In which Admiral Bunter considers his options.

Oh, I see how it is: every time the story is about to shift to a different set of characters, something’s going to happen that will leave us worrying about one of the characters we’re parting from, until we see them again.

In this case, it turns out Tolly was right to be concerned about what Admiral Bunter might do once he was restored to himself. Having had his trust so comprehensively violated already by someone who seemed to wish only to help him, he’s going to find it hard to trust another helpful person again.

It’s not clear what he has in mind to “neutralize” Tolly, though I don’t think he intends anything lethal, given his wish to study humans further. (If he expects Tolly to teach him about humans directly, he’s likely to be in for a refresher on the melant’i of the prisoner and the jailer.)

There was a moment, when Admiral Bunter shifted his course back toward Nostrilia, when I thought he was going to try shopping Tolly to the Institute anyway, only on his own account instead of Inkirani’s. He knows better than that, though; he was just testing to see if Tolly had taken any overt precautions against him doing it. We know, of course, that Tolly respects Admiral Bunter’s self-determination too much to prevent him outright from choosing his own course.

Whether, having foreseen the likelihood of trouble, Tolly took any less overt precautions, and whether they were the right precautions for being “neutralized”, remains to be seen.