I know. [ Heavily, tiredly, lifting a hand to rub at his brow. ] You'll be more useful in there than back here, and at this point we need someone on the inside more than ever.

[ Her not being Barrayaran didn't just make her the smarter sacrifice, it also makes her less of a risk. There's nothing she knows that Byerly wouldn't also already be giving away. The location of the camp ( which they'll be moving, right, that'll be a pain in the ass with all the reinforcements they still got ), any key information, already compromised, already gone. It was safe to send her back on that front, would be worth the information she could still feed them on the off-chance that she could still maintain her cover. ]

I just don't want you back there, Tashka. [ A beat. ] As a friend.

[ Not as a CO, as a friend. She's here right now. Troubled, shaken, but breathing, alive, safe. Knowing that he has to send her right back into the Cetagandan's grasp, knowing that as clever and wily and prepared to distract as Byerly might be, one right question and he'd put Natasha right into their hands alongside him. God. He's going to have to do it, he knows, but he still hates it. ]