Narration: But what kept them on their feet when there was no sane reason for hope were the bonds between them, loyalty to one another, the knowledge… - David Weber

Honor Harrington: The world's best swordsman doesn't fear the second best; he fears the worst swordsman, because he can't predict what the idiot will do. (paraphrase on Mark Twain)

Narration: No one else knew how she'd longed for extinction, how much part of her had hungered simply to quit. To end. She'd once intended, coldly and logically, to do just that... She'd sacrificed her naval career... and a corner of her mind suspected she'd actually wanted to sacrifice it - that she'd planned to use the loss of the vocation she loved so much as one more reason to end her dreary existence. It had seemed only reasonable then; now the memory was one more coal of contempt for her own weakness, her willingness to surrender to her own pain when she'd always refused to surrender to anyone else.

Narration: Perhaps his love for her made him less than impartial, but he also knew how deeply she'd been hurt and chided her for judging herself so much more harshly than she would have judged someone else...