by neetha Napew
Most classes went on in the “front quad” or in the double row of simpler stone-faced buildings that lay uphill from it. History - from Fleet’s perspective, which included knowing the history of “important” old Earth navies, all the way back to ships rowed or sailed. Sass could not figure out why they needed to know what different ranks had been called a thousand years ago, but she tucked the information away dutifully, in case it was needed for anything but the quarterly exams. She did wonder why “captain” had ever been both a rank and a position, given the confusion that caused, and was glad someone had finally straightened it out logically. Anyone commanding a ship was a captain, and the rank structure didn’t use the term at all. “You think it’s logical,” the instructor pointed out, “but there was almost a mutiny when the first Fleet officer had to use the rank ‘major’ and lieutenant commanders and commanders got pushed up a notch.” Sass enjoyed far more the analysis of the various navies’ tactics, including a tart examination of the effect of politics on warfare, using an ancient text by someone called Tuchman.
Cadets ate together, in a vaulted mess hall that would have been lovely if it hadn’t been for the rows and rows of tables, each seating eight stiff cadets. Looking around - up at the carving on the ceiling, for instance - was another way to get marks taken off. Sassinak, with the others, learned to eat quickly and neatly while sitting on the edge of her chair. Students in their last two years supervised each table, insisting on perfect etiquette from the rockheads. At least, thought Sass, the food was adequate.
The Academy was not quite what she’d expected, even with the supposedly inside information she’d had before. From Abe’s attitude towards Fleet officers, she’d gotten the idea that the Academy was some sort of semi-mystical place which magically imbued the cadets with honor, justice, and tactical brilliance. He had told her about his own Basic Training, which he described succinctly as four months of unmitigated hell, but that was not the same, he’d often said, as officer training. Sass had found, more or less by accident, a worn copy of an etiquette manual, which had prepared her for elaborate formalities and the fine points of military courtesy - but not for the Academy’s approach to freshman cadets.
“We don’t have hazing,” the cadet commander had announced that first day. “But we do have discipline.” The distinction, Sass decided quickly, was a matter of words only. And she quickly realised that she was a likely target for it, whatever it was called: the orphan ward of a retired petty officer, an ex-slave, and far too smart for her own good.
She wished she could consult Abe, but for the first half-year the new cadets were allowed no visitors and no visits home. She had to figure it out for herself. His precepts stood like markers in her mind: never complain, never argue, never start a fight, never boast. Could that be enough?
With the physical and mental discipline he’d taught her, she found, it could. She drew that around her like a tough cloak. Cadet officers who could reduce half the newcomers to red rage or impotent tears found her smooth but unthreatening equanimity boring after a few weeks. There was nothing defiant in that calmness, no challenge to be met, just a quiet, earnest determination to do whatever it was better than anyone else. Pile punishment details on her, and she simply did them, doggedly and well. Scream insults at her, and she stood there listening, able to repeat them on command in a calm voice that made them sound almost as silly as they were.
Abe had been right; they pushed her as hard as the slavers had, and the cadet officers had - she sensed - some of the same capacity for cruelty, but she never lost sight of the goal. This struggle would make her stronger, and once she was a Fleet officer, she could pursue the pirates who had destroyed her family and the colony.
That calm reticence might have made her an outcast among her classmates, except that she found herself warming to them. She would be working with them the rest of her life - and she wanted friends - and before the first half-year was over, she found herself once more the center of a circle.
“You know, Sass, we really ought to do something about Dungar’s lectures.” Pardis, an elegant sprout of the sector aristocracy sprawled inelegantly on the floor of the freshman wardroom, dodged a feinted kick from Genris, another of her friends.
“We have to memorise them; that’s enough.” Sass made a face, and drained her mug of tea. Dungar managed to make the required study of alien legal systems incredibly dull, and his delivery - in a monotone barely above a whisper - made the class even worse. He would not permit recorders, either; they had to strain to hear every boring word.
“They’re so ... so predictable. My brother told me about them, you know, and I’ll swear he hasn’t changed a word in the past twenty years.” Pardis finished that sentence in a copy of Dungar’s whisper, and the others chuckled.
“Just what did you have in mind?” Sass grinned down at Pardis. “And you’d better get up, before one of the senior monitors shows up and tags you for unofficerlike posture.”
“It’s too early for them to be snooping around. I was thinking of something like ... oh ... slipping a little something lively into his notes.”
“Dungar’s notes? The ones he’s read so many times he doesn’t really need them?”
“We must show respect for our instructors,” said Tadmur. As bulky as most heavyworlders, he took up more than his share of the wardroom, and sat stiffly erect. The others groaned, as they usually did. Sass wondered if he could really be that serious all the time.
“I show respect,” said Pardis, rolling his green eyes wickedly. “Just the same as you, every day - “
“You make fun of him for his consistency.” Tadmur’s Vrelan accent gave his voice even more bite. “Consistency is good.”
“Consistency is dull. Consistently wrong is stupid - “ Pardis broke off suddenly and sprang to his feet as the door swung open without warning, and the senior monitor’s grim face appeared around it. This weekend, the duty monitor was another heavyworlder, from Tadmur’s home planet.
“You were lounging on the deck again, Mr. Pardis, weren’t you?” The monitor didn’t wait for the reply and went on: “The usual for you, and one for each of these for not reminding you of your duty.” He scowled at Tadmur. “I’m surprised at you most of all.” Tadmur flushed, but said nothing more than the muttered “Sir, yes, sir” that regulations required.
Sassinak even made some progress with Tadmur and Seglawin, the two heavyworlders in her unit. When they finally opened up to her, she began to realise that the heavyworlders felt deep grievances against the other human groups in FSP.
“They want us for our strength,” Tadmur said. “They want us to fetch and carry. You look at the records - the transcripts of the Seress expedition, for instance. How often do you think the med staff is assigned heavy duty, eh? But Parrih, not only a physician but a specialist, a surgeon, was expected to do the heavy unloading and loading in addition to her regular medical work.”
“They like to think we’re stupid and slow.” Seglawin took up the complaint. Although not quite as large as Tadmur, she was far from the current standard of beauty, and with her broad forehead drawn down into a scowl looked menacing enough. Sass realised suddenly that she had beautiful hair, a rich wavy brown mass that no one noticed because of the heavy features below it. “Pinheads, they call us, and muscle-bound. I know our heads look little, compared to our bodies, but that’s illusion. Look how surprised the Commandant was when I won the freshmen history prize: ‘Amazingly sensitive interpretation for someone of your background.’ I know what that means. They think we’re just big dumb brutes, and we’re not.”
Sass looked at them, and wondered. Certainly the heavyworlders in the slave center had been sold as cheap heavy labor, and none had been in any of her tech classes. She’d assumed they weren’t suited for it, just as everyone said. But in the Academy, perhaps five percent of the cadets were heavyworlders, and they did well enough in classwork. The two heavyworlders looked at each other, and then back at Sass. Seglawin shrugge
d.
“At least she’s listening and not laughing.”
“I don’t - “ Sass began, but Tad interrupted her.
“You do, because you’ve been taught that. Sass, you’re fair-minded, and you’ve tried to be friendly. But you’re a lightweight, and reasonably pretty enough, to your race’s standard. You can’t know what it’s like to be treated as a - a thing, an animal, good for nothing but the work you can do.”
It was reasonable, but Sass heard the whine of self-pity under the words and was suddenly enraged. “Oh, yes, I do,” she heard herself say. Their faces went blank, the smug blankness that so many associated with heavyworlder arrogance, but she didn’t stop to think about it. “I was a slave,” she said crisply, biting off the words like so many chunks of steel. “I know exactly how it feels to be treated as a thing: I was sold, more than once, and valued on the block for the work I could do.”
Seglawin reacted first, blankness then a surging blush. “Sass! I didn’t - “
“You didn’t know, because I don’t want to talk about it.” Rage still sang in her veins, lifting her above herself.
“I’m sorry,” said Tad, his voice less hard than she’d ever heard it. “But maybe you do understand.”
“You weren’t slaves,” Sass said. “You don’t understand. They killed my family: my parents, my baby sister. My friends and their parents. And I will get them - “ Her voice broke, and she swallowed, fighting tears. They waited, silent and immobile but no longer seeming inert. “I will get them,” Sass continued finally. “I will end that piracy, that slavery, every chance I get. Whether it’s lights or heavies or whoever else. Nothing’s worse than that. Nothing.” She met their eyes, one and then the other. “And I won’t talk about it again. I’m sorry.”
To her surprise, they both rose, and gave a little bow and odd gesture with their hands.
“No, it’s our fault.” Seglawin’s voice had a burr in it now, her accent stronger. “We did not know, and we agree: nothing’s worse than that. Our people have suffered, but not that. We fear that they might, and that is the source of our anger. You understand; you will be fair, whatever happens.” She smiled, as she offered to shake hands, the smile transforming her features into someone Sass hoped very much to have as a friend.
Other times, more relaxed times, followed. Sass learned much about the heavyworlders’ beliefs. Some reacted to the initial genetic transformations that made heavyworld adaptation possible with pride, and considered that all heavyworlders should spend as much time as possible on high-gravity planets. Others felt it a degradation, and sought normal-G worlds where they hoped to breed back to normal human standards. All felt estranged from their lighter-boned distant relations, blamed the lightweights - at least in part - for that estrangement, and resented any suggestion that their larger size and heavier build implied less sensitivity or intelligence.
Cadet leave, at the end of that first session, brought her home to Abe’s apartment in uniform, shy of his reaction and stiff with pride. He gave her a crisp salute and then a bear hug.
“You’re making it fine,” he said, not waiting for her to speak. Already, she recognized in herself and in his reactions the relationship they would have later.
“I hope so.” She loosened the collar of the uniform and stretched out on the low divan. He took her cap and set it carefully on a shelf.
“Making friends, too?”
“Some.” His nod encouraged her, and she told him about the heavyworlders. Abe frowned.
“You want to watch them; they can be devious.”
“I know. But - “
“But they’re also right. Most normals do think of them as big stupid musclemen, and treat them that way. Poor sods. The smart ones resent it, and if they’re smart enough they can be real trouble. What you want to do, Sass, is convince ‘em you’re fair, without giving them a weak point to push on. Their training makes ‘em value strength and endurance over anything else.”
“But they’re not all alike.” Sass told him all she’d learned, about the heavyworld cultures. “ - and I wonder myself if the heavyworlders are being used by the same bunch who are behind the pirates and slavers,” she finished.
Abe had been setting out a cold meal as she talked. Now he stopped, and leaned on the table. “I dunno. Could be. But at least some of the heavyworlders are probably pirates themselves. You be careful.” Sass didn’t argue; she didn’t like the thought that Abe might have his limitations; she needed him to be all-knowing, for a long time yet. On the other hand, she sensed, in her heavyworlder friends, the capacity for honesty and loyalty, and in herself an unusual ability to make friends with people of all backgrounds.
By her third year, she was recognized as a promising young cadet officer, and resistance to her background had nearly disappeared. Colonial stock, yes: but colonial stock included plenty of “good” families, younger sons and daughters who had sought adventure rather than a safe seat in the family corporation. That she never claimed such a connection spoke well of her; others claimed it in her name.
Her own researches into her family were discreet. The psychs had passed her as safely adjusted to the loss of her family. She wasn’t sure how they’d react if they found her rummaging through the colonial databases, so she masked her queries carefully. She didn’t want anyone to question her fitness for Fleet. When she’d entered everything she could remember, she waited for the computer to spit out the rest.
The first surprise was a living relative (or “supposed alive” the computer had it) some three generations back. Sass blinked at the screen. A great-great-great grandmother (or aunt: she wasn’t quite sure of the code symbols) now on Exploration Service. Lunzie ... so that was the famous ancestor her little sister had been named for. Her mother had said no more than that - may not have known more than that, Sass realised. Even as a cadet, she herself had access to more information than most colonists, already. She thought of contacting her distant family members someday . . . someday when she was a successful Fleet officer. Not any time soon, though. Fleet would be her family, and Abe was her father now.
He took his responsibility seriously in more ways than one, she discovered at their next meeting.
“Take the five-year implant, and don’t worry about it. You’re not going to be a mother anytime soon. Should have had it before now, probably.”
“I don’t want to be a sopping romantic, either,” said Sass, scowling.
Abe grinned at her. “Sass, I’m not telling you to fall in love. I’m telling you that you’re grown, and your body knows it. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, but you’re about to want to.”
“I am not.” Sass glared at him.
“You haven’t noticed anything?”
Sass opened her mouth to deny it, only to realise that she couldn’t. He’d seen her with the others, and he, more than anyone, knew every nuance of her body.
“Take the implant. Do what you want afterwards.”
“You’re not telling me to be careful,” she said, almost petulantly.
“Stars, girl, I only adopted you. I’m not really your father, and even if I were I wouldn’t tell you to be careful. Not you, of all people.”
“My ... my real father . .”
“Was a dirtball colonist. I’m Fleet. You’re Fleet now. You don’t believe all that stuff you were taught. You’re the last woman to stay virginal all your life, Sass, and that’s the truth of it. Learn what you need, and see that you get it.”
Sass shivered. “Sounds very mechanical, that way.”
“Not really.” Abe smiled at her, wistful and tender. “Sass, it’s a great pleasure, and a great relaxation. For some people, long-term pairing is part of it. Your parents may have been that way. But you aren’t that sort. I’ve watched you now for what? Eight years, is it, or ten? You’re an adventurer by nature; you always were, and what happened to you brought it out even stronger. You’re passionate, but you don’t want to be bothered with long-term relation
ships.”
The five-year implant she requested at Medical raised no eyebrows. When the doctor discovered it was her first, she insisted that Sass read a folder about it “... So you’ll know nothing’s wrong when that patch on your arm changes color. Just come in for another one. It’ll be in your records, of course, but sometimes your records aren’t with you.”
Once she had the implant, she couldn’t seem to stop thinking about it. Who would it be? Who would be first, she scolded herself, accepting with no more argument Abe’s estimate of her character. She watched the other cadets covertly. Bronze-haired Liami, who bounced in and out of beds with the same verve as she gobbled dessert treats on holidays. Cal and Deri, who could have starred in any of the romantic serial tragedies, always in one crisis of emotion or another. How they passed their courses was a constant topic of low-voiced wonder. Suave Abrek, who assumed that any woman he fancied would promptly swoon into his arms - despite frequent rebuffs and snide remarks from all the women cadets.
She wasn’t even sure what she wanted. She and Caris, in the old days, watching Carin Coldae re-runs, had planned extravagant sexual adventures: all the handsome men in the galaxy, in all the exotic places, in the midst of saving planets or colonies or catching slavers. Was handsome really better? Liami seemed to have just as much fun with the plain as the handsome. And Abrek, undeniably handsome, but all too aware of it, was no fun at all. What kind of attraction was that kind, and not just the ordinary sort that made some people a natural choice for an evening of study or workouts in the gym? Or was the ordinary sort enough?
In the midst of this confusion of mind, she noticed that she was choosing to spend quite a bit of time with Marik Delgaesson, a senior cadet from somewhere on the far side of known space. She hadn’t realised that human colonies spread that far, but he looked a lot more human than the heavyworlders. Brown eyes, wavy dark hair, a slightly crooked face that gave his grin a certain off-center appeal. Not really handsome, but good enough. And a superior gymnast, in both freeform and team competitions.