It was morning when the guards came for Tessa, the rattle of composite and boots as they opened her cage almost a welcome change from the dim, sleepless monotony of laying on the scratchy cot. She was up and on her feet before hands could grab her, catch her shoulders and twist her hands into synthplastic cuffs, but she went along with it anyway, didn’t fight her captors. She’d come back to save lives, not end more of them.

No one told her where they were taking her– she simply walked, let them lead her, hardly even looked up as they crossed the ship, brought her to a conference room and pressed her into a seat. Above her, the six captains of the six warships that had come together in the system sat like a tribunal, each shuffling through their own set of files on silicon. Admiral Virek sat quietly at the head of the table, fingers steepled. Locking eyes with him came natural, felt right. If this was a court, it was a joke, a useless formality, and she smiled accordingly.

“Major Eisenherz,” The admiral met her stare levelly. “You have been accused of murder in the first degree of one, Lieutenant Commander Tessa Eisenherz, treason and intent to undermine the structure of command within the military, breach of the conventions of New Arahal prohibiting temporal displacement with intent to modify the course of events, and theft of experimental military technology in the form of the Seindrive V Stormfury. How do you plead?

“Guilty.” Tessa’s stare stayed strong, refused to waver. “On all counts.”

Several of the captains glanced at each other, hesitated. The man she recognized as Kongar-Ool, captain of the Feynman, leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms, brown and harsh-edged face darkening quietly. Virek blinked, breathed.

“You realize that the penalty for being found guilty of even one of these charges is death.”

Tessa nodded immediately, shifted into a more casual position.

“You can only kill me once, admiral.” She bared teeth in a half-grin. “I’ve done my duty. I’ve set things right. That’s all that matters.”

“The sentence of death could be commuted for an indefinite period of service at one of the Navy’s experimental research facilities. . .” Another captain offered– Kyme of the Constantine. Virek glanced at her, met her gaze evenly. “There is still a lot about the Stormfury that we don’t know, and even more that we could learn about the major’s own enhancements.”

“Fuck that.” Tessa said evenly. “I’d rather die than be one of your lab rats.” The look Kyme shot her was half stunned, half furious. “The instructions, the research, everything you would ever need to know is in the files I brought back with me.”

“There’s also the matter of your child.” Virek added suddenly. Tessa hesitated under the force of his stare, swallowed, pushed her resolve back into place. “The laws as they stand hold that an unborn child shall not be condemned along with its mother in the case of a death sentence.” He paused. “Do you really want your daughter to grow up an orphan?”

Tessa hesitated, lips parting for words that wouldn’t come. Before she could speak, another Captain slammed down his packet of silicon sheets and crossed his arms.

“With all due respect, admiral, Major Tessa Eisenherz is a genetically modified organism that has been serving in the Navy illegally for years, openly and willingly defying the laws passed in council over fifty years ago.” He gestured fiercely. “I move that this court stop dodging the point and pass sentence now. It’s clear that this thing wants to die.” He looked directly at Tessa. “I say we grant its wish and put it out of its misery before it can bring the abomination it is carrying into our world.”

Tessa swallowed under the force of his words, the stares of the assembled officers. Bastard. She shook her head. She recognized the captain, even as he stared back at her with a look somewhere on the edge of pure hatred, so different from the easy smile of his file photo. Yuuki Kohta, Captain of the Carl Sagan.

Virek sighed, glanced at his stack of silicon. “Major Eisenherz, do you have anything to say in your own defense?”

Tessa’s lips parted on the edge of words, but the sound was cut off by a sudden scuffle outside the conference room. Shouting lanced into the silence, two voices struggling to overpower one another. Virek glanced at one of the guards standing behind Tessa, gestured.

“Sergeant Dougherty.” He glanced at the door. The sergeant moved like clockwork, crossed to the door and keyed it open. Beyond the threshold, a woman was shouting, something vague and angry that ended with “–you fucking white-glove command assholes. . .” Dougherty shifted, took it in stride.

“What seems to be the problem, Ma’am?”

“Thank fucking. . . finally.” The woman spat back. “I need to get in there. I know Eisenherz better than anyone else on any of the ships here, and there are things the brass in there need to know before they pass any kind of judgement on her.”

“Ma’am, I’m sorry, but this is a closed. . .”

“Let her speak.” Kongar-Ool insisted suddenly, voice as hard as iron, smooth as an hiss.

“Agreed.” Kyme glanced at the admiral even as Yuuki crossed his arms, pressed back into his seat. “Virek?”

The old admiral nodded, watched the woman for a moment. Tessa closed her eyes, let herself sag forward in her seat. Just what I need. She breathed a tired sigh. Here I am about to die for saving the human race, and the two people ready to crucify me before anyone else are the captain whose ship I saved and the woman I loved enough to go back in time for. She looked up as Virek made a gesture, met Izzy’s smoldering brown eyes as she crossed to the center of the room, turned to stand before the assembled officers. The admiral was the first to speak.

“Is there something you would like to say, Lieutenant?”

“Yes, Admiral, there most certainly is.” Izzy shot back. Tessa closed her eyes, steeled her heart against the coming storm.

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