“What about anyone else in the fleet? I understand Captain Hiyakawa has that skill code.”
“I don’t know Captain Hiyakawa well, Admiral,” Neeson replied after the six-second delay caused by outgoing and incoming transmission times. “But we’ve talked a little. He’s about at my level. Sir, the only fleet officer who could have contributed significantly to such an effort was Captain Cresida. Not because of her education on hypernet matters but because she was intuitive and brilliant. I’m just a plodder, and I’m as good as anyone now in this fleet as far as I know.”
“Can you think of any hypernet project in which your experience would make a significant difference?” Geary asked.
“Outside the fleet? No, sir. I could get coffee during meetings, but that’s about it as far as usefulness.”
“Thank you, Commander. I appreciate your assessment.” After the link had ended, Geary sat watching the empty space where the comm window had been. No difference. Not when it came to hypernet skills. But a very big difference if the skills of those fleet personnel in other areas were lost to me now. And fleet headquarters already has people who are far more qualified. And the message from fleet headquarters didn’t even promise me any replacements.
Cresida was the only fleet officer who could have contributed . . . Damn, I miss Jaylen. A fine officer. Brilliant, like Neeson said. But if she was the only one who could be said to have real expertise, according to Commander Neeson, who is perhaps the most capable hypernet knowledgeable person I still have in the fleet, then I believe I am justified in responding appropriately to this message.
Geary tapped the respond command. “In reply to your request, a review and evaluation of fleet personnel turned up none who in my judgment satisfy your needs.”
The worst they could do was question his judgment, and he was getting used to having people do that. Since being awakened from survival sleep, he had seen his judgment questioned more often than since he was an ensign. But all that mattered in the short term was avoiding losing a lot of personnel his ships needed. Maybe whoever at headquarters had generated this odd request would manage to shoot another demand to him before the fleet left in two weeks, but he could stall that one easily with the little time that would be left at that point. In any case, it was better to receive a complaint that he hadn’t offered a good enough reply this time than to transfer all of those men and women before the fleet left Varandal.
At least most of my problems seem to be at headquarters these days instead of being here in the fleet.
Another chime sounded, alerting him to a call. Timbale. That shouldn’t be too bad.
Admiral Timbale’s image appeared, smiling encouragingly. “Good news.”
“I could use some.”
“Your experts are arriving tomorrow.”
Geary waited, then asked. “Experts? On what?”
“Intelligent nonhuman species.”
“We have experts on that? Until we found the enigmas, we didn’t even know any existed, and we just confirmed the existence of the enigmas a few months ago.”
“That’s true,” Timbale admitted. “But science and academia have nonetheless been producing experts on the subject for centuries now. Not too many in recent centuries, I gather. Apparently, the dearth of intelligent nonhuman species actually discovered managed to slow down the production of experts on that topic. But there are some. You’re apparently getting most of the experts on the subject who exist within the Alliance. They are, I am told, thrilled to be coming along.”
Geary felt the old headache making another appearance. “How many?”
“Twenty-one. All civilians. Fourteen of them are full-scale doctors.”
“I’m still waiting to hear the good news. Where am I supposed to put twenty-one civilian experts on nonhuman intelligent species who have never actually heard about or read about or encountered an actual nonhuman intelligent species?”
Timbale made an apologetic gesture. “They are the best humanity has on that topic. If I may make a suggestion, one of the assault transports would be a good place to keep them. You should have plenty of extra staterooms on one of them, and if the professors and doctors get bored, they can study the Marines.”
“That should generate some interesting conclusions,” Geary said. “Thanks for the heads-up. I’ll have General Carabali take our experts in hand and decide which transport to put them on.”
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.”