Sarah blinked in surprise at the proposed promotion. After Warren was through speaking, it took the medic a short time to process all this and compose her thoughts. When she finally spoke, she was forceful and determined. “Yes, Sir, I’m afraid I would like to talk you out of this. Let’s look at this rationally, positives and negatives. There is only one upside here—in a medical emergency, such as when we had to evacuate my patients off the<em>Roger Young,</em>I would be able to give actual orders instead of just hoping everyone decides to defer to my experience.<br/><br/>“As for our drawbacks: I’m clearly not qualified. I have little training and no experience with small unit tactics. I’ve encountered the enemy twice very briefly and damn near pissed myself both times. What happens if some of your soldiers are isolated and I’m the only NCO on the scene? Sure, I could just pick someone who looks like they know what they’re doing to tell me what to do, but that’s not going to inspire much confidence.<br/><br/>“Which brings me to the next issue, morale. Seeing someone who’s inexperienced and loyalty flagged promoted ahead of experienced and loyal soldiers is going to cause a lot of resentment.<br/><br/>“And that naturally brings us to my PES situation. I’m not going to sit here and pretend I’ve been flagged for loyalty issues unfairly. I’m not allowed to talk about how I view the current government or its military, but I can tell you this much: The charges leveled against me were all basically true, albeit exaggerated, and my only regret is getting caught. I’d never pass a polygraph to the effect that I had done anything for the ‘glory of the Emperor.’ The only reason PES even let me through is that they sent me here to die, and be a useful tool until that happens. You can ask the battalion PD, I’m sure she’ll tell you I’m beyond ‘redemption.’<br/><br/>“Lieutenant, I doubt you’ve ever defied the Propaganda Department flagrantly, or you wouldn’t hold your current position. I have a lot experience with them through PES, and I know this much: the best case scenario here is that the battalion political officer crawls up your ass for a couple months and then PD makes your life subtly more difficult for the rest of your career. The worst case is that they decide I’ve somehow compromised you and arrange an accident for both of us. And they’ll go on instinct as much as evidence for that.<br/><br/>“As for Private Key...if they doubt you then they’ll have additional question for him—which means additional torture unless they’re satisfied he’s already broken. For his sake I hope he starts crying and grovelling as soon as possible.”<br/><br/>Sarah paused to consider. She really wanted to head this off, and she was not afraid to play dirty even if it meant embarrassing herself a bit. She changed to a more sultry tone. “On a more personal level... well, I’ve developed a bit of a crush on you and was hoping to take you to bed at some point. But if you promote me, any sexual encounter between us looks like evidence of a quid-pro-quo at best and treason at worst...” She gave him a sly smile and crossed her legs, sitting up a little straighter just to be sure she was properly showcasing her breasts. It was definitely not her usual style to be this direct—not even given her recent embrace of her inner slut. But it was true enough that she was attracted to him. If sleeping with Warren also prevented him from making a self-destructive career move, she considered that win-win.