Admiral Nortin's office on New Morning was sumptuously large, but bare to the point of sterility. On the hard metal bench by the doorway, Jensen sat in his dress uniform. He kept his eyes straight ahead, resisted the urge to search the impeccable white of his jacket for bloodstains the cleaners had soaked out. He waited, rigidly correct, while the admiral's pearl-white fingers paged front to back, through his report.

    The words matched the circumstances closely enough: Sail had happened across a raid on Chalice station and picked up the trail of a skip-runner who had stolen core intelligence crystals. The lieutenant in command had given chase, followed the space pirate MacKenzie James to Arinat, Van Mere's station. The log spool on the admiral's desk held proof positive of a Syndicate spy post, in the form of a recorded transaction between James and a covert network on Van Mere's. Sail had maintained a standard patrol pattern, then pursued as the Marity made her getaway. Battle had resulted. Sail's bridge had sustained severe damage, her pilot and her ensign dead in the course of duty. Jensen, sole survivor, had nursed his command back to base.

    The admiral finished reading. He raised bleak eyes to the impeccably dressed lieutenant before his desk. He did not point out the unmentionable, that the log spool might hold proof of a Syndicate spy post, but events differed drastically from the report. Neither Jensen nor the admiral wished the particulars of that tape examined for documentation. Jensen staked his future on the surety that Nortin held the power to misplace, or alter, or erase, the flight logs and checkpoint records of Sail's passage between Chalice and Arinat. Jensen balanced everything on an extortionist's secret imbedded within proof of his own crimes. Only the admiral's guilt

could spare him from certain court-martial and a firing squad. A minute passed like eternity.

    The admiral's cragged face showed no expression when at last he drew breath for conclusion. 'Young man,' he said sourly. 'For outstanding service, and for your discovery of a Syndicate spy base, you'll report for commendation, decoration, and promotion. Then you'll be transferred into Admiral Duane's division, and I trust we'll never need to set eyes on each other again.'

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