Whoa! Giscard thought. "Uncover less vital areas"? She knows as well as I do that what weve really been covering some of those "less vital areas" against has been domestic unrest. Is she saying shes talked the Committee into?
"We will be amassing a strike force and organizing a new fleet," she went on levelly, confirming that she had talked the Committee into it. "Its wall of battle will be composed primarily of battleships withdrawn from picket duties in less vulnerable, less exposed, and frankly, less valuable areas. We do not make those withdrawals lightly, and it will be imperative that, having made them, we use the forces thus freed up effectively. That will be your job, Citizen Admiral."
"I see, Maam," he said, and the calmness of his own voice surprised him. She was offering him the chance of a lifetime, the opportunity to command a powerful force at a potentially decisive point in the war, and patriotism, professionalism, and ambition of his own churned within him at the thought. Yet she was also offering him the chance to fail, and if he did fail, no power in the universe could save him from the people who currently ran the Peoples Republic of Haven.
"I believe you do, Citizen Admiral," she said softly, still smiling that smile while her green eyes bored into his as if she could actually see the brain behind them. "Well give you every possible support from this end. Youand, of course, Citizen Commissioner Pritchart," she added, with a nod at the peoples commissioner "will have as close to a free hand in picking your staff and subordinate flag officers as we can possibly give you. Citizen Admiral Bukato and his staff will work with you to plan and coordinate your operations so as to allow the rest of the Fleet to give you the highest possible degree of support. But it will be your operation, Citizen Admiral. You will be responsible for driving it through to a successful conclusion."
And Ill give you the best command team I can to pull it off, she thought, including Tourville, if I can finally pry him loose from Saint-Just! "Investigation" ha! I suppose I should be grateful hes been willing to settle for keeping Tillys crew sequestered so they cant tell anyone what really happened to the bitch, but I need Tourville, damn it! And ten months is frigging well long enough for him to sit in orbit and rot!
"Yes, Maam," Giscard said. "And my objective?"
"Well get to the territorial objectives in a minute," she told him, neither voice nor expression showing a hint of her frustration with Saint-Justs foot-dragging. "But what matters far more than any star system you may raid or capture is your moral objective. So far in this war, weve danced to the Manties piping. I know thats not the official line, but here in this briefing room, we simply cannot afford to ignore objective realities."
This time she did glance at Fontein, but her peoples commissioner only looked back at her without a word, and she returned her own gaze to Giscard.
"That stops now, Javier," she told him softly, using his first name for the very first time. "We must assert at least some control over our own strategic fate by forcing them to dance to our tune for a change, and youre the man weve picked to play the music. Are you up for it?"
Damn, but shes good, a small voice mused in the back of Giscards brain. He felt the siren call of her personality, the enthusiasm and hope shed fanned by the apparently simple yet ultimately profound fact of speaking the truth openly... and inviting him to follow her. And I want to, he marveled. Even with all Ive ever heard about her, even knowing the dangers of even looking like Ive committed to "her faction," I want to follow her.
"Yes, Maam," he heard his voice say. "Im up for it."
"Good," she said, and her smile was fiercer... and welcoming. "In that case, Citizen Admiral Giscard, welcome to command of Operation Icarus."
Chapter Sixteen
Citizen Admiral Giscard, CO Twelfth Fleet, stepped through the briefing room hatch aboard his new flagship and looked around the compartment at the equally new staff charged with helping him plan and execute Operation Icarus. Personally, he would have preferred to call it Operation Daedalus, since at least Daedalus had survived mankinds first flight, but no one had asked him.
Besides, I probably wouldnt worry about the "portents" of naming operations myself if the Manties hadnt kicked our asses so often.
He brushed that aside and crossed to the empty chair at the head of the briefing room table, trailed by Eloise Pritchart. She followed him like the silent, drifting eye of the Committee of Public Safety, her public, on-duty face as cold and emotionless as it always was, and slipped into her own seat at his right hand without a word.
By and large, he reflected, he was satisfied with both his flagship and his staff. PNS Salamis wasnt the youngest superdreadnought in the Peoples Navys inventory, and shed taken severe damage at the Third Battle of Nightingale. But shed just completed repairs and a total overhaul, and she was all shiny and new inside at the moment. Even better, Citizen Captain Short, her CO, reported that her upgraded systems reliability was at virtually a hundred percent. How long that would remain true remained to be seen, but Short seemed pleased with the quality of her Engineering Department, so perhaps they could anticipate better maintenance than usual.
He adjusted his chair comfortably and brought his terminal on-line while he let his mind run over the details about Salamis readiness already neatly filed in his memory. Then he set them aside and turned his hazel eyes on the staffers sitting around the table.
Despite McQueens promise of as free a hand "as possible" in their selection, hed been unable to exercise anything approaching the degree of control an officer of his seniority would have wielded before the Harris Assassination. The only two hed really insisted upon had been Citizen Commander Andrew MacIntosh, his new ops officer, and Citizen Commander Frances Tyler, his astrogator.
Hed never actually served with MacIntosh, but he expected good things from him. Most importantly, the black-haired, gray-eyed citizen commander had a reputation for energy and audacity. Both those qualities would be in high demand for Operation Icarus, and both had become unfortunately rare after the purges.
Tyler was another matter. "Franny" Tyler was only twenty-nine T-years old, young for her rank even in the post-Coup Peoples Navy, and Giscard had done his best to guide and guard her career over the last five or six years. There was a certain danger in thatfor both of themthough Tyler probably didnt really realize the extent to which hed acted as her patron. Given the vivacious young redheads attractiveness, some might have assumed he had more than simply professional reasons for sheepdogging her career, but they would have been wrong. Hed seen something in her as a junior lieutenantnot just ability, though she certainly had that, but the willingness to take risks in the performance of her duty. Like MacIntosh, she not only accepted but actually seemed to relish the prospect of assuming additional responsibilities, almost as if (unlike the wiser and more wary of her contemporaries) she saw those responsibilities as opportunities and not simply more chances to fail and attract the ire of her superiors and StateSec. That sort of officer was more valuable than Detweiler rubies to any navy, but especially so to one like the Peoples Navy.