Leviathan

Four

Lieutenant Iger did not look happy. “Admiral, I am very uncomfortable with the idea of interrogating Alliance personnel whose identification materials appear completely authentic and who indicate security grounds for their actions.”

“I understand your concerns,” Geary said. He could just order Iger to do it anyway, but he had long ago learned that dramatically different results could come from someone’s pursuing a task willingly and enthusiastically as opposed to someone ordered to “do as you’re told or else.” “But no matter what their identification says, and no matter what they say, they were directly involved in actions that caused the destruction of Alliance warships, the death of fleet personnel, and attempts to corrupt the systems in the battle armor of our Marines.”

Iger nodded. “Yes, sir. There doesn’t seem any doubt of that.”

“So what we need to know, Lieutenant, is who those two are really working for. Isn’t there a term for someone who seems to be one of ours but is actually working for someone else?”

“A mole, Admiral.” Iger’s eyes narrowed in thought. “They could be moles. The identification could be completely legitimate, they could be part of a covert Alliance agency, and they could still be plants working for the Syndics.”

“Exactly,” Geary said. “I need to know whose orders those two are really responding to, and I am certain that we are more than justified in wanting to know that answer given events in this star system as well as at Indras and Atalia.”

“Yes, sir.” But Iger hesitated once more. “Admiral, it is likely that they will refuse to cooperate with interrogation and refuse to reply to any questions. We can still learn some things by monitoring the reactions of their bodies and their brain patterns to specific questions, but we would not be able to identify their true superiors using something that vague.”

Geary considered the statement, wondering what Iger was driving at, then abruptly understood. “Do not take any actions contrary to good interrogation procedures, the laws of the Alliance, or fleet rules and regulations. I want accurate, actionable intelligence. And when the time comes, I want to be able to greet my ancestors knowing that I did not shame them.”

Iger nodded, a smile flitting across his face, then saluted. “Yes, sir. Me, too, Admiral. I will do my very best to get the answers you seek, sir.”

“I never doubted that,” Geary said.

As Iger left, Geary leaned back in his seat, grateful to be in his stateroom aboard Dauntless once more. His ships were gradually assuming assigned parking orbits and taking on new supplies. A message from Captain Smythe had provided a real picture of the readiness of his fleet, one which wasn’t nearly as good as could be hoped but wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been. Varandal’s defenses were now on alert, and the software patches were gradually being introduced throughout the star system to clean out at least some of the dangerous subroutines hidden in the mass of official software.

All of which left him in the unenviable position of trying to decide what to do next.

He called Desjani. “Tanya, who can we trust as a high-level courier and afford to spare?”

She was in her own stateroom, absorbed in the many and unending responsibilities of a ship’s commanding officer. Desjani looked back at him, rubbing her forehead with a resigned expression that implied she was also trying to deal with a few headaches. “Jane Geary,” she replied after several seconds.

“My grand-niece?” Geary grimaced as he considered the idea. “All of the battleships in her division are laid up in dock. Dreadnaught won’t be underway again for… five weeks.”

“Right. Long enough to use the hypernet to get to Unity and back.” Desjani shrugged. “Unless you’re planning to head off with part of the fleet—”

“I hope not.”

“Then Jane Geary won’t be needed to help hold things together here.”

“Will she be able to get to the right people?” Geary asked.

Tanya gave him one of those looks that told him he had said something that betrayed his lack of familiarity with how the universe worked a century after his supposed death. “She’s a Geary. Descended from Black Jack.”

“Descended from my brother,” Geary said.

“Close enough, since you didn’t have any children before the battle at Grendel. The point is, if Captain Jane Geary shows up and says, I need to talk to so-and-so, she’ll get to talk to so-and-so.”

“All right.” He looked away, thinking. “How much should I send?”

“Who are you sending it to?”

“Senator Navarro and Senator Sakai.”

“Navarro and Sakai?” Desjani gave him a doubtful look. “How much experience do we really have with Navarro?”

“I have seen him enough to have formed an impression,” Geary explained. “And Victoria Rione said he could be trusted.”

“Oh, well,” Desjani said archly, “if that woman vouched for Navarro, I guess that settles the issue.”

“Tanya—”

“Do you have any idea where she is?”

“She—? You mean Rione?” Geary asked. “No. Why?”

“Because you should send it to her, too.” Desjani smiled thinly at his expression. “Hey, I may not like her… actually, I definitely don’t like her… but I know she would get that information to places where it would do some good.”

“True,” Geary agreed. “But since I have no idea where she is, all I can do is authorize Jane Geary to pass Rione a copy if she runs into her.”

“That’s the best you can do,” Desjani said. “Now, as to how much to send? Send everything. Make it clear that absolutely nothing has been held back, that you are not keeping anything from them.”

“That’s good advice,” Geary said.

“Why, thank you, Admiral.” She lowered her forehead onto her palm, resting it there. “We’ve done the easy part. You know how hard the rest might be.”

“The rest of the dark ships?”

“Yeah.” Desjani raised her gaze to look into his eyes. “They’ve still got fourteen battle cruisers and twenty battleships, all superior in combat capability to ours. That’s not even taking into account the accumulated damage and wear and tear on our ships, whereas the dark ships are all shiny and new. I have no idea how to beat a force like that.”

“We have to hope that the rest of the dark ships haven’t slipped their leashes,” Geary said. “That they are still under control of humans who can shut them down.”

“If it’s a virus or other malware, not just glitches, the other dark ships could be just as badly infected.” Desjani rolled her eyes. “Crazy artificial intelligences. Driven mad by malware or just problems in programming that was too complex for anyone to really understand. How many horror movies have used that plot?”

Geary shook his head. “Apparently not enough. The government got convinced that this time the AIs couldn’t be corrupted or develop serious failures.”

“I used to think fleet headquarters had first call on idiots,” Desjani said, “but I have come to realize that the government must be requisitioning some of them. Aside from the ones that the citizens elect, that is.”

“Tanya, I know some of the men and women we’ve encountered in the government appear to have been born without any common sense and lost ground every year of their lives since, but if we start believing that as a rule the citizens can’t be trusted to elect their representatives, then we’ve stopped believing in the Alliance. We might as well change the name to the Syndicate Worlds and pass control to an unelected elite.”

She sighed heavily. “Doesn’t all that idealism ever make your hair hurt?”

“What?”

“Look, I understand. We all do. But it’s kind of hard to believe the way the Alliance is run reflects the best of all possible ways of doing things!”

“It doesn’t,” Geary admitted. “Somebody once said that allowing the citizens to vote on their government was the worst way of doing things, with the exception of every other way that humans have tried.”

“It’s the least-worst option?” Desjani asked. “That I can believe. Now, I’m going to use my dictatorial powers aboard Dauntless to get that package of material assembled for your courier. You need to put together an executive summary for it, though. Something with bright colors, explosions, and short words so our leaders don’t let their attention wander.”

After ending the call, Geary glumly turned to the task of trying to very quickly and very clearly explain what the mass of data he was sending meant. First, a secret Alliance program is out of control, threatening the Alliance itself. It has already launched unprovoked attacks on Alliance citizens and property. Second, the Syndics have threatened to start the war again because of the attack on Indras by elements of that secret Alliance program. Third, Atalia, a neutral star system, was savaged by the same elements of that secret Alliance program, which then launched an unprovoked attack on fleet units. Fourth, Atalia urgently requires humanitarian assistance. Fifth, software for critical, official systems is riddled with “features” that aid and allow intrusion and misuse, and place those critical systems in jeopardy of being unable to fulfill their functions. Sixth…

Sixth…

Dammit, why didn’t you place your trust in the citizens of the Alliance rather than in secrecy and technology?

The courier ship carrying Captain Jane Geary and multiple copies of Geary’s report on multiple backup systems departed through the hypernet gate three days later. “There have been a lot of civilian ships leaving since we got back,” Desjani commented, “but this should be the first official reporting of what has happened that gets to the government at Unity and fleet headquarters.”

“What have I done, Tanya?” Geary asked. “I’ve knocked over the first domino. How far and how wide will the reaction be?”

“You didn’t knock over the first domino,” she replied, giving him a crooked smile. “Whoever sent out those dark ships to hit Indras… no, whoever authorized the whole dark ship program… the war… there was a century of dominos falling in that war.” Her gaze on him shifted, becoming appraising. “Or maybe the first domino fell when you were the last person off Merlon a century ago, and your damaged escape pod put you into survival sleep, to be lost until the fleet found you on our way to Prime to try to beat the Syndics once and for all. Maybe that’s when this whole thing got put into motion.”

He made a scoffing sound. “You make it sound like a plan.”

“Maybe it was. Maybe the living stars knew that we’d need you, and for some reason that I admit I don’t understand, maybe they thought that we deserved being saved from our own follies.” Desjani smiled again. “And if that’s true, then you’ll figure out a way to stop the dark ships.”

Geary shook his head at her. “No pressure, huh? Tanya, right now I have no idea how to stop them.”

He looked back at the depiction of the hypernet gate, knowing that at any moment a fleet of dark ships might erupt from it, and wondering what he could do to lessen the disaster if that did happen.

Captain Tulev’s battle cruisers arrived at the jump point from Atalia a few days later. His own ships battered in the fight with the dark ships at Atalia, Tulev had been left behind to assist damaged ships, pick up survivors of destroyed ships, and provide what pitifully small aid he could to the ravaged human cities in Atalia.

He had come aboard Dauntless to provide additional details because recent experience had only emphasized for them all that even the supposedly most secure forms of conferencing and communication were not truly safe from eavesdroppers. Geary had invited Desjani to attend the meeting in his stateroom as well, they sitting on the short couch together while Tulev occupied the chair opposite them. Tulev rarely displayed much emotion, but even he could not avoid occasional flashes of anger and distress as he reported in detail on the damage done to Atalia by the rogue dark ships. “The only good thing, and this only from the perspective of the Alliance, is that the people of Atalia are convinced that the dark ships must be Syndic in origin because they attacked us and we destroyed many of the dark ships in the subsequent fighting.”

“At least we finished off the dark ships that escaped from Atalia,” Geary told him.

“Yes. I regret missing that action.” Tulev paused, thoughts moving behind his eyes. “Can it be called vengeance when what was destroyed were only machines?”

“I derived some satisfaction from it,” Desjani said.

“But of course, Tanya. I would expect nothing else from you.” Tulev bent the corners of his mouth in the briefest of smiles at her.

“I’ll be even happier if I get to blow away the fools who thought building those dark ships was a good idea,” she added.

“This, too, I would expect of you,” Tulev said, then looked at Geary. “Do we have plans, Admiral?”

“I’m trying to get the fleet in the best possible state of readiness,” Geary replied. “I’ve sent a very detailed report on what happened at Indras, at Atalia, and here at Varandal, to the government and to fleet headquarters. They will realize that we have to do something. Hopefully, they can deactivate the surviving dark ships. If not…”

“It will be difficult,” Tulev observed with typical understatement. “My ships will be ready, Admiral.”

Desjani had been watching Tulev closely. “Is everything all right, Kostya?” she asked.

Tulev glanced at her. “Has everything ever been all right, Tanya?”

“Not in my memory.” She leaned forward a bit toward him. “We’ve been through a lot, you and me. Fought in a lot of battles, lost a lot of friends, seen a lot of things we’d rather forget having seen. I’m a little worried about what I think I’m seeing now. Is anything in particular wrong?”

This time Tulev took a few seconds to answer, his gaze distant, then he looked back at her, then at Geary. “I’m waiting for the war to end.”

Geary nodded. “I know that this peace feels a lot like a war at times.”

“That is not what I meant, Admiral.” Tulev frowned slightly, his eyes on the table before him. “I’m waiting for the war with the Syndicate Worlds to end. The war that destroyed my home, and so much else. A peace agreement was signed. Officially, the war is no more. But that happened outside of me. Inside… the war remains. It still goes on. It doesn’t end. I don’t think it will ever end, in here.” He tapped his chest with one forefinger.

Geary looked away, trying to find words. “I’m sorry.”

“I know how you feel,” Desjani said. “If not for—” She broke off, looking away, uncharacteristically embarrassed-looking.

Tulev showed that shadow of a smile again. “It’s not something that should not be said, Tanya. You found someone.” He nodded very fractionally toward Geary. “It must help a great deal.”

“It does,” she whispered, still not looking at him, and sounding guilty now. “There’s something in my soul besides the war.”

“And that is a good thing, what I would want a friend to have, just as you would be pleased if it were me who had found someone.”

“Is there anything I can do?” Geary asked.

“Thank you, Admiral, but you are not my type.”

Desjani snorted a brief laugh and shook her head at Tulev. “That’s the guy I used to know.”

“He is still inside there. But… so is something else. It is war.” Tulev shrugged. “In the histories, they give dates. A war begins on this day, at this hour, and then it ends at some precise date and time. All very neat and clean. But you and I, all of us who have fought, we know that wars don’t end at some moment dictated by a peace treaty. There’s nothing neat about the endings, if they truly end at all. I remember too many things, Admiral. I remember too many people. Many of them I don’t want to forget. But I cannot forget any of them. I have no home left to me. And so the war goes on, inside.”

Geary nodded. Tulev did not often talk about the destruction of his home world during the war. It was something everyone knew about him, so it did not need to be discussed. “The price of war goes on, too. Histories tend to calculate that in terms of money and casualties during the war, not in terms of what it does to those who fight and experience the wars. We’ve been… talking to… some official representatives who were involved with supporting the dark ship program on Ambaru Station. They haven’t told us much, but one thing we did get out of them was one of the concepts behind the dark ships, that by turning fighting over to artificial intelligences we would eliminate the impact of the killing on humans. They said it would make war less horrible.”

Tulev fixed his eyes on Geary. “They said that? Tell me, Admiral, what would you call a person, a man or a woman, who killed without concern, without thought or regret, simply because they had orders to do so? What would you call someone who felt nothing at all when they killed, never questioned an order to kill, and never hesitated, but simply killed, then moved on to the next target?”

“I’d call a person like that a monster,” Geary said.

“A monster. Yes. Because those who we send to kill must know what they are doing, must realize what life means, must feel the pain. If killing becomes too easy, those who issue the orders become too fond of it. We know this from history. There have been too many times and places where it became easier to kill than to think, easier to kill than to debate, easier to kill than accept differences.” Tulev frowned, revealing great anger for the first time since Geary had met him. “And they would make war ‘better’ by turning it over to monsters who don’t care? Who feel nothing when they kill?”

“An ancient military leader supposedly once said that it is well that war is so terrible, because otherwise people would grow too fond of it,” Geary said.

“He or she knew much more than the fools who sought to give war to the uncaring minds of machines,” Tulev said, still frowning. “To the dark ships, what they did was not terrible. It was simply a task, an order to be fulfilled. We will stop them, Admiral? We will not accept official assurances that next time there will be no malfunctions?”

“I will not,” Geary said. “I will use every bit of my authority and influence to stop them. I don’t care how many peaceful tasks are supervised by artificial intelligences. They’re good at a lot of things, as long as someone is watching for times when something goes wrong by accident or malware. But not war. Not if we’re going to stay human.”

“Welcome back.” Admiral Timbale led Geary out of the shuttle dock and toward one of the main commercial areas of Ambaru Station. “Things are still a bit unsettled here. Everyone will be immensely comforted by the sight of Black Jack.”

“It’s that bad?” Geary asked.

“Enough word of what happened, and what nearly happened to this station at the hands of those dark ships, that both the civilian and military populations of the station are jumpy.” Timbale smiled and waved at a passing group in civilian work clothes. “I’ve been going through recent shipping reports and finding some very disturbing things,” he continued, Timbale’s relaxed tone of voice and outward demeanor clashing with his words.

“Disturbing things?” Geary asked, nodding and smiling at passersby who brightened at the sight of him.

“Yes.” Timbale glanced sideways at Geary. “Shipping losses. You understand, we’re used to a certain level of those. Syndic raiders slipping into border star systems. Sabotage. Accidents due to rushed manufacture of the ships or hazardous materials being transported. Stuff happens. Once the war officially ended and word of that filtered through the Syndic border star systems, we had a big change for the better. Shipping losses declined by over seventy percent.”

“That’s good.”

“Yes. But less good is the fact that, according to the reports that have come in, we saw a resurgence of losses in recent months.” Timbale looked down, his mouth working. “Freighters and other shipping that never reached their destinations. Sometimes wreckage was identified, but with all of the wreckage in most star systems within a score of light-years of Syndic space, that hasn’t been possible too often.”

As he returned salutes from several passing ground forces soldiers, Geary somehow managed to keep his smile fixed despite an urge to snarl. “Mysterious, unexplained losses.”

“And no survivors from the crews.” Timbale reached one hand up and back to rub his neck. “We had thought, well, that’s the Syndics. They’ve been messing with us, like they did with your forces transiting their space, and this is just more Syndic ugliness. But no one has spotted any Syndic warships transiting Alliance space in or near the star systems where the losses have occurred.”

“Unbelievable,” Geary murmured. “I wonder how those ships were written off by the people running the dark ship program? Collateral damage? Training accidents?”

“They would have had trouble blaming it on personnel error,” Timbale said, his eyes now straight ahead as he walked beside Geary.

“I’d like to see that data,” Geary said. “See where the losses have been occurring.”

“It might help identify where the base is,” Timbale said. “Listen. You need to say something. Give an interview. I know you can’t talk about the dark ships and all of the garbage associated with that, but the people need to hear Black Jack telling them to keep the faith.”

“Surely there are other people who can tell them that,” Geary said, reluctant to step into such a public role again.

“There are,” Timbale agreed. “But no one believes them when they talk about what the Alliance means and how important it is because they don’t believe it. But you do, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“They’re putting it all together, Admiral,” Timbale emphasized. “The press and others. This is going to come out. Word of what happened to Atalia is all over the place, and word is trickling in from Indras. A lot of people saw your ships apparently fighting nothing and taking damage from apparently nothing, and they want to know what the hell happened here. Corporations want to know what’s happening to their ships and their cargoes. Families are raising hell about missing crews. And some of your own sailors and Marines are finding ways to talk to people. You and I both know that it’s going to take a while for the government to decide how to respond to this mess. Fleet headquarters is going to pass the buck for doing anything to the government, so don’t expect any orders from them. That means it’s up to us to handle things here for the time being, which means it is really up to you.”

“Things keep working out that way, don’t they?” Geary said. He looked over and saw a group of civilians hustling toward him, their clothes and overall appearance matching those of newscasters.

The woman in the lead skidded to a halt about a meter short of him, positioning herself in a way that offered a good look at Geary from the vidcam resting on her shoulder. One thing that hadn’t changed in the last century was that news reporters were still legally required to openly display any recording devices. “Admiral Geary, there are many rumors making the rounds. The people of the Alliance would like a statement from you.”

Geary waited as other reporters stopped nearby, behind them a growing, mixed crowd of military and civilians, all craning to hear anything he said. “I am waiting for orders,” he said. “I have reported to the government everything that I know and am preparing my forces to be ready for whatever mission I am assigned.”

“Who really gives the orders, Admiral?” a male reporter demanded. “The government? Or you?”

“The government.” He said it as if no other answer could have been expected. “I serve the Alliance.”

“Does the government really represent the people of the Alliance anymore?” another woman asked.

“As far as I’m concerned, it does,” Geary said. “As far as I’m concerned, I’m looking at the government of the Alliance right now.” He slowly ran his gaze across the crowd to drive home the point. “They are men and women whom you have elected. You chose them to speak for you, to make decisions.”

“I didn’t choose any of them!” someone called from the crowd.

“Did you have a voice in whether or not they were chosen?” Geary asked. “Did you have a vote, and did you use it to express your wishes? I didn’t actually vote for anyone in the government now. I was… not in a position to vote,” he added, drawing smiles and laughs from the crowd who all knew variations on the claims that he had not simply been frozen in survival sleep but actually among his ancestors for a century. “But I still consider them to be my government because you are the people of the Alliance, and you voted for them, and I believe in your ability to over time find the right solutions or to find the right people to find the right solutions. I believe in you, and therefore, I believe in the Alliance, and that will not change. If you believe in me, then I hope the fact that I believe in you means something.”

Everyone was looking at him, no one was saying anything. The reporters fumbled for more questions. Geary turned to go, but paused as another question was shouted from the crowd. “Will you support the government if it does something illegal?”

The silence this time felt almost physical in its intensity. Geary faced everyone again, and shook his head. “I will not support illegal actions. If necessary, I would resign my command and my position rather than carry out illegal orders. I assure you that the government knows that. Thank you.”

A squad of security police had hastened up to provide an escort as the crowd kept growing. They readied themselves to force a path through the mass of people, but the crowd parted before him as Geary walked back toward the shuttle dock, knowing his words would be sent around the Alliance as fast as light, jump drives, and the hypernet could carry them, and wondering if they would make any difference.

“Our requisitions are being rejected,” Captain Smythe said with an apologetic look.

Geary glanced from Smythe to Lieutenant Jamenson, whose uncanny ability to confuse anything had proven invaluable in keeping the fleet’s many, overlapping sources of repair and funding from realizing anywhere near how much money had been getting spent on repairing his fleet. “Do they say why?”

“Insufficient funds,” Smythe said.

“They don’t reject the requisitions themselves,” Jamenson added, the green hair bequeathed her genes by the original settlers of her home world of Eire standing out incongruously in Geary’s stateroom. “They just say there’s no money.”

“I told you that the wells were running dry,” Smythe reminded Geary.

He looked at Smythe and Jamenson again. “You tell me. How do we keep the work going?”

Smythe made a face. “Legally?”

“Yes. Legally.”

“Cannibalize,” Smythe said. “Pull funds from other sources that are available to the fleet. By the way, we’ve already received a number of requests to transfer some of those funds back to various higher-level accounts and have successfully failed to manage those transfers as of yet. Spend it or lose it, Admiral.”

“What funds are we talking about?” Geary asked.

“Training. Mess funds—”

“Mess funds? They want to short how much food the crews of my ships get?” Geary demanded in disbelief.

“No,” Smythe said. “They want you to feed them the same quantity in the same quality while using less money.”

Geary resisted the urge to hit the nearest object. “And, of course, they aren’t explaining how I’m supposed to do that.”

“No, of course not.”

Lieutenant Jamenson gestured toward the star display over Geary’s table. “There were the budget cuts after the war, then money being siphoned off to pay for that special program—”

“The dark ships,” Geary said.

“Yes, Admiral, and apparently that program cost a whole lot more than was budgeted, and now I’m seeing reports that the fleet is having to reactivate some of the border defenses that were deactivated to save money after the war ended even though no one has the money for that. It’s actually pretty simple. Less money available, and financial obligations higher than expected.”

“They could have guessed that the dark ships would cost much more than anticipated,” Geary said. “Is there any other way I can drum up more money for repairs and operations?”

Smythe spoke reluctantly, his face twisted as if he were tasting something sour. “We could reduce costs by selectively shutting down some of your ships, Admiral. Don’t officially decommission them. Just shut down everything, send the crews to other ships, and leave them orbiting until we get the money to get them going again.”

“I can’t do that!” Geary pointed to the star display. “At any time, I could end up fighting the rest of those dark ships, and if that happens, I will need every ship and weapon I can lay my hands on! How long can we keep things going by cannibalizing those funds we’re supposed to be transferring back to other people?”

“A month, give or take a few days,” Smythe said.

“Can we legally spend that money if we’ve been told to send it elsewhere?”

Lieutenant Jamenson smiled. “Yes, sir. There are some amazing loopholes in official regulations. It will take some careful maneuvering, but we can drive a transport full of cash through them. After spending the money, I will inform everyone expecting it that it has already been spent, though saying it in such a way that it will take everyone months to figure out that has happened.”

“I’m glad that you’re on our side, Lieutenant. Is there anything else?”

Smythe looked thoughtful. “There are some critical parts and materials I would dearly like to lay my hands on, Admiral. But there are a few obstacles hindering my acquisition of them. Could you persuade Captain Desjani to loan me Master Chief Gioninni for a few days?”

“A few days?” Geary asked. “I’m sure that can be worked out. What exactly are we talking about doing?”

“Oh, Admiral, do you really want to know? Or do you want the parts and materials?”

Geary sighed. “I need to know if this is anything that will get anyone court-martialed.”

“No, sir!” Smythe said, not-quite-successfully feigning shock at the question. “That would mean someone was committing theft. Did you know, Admiral, that legally no one can be charged with theft unless it is proven that they never intended returning whatever they might have taken? Assuming something was taken.”

“You know,” Geary said, “I think I’m going to stop asking questions.”

“Good,” Smythe approved with a grin. “I was about to ask Lieutenant Jamenson to start answering you. By the time she was done, you wouldn’t know your left hand from your right.”

Geary waved dismissal to Smythe and Jamenson. “Thank you, both. Do what we discussed. I’m going to send fleet headquarters a direct and simple message, though, telling them that if they want this fleet to be in any condition to defend the Alliance they need to give it the money to maintain itself.”

“Do you think that will actually produce any results?” Smythe asked.

“Whether it does or not, it will be part of the official record, and no one will be able to claim I never told them there was a problem,” Geary replied.

“They’ll classify it, refuse to admit that it ever existed.”

“Did I mention who the information copies are going to?” Geary asked.

Smythe grinned. “Now it’s my turn not to ask questions.”

THE light showing the arrival of a ship at the jump point from Bhavan had barely appeared when a frantic message from that ship came on its heels. “There are warships cruising through Bhavan Star System! They won’t answer any comms, they don’t match known Alliance ships, and they have intercepted and destroyed half a dozen freighters and other civil shipping in the days before we managed to reach the jump point for Varandal! We were lucky to get away with our lives! We need assistance!”

“The software patches are spreading,” Desjani said as Geary took his seat next to hers on the bridge of Dauntless. “Bhavan is able to see the dark ships, too.”

“But that ship is reporting a half dozen attacks on civil shipping,” Geary said, frowning at his display. “In a few days. The reports that Admiral Timbale had received didn’t reflect attacks with anywhere near that frequency.”

“Can the dark ships tell when we can see them? Maybe that’s what triggered these attacks.”

Geary didn’t answer, gazing at the detailed data the ship from Bhavan had attached to its plea for help. “Four battleships.”

“Damn,” Desjani breathed. “Ten heavy cruisers. Twenty destroyers. Nice round numbers. If they decide to start shooting up Bhavan like they did Atalia…”

“There won’t be much left of Bhavan.” He frowned again as he studied the data. “Look at their movements in the days before that ship jumped for here. It’s like the dark ships were enforcing a blockade.”

“A blockade? Of Bhavan?” Desjani squinted at her own display, where the same data was shown, then nodded. “Yeah. If the ship that jumped here hadn’t been positioned well relative to the jump point for Varandal, they never would have made it. There were a couple of dark destroyers on their tail.”

“Which explains why that ship is racing in-system toward us,” Geary said. His hand moved to the comm controls. “All units in First Fleet, be aware that two dark destroyers may be pursuing the ship that just arrived from Bhavan. First Battle Cruiser Division, you are to move immediately to intercept the incoming ship and protect it if necessary from any pursuers. Geary, out.”

“Captain?” the comm watch-stander said. “That message the ship from Bhavan sent. It was a universal broadcast. Every receiver in this star system will get it.”

It took a moment for the significance of that to strike home. Every receiver. Not just Admiral Timbale’s comm systems on Ambaru Station, or the other military and official comm systems throughout Varandal, but every civil and press receiver as well.

“That cat is out of the bag,” Desjani said. “I hope the government surprises me and has already started trying to do something, though from the looks of what’s happening at Bhavan some more of the dark ships are operating outside their intended orders.”

“Maybe a training scenario that they’re implementing as if it were real,” Geary speculated. “Or malware that activated offensive tactics against what the dark ships should recognize as a friendly star system.”

“Whatever the reason, it’s produced a real threat. What are we going to do?”

“The only thing we can do,” Geary said. “Go to Bhavan and lift that blockade.”

“I’m not looking forward to trying to stop dark battleships,” Desjani said in a low voice.

“Neither am I,” Geary replied. He hesitated, frowning again. “Tanya, the dark ships are at Bhavan, right next to Varandal.”

“In terms of a galactic scale, yes, a few light-years is right next to,” she agreed.

“They’re not hitting Bhavan. They’re blockading it. But one ship got away. To here. To let us know that dark ships were hanging around Bhavan.”

Desjani eyed him. “That’s… interesting.” She looked back at her display. “Lieutenant Castries, run some quick analysis of what that ship from Bhavan sent us. I want to know if those two dark destroyers could have caught it before it jumped.”

“Yes, Captain.” It only took a minute or so before Castries spoke again. “Uncertain, Captain. There is a seventy percent possibility that the dark ships could have intercepted that ship before it jumped, but thirty percent uncertainty due to gaps in the data we were sent.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant.”

“Captain? Why would they have let that ship escape?”

Geary answered. “So that we would know they were there.”

“With four battleships,” Desjani added. “So when we came to deal with them, we would come with as much force as we could muster. Sir, they want us to come to Bhavan.”

“It sure looks that way,” Geary said.

“So, what are we going to do?” Desjani asked again.

“The only thing we can do,” Geary repeated. “We’re going to Bhavan.”