The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Leviathan (32 page)

He was jolted awake by the loudest, most urgent call alert that his comm panel could produce. Groggy, Geary hit the accept control. “What?”

“That woman is still on the facility!”
Desjani yelled.

He had to gather his thoughts to make sense of the words. “Rione? She’s—she’s on
Mistral
.”

“She is sending messages from the facility, Admiral!”

“What message?” Geary was still trying to grasp what he was hearing.

“I don’t know. It’s set so only you can open it.”

“Relay it to here and set it to play for you as well,” Geary ordered, a feeling of dread beginning to replace his earlier confusion.

He slapped the virtual command to open the message, waited impatiently for the second needed for the system to verify who he was, then saw Victoria Rione’s image appear before him. She was clearly still on the government facility, standing in the command center that Geary had seen earlier. The command center itself had a feeling of abandonment and hasty departure, except for Rione herself, and in the background a man lying in a fully reclined seat. The man appeared to be sleeping, his chest slowly rising and falling.

Rione’s face was drawn even tighter, the skin thin over bones, and she was gazing outward with eyes that held fear as well as a terrible resolve. “Admiral Geary, the first thing I must say is that you must not blame your people for my success at remaining here. The same sort of software that can make my presence appear to the fleet’s systems to be fully authorized can also make it appear to those systems that I am somewhere I am not. The systems on the assault transport told everyone on that ship that I was in my stateroom.”

She paused, as if a little short of breath. “I was right. That is the other important thing. I found the necessary codes for the hypernet
gate. Not those to unblock it. That remains beyond my ability. But I was able to use official software, which I am not supposed to have, to reprogram the safe-collapse system on that gate. Its function has been reversed, and it will now ensure the maximum outburst of energy when the gate collapses, something on the order of point eight on the Schneider Nova Scale.”

Touching a control, Rione indicated a number that appeared. “I have just sent the collapse command to the gate, at exactly that time. You can calculate when it will reach the gate and when the resulting shock wave from the gate’s collapse will reach every portion of this star system. I remember what you did at Prime when facing such a threat, taking your fleet into the shadow of the star to protect it from the shock wave. You can do the same here. But the dark ships will not know the gate is collapsing until they see the collapse begin. They will not know the safe-collapse device has been subverted until the shock wave hits them.”

Even though this message had been sent hours ago, she seemed to be staring straight into his eyes. “I’ve learned a lot about space battles since meeting you, Admiral. I have learned enough to know that this is a battle you could only win at tremendous cost. You might even lose, with catastrophic results for the Alliance. So I have done the only thing that will make certain the dark ships are destroyed. It will hopefully also save your fleet. I confess to having developed a fondness for the men and women under your command.

“Do not waste your time trying to get me off this facility. I can read a maneuvering display well enough to know there is no chance of that in the time that you have left.

“I am not alone here. As you can see, my husband, Paol Benan, is here with me. He is fully sedated.” She swallowed before being able to speak again. “According to the records I found here, his treatment to reverse the damage caused by the mental block was delayed repeatedly for ‘security reviews,’ delayed until the damage to his mind was
declared irreversible. Paol is now a danger to everyone, including himself, including me. He must remain fully sedated, a living death. They took my husband, Admiral. They denied him an honorable death. And the worst part is, I don’t believe they even cared what they were doing.”

Rione paused again, breathing deeply. “Finish the job, Admiral. Get your ships home. Get
Mistral
home. The information in the files, and what the people we found here can testify to, will bring to account those who through narrow-sightedness, greed, ignorance, fear, or their own desire for power nearly destroyed the Alliance. Others acted out of wishful thinking or willful ignorance, and while they may not deserve the same fate as others, they do need to answer for their decisions. Some have clean hands, as clean as any hands involved in this can be, and those records will ensure they are exonerated despite the attempts of the guilty to shift blame to them. It is past time the people of the Alliance stopped blaming the government for their ills and looked in the mirror to realize that the government is
them
.

“Save the Alliance, Admiral. As I told you the first time we met, that is what I am willing to die for. Now, that is my last request. You owe me that.”

Rione paused longer this time, struggling to speak. “Thank you for the services you have done me. Thank you for tolerating my presence, and listening to my advice, and for doing the best you could, and for still believing in the things the rest of us forgot were important. I will not pretend to be facing the certain end with calm resolution. I never claimed to be that sort of person. I am frightened. Once this call is ended, I will take a sedative, lie down with my husband, and when the blow strikes, neither of us will feel it, but we will go through that last door together, where I hope our ancestors will welcome me and forgive me for the things I have felt I must do.”

A flash of her old fire appeared in Rione’s eyes. “Perhaps I will finally earn a little respect from the men and women like those in your fleet who we politicians have for too long sent to their deaths with too
little thought or foresight. After all, the people admire dead politicians almost as much as they detest living ones.

“Good-bye, Admiral Geary. Save the Alliance. May you and Captain Desjani survive to live long and happy lives.

“To the honor of our ancestors. Victoria Rione. Out.”

Geary drew in a shaky breath as her image vanished, then his mind shot into action. “Tanya, I’m on my way to the bridge. Start working the maneuvers and see if we can make it to the shadow of one of the stars with the time we have.”

He raced to the bridge and dropped into his command seat. Desjani was working furiously on her maneuvering display, her face rigid with anger. “We can just make it,” she snarled. “Taking into account the limits on propulsion from our most heavily damaged ships, we have a decent chance of getting behind Beta
just
before the shock wave hits.
Damn her!
She
knew
that now I will have to honor her memory!”

Geary quickly checked over Desjani’s work. “We head back in-system, on a vector apparently aimed at returning to the government facility—”

“Then as the dark ships close to intercept, we shift vector to aim for the shadow of Star Beta. But it is going to be close. Depending on how long the gate takes to collapse, we might get caught in the shock wave. We have no time to spare. But if we get there too fast, we’ll be sitting ducks for the dark ships.”

He hit his comm controls. “All units in First Fleet, this is Admiral Geary, immediate execute attached maneuvers. Any unit that believes propulsion damage may limit its ability to carry out these maneuvers contact me at once.”

Dauntless
began pivoting, her main propulsion lighting off to push her onto a new vector heading back the way the fleet had come. The battle cruiser’s propulsion didn’t light off at full, instead matching the best effort that some of the most badly damaged ships could manage. “Can we transfer crews—” Geary began.

“It would take too long,” Desjani said. “We would have to limit acceleration even more for the shuttles to transfer crews off the most badly damaged ships so we could leave those ships behind. We’re better off trying to get everyone into the shadow of the star. Damn that woman!”

Geary sat back, trying to sort through his emotions. “She saved us. Maybe.”

“Why did I have to be saved by her?” Desjani shook her head angrily, blinking back tears. “She is braver than I thought. You could see how scared she is. But she went ahead with it.”

“Was she right about it being impossible to get to her?”

“Yes. Any ship we sent would be pulling alongside the government facility when the shock wave got there. Any attempt would be futile and suicidal.”

“Captain?” They looked back to see Lieutenant Castries staring at them. “What has happened?”

Geary sighed, realizing that he must tell everyone about the sudden shift in their fortunes. He tapped his comm controls. “All units in First Fleet, this is Admiral Geary. We have an unexpected chance at victory and survival. Former co-president of the Callas Republic, former Senator of the Alliance, former Emissary Victoria Rione stayed behind on the government facility and was able to break into the hypernet gate controls and order the gate to collapse with the force of point eight nova. We are proceeding at the best rate we can manage to shelter in the shadow of Star Beta so that we will avoid the shock wave that should destroy the dark ships in their entirety, but we will have to also avoid being caught and delayed by the dark ships along the way.” He had to take a breath himself before continuing. “Victoria Rione has no chance of survival. She cannot be rescued from the facility before the shock wave hits. She has sacrificed herself to ensure the destruction of the dark ships and the safety of the Alliance. If we live, it will be because of her. Honor her memory. Geary, out.”

He could hear, could feel, the hush that spread through
Dauntless
after his announcement.

A minute later, a frantic call came in from
Mistral
.

“Admiral,” Commander Young said, “our systems assured us she was aboard! We tried to get in just now and found the locks on her stateroom are sealed with overrides. I have crew members breaking in, but there were ongoing, confirmed status feeds from that compartment telling us that Senator Rione was there.”

“She told me that she hacked
Mistral
’s systems to show that,” Geary said. “There is no fault on your part, Commander.” He wondered if he should ever tell Commander Young of the fate that she had been saved from by Rione’s actions. “I suppose all of us ought to start double-checking more on what our systems tell us.”

“Commander Benan may be aboard. We are checking, sir.”

“He’s not aboard
Mistral
, either. They are together. You did everything that you should have, Commander.” Having reassured Young, Geary stared at his display for a few moments, not really seeing the information it showed, his mind filled with memories.

Desjani was gazing bleakly at her own display. “We get to spend the next several hours hoping we don’t get annihilated by the shock wave or the dark ships or both. There’s nothing else we can do.”

“It beats what we were looking forward to a half hour ago,” Geary said. “Tanya—”

“Admiral, with all due respect, I am not yet prepared at this time to discuss matters concerning her.”

“Understood.”

“Admiral.” General Charban, calling up from the comm compartment, appeared to be dazed. “I have informed the Dancers of what is happening, which took some very creative poetry. I think it is safe to say that they will remain close to us until the shock wave is past. You will recall that Senator Rione was embraced by one of the Dancers. That gave her some special status with them, and these Dancers . . .
well, I don’t know if the word means the same thing to them, but they said that the pattern will grieve for her.”

“Tell the Dancers that we appreciate that,” Geary said.

“Am I correct, Admiral, in my understanding that our survival is not yet certain?”

“You are, General. We still have to get past the dark ships. If the gate collapses as fast as possible, we won’t be in the shadow of Beta in time. If it collapses more slowly, we’ll get there.”

“Then I will pray that the gate collapses with all due deliberation,” Charban said.

DESJANI’S
planned maneuvers accomplished what they were supposed to. The dark ships were just over a light-hour and a half distant when the major change in the Alliance fleet’s path was made at Geary’s order following the receipt of Rione’s last message, and as a result the dark ships did not see the maneuver until about an hour and a half after it was made. They then shifted their own vector, aiming to intercept on the assumption that Geary’s warships were returning to the government facility.

A few minutes before the dark ships intercepted their track, Geary ordered the change in vector to head for the side of Star Beta that was opposite where the hypernet gate apparently still orbited nearly seven light-hours distant. By now, that image was a lie. The gate was already gone.

The dark ships had anticipated vector changes by Geary to either continue on his way toward the government facility or to engage the enemy. The change toward the far side of Star Beta was unanticipated by the dark ships, with the result that their intercept was completely missed.

The five dark ship formations, now operating as almost a single unit, swung wide and around, aiming to catch Geary’s fleet again.

“Once we start braking, and we have to do that now, the dark ships are going to catch up to us fast,” Desjani cautioned.

“They’re going to aim past us,” Geary predicted. “No matter what projected vector they have for us, they are not going to predict that we will slow so much that we drop into fixed orbit close to Beta. Doing that would be totally irrational for us and give no possible benefit, except under one set of conditions, which the dark ships do not think exists. They need observations to make their decisions, and they won’t see any sign of trouble until too late.”

His ships pivoted again, every bow coming up and around, and as their main propulsion lit off again, the entire fleet began reducing velocity as fast as the most badly damaged ships could sustain.

The dark ships, swooping down on Geary’s formation, began braking as well.

“How are we doing on time?” Geary asked.

“Right on our mark,” Desjani said. “We’re coming in perfectly.”

The projected vectors of the dark ships bent forward as they braked, showing intercepts well past Beta. As Geary’s force continued to slow, the dark ships kept slowing, too, but also kept assuming that the Alliance warships would stop braking at any moment. The paths of the dark ships continued through space above and beyond Beta.

“You know,” Desjani commented, “it does feel insane to be slowing down this much with those dark ships that close and trying to hit us again. My head says we have to do this, but my guts are telling me this is crazy.”

“I feel the same way,” Geary said.

Star Beta was looming larger and larger as the Alliance fleet slid closer and closer. Geary gave more commands, ordering the warships to collapse their current four formations into a single, tight formation that would be protected as well as possible from any shock waves spreading back around the star after they hit it.

“Five more minutes until we’re there,” Desjani said. “If the gate collapsed extrafast, we’ll find out the hard way within the next couple of minutes.”

“Make sure we drop some expendable surveillance sats before we get behind Beta, so we can see what’s happening,” Geary said.

The dark ships had completely overshot Geary’s force and were skidding through a turn well beyond Star Beta, their bows coming back to point at the Alliance fleet. “Twenty minutes until the dark ships manage their latest intercept attempt,” Lieutenant Castries said.

“You sound very calm, Lieutenant,” Desjani remarked, her chin resting on one fist, her entire attitude that of relaxed composure. “Well done.”

Castries grinned. “I’ve been through a lot in the last several months, Captain.”

“This is just one more near-death experience?”

“That’s right, Captain.”

“How about you, Lieutenant Yuon?” Desjani asked. “How are you feeling?”

“Sort of numb, Captain,” Yuon admitted.

“Numb works, as long as you keep thinking. Ah, here we are.”

Dauntless
slid into her intended fixed orbit about Beta, the star looming huge nearby and blocking off a vast section of space. All about
Dauntless
, the rest of the Alliance warships, more closely packed than usual, hung in a glittering array, illuminated by the light of Beta’s close-by nuclear fires. The Dancers had come in near as well, weaving through the fleet and parking themselves in the midst of the Alliance warships as if such difficult maneuvers were routine and easy.

The dark ships had finished coming about, and were accelerating toward Geary’s fleet and the Dancers.

“I sure as hell hope that gate collapsed,” Desjani muttered so low that only Geary could hear. “Otherwise, we’re going to get ripped from one end to the other.”

Geary kept his eyes on his display, where the unmagnified view
from the surveillance sats was visible. The bright disc of Star Alpha could be seen to one side, but the other objects in Unity Alternate were just bright dots among the innumerable stars. If the gate had collapsed as it was supposed to, many of those bright dots no longer existed. But the wave of destruction that had engulfed them was traveling with the light that would bring news of the devastation.

“Ten minutes until dark ship intercept,” Lieutenant Castries said.

“All units’ shields are at maximum,” Lieutenant Yuon reported.

“We can see the gate collapsing,” Lieutenant Castries added.

It had happened nearly seven hours ago, but it felt like something taking place right now.

Geary saw one of the bright dots go out. “Here it comes.”

More dots vanished.

One of them had been the government facility.

The view from the surveillance sats vanished, and Geary looked toward his main display.

The shock wave hit Alpha, then, seconds later, Beta, the flaming atmosphere of the stars blossoming outward on all sides like a ball of fire hit on one side by a mighty gust of wind.

Hundreds of dark ships were closing in on Geary’s fleet. Five formations of the most dangerous warships ever built by humanity. Precise, cold, terribly lethal.

The shock wave was moving so fast and was so powerful that he did not actually see the impact. One moment, the dark ships were racing to attack. The next, they had been swept from space and only a vast glare could be seen. The glare faded, then vanished, leaving only empty space.

Geary heard sounds aboard
Dauntless
; the mumbling of prayers, a few half-muffled cries of jubilation, something that sounded like a sob.

Desjani had her head bowed, her lips moving silently.

He looked toward where the government facility had orbited for decades.
Thank you, Victoria. May the light of living stars welcome you and your husband.

—

THEY
took a few days to make their way back out to the fringes of what had been Unity Alternate Star System, conserving fuel this time and limiting the stress on damaged ships. The emptiness of the star system, swept clear of all but the largest planets by the shock wave, felt unnatural. Sailors had to be reprimanded for violating uniform regulations by wearing good-luck charms and necklaces designed to ward off evil, but every day some other members of the crew wore similar objects despite the risk of being chewed out and having their protective objects confiscated by Master Chief Gioninni, Senior Chief Tarrani, and the other senior enlisted. “They’re spooked, Captain,” Gioninni explained to Desjani. She and Geary had encountered the master chief in one of
Dauntless
’s passageways.

“They’ll have to live with it a little while longer,” Geary told him. “Some of the data from the government facility were automated astronomical observations that included where and when unstable jump points have appeared in this star system. We’ve used that data to help predict when the next jump point will appear. It should happen near this part of the star system, and sometime anywhere from now to within the next few weeks. That will let us jump for Drezwin.”

“Yes, Admiral,” Gioninni said. “The crew is also a bit worried about using an unstable jump point.”

“Just remind them that it doesn’t matter how unstable the jump point here is as long as the one at Drezwin is stable! Which it is.” Desjani paused and eyed Gioninni. “By the way, Master Chief, it’s pretty surprising how many of those luck charms and evil-aversion necklaces are aboard this ship.”

Gioninni scratched his head, adopting a puzzled look. “Things have been a bit rough the last few years, Captain. The crew must have collected quite a few.”

“I found myself wondering,” Desjani continued, “if perhaps the
charms and necklaces being confiscated are being resold to other crew members by someone.”

“That would be highly improper!” Gioninni declared, scandalized. “I will look into that, Captain!”

“See that you do, Master Chief,” Desjani said.

As she and Geary walked away from Gioninni, Desjani smiled. “That little resale operation should stop within a few minutes,” she murmured to Geary. “As soon as Gioninni can tell his coconspirators to shut it down.”

“Life goes on.” They stopped before the compartment where comms with the Dancers were maintained as Lieutenant Iger exited.

Iger, startled, hastily saluted. “Admiral, Captain.”

“Is there anything wrong?” Geary asked, looking toward the compartment.

“No, sir. I’m just going to check on things in the intelligence spaces while Shamrock—Excuse me, while Lieutenant Jamenson holds the fort in there.”

“And how are you and Lieutenant Shamrock getting along?” Geary asked.

Iger smiled broadly. “Planning a honeymoon, sir. We didn’t think that would be a possibility. But it looks like this is a long-term thing after all.”

“You seem happy about that,” Desjani commented. “When planning on where to honeymoon, I’d advise avoiding close binary star systems.”

General Charban exited the compartment as well, giving Lieutenant Iger the opportunity to head for the intelligence compartments. Charban looked weary again but in a satisfied way, not a frustrated way. “I may yet become a songwriter,” he announced. “No one but the Dancers will want to listen to my songs, but that’s a fair-sized audience. They intend jumping
home
from here, Admiral.”

Geary shook his head. “There are a hell of a lot of things in this
universe that humanity has left to learn. I honestly can’t remember, General. Did I ever offer formal condolences to the Dancers for the ships they lost assisting us in the fight against the dark ships?”

“You did,” Charban confirmed. “And the Dancers have offered formal condolences for our losses. They have also asked about what Victoria Rione did, wanting to know more about her reasons and motivations.”

“What have you told them?” Geary asked.

Charban pursed his mouth before answering. “Admiral, I told them that Victoria Rione was what humans call a Fury.”

“A Fury?”

“Mythical creatures,” Charban explained. “They avenge wrongdoing. They are absolutely merciless, never to be deflected from their purpose. Victoria Rione was a Fury, wasn’t she?”

“Yes,” Geary agreed. “I think she was.”

“I’ve been thinking about the whole Black Jack thing,” Charban continued. “A century ago, the Alliance needed not just a hero, but a military hero. Someone to inspire support for the war, someone to inspire everyone who fought.”

“Black Jack fulfilled that need,” Desjani said.

“I agree. But doesn’t a democracy also need other kinds of heroes? Doesn’t it need political leaders who are heroic?”

“Heroic?” Desjani questioned. “Political leaders?”

“I would think those were needed,” Geary said. “But from what I’ve seen, the people of the Alliance don’t have a very high opinion of politicians these days.”

“No, they don’t,” Charban agreed. “The idea of a heroic politician has become so ridiculous that no one probably even thinks of it. Our politics has been about tearing down other politicians, about mocking any claims to heroism. Politicians claim as acts of courage actions that are only aimed at advancing their own ambitions or pet causes.”

“That’s been noticed,” Desjani said dryly.

“But I do think we need heroes among our political leaders.
Real
heroes, whose claims to that status might perhaps be embellished but who at their core deserve to be celebrated for doing more than anyone expected. Doing something that would not benefit them personally.”

Charban looked at Geary. “Victoria Rione has given us such a figure. A heroic politician. A dead, heroic politician, and as the Black Jack example illustrated for nearly a century, the best heroes are always the dead ones because their subsequent actions can never disappoint. Would she be angry, Admiral, if she were held up as such a figure?”

To his surprise, Geary felt himself smiling. “General, given Victoria Rione’s attitude toward those around her and those she worked with, I think she would be incredibly amused by the idea of being looked up to as a paragon of political leadership.”

Desjani nodded. “She would be laughing her butt off.”

“Then I am going to pursue that, Admiral, when we get back to the Alliance,” Charban declared. “The Alliance is not, cannot be, about whichever men and women currently lead it. It has to be about ideals epitomized by those who have gone before. About sacrifice by our leaders. Maybe that is why the Dancers intervened the way they did. Not just because of the cold minds of the dark ships. Our part of the pattern, the Alliance part, was rotting from within. But we can still fix it. I’m going to do what I can.”

“You really are going into politics?” Desjani asked. “You know what that will do to your reputation.”

“I’ll risk it. Maybe if enough good people do the same, we’ll be able to change the image of our leaders.”

“Good luck,” Geary said.

He walked with Desjani the rest of the way back to her stateroom. “Come in for a moment,” she offered.

“What’s the occasion?” he asked. “We don’t want people talking.”