“Thank you, Captain,” Geary said. “I still appreciate the advice you gave me. It was the best option for all of us, but if the Rift Federation refuses to dance along, we can’t make them.”
Next came another call to Ambassador Rycerz. “She told you the Rift Federation has canceled its military assistance agreements with the Alliance? That’s the first I’ve heard of it. It’s not really a surprise, though.” Rycerz looked to one side of her desk, apparently viewing a display there. “If they’ve canceled those agreements, Rift Federation warships no longer have free right of passage through Alliance space. That’s probably why they had this Captain Kapelka tell us of it at a point where we couldn’t physically enforce a denial of passage.”
“We still couldn’t use force, could we?” Geary asked. “The same problems would still flow from that.”
“Yes. You said that Captain Hiyen made a personal appeal to Kapelka?”
“That’s right,” Geary said. “Invoking his status as someone who’d fought alongside her, and as a representative of another smaller entity also concerned about asserting independence.”
“How far ahead of us are those Rift Federation warships going to be?”
“About a week and a half,” Geary said. “If they run into trouble, all we’ll be able to do is search for any survivors. I doubt any fighting would still be going on.”
“Admiral, we no longer have legal grounds to assist them by military means if they run into trouble,” Ambassador Rycerz pointed out. “If we see them being attacked by a Syndic force, it will be an incident involving two foreign powers.”
“Are you saying we’d have to let them fight on their own?” Geary demanded, appalled.
“That’s exactly what I’m saying, because canceling the military assistance agreements with the Alliance means the Rift Federation is on its own and that’s how the Rift wants it.” Rycerz rapped one fist against her forehead, but suddenly paused. “What about the aliens? The enigmas? What’s the legal status of us assisting the Rift Federation ships against them?”
“You don’t know?” Geary asked.
“Hell, no.” This time the ambassador rapped both fists against her forehead. “And there’s not enough time to send a courier ship to Unity and for it to return with guidance. Admiral, is there some . . . fleet thing that would guide our actions?”
“Fleet thing?” He paused, thinking. “There’s an old rule that whenever a ship encounters another ship in trouble, or survivors from a wreck, that ship is supposed to offer aid and rescue. It’s an obligation. That’s a rule older than space when it comes to ships. Older than the Alliance or the Syndicate Worlds or the Rift Federation.”
Rycerz gazed at him, her eyes intent. “That might have to do, Admiral. This rule came from Old Earth?”
“That’s my understanding, yes. I haven’t really thought about it in legal terms, but that’s why the Alliance fleet defended Midway against the enigmas,” Geary said. “They were people, and they needed help. They were being attacked, so we helped defend them.”
“Which gives us precedent, as well as a rule established by our ancestors.” She nodded as much to herself as to him. “The ancestors who came from Old Earth, meaning the ancestors of every human. We can’t very well ignore the wishes of those ancestors. The only question will be whether the Rift Federation will allow us to save them if it comes to that.”
He wanted to say that wasn’t something they should worry about, that of course the Rift warships would accept help, but thinking about the posture and the attitude of Captain Kapelka in her last message he realized Ambassador Rycerz was right to be concerned about that.
* * *
THEY could only watch over the next couple of days as the Rift Federation ships swung through space to reach the jump point, then vanished into jump space.
“If I lose one sailor because of those idiot Rifters alerting everyone we’re coming I’ll personally take it out of Kapelka’s hide,” Captain Desjani vowed.
The sentiment was widespread in the fleet, Geary found. Nor could he blame everyone for feeling that way. He felt the same anger whenever he thought about the possible consequences of the Rift Federation stirring up trouble just before his own ships arrived.
Luckily, he was too busy with the last-minute preparations to depart to spend much time brooding over the actions of the Rift Federation.
In the midst of those preparations he got a text message from Desjani. “You need to talk to Roberto Duellos.”
Groaning at the interruption, but knowing she wouldn’t have sent that unless it was important, he called Captain Duellos on the Inspire. “How are you doing?”
Duellos used his lips to sketch a brief smile that didn’t reach as far as his eyes. “I’ve been worse.”
Frowning, Geary took another look at him. “You look like hell. What happened? Didn’t you get back from leave just a day ago?”
“Yes,” Duellos said. “I put it off to ensure my ship was ready before I took leave.”
“Tanya said you put it off because you didn’t know what would await you at home.”
Duellos smiled again, this time the expression lasting a little longer. “Tanya Desjani always speaks the truth, even when it’s uncomfortable. Well, as commander of the fleet, you deserve to know of matters that might degrade the performance of your senior officers.” The smile faded, leaving a look of weary despair. “My wife and I have officially separated. She wanted her husband back. But I couldn’t bear the idea of spending the rest of my life in an office somewhere, dreaming of a past when I was doing things that mattered. We still might have hung on, but . . . there’s a new ensign assigned to Warspite.”
The abrupt shift in topic startled him out of the condolences he’d been about to offer. “Warspite got a couple of them,” he said, calling up the data with one hand while he was speaking. “Ensign Dimitri Gamal and Ensign . . . Arwen Duellos.” Geary focused on his friend. “Your daughter?”
Duellos nodded. “Following in her father’s footsteps. Or, to my wife, placing herself in unnecessary peril far, far from her home and family because of the poor example provided by her father.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I know you mean that. Thank you. I assure you that I will continue to carry out my duties to the best of my abilities.”
“You know that’s not what I’m worried about.”
That earned him another small smile. “Indeed.” Duellos grimaced, looking away. “The hell of it is she’s right. She deserves a spouse who’s there, who puts her above everything else. But when push came to shove I couldn’t. I loved space more than I loved her. I guess that’s the hardest part. I hate that I didn’t love her more. I should’ve. But I didn’t. I failed her.”
There were times when no words seemed adequate or right. Times when only silence felt appropriate. As much as Geary wanted to say something, anything, that would make things better, he could think of nothing.
Finally, Duellos looked back at him. “I won’t fail anyone else. Not my crew, not my commander, and not my daughter. No matter what it takes. You don’t need to worry about me, Admiral.”
“I will worry about you, because I care about you. Promise me that you’ll speak with me or with Tanya if you need to.”
“A promise easily given,” Duellos said. “Fear not, Admiral, I have a role model to look to in my loss. A man who lost every person he’d ever known or loved, and still managed to keep going. I hear he even saved the Alliance.”
Geary felt a twisted smile form on his own lips. “He’s not much of a role model. He makes a lot of mistakes.”
“I don’t think anyone wants or needs a role model who’s perfect,” Duellos said. “How could any aspire to match such a person? But a flawed, human individual, that’s someone useful to look to. It’s not perfection that makes someone great. It’s what they achieve despite their many i
mperfections.”
“That applies to you as well,” Geary said.
“It does. I’ll be all right, Admiral. Thank you for your concern. At least Arwen is on a battleship rather than a destroyer. There’s something comforting about knowing my daughter is behind that much armor and is that well armed.” Duellos looked exasperated. “She told me she’s putting in for a transfer to a battle cruiser.”
At least he could help with this. “I’d have to approve that, and regardless of who the ensign is I don’t want to move around people just as our crews are getting settled again. It’s not special treatment to tell you I won’t be approving any transfers among ships for some time.”
“That is a relief.” Duellos nodded to him, gathering himself to look more like his usual nature. “I should get back to work.”
“Me, too,” Geary said. “Be well, my friend.”
* * *
EIGHT days later the Alliance force finally began moving, the various warships sliding into their assigned positions as the entire mass of ships began accelerating toward the jump point for Atalia.
He’d wrestled with the right formation to adopt, wanting something that looked too powerful for anyone to want to mess with but also wanting to avoid looking as if the Alliance force was arrayed for attack.
The result was a formation of boxes positioned around a cylinder. The leading box, and that at the rear, each held a division of battle cruisers. Due to losses that hadn’t been replaced, Geary had reorganized the remaining battle cruisers into only three divisions. In the lead was the new division commanded by Captain Badaya on Illustrious, also including Incredible, and Valiant. Guarding the rear was Captain Duellos on Inspire, accompanied by Formidable, Dragon, and Steadfast. “Above” the cylinder was the last battle cruiser division, led by Captain Desjani on Dauntless, along with Daring, Victorious, and Intemperate. Each group of battle cruisers was accompanied by a division of heavy cruisers, as well as squadrons of light cruisers and destroyers.
The walls of the cylinder itself were made up of battleships, forming a fearsome barrier against any attack. The battleships had taken fewer losses than the fleet’s battle cruisers, but their numbers had still been whittled down, so they had been regrouped into five divisions. The first held Gallant, Indomitable, Glorious, and Magnificent. The second consisted of Dreadnaught, Fearless, Dependable, and Conqueror. The third was made up of Warspite, Vengeance, Guardian, and Resolution. In the fourth division were Colossus, Encroach, Redoubtable, and Spartan, while the fifth included Relentless, Superb, Splendid, and the newly rejoined Reprisal from the Callas Republic. The fleet’s remaining heavy cruisers, light cruisers, and destroyers roamed around the battleships.
Inside the front portion of the cylinder were the four assault transports (Tsunami, Typhoon, Mistral, and Haboob) carrying General Carabali’s Marines. Inside the back part of the cylinder were the eight fast fleet auxiliaries, boxier and slower than warships, but able to fabricate any new parts or weapons or fuel cells needed by the fleet. Without ships like Titan, Tanuki, Kupua, Domovoi, Witch, Jinn, Alchemist, and Cyclops, Geary never would’ve been able to get the fleet back home after it had been trapped deep in Syndicate Worlds space.
Finally, in the center of the cylinder was Boundless. The ship carrying Ambassador Rycerz and the scientific teams had the least defenses on it but was in the most well-protected position. Anyone trying to reach Boundless from any angle would have to fight their way through walls of defenders.
The damage inflicted at Unity Alternate and other battles had been repaired, in some cases (such as with Incredible) so many repairs that the crews joked they were new ships. Every ship held as many supplies, as much food and weapons, and as many fuel cells as they could safely carry, and the crews were close to full strength. That last was a bit of an illusion, since as Master Chief Gioninni had predicted roughly a quarter of the sailors in the fleet were new, with too little experience in their jobs. Others were veterans, rescued survivors whose original ships had been destroyed. But in a sense almost everyone in the fleet (Geary himself included) fit into that category. Tanya had never told him how many ships she’d had blown out from under her since she’d joined the fleet as an ensign, but he knew there’d been at least three.
The fleet accelerated as one, every ship just where it was supposed to be. It formed a magnificent sight, even though Geary kept seeing the ships that weren’t there, having been lost in earlier battles. But it should still be powerful enough to get through Syndicate Worlds space unscathed, and hopefully to deter the enigmas from attacking. That was assuming everyone behaved rationally, though. He had enough experience with both people and aliens to have little expectation of that.
As a matter of fact, he’d already had an example with the Rift Federation ships.
He wondered how far they’d get.
It took a while to get up to speed, because the “fast” fleet auxiliaries and Boundless couldn’t match the acceleration of warships. But eventually the main propulsion units on every ship cut off as the fleet reached point one light speed.
“All ships on station, on vector for Atalia jump point,” Lieutenant Yuon reported.
Geary stood up from his seat on the bridge of Dauntless. It would be a couple of days before the fleet reached the jump point, leaving him with a sense of anticlimax. He looked around the bridge, trying to recapture some of the excitement of beginning the mission. “I see you kept your lieutenants, Captain Desjani.”
“They all came back,” Desjani replied. “I let them go and they came back.”
Lieutenant Yuon grinned. “There’s nothing I’d rather be doing, Captain.”
Lieutenant Castries nodded. “This mission is historic, Captain. Why would I want to miss it?”
Desjani gave them a skeptical look. “You two are agreeing on something? That’s pretty historic in and of itself.”
“It won’t happen again, Captain,” Lieutenant Castries promised.
“Good.” Desjani looked at Geary. “Admiral, there’s something we have to discuss.”
He followed her off the bridge, through passageways, all the way to the secure conference room that was usually used for meetings. Gunnery Sergeant Orvis was waiting there.
Desjani sealed the hatch, activated the security measures in the compartment, and then held out her hand to Orvis. The Marine handed her a small box. “We’ve got a problem,” she said to Geary, opening the box.
He looked inside, seeing a black speck. “What is it?”
“A sophisticated, state-of-the-art bug called a tick. It’s tiny, it can move on its own, or it can latch onto someone and get carried to other places.”
“Someone bugged this room?” Geary said. “How? Why didn’t the security measures detect it?”
“It has some new passive concealment features,” Gunny Orvis said. “The good news, Admiral, is that when the security features in this compartment are active, that bug couldn’t transmit out. The bad news is it was in here, so it could’ve sent information about what people in here were saying before security features were activated for a meeting, and it has a limited storage capability that would’ve allowed it to save some of what was said during a secure meeting and transmit it later.”
“How’d we find it?” Geary asked, trying not to get angry at whoever had done this. Anger would only cloud his mind when he needed it clear.
Desjani held out the device she’d been bequeathed by Victoria Rione. “Handy gadget, like I said.”
“Do we have any clues who planted it?”
“It seems to be Alliance manufacture, Admiral,” Gunny Orvis said. “But that doesn’t mean anything. There aren’t any indications of who put it here.”
“We can’t even narrow it down to people who attended meetings,” Desjani said. “Someone else could’ve planted this on one of them, and when it got here it would’ve dropped off.”
�
��Who knows about this?” Geary asked, staring grimly at the black speck.
“You, me, Gunny, and his hack-and-crack specialist,” Desjani said.
“All right. I’m going to notify Ambassador Rycerz and General Carabali. Gunny, I want you to deliver that tick to Lieutenant Iger and tell him what you know about it. No, wait. Is it still working?”
“No, Admiral. My hack and crack disabled it,” Orvis said.
“Good. Then go ahead and get it to Lieutenant Iger. Tell him he’s authorized to share any information he gets from it with General Carabali.”
“I’m on it, Admiral.”
After the gunnery sergeant left, Desjani stopped Geary from following. “Are you thinking this might involve the special operators on Boundless who are pretending to be spit-and-polish peacocks?”
He raised both palms out in surrender. “Yes. The ones Carabali thinks might be Wendigos. We have to make sure the rest of the fleet doesn’t suspect who they are.”
“The entire fleet already knows who they are. At least that they’re special operations types. You can dress knuckle-draggers up in pretty uniforms but everyone can still tell they’re knuckle-draggers.” She eyed him warily. “Do you really think they might be the ones who bugged this room?”
“Maybe,” he said.
“If it was them, then they messed with my ship,” Captain Desjani said, her eyes growing hard. “That’s a serious line to cross.”
“I’ll make sure the ambassador knows that.”
“I’m not joking, Admiral.”
“I know.”
“Why do you think this ambassador isn’t behind it?”
Tanya rarely expressed anti-government sentiment, but like the rest of the Alliance military she’d been affected by the long, terrible war. The military couldn’t blame itself for the failure to end the war, not when its men and women were dying in the effort. But the failure hadn’t been only the government’s fault, Geary knew. Both the Syndicate Worlds and the Alliance had access to vast amounts of resources and people, so neither side could overwhelm the other. His own final victory owed at least as much to the impending collapse of the overstressed Syndicate Worlds as it did to the efforts of his fleet. The Alliance itself had been trembling on the edge of failure due to the stress of the war as well. But while the Syndicate Worlds was falling apart, racked by rebellion, the Alliance had held together. And its military officers had never raised their hands against the Alliance government.
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