers submitting testimony could not possibly be true.
Mike didn't like being wrong about someone.  He liked less the chance that he could be that wrong about someone.
He seethed because the bitch made him feel like a cretinous caricature of a man, like...like an upper class twit for judging her character in the present, based on a past career as the scum of humanity.
He hated her, because she proved an article of his own religious upbringing-that anyone can be redeemed in the eyes of god.
That really pissed him off-and he had enough self-awareness to know that that was the problem.
"Shilling for your thoughts, Admiral sir?"  Colonel Geoff Nelson asked.
"Lukassi. the convict." he said, "Needs more challenges, more responsibilities.  Test her limits, find those limits, make her your special project."
"To what end, sir?"
"She either breaks down completely and reverts to her old self, or she becomes a model officer."  the Admiral turned to look at the Dean of Aerospace instruction, "One or the other-either she breaks or she passes at the top of her class, see to it."
"Yes sir."
The toughest metal comes from the hottest fire. She'll either become the sword or she breaks. Halsey thought
-----
Previous Chapter - Return to Story Index - Next Chapter
Category:Works by CannonShop
Category:The Advisor Chapters