Fool's War by Sarah Zettel

could have Mirror of Fate commissioned.
    She had designed the ship. Asil had designed the payment scheme. With him, money was not just a commodity to be tracked and traded. He saw endless possibilities embedded in what to her were meaningless statistics. Maybe that was how she had known she loved him, when she saw that he found possibilities in accounts the way she saw them in a ship’s systems and that like her, he lived to realize the possibilities he saw in his mind.
    Mirror of Fate represented the grandest of all those possibilities. Freedom. Asil and the children and their possibilities in a home she had made and a ship that worked under her hands and eyes and inner vision. She’d dreamed this ship all the years she was learning her trade. When Asil entered her life, they dreamed it together and together, no matter how long the runs lasted, they still dreamed.
    It was a sweet dream and she savored it slowly, like fine coffee. She sipped it gently and let it roll across her senses and warm her from the inside. It would happen. Another two years’ work, three at the very outside. Pasadena ’s upgraded rating would bring in…
    “…so you tell the Ninja Woman I am not going to put up with…”
    The strident voice jolted Al Shei out of her reverie. She started and dropped a forkful of curry onto her plate. “…this kind of crap from a bunch of bigoted…”
    Yerusha. The stun bled away and Al Shei was able to identify the voice clanging through the intercom.
    “And the thunder crashed in a mighty cacophony and all did tremble and shake at the oath that could make the stars ring!” There was a shuffling of cloth and silence. Dobbs. Whatever she had done had caught Yerusha so off-guard she wasn’t able to respond.
    “Intercom to Yerusha,” said Al Shei. “Yerusha. The com’s on and I want to talk to you and whoever you’re yelling at with the Watch Commander.”
    More silence. “Yes, Engineer,” came the answer finally.
    “Intercom to Watch Command,” said Al Shei.
    “It’s okay, Engineer,” came back Schyler’s voice. “I’m the one she was yelling at, myself and the Houston.”
    “Obviously, there is a problem with the intercom,” said Al Shei dryly.
    “Obviously,” cut in Chandra, “unless you really meant this conversation to hit the galley.”
    “Walls are supposed to have ears, but tongues…” chipped in Dobbs. “Do you suppose they gossip about us during the night shift too?”
    “All right, all right,” said Schyler. “Obviously we need a meeting, now.”
    “Obviously,” agreed Al Shei. “Lipinski, who’s on comm watch? I want whatever’s wrong with the intercom routing fixed. I’ll meet all of you in the conference room. Intercom to Close.” She looked regretfully at the Mirror of Fate . “Store file.” She stuffed another forkful of curry into her mouth before she closed the box lid and popped it into a drawer. “Why do I have the feeling this is going to be one of my more interesting runs?”
    She changed back into her working clothes and wrapped her hijab back around her face.
    By the time she reached the conference room, Schyler, Lipinski and Yerusha were already there. So was Dobbs, Al Shei noticed as the hatch cycled closed. The Fool, disdaining any of the available chairs, sat cross-legged in the corner, resting her elbows on her knees. Al Shei suppressed a sigh. According to contract, the Fool could not be excluded from any crew meeting, including disciplinary hearings, but Al Shei really could have done without her presence.
    Yerusha sat with her arms folded and a look of studied blandness on her face. Lipinski was frowning at the pilot and giving her a look that could peel paint. Schyler had one hand laid on the table-top and was dividing his attention between the two recalcitrant crewmembers.
    “All right, Watch.” Al Shei leaned rested her hands on the back of one of the chairs. “What happened?”
    Schyler turned towards her. There was an odd light in his