“That’s true,” Rione conceded. “Maybe my threats are my own form of retaliation, something I should know won’t really work but make me feel better.”
“No, the threat is still a good idea. The impact will take place over the long haul, so it can’t help us anytime soon, but it might change the plans of the Syndics in coming months. And there’s always the chance that if something else is planned for this star system, the local authorities might call it off, using your threats as justification.”
She nodded, as if thinking of something else, then spoke abruptly. “This diversion through Sobek is costing us time, isn’t it? How much?”
“Not too much,” Geary said, knowing that Rione was asking that question because of her concern for her husband, still sedated and now in sick bay on Dauntless. “It’s a bit longer a path than if we’d come through Indras as originally planned, but only ten days more unless we run into significant obstacles at Simur or Padronis. Atalia is so close to Alliance territory that I don’t think the Syndics could have prestaged any attacks there without them being spotted, even assuming that Atalia would cooperate with the Syndics.”
“Ten days can be a long time, Admiral,” Rione said, one of the few times she openly admitted to the strains upon her.
Geary nodded in reply, not certain what words would be right, if any, and thinking about the sort of obstacles this fleet might encounter the rest of the way back to Varandal.
Over the next several hours, Geary was bombarded with messages from the Syndic authorities in Sobek Star System. They demanded to know exactly what had caused the hypernet gate to collapse, they demanded to know why the Alliance warships were taking a path diving through the star system if they were simply headed for the jump point for Simur, they demanded that the fleet release to their custody any Syndicate World citizens in Alliance custody, and, in a breathtaking bit of gall, they demanded payment for the Alliance fleet’s use of the hypernet gate.
Geary was on the bridge of Dauntless when Rione informed him of the latest demand. Before replying, he made sure the privacy field around him was activated so none of the bridge watch-standers could overhear. “Emissary Rione, please inform the Syndicate authorities that they can go to hell, where they will doubtless receive everything that is due them.”
“Do you want me to phrase that diplomatically?” she asked.
“If you want to. I’m not worried about offending them. What’s the proper reply on the prisoners issue?”
She spread her hands apologetically. “The individuals in our custody have no proof of Syndic citizenship. We have to assume that they are stateless unless the authorities here want to both claim them as citizens and accept responsibility for their actions.”
“That works for me.” He paused, looking at his display. “Lieutenant Iger and his people have found no evidence of any Alliance prisoners of war in this star system. It’s just as well. If they were here, the local Syndics would probably try to bargain a swap for the prisoners we hold now.”
“There’s been no hint of that,” Rione said.
“What about the stealth shuttles we destroyed? Any comments from the CEOs about that?”
Rione actually rolled her eyes in a rare display of open contempt. “The Syndic authorities here blame that and everything else on rogue elements and unknown actors who are all not operating under the authority of the Syndicate Worlds. They are, in their words, shocked that military equipment ended up in the hands of criminals who, for reasons of their own, attacked us.”
“Too bad you can’t strangle a virtual image in a transmission,” Geary said.
“That is a shame. I’m a bit disappointed they aren’t making a better effort at lying about what they’re doing.” Her expression had turned grim. “It may be that they want us to react, to overreact, in a way that nullifies the peace treaty. Or the opposite could be true, that they think Black Jack won’t overreact, that you will keep your responses limited and thus allow the Syndics to keep inflicting minor injuries upon us until they add up to major injury.”
“Orion wasn’t a minor injury,” Geary said. “What do you think my options are?”
“Walk a tightrope, Admiral. Hit them back harder than they expect but not so hard that they can cry injustice.”
“How am I supposed to figure out what’s hard enough but not too hard?”
Rione smiled. “I can help with that. As I did with the unfortunate loss of the hypernet gate here.”
“I see.” Geary cocked a questioning eye at her. “What exactly have the Syndics said about the gate?”
“You just want to hear how upset they are, so you’ll be pleased to hear that they’re screaming bloody murder about it. Demanding data that explain the collapse of the gate and prove that our engineers didn’t themselves inflict the damage on purpose. Demanding compensation. Expressing great distress at such an act of aggression. Don’t look so murderous, Admiral. If you answered them looking like that, you’d be proving their, um, outrageous claims.”
“I have to admit, the sheer nerve of some of these Syndics is starting to get to me,” Geary said when he thought he had his voice under control.
Rione smiled again. “I’m a bit more used to it. I am expressing surprise, shock, and dismay at their charges. I am asking for evidence. I am invoking the arbitration clause of the peace treaty. I am promising to look into the matter. They know I am playing with them, that nothing will be done, that their hypernet gate is gone, and they will never be able to prove we had anything to do with its loss, and all of that, I assure you, is driving them completely up the wall.”
He smiled back at her. “You’re good at driving people up the wall, aren’t you?”
“It’s a gift.”
“Why are you being so helpful again? Did finding the Kicks and the Dancers really change things that much?”
She looked away, then back at him. “What changed things a lot was your discovering what was wrong with my husband. The thing done to Commander Benan, and the reason why it was done, are so far beyond what the public of the Alliance would accept that I now have a weapon that gives me an immense amount of leverage. Those who tried to use me, who blackmailed me, will know that.”
“But if you go public with that, it might literally kill your husband.”
Rione nodded calmly. “In my place, they would do such a thing anyway, and so they will believe that I would as well. Beware of people who are certain they are right, Admiral. That certainty allows them to justify almost any act in pursuit of their goals.”
“Like the Syndic CEOs in this star system?” Geary asked, hearing the bitterness in his voice. If only there had been some way to make them personally pay for what happened to Orion…
She shook her head. “I’d be very surprised if there’s any idealism there, Admiral, any sense of right and wrong. Those CEOs were doing what they thought would benefit them personally. There might have been private motives of revenge if they had lost someone to the war, but my conversations with former-CEO Iceni at Midway gave me some more insight into the CEO way of thinking. Their internal-security service produced true believers, but everyone else was motivated by self-interest or fear.”
“How does a system like that survive?” Geary asked.
“Self-interest and fear.”
“I was asking a serious question.”
Rione gave him that superior look. “And I was giving you a serious answer. Self-interest and fear work, for a while. Until self-interest, unconstrained by any higher loyalty, becomes more destructive than the system can endure, and until the people’s fear of acting against their system becomes less than their fear of continuing to live with it. Eventually, those things always happen. In the case of the Syndicate Worlds, the war meant that their leaders were able to use fear of us to reinforce fear of going against their system. The Syndicate Worlds is coming apart not just because of the stresses from the war and not just because it lost that war and a great deal of its military in the process, but also because fear of the Alliance can no longer be stoked to bind individuals, and individual star systems, to the Syndicate government.”