Sci, returning from his sojourn into the Old City, turned a corner in the Red Home and walked almost into Dohrnaira Neris. He smiled, half-bowed, and asked how she was.
"Hungry," she admitted. "I've not eaten in a while."
"Ah. Care to join me for a small bite? The food here isn't exactly up to the standards in the palace, but it's close."
"Good food on missions? Seems a waste of space and power," she commented.
"Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow..." He trailed off and held out his hand. She took it and he guided her to the mess.
Over a simple but tasty meal, Sci and Naira exchanged some small talk. Though she did note that he didn't give anything away, he did make pleasant conversation. She did most of the talking, it seemed.
At one point he asked her what she planned to do when they got back. "I'm not sure. After I stopped being a Lady-In-Waiting I became a surrogate, helping Eti. I don't know if I have very many marketable skills--they weren't exactly on the top of the list of my education."
"Nonsense," he responded. "I'm sure you have some useful skills. Tell you what--I'll put in a good word for you with the right people next time we get back into Mendellia. I'm sure you can find something worth doing, in the Palace or the City."
"Are you sure I--" Naira seemed flustered, a rare occasion.
"I'm sure," he cut her off.
"But...will you even be alive in that time?"
He smirked. "Worried about losing your lifeline?" As she reacted, flustered, he shook his head. "Just kidding. For what it's worth I'm touched by your concern, but this part is the part of the job I accepted a long time ago." She seemed moved by his low tone.
"But how do you live, knowing that every day might be your last?"
"I'll skip the fact that the same is true of everybody," he responded, "and just say that you fortify yourself against it. You've heard the joke, the most guaranteed way of dying in war is to talk about your life back home?" She nodded. "Well, that's all wrong. You talk about when you get back, not if. If you don't talk about your life outside, or what you'll do when you get back...if you don't look beyond the battle to the rest of your life...you're sure to fail.
"You lose sight of what guides you, and then, even if you live, you never recover. It's like America's Lost Generation after the Great War of the 1910s...they had a generation of people so touched by the war that they became lost, adrift. The literature of the time was sad, filled with isolation, pain, and loneliness." She hadn't heard of the Lost Generation, unfortunately, but she certainly understood the idea. "It's not uncommon...once you've defeated the enemy, you realize your life has no meaning anymore.
"So what you do is, you keep planning. You think about your first meal afterwards. You imagine the smiles on your family's faces. Or you look forward to the monotony of normal life. You do anything to avoid concentrating on the fact that you're facing death. And then, you go into battle. Moral is to the physical, like John Ringo said, as ten is to one."
"Who?"
"A writer. Surely you heard the stories."
"Yes. But even with all of that, the concentration on the future, you're killing. Ending lives."
"I know. That's after the battle. In the moments afterwards, win or lose, you look back on the lives you snuffed out. You try to understand why, and you tell yourself it was necessary. With us it's easy, like in the Second World War: We're fighting to preserve our world. When you don't understand why, when you can't accept it, you get the Vietnam War."
"So what do you look forward to?"
He smiled. "In the short term? Helping you find a place to work."
Partly in an effort to move away from the possibility of onrushing doom, the conversation shifted to old stories. Sci retold some of the Mendellia-themed stories from Project Boussh, such as the death of Eugor Atner, and Naira related her tales of her life at that time. With the Queen still in exile, most of the upper crust was in Eugor's court. She had been a little too young for Dictator Atner then, though her parents weren't completely averse to the idea, but she was overshadowed by other noble ladies. She spoke of the grand parties and the beauty of the court, but did say that there was a sense of unease and worry. "Some nobility thought that Dictator Atner's ideas for genetic purity were...extreme, to say the least. It's probably likely that even if Lord Thayer had not staged his rebellion, an organized resistance would have been formed."
"It was a difficult time for many," Sci said. "It seems to be the way of the world...some prosper on the backs of others. What about your parents? What did they think?"
"My father never discussed his political views with anybody. My mother was slightly more outspoken in private, but she couldn't say anything in public."
"Well," he said, finishing off his meal, "times change. And people with them. You seem more relaxed now, certainly, than the last time we talked."
"The last time we talked, Major--"
"Call me Sci," he cut her off. "Major is too formal."
"...Sci. The last time we talked you were doing your best to intimidate us."
"Oh, yes," Sci chuckled, "that I was. Did it work? No, I don't want to know that."
"Smart move," said Naira as a gray droid rolled into the mess.
"Major," said Nat, "you're needed."
"All right," he called, "I'll be right in." He turned back to Naira. "I should get going, it seems. I'll let the right people know you're looking for work when we get back."
"I don't know how to thank you enough," she said, holding out her hand to shake.
He reached over, took her hand lightly, and kissed it. "How about dinner when we get back?"
Her eyes widened and she smiled. "I would be honored."