Chapter 21: The Ration Logs

Dax was propped up in the medbay with his ribs wrapped, looking enormously pleased with himself.

"You opened the channel," I said.

"I did."

"Before the first shot."

"I opened it when we came out of the jump." He winced and grinned at once. "Nobody checks the bridge feed."

"Why not?"

"It goes to the Council archive by default. All you have to do is not switch it off."

"You could have been shot for that."

"I was shot for that. A little."

Caspian stood at the foot of the cot with his arms folded.

His left sleeve was rolled up to the elbow.

The seam on his arm was dark.

It had been dark for nearly an hour, and he kept looking at it.

"You should have told me," he said.

"You'd have said no." Dax pointed at me. "She'd have said yes, but she'd have worried."

"And then I'd have told him," I said.

"Exactly."

The engineer came in from the corridor with a flat slate under one arm and a ration pack in her hand.

"Bridge," she said. "The Council's asking for us."

We went up together.

On the bridge screen nine councillors sat in a curved gallery of dark wood.

The one in the middle was an old woman with white hair and a plain grey coat.

She looked at Caspian first and then at me.

"Commander Roark. Miss Hargreave," she said. "The Council has watched the whole engagement."

"Speaker," said Caspian.

"We saw three Anchor Office cruisers answer a false distress call with fire. We saw your anchor port cut."

She folded her hands.

"We did not see what you did in your quiet room, and we are grateful."

Keep reading free with an account. Start They Called Me Defective, Until I Tamed the Interstellar Commander from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.