Courageous

FOUR

No matter how bad it got, no matter how lonely and isolated he felt in command of this fleet, there were always his ancestors.

When the fleet finally reached the right point around the sun of Baldur and entered jump space en route to Sendai, Geary watched the external display change from endless star-spangled black to endless dull gray shot through with occasional lights that bloomed and faded. No one had known what the lights were in Geary’s time, since it had been impossible to explore jump space, and with the advent of the hypernet, interest in jump space had faded. Or maybe the lines of research that might have explained the lights in jump space had been forestalled by the need to support the war with all the scientific, technical, and monetary means available.

Captain Desjani caught Geary gazing at the lights, realized that Geary had noticed her noticing him, and looked away quickly. She’d told him soon after he assumed command that many sailors believed that Geary had been one of those lights, his spirit resting in the otherwise unchanging expanse of jump space until the Alliance’s need was so desperate that the legendary Black Jack Geary would return to save his people. Did they still believe that, after learning that Geary had actually been drifting in a damaged survival pod orbiting the star named Grendel at the edge of Alliance space for all those years, the beacon inoperative, the survival sleep equipment barely keeping him alive until this fleet stumbled across him?

Would he ever see Grendel again? He didn’t particularly want to. It was pretty much a useless star, the sort of place ships and convoys had once passed through on their ways to important places. Geary had been told the system had been abandoned because it was too close to the border with the Syndicate Worlds, and there wasn’t anything really worth defending in it, the wreckage of dozens of battles orbiting the star the only remaining signs of humanity’s former presence. But some of that wreckage had belonged to his old ship, the ship destroyed while covering the retreat of the rest of the convoy. A lot of his crew had died at Grendel. He owed them a respectful visit to the place where they had fought and died under his command.

Unfortunately, a lot more people had already died under his new command, including almost certainly his own grandnephew, whose ship Repulse had been destroyed covering the fleet’s retreat from the Syndic home system. Michael Geary probably rested with Geary’s ancestors now, ancestors he hadn’t paid respect to for too long. “Captain Desjani, please hold everything but emergency calls for me for the next hour or so.”

She nodded, her own face weary from time spent on the bridge while in enemy space. “There’s not much chance of an emergency while we’re in jump. Jump space might be boring, but at the moment boring sounds pretty nice.”

Geary turned to leave the bridge of the Dauntless, his eyes resting for a moment on the empty observer’s chair. Co-President Rione had normally occupied that chair even for something as routine as entering jump space. I need to find out what’s going on with her. I’ve needed to do that for a while, but I could find excuses not to while we were in Baldur Star System.

He left the bridge, but instead of heading for his stateroom went deeper into the ship, toward a set of compartments buried as deeply within the battle cruiser as possible, protected as well as anything on the ship from enemy fire or accident. With all else that had changed since Geary’s time, finding those compartments still on ships had been a major relief.

Sailors and officers in the passageways made shows of saluting Geary as he passed, smiling at him with looks of admiration and hero worship. He smiled back, even though inside Geary wanted to shake all of them and ask why they couldn’t see that he was as human and as prone to error as each of them. He returned the endless salutes, his arm tiring rapidly from constant use and causing Geary to wonder if maybe he shouldn’t have reintroduced saluting to the fleet after all.

There were a few sailors standing near the worship spaces, but they all cleared a way for Geary when he arrived. After he’d passed them, he heard the murmur of whispered conversations. The crew liked knowing that he talked to his ancestors, liked knowing that he sought their advice and comfort just like anyone else.

Geary entered a small room, pulled shut the privacy door, then sat down on the wooden bench facing a small shelf on which a candle rested. Picking up the nearby lighter, he set the candle’s wick ablaze, then sat a little while, relaxing his mind as he waited for his ancestors’ spirits to gather.

Finally, he started talking. “Thank you, my ancestors, for bringing this fleet safely through another enemy star system. Thank you for guiding me in my decisions and for your help in ensuring we lost no people at Baldur.” Geary paused, his thoughts straying to places he hadn’t let them go for a while. “I hope Baldur hasn’t changed. I’d still like to see that world someday, see if it’s really what everyone used to say. But nobody in this fleet but me remembers that. Nobody else in this fleet remembers Baldur as anything but another enemy star system.”

Another pause while Geary let his thoughts drift. “I hope I’m making the right decision by going to Sendai and the stars beyond. If I’m wrong, please find a way to show me. These people trust me. Well, most of them do. Some of them think … hell, I don’t know what they think. It’s not like I want this job.”

He looked beyond the candle at the bulkhead, mentally seeing the emptiness outside of Dauntless’s hull. “It’s a great temptation. You know what whispers to me. Just be Black Jack Geary. Just do whatever I think is right. It’d be so much easier. Don’t try to convince people. Just show them how it should be done. I have to keep reminding myself that I’m not who they think Black Jack is, some perfect hero. If I start acting like someone I’m not, it could be a disaster for not just the Alliance but for all humanity.

“Is that okay? I can’t believe I’m asking, but is it okay to see the Syndic people as people? Their leaders are horrible, and their warships and other armed forces have to be stopped, but if I start thinking all Syndics are monsters whose deaths don’t matter, wouldn’t I be wrong? If there truly is a nonhuman intelligent race on the other side of Syndic space, one that’s tricked humanity into planting unbelievably destructive mines in every important human-occupied star system, don’t we need to remember the good things that tie humanity together? We might have a common enemy now.”

Might have. Those two words hung in the air for a moment. “I wish I knew. I can’t even be certain the aliens exist. What do they want? What are their plans? Can I bring this fleet home safely without triggering truly genocidal fighting between the Alliance and the Syndicate Worlds?”

He spent a long while just sitting, not trying to think, letting his mind wander so he’d be open to any messages.

Nothing appeared in a burst of inspiration, though. Geary sighed and prepared to stand up, then spoke one more time. “I don’t know what’s bothering Victoria Rione, but something is, something she won’t share with me or anyone else. I know she’s not family, but if there’s anything I can do for her, show me how, if that’s permitted. I honestly don’t know how I feel about the woman, but she’s given a lot to others.”

Reaching to snuff out the candle, Geary recited the old, old words. “Give me peace, give me guidance, give me wisdom.”

Leaving, he felt considerably better.

“There’s some interesting material among the records recovered by the Marines at the Syndic mining facility at Baldur.”

The message from Lieutenant Iger in intelligence didn’t reveal much, but then intelligence types enjoyed sounding cryptic and mysterious, as if they always knew a little more than they’d actually ever tell you. In this case, the message succeeded in getting Geary down to the intelligence section. “What have you got?”

Lieutenant Iger and one of his petty officers offered a portable reader to Geary. “It’s on here, sir,” Iger explained.

Geary read the first document. “Dear Asira”

…It’s a personal letter. He started skimming, then slowed down. “We can’t get the parts we need to keep everything running and have had to cannibalize some of the mining equipment to keep the rest going … rations ran short again last week … there’s rumors of another draft call, please tell me they aren’t true … when will this war end?”

He looked up. “Is this from the files of the security police on that facility? I assume whoever wrote this was under arrest.”

Iger shook his head. “It was queued for transmission, sir. The security reviewers had already passed it.”

“You’re kidding.” Geary frowned down at the letter. “I assume you didn’t ask me down here to tell me that the Syndicate Worlds are a lot freer than I’ve been led to believe.”

The lieutenant and the petty officer both grinned. “No, sir,” Iger replied. “They’re still a police state. But this is just one letter. There’s a whole bunch in there, all pulled off the Syndic transmitter queue, and most of them contain the same sort of sentiments. We bounced the names on the letters against the files the Marines lifted from the security offices, and aside from routine entries, there’s nothing on these people.”

“Why not?” Geary held up the reader. “Isn’t this the sort of thing that gets people sent to labor camps in the Syndicate Worlds?”

“It is, sir.” Iger was serious now. “Or it should be. But to all appearances, open complaints were being tolerated to an unprecedented degree at that facility. Either the security force was extremely lax, or unhappiness with the state of affairs is bad enough that these kinds of sentiments are too common to be suppressed.” He indicated the reader. “The files at the installation also included some mail from the habitable world not yet delivered to miners and other workers at the facility. Many of them say pretty much the same thing. Not enough of anything and worries about more people or resources being demanded to meet war requirements.”

“Do any of them directly criticize the government?” The few Syndics who Geary had met since assuming command had all been thoroughly frightened of saying anything wrong or against their leaders.

“Only one, sir. The others carefully tiptoe around criticism of the Syndicate Worlds’ leaders.” Iger reached to push a couple of commands. “Here’s the exception.”

Geary read carefully. “What are our leaders thinking? Somebody must be making serious mistakes. But nobody pays except you and me. This can’t go on.” “Was this one flagged by security at the installation? It must have been.”

“No, sir.” Iger barely suppressed another smile. “The person who wrote it is the chief of security at the installation.”

“You’re joking.” Geary looked down at it again. “It’s not fake? Some sort of trick designed to mislead us?”

“As far as we can tell, it’s the real deal, sir.”

“I’ve talked to Syndics we’ve captured. You’ve interrogated them. None of them have said this sort of thing.”

“Not to us, sir,” Iger agreed. “It’s one thing to discuss this sort of thing among themselves, but saying it to us would be suicidal for any Syndic who ever got home again and was debriefed. ‘Did you tell the Alliance anything?’ ‘What did you say to Alliance personnel?’ That sort of thing. They’d pop positive for deception and be subjected to, um, harsher methods of interrogation and then find themselves charged with treasonous statements to the enemy.”

That sounded reasonable. “What do you think the fact that Syndic civilians are saying this among themselves means, Lieutenant?”

Iger paused, getting solemn again. “We ran it by our expert-based social analysis systems. They said if these messages were authentic and accurately reflected the state of public sentiment in Baldur System and were not resulting in punitive actions or arrests, then the Syndic political leadership is on shaky ground. The stresses of the war must be making it harder and harder to keep a lid on dissent and dissatisfaction with the leadership. Some of the other letters discuss official announcements of Syndic victories over the Alliance, almost always in dismissive terms. Granted, this is just one hypernet-bypassed system, and sentiment in other Syndic star systems may well vary in intensity and degree of expression, but there’s no reason to think Baldur is completely unique.”

“We didn’t find anything in Sancere like this,” Geary observed.

“No, sir, but then Sancere is … or rather was a wealthy system packed with military shipyards before we hammered the hell out of the place. Lots of government contracts, good jobs, priority on resources, linked to the hypernet, and the great majority of the people probably in critical war-related jobs that exempt them from drafts. Not many grounds for complaint in a place like that.” Lieutenant Iger made an apologetic face. “I come from a star system like that in the Alliance, sir. Marduk. Life is pretty good in that kind of star system. Better than anywhere else during this war, anyway.”

Geary regarded the lieutenant. “But you joined the fleet anyway instead of taking one of those good, draftexempted jobs?”

“Um … yes, sir.” Iger glanced at the petty officer, who was grinning again. “People like to joke that’s why I ended up in intelligence, because I demonstrated I didn’t have much.”

Jokes about intelligence officers obviously hadn’t changed in a century. Geary focused back on the letters from Baldur. It seemed too good to be true, enemy morale finally cracking. “What do they say about the Alliance?” Nobody answered for a moment, and Geary looked up at the lieutenant and the petty officer. “Do they say anything about the Alliance?”

Iger nodded, unhappiness obvious. “It’s mostly repeating Syndic propaganda, sir. One of the last messages in the queue was after our fleet had been sighted, and it’s almost a last testament. There are a few other partially finished but unsent messages like that, all assuming our fleet would wipe out everything within Baldur System, that we wouldn’t distinguish between civilian and military targets, expressing worries about the safety of their families. One individual talked about a relative who’d been captured by us and expressed the belief that they’d been killed. That sort of thing.”

“Propaganda?” Geary repeated. “Lieutenant, I know that Alliance military forces have been bombarding civilian targets for some time. I know that prisoners were being executed.”

Iger appeared shocked. “But that was situational, sir! Driven by necessity. It was never Alliance policy like those actions are Syndic policy.”

“The Syndic population doesn’t seem to have recognized the distinction, Lieutenant.” Geary pointed to the reader. “They may be unhappy with their leaders, but they are afraid of us. Is that a fair assessment?”

“I … Yes, sir, it may be.”

“Which would mean the main thing keeping the Syndic population supporting their leaders and the war is fear of the Alliance, fear our own actions have created.”

The petty officer finally spoke. “But, sir, we only did those things because we had to.”

Geary tried not to sigh. “Assume that’s one hundred percent true, and I have no doubt that Alliance personnel sincerely believe that. Do the Syndics know that? Or are the people on Syndic worlds judging us by our actions and not our justifications for them?”

Lieutenant Iger was staring at Geary. “Sir, you stopped bombarding civilian targets and allowing prisoners to be killed as soon as you took over. Every Syndic star system we’ve been through knows that under your command this fleet isn’t a threat to their homes and families. How did you know how they felt? How did you know what to do?”

Remember that the lieutenant and the petty officer and every man and woman in this fleet have spent their entire lives at war with the Syndics. Remember that their parents spent their entire lives at war. Remember the atrocities, the revenge attacks, the endless rounds of provocation and retaliation. Remember that I didn’t have to endure that and have no right to condemn them for thinking differently. “I did what I did,” Geary stated softly, “because it was right. The sort of thing I’d been taught was right, what our ancestors demanded of us, what our honor demanded of us. I know what you’ve been through, what the Alliance has endured in the course of this war. Under that kind of pressure, it’s possible to forget why you’re fighting in the first place.”

The petty officer nodded, looking stricken. “Like you told us in Corvus, sir. Like you reminded us. Our ancestors had to tell us we’d taken the wrong path, and they sent you, because they knew we’d listen to you.”

Oh, great. He couldn’t simply be reminding them of what they had been; he also had to be a messenger from their ancestors.

Though in a way he actually was, bringing with him from a hundred years ago the ways their ancestors had thought.

Because he was one of their ancestors. He didn’t like remembering that, recalling that his world had vanished into the past, but it was true.

Lieutenant Iger planted a fist on the table, staring down at it. “We need to convince the Syndics it’s different now, that we’re no longer a greater threat to them than their own leaders. We can do that if we keep demonstrating it. Right, sir?”

“Right,” Geary agreed.

“And if their morale is starting to break, and they decide they have less to fear from us than from their own leaders, it could finally break the Syndicate Worlds.”

“That’d be an outcome to be hoped for.” Geary turned the reader in his hands, thinking. “Let’s keep our eyes out for anything else like this, and if your expert-based systems have any recommendations for how we can exploit the sort of Syndic morale problems we see in these letters, I want to know them.”

Maybe, just maybe, there really was a light at the end of the tunnel. The Alliance had no hope of defeating the Syndicate Worlds as long as the Syndic leaders could keep drawing on the resources of all the worlds under their sway. But if even a good percentage of those worlds began to rebel, to hold back their people and their resources from the Syndic war effort, it would finally provide the advantage the Alliance had needed and had been unable to achieve for a century.

Victoria Rione successfully avoided Geary during the six days needed to reach Sendai. Geary spent the time going over possible battle scenarios, trying to figure out how to avoid losing his battle cruisers and their commanding officers and coming up with nothing. There simply wasn’t a good excuse for holding those ships out of battle.

He sat on the bridge of Dauntless again as the fleet left jump space. The odds the Syndics had been able to plant mines here or even guessed that the Alliance fleet was headed to Sendai were very small, but Geary wanted to be ready to react, just in case the Syndic leaders had been able to make a very lucky guess.

His guts wrenched as the transition to normal space occurred, and the dull gray of jump space disappeared as the infinite stars became visible.

Geary couldn’t waste time admiring the view; his eyes locked on the star system display, watching for any sign of Syndic ships or mines.

“Looks completely empty,” Desjani remarked. “Not even picket ships. You were right, sir. The Syndics had no idea we’d head for Sendai.” She gave him an admiring smile.

“Thanks,” Geary muttered, feeling uncomfortable. “There’s not even any satellites monitoring the system?”

“No, sir,” a watch-stander reported. “Because of that.” He pointed to the center of the display, seeming nervous.

Normally the display would be centered on a star, the object with enough mass to warp space around it and create the conditions necessary for jump points. Sendai had been such a star, once. A very large star. It had certainly had many planets back then, unknown millions of years ago.

Until it ran out of fuel, exploded in a supernova that turned its planets into burnt fragments, then collapsed into itself, the matter making up Sendai crushing tighter and tighter together, denser and denser, until all the mass of a huge sun was compressed into a ball of matter the size of a small planet so dense that the gravity from it kept even light from escaping.

Captain Desjani nodded, then swallowed in apparent nervousness as well. “The black hole.”

Nothing was visible to the naked eye where the remnants of Sendai still existed. But on full-spectrum displays, a riot of radiation shot out from the black hole in two tight beams from the north and south poles of the dead star, the death screams of matter being sucked into the black hole at incredible velocities.

Geary looked around and saw every man and woman on the bridge staring at their displays in the same edgy way. Veterans of unnumbered battles, they seemed unnerved by the black hole. “Do ships ever visit black holes anymore?”

Desjani shook her head. “Why would they?”

Good question. When using the jump drives, ships had to go to every star intervening between themselves and their destination. But the hypernet let a ship go from any gate to any other gate. Black hole star systems, which weren’t really star systems anymore because the holes ravenously sucked down all of the matter that had once orbited them, offered nothing for ships and held peril from the radiation being pumped out into space. Even modern shields wouldn’t stand up indefinitely to that sort of radiation barrage.

But still, it was just a black hole. They weren’t going to linger here but just transit quickly to the next jump point, while avoiding those jets of radiation at the black hole’s poles. Geary leaned close to Desjani. “What’s the matter?”

She looked down, then spoke reluctantly. “It’s … unnatural.”

“No, it’s not. Black holes are perfectly natural.”

“That’s not what I mean.” Desjani took a deep breath.

“They say if you look at a black hole too long you … you develop an overwhelming urge to dive in, to take your ship below the event horizon and see what’s on the other side. That which was once the star calls to you, seeking to consume human ships just as it does everything else.”

He’d never heard such stories, and the sailors Geary had served with as a junior officer had enjoyed regaling him with all manner of ghost stories and tales of mysterious threats that devoured ships and people in the cold reaches of space. But then a hundred years was plenty long enough to develop new stories. “I haven’t been around a lot of them, but a few. I’ve never felt that.”

“I’d wager that no one in this fleet but you has ever been around a black hole,” Desjani replied.

The unknown. Still the most fertile ground for human fears. And as Geary took another look at the display, now aware of the beliefs of those around him, he could almost feel a tug from the invisible mass at the heart of Sendai. Something more than simply gravity so great it held light itself hostage.

“That’s why the Syndics aren’t here,” Desjani announced suddenly. “They knew if they tried to order ships to be pickets here that the crews would revolt rather than stay around a black hole for a long time.”

“Good guess.” Geary raised his voice and spoke calmly. “I’ve been around black holes before.” He could tell everyone on the bridge was listening. “There’s no threat as long as you don’t get too close. And we won’t. Let’s get this fleet to the next jump point.”

He realized that giving the order to jump out of Sendai would probably be the only order he’d give that even his worst enemies in the fleet would approve of unconditionally.

“Damn.” Three more Alliance battle cruisers had just exploded.

Geary killed the simulation with an irritable punch of the controls. The tactic he’d tried had seemed a little crazy, and apparently it really was. It certainly hadn’t worked worth a damn. Instead of reducing the risk to his battle cruisers, it had led to them being pinned between superior Syndic forces and blown apart. Granted, the simulation might have smarter Syndic commanders than the Alliance fleet would actually encounter, but officers Geary had once known and respected a century ago had warned him never to base his plans on the assumption that the enemy was stupid. A clever trap worked far better than one that assumed the enemy was too dumb to see the obvious. Now all I need is a clever trap.

His hatch chimed to announce a visitor to Geary’s stateroom. Captain Desjani, saluting, her face professional. “We’re two hours from the jump point to Daiquon, sir. You asked to be informed.”

“Yes, but you didn’t have to come down here in person to tell me.”

Desjani shrugged, letting discomfort show. “You’re … reassuring, sir. Surely you’ve noticed how much the crew appreciates seeing you being so calm around the black hole. I assure you that word of that has spread to every ship in the fleet and helped keep everyone calm.”

“Huh.” It seemed odd to be praised for not being spooked by a black hole. But Geary had found himself increasingly reluctant to view the thing himself, influenced by the superstitions of those around him. “Thanks, but I don’t mind telling you that I won’t miss this place.”

“Not you and not anyone else in the fleet,” Desjani replied with a brief smile. “I’m sorry I disturbed you, sir.”

“Don’t worry about it. I was just running a simulation that wasn’t going right.” Geary leaned back and sighed. “Sit down. I’d appreciate the chance to just talk about something other than tactics and strategy and Syndics and the war.”

Desjani hesitated, then came in and sat down opposite Geary, sitting at attention the way she usually did when in his stateroom. “Those topics have dominated life in the Alliance for much longer than I’ve been alive,” she confessed. “I don’t know what we’d talk about if we didn’t have them.”

“There are other things. Things that keep us going when the war seems to be all the universe contains.” Geary’s eyes rested on the still-distant stars of Alliance space. “What’ll you do when you get back to Kosatka, Tanya?”

Desjani seemed startled by the question, her own gaze going to the starscape. “My home world,” she murmured. “I haven’t been back for a long time. There’s no guarantee I’ll get a chance even if—even when we get back.”

“I understand. The war isn’t going to stop just because we make it home.” Geary sat silent for a moment. “Are your parents still there?” Are they still alive, he’d meant, but he wouldn’t phrase the question that bluntly.

She knew what he meant, nodding. “They’re both there. My father works in a manufacturing plant supplying the orbital shipyards. Mother is part of the planetary defense forces.”

A wartime economy, of course, even on a planet as far from the front lines of battle as Kosatka. What else could you expect after a century of war? “How do they feel about you being the captain of a battle cruiser?”

Captain Tanya Desjani, hardened veteran of dozens of space battles, actually blushed and looked down. “They’re … proud. Very proud.” Her expression changed. “They knew the risks that being a fleet officer entailed. I’m sure they’ve been waiting for the notification that I died in battle ever since I went to my first ship. So far I’ve beaten the odds, and they’ve been spared that, but they may believe I’m dead now, along with the rest of the fleet.”

That brought a grimace to Geary’s face. “Surely the Alliance government wouldn’t have told the population that? It’s not that the people don’t have a right to know, but governments tend to believe they have a right to lie about bad news.” He’d examined an official history of the war soon after assuming command of the fleet and discovered it contained a relentlessly positive and upbeat account, chronicling alleged victory after Alliance victory but remaining silent on the question of why such victories had yet to result in winning the war. Distressingly similar to the nonsense the captured Syndic merchant officer had told him, Geary realized. The government that wrote that history wasn’t likely to confess that its main fleet had disappeared behind enemy lines and had very likely been wiped out.

“Certainly,” Desjani agreed, “but the Syndic propaganda broadcasts would’ve announced it. They jump automated broadcast units into border star systems and pump out as much of their lies as they can before our defense systems can destroy them.” Geary nodded, thinking that the Alliance probably did the same thing to broadcast its side of things to Syndic border star systems. “Officially,” Desjani continued, “no one’s supposed to repeat what they hear from the Syndics, but word gets around. Unlike Syndics, citizens of the Alliance can still express opinions and don’t believe everything their politicians say.” She shrugged, her expression grim. “My parents have surely heard that the Syndics are claiming our fleet was lost deep in Syndic space. They won’t believe the Syndics, but they won’t be too comforted by official Alliance government denials. They have to be worried.”

“Sorry.” The single word was inadequate, but Geary couldn’t think of anything else for a moment. “I guess they’ll be doubly happy, then, when you come home.”

Desjani grinned. “Yes. Oh, yes.” She gave Geary an almost shy glance. “And when my home world hears that their daughter’s ship carried Black Jack Geary himself, that he commanded the fleet from the bridge of my ship as he brought us home against all odds, they’ll be the most famous people on Kosatka, I’m sure.”

Geary laughed to cover up his embarrassment. “I’ve thought about going to Kosatka once we get back.” The words Victoria Rione had once said came to him. Kosatka isn’t big enough to hold you, John Geary. “To visit, I mean.”

“Really?” Desjani seemed awed.

“I told you I was there once. A long time ago.” Geary managed not to slap his forehead in exasperation with himself. Very few things in his life didn’t fall under the heading of “a long time ago.” “I wouldn’t mind seeing it again.”

“I’m sure it’s changed, sir.”

“Yeah. I guess I’ll need a guide.”

Desjani hesitated. “We could, I mean, if you wanted to come along when I, that is—”

“That’d be nice,” Geary replied. “Maybe I’ll do that.” Having a familiar face along, a known presence, might be a very good thing indeed. And he had already started to wonder how he would feel once he got this fleet home and walked away from it, having done his duty and more. Because what had once been a collection of strange ships and unknown people was increasingly becoming his fleet, populated by people he knew and in some cases liked and admired. Hell, after seeing the crews of Dauntless, Daring, and Diamond stand firm while the hypernet gate at Sancere collapsed, Geary had developed a fierce pride in the courage and dedication of these sailors. Did he really want to exchange that for the unknowns of a civilian world in which the worship of Black Jack Geary would be even harder to escape?

Should he even be asking himself that question? He couldn’t remain in command of this fleet when it returned to Alliance space. It wasn’t just that he didn’t feel competent to the demands of the position; he feared that Victoria Rione might have been right when she spoke of the temptations he would face then. Black Jack Geary, mythical hero, back from the dead to save the Alliance, the fleet under his command. Anything he wanted could be his. He need only reach out and take it.

“Sir?” Desjani asked, eyeing him curiously. “Did I say something wrong?”

“What? No. I’m sorry. I was thinking about something else.” Geary smiled reassuringly again. “Let’s go to the bridge and get ready to say good-bye to Sendai.”

Everyone on the bridge was studiously avoiding looking at the display where the black hole dominated space. As Geary entered the bridge, he noticed everyone giving him those looks, hope and trust mingled together. Like Desjani, they apparently thought him a sort of talisman against whatever demon lurked inside the black hole.

Too bad he didn’t have a talisman.

An hour and a half until the fleet reached the jump point. Geary took a moment to order his thoughts, then tapped the controls so he could speak to the entire fleet. Once within jump space, communications would be extremely limited, with only messages a few words long able to be exchanged among ships. There were things he needed to say while the fleet was still in normal space. If space around a black hole could be called normal, that is.

“All ships of the Alliance fleet, this is Captain Geary,” he began, speaking with deliberate calm. “We don’t know what awaits us at Daiquon. The Syndics didn’t expect us to come to Sendai, but they’ve surely figured out by now that we didn’t go to any of the other places reachable from Baldur. They may well guess Daiquon is a possible objective of ours in time to position forces using the advantage of their hypernet. I want all ships ready for battle when we leave jump space at Daiquon. We may face an immediate engagement, and if so I want whatever Syndic warships we encounter to get kicked into Daiquon’s sun so fast they’ll still be trying to figure out what happened.” He paused again, trying to think of the best ending for his transmission. “To the honor of our ancestors.”

Then it was just a matter of waiting. Geary occupied the time going over fleet readiness data again. The auxiliaries had been manufacturing new fuel cells and expendable weapons at a furious pace, as if the engineers were determined to make up for the errors that had led to shortages of trace elements. Even without those new items, the fleet’s warships were in good shape for an engagement if the Syndics were waiting at Daiquon. Except for Orion, Majestic, and Warrior, of course. But most of the damage that Captain Tulev’s battle cruisers had sustained at Sancere had been repaired now, and Leviathan, Steadfast, Dragon, and Valiant were fully combat-ready again.

If the Syndics were waiting at Daiquon, this fleet was ready for them.

“Captain Geary”—Desjani broke into his train of thought—“the fleet has reached the jump point for Daiquon.”

“Good. Let’s get the hell out of here.” He tapped the communications controls again. “All ships in the Alliance fleet, jump for Daiquon now.”

As the fleet entered jump space and the black hole named Sendai vanished, the feeling of relief that ran through Dauntless was so powerful that Geary could have sworn the ship itself sighed with satisfaction.

Four days and a few hours to Daiquon. Victoria Rione managed to avoid him the entire time, so Geary spent his time working on more simulations, watching his battle cruisers explode and getting steadily more frustrated in every sense of the word.

The Syndics were at Daiquon.

Right in front of the jump point.

Staring at the enemy ship symbols popping into existence on the star system display, Geary first focused on two battleships and two battle cruisers, apparently tracking across the front of the jump point.

“They’re laying mines!” Desjani warned.

And the path of the Alliance fleet would sweep partly across areas where those mines had already been laid. Geary did the maneuvering solution in his head. “All units in the Alliance fleet. Immediate execute, turn starboard four zero degrees, up two zero degrees.” Turning toward the watch-standers, he snapped out another order. “Get a minefield marker displayed along the track those Syndic ships must have followed!”

Four major warships. Geary’s eyes raced across the display, adding up the rest of the Syndic force. Three heavy cruisers, five light cruisers, a dozen Hunter-Killers. Probably sent here to lay mines in front of the jump points and then leave a few light units behind to report if the Alliance fleet passed through the system. Instead, they’d been caught in the middle of laying the minefield. The Syndic warships weren’t a major threat to the Alliance fleet, not if he had time to set up an engagement. But the fleet was right on top of the Syndic warships, both formations tangling in a melee without time to plan or execute a careful plan of action. “All ships, engage nearest Syndic warships.”

A squadron of destroyers had emerged from the jump point almost in the laps of the two Syndic battleships. The light warships swung away frantically, firing their few weapons, which sparkled futilely against the massive shields of the enemy battleships. The Syndic battleships fired back, their heavy armament shredding through the light shields of the destroyers and into the little armor the destroyers boasted. Kheten exploded under the barrage, and Epee was torn apart, its pieces tumbling away.

The only thing that saved the rest of the destroyers in the squadron was the arrival of a squadron of Alliance light cruisers, flashing out of jump space and right into the arms of the Syndic battleships. The battleships greedily shifted fire to the new targets, ripping Glacis into fragments and smashing Aegis and Hauberk.

But now the heavy cruisers and battle cruisers of the Alliance fleet had reached the Syndic battleships, bearing shields heavy enough to engage the enemy and enough firepower to instantly shift the odds drastically against the Syndics.

Six of the Syndic Hunter-Killers had been escorting the battleships, and now five of them blew apart as a swarm of Alliance destroyers swept past the battleships and targeted their lighter counterparts. The last HuK tried to run but had no time to accelerate away before being pounded into scrap. Two light cruisers tried to hide behind the battleships but were pinned between three divisions of Alliance heavy cruisers and smashed. The single Syndic heavy cruiser with the battleships found itself facing Tulev’s battle cruiser division and blew up after a single volley from the big Alliance warships.

“First, Second, and Fourth Battle Cruiser Divisions,” Geary ordered. “Disregard Syndic battleships and engage the enemy battle cruisers and their escorts.” He scanned the display, trying to figure out who else to order where. “Second, Fifth, and Seventh Battleship Divisions, get the Syndic battleships. All heavy cruisers attempt to engage the surviving Syndic escorts around the enemy battle cruisers. All lighter Alliance units engage targets of opportunity.” It amounted less to tactics than to simply trying to overwhelm the enemy forces as fast as possible, but that seemed the best option at the moment.

And he also had to ensure against the Syndics trying a desperate counterblow. “Eighth and Tenth Battleship Divisions, guard the auxiliaries division. Make sure nothing gets through to them.” He didn’t know if all of those battleships would obey the command in the heat of battle, but if even a few did, it would provide necessary insurance.

Eleven Alliance battle cruisers swung their bows around and accelerated toward the two Syndic battle cruisers, followed by a tangle of heavy cruiser divisions mixed in with light cruisers and destroyers. “Accelerate to point one light,” Captain Desjani ordered. “Up one five degrees, port zero four degrees. All weapons target the leading Syndic battle cruisers. Prepare to fire specters.”

At the same time, the eleven Alliance battleships of the Second, Fifth, and Seventh Divisions bore down on the Syndic battleships. Geary saw the two surviving and combat-ready battleships of the Fourth Division also come around and swing toward the enemy battleships but didn’t try to order them away. Vengeance and Revenge owed the Syndics for the loss of Triumph at Vidha and the terrible damage suffered by Warrior at the same battle.

Thirteen battleships tore into the Syndic battleships, the range too short to fire specter missiles. Instead, several of the closest Alliance ships hurled out grapeshot, the metal ball bearings slamming into enemy shields and vaporizing from the impacts. Then all of the Alliance battleships unleashed their hell-lance batteries from three sides, causing the weakened shields of the Syndic battleships to flare and collapse almost instantly. The hell lances then punched through armor and into the guts of the Syndic ships, tearing holes through which gusts of atmosphere vented as the enemy ships shuddered under the blows.

Vengeance and Revenge ripped past at close range, firing their short-range null-field projectors. The glowing balls of the null fields met the hulls of the Syndic ships, causing atomic bonds to fail everywhere they passed. Sections of the enemy battleships vaporized inside the null fields, opening huge wounds in their hulls.

The two Syndic battle cruisers could have tried to run as the Alliance battle cruisers bore down on them, but their commander apparently hesitated. The brief delay doomed both ships. “Fire specters,” Desjani ordered. As Dauntless fired a volley of missiles, the other Alliance battle cruisers followed suit, sending a flock of the autonomous missiles accelerating toward the enemy battle cruisers.

The Syndics fired back, the surviving HuKs, light cruisers, and heavy cruisers placing themselves between the battle cruisers and the onrushing Alliance missiles. Despite their evasive maneuvers, speed, and stealth, a lot of specters flared and died short of their targets. But by concentrating their fire on the specters, the Syndic ships let the lighter Alliance ships close to firing range.

HuKs flared and burst under the fire of Alliance destroyers and light cruisers, while the three Syndic light cruisers were riddled by fire from the heavy cruisers accompanying the Alliance battle cruisers.

Then the Alliance battle cruisers reached engagement range for their hell lances. The leading battle Syndic cruiser seemed to glow as its shields absorbed hit after hit; then the shields collapsed and the hell lances began ravaging the ship itself.

Geary held his breath, trying not to betray his concern as Desjani led Dauntless, Daring, and Victorious in a close pass against the stricken Syndic battle cruiser, firing null fields as they raced past. Here I was worried about risking any battle cruisers, and I’m throwing them into the thick of a battle, led by the one battle cruiser that I can’t afford to lose. If we lose Dauntless, we lose the Syndic hypernet key it carries. I have to come up with a solution to this problem.

Not that the leading Syndic battle cruiser was a threat anymore. The null-field hits on top of the torrent of hell-lance fire had riddled the warship and left it a drifting wreck from which survival pods were bursting spasmodically as the surviving crew tried to find safety.

Geary searched for the second Syndic battle cruiser, clenching his teeth as he saw that the battle cruiser’s commander had wrenched the big warship around and was accelerating toward the Alliance auxiliaries.

“He doesn’t stand a chance,” Desjani observed.

As the battle cruiser tore through the Alliance formation, it took hit after hit from destroyers, light cruisers, and heavy cruisers along its path. Each individual blow did little damage, but they kept adding up as the Syndic battle cruiser kept accelerating in an attempt to confuse the Alliance targeting systems. But without enough time and distance to get its speed high enough, the battle cruiser took more and more hits. It sliced past Illustrious and Incredible and staggered as the two Alliance battle cruisers poured fire into its port side.

The Syndic battle cruiser kept going as the damage accumulated, running into wave after wave of fire.

By the time it reached the battleships of the Tenth Battleship Division, the Syndic battle cruiser had taken so many hits that it was probably running blind, its sensors smashed, its remaining weapons flashing out futilely and gaining no hits. Only the battle cruiser’s main drives at the stern remained relatively undamaged, bringing the Syndic warship up past point one light as it kept accelerating.

Amazon and Guardian, the closest Alliance battleships to the doomed Syndic battle cruiser’s path, fired volleys of grapeshot almost straight down the enemy ship’s course, the metal shot hitting the Syndic’s hull at a combined velocity of close to point two light speed.

The front half of the Syndic battle cruiser vaporized under the impacts, the stern portion shuddering as it passed through the remains of the bow and then coming apart into a field of small fragments, some of which impacted harmlessly on the shields of Amazon and Guardian.

Desjani sighed. “The entire crew of that battle cruiser must be dead.”

Geary nodded in agreement. “No one could’ve survived that.”

“Too bad.” Desjani looked toward Geary. “For the first time in my life, I really wanted to meet a Syndic. The commanding officer of that ship. He or she fought very gallantly.” She’d come a ways from the officer who Geary had first met, to whom the Syndic enemy were inhuman and beneath contempt. “It’s best he or she is dead, of course,” Desjani added matter-of-factly. “I’d hate to leave a Syndic like that alive.”

“You’d hate to leave alive a Syndic officer that you respect?” Geary asked.

Desjani lowered her brow slightly. “Respect? I couldn’t respect a Syndic, sir. How could anyone? Though this one died well. I just wanted to see what such a Syndic was like.”

Geary shrugged. “Right now, they’re dead, blown into very small pieces along with their crew and their ship.”

“Yes, sir.” Desjani smiled in reply.

Maybe she hadn’t come that far. But then, Desjani was the daughter of a hundred years of war, a century of tit-for-tat atrocities. The enemy was as alien to her as the intelligences that Geary suspected lurked beyond Syndic space. “Let’s get this fleet straightened out. All units, well done.” Geary’s eyes locked on the display, where in one corner names in red told of Alliance ships lost: two destroyers and three light cruisers. A lot of other ships had taken damage during the melee. Some of the surviving destroyers might not be repairable and might have to be abandoned here, and at least one heavy cruiser had taken serious damage. “Assume Formation Delta One unless engaged in recovering Alliance survival pods.” He would have to figure out which warships were so badly hurt that they’d have to fall back with the auxiliaries to simplify repair efforts, joining the torn-up battleships Orion, Majestic, and Warrior in what was becoming a formation of crippled ships.

Geary switched circuits and called down to the intelligence section. “See if you can find out if any of those Syndic survival pods have high-ranking officers in them.” He needed to know what the Syndics were doing and how the war was going along the border with the Alliance. Given the Syndic obsession with secrecy and keeping their own officers under tight control, odds were that even if the commander of the entire Syndic force had survived, he or she wouldn’t know the answers to that. But the longer Geary went without knowing, the more the questions gnawed at him. How long could he evade an enemy, most of whose movements were invisible to him?

If the Alliance fleet had arrived in Daiquon half a day later, it would have run right into that minefield outside the jump point, and the Syndic picket ships would have escaped to tell their high command the path the Alliance ships were following.

Any elation in the victory vanished as Geary stared at the names of the dead ships and the nearby reports of damage and crew casualties from other ships. It had been a small victory, dearly purchased.