The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Dreadnaught (16 page)

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Authors: Jack Campbell

BOOK: The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Dreadnaught
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A
week later, he looked up in alarm. The knocks on his stateroom hatch were so forceful that they evoked images of grapeshot slamming into a warship’s armor at a velocity of several thousand kilometers a second. Before the tremors from the last of the knocks had subsided, the hatch slammed open, and Tanya Desjani stormed into the stateroom, looking inflamed enough to spit plasma.
“What is
that
woman doing on
my
ship again?”
SIX
 
GEARY
knew how stunned he looked because that matched how he felt. There was only one woman who could produce a reaction like that in Desjani. “Rione? Victoria Rione?”
Her eyes fixed on him, blazing with anger. “You didn’t know?”
“She’s aboard
Dauntless
? When? How?”
Still plainly enraged, but mollified by Geary’s surprise at the news, Desjani nodded stiffly. “She came aboard with the routine daily shuttle flight. I didn’t learn that until she came off the shuttle a couple of minutes ago.” Pacing back and forth, Desjani turned a sour look on him. “You’re lucky that you’re such a lousy liar. That made it obvious you hadn’t known she was coming. If you had known and hadn’t told me—”
“Tanya, I’m not that stupid. What the hell is she doing on
Dauntless
?”
“Since you can’t tell me, I suppose you’ll have to ask her.”
Wondering what he had done to cause the living stars to call this particular fate down upon him, Geary nodded in what he hoped was a calming gesture. “Where is she?”
“Right now? Knowing that woman, she’s probably on her way to this stateroom.”
On the heels of Desjani’s words, Geary’s hatch alert chimed. Desjani crossed her arms and stood there, plainly not intending to go anywhere. He braced himself, then keyed the hatch open again.
Any lingering hopes that it might be some other Victoria Rione vanished as he saw her standing there, her expression reflecting polite interest. “I’m not interrupting anything, am I?”
Desjani’s face, already reddened, darkened toward an ominous purple, her jaw clenching as well as her left fist so that the ring on one finger stood out clearly. Yet somehow she managed to speak in an almost emotionless voice. “I was not informed that you were coming to visit my ship.”
“It was a last-minute assignment by the government,” Rione said, answering Desjani’s question while somehow making it seem as if she were replying to something Geary had asked.
“Won’t the Callas Republic miss you?” he asked.
“Sadly, no.” The first flickers of real emotion flashed across Rione’s face, there and gone too fast to read. “Special election. You may have heard of them. The voters have judged me too focused on the Alliance and not engaged enough in issues purely of interest to the Callas Republic.”
That took a moment to sink in. “You’re no longer Co-President of the Callas Republic?”
“Not Co-President, and not Senator of the Alliance.” Rione’s voice stayed light, but more emotions flared within her eyes. “Someone judged to be more loyal to the Alliance than to the Callas Republic would be a poor representative on the issue of whether or not the Republic should withdraw from the Alliance now that the war is over, don’t you agree? After all, the Republic only became part of the Alliance in the face of the Syndic threat. Taking advantage of my lack of other responsibilities at the moment, the Alliance government has appointed me to be an emissary of the grand council.”
“Emissary of the grand council?” Geary asked. “What the hell does that mean?”
“Whatever the grand council, and I, wish it to mean.”
She’s enjoying this,
Geary realized.
Desjani had clearly come to same conclusion and was struggling to keep her temper in check. “I’m certain that you’ll need to complete your business with the admiral before the shuttle departs, so—”
“I will be staying,” Rione interrupted, speaking again to Geary. “The grand council wishes that I stay on the same ship with the admiral for the duration of its next mission.”
Worrying that Desjani would actually explode on the spot, Geary frowned at Rione. “You’ll leave when we return to Alliance space?”
Did something else show in her then? Something too strong to completely hide but so well concealed that he couldn’t even be certain that he had seen it? “That depends upon my orders from the grand council,” Rione said.
Ancestors preserve us.
Stuck on the same ship with Desjani and Rione again. Stuck on the same ship
between
those two women. “I will send a message—”
“Don’t bother. Really. It would be a waste of time. The grand council wants me here. The other emissary appointed by the grand council will be arriving soon.” Rione finally acknowledged Desjani, turning a frosty smile upon her. “But I have been remiss. Congratulations to you both. How fortunate that everything worked out when the fleet last returned to Varandal.”
Desjani stiffened again, her eyes going to Geary for a moment while he now tried to avoid showing any reaction. If she ever guessed that Rione had played a role in helping him catch up with Desjani that day, there would be hell to pay.
And Rione knows that, so why did she hint at it in front of Desjani? What’s going on inside her head this time?
“What exactly is your role supposed to be?” Geary demanded.
“Representing the government,” she said, glancing toward Desjani.
Tanya got the message, glowering as she turned to face Geary. “By your leave, sir, I will return to my duties.”
“Thank you, Tanya.” He tried to put extra meaning into the words and perhaps succeeded, because her rage seemed to subside a little.
The hatch had no sooner sealed behind Desjani than Rione flopped down in a chair, her expression suddenly haggard. “I’m truly sorry for the lack of warning about my arrival.”
“You didn’t need to provoke Tanya that way.”
“No, but I’m a bitch, and I have to stay in practice. As for why you got no warning, that wasn’t my doing. The grand council is doing a lot of shooting from the hip these days. My co-emissary should be arriving within the next couple of days.”
“He’d better, because we’re leaving in about a week. Is it anyone I know?” Geary asked, sitting down opposite her.
“I doubt that you know him. Retired General Hyser Charban.” Rione smiled sardonically. “He’s not trying to achieve power by the coup route, but in the old-fashioned way, accumulating favors from powerful politicians before he runs for office on his own.”
“General? A Marine?”
She laughed. “No. Ground forces. I don’t know Charban personally, either. The reports I’ve seen characterize him as a ‘pragmatic dove, sadder and wiser for his experience with the limitations of firepower when it comes to achieving end-goals.’ ” Rione recited the words with an ironic lilt.
“There’s nothing wrong with being aware of the limitations of firepower,” Geary observed.
“Not if that’s what you truly believe.”
“What exactly
are
you emissaries coming along with the fleet to do?”
She paused, as if deciding what to say. “Our job is to represent the government.”
“That’s what you said before,” Geary pointed out. “It tells me nothing.”
“You’re getting better at this. Let’s put it this way. Since neither Charban nor I holds elective office, we can’t be voted out of power while in the middle of a voyage, something that would cast our legitimacy as representatives in doubt if it did happen.”
“Victoria, tell me why you’re coming with the fleet.”
She looked into a corner, her expression guarded. “Perhaps you should ask me instead what it is the government really wants accomplished on this mission.”
He took his own time answering, making sure he framed the words right. “My understanding is that I’m to learn more about the alien race, especially about their technology and strength, and attempt to establish peaceful relations with them.”
“More or less.” Rione closed her eyes, looking tired again. “What the government really wants is the cheapest, easiest solution to a big, complicated, and possibly very expensive problem. That should mean talking to the aliens and stopping any conflict. But maybe not. The aliens will surely want something in return. They may need to be pressured. It is the task of myself and Charban to make sure you take the path with the least costs and least risks up front.”
Geary blew out a derisive breath. “What about the long-term costs and risks?”
“Long-term problems can be confronted when they get here,” she said, her voice once again betraying no hint of her own feelings, “with more cheap and easy short-term solutions that push the problems further down the road for someone else to handle someday. That’s how politicians think. I thought you knew that by now.”
“
You’re
a politician.”
“One who got voted out of office.” She smiled without humor. “The government,
all
of the governments in the Alliance, are in survival mode right now. They’re afraid of you, but they also need you. So you’re being sent off to be heroic, far, far from any opportunities to cause problems.”
“I already knew that. Sort of like when I was dead. The government got the benefit of who they claimed I was but didn’t have to worry about what I’d actually do.”
“Yes, it is sort of the same thing, isn’t it? But you are alive, and capable of doing all sorts of things. General Charban and I are to judiciously guide your choices into directions most beneficial to the government.”
Maybe he had spent too much time around Rione because he immediately caught the significance of her words. “Beneficial to the government. As opposed to beneficial to the Alliance.”
“But aren’t those the same thing?” she replied in a bland voice that confirmed his statement without actually saying so. “Now you know where you stand and where I stand.”
“I know what you say your orders are,” Geary countered.
Another smile, but one that could mean anything. “Yes.”
“Why the hell did you come here, Victoria? You must have known how Tanya would feel.”
“I had my reasons, and I had my orders from the grand council.” Rione made a casting-away gesture with one hand. “Since I was between jobs, I wasn’t in any position to turn down the grand council’s offer.”
“I still can’t believe they really voted you out of office,” he said.
“The gratitude of the people tends not to extend very far.” Bitterness crept into her voice. “I was willing to state unpleasant truths. Unfortunately, I’d been influenced in that regard by a certain relic from an earlier age, a man commonly known by the name ‘Black Jack.’ ” She fixed the cool look on him that he remembered all too well. “My opponent was willing to promise the voters anything they wanted, and promise that they wouldn’t have to sacrifice in any way for it. A majority of the voters thought that was a wonderful idea.”
Geary looked back at her steadily. “So you lost the election because you insisted on being honest.”
“That
is
ironic, isn’t it?”
“As you once took pains to point out to me, some of the ships in this fleet are from the Callas Republic. Their crews, and the crews of the ships from the Rift Federation, are expecting orders to go home. They haven’t received them yet, and I’ve been trying to decide whether I should leave those ships at Varandal.”
Rione looked away again and shook her head. “They’ll be waiting a long time for such orders. The government of the republic won’t be calling back those ships. Don’t expect me to say that publicly, and don’t expect any official acknowledgment of that policy from either the republic or the federation.”
He thought about the hopeful looks on the faces of those commanding officers, who thought they would soon be returning to their home space. “That makes no sense at all. If they want to loosen ties with the Alliance, why should they leave the bulk of their warships under Alliance control?”
“Because they fear those warships.” Rione turned her head and regarded him with a somber gaze. “The new government strongly suspects that the crews are more loyal to Black Jack Geary than they are to the government of the Callas Republic. They’re probably right.”
His temper flared, all of the anger he had felt during his confrontation with the grand council surging to life again. “Suspicions don’t excuse treating those crews that way after all of their courage and sacrifice! How can they treat their own people like that? If they distrust me, fine! I’m getting used to it. But I will not allow those ships to be exiled from home because of vague concerns about what I might do someday!”
She confronted his anger without flinching, simply gazing back at him, then shook her head slowly. “You’re letting the Alliance do it to their own warships, aren’t you, Admiral?”
“My Alliance ships will be coming home between missions!”
“Of course.” Her tone conveyed no hint of agreement or emotion.
“I’ll send those ships home,” Geary said. “On my own authority. I’ll tell those ships to return to the Callas Republic and—”

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