From: watkins julia k Subject: "The Last Possible Moment" 1/1 Date: Mon, 28 Dec 1998 13:06:10 -0600 (CST) Hello all, Under ideal circumstances this would have been done and posted several months ago. I've been too much distracted by other people's fanfic to write my own! For this story, turn back the clock to early fifth season. This is sort of a gapfiller. Beta thanks to Tamzin, Jeanne, Frieda & Patricia for comments and grammar corrections on the first drafts. Tamzin's story "Reaction" is what started me on this project, long months ago. Unlike "Reaction", this is an AU, even though I'm trying to present a backstory that's consistent with canon, though not consistent with my other 4th season fanfic, still in progress. I think the conversation John and Delenn had off-camera was much shorter than what I have written below, and there were topics I wanted to discuss at greater length. Note: I'm taking the year for John & Anna's wedding from "The Shadow Within" (novel 7), as confirmed by the timeline for John Sheridan printed in "Universe Today". This somewhat contradicts a line of dialog from "In the Shadow of Z'ha'dum", but then that episode contradicts "Revelations" ("six months" vs. "two weeks"). :) Comments welcome. ============== Standard Disclaimers ============== "The Last Possible Moment" ...halfway between a gapfiller and an AU ...for canon, tweak at a couple points and/or multiply the false starts by 5 or 20 (your choice) By Julie Watkins julifolo@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu "Hell, this isn't going to work." John stopped and erased the message. He didn't want to admit defeat, but there was no other conclusion. His throat locked up when he tried to say it in person. He couldn't even tell it into a recorder with a script in front of him. Five hours thirty-three minutes and counting. At this point, he didn't have a choice. He printed out the text, choosing paper instead of film and hoped he could find her alone so he could put the letter in her hand and ask her to read it. --\-- "John, you should not be here. I believe this would be 'bad luck'?" The white dress was lying across her couch. His eyes were cast down and he was looking everywhere except at her. He held some white papers sheets inside a thin blue portfolio. It looked official. He seemed excessively embarrassed that he was interrupting her with 'business' so soon before the ceremony. "Er, sorry," he muttered. "I know this isn't ..." She couldn't hear the rest of what he said, except for the continued embarrassed voice. The shuttle from Earth would be arriving in a short time. "Very well. I will take care of it. Go and meet your family. I know you are anxious to see them." She shooed him out the door. --\-- John stood in the waiting area. He was twenty minutes early. By the time the shuttle arrived it was thirty minutes late. Every fifteen seconds he debated calling Delenn. The other voice always answered that she knew where he was, and would call if she needed to talk. That quieted the doubts for a few moments, then the worry cycle started again. "Nervous, Johnny?" Dad laughed after John's haphazard hug. "Some things don't change." John smiled back ruefully. //You told me, "Don't rush in,"// he answered him silently. //You told me, "Don't hurt your career." I never even told you her name. For all you knew, I'd been a good son and followed your advice.// Sister Lizzy's greeting was something that was trying to tease, but there was a sad undertone to her voice. She was thinking about Anna, John realized, his emotions further complicated. --\-- It was a beautiful ceremony, uninterrupted by crisis or uninvited guests. Likewise their night was uninterrupted, though the command crew of the _Whitestar_ received many urgent inquiries from ISN. --\-- Delenn closed her robe and accepted the tea John handed her. He had awoken first and had investigated the abbreviated kitchen facilities. She saw the portfolio was in a different position from where she had left it. There was something odd in John's movements. "Oh, I did not read that report. Susan called, and -- Was it urgent?" She spoke in a happy honeymoon voice. "I'm sure it can wait. John?" "Did you say something?" he asked, pretending deafness. "Nothing important." With one hand she turned his face toward hers and gently kissed his lips. It took him a moment to respond and there seemed to be a tension hidden underneath his caress. She let the embrace unwind, letting her hands slide lower to grasp his fingers. "Where are your thoughts, John? Is something wrong?" John's gaze flicked toward the side table where she had put the portfolio yesterday afternoon. "Something." He swallowed. "In my past." There was an odd tone to his voice. He sounded upset. It didn't make any sense. This was so different from yesterday, from last night. "You are trying to tell me something." "Yes." "You are worried?" "Oh, yeah." The words came out in a rush. "I'm scared I'm going to mess this up." "'This'? What 'this'? What are you talking about?" "Ahhh -- " One hand waved nervously, and the pitch of his voice changed, as if he were changing subjects. "I've been thinking about what clan I'd be if I were minbari. Pilots are the most bull-headed and wild clan of the human warrior caste." He seemed pleased with the analogy. "I'll tell you something about pilots. They aren't afraid of death. It was something you lived with." He smiled painfully. "Death, for me, used to be personal friend I hoped I could bribe to stay away. Pilots pretend to be immortal. Even in peacetime one in every ten pilots, statistically, was going to get killed. Pushing the envelope, trying to fly faster. It was an adrenaline rush, addicting. That was me, nineteen years old." "You're surprised to be alive." She did not understand what this long story had to do with anything. He nodded. "In war it's even odds or worse in every battle you fight. It makes so little sense that I survived that, even thrived on it, but I can't -- Ah, hell." He gave her a frustrated smile that explained nothing. "You clan is 'pilots'?" Delenn made an attempt to find the purpose of his meandering words. "Most of those you trained with were killed?" He halted, looking a bit lost. "Yeah." The frustrated smile returned. "That's right. But it's not what I'm trying to talk about. I'm talking about talking." That explained nothing. "For a pilot -- the fear is failure. If something is dangerous, we're not thinking about dying. We're praying, 'Dear God, please don't let me f--- up.' We're afraid of making a mistake everyone will see." The conversation had circled back to "making a mistake". The intervening dodging and awkwardness had given Delenn no insight into what was wrong. "John J. Sheridan. Husband. You will stop this nonsense and speak plainly." "I'm trying," he whispered. He turned away from looking at her. He had twitched at the word 'husband'. "This is about us, the marriage?" She was frightened to say that, she was frightened when he didn't respond. He loved her. Didn't he love her? Last night -- the heady memories nearly overwhelmed her. He was human, she was minbari. He had said it wouldn't matter. Had the joining not been for him as it had been for her? He had seemed satisfied. They had spoken many words of love and happiness. Now all that seemed changed. What had happened? How could he be afraid? How could he believe she would ever stop loving him? She thought of all the secrets she had kept from him. He had said it didn't matter. She had to trust his word. Did he think he couldn't trust her? There was nothing he could have done that could alter the love she felt towards him. Was there? He picked up the folder and put it in her hands. --\-- He walked to the opposite wall and stared at it, cursing himself for a fool. He strained his ears to hear what she was doing. It was a long time before she turned the first page. He had known that the longer he waited the harder this was going to be. He'd told himself that every morning, and just let the time slip away out of embarrassment. Seven months ago, it could have been a joke. //"Fifty," he could have said. "That's a lot of rituals, but maybe it's the right idea. I wouldn't have made the mistake I made--"// Yesterday he had married again. Last night had been wonderful. He had pushed the letter out of his mind, though he had suspected that she hadn't read it. He'd tried. All his other excuses were avoidance, but last night was *not* the time. He had given her everything he could, and it had been everything thing he'd dreamed of -- and more. Last night gave him the strength to do what he had to do. This morning should have been just as wonderful, not an argument. If he could just have flat out told her. He'd made such a big deal out of something that didn't really matter. Elizabeth didn't matter. How Delenn felt mattered; what she thought of him mattered. But his tongue had tied up into knots once again and Delenn was going to misinterpret that as real fear. She had no experience about marriage arguments, that they weren't permanent. Usually weren't permanent. He'd just made matters worse. Much worse. //Fool,// he told himself. //You're a fool.// --\-- Delenn walked unsteadily to where John stood and sat cross-legged on the floor. He sat and waited for her to speak. "She's alive." "Yes." The word hung in the air a while. More needed to be said. "I don't think she ever married again. She's not married now." "This would be part of the 'not serious stuff' before Anna." "Yes." "Who ended it?" she asked sternly. She couldn't make herself say the word 'divorce'. "Which of you asked to be released from your vow?" John grimaced, looking away. Hands nervous. He knew he had to speak, but his voice was frozen again. It seemed that the cultural horror at the thought of broken promises was every bit as strong in Delenn as he had feared. He forced out the answer. "I don't know." She stared for a moment, then her head turned sharply and shifted her weight away from him as if she were getting ready to stand. He laid on hand on her wrist. He didn't want her to leave. "That's the truth," he pleaded. "It became one more thing we argued about. Somehow the topic came up in the middle of another row and devolved into a nasty game of trying to assign blame. Even when things calmed down, we couldn't remember. The judge asked the same question. We said 'mutual agreement' and he accepted that." Her answer was silence. "Right. Ugly. I'm not proud of myself." She was waiting for an explanation for something that couldn't be explained. Talking specifics would only cause more pain. "I love you," he risked saying. "All I want is you." "Now." "Forever." "You meant 'forever' when you married Elizabeth." "Yes." More accurately, he had been hoping for forever, but that was not a distinction he could attempt to make to Delenn in her present mood. "I was wrong. I didn't know what I was doing." "I must trust that *this* 'forever' is real?" "Yes." She turned away. The cultural gap was too wide. Intellectually she might understand, but emotionally there wasn't enough shared experience. "I didn't know what I was doing," John pleaded. "I do now. I was nineteen--" "How can your people allow children to make an adult decision?" "In my culture the choice doesn't have to be permanent." "It is wrong." Even with her long dark hair she looked very minbari. "It's how we learn." "Your rituals are cruel." "Sometimes." He conceded the point. Under the circumstances it was hard not to. He was too nervous to remain seated on the floor. He stood and tried to clear his thoughts. As he paced restlessly he tried not to turn his back on her. "Better rituals would have helped. They could have prevented much pain. Then and now. I wanted to tell you. I didn't want to hurt you." Delenn remained as she was. Her eyes tracked every movement. "You loved her." "No. Yes." His eyes wandered, his voice was heavy with embarrassment over motivations and feelings he didn't want to explain. "We were infatuated. We couldn't see each other clearly." "Do these feelings remain?" "No." The word was firm. If Delenn's crossed legs had not set up a barrier he would have rejoined her on the floor. He met her gaze unflinching. Whatever his confusion and mistakes in the past, in the present he had nothing to apologize for. "We're friends. When the ugliness got untangled, we got that back. She's a good officer. I'm not carrying a flame. Not interested in her sexually." Delenn looked up, meeting his gaze. "Nothing?" she asked. He didn't need to be a telepath to read the rest of the question: then why had it been so difficult for him to tell her? He grimaced and it was another round of pacing before he spoke again. "She didn't come to Anna's funeral. She didn't want questions asked, didn't want to risk a scene. But she visited me two days afterwards. For the first and only time I can remember, Elizabeth kept her mouth shut let me talk. She didn't question me about what I didn't say, though she knew I was hiding something." John was glad they had spoken of this before, in the aftermath of Z'ha'dum, during the short peace after the First Ones had left. For two years he had blamed himself for driving Anna away to her death. The letter his sister had shown him had eased his paint, but the guilt had left only briefly, coming back in another form. Delenn had tried to tell him that the marriage with Anna had been no failure, but he remained unconvinced. "Elizabeth didn't give me advice or tell me what I should do or feel," John continued. "She said she was sorry, and left. She didn't come back, I didn't look for her. If there was any romantic feeling left, something would have happened. I gave up on love and buried myself in my work. Then I met you, and my heart changed. It was difficult to admit it at first." He didn't want to look at Delenn. He was afraid of what he would see in her face, that she might be questioning the wisdom of her choice. She didn't speak. He wanted her to speak. He didn't know what to do but keep talking. "Anna knew about Elizabeth. She practically forced the story out of me, wanting to know why I didn't want to set a date for our wedding." Anna had known he had carried her picture since the start of the war, but they didn't marry until nearly two years after the war's end. "Once Anna knew, she would use it to tease me. When she wanted to win an argument she'd threaten to tell my sister Lizzy about her namesake. When she *really* got going she'd insist she was going to invite Elizabeth to our tenth or fiftieth wedding anniversary party and make people guess why she was there -- " His eyes misted over. "It was a tease, not a threat." His whispered voice was puzzled and grieving. "On the tenth anniversary of my marriage to Anna she was two and a half years dead. All that was left of our grand plans were loving memories. Those would be poisoned. Ten years after that marriage was close to the time I'd admitted to myself I'd fallen in love with you. So much time wasted, I didn't want to make that same mistake again. Anna and I had promised each other we'd do it right, but we assumed we had all the time in the world. We let our jobs keep us separated. "We believed the war propaganda they put out about me, that I could do anything. 'Starkiller'. The War Office took an act of desperation & turned it into a Grand Plan. If there had been a plan the next two years would have happened differently. The Warrior caste despises me because I'm not what I pretend to be. I had to follow the government script and answer with silence. Seeing how the government manipulated the truth, it wasn't that much work for Hague to recruit me." "You are speaking in circles again." Delenn's right thumb and index finger pressed against her wedding band. She wasn't sure how she felt about this revelation. It would take time to get used to the idea. But she had known about Anna, had kept her own secrets. She could see his distress and worry, and could not help but respond to that. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner," he continued. "It was so long ago. It didn't work, it was a secret -- " "A marriage cannot be secret," she interrupted, startled. "It is a statement to the community." "There are other reasons to be married," John muttered under his breath, idly wondering if casual sex existed in minbari society. If family was all-important something impermanent might be so invisible as to be ignored as Sex Ed. He really didn't want to know. After _Shan Fal_ John had first-hand experience that Minbari, or at least Delenn, had more conscious control over responses. He decided not to explain 'raging hormones', or why rebellion made him ignore political realities. "In order to win a spot in a fast-track officer training program 'married' was a bad idea, and married to a fellow cadet was forbidden. "Dad had expectations. I felt so stupid. A high ranking friend of the family wanted to be my sponsor. He wouldn't take 'no' for answer. I had to explain. I begged him not to tell my family." "They don't ...?" Her voice quickly faded into silence. He grinned sheepishly. "I wasn't rebellious enough to tell Dad that I ignored his advice. Then it was over. They didn't know, still don't. There was never a reason to mention it." "Now there is a reason." "I don't want to hide this from you. I can't." There was a curious look on her face. Minbari secrecy, John realized. He was going to have to tell the rest quickly, before Delenn added it together. If there was not a good reason why Delenn should know, she would have accepted not being told. If it was acceptable for him not to tell his family, then there was had to be a reason outside of 'family' that she had to be told. He spoke quickly before her thoughts reached their logical conclusion. "I want to invite her onto the station." Delenn stared at him, doubts returning. "Why?" This was going to be a hard sell. How could he expect her to understand? "Ivanova's replacement. ISA is going to buy the station, making it alliance territory, but I still want an Earth Force captain in charge of daily operations. It would be good to have someone from the other side. I've so many broken bridges to mend. A lot of Earth military approves of my result, but not how I got there. This will be a sign that says 'your support matters.'" "Why your former wife?" "I trust her. She didn't join the rebellion, but she didn't help Clark either. She was doing all she could do within the system to stop what he was doing. Everyone else -- I can't be sure of their agendas and egos." "But when her past becomes known -- " "It won't," he almost snapped. "The marriage was a secret. No one is going to know about it. I had to tell you because you're going to need to work closely with her." That was a bad way to put that. "If she comes." The qualifying words didn't do much to thaw the sudden chill. "Your 'reporters' will make a scandal." Delenn was speaking minbari-to-human again. Earlier she had been concerned by how upset he was acting, but his feelings or her own could not be held more important than the common good. "John, this is not wise. Our Alliance is new, fragile. We cannot afford a controversy." "There's no record." "It was not a real marriage? You were lovers?" "It *was* real -- " Cultural differences again. Without a vow broken, she wouldn't have minded. Maybe it would have been easier if he had said it that way, but it was too late now. "There's a procedure," he explained. "You can have a marriage, other stuff, deleted from the public record, though the record of the request remains in sealed court records. Top military would have full access to that. "I didn't make that request; I was going to take responsibility for my choices. I expected to catch hell one way or another when I didn't place. But my sponsor pulled a few strings and made the request on my behalf. I got an invitation to Annapolis and found that my record had been altered. I sent word to Elizabeth. Next I heard she was in West Point. We kept mum. We were ambitious. We both moved quickly up the ranks." Despite his assurances, this sounded worse and worse. "But your friends. Those three months -- " "Not a problem." Delenn was speechless, torn between the need to trust her husband and the fear of what would happen if he were wrong. "We told only our closet friends, and swore them to secrecy," John said gently, as if that were assurance enough. "They had the same ambitions. We all joined the Force together. They all died in the war." "All -- " She started to ask if he was sure, then she abruptly turned aside. He didn't have to say which war. Her motions filled with grief and maybe shame. Would Delenn feel shame? For a brief moment he wanted that to be so. Better not to ask. One part of him wanted the apology, but no words would ever be enough. This was dangerous ground. By mutual unvoiced consent, they had agreed not to talk about that time in their lives when each was the enemy of the other. When they talked of the war it was always other people's experiences, or they spoke as if the other was an uninvolved third party. But his life before and after and how he had changed and what was forgotten was so caught up in those terrible years that opening up the wounds was unavoidable. "All?" he whispered, perhaps too faint for her to hear. "Some dark mornings it felt that way." Unending funerals and memorial services that were no more than lists of names. And then there were too many names to be spoken. He closed that door, and turned away from the memories. His next words were spoken firmly. "Clark's people questioned everyone, looking for material to twist into slander. Randall was his puppet. If it there had been anything to find, he would have trumpeted and twisted it. Records were lost and corrupted during the course of the war, especially at the end. Preserving the historical record wasn't a matter of survival. Those few people who know won't say." Delenn avoided the dangers of the past to focus on those of the present. "You are sure of this." "You saw all the lies, how Clark discredited everyone close to me. Elizabeth couldn't have kept her ship, kept her people protected. She wasn't a high profile person like James on the _Aggy_. If 'treason' didn't dig the secret out, why should I worry about charges of 'nepotism'?" "Because of the risk. Because bringing her close to you would expose her to scrutiny that did not exist before." "My only concern is you. This could be awkward. I don't want you walking on eggshells. I could never hurt you." "You're not hurting me." She said that as if she meant to make that the truth. "This isn't a question of my feelings. From a political standpoint -- " "Right," he interrupted. "I can't afford to mess this up." He grunted, then let a veil of long-endured frustration cover his voice. The universe had conspired to give him a 'destiny' much against his wishes. Fitting punishment for young and brash ambition. "I still don't understand how *I* got here, why *I'm* the hero. So many times I've had to be rescued -- you rescue me -- but somehow I'm the one getting the credit, the responsibility. Everyone is looking to me. This Alliance wouldn't be, except for you. I can't let them down." "You won't." Circles again. So much had been tangled in and around she could barely keep it straight. Was there a way to reverse this? "Why are you so afraid of failure?" "Do you want a list?" "You don't give yourself enough credit." He grunted once again. His memory flashed back to his first mistake, refusing the assignment to the _Prometheus_. He had claimed duty to the _Lexington_ and Captain Sterns. The truth was he had considered Jankowski a 'loose cannon' and was avoiding a fight. The universe had put John in the position of preventing a great tragedy and he had walked away, putting his own career first. He had been afraid of a bad scene and a black mark on his record. Instead, the first contact between humans and minbari ended in death. Then the war came that had made him a 'hero'. Better if the war had never began. The peace attempt failed, and on and on. Delenn stared with concern into John's face. His eyes had the same haunted and hollow look that she had seen after his rescue. Pushing through his insecurities in this matter were causing other doubts to surface as well. She put one hand on his chest, but he seemed not to feel it. John was in a dark, concrete room. Bound, hungry, filthy, helpless. Without hope. "I kept thinking of you. I had to be strong, for your sake. You didn't want me to fail ... I was going to break." She tried to gently to change the subject. "You were rescued soon enough. It will do no good to brood on what might have been." Her reassurance only made him more nervous. "I said such brave words. I don't know where they came from. I kept saying 'no' to them, that I wouldn't bow down. It was a lie. I knew they were going to win. If Michael hadn't-- *I* didn't get out of there. *I* didn't win. Michael got free, then he got me free, but nobody knows ... they would have won. Another day, they would have won." He stepped away from her touch and paced all over the room, agitated. "I thought of you. I couldn't stop thinking of you. I couldn't answer the question: was your love a shield or was it a weakness? I remembered your strength, I needed to be that strong ... but I wanted to live. More than anything? Did I want to live more than I wanted not to fail? ... I dreamed of loving you, I longed to make a life with you. If I didn't love you so much ... I would have died for the cause. They tempted me. Tempted me with you." "John." Delenn's touch brought him back to the present. He saw her fear, pulled back from the abyss. "Sorry, I shouldn't -- " He wasn't ready to talk yet. He pushed the memory back again, came back to happiness. "You're not a mistake; you're my reason for living." His voice was husky and a bit unsteady. "Once in a while I do the right thing. Anna wasn't a mistake, it was taking the future for granted." "Elizabeth won't be a mistake." Her voice was neutral, her tense carefully chosen. "No," he said firmly, then grinned. "Not this time." She still did not understand his surety. She groped for a safe question, hoping to gain more clues. "How did you make this choice?" "One of those unending meetings," he grunted, happy to rant safely. "I had proposed the idea of a 'mending fences' candidate for captain of B5. Lefcourt liked the idea." John's face turned angry. "Somehow he inserted himself into the negotiations. Lefcourt and I have a history. He got offended when I wouldn't accept a favor; he picked me for a doomed mission once because I was 'expendable'. One moment he was ready to kill me, the next he saved my life, and then he decides it's time to do me favors again. "He left that meeting, and then came back with a list of names and wanted me to make the call on the spot. He thought it was bad politics that I didn't. Luckily, things had been interrupted. Elizabeth was second on the list. I almost revealed the secret then and there. At first I thought it was his idea of a bad joke, but when he started rattling off the same handful of stats on Lochley as he did for the other names on the list he thought I might not remember, I realized he didn't know." "How can you be sure?" He returned her hesitant question with a 'haven't you been listening?' stare. She tried a different approach. "There must be other acceptable officers on that list." "It was a short list of twenty names. Most of them I don't know well. Except for Elizabeth, those I do know made me wonder about those I don't. Lefcourt's instincts are opportunistic. I could see serious jurisdiction arguments down the line, with Croft or Vuori." "Do you have reason to believe Lefcourt 'stacked the deck'?" "My love, I dare not take chances. I don't *think* so, but--" He was starting to pace again. He did not feel in control. She stared at him, at a loss for words. It seemed that he literally could not comprehend the trap he was setting. He had shed his uniforms to become a politician. There had been days, almost weeks of meetings before they could leave Earth orbit. The give-and-take of political negotiation was different from military decision-making. She had been surprised by his flexibility. Now the rigidity had reappeared. This was something he thought he could give orders about, and expect unquestioned obedience. He would accept the rest of the political uncertainty, but he would have this. Franklin had warned her that there would be repercussions from the torture. Once rescued, he knew what to do. There was little time and the game plan had already been decided. Given time to think, to brood ... it must be a recurring nightmare now: how it could have gone wrong. He was desperate not to fail the Alliance. He was desperate to keep Earth. Somehow he was convinced that having Elizabeth meant he could do it and without her he would lose. This compulsion was not logical, but it appeared to be well contained. This was something she could live with, even if it seemed unwise. Although he wished to give her the choice to say 'yes' or 'no', he needed her to agree. She would have to trust him. He was looking at her, waiting an answer She didn't know what to say. She turned and stared at the wall. --\-- After another silence, John heard Delenn give a long, frustrated sigh. His mind was much clearer now, relieved to have finally made his confession. It was long past time to lighten the mood. He stepped in front of her and spoke in a soft voice. "This isn't what a honeymoon morning is supposed to be." "You should know," she pouted with mock-seriousness. "Exactly. It's my own damn fault." "Yes." "I'm a Grade A total ratfink," he continued cheerfully. "This isn't something you should have to deal with -- " He made his voice deliberately low and sensual " -- the morning after the night before." She made a strangled sound that he hoped was a laugh. "Correction. I'm a clueless *egotistical* ratfink. I humbly apologize for by abysmal behavior when this time should be all hearts and roses. I had dug myself into an awful hole and I was afraid if I delayed one second more I'd be in too deep to ever climb out." "You are, as you say, 'in the dog house'?" "That about covers it." "You would not fit in a dog house." "That could be the point." She sighed and put her head against his chest. Letting himself relax he carefully placed his hands on her shoulders. He was exhausted, and no wonder. All this unexpected emotion had probably drained her as well. "Hello beautiful," he whispered. "Wanna cuddle?" He got her back to the slanted bed and held her as if he would never let her go. He asked no questions. --\-- Delenn thought for a long time as John held her, and decided 'eggshells' were not attractive. "Does she have to come to the station?" "No," John answered immediately, holding her closer. "On purely practical grounds, as I explained, I think she'd be the best choice. When we get back to the station we can go over the list together and you can check my reasoning. There are other possibilities. I have four more days before Earth Force needs 'my' decision." He paused and pitched the word to make clear he meant this to be a 'joint' agreement, even if, strictly speaking, the choice was his alone. "We'll work it out. I need you to be comfortable with this." ---=== end ===---