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Jonathan asked this question about Ancillary Justice (Imperial Radch, #1):
I'm half way through the book, thought I was over theinitial confusion on language. I still can't figure out what a "decade" is whenever discussing ships. Eg: "Each decade held twenty lieutenants and its decade commander, but Esk was now my lowest occupied deck." from Chapter 12's opening. What's a decade? A troop of soldiers? Actually I still don't know what "Esk" means.
Cherie My understanding of the Radtch universe is this:

Each ship is either a Justice, Mercy, or Sword, depending on their role in the conquering of new syste…moreMy understanding of the Radtch universe is this:

Each ship is either a Justice, Mercy, or Sword, depending on their role in the conquering of new systems.

Each Justice class ship (the type Toren is) has decks with names such as Bo, Esk, Var, etc. These names come from their religion of opposites (except for Amaat, who is a god, I believe). Esk is opposite from Var, etc. I don't remember which book details this. So, a Commander may have ten human Lieutenants, and each Lieutenant has ten ancillaries at their disposal. I think only the Captain of a ship has twenty ancillary crew, with ten on duty at a time.

In the book you're referring to (if I remember correctly), the system they are in is past the invasion phase, so the crew members (ancillaries) of some of the decks (Var, at least) have been put back in storage and the decks powered down so that these three instances of Anaander can operate onboard without any human crew suspecting.(less)
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Ancillary Justice
by Ann Leckie (Goodreads Author)
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