“Once the breech is hot, she’s in range,” Benning commented. “Keep firing, Mr. Abrams!”The second long gun, also carefully loaded by the sen...ior gun captain, barked and the fall of the next shot could not be ascertained. Then Mr. Abrams fired again, and the shot fell perhaps a pistol shot away from the brig’s hull, quite possibly hitting it as a ricochet. The starboard gun fired next, and again there was no splash to observe, but Thomas thought he saw splinters fly.“You hit her!” Captain Benning. This is the best damn mission there is. We’ll log ten hours today, we’ll be lucky if we shut down more than once and that’ll be for a maintenance check. No waiting around for some tight-ass colonel. We’re going to deliver fresh food to the guys in the boonies. This afternoon we’ll re-supply the Marine CAP teams because their 46s can’t fit in most of the LZs—landing zones—and because they’re a bunch of pussies. You’ll get to see the mountains close up and they are quite spectacular. ‘We’ll log. She could end up dying in some gutter from a drug overdose.”He paused to give his next statements a dramatic quality. “The responsibility that comes with that power is frightening, but the question is, ‘Am I up to it?’ I fear the answer is no, I am not.”To hear him describe what she had requested in that fashion was shocking. She asserted, “I didn’t give you that kind of power over me.”“Alas, you did. You wanted me to tell you what to do. If that isn’t giving me power over your life, I don’t. “What would you expect of me if I moved in with you, you know I can’t and won’t stop whoring, I can’t cook or sow”“I know you started whoring and fucking anyone with some spare change out of necessity, and I know you love it. If you had all the money in the world you would still be a slag. And I don’t mind, it turns me on Alice, I wouldn’t want you any other way”“You want me to stay on with you like a mistress or a wife, but sill let me whore myself out, and fuck other men just for fun when I.