Reginar handled the return to orbit without any assistance from her. Sam made sure to offer multiple times -- sometimes blatantly and sometimes with passive aggressive subtlety. They assisted the porters and cargo master with the unloading of the shuttle, then the others departed to Earth for another cargo run while Sam stayed behind with the same Captain that had confronted Cassandane on one occasion that she had witnessed. The Captain took her to a room where they waited in silence for several minutes, the man glaring at her any time she began to open her mouth. Their time there ended when a man with a five pointed star insignia on each shoulder of his medal-covered uniform invited them in to his office.

Following the lead of the Captain, Sam stood stiffly until the owner of the office gave them permission to sit in chairs.

"Hello, Soldier Samantha Wilcox. I am Imperator Kama Dean. Normally I would not conduct the briefing of someone at the soldier rank personally, but due to the peculiarities of the situation I thought it best to get involved." The man steepled his fingers while he sized her up. "I read your incident report already. It was poorly written, Soldier. Your selfish jockeying for position was in particularly bad taste. Not only was an incident report the wrong format, such a request should not even have been made considering you cannot lift a shuttle into orbit."

The Imperator sighed. "We are going to ignore your entitled blunder this time. You are an untrained civilian play-acting a role you don't understand. That will be remedied soon. Until then, I am assigning you to generator duty. Today you are taking over the shift Reginar would normally fill. Tomorrow and every day after, you will be assigned to work a morning and an evening shift on generators. Training on military ettiquette and operational procedures will be fit into your schedule. Check your tablet every morning for your orders. Do you understand?"

Sam tried to emerge from the hunched posture she had retreated to under the man's stern lecture. "Uh, yes, Imperator." She took a deep breath and forced the question out. Come on, Sam. "But . . . I will get to fly shuttles again eventually, right?"

"Soldier, you will get to do what duties we assign to you. Whether you like it or not is up to you, but you will follow orders. Is that clear?"

"Yes, Imperator."

"Captain, take her to the generator station."

That short trip proved to be less than pleasant as the Captain spent every moment pontificating on proper military bearing. Sam didn't respond to any of the remarks lobbed her way as she had the distinct impression that her role in the conversation was to listen silently. They went down the spindle to the ring section that held Sam's apartment -- was it considered her apartment now? Probably best not to ask, lest she find herself downgraded -- and around the corner to the generator station. Inside, a middle-aged woman perked up at their entrance.

The Captain briefly explained that Sam would be relieving her to take on Reginar's shift but that she should be ready to take over if Sam wasn't able to handle the job. The woman nodded her agreement and then the Captain left. Sam thought it likely he had to find someone else to browbeat with the weight of his rank. She smiled at the woman. "So how do I do this?"

"If you're able to shift your corona upwise of mine, we can do a seemless handoff."

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

"What-wise?"

"That's what I figured," the woman said. "We'll just do a countdown. On one, I withdraw my corona and you engage yours. The gauge will indicate if your speed is within the acceptable range. The bottom red means too slow, the top red means too fast, and the closer you can keep to the middle yellow lights, the better. Ready? Three. Two. One."

Sam wasn't prepared. The gauge immediately began to plunge towards the bottom red as she struggled to keep the heavy flywheel turning at the proper speed. The loss of power slowed, then it leveled off just above the red. "This is heavy," she said.

"It's the resistance from the magnets and the wires and lights that makes it hard. The flywheel bearings have been replaced recently and it is pretty easy to turn."

Sam didn't bother to thank the woman for her oh-so-helpful correction. Most Angmari didn't seem to care much for sarcasm. Besides, she had a role to play here. After a few minutes, Sam had to begin clearing to increase her kinetic potential. She also had to resort to heavily vasting her mind and hardening her body to get rid of the sudden excess of nous and gravitas.

It took a good ten minutes, but she finally managed to get the gauge to a satisfactory setting. Sam turned to face the woman. "How long is my shift?"

"Eight hours. Reginar worked a double."

"Oh, great."

"Don't feel too sorry for yourself. I have to go back on duty for Cassandane's usual shift, so I'll be relieving you instead of going to my son's play tonight."

Sam put on a lopsided smile. "It sounds like Cassandane really screwed everyone over."

"We're still better off without the Aoleyen," the woman said. "You just can't trust their kind."

"Uh, yeah, I know what you mean . . . ." Sam shrugged. "See you in eight hours!"

"Eight and a half, actually. My shift hadn't ended yet when you took over. Have fun!"

As the door shut, Sam flipped her middle finger at where the woman had stood. She settled into the chair and kept her eyes fixated on the gauge.

When the woman finally returned, Sam had to prevent a snarky comment about her being fifteen minutes late. There was nothing to be gained and everything to be lost if she broke her cover too soon. It wasn't as if she had to keep up appearances for an extended time. "Hey, did you get to see any of your son's play?"

The woman avoided eye contact as she took over the seat. "I saw part of it. Sorry I'm running late today."

"It's not a big deal. Our schedules were screwed up by Cassandane, so it's her fault, really."

"Yeah. Exactly. The Aoleyen put us in this situation. Three. Two. One." And the woman took over control of the flywheel by overwhelming Sam's corona somehow.

"All right, I'll see you tomorrow, then. I'm off to get some sleep," Sam said. She kept up the smile until the door shut behind her, then let it drop from her face. It had been a shit day. If her little operation didn't go well, tomorrow would be even worse. So unbelievably worse.

She ate at the same place as always before returning to Cassandane's apartment. For a moment, in the safety of isolation, she hesitated to use the tablet. But whether or not the authorities monitored her use of it, she needed the information. Sam typed in her query. How high is geosynchronous orbit of Earth? The answer came back. Approximately 22,200 miles above sea level. "Hope no one is reviewing the logs in real time," she muttered. That done, she set an alarm for one in the morning and curled up on her cot. Hopefully she would be able to get some sleep.

One way or another, the next day was guaranteed to be interesting.