They Called Me Defective, Until I Tamed the Interstellar Commander novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: The Oversight Dinner

The mess hall had never been so clean.

Dax had made the crew scrub it down in an hour, and the long tables now held real plates and a roast nobody could explain.

"For the oversight inspection," he said, setting the last fork. "Admiral's orders. We feed the delegation and we smile."

"Do you smile?" I asked him.

"I'm out of practice. Watch."

He bared all his teeth.

"Terrifying," I said.

"That's the idea."

Slade and Odette came in at the head of a small knot of Anchor Office staff.

He wore his dress blues, and she wore pale blue silk and a thin gold chain I did not recognize.

She crossed the room at a run and threw her arms around me.

"Vesper, you're alive," she said, loudly enough for the room. "I've been sick about it for days."

"I'm alive."

"And your hands." She caught my bandaged palm and turned it over in her own. "What did he do to you?"

"Nothing. I burned them."

"Of course you did." She patted my wrist and let go. "You always hold on to things too hard."

Her smile was wide and sweet.

I felt the whole crew's eyes sliding from her to me and back again, and none of them were smiling.

We sat down to dinner.

The Commander took the head of the table, and Slade sat at his right, because that was protocol.

I sat at the Commander's left.

I could feel him beside me without looking.

He had not touched me once all evening, and I had counted every inch of the empty space between our chairs.

"The Ninth Wing looks well," Slade said, cutting into his meat. "I'm glad to see the Fleet's patience paid off, Commander. Eleven anchors, and now a charity case. You must be relieved."

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