Invincible

FIFTEEN

It’s just another star occupied by the enigmas, Geary told himself as the last minutes went by before they left jump to arrive at Hua. We’ve gotten though any number of those, even when the enigmas knew we were coming. We’ll get through this one.

“At least the enigmas should be totally surprised at seeing us show up at Hua,” Desjani commented in unconscious echo of Geary’s thoughts. “They’re probably still congratulating themselves over our imagined annihilation in Kick territory. You know there’s going to be a hypernet gate here, right?”

“Yeah, I know that.” It was a border star system for the enigmas, and as far as they could tell, the enigmas used the gates themselves as defensive weapons instead of crafting the same sort of mechanisms into supermines as the spider-wolves did.

His mind fuzzed as Dauntless left jump, the Alliance warships twisting in the preplanned evasion straight off to one side. But as Geary’s mind cleared, he noticed the lack of immediate danger warnings from the sensor systems and saw his display remain comfortingly clear of any sign of minefields or enigma warships near the jump point.

“There it is,” Desjani said. A hypernet gate, hanging menacingly three light-hours off to the side opposite where the fleet had turned. “Good choice on the direction we turned, Admiral.”

“Thanks.” Where were the jump points?

Then he realized that he didn’t have to wait for the fleet’s sensors to identify those locales in space. Just ahead of the fleet, the six spider-wolf ships were leaping forward, accelerating toward a point off to starboard. He gave the necessary orders to his fleet to move in the wake of their alien allies, increasing velocity as well to match their increase in speed. “Let’s follow the spider-wolves.”

“Did you ever expect to say that?” Desjani was eyeing her display. “Fixed defenses scattered around… space docks here and there… that looks like a big orbiting military base… warships here, here, and here.”

“Definitely enigma warships,” Geary agreed. There were only five of them, all showing the squat, turtlelike shapes that the enigmas used for warships, though in size they varied from human destroyers to something larger than a heavy cruiser but much smaller than a battleship.

“Except for that damned hypernet gate,” Desjani concluded, “it’s not nearly as many defenses as I would have expected for a star system facing an opponent like the spider-wolves. General Charban may have been right.”

“Captain,” Lieutenant Yuon called, “there appear to be substantial docking facilities for military ships in this star system. It looks like they normally have a lot more warships here.”

Desjani nodded. “Good assessment, Lieutenant. They’ve stripped out the defensive forces here to help equip an attack force.” She looked over at Geary. “And we know where that attack force is probably going. It must have looked like a real safe bet to the enigmas to draw down the defenses at Hua long enough to trash Midway. We’re supposed to be dead meat at the hands of the Kicks, with maybe some torn-up remnants far away from here trying to limp home, and the spider-wolves don’t bother their neighbors as long as their neighbors leave them alone.”

“When things look that good, you always have to wonder what you’ve missed,” Geary agreed. “And the enigmas missed the fact that we might not fulfill our assigned role in their plan.”

“The hypernet gate is three light-hours behind us now,” Desjani pointed out. “The main military facility is four and a half light-hours off to port, a lot closer to the star. How far away is that jump point?”

It took several more seconds before the displays popped up that information.

“One and three-quarters light-hours,” Desjani said, the fingers of one hand flying as she ran the data through the fleet’s maneuvering systems. “If we keep trying to match the speed of the spider-wolves, that means reaching point one five light speed before braking and… fifteen hours transit time.”

The geometry was simple enough. In no more than four and a half hours, the enigmas at the main military base would learn of the human fleet’s arrival. If one of the enigma warships used its faster-than-light comms before then, that margin of safety might be whittled down to two hours. If the main base sent a collapse command to the hypernet gate, it would take almost five and a half hours to reach the gate, then the resulting blast more than another three hours to reach the fleet as it moved away from the gate. “Thirteen hours before they could hit us.”

“Make that as little as ten hours if any of those warships report in via faster-than-light comms,” Desjani warned.

Geary looked over the star system as the fleet’s sensors continued to fill in details. Not wealthy or heavily populated with planets but a reasonably well-off star system. One planet had the veiled cities and towns of the enigmas straddling the borders of land and some impressive oceans. “We don’t have any idea what level of detail their faster-than-light comms can provide. Would they blow this away without confirming whatever their ship reported? Especially if they saw us heading straight for a jump point out of here instead of lingering at all or heading for somewhere within the star system?”

“Using human logic hasn’t always worked well when it comes to enigmas,” Desjani pointed out.

“Granted. But we know that the number of star systems available to them is limited because they’ve got us on one border, the bear-cows on another, and the spider-wolves facing them elsewhere. And in our travels through their space, we didn’t find any enigma star systems that had suffered through the collapse of a gate. They can’t be authorized to blow up star systems unless as a last resort.”

A vulnerability period of anywhere from two to five hours. But nothing could be done about that except what he was already doing, getting to that next jump point and getting out of here as fast as the fleet could manage it.

He hadn’t slept well in the day before they arrived, and now nothing could happen to threaten the fleet for hours. “Captain Desjani, I am going down to my stateroom to get some rest. I encourage you to stand down your crew for the next few hours as well.”

Desjani frowned at him, pretending to be unaware of the desperate efforts of every crew member within sight to avoid looking hopeful. “Let my crew rest?”

“If you’re comfortable with that.” He knew how hard they had been working to get every system ready for arrival here, testing and repairing and tweaking to bring Dauntless to the highest possible combat readiness.

“Yes, Admiral, I am. They earned it. All hands, this is the Captain. Stand down from normal work routine for three hours. Normal workday routine is to resume at the end of that time.” She released the general announcing system control and winked at Geary in such a way that no one else could see. “Enjoy your rest, Admiral. I’ll be keeping an eye on things.”

“Tanya, you should—”

“I got plenty of rest last night.”

She was probably exaggerating wildly when she said “plenty,” but he couldn’t very well call her a liar in front of her crew.

He was actually back on the bridge after only two hours, noticing as he traveled from his stateroom that numerous members of the crew had also drifted back to duty stations earlier than required.

“What do you suppose they’re thinking?” Desjani asked. “The enigmas, I mean. We show up here with six spider-wolf ships along for the ride, and towing a Kick superbattleship that’s obviously seen better days.”

“What I hope,” Geary replied, “is that the enigmas are seeing we have new allies and that we not only beat the Kicks but acquired a very impressive souvenir from them.” He wondered for a moment by what name the enigmas called the Kicks. “Either one of those things might have influenced the enigmas to seriously negotiate with us. Taken together, maybe they’ll be enough to convince the enigmas not to mess with us anymore.”

“It doesn’t sound like you believe that, though,” Desjani commented, sitting back in her seat, her eyes on her display.

“No.” Geary felt the old sense of futility. “General Charban thinks the enigmas will have to be beaten badly at least one more time in order to get across that they can’t defeat us militarily.”

“How did that ground-forces general get so good at figuring out how alien species think?”

“I have no idea. And, yet, he’s single,” Geary couldn’t help adding.

Desjani didn’t turn her head, just cutting him a look from the corners of her eyes. “Women are not an alien species.”

“Did I say that? Is anything important happening?”

“Aside from an admiral skating on thin ice? No. You would have been informed, sir.” She indicated one of the enigma warships. “This guy is closest to us. He will see us first, anytime now, as a matter of fact, and when we see his reaction in a few hours, it may give us some indication of what the enigmas are going to do.”

Geary rubbed his lower face with one hand, wishing he had some more definitive and timely information. You would think I would be used to this kind of time lag in information by now. He tapped an internal comm circuit. “Emissary Rione? General Charban? Have we heard anything from the spider-wolves?”

Dr. Shwartz answered. “I’m the only one here at the moment, Admiral. We haven’t heard a thing.”

“What have we sent them?”

“Upon our arrival here, we sent a message trying to ask the spider-wolves what they would do. It’s still hard to format the pictograms and other symbols in ways that we know get across anything but the simplest concepts. About an hour ago, we sent another message, asking them if they knew what the enigmas would do. We asked them that before we left spider-wolf space, of course, but they didn’t answer us then. We thought it wouldn’t hurt to repeat the question.”

“Not too friendly,” Geary muttered.

Dr. Shwartz must have heard. “We don’t know that we’re getting across the right question, and we don’t know their social protocols. If you ask a human something, and they don’t know the answer, the polite thing for them to do is say, ‘I don’t know,’ or something like that. For spider-wolves, the polite thing might be to say nothing if you can’t provide a meaningful answer.”

“But we don’t know if that’s how they do things.”

“No, Admiral, we don’t know.” Dr. Shwartz shook her head ruefully. “It’s much easier dealing with imaginary aliens. They somehow always come around to acting the way you want them to act. That’s what all of us ‘experts’ found during our careers prior to this, that is. But the enigmas, the bear-cows, and the spider-wolves persist in doing things that don’t fit the molds we’re trying to create for them. Some of my colleagues are having a great deal of trouble with that. They keep trying to make the aliens fit the mold rather than the mold fit the aliens. I can’t blame them for that. It’s how we all worked for a long time.”

“Do you think that’s why General Charban is coming up with some of the insights he’s having? Because he’s not an expert with a lifetime of trying to figure out how an alien species would think to hinder his ability to see how these aliens really are?”

Shwartz looked startled, then thoughtful. “That is possible, Admiral. Would it be immodest of me to point out that I’ve also come up with a few insights?”

Geary smiled. “You have indeed, Doctor. I am grateful for your presence with us and will ensure that everyone back in Alliance space knows how much you have contributed to our mission.”

She laughed. “At which point my colleagues will all develop legendary levels of hatred for me! Have you ever seen the knives come out among academics? I’m not sure that I should thank you. Well, I will. If the government decides to send a delegation to the spider-wolves, I hope my name will be considered as a participant.”

“If I have any say in it, you’ll be part of such a delegation.”

There had still been nothing from the spider-wolves, whose ships had maintained a steady vector aimed at the jump point for Pele, when a reaction from the enigmas could finally be seen. “He’s coming around,” Desjani said. “Looks like… I’ll bet you he’s coming to an intercept with us or something a few light-minutes short of an intercept.”

“A lookout,” Geary said. “Coming to tail us so it can send out faster-than-light status updates and let the enigma bosses in this star system know much quicker what we’re doing. The same thing the enigmas did when we went through their star systems earlier.”

“That doesn’t imply they’re going to collapse the gate,” Desjani pointed out.

“No. It implies the opposite, that they’re going to watch us and make sure we leave as fast as we came.”

“So they want us to go to Pele,” Desjani added, dumping a cold pail of water over his growing sense of relief.

“If they do, they’re going to be sorry when we get there.”

The enigma tail was still closing on Geary’s fleet when the spider-wolves reached the jump point and vanished. Fifteen minutes later the human warships jumped as well, the star system of Hua disappearing and the nothingness of jump space taking its place.

“Five days,” Desjani commented. “Like Neeson said, if they’ve got a force heading for Midway, the enigmas at Hua will have told them we’re on the way.”

“I know. Five days.” But this time he felt no dread of what might await them at Pele, just an eagerness to come to grips with the last obstacle between this fleet and human space.

They came out of the jump point from Hua with every nerve tense, every weapon ready, waiting to see what awaited them at Pele.

“They’re here,” Desjani said.

“Not for long,” Geary replied.

The enigma flotilla was far off to the right of the Alliance vessels, nearly three light-hours from the place where the human fleet had arrived. The enigmas were heading toward the jump point for Midway at point one six light speed, away from Geary’s warships, and were not much more than one hour’s travel time away from being able to jump. Because the light from the arrival of the Alliance fleet would not get to them for more than three hours, the aliens would reach that jump point and jump for Midway before they knew the human fleet had arrived at Pele.

Though they might not care if their orders were to get to Midway and do damage before Geary’s fleet could catch up.

“Two hundred twenty-two enigma warships,” Desjani commented. “I guess that’s all they could scrape up.”

“Yes, I—” Geary stopped speaking as a memory came to the fore. “Three hundred thirty-three.”

“What?”

“Those humans we rescued from the enigma prison asteroid. Their numbers had been kept constant at three hundred thirty-three. And now this enigma force consists of two hundred twenty-two ships.”

She looked startled, then shrugged. “So they like repeating numbers.”

“Apparently. I wonder why?”

“Does it matter?”

“In terms of understanding them, yes.” He saw the disdain Desjani couldn’t quite conceal at the idea of bothering to continue trying to understand the enigmas. “Tanya, the more I understand them, the more I can outthink them and predict what they’re going to do. That enigma force is going to get to Midway quite a few hours before we can. I would love to be able to know what could divert and distract them once we get to Midway so that we have time to get the enigmas before they do too much damage.”

“All right. I’ll admit that’s a good reason to continue trying to figure them out. But regardless of how they think, how many hours they have at Midway to play with before we show up is partly dependent on what we do.” Desjani glanced at him, awaiting Geary’s decision.

He knew what she was asking, and also knew that every sailor in the fleet was wondering the same thing right now. Would the fleet continue its pursuit together, slowed by the battleships, auxiliaries, assault transports, and the captured superbattleship? Given the numbers of the enigma warships, that would be the prudent thing to do, keeping all of his firepower at hand. But being prudent might well mean arriving too late for that firepower to make a difference. “Help me set this up, Tanya. I want to split the fleet. All of the battle cruisers, all of the light cruisers, and half of the destroyers in a fast pursuit force, and all of the battleships, heavy cruisers, and the remaining destroyers following on at best speed.”

Her grin told him how much Desjani liked that plan before she faced her display, hands and fingers flying to help designate who went where.

Before doing the same, Geary called Captain Armus. “Captain, I’m going to be splitting the fleet and going on ahead with our fastest ships to try to disrupt the enigma attack on Midway. You will be in command of the rest of the fleet, and are to bring it on at the best speed you can manage to catch up with us at Midway. I’m going to need the firepower of those warships with you as soon as you can get them to me, but do not leave the captured superbattleship and the battleships towing it behind. Any questions?”

If Armus had been the sort of person to beam with delight, he would have done so now. Battleship commanders were looked down upon in this fleet as the steady but unremarkable type, with formation command positions almost always going to battle cruiser commanders. Geary had usually been forced to follow that same pattern since he was stuck with the ship commanders he had inherited, which meant that the battle cruiser commanders were more likely to be his best commanders. Unfortunately, some of them had also been among his worst commanders.

But rather than show any sign of celebration at an opportunity battleship commanders rarely received Armus merely nodded with slow deliberation and then, almost as an afterthought, threw in a salute. “I understand, Admiral. Thank you for your confidence in me.”

After the call ended, Desjani gave Geary another glance. “Armus? He and Jane Geary are toss-ups for that assignment in terms of seniority.”

“I know.” I also know which one of them I can trust to stay with that superbattleship and its tow ships.

He didn’t say that out loud, but Tanya surely knew he was thinking it. She didn’t object or argue, though.

“All units, this is Admiral Geary. I will be dividing the fleet. The fast pursuit force will proceed to Midway to engage the enigmas while the main body of the fleet follows. Formation orders will be going out momentarily.”

“Done,” Desjani said. “How’s yours? Oh, hell, let me finish it.”

“I had to talk to people,” Geary said defensively.

“Yes. You’re the admiral. Now that you’ve told me and everyone else what to do, let us help you do it.”

Maneuvering problems that would have taxed the minds of humans and taken long hours to work out could be done in moments with the assistance of the automated systems. If the person doing the work also had a good intuitive grasp of maneuvering and what could most easily go where, it went even faster.

Desjani had a very good intuitive grasp of maneuvering.

“Check it,” she asked him.

He did a quick sanity check of her work, knowing that small problems would be corrected automatically by the fleet’s maneuvering systems. In terms of the big picture… “It looks great.” Two more taps on the comm system, and the maneuvering orders were flying out to every ship in the fleet.

Geary had specified an oval formation for the pursuit force, with one broad side facing forward, and the designated ships raced to get into position. Lined up along the center were the battle cruisers, where he could easily redistribute them to anywhere else in the formation. After the losses of Invincible and Brilliant he had only fourteen left, and of those, Illustrious and Incredible had been chewed up at Honor. While they were technically combat capable again after a tremendous amount of repair work, Geary had to be careful what he did with those two.

Around the battle cruisers ranged the light cruisers, while the destroyers formed up on the outer edges as well as the front and back of the formation. “All units in pursuit force, immediate execute accelerate to point two five light speed.”

The pursuit force began pulling away from the main body while the battleships, heavy cruisers, and destroyers were still getting into position in another oval, this one centered on the captured superbattleship, the assault transports and auxiliaries, and the battleships.

Geary realized that his pursuit force was rapidly gaining on the small spider-wolf formation, which had remained in the lead thus far. “General Charban, Emissary Rione, we need to notify the spider-wolf delegation that this force is heading back to Alliance space at high speed to engage the enigmas.”

Rione answered. “That message may exceed our vocabulary, Admiral, but we’ll do our best.”

What else? Something behind him. Another call. “Admiral Lagemann.”

Lagemann looked more than a little haggard but still cheerful. Given the rough living conditions on the captured ship, Geary was only surprised that the other admiral didn’t look worse. “I’m going ahead. Captain Armus is in charge of the formation around your ship. He won’t let anything through to you.”

“Thank you, Admiral,” Lagemann replied. “If something does get through, I’ve got an impressive force of Marines to defend my ship. I never imagined going into combat in something like this.”

“We’ll try to keep you out of combat.”

“Well,” Lagemann said, waving a hand around to indicate his surroundings, “if worse comes to worst, at least there’s a lot of armor and a lot of mass between us and whoever is attacking. Did I tell you that I’ve christened my ship?”

“No,” Geary said. “You gave it a name?”

“Yes. A fitting name. I’m tired of hearing my ship called BKS or LCCO or RBST or—”

“RBST?” Geary asked.

“Really Big Slow Target. I came up with a much better name.” Lagemann grinned. “This is the latest Invincible, Admiral.”

Lagemann might be pleased by the joke but Geary didn’t think that Desjani or a lot of other sailors would be. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

“Yes, I do. First, because it’s so damned big and hard to destroy. Second, because it’s already been defeated and captured once. It’s already been proven not to be truly Invincible. Maybe the Kicks thought of it that way, but we showed them wrong.” Lagemann smiled again. “So you see, naming it Invincible is our acknowledgment of their error in thinking they could construct a ship too big and too tough to be defeated.”

In a strange way, that almost made sense. “You’re assuming that the living stars appreciate irony.”

“Good heavens, Admiral, look at the universe. If whatever created and oversees it doesn’t appreciate irony, how else do you explain some of the things in the universe? How else do explain us, the human race?”

Admiral Lagemann had a point. “How does your crew feel about the name?” It wasn’t a very big crew, especially compared to the size of the superbattleship, only about a hundred officers and sailors plus the Marines.

“Surprisingly accepting,” Lagemann said. “Some of them are off of the last Invincible, and all of them like the idea of trying to break the curse of that name. And, of course, the Marines are all in favor of being a threat magnet.”

“Really?” Geary asked.

“All right, the Marines aren’t actually all that thrilled, but they still like the thickness of the armor on this thing. Excuse me, on the new Invincible.”

“I’ll say good luck, then, and we’ll see you at Midway.” Geary broke the connection, looking over at Desjani. “Did you hear any of that?”

She had a horrified expression on her face, which gradually shaded into mere disbelief. “He’s willing to do that? He’s crazier than Benan.”

“If he calls that hulk Invincible, then the fleet can’t name any new ships Invincible, right?”

Desjani’s expression shifted to calculation. “Right. I think. And those superbattleships are very hard to kill.” She gestured toward her display. Geary saw that Desjani had opened a large virtual window that showed a view of the bear-cow ship—the Invincible, he corrected himself. Close-up, he saw the same armored hull he had last viewed this way during the Marine assault. The impression of strength was overwhelming in that surface of metal and composites, in some places pitted and scored by hits and in most others smooth and bright so that the stars themselves seemed to reflect in the dark surface.

“How do you make armor that thick?” Geary wondered.

“I imagine that’s one of the things our own engineers and scientists will try to learn,” Desjani said. “It’s not my thing. I like speed and agility as well as power. But even I look at that hull, the size of that ship, and think, ‘Wow, that is cool.’”

“But it’s not really invincible.”

“No, of course not. But that Admiral Lagemann may be right. It’s a way of saying, ‘We get it, living stars. We know this name doesn’t fit even this ship because we’ve proven that it doesn’t.’”

They were interrupted by a call. Geary gazed into the solemn face of Dr. Nasr. “Two more of the bear-cows died during our transit here from Hua,” the chief medical officer said. “As nearly as we can tell, they were oversedated, but that’s not a certainty.”

That left three living Kick prisoners. Geary looked away, feeling sick inside. “Why won’t they let us save them?”

“We’ve discussed this, Admiral. To them, we’re only saving them for a future meal with fresh meat.”

“Doctor, I’d like your honest opinion. What’s the right thing to do here?”

Nasr sighed. “Admiral, the guiding rule of my profession is not to harm. That sounds like a simple rule, but any doctor with any experience will tell you that it can lead to severe dilemmas if you take the rule seriously. We tried to do the right thing as we saw it, to treat the injuries of the wounded bear-cows and save their lives. And we did that not just out of self-interest but because we truly wanted a chance to establish communications with their species. But you know the saying about the road to hell. Our best intentions have created a situation where every option is bad.

“They’re going to die, Admiral. We don’t know enough about their metabolism, about their bodies. Either we will oversedate them, or we will undersedate them. A moment of consciousness, of awareness, and the bear cows will end their own lives. Enough oversedation, and they’ll die anyway.”

Geary stared at the doctor. “You’re telling me I should let them die?”

“No. I can’t do that. What I am telling you is that they will die, the only question being when and where. You can order me to reduce sedation, or order me to increase it. Or tell me that we should continue to try to tread the narrow line to keep them going as long as possible.”

“Doctor, I can’t tell you to kill them. Will they suffer if we keep trying to do our best?”

“Suffer? No. They’ll simply go from sedated to dead, or from sedated to aware to dead. I don’t know if the dying process hurts, but from the readings we got on the one who killed himself and the autopsy, it doesn’t seem to cause trauma. Instead, the body floods itself with chemicals and hormones that block pain and might well create delusions while they cause metabolic functions to very quickly shut down.”

It sounded almost pleasant. No pain. Perhaps visions of whatever the dying creature most wanted to see. Comfort. But to deliberately cause even that to happen… “Maintain your efforts to keep them alive. Those are our rules. I admit that. But those are the only rules I can use.”

“We allow an ending when all hope is gone and the patient rejects artificial intervention,” Dr. Nasr pointed out.

“Hope is not gone,” Geary said, wondering whether he believed that.

The doctor nodded. Geary never had been able to get the medical staff to grasp the idea of saluting superior officers. “There’s one more issue, Admiral. The Syndicate Worlds’ citizens we rescued from the enigmas. Have you made any decision as to their disposition?”

“No, Doctor, I haven’t. I’ve just played divine judge once with those bear-cows. Do I have to do it again with the Syndics?”

“Yes, Admiral, you do. If you turn them over to Syndicate Worlds’ authorities, you know what will happen to them. They will be treated like lab animals, worse even than what the enigmas did to those people.”

Geary shook his head angrily. “If I take them back to the Alliance, they are liable to be treated the same way! Our researchers may make noises about respecting their dignity and humanity, but the end result will be the same.” He pulled up a report he recalled seeing, scanning the information in it to confirm his memories. “Those Syndic citizens have been asked what they want, and all of them said that they want to go home.”

“Do you want to go home, Admiral?”

“I—” Yes. But my home no longer exists. It went away a long time ago. And if I went to where home used to be, I wouldn’t have a moment of peace. Just like those poor three hundred thirty-three Syndics. “I understand, Doctor. I really do. I promise you that I will take no action without carefully considering the well-being of those people.”

“Thank you, Admiral. I can’t ask for more than that.”

Geary slumped back, tired of making hard decisions, especially when the right thing to do was far from clear.

“Admiral?” Desjani said in a soft voice.

“Yes?”

“While you were talking to the doctor, we got another high-priority message for you. Captain Jane Geary requests a meeting as soon as possible.”

Oh, great. He had known that was coming, though, and with the battle cruisers drawing steadily away from the battleships, the longer he put this off, the bigger the time delays between ships would be and the longer a painful conversation would take. “I’ll call her from my stateroom.”

“Don’t beat around the bush. Don’t try to spare her feelings. Be as blunt and clear as possible. And for the love of our ancestors, don’t tell her I gave you any of that advice.”

He sat on the bridge for a few more minutes, watching the enigma attack force vanishing as it jumped for Midway. That had actually happened hours ago, but seeing the event take place as the light from it finally reached them still carried a sense of immediacy. “All right. I’m off to speak with my grandniece.”

He double-checked the security settings on his comm software before calling Dreadnaught. Experience had taught him that security with comms was never absolute, but he still had to try to keep this conversation private.

The image of Jane Geary appeared in his stateroom. She didn’t look happy, but then he hadn’t expected her to. “Admiral, I must respectfully request the reasons for my being passed over to command the main body of the fleet.”

He could take a personal tack in answering her, or he could reply with the same sort of professional smoke screen that Jane Geary had repeatedly thrown up to hide her own feelings. Despite Desjani’s advice, he decided to open with that second option. “Captain Geary,” he began in a formal voice, “I chose the officer who in my opinion was best suited to carry out the tasks the main body has been assigned.”

“If this is about the rumors that you are favoring me, it is unfair to penalize me because others have spread such a false accusation, Admiral.”

Geary had to pause before replying. There are rumors that I’m giving Jane Geary special treatment? Why hasn’t Tanya told me about them? But then, she might not have heard. Who would repeat that gossip to Tanya?

And what’s the basis for such rumors? I commended her after the battle at Honor, but who could object to that? “Captain Geary, I assure you that my decision did not take into any account such rumors.” Since I hadn’t heard them, that’s as true a statement as I’ve ever made.

It was Jane Geary’s turn to hesitate before speaking again. “Why am I not the officer best suited to command the main body?”

Did he tell her the truth? If he didn’t, wouldn’t he bear responsibility for anything she did? He could see in his mind’s eye Tanya giving him a severe look. Be as blunt and clear as possible. “I’m going to be direct, Captain Geary. The commanding officer of Dreadnaught who I first met at Varandal would have received that assignment. She was aggressive and smart, she was dependable and capable. I could feel confident that I knew what she would do. In the time since we have left Varandal on this mission, I have grown increasingly less certain as to what you would do in any situation.”

She paled, then reddened. “In what way have I failed my duties? Which mission have I failed to carry out? I heard no fault being given for my actions at Honor.”

“It is impossible to fault your actions at Honor,” Geary said. “As my commendation of you for that engagement stated, you acted in the highest and finest traditions of the Alliance fleet. But,” he added as she started to speak, “I don’t need to know whether or not one of my commanding officers can act heroically. It’s my job to do my best to prevent anyone from having to do that. When my efforts fail, then someone may have to step up as you did. The problem, Captain Geary, is that you have developed a pattern of wanting to act heroically even when that is not required. You want to be a hero. There are few things more dangerous to a ship, to a crew, to a fleet, than a commanding officer who wants to be a hero.”

As Jane Geary stared at him, he could almost see the professional armor cracking and falling away. “You…” she struggled to say. “You are Black Jack. He—”

“I am not the figure of legend. Everything I have done is because it was required of me, because I had to do it, not because I sought it.”

“That is not how everyone else sees it!” She didn’t seem aware that she had yelled that.

“Everyone else doesn’t know me. I have tried to get to know you, to establish a personal relationship, but—”

“Why didn’t you go to Glenlyon? They were waiting for you. They got me. The grandniece who is only good enough to be a battleship captain. I got to hear endless orations about Black Jack, and about my heroic brother, who fought under his command!”

Geary shot to his feet, feeling anger working in him. “You fought under my command at Varandal, and you fought damned well. Jane, you did what was necessary at Honor. What worries me is that you do the same kind of things when they aren’t necessary. Tell me the truth. When you acted at Honor, were you thinking about anything other than what needed to be done?”

Her jaw muscles stood out as she stared at him, then Jane Geary spoke in a strangled voice. “I was scared. All I was thinking was that this was the only way. I didn’t think the use of kinetic projectiles would work, but I was desperate. And ever since then, while everybody tells me how brave I was to lead that charge, all I can think about is how scared I was. There. You wanted the truth. You have it. I’m no hero. I’m not even a good officer. When I faced that situation, I was terrified.”

It was his turn to stare, then he laughed, seeing the shock on her face and the growing anger after it. “Jane… please… I’m not… Ancestors preserve us. What do you think courage is?”

“Being unafraid when you face danger! Everybody knows—”

“Then everybody is wrong.” Geary sat down again, looking at her. “You were terrified? Do you have any idea how frightened I was at Grendel? My ship was shot to pieces under me, the only crew left on Merlon were me and the dead, the power core self-destruct had been activated, and I couldn’t find a working escape pod.”

“You couldn’t find—? Nobody ever said that.”

“Nobody else knows! Except Tanya Desjani. And now you. Jane, when I was a lot younger, my father told me something. We were talking about heroes. I remember that I’d been reading histories and saying how great these people were who hadn’t been afraid when they faced great challenges. And my father laughed a lot harder than I just did; and then he said that courage wasn’t the absence of fear. Courage, real bravery, is being afraid and doing what you need to do anyway. I didn’t believe him. Not really.” Geary took a deep breath. “Not until I was on Merlon and ordering the surviving crew to evacuate while I kept fighting the ship a little longer. Not until I was pulling myself along a passageway littered with wreckage and the dead, trying to find a way off of a crippled ship that was about to explode.”

Jane Geary looked down at the deck. “People have told me that, too. I haven’t believed them. I feel like a fraud.”

“You’re human, Jane. And a good officer when you’re not trying to prove that you’re a hero. You showed that when you charged the enemy at Honor, thinking only of the necessity of doing that despite how scared you were.” Did she believe him? He couldn’t tell.

When she finally spoke again, it was in a voice so low he could barely hear. “Was Michael scared?”

“When he used Repulse to hold off the Syndics so the rest of the fleet could get away? Yes.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that?”

Why hadn’t he? He suddenly understood the reason why he had been reticent before this. “Because if you haven’t been through something like that,” Geary said slowly, “then telling someone that the person who did it was scared can sound like a criticism, a put-down, instead of what it really is—a testament to just how brave they actually were. Now, there are people who get so involved in what they must do, in doing this and that and the next thing, that they don’t have time to be scared. Tanya Desjani is like that. They’re brave, too, just in a different way because they submerge their fears long enough to get the job done. But feeling no fear? That would make machines the bravest things in the universe.”

She thought about that for a while, then spoke in a firm voice. “What do I need to do?”

That one was easy. “Be the officer I first saw at Varandal. I don’t need someone trying to prove that she’s Black Jack. I need Jane Geary.”

She looked up, meeting his eyes, then nodded. “I think I remember her. She was trying to prove something else, though. She was trying to prove who she wasn’t.”

“We all are trying to prove things. All of the time.” Geary stepped closer, searching her eyes. “Jane, we need to get that superbattleship, the new Invincible, home. Your battleships are the last line of defense before the four battleships towing the new Invincible. Don’t leave them hanging. They need you blocking any attacks that come at them.”

Her arm came up in a slow salute. “If anything gets through, it won’t be because I let them.”

After she ended the call, Geary stood looking at where his grandniece’s image had been. Once again, he had ordered her to stand and die. After this talk, he felt confident she would do it, not because of his order but because of who she was. That wouldn’t make him feel any less guilty if this time she did die carrying out his orders.