The way the question was phrased told him that Jane wasn’t asking about official reporting or anything like that. “Our ancestors haven’t spoken to me about that. But I haven’t sensed any message from Michael among them, either.” The meaning of that was ambiguous at best, but messages from the ancestors were usually like that.
“I haven’t, either.” Jane frowned, realizing that they had veered onto personal topics better discussed in person. “That’s all I have for now, Admiral.”
“Let’s get together tomorrow,” Geary said. “It’s always good to see you again.”
As Jane Geary’s image disappeared, Tanya, sensing his distress, abruptly changed the subject. “I hear that Roberto Duellos is going on leave for a while.”
Geary nodded, feeling relieved to be back on more comfortable ground. “Inspire is going to be in dock to get her main propulsion units and some hull structure damage repaired. He didn’t have any professional excuse to stay here, so I suggested he go home and talk to his wife. I told him they had to make some decisions together, or they’d each be making them alone before long.”
Desjani regarded him closely. “You’ve been doing some thinking, too, haven’t you?”
“Yes. Tanya, in some ways it was good to be away from you.”
“What?”
“I mean, it’s hard to think when you’re there. You’re distracting and you demand my attention and—”
She had stood straight, her arms coming out of their relaxed crossed stance. “I’m demanding?”
The temperature in his stateroom seemed to have abruptly dropped by several degrees. “You know what I mean.”
“No. No, I don’t.”
Geary stood up, making a calming gesture. “Then let me explain. When you’re there, I don’t need to ask myself why I’m here. You provide all of the answers, just by being there. You’re my reasons.”
“Oh, please.”
“I’m serious!” He gestured toward the star display with a wide sweep of one arm. “But out there, you weren’t around. I had to think about that. I knew what I could do, but what should I do? I’ve had this growing sense that the answer was coming to me, and when I was in a meeting with the government of Adriana and the other Alliance commanders in that star system, I found the start of an answer. I thought more, and I talked to our ancestors, and I think I get it now.”
Her hostility had vanished, replaced by curiosity. “And the answer is?”
Geary sat down, frowning at his hands in his lap as he tried to find the right words. “We think that the Dancers believe the universe is a pattern, that everything is a pattern, and we think they act to make the pattern right and strong. What if there’s some truth to that which we humans can see? What kind of pattern do I want to exist, and how can I add to that pattern and make it stronger? Maybe the pattern of humanity is completely coming apart, shredded by our own actions, including the war, and the covert sabotage by the enigmas. Maybe I can still help fix it. Maybe I was given this ability to influence events so I can help make our pattern strong again.”
She smiled, shaking her head. “How many times have I told you that exact same thing?”
“You never said anything to me about my place in a pattern.”
“All right, maybe I didn’t use the exact same words when telling you the exact same thing, but that doesn’t matter. Maybe being away from me gave you time to finally listen to me instead of being, um, distracted by me.”
Geary sighed. “I didn’t mean distracted in a bad way.”
“You know what, Admiral? I’m going to save you by not pursuing that line of conversation any further.”
“Thank you.” He moved his hands as if trying to shape something. “That’s what I decided to do at Adriana and Batara, to do what I could to strengthen what I thought would be the best pattern. I got a lot of confidence from that because it finally focused me on something other than the mistakes I might make. I may get raked over the coals for talking to the press so freely and for exceeding the letter of my orders, but they said to deal with the refugee problem, so I did what I thought best to resolve that issue for the long term and to leave Alliance security in that region in much better shape. And I planted some seeds at Adriana and at Batara, while also knocking down the threat of Tiyannak, that might bear some good long-term outcomes for everyone in that part of space.”
Tanya nodded, still smiling. “And you also blew up a lot of stuff. So I’m good with all that.”
“Is there anything else I need to know that isn’t in the official status reports and can’t be said over any supposedly secure circuits?”
“Yes.” Her smile disappeared. “You got a message from that woman. It came in two days ago.”
Geary frowned at Desjani’s tone, trying to parse the emotions behind it and failing. “I’ll check it—”
“You don’t have to. It was security-sealed eyes only for you, but it opened for me, too.” Desjani didn’t say what they both knew, that Rione must have set it that way. “The entire message was one word, and that was ‘missing.’”
“The one word was missing?” Geary asked, confused.
“No,” Desjani repeated patiently. “The entire message consisted of only one word, and that word said ‘missing.’”
There was only a single likely meaning for that. “Her husband.”
“Yeah.”
“They were supposed to be lifting the mental block on him!” Geary yelled in sudden anger. “They were supposed to be repairing the mental and emotional damage the block caused!”
“Maybe they are, but wherever they’re doing it, that woman can’t find him.”
“If Rione can’t find him…” Geary muttered.
“Yeah,” Desjani repeated. “I can’t stand her, but I don’t underestimate her. Her husband must be hidden very, very well.”
Hidden along with the secrets her husband knew about an Alliance biological warfare program that would at the least embarrass some senior officials and might lead to some being charged with war crimes. “Unity Alternate,” Geary said angrily.
“Unity Alternate? I can’t remember the last time I heard that joke.” Desjani grimaced. “But if a place like that existed, it would be a good place to hide him. And Admiral Bloch.”
“Still no word on Bloch?”
“No. It’s as if he vanished off the space of the galaxy, like someone dumped him out an air lock in jump space.” She looked thoughtful. “I doubt we were lucky enough for that to have happened, though.”
“I’m not sure I would wish that even on Bloch,” Geary said, trying to suppress a shudder at the idea of body and soul being lost forever in the gray nothingness of jump space.
“I might,” she replied. “He made a heavy-handed pass at me before that last campaign, you know.”
“He… what?”
“Yeah. Came aboard, I escorted him to his stateroom, this stateroom, and he went over by the bed, then looked at me and said something like You could make admiral yourself someday if you did the right things for the right people. You could start right now.”
Geary’s earlier emotions were lost in a surge of red rage. “You were already in his chain of command, you were a captain in the fleet, and he…”
“Yes, he did.”
“On your own ship!” Geary’s anger was replaced by a rush of puzzlement. “You didn’t kill him?”
“Killing superior officers is frowned upon in fleet regulations. Didn’t we go over that at some point?”
“You could have brought charges!”
She shook her head. “I knew he was wearing the same personal security that the politicians do. Nothing he was saying could be recorded by any of the ship’s systems. It would have been my word against his, fleet commander versus one of his subordinates who already had a reputation for her attitude. I’ve been known to fight hopeless battles, Admiral, but I took a pass on that one.” Her smile held a very sharp edge. “But I also made it clear what would happen if he made another pass like that at me.”