“The reconnaissance platforms?” Honor asked.

“What?” McKeon blinked for a moment, then chuckled. “Sorry. I can see why you thought that was what I was asking about, under the circumstances. But I was actually referring to what we were talking about last night.” She looked at him, and he shrugged. “Call it a way of distracting myself.”

“A fairly futile one,” she observed.

“The best distractions are,” McKeon replied cheerfully. “If you can answer the question once and for all, it stops being a distraction, doesn’t it?”

“Did I ever tell you that you’re a peculiar person, Alistair?”

Orndorff, Grant, and Brigham grinned at each other behind their superiors’ backs. Yu and Caslet, on the other hand, were sufficiently senior to chuckle openly, and Nimitz bleeked a laugh of his own.

“Actually, I don’t believe you ever did,” McKeon replied. “But all gratuitous insults aside, my question stands. What do you think they’re likely to find?”

“I don’t have the least idea,” she said frankly. “On the other hand, whatever it is, they’ve undoubtedly found it by now. It’s just going to take a while for the news to reach us.”

“We are sort of on the backside of nowhere,” McKeon agreed more sourly.

Which, Honor reflected, was certainly the truth in a lot of ways. McKeon’s question had brought that back into clear relief, whether that was what he’d intended to do or not. They’d received word only two days ago that HMS Harvest Joy had been ordered to depart the Manticore System via the newly discovered Junction terminus, but that message had required over three standard weeks to reach them. It would take just as long for any report of what the survey ship discovered at the terminus’ far end to make the same trip… which was also true of any other message it might occur to the Admiralty or High Ridge Government to send them.

Not that either of those august entities had so far evinced any interest in communicating with something as obviously unimportant as Sidemore Station.

“I don’t have any idea what Zachary and Dr. Kare are likely to find,” she told McKeon, “but I hope whatever it is doesn’t distract the Government even more from our situation out here.”

“Um.” McKeon frowned. “I understand what you’re saying, but I think it’s a bit of six of one, half a dozen of another. We’re not getting any support or guidance, but they’re not screwing the situation up still worse, either.”

Yu started to say something, then visibly changed his mind. Other people felt less constrained by tact, however.

“Admiral McKeon may have a point, Your Grace,” Brigham offered diffidently from behind them. Honor looked over her shoulder at the chief of staff, and the commodore shrugged. “It’s not fair for them to dump the responsibility for making policy, as well as executing it, on you,” she continued. “But given the kind of policy they seem to delight in making, the Star Kingdom may be better off if something does distract them for the duration.”