“There’s a bright side?” Geary asked, glumly surveying the slowly subsiding mess aboard Haboob.
“Hell, yes, there’s a bright side. If we dump them all here, they’ll be Midway’s problem from now on. We’ll be free of worrying about them.”
He paused, then felt a smile appear on his face. “That’s true. I wasn’t looking forward to trying to protect them from Alliance researchers and media vultures once we got back. We’ll have freed them and taken them home. The honorable and the right thing to do. Hooray for us. What are you doing?”
“Research.” Tanya continued tapping some of her controls, zooming a virtual sound pickup in on the Alliance officers who had spoken with the shuttle pilot. “This is a recording from just before our many freed prisoners decided to freak out on us. I want to know what these officers thought of their conversation with that former Syndic.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t know the answer, and I want to find out, Admiral, sir.” She finished entering her commands. The officers had all been muttering or speaking in low voices, which would normally have made it hard to sort out the conversations they were having with each other. However, the sound systems automatically analyzed everything and broke out each voice digitally, producing a series of phrases that could be heard clearly by Geary and Desjani.
“Lakota was that bad?” “Worse.” “Like Kalixa?” “Worse.” “What was that about Taroa? We ought to report that.” “They called their own cops snakes?” “Not cops. She said secret police or something.” “Maybe she was lying.” “Hell of a good liar if she was.” “How could they believe we started it?” “Bitch.” “She lost her brother.” “So did I!” “We don’t trust our own politicians, do we?” “Hell, no.” “Syndics are worse. Everybody knows that.” “Maybe our government isn’t so bad after all.” “Not if you compare it to the Syndics.”
“The one great virtue of the Syndics,” Desjani said, as the recording ended with the beginning of the former prisoners’ panic session that swamped the sound pickups with a cacophony of noise. “Everything about the Syndics makes everything else look so much better when weighed against the Syndics.”
“That’s something I hadn’t thought about,” Geary admitted. “We’ve gone through Syndic space once on this mission, and we’ll be doing the same on the way back. The personnel in this fleet are seeing firsthand what happens as the Syndicate Worlds falls apart. They’re seeing how bad Syndic rule was. No matter what they think of the Alliance government, no matter how unhappy they are with how our government does things or with Alliance policy or with Alliance politicians, they’re seeing firsthand how much worse things could be.”
Desjani rolled her eyes. “Saying our government is better than the Syndics’ isn’t exactly high praise. Anything is better than the Syndics. And claiming our politicians are better than Syndic CEOs might generate some debate.”
“Not all politicians are the same. Take a look at some of the star systems where Syndic authority has collapsed,” Geary suggested. “The people of Midway were lucky.”
“Maybe they were lucky. So far, this place hasn’t fallen apart. Doesn’t mean it won’t. You heard that woman, the shuttle pilot. We’re free, she said. How long do you think she and others like her are going to keep taking orders from a couple of former CEOs?”
“It depends upon what those former CEOs do,” Geary said. “President Iceni has been asking Rione a lot of questions about the different governments in the Alliance. How they maintain order, how stable they are, how they retain popular support.”
“She’s asking that witch for advice on how to be a good politician? Or maybe Iceni figures that woman has good advice for dictators.”
“Tanya, for all of Victoria Rione’s faults, she does believe in the Alliance.”
“You may think that counterbalances the faults. I don’t.”
He sighed and stood up. “All right. There’s nothing to do now but wait about five hours, at least five hours, to hear what Iceni says about taking all of them.”
“Nothing to do?” Desjani asked, getting up as well. “What world are you living in?”
“Dreamworld,” Geary admitted. “There are plenty of other things to do.”
“That’s my admiral.” She raised one hand to gently brush a nonexistent speck from Geary’s shoulder. “I miss my husband.”
“He misses you.”
“Hopefully, the admiral will get us home so we can spend a little while off my ship and his flagship. A little off-duty, private time.” She stepped back and smiled briefly. “I’ll be on the bridge, Admiral.”
“I’ll be in my stateroom, Captain.”
Five hours and ten minutes later a message came in from Haboob. “Midway says they will take them all,” Dr. Nasr said, looking happier than he had in months.
That had been quick. Iceni must not have spent much time thinking about it at all. Does she really care about them and their fates? Or does she see them as something to exploit, a source of information about the enigmas and leverage with the Syndic government and other star systems? The more, the better.
But those people aren’t prisoners. We freed them from imprisonment. They have expressed the desire to leave this fleet here at Midway, and Midway has agreed to take them. Do I have any choice but to hope Iceni does the decent thing?
No, I don’t. “Do you recommend that we turn them all over to Midway?” Geary asked, wanting that to be part of the official record.
“That is my recommendation, Admiral. I think the authorities here will treat in a civilized fashion those we liberated from the enigmas.”
“Then get them all on those shuttles. It’ll take a few extra runs, but get it done.”
One headache disposed of. Too bad there were a lot more left.
But now he could set a departure time. He had no trouble imagining how well received the news would be that the fleet was finally continuing its voyage home.
Humanity had built many large objects since the first hand grasped the first tool. Some of those objects had seemed awesomely large to those who constructed them, only to eventually be eclipsed by some new work that dwarfed what came before.
But the hypernet gates were in a class of their own. The many “tethers” that held together a matrix of energy formed a circle so large that even a human battleship appeared small as it approached a gate. Geary’s entire fleet, hundreds of warships, could enter a gate simultaneously. And the net created by the gates was unimaginably huge, spanning a volume hundreds of light-years across and granting direct access to scores of star systems.
The hypernet gate at Midway was close now, looming in space before the Alliance warships, looking like exactly what it was—a gateway to somewhere else.
Geary had his fleet together again, all of the warships in one titanic, egg-shaped formation that would serve well for defense but convey no offensive intent. In the most protected part of the oval were the assault transports, the auxiliaries, and the captured Kick superbattleship, the Invincible. Near those ships were most of the battleships in the fleet, forming an armored shell close to the weakest, most valuable units. Ranged outward from them were the battle cruisers, the heavy cruisers, the light cruisers, and the destroyers.
Battered and tired as they were—the crews as well as the ships—they still looked magnificent.
Geary took his eyes away from the reassuring image of strength on his display, carefully touching his comm control. “Captain Bradamont, we’re about to depart. I have every confidence in you. Use your best judgment. To the honor of our ancestors, Admiral Geary, out.”