Line #75 Awesome/HonorHarrington


1	[[AC: ''On Basilisk Station'']]
2	* Honor's light cruiser as sole protection for an entire star system, with an crippled armament mix, creates and maintains order in the system anyway, and finally fights off a Q ship that outguns her ship by a ridiculous margin.
3	** In a later novel, Admiral Hemphill finally finds an opportunity to discuss its armament mix with Honor. Her comments boil down to 'That ship was intended solely as a testbed! What kind of ''idiot'' sent you into ''combat'' with it???'
4	* Part of Honor's overwhelming duties at Basilisk Station is to hold customs inspections. The NPA, the local police organization, is mainly ex-Army and ex-Marines and so they have almost no experience finding smuggling compartments or the like. (Which is why its supposed to be the Navy's job to handle customs in the first place, a duty the previous Basilisk Station commander had been ignoring.) During the meeting with the head of the NPA, she calls in the Bosun.
5	-->''"I'm not going to ask you to betray any secrets, Bosun, but what I'm looking for are people who--from their own experience, let us say--would be intimately familiar with the best way to hide contraband aboard a shuttle or a starship.''
6	** After the Bosun leaves, Major Isvarian, the head of the NPA customs, intrudes on the conversation:
7	--->''"Excuse me, Captain, but did I just hear you ask the bosun to find fifteen ''smugglers'' to man our customs flights?"''\
8	''"Of course not, Major. This is a Queen's ship. [[IllPretendIDidntHearThat What would we be doing with smugglers on board?]]"''
9	* When Klaus Hauptman is meeting with Honor and [=McKeon=], [=McKeon=] responds to Hauptman's egotistical behavior with a [[TranquilFury several paragraph explanation]] on how it could easily be considered treason.
10	** Throughout the book, Alistair has struggled with an inability to connect to Honor, a resentment toward her that he knows is irrational, and the self-hatred of knowing he's not behaving like a professional and that he's not the XO she deserves even as he wishes he was in command of ''Fearless'' instead. But the instant Klaus Hauptman verbally abuses and threatens ''his captain,'' everything instantly [[TrueCompanions clicks into place]]--and lets him realize that Honor ''is'' his captain, and he's capable of the loyalty he's been struggling to feel after all. The two would go on to become the fastest of friends, and one of the closest Honor has ''ever'' had.
11	* Before the final battle, Honor sees that there are ''two'' ships in a position to summon the Havenite invasion force and, knowing that she can only chase one, lays in a course ''by eye'' to disable the other by slicing past her target at a bare ''two kilometer'' distance (from a range of a hundred and fifty ''thousand'' kilometers) to burst its impeller nodes with her own wedge. And this from the girl who wouldn't have passed multi-dimensional mathematics without Michelle Henke's help!
12	* Dame Estelle Matsuko's reaction to being told, essentially, to stop regulating trade with the natives of the planet Medusa and performing customs inspections on incoming and outgoing cargo -- as doing so upset the {{Corrupt Corporate Executive}}s in charge of the trading cartels -- proves her {{Ambadassador}} status for the first but hardly the last time.
13	-->[Dame Estelle had] snapped the unlucky messenger's head off and sent him home with it under one arm and a detailed account of the nature and severity of recently discovered violations of Her Majesty's Medusan Protectorate's laws under the other. And, she'd told Honor with grim delight, she'd concluded her report with the observation that the discovery of those violations had been made possible solely by the "dedicated, professional, persistent, and outstandingly successful efforts, both in their own right and in association with the NPA" (that was a direct quote) of Commander Honor Harrington and the crew of HMS ''Fearless''. Under the circumstances, Dame Estelle had added, she had no intention of striving to abate Commander Harrington's activities and every intention of aiding and abetting them in any way she could. And if Her Majesty's Government disapproved of her intentions, she would, of course, submit her resignation.
14	* After all is said and done, Honor is approached by one of the same idiots that were responsible for the gravity lance in the first place, which had caused the deaths of a full third of her crew. While the man is gushing about her giving her thoughts on it to the officers and other interested parties, she's about to go off on him...then she reins herself in and then realizes that yes, she'd love to tell them ''exactly'' what she thinks of the gravity lance and its performance.
15
16	[[AC: ''The Honor of the Queen'']]
17	* Nimitz shows his deadliness for the first time when he goes utterly berserk on a false security guard, and thereby provides enough warning for himself, Honor, and the real security men to keep Protector Benjamin and his family alive through a very determined assassination attempt.
18	* Wiping out the assassination squad sent against the Protector, and then charging straight into a massively more powerful ship though she knows her ship is too crippled to do really much of anything, just because it's the only chance the planet has... with her favourite music playing over the bridge.
19	* When Commander Truman has been sent in HMS ''Apollo'' to evacuate the wounded and summon the cavalry, knowing that every day counts, she [[TimTaylorTechnology orders her engineer to remove the hyper generator safety interlocks]] and cuts ''thirty hours'' off her transit to Manticore, risking her ship being torn apart at the seams for those precious hours.
20	* Scotty Tremaine gets one by stopping Honor from summarily executing a (really deserving) prisoner and thereby torpedoing her career. Given everything she does later, there's no calculating how many people Scotty indirectly saved.
21	* The assault on the secret Masadan base on Blackbird, which involves a joint Manticoran-Grayson fleet smashing their way through the bulk of the Masadan forces, [[OrbitalBombardment blasting an opening into the base with their broadside mounts]], and a [[CurbStompBattle demonstration of what happens]] when a group of PowerArmor wearing SpaceMarines StormTheCastle against a defending force that is still limited to gunpowder firearms. [[Webcomic/SchlockMercenary Like a chainsaw through butter.]]
22	** The same battle features a young Havenite destroyer skipper managing to get the drop on Honor's task force, crippling one of her cruisers. A young Havenite destroyer skipper who would become ''far'' more important in later books. A young Havenite destroyer skipper who happens to be named ''[[AscendedExtra Thomas]] [[ChekhovsGunman Theisman]]''.
23	* While we know Manticoran reinforcements are on the way no matter what, the system is still a small and relatively unimportant one. Which means the soft, silent, unnoticed arrival of ''sixteen'' battlecruisers, ''and their assorted escort ships,'' is enough in the middle of an increasingly hopeless battle to trigger cheers in the reader--at least once it's confirmed in the next paragraph that they're Manticore, and not PRH.
24
25	[[AC: ''The Short Victorious War'']]
26	* The first [[MacrossMissileMassacre Manticoran Missile Massacre]] of the series is unleashed upon an unsuspecting squadron of Havenite Dreadnoughts that thought they had the jump on a helpless squadron of Battlecruisers.
27	* Helen Zilwicki, Sr threw her small escort force [[HeroicSacrifice into the teeth of a much larger enemy fleet]] to protect the civilian ships they were protecting. We see nothing at all of the battle, just her husband, Anton, holding their terrified daughter Helen in his arms and whispering, "It's okay, honey. Mommy's gonna make it safe."
28	* The Peeps have taken to dropping half-squadrons of battlecruisers out of hyper just far enough away from lone Manty cruisers for their captain to realise how [[CurbStompBattle screwed]] they are. We see a half-squadron come out of hyper ready to ambush a light cruiser - within spitting distance of a single Manty dreadnought that is just leaving the system on a routine rotation home. [[LowerDeckEpisode None of the senior officers are on duty]], and the senior officer on the bridge is the [[FishOutOfWater Communications Officer]]. Fifteen seconds later, all four Peep battlecruisers are expanding clouds of monatomic vapour.
29
30	[[AC: ''Field of Dishonor'']]
31	* Admiral Sonja Hemphill brokering the compromise that ends Pavel Young's career as a Queen's officer for good, while still sticking to her own convictions. It was the moment she became "Horrible Hemphill" no longer.
32	* After her lover, Paul Tankersley is murdered, Honor kills the expert duelist who was hired to do the job while he mocks her inexperience in duels - and she does it the same way he was planning to do it to her, only she shoots ''from her hip''. Then she kills the guy who hired him, longtime enemy Pavel Young, with one shot in a duel, even though he broke the law to fire on (and hit) her first.
33
34	[[AC: ''Flag in Exile'']]
35	* Honor, having been put on half-pay by the Royal Manticoran Navy, has been living on Grayson for nine months at the start of the book. While plenty of Graysons are in awe of her prior defense of their world, she still has to deal with numerous protesters lining up outside of her house, a preacher calling her the "Harlot of Satan", and the loss of her lover, Paul Tankersley. Unfortunately, the Grayson Navy needs experienced captains, having very few of their own, and Honor reluctantly accepts a commission. While discussing her new command, [[MightyGlacier a superdreadnought]], Honor comments that it's a big step up for her, as the largest ship she had commanded before was a battlecruiser. High Admiral Matthews says that Honor doesn't quite understand... she's not becoming the Captain of a superdreadnought, she's becoming the ''Admiral'' of a superdreadnought ''squadron''.
36	* Honor has: been called a whore for most of the book, blamed herself for an industrial accident which killed a group of schoolchildren, learned that the "accident" was sabotage, had her pinnace shot down, and saved from a point-blank assassination when ''Grayson's [[GoodShepherd spiritual leader]]'' [[HeroicSacrifice threw himself in front of her]], and generally [[Theatre/{{Hamlet}} suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.]] She finally gets to the Council Chamber, battered, bruised, limping and exhausted, presents her evidence, and names the man who's been orchestrating all of this... who promptly claims a [[SuddenlySignificantRule traditional form of justice]] and demands to face the Protector's Champion in [[TrialByCombat trial by sword combat]]. And guess who that is? The Protector, seeing that she's in no shape to fight, begins to back off from his proclamation (which will undermine his authority for all time), but she cuts him off:
37	--> '''Honor''': Your Grace, I have only one question. Do you wish this man crippled, or dead?
38	** To clarify, the traditional form of justice is dueling with swords... and Grayson, being a LostColony, forgot how proper swordplay works. So instead, they studied the swordplay of [[TaughtByTelevision ancient samurai movies]], such as Film/SevenSamurai. Honor Harrington, already known for carrying a Colt 1911 .45, is now [[KatanasAreJustBetter toting a katana.]]
39	** And her opponent [[OffWithHisHead learns the hard way]] that just because Honor's only been studying the ''sword'' for a few months, that doesn't mean that she hasn't been studying ''combat'' for decades.
40	--> ''Honor watched him with the eyes of a woman who'd trained in the martial arts for almost forty years, and the hard-learned, poised relaxation of all those years hummed softly within her. She felt her weariness, the pain of broken ribs, the ache in bruised muscles, the stiffness of her left shoulder, but then she commanded her body to ignore those things, and her body obeyed.''
41	** If that wasn't enough, as soon as she's done with that, she has to defend the system from an invasion fleet which outnumbers and outguns hers... ''again''.
42	** Hell, that's most of her entire career.
43	* Adam Gerrick. [[PunctuatedForEmphasis "We...are...engineers!"]] A [[DomedHometown dome]] he was building for a local middle school collapsed and killed a number of children who would have attended it. He doesn't know how that's possible, but he's bloody well going to find out the truth -- with math!
44	** Made even better when Clinkscales finally believes he can do it. "You are engineers. I was a policeman. [...] Find me the what and how and I'll give you the who and why." -- and this is believed to be the worst crime ever committed in the history of their ''world''.
45	* Protector Benjamin verbally rips apart the Conclave of Steadholders (An upper chamber of Grayson's Parliament), and makes them feel about 3 microns tall for the way they treated Honor.
46	* Shannon Foraker's first appearance
47
48	[[AC: ''Honor Among Enemies'']]
49	* Citizen Commander Caslet, Citizen Commissioner Jourdain, Shannon Foraker and the entire crew of the PNS ''Vaubon'' in ''Honor Among Enemies''. During an operation against Manticore, they run across a GhostShip containing the horrific handiwork of some vaguely [[{{Series/Firefly}} Reaver-esque]] pirates. In spite of being the "bad guys" the Peeps are generally nice people, and as such the ''Vaubon'' goes after the pirates, tracks their ship to the next star system and engages them. The ''Vaubon'' '''ruins''' the pirate ship with one laser salvo. [[WillfullyWeak And it wasn't even a full strength salvo]]. It's [[LaserGuidedKarma incredibly satisfying]].
50	** They then go to the next system they think the pirates will be at and find three of them attacking a merchant vessel. Despite the fact it's a Manticoran vessel, they elect to fight three-to-one odds to help it out. It turns out to be Honor's Q-Ship and she, very regretfully and with impeccable politeness, takes them prisoner.
51	* The Book also contains the first single-ship [[MacrossMissileMassacre Manticoran Missle Massacre]], Honor's Q ship lays out five patterns of six pods and fires 300 missiles at four pirate cruisers in one go.
52	* [[NewMeat Aubrey Wanderman]] spends the beginning of the book being bullied and getting a beating. Chief Harkness notices this, and takes some steps to help the young petty officer adjust... by bringing him along to the unarmed combat training sessions of the ship's Marines. The horrible beating that Wanderman suffers early in the book only makes his CurbStompBattle of the bully near the end of the book ''so'' much sweeter.
53
54	[[AC: ''In Enemy Hands'']]
55	* Honor again: she recommends a huge shift in tactical and R&D thinking in coalition with the ''jeune ecole'', then gets captured and apparently killed before it can be implemented. When it is implemented, it turns out she was right about pretty much everything. And until she comes back about half of it gets named after her, much to her horror.
56	* Citizen Admiral Lester Tourville and Citizen Commander Shannon Foraker for having a successful offensive operation under StateSec. Especially Shannon, after getting captured in the prior book.
57	* Shannon Foraker gets one when she saves Nimitz from being murdered by a StateSec thug. It was a masterpiece of quick thinking to come up with a line of reasoning that would reach a monster like Cordelia Ransom, and she knew full well she could die horribly for her defiance, but she did it anyway to save a person she respected and liked.
58	* Horace Harkness betrays the Star Kingdom of Manticore by defecting to the side of his Peep captors. Only he's really planning an escape operation for his crewmates all along. When he finally springs the trap, he has singlehandedly reprogrammed every computer on board his captors' ship to do his bidding. And all he needed to get started was access to the video game library.
59	** Harkness demonstrating, during the course of the aforementioned breakout, what happens if a pinnace activates its impeller wedges while still in its host ship's docking bays. Namely, the host ship in question blows up. And by "blows up" we mean "is reduced to metallic grit". This story is an InUniverse SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome as well, judging from the reactions every time this exploit is mentioned over the next couple of books.
60	* Even half-starved and with all of her cybernetic augments turned off, Honor is more than capable of defending herself, which she shows when one of the StateSec thugs tries to molest her: not only does she goes unscathed from that episode, but the female thug partnered with the other one mentally compares her to a wolf and wonders if locking the door to Honor's cage is either locking the wolf in... or locking herself outside.
61	* Andrew [=LaFollet=] escorting his malnourished and weak Steadholder through a corridor under heavy enemy forces. By the time they reach the end of the corridor, the two of them are the only ones alive, and his charge is completely unharmed.
62	* After the destruction of ''Tepes'', Shannon Foraker goes to erase the recording of Honor's shuttles escaping to the planet, as ''Count Tilly'' was the only ship to have seen it. Lester Tourville then stops her from erasing it, only to walk over, watch the recording, and erase it himself.
63
64	[[AC: ''Echoes of Honor'']]
65	* Allison Chou-Harrington gets one when she explains her Beowulfian heritage and training, hence justifying her fixing the entire genetic problem with the Grayson population.
66	** It says something about the series as a whole when someone's announcement that they are the direct descendant of the two most famous medical families in the galaxy's history -- people who quadrupled human lifespan and cured virtually every disease known to man, and that she is at least that skilled a doctor, rates a single sentence on a CMOA page.
67	* The amazing teamwork that allows the ''Hell'' [=POWs=] to not only take over the entire prison planet, but also get themselves a nice fleet of their own.
68	* The subverted ToAbsentFriends speech delivered by Yanakov: "Your grace, my lords and ladies, ladies and gentlemen all, I give you Steadholder Harrington ... ''and damnation to the Peeps!''"
69	* Admiral Hamish Alexander, Earl White Haven, riding to the severely under-picketed Basilisk's rescue by basically bending the laws of physics just as far as he possibly can. It's too little, too late to save the orbital installations, but far more importantly, he manages to hang on to the Basilisk wormhole terminus.
70	* Admiral Javier Giscard and his entire fleet get one when they ''very nearly'' take the terminus away from Manticore altogether. They were a hair's breadth from success, and only White Haven's aforementioned physics-bending kept them from doing it. Given just how far back on its heels the Havenite navy had been, it's a resounding demonstration of what they're truly capable of when the naval leadership is allowed to do its job ''without'' such heavy-handed government interference. And that tactical and strategic brilliance -- not just from Giscard, but from those under his command -- bodes very, ''very'' well for the future of the Grand Alliance.
71
72	[[AC: ''Ashes of Victory'']]
73	* Publicly executed on video, Honor reappears with a fleet of stolen warships filled with jury-rigged crews from the prison planet she just broke out of.
74	** Of course (and quite justifiably) Horace Harkness gets credit for much of that, including the Parliamentary Medal of Valor that Honor refused to accept for her part in the jailbreak.
75	** Later on, it's expanded even more: Harkness implies that he admitted to [=BuPers=], the department in charge of managing personnel, that he's been hacking their systems for ''decades'' in order to always be assigned to the same ship as Scotty Tremaine. Not only does [=BuPers=] not penalize him for it, they make a note to never break up [[HeteroSexualLifePartners Scotty and Harkness.]]
76	--->'''Chief Harkness''': "...And I've sort of promised the Navy I'd swear off playing with computer systems in return for a certain, ah, lack of scrutiny where a few of my records over at [=BuPers=] are concerned."
77	* While teaching at the Academy, Honor meets Cadet Abigail Hearns. While the young woman later went on to even bigger and better displays of badassery and awesomeness in the future (as mentioned several times below), the first Grayson woman to become a military officer in the history of her planet started out early when it's revealed that as a 7 year old child she'd watched the explosions as Harrington, a foreign woman, had defended her planet and her people and ''demanded'' her father give her the right to do the same, an extraordinary step for a culture beginning its first tentative steps toward gender equality. As her later actions demonstrated, her father was a wise man.
78	* Honor putting her tiny little runabout directly between ''Grayson One'' and an oncoming missile, saving the lives of Protector Benjamin, Queen Elizabeth, and everyone aboard. She may have avoided the Parliamentary Medal of Valor after Hades, but she couldn't avoid it after ''that'' little stunt.
79	* The scene in general is depressing, but Queen Elizabeth manages one during her meeting with High Ridge to discuss the Havenite cease-fire proposal:
80	--> '''Elizabeth:''' If you ever mention my uncle to me again, I will personally push your face through the top of this table.
81	** Fortunately for the baron, he does recognize that yes, Her Majesty ''is'' that angry at him.
82	* Shannon Foraker in ''Ashes of Victory'': Her Admiral, Lester Tourville, has just gotten a message from the State Security commander which is essentially his death sentence and that of Admiral Javier Giscard. He gets half way through his message when State Security commander's ship, and ''the two full squadrons of ships'' with it, spontaneously vaporize... because of an innocent little data packet Foraker sent over the com net as he was talking. And what does she have to say about this? "[[BewareTheNiceOnes Oops.]]"
83	* Admiral Thomas Theisman puts an end to the tyranny of State Security with two simple sentences: "I think we've had quite enough of [[KangarooCourt those sorts of trials.]] Goodbye, Citizen Chairman." Made even more awesome by the fact that those are the last words in the book.
84	** For the record, yes, Thomas Theisman ''did'' just topple a regime that had killed millions of its own people, and yes, he ''did'' just restore the Republic and its Constitution, which hadn't seen the light of day in two centuries. Granted, he had help, but still. That's... wow. Just... ''wow''.
85
86	[[AC: ''War of Honor'']]
87	* The Havenites manage to pivot from near total defeat four years ago to rebuild their fleets and reverse engineer the technology that gutted them to make ships that can very nearly go toe to toe with Manticoran ships, which they had always been at a tech disadvantage to. Even though their tech is still less sophisticated, less efficient, and less powerful than Mantie technology, the Havenites ''still'' manage to figure out how to beat the Manties with careful tactical thought. Even better, after Operation Oyster Bay, that tech would go on to save the very people they reverse-engineered it from as Haven rode to Manticore's defense against the Solarian League, ending with those two navies standing side by side against the very forces that manipulated them into war in the first place. ''Thank you, Shannon Foraker.''
88	* Eloise Pritchart's election as the first President of the restored Republic of Haven. Not only is Haven's restoration awesome in itself, but Pritchart's election represents, at long last, the ultimate triumph of the April Tribunal. It's been a long and bloody road, but Eloise and her compatriots did exactly what they set out to do, and it's ''beautiful''.
89	* A subtle one for Shannon, but her reassignment to be the leader of the secret applied research station Bolthole is enough to give Honor of all people, an minor case of Oh, Crap.
90	* As Operation Thunderbolt rolls through Manticoran space, High Ridge approaches Queen Elizabeth while the House of Commons is in a frenzy and many of his cronies are dealing with the fallout of their poor decisions that negated decades of sacrifice through warfare and sent Manticore, in effect, back to square one before the outbreak of the war 15 years prior. With the Liberals fracturing and the Progressives imploding, he needs to form a new government, and requires her consent to do so. Elizabeth, having held her tongue for half a decade, finally throws the same reasoning High Ridge used to form his government in the first place back at him, in some cases parroting his exact words.
91	* Admiral Allen Higgins, {{the Woobie}} of all Woobies in this 'verse, making the most excruciating decision of his career up until that point to nuke the naval yards at Grendelsbane and withdraw to save his remaining people rather than fight a hopeless battle he can't possibly win[[note]]he knows that the planet and its population are not in danger because of the Eridani Edict, and while the shipyard workers do end up taken prisoner, the RHN has no intention of mistreating its [=POWs=][[/note]]. While the decision haunts him forever after, in the crucible of the moment he did the ''only'' thing a man of his integrity could possibly have done, and not one (sane) member of the Royal Manticoran Navy thinks he did anything other than make the best possible decision he could have under the circumstances.
92
93	[[AC: ''At All Costs'']]
94	* When Pritchart's summit offer arrives, it takes the combined, ''unanimous'' voices of every one of Queen Elizabeth III's advisors to convince her that it's a good idea to accept the offer. When she finally does, however, she startles her Prime Minister by immediately making several deeply-shrewd suggestions regarding the arrangements.
95	-->'''Elizabeth''' [''chuckling'']: I may still have my reservations about this entire idea, Willie. But if we're going to do it anyway, we might as well accomplish as many objectives at once as we can.
96	* Everyone on both sides who was involved in the titanic battle at the end of ''At All Costs'', especially Honor's entry into the fight. Seriously, the Battle of Manticore was a cavalcade of [=CMOAs=] for both the RMN and the RHN. With the hindsight of ''Mission of Honor'' and ''A Rising Thunder'', it gets better: this is quite literally the single most titanic battle ever fought ''in the history of humanity'', and the people fighting it eventually ''combine military forces''.
97	* FTL communication. Podnoughts. CLAC carriers. Ghost Rider. Apollo. Mistletoe. Good Lord, the sheer list of ingenious, brilliant tech Sonja Hemphill comes up with over the course of the series could fill up its own damn CMOA page!
98	* Admiral Stephania Grimm of Astro Control may be singlehandedly responsible for Manticore's victory by not waiting for higher orders, but declaring "Case Zulu" on her own authority as soon as she saw the hyper footprints, and then immediately clearing the Junction of ''all'' traffic, making Honor's and Theodosia Kuzak's entry into the battle possible.
99
100	[[AC: ''Mission of Honor'']]
101	* Queen Elizabeth and President Pritchart, when they not only sign a peace treaty but a '''military alliance''' against the Solarian League. With hundreds of Havenite Superdreadnoughts ready to defend Manticore from an imminent Solarian attack. All you can think of is: Mesa and the SLN are so incredibly ''FUCKED''.
102	** Hell. Considering the ship numbers thrown in ''At All Costs'' about the Haven Navy, and considering that Haven kept its production capabilities, considering the Andermani numbers and production capabilities and whatever the Graysons and Manticorans managed to save, it's pretty safe to assume that, even with the disastrous losses in the end of ''At All Costs'', the SLN navy, "the biggest, baddest navy in human space", is pretty much outgunned, out-teched, and probably outnumbered.
103	*** Re: outnumbered, to quote Commodore Terekhov from a later novel:
104	---->'''Terekhov:''' For example, on the basis of what you’ve just said, I don’t suppose you’ve heard about what happened to Vice Admiral Dubroskaya at Saltash, when five of our destroyers destroyed all four of her battlecruisers. Or about the fact that the Star Empire is now allied to the Republic of Haven. Or that between us, we now have somewhere around five hundred ships of the wall, any two of which could have controlled every missile we fired at Crandall in Spindle. Let’s do some math here, Brigadier. If two of our ships can kill seventy of yours, and we’ve got five hundred of them, that means we can kill every superdreadnought in Battle Fleet, including the Reserve, about three times each.
105	*** Also, according to Honor, because of the events of ''Mission of Honor,'' the Mesan Alignment has enraged '''every single treecat in the universe,''' to the point where the ''entire species'' is dedicated to wiping them out. That alone is a death sentence.
106	---->'''Sorrow Singer''': [[BewareTheNiceOnes We know how to deal with those]] who would [[ThisIsUnforgivable slay those we love]].
107	** People who are on the same side now, resulting in the Alignment being SO VERY FUCKING SCREWED:
108	*** Eloise Pritchart and Elizabeth Winton.
109	*** Honor Harrington, Hamish Alexander, Thomas Theisman, and Lester Tourville.
110	*** ''Sonja Hemphill and Shannon Foraker.''
111	* Queen Elizabeth's speech to her fellow Manticorans, in which she outlines all the primary events between ''At All Costs'' and ''Mission of Honor'', ending with the Yawata Strike and how it took them ''completely'' by surprise. She goes into detail about how badly they've been wounded, and how the Solarian League is getting ready to try and pound them. Then she proceeds to assure them they ''will not'' succeed in doing so, that Manticore ''will'' stand tall, and ''will'' show the League that they are not to be trifled with.
112	** It's basically a free fusion of the Allies leaders' speeches as their nations joined UsefulNotes/WorldWarII. Somewhat subverted in that the Allies ''dwarfed'' Axis in terms of industrial and military might (and it still took them six years and fifty-odd millions dead to win), but even the Grand Alliance is ''tiny'' compared to the League.
113	* Oyster Bay itself was one for the villains. As Albrecht Detweiler pointed out, the operation was launched with ships that weren't really meant for actual operations, required them to sneak into two of the best-defended systems in the galaxy, and they pulled it off ''perfectly''.
114	* Eloise Pritchart turns up in Manticoran space, almost ''immediately'' after their home system has been catastrophically attacked, screens Queen Elizabeth in the middle of the night, and within three days has not only cleared up every single diplomatic misunderstanding between the two star nations going back nearly fifty years, but been genuine enough, truthful enough, and convincing enough to end up signing a military alliance against the Mesan Alignment ''and'' the Solarian League. It's RefugeInAudacity the likes of which has rarely, if ''ever'', been seen in the Honorverse up until this point, but she did it anyway because she was sick and tired of fighting people she respected, liked, and didn't want to hurt any more. And she was able to see past the fact that the very same star nation she is allying with was responsible for killing the love of her life, however unintended and however much they regret it. Just... the whole damn book is one triumph after another for the Republic's President.
115	* When you include Mesa's interference to continue the Manticore-Haven War the Official We Are So Going To Stomp Mesa List will include Manticore's queen, who takes such things ''very'' personally; Harrington herself; Thomas Theisman, who ''Honor'' is afraid of on the battlefield; Eloise Pritchart and the rest of the Haven government who survived in the dictatorship, pulled off their coup, and restored a democracy. You'd think that if they had any GenreSavvy at all, Mesa would realize they were utterly doomed.
116	** At the end of ''Mission of Honor'', Cachat, Zilwicki, Kevin Usher, Pritchart, Theisman, Queen Elizabeth, and Honor herself -- not to mention a whole whack of ''other'' awesome characters -- are ''in the same room''. And ''on the same side.'' Which is precisely the scenario that the Alignment spent capital like water to prevent -- with the added bonus that ItsPersonal for the Manticorans' best naval commander, who's pretty much primed for a RoaringRampageOfRevenge like the galaxy's never seen, backed up by a force that might be the entire Eighth Fleet, or might be the entire Royal Manticoran Navy plus a good chunk of the Grayson Space Navy, and might also include a lot of Havenite heavy metal, helpfully commanded by a few Havenite military geniuses -- including one Lester Tourville, who has beaten ''Honor'' in combat. And all that heavy metal is going to be fitted with whatever new toys the combined genius of [[GadgeteerGenius Shannon Foraker and Sonja Hemphill]] can come up with. Once they figure out where to point it all, odds are the Alignment's going to get ''disintegrated''. Or worse.
117
118	[[AC: ''A Rising Thunder'']]
119	* The result of the aforementioned meeting between Elizabeth and Pritchart, and how over the next few weeks the result of Honor Harrington commanding the newly formed Grand Fleet, with Lester Tourville commanding its subdivision Second Fleet, Thomas Theisman ''sharing her command deck'', and the combined forces of Haven, Grayson, and Manticore allied in force results in the single greatest complete CurbStompBattle in human history. Also a rather tragic one as it should have ended without a shot being fired.
120	** Bonus points because the stomp-ees were utterly convinced that it would be a CurbStompBattle alright, but with ''them'' wearing the boots ... until the trap was closed on them.
121	* A small Manticoran task force encounters a much heavier Solarian battlegroup and ''intentionally'' causes their first wave of missiles to miss. With the warning that the next round will be "Firing for effect" unless the Sollies get the hell out of Dodge. The Sollies get the hell out of Dodge.
122	* A group of Memory Singers informs the Alliance that the treecats are [[ThisMeansWar officially going to war.]]
123	--> But we will not hide. We will not be children. If you will fight for all this world, for all of us, then ''we'' will fight for ''you''.
124	** It gets better than that. Because the treecats can telepathically share memories, they can relay Nimitz's memories of the events of Timothy Mears' attempt on Honor's life to other treecats. Like a telepathically-distributed vaccine, any treecat that wishes to aid the Alliance in reading minds and detecting Mesan nanotech will know exactly what to be on guard for, and each surviving treecat from such an incident will be able to share their own memories to add to the knowledge pool. It's not a perfect counter, but it's better than anything else the Alliance could come up with.
125	* Towards the end of the book, the League Senate holds a vote on whether or not they should censure the League world of Beowulf for conspiring with the Manticorans. The League's senate is horribly corrupt, and the vote is essentially a kangaroo court... and a full quarter of them ''still'' vote in favor of Beowulf. The Mandarins fully understand the implications of that. And then the Beowulfian delegation announces their intent to withdraw from the Solarian League.
126	* The sight of the Mesan Alignment's leadership suffering a complete OhCrap moment when news of the preceding events comes out: centuries of absolute secrecy blown apart, the existence of some of their newest technology now known, and their worst enemies now in an alliance. [[ITakeOffenseToThatLastOne And they're being falsely accused of murdering]] [[BrickJoke Arnold Giancola.]]
127	* Thomas Theisman verbally [[QuitYourWhining smacks Honor right out of her self-pity party]] after she's forced to destroy most of SLN Admiral Filareta's 400-odd-strong fleet of superdreadnoughts because the Mesans nanoprogrammed one of the officers to fire even against overwhelming odds when Filareta had been ready to surrender. He reminds her forcefully that her responsibility is to the people under her ''own'' command, and that if she hadn't fired back, she'd have been justifiably removed from command and possibly dishonorably discharged, no matter how high the casualties were on the other side. In that moment, ''no one'' understands Honor better -- not even her own husband! -- and it is starkly apparent just how much she and Theisman have in common, and why they are such a formidable team.
128	-->'''Theisman''': Oh, stop it! No, you could ''not'' have ‘just taken the fire’! And if you ''had'' done something that stupid, you’d deserve to be broken for it!
129	-->'''Honor''': But—
130	-->'''Theisman''': Don’t you 'but' ''me!'' You didn’t know -- you ''couldn’t'' know -- if they’d come up with some kind of fire control fix we’d never heard of before. You had no right, not one ''shred'' of a moral justification, to risk the lives of personnel under your command just because somebody on the other side had done something suicidal! Your responsibility is to ''your'' people, not theirs! It’s your job to neutralize an enemy before he kills ''them'', and you’d ''damned'' well better do it if you’re going to be worthy of the uniform you wear! ''That’s'' your responsibility, Admiral Harrington, and you lived up to it! You reacted to the threat you knew about, the one you saw, and I was right there on that flag bridge with you. It took those missiles three minutes to reach us, and you had a Hermes buoy sitting right off his flagship’s bow. There was ''plenty'' of time for him to get on the com and tell you the launch was a mistake, if he hadn’t meant to launch it! Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t believe he did that, now did he? Not only that, but thirteen-second lag or not, the ''rest'' of his damned fleet was firing full broadsides at you on its heels! I understand that realizing you gave the order to kill that many people has to make you sick to your stomach. It makes ''me'' want to puke, and I didn’t have to give it. But the only ones responsible for what happened to Filareta and the people under his command are whoever arranged to get him sent here and — assuming there’s any basis to all this speculation in the first place — whoever got to his tac officer. Not you; not me — ''them!''
131
132	[[AC:''Uncompromising Honor'']]
133	* The Battle of Hypatia. A Solarian fleet has appeared in Hypatia, which has just voted to leave the Solarian League, and given them thirty six hours to evacuate all the space industrial stations and habitats, an impossible task that will still leave close to twenty million people in those stations when the Solarians open fire, in direct defiance of their own edicts. The only Manticoran presence there is a small detachment of five ships led by Admiral Kotouč, which is overwhemingly surpassed in number and tonnage by the Solarians. What does he do? He leads four ships into the quagmire as the deadline approaches and destroys half of the Solarian fleet with precision strikes before getting pounded himself with close to [[NoKillLikeOverkill 120,000 missiles]]. Then, the last ship's captain, Commander Megan Petersen, when she sees that the Solarians have not only launched another salvo at the now defenceless ships (which is another war crime) but that they are also planning to continue with the attack, she proceeds to attack the leading ship and bluffs the second in command into leaving with the ships that still can do so, lest she destroy him and ask the same question of the next in the line of command. And, finally, just by pure luck, one of the Hypatian rescue ships manages to find Admiral Kotouč still alive.
134	** That expression “overwhelmingly surpassed” above does not do the situation justice. What does it mean? It means ''one'' battleship with escort against ''ninety eight'' battleships. But, as a character of [[{{Literature/Unsong}} another book]] said, “somebody has to and no one else will”. Despite [[WhatYouAreInTheDark only a handful of people even being aware of the Manticoran presence in the system]].
135	** The moment is tinged with TearJerker status as well: A major motivation for the Manticoran task force to take on the much larger Solarian fleet is their realization that they are about to witness another [[OrbitalStrike Yawata Strike]] if they don't do ''something'', leading the outnumbered Manties to go berserk on the Sollies out of desperation to ''stop'' them from doing to the Hypatians what the Mesans did to the Manties.
136	* The climax: Honor leads the Grand Fleet on a direct assault on Sol itself. Her demonstration attacks are enough to compel the SLN to surrender (and Admiral Kingford to launch a coup), and she proceeds to destroy not only the entire SLN presence in Sol, but every piece of space-based industry apart from habitats and power collectors, and dictate surrender terms to the Solarian League. Honor Harrington becomes the first commander in ''history'' to conquer Sol, to take control of Old Earth's own orbitals... and not a single Manticoran, Grayson, or Havenite life is lost in the process.
137	* Throughout the climax Honor is in a state of TranquilFury. The whole situation comes as retaliation after a Solarian attack on Beowulf that was then exploited by the Mesans to kill millions, civilian and military alike, with Honor's husband Earl White Haven as one of the casualties. After all that, Honor is ''through'' with putting up with the Sollies' B.S. As a result, she is very matter-of-fact about why she is there, what she's demanding, and what she will do if those demands are not met: Namely kill anybody stupid enough to reject them. Every officer that personally interacts with Honor, ally and enemy alike, and even a few who only see recordings of her demands, recognize that Honor is not only ''not'' bluffing, she practically ''wants'' the Solarians to give her a reason to wipe them from the universe, and the only reason she ''hasn't'' done anything yet is because nobody has given her that pretext. Part of the reason the affair goes as well as it does for the Grand Fleet is that the Solarians are too legitimately intimidated by Honor to seriously consider resistance.
138	* Admiral Sonja Hemphill and her Havenite counterpart, Vice Admiral Shannon Foraker finally working together, and being BFFs.
139
140	[[AC:''The Shadow of Saganami'']]
141	* The Battle of Monica for Aivars Terekhov and his entire ad-hoc squadron. For one thing, he shouldn't have been able to win. For another, the whole squadron's tactical net was in the hands of Abigail Hearns, a junior-grade ''lieutenant'', and Helen Zilwicki, a ''midshipwoman''. Everybody involved -- who survives -- gets ''serious'' notice from the Navy, and every ship in the squadron is placed on the List of Honor.
142	** Of special note regarding the Battle of Monica is the fact that HMS ''Warlock'' is a part of Terekhov's task force, the same ''Warlock'' first seen at the start of the series, now even more disgraced, and hopelessly out of date next to HMS ''Hexapuma'', which is also a heavy cruiser. When Terekhov confers with his fellow skippers before the battle, one of them, Commander Hope of HMS ''Vigilant'', objects. Captain Ito Anders of ''Warlock'', however, decides to ride with Terekhov.
143	---> '''Captain Ito Anders''': ''"My ship is older even than yours, Commander. And, to be honest, she's always had something of a reputation to live down. She hasn't been fortunate in her commanding officers. I'm not going to add to that reputation. In fact, I'm going to clean it up properly at last."''
144	* Augustus Khumalo's response to Terekhov's dispatch. He's spent the entire book being ridiculed by the main characters. Nobody -- not Terekhov, not Helen Zilwicki, not Abigail Hearns, not Estelle Matsuko, ''nobody'' -- thinks he has the guts or the imagination to deal with a real battle situation; he'd been sent to Talbott because it was supposed to be entirely unimportant, and in fact had been wondering when the Admiralty was going to yank him. Nevertheless, when the flag went up at Monica, he backed Terekhov to the hilt -- despite having been explicitly set up so he could ''disavow'' Terekhov's actions if necessary, and despite knowing that if it all went wrong he would be yanked from his post without ceremony. In that moment, he proved that doing the right thing was far more important to him than saving his career, and in a beautiful bit of irony, it was that decision which in the end ''did'' save his career.
145	-->[HMS] ''Hercules'' certainly looked impressive as [the squadron's] flagship. Unless, of course, one knew all of the old ship's manifold weaknesses as well as [Victoria] Saunders did.\
146	But she's still a damned superdreadnought, Khumalo's flag captain told herself. And we're still the Queen's Navy. And I will be damned if Augustus Khumalo hasn't actually remembered that.\
147	She shook her head, bemused and, to her own astonishment, proud of her Admiral....
148
149	[[AC:''Storm from the Shadows'']]
150	* Augustus Khumalo's response to President Tyler of Monica's request that he disavow and incarcerate Captain Aivars Terekhov for the Battle of Monica. It's the polite military version of "... and the horse you rode in on." Given that Khumalo had, prior to Monica, been known far more for his political connections than his competency as a commander, it stuns everyone -- including, to an extent, Khumalo himself. Terekhov can barely hold back the JawDrop.
151	-->'''Khumalo''': Obviously, I am deeply distressed by the loss of life, both Monican and Manticoran. The destruction of so many ships, and so much damage to the public property of the Union, are also deeply distressing to me. And I must inform you that Captain Terekhov, by his own admission to me in his formal reports, acknowledges that his actions were completely unauthorized by any higher authority. [...] Unfortunately, Mr. President, while all of that is true, I am also of the opinion that what my Queen would even ''more'' strongly desire is for you and your government to explain to her why you have been directly assisting efforts to recruit, support, encourage, and arm terrorist organizations engaged in active campaigns of assassination, murder, and destruction against the citizens of ''other'' sovereign star nations who have requested membership in the Star Kingdom of Manticore.
152	* After the report comes to Manticore about Byng murdering Chatterjee's destroyers, Queen Elizabeth III and her top advisers are discussing what might happen if they end up at war with the Solarian League -- which ''everyone'', for the entire series, has known to be [[TheDreaded the galaxy's most powerful political unit, with a population and economy that dwarfs every other entity seen in the story]]. Except that right after Hamish finishes explaining how Manticore will be steamrollered into oblivion the moment the Solarian League navy R&D catches up to Manticore (which, given its larger talent pool, it can), Honor names the solution to their quandary: ''destroy the Solarian League''. And then she lays out a workable plan to do ''exactly that''.
153	-->''Not a man or woman at that table would have questioned Duchess Harrington's military insight, or tactical or strategic ability ... in the purely military arena. Yet most of them still tended to think of her as a fleet commander. Manticore's '''best''' fleet commander, perhaps, but still a fleet commander. As they'd listened to her, they'd come to realize how silly that was -- and how foolish they'd been not to recognize their own silliness much earlier. In their defense, most of the insight she'd previously shown in the field of political strategy and analysis had focused on domestic concerns, or on the internal workings of the Manticoran Alliance. It hadn't occurred to them that she might have already focused that formidable ability on the Solarian League as the Star Empire's next great challenge, and that had been remarkably blind of them.''
154	* Relatively early in the novel, Solarian Admiral Josef Byng makes the mistake of slaughtering three Manticoran destroyers in a panic; the fourth and last member of the division survived only because it was hiding out-system to do recon. Later in the book, a rather pissed-off Michelle Henke and company vaporize Byng, and his entire flagship, into subatomic particles in retaliation. [[LaserGuidedKarma It is incredibly satisfying]].
155	* On the villainous side, the revelation that nearly everything in the last 200 years has been manipulated by Mesa in the Haven Sector. The first Haven revolution was planned by them just to keep the entire sector occupied under an unstable Haven. What's further awesome is the fact they have spent their time building new technology besides genetic modification. Including 2 engine types, one a much faster FTL that causes everyone to not believe they could react and plot so fast, the other a slower real space drive that doesn't use gravametrics. The book ends with the cliff hanger of a massive sneak attack on the shipyards and possibly homeworld of Manticore.
156
157	[[AC: ''Shadow of Freedom'']]
158	* Lieutenant Abigail Hearns needs to rescue captives from a space station held by Solarian Gendarmerie thugs. She has exactly one actual marine at her disposal, the rest of her team are regular crewmen. The enemy outnumbers her and is fighting on their home ground, and even if she manages to push them back they'll have the option of threatening to shoot the hostages. She proceeds to [[CurbStompBattle utterly wipe the floor with them]], getting the captives out with zero casualties while blowing through a series of Gendarme squads forted up behind blast doors.
159	** It gets better. All of the curb stomping was [[WeNeedADistraction the diversion.]] The station's staff ([[TheDogBitesBack not Solarians]]) gave Hearns detailed engineers' schematics of the station, allowing her to send another team to take the brig by surprise from the rear.
160	* Commodore Aivars Terekhov gets one by shutting up a particularly vicious Gendarmerie officer with [[DeathFromAbove an orbital strike]].
161	--> "Why is it," Terekhov asked conversationally, "that people like you always think you're more ruthless than [[BewareTheNiceOnes people like me?]]"
162
163	[[AC: ''Shadow of Victory'']]
164	* The Grand Alliance makes its first moves against Mesa... by sending none other than (Citizen) Admiral Cowboy, Lester Tourville himself, off to the Quadrant to join forces with Manticore's own military cowgirl, Michelle Henke. It is [[BirdsOfAFeather fast friendship at first sight]] for those two, and brings extra awesome to the ending of ''Cauldron of Ghosts'' -- because [[TheCavalry Henke]] winds up bringing Tourville and his ''Havenite'' forces to help relieve the siege at Neue Rostock.
165	** Mesa knows how thoroughly screwed they are the moment the Grand Alliance arrives in system. The system fleet commander crunches the numbers and, knowing that Mesa has the biggest Navy in the Verge outside of the Solarian League, two of the Manticoran ships could probably kill their entire fleet and sustain minimal damage, and the League is [[CurbStompBattle having its own problems with the Alliance]] so no help is coming. Since the system command isn't run by Solarians, [[KnowWhenToFoldEm there isn't much of a battle]] but a "Which one of you do we surrender to?" conversation.
166	* On the Mesan side, the fact that they succeed at evacuating most of their core Alignment members to Darius without anyone being the wiser, and [[MagnificentBastard even leave the Manticorans holding the bag for the collateral damage]]. One bit of hedge on this success is that the BigBad, Albrecht Detweiler, is unable to escape in time, and is nuked with the other remaining Alignment members on Mesa to cover their tracks.
167	** As a bit of extra icing on top, Marinescu, the woman in charge of planning the mass-casualty attacks on both the remaining Alignment members and the innocent Mesan bystanders, is informed that she herself is [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness surplus to requirements]] while she's on her way to her evacuation ship, and receives her severance package, [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill in the form of a nuclear bomb concealed in her communicator.]]
168
169	[[AC: ''Crown Of Slaves'']]
170	* A seventeen year old former street urchin slaps a SuperSoldier in the face ... for moping.
171	-->'''Berry:''' Nobody calls you a monster to my face, not even you! ''Is that understood?''
172	* Victor Cachat manipulates one of Manticore's oldest allies to void their treaty and cease hostilities with Haven, and then is in large part responsible for a successful attack that frees a slave-planet resulting in the creation of a new nation, and despite being an enemy agent, does it with the cooperation of the Manticoran navy. Victor Cachat, badass, ladies and gentlemen. Granted, he's really only able to get away with prying Erewhon from the Manticoran alliance thanks mostly to the gross stupidity of the High Ridge government on Manticore. Cachat even admits that himself. Which is why there's no personal hard feelings between him and Zilwicki, despite both of them being deeply devoted to their nations. Still.... ''Victor Cachat'', ladies and gentlemen.
173	* Captain Michael Oversteegen gives a truly magnificent ShutUpHannibal speech to his cousin, who happens to be the [[AssInAmbassador Ambassador to Erewhon]]. The phrase "brains of a carrot" is used. It's a verbal double broadside that, if rendered in actual missiles, would make Honor Harrington and Sonja Hemphill proud -- once they [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments finished laughing]], anyway.
174
175	[[AC: ''Torch of Freedom'']]
176	* Victor Cachat takes on the whole world of Mesa to find information necessary to stop the war. Well, he wasn't alone, and it was mostly just an undercover infiltration, but he's just awesome in that TOO.
177
178	[[AC: ''Cauldron of Ghosts'']]
179	* [[SpaceMarine Thandi]] gets ambushed by a street gang hoping for an opportunistic highway robbing, [[MuggingTheMonster having no idea what they have just gotten themselves into]]. After Thandi dispatches several of them with deadly efficiency, Victor [[DynamicEntry shows up]], by ramming his car into one of the gangsters' vehicles and [[DisproportionateRetribution launching a grenade into the cab.]] Victor knows how to make a first impression.
180	* The siege of the seccy districts is basically one solid CMOA from start to finish for the defenders, but a few incidents deserve special mention:
181	** A number of criminals discovering that they do ''have'' some principles and are willing to die to defend their fellow seccies against what looks very much like planned genocide.
182	** A MauveShirt criminal taking out a squad of goons intent on slaughtering fleeing civilians ... using nothing but discarded camping equipment and some ingenuity.
183	** General Thandi Palane proving that she really is a FourStarBadass by commanding the defense of Neue Rostock ... and holding out with a ragtag band of gangsters and volunteers against well-equipped military forces for almost a month.
184	** Triêu Chuanli combining YouShallNotPass and TakingYouWithMe (with an anti-tank mine) to buy the defenders a bit more time.
185	** After several chapters of the heroes pointing out that Hancock is not nearly as prepared to fight off an invasion as Neue Rostock is, the "Mistie" troops storm the building and secure the first floor ... only to have most of the ''second'' floor [[DeathFromAbove dropped on them with demolition charges.]] Which kills ''more than 80 percent of the attackers in one sitting''!
186	** Hancock has been [[DeathFromAbove destroyed]], and Neue Rostock is on the verge of being overrun after weeks of bloody room to room combat. Several of the protagonists are dead, most of the rest badly wounded, and Thandi, Victor, and Dusek are preparing to take out as many of the Peacies as possible in a last defiant attack. General Drescher, on the verge of her final assault, calls Thandi and asks for a ceasefire so she can withdraw her troops from Neue Rostock. [[BrickJoke The brick tossed in the air]] at the end of ''Shadow of Freedom'' has finally hit the ground as Admiral Mike Henke, Countess Gold Peak, has arrived in the Mesa system, entirely unaware that she was bringing TheCavalry.
187	*** ''Shadow of Victory'' reveals, '''awesomely''', that TheCavalry included Lester Tourville and the "Havenite first team" commanding a sizable chunk of Haven's Second Fleet. Come what may, clandestinely or not, it will ''always'' be Manticore and Haven standing against Mesa.
188
189	[[AC: ''To End In Fire'']]
190	* The Grand Alliance is able to track the Mesan Alignment back to their [[spoiler: decoy]] home star system of Galton. Honor contacts the system commander and explains what her plan is if they do not surrender: She will methodically destroy every space station, starship, and platform capable of offering resistance until the Alignment surrenders or there is nobody left to fight her. Adebayo has one last question for Honor, and she doesn't like the answer:
191	-->'''Adebayo''': And what do you think the forces under my command will be doing while you do that, Admiral?
192	-->'''Alexander-Harrington''': [[BadassBoast Dying.]]
193	* In response to Honor's demand for her surrender, Adebayo launches a wave of stealth attack drones which manage to get dangerously close to the GA fleet before they are spotted, managing to overwhelm their defenses and cause greater losses on the GA forces in a single salvo than the Sollies managed to throughout their entire war with the Alliance. But even taken by surprise, the Alliance forces are battle-hardened with decades of experience driving their defense doctrine: Their losses amount to less than a half-dozen superdreadnoughts and one carrier.
194	* Honor contacts Adebayo again, in order to put it on the record that Adebayo understands that by refusing the offer of surrender, she can't legally expect Honor to make the offer again.
195	-->'''Alexander-Harrington''': And at least now I won't have to second guess myself after I blow every single one of your forts to hell. [[TranquilFury Enjoy the ride, Generalfeldmarshall.]]
196	* While everything listed above for this book is a [[SugarWiki/MomentofAwesome Crowning Moment of Awesome]] for the Grand Alliance...it also is one for the Mesan Alignment.
197	** Despite all of their setbacks, the defection of Dr. Herlander Simões, the eradication of both Manpower Incorporated and the Jessyk Combine, the war against the Solarian League leading to reforms instead of a collapse, the liberation of Mesa...the Alignment is still around, and even more concealed than before. No more links can trace them back to Darius, they have purged themselves of their more militant elements, they have started the Renaissance Factor (albeit on a smaller scale than planned), and the entire galaxy believes them to be eradicated once and for all.
198	** Furthermore, the Alignment managed to use the sacrifice of Galton to their advantage not just to go back into the shadows, but also take care of one of their most glaing weaknesses: the treecats. The deep-cover operatives not yet discovered have been informed that the Alignment on Galton was a militant splinter faction that truly carried out the atrocities of the past several years, such as the Yawata Strike, and the true Alignment still wants to peacefully uplift the galaxy. Through this "reveal", these operatives have been placed into an entirely NEW layer of the Onion, one where they not only truly believe that the "Mesan Alignment" is destroyed, but that they feel incentivized to work WITH the Grand Alliance in making sure it stays dead...because it isn't THEIR "Mesan Alignment".
199
200	[[AC: Short stories]]
201	* ''Ms Midshipwoman Harrington'': takes over command of her ship while not even technically an officer yet because everyone else is dead, unconscious, or out of communication, and stern rakes[[note]]the bow and stern of the warships are relatively unprotected, until Manticore came up with bow and stern wall technology that can block weapons firing at the bow and stern, at first stopping movement while the system is up, then allowing movement via dual phase bow and stern wall technology. "rake": cross your (well protected, weapon heavy) broadside across their bow or stern, firing in sequence to that every weapon hits their vulnerable area.[[/note]]the attacking ship from ridiculously short range, destroying it.
202	* ''The Promised Land'': Judith Newland leads an escape of [[TheFundamentalist Masadan]] women and children by ''stealing a spaceship.'' She organized an escape of a group of women from the planet Masada, which doesn't sound like much until you know that Masada is a planet of religious nutcases who don't allow their women to even learn how to read. Judith, captured as a child, had spent years keeping this ability a secret. And when she pulls it off, ''while very pregnant'', ends up impressing a young Michael Winton, Crown Prince of Manticore, and brother of Queen Elizabeth III.
203	* ''The Service of the Sword'': Captain Michael Oversteegen systematically rips to shreds a particularly obnoxious fellow snotty of one Abigail Hearns, and in doing so reveals himself to be the complete and total opposite of the UpperClassTwit he appears. And then he ''really'' starts to get awesome.
204	** The climactic battle of the short story has Hearns and her landing party in a fighting retreat being pursued by a band of SpacePirates. This sequence shows several times the dangers of trying to ZergRush a defensive position when the defenders are equipped with body armor and automatic weapons, even when using superior numbers. Meanwhile, four Heavy Cruisers have arrived, forcing Oversteegen to withdraw, chased by three of the cruisers while the fourth stays in orbit. Several hours later, the pirate cruiser that stayed behind is surprised and destroyed with a single salvo by a ''[[PapaWolf really pissed off]]'' Oversteegen, who has just returned from defeating the other SpacePirates [[NeverTellMeTheOdds in a 3:1 match]].
205	* ''Call To Arms'', by Timothy Zahn, has a small flotilla of Manticoran warships (a new light cruiser, a destroyer, and two corvettes) going up against a mercenary fleet of two battlecruisers, two cruisers, and several destroyers. The Manticorans are able to [[AwesomenessByAnalysis guess from analyzing the Mercenary ships' maneuvering]] that one of the cruisers [[AttackItsWeakPoint has a malfunctioning point defense system]], and focus their fire on it... only to redirect their missiles at the last minute to avoid hitting the vulnerable cruiser, taking advantage of it's weak defenses to slip past it and land a cheap shot on one of the battlecruisers, knocking out half of it's forward armament.
206	** Towards the end of the battle, the Manticoran force has been scattered, and the flagship, HMS ''Casey'', is crippled and drifting into the middle of the enemy formation. By using some of their practice missiles as a defensive screen, they are able to buy the fraction of a second they need to lay in a broadside on the other battlecruiser, leading to a stunningly one-sided victory for the ''Casey''. The other Mercenary ships are [[HeroicBSOD too spooked by what just happened to engage]], and ''Casey'' drifts past the rest of their formation without being attacked. It is only after that the narration reveals that this is not the famous historical battle between the RMN and an invading mercenary fleet that [[BackStory gets mentioned from time to time]], but merely an early skirmish leading up to it.
207	* ''Beauty And The Beast'': Lieutenant Karl Alfred Harrington is attending medical school on Beowulf, and has become infatuated with a female student named Allison Chou (unbeknownst to him, she is similarly infatuated with him). When she is kidnapped by a group of [[CorruptCorporateExecutive Manpower Inc]] thugs who want to blackmail her brother, Alfred tracks them down to their hideout and, using the skills he picked up in the Marines, [[OneManArmy single-handedly]] launches a rescue. It turns out that ass-kicking runs in the family, and that Honor Harrington is most ''definitely'' her father's little girl.
208	* ''The Hard Way Home'', a major avalanche hits a ski resort, burying hundreds of people including a group of schoolkids on a field trip. A young Susan Hibson (in the main line of books, a Marine officer who spends much of her screen time hip deep in the action) [[{{Determinator}} begins digging her way out]], having no idea how deep she even is or which way to dig to get out. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Commander Honor Harrington is coordinating rescue efforts, but they are having trouble finding the survivors under the heavy snow, even with shipboard sensors. Nimitz picks up on the girl's mindglow and immediatly starts tunneling to meet her. Thanks to the girl's determination, the other kids in her ski lift, and other survivors in the previously overlooked area, are found and rescued.
209	** Hibson's actions so impress the Commandant of the Manticoran Marine Corps that when he learns that she wanted to join the Corps when she grew up, he ''personally'' reserved a slot for her at the RMMC academy several years before she could legally apply. We later discover that Hibson was awarded the Monarch's Cross for Bravery the second highest award for bravery behind the Parliamentary Medal of Valor but is only awarded non-combat situations.
210	* ''From the Highlands'':
211	** Victor Cachat single-handedly obliterates a squad of Havenite State Security troops and genetically-engineered terrorists when deciding he doesn't like the current Havenite government any more. Not only does he get away with it, he cons his superiors so well as to what happened that he gets ''promoted'', even after telling the head of the Havenite State Security that he executed his immediate superior for his involvement in the fiasco.
212	** Anton Zilwicki goes on an ''epic'' RoaringRampageOfRevenge when someone has the audacity to kidnap his daughter.
213	** Zilwicki's daughter Helen, at the ripe old age of 14, escaped on her own when kidnapped, casually killing three sewer scumbags who get after her ''[[LittleMissBadass with her bare hands]]'' in the process. And while escaping, rescues two sewer urchins named Berry and Lars. One of them goes on to become Queen of Torch.
214	* ''Fanatic'': Victor Cachat single-handedly arranges for an entire sector's [=StateSec=] forces to be rendered impotent, undermines the local authorities, and gets the loyalty of the regular Navy forces (who don't trust him) so that when a coup takes place on Haven, the entire sector is delivered to the new government lock, stock, and barrel with minimal casualties (only [=StateSec=] personnel too stupid to recognize he's simply too awesome for them to comprehend).
215	* ''Honorverse Companion 1921 PD'' is one great big InfoDump about the setting, and goes into considerable detail explaining how the governments and militaries of the Star Kingdom of Manticore and the Protectorate of Grayson are organized, and even nitty-gritty details like differences in Manticoran and Grayson warship design philsophy. Of note is the brief history of the Grayson Civil War, which Grayson's early space forces mostly had to sit out, being more akin to a Coast Guard than a Navy, and having little in the way of weapons. A single sentence mentions that this changed when their space forces had developed a capability for OrbitalBombardment, which they proceeded to use against the forces of The Faithful in support of the Protector's forces.

Context Awesome / HonorHarrington