Silence fell at the end of that statement. Geary took a long, slow breath, realizing there was something else he needed to say. “Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve told you before that I admired the courage of the personnel in this fleet. I freely admit that I’ve had difficulty grasping some of the changes in the Alliance fleet from my time to now, the changes wrought by a century of time, a century of war. But I tell you now that I had not fully realized one thing before this day.”
He paused, finding the right words. “The fleet I knew was smaller, professional, more highly trained. But we had not been tested in battle. Not like you have. And when Dauntless, Daring, and Diamond stood at that gate, standing their ground without a moment’s hesitation even though they were facing something so terrible I had never imagined the like, that’s when I truly realized just how courageous you all are. Every officer and sailor of this fleet has the right to stand among the finest the Alliance has ever seen. You could not possibly bring more honor to your ancestors than you have by your dedication to duty, your perseverance in the face of a seemingly endless war, your willingness to bear any burden in the defense of your homes. I am honored beyond all measure by having been granted the right to command you. I will bring this fleet home, if for no other reason than that such people as you deserve that your exploits be known to your homes, and you deserve to return safely to them. I will bring you home. I swear it.”
He stopped talking, worried that he had let too much emotion into the impromptu speech as the words tumbled out, worried that he had sounded foolish or patronizing. But everyone was watching him silently, their own faces solemn. Finally the commanding officer of Vambrace spoke again. “Thank you, sir. The honor is ours.” No one contradicted him. Not out loud, anyway.
Geary sat down after the meeting had ended and the virtual presences of the other officers had vanished, only Captain Desjani remaining. She smiled, saluted, and left, letting her expression and the gesture speak for her.
He had often wondered why fate had put him in this position, why he had lost all he had known and been thrust into a command far beyond his old responsibilities. The idea that he would ever be grateful for any part of that had never occurred to him. But, remembering the steady presences of Dauntless, Daring, and Diamond at the gate, Geary breathed a prayer of thanks for having such ships and sailors at his side.
THE ship’s night had begun, with Geary sitting in his stateroom staring at nothing, his mind filled with memories of the hell mouth within the hypernet gate, when his hatch alert sounded. Expecting Captain Desjani, he was startled when Victoria Rione entered, her face betraying some deep emotion. I probably ought to be mad at her for making my life even more difficult since Sutrah, but compared to what Falco did, it’s nothing. Rione isn’t going to cause the loss of a lot of ships. So Geary stood and spoke politely.
“Madam Co-President. I admit to being surprised by this visit. You haven’t been by here for some time.”
“Not unless you insisted, you mean?” Rione stated calmly.
“Yes. I hope you’re not planning to hand me the sort of problem I handed you at our last meeting here.”
“No.” She paused, apparently steeling herself to do something. “Captain Geary, I wish to apologize.”
That was a surprise. “Apologize?”
“Yes.” She indicated the star display floating above the table. “Since our argument at Sutrah I’ve done as I said I would. I ran simulations. I took this fleet along every possible path from Sutrah using the jump points we had planned on employing.” Rione hesitated, her jaw muscles tightening. “They all ended the same. Minor losses in system after system adding up while options kept being limited more and more by Syndic defensive moves, until the fleet ended up pinned between superior forces.”
Geary couldn’t help saying it. “So I was right.”
“You were right,” Rione agreed in a sharp voice. “I admit it.”
“What I told you that I’d worked out in my head was accurate enough to predict exactly what the simulations predicted.”
She nodded tightly, her expression hard. “You spoke the truth. I admit that as well. I apologize for questioning your motives.”
He shook his head, letting frustration show. “My motives? Hell, Madam Co-President, you all but called me a traitor to this fleet and the Alliance. You actually did use the word betray, didn’t you?”
“I did, and I admit I was wrong.” Rione’s eyes were flashing with resentment now. “Will you not accept my apology?”
“Yes. I will. Thank you.” Geary struggled not to lash out at her again, knowing he was actually angry at Falco and people like him. “The last several weeks have been difficult ones.”
“I know.” Rione shook her head. “It must have been very difficult to face Captain Falco’s betrayal.”
“It would’ve been easier if I’d had you to talk to.” Startled that he had actually said that, Geary looked to Rione, seeing her face composed again, carefully not betraying her feelings. “I’ve missed your counsel.”
“My counsel. I’m glad you find my counsel welcome.” Her voice was flat. “But you obviously don’t need it. Your judgment was superior to mine on where this fleet should go.”
Now what was she mad about? “Madam Co-President…” Geary struggled to find the right words. “I do need it. I don’t have many people to confide in. I don’t have many people I trust the way I trust you.”
Her expression was hard to read, but her eyes searched Geary’s face. “I can’t be the only person in this fleet you can trust.”
“No. It’s not just that. It’s…” Geary looked away, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. “I like having you around.”
Silence stretched for a few moments. He finally looked back at Rione, to see her still watching him. “Do you think I’m your friend, Captain Geary?”
He hadn’t gone there. Hadn’t been willing to consider it. “My last friend died a very long time ago.”
“Then accept new friends, Captain Geary!” Her renewed anger startled him.
“You don’t…Madam Co-President, if I…” Geary felt the words sticking in his throat, surprised to realize how hard it was to actually speak of his fears, of how it had felt to wake up from survival sleep and learn every friend, every acquaintance, everyone he had known, was long dead.
“Is this the man daring enough to take the Alliance fleet to Sancere?” Rione asked in a mocking voice.
“The hero of the fleet? The man who stood facing the mouth of hell? And he cannot bring himself to risk accepting a friend for fear of the possibility of loss?”
“You have no idea what this is like,” Geary stated angrily. “When they revived me, every single person I’d known was dead. All of them.”
“Are you the first to ever lose someone they cared about? Or everything they cared about? Let yourself live again, Captain Geary!”
“You don’t know—”
Her face turned furious for a moment. “A man I loved more than life itself died, Captain Geary, one more victim of this endless, ugly war! It happened more than a decade ago, but I can still see him clearly if I close my eyes. I had to decide whether to let myself die inside or try to live again. I knew what he would’ve wanted. I won’t deny it was hard, but I have lived.”
Geary just stared at her for a moment. “I’m sorry. Very sorry.”
The fury faded, replaced by weariness. “Damn you, John Geary, no one else has ever been able to make me lose control. Not since he died.”
“Why do you care?” he asked, feeling bewildered now. “Why do you care what I think? Why do you care what happens to me?”
She took a moment to answer. “I do care. You’re a remarkable man, Captain Geary. Even at your most infuriating.”
“You hate me!”
“I have never hated you!” Rione shot back at him. Then she grimaced. “That’s not quite true. When I thought you’d betrayed the fleet, believed that you’d lied to me and used me, I did hate what I assumed you were doing.”
“You accused me of betraying you personally, as well as the fleet.”
Rione nodded. “I told you that I thought you’d deliberately manipulated me. It wasn’t just my pride that was hurt by that. I’d let myself believe in you. I’d let myself…grow to care for you.”
Geary shook his head, feeling baffled again. “Do you actually like me, Madam Co-President?”
Rione looked upward as if beseeching aid. “You are so wise in the movements of fleets and such a dolt in reading the feelings of others. I’ve liked you for some time, Captain Geary. I wouldn’t have been so angered by what I thought was your betrayal if I hadn’t become fond of you, despite my instincts that warn me away from someone like you. My instincts that tell me you are not to be trusted, that you cannot be sincere.”
Geary wondered if his puzzlement showed. “You don’t trust me but you like me?”
“Yes. I will never trust Black Jack Geary,” Rione explained. For some reason she was smiling wryly at him. “But I’ve come to like John Geary. When he isn’t driving me insane. Who are you?”
“John Geary, I hope, Madam Co-President.”
“Madam Co-President? Is that who you wish to be here? If you care for me at all, if you consider me a friend, call me Victoria, John Geary!”
He stared at her again. “Care for you? I do. I hadn’t realized how much I’d grown to enjoy your company until I was deprived of it for a while.”
“I’m waiting,” she stated.
“Victoria.”
“That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
Geary uttered a small laugh, then sat down again. “It was very hard.”
“Try saying it again. It may get easier.”
He watched her, trying to figure out what Rione was doing. “All right, Victoria.”
She sat down next to him, her face somber now. “You’re not the only lonely person in this fleet, John Geary. Not the only person in need of comfort with few places to turn.”
“I know that. But I only knew my feelings. I missed not seeing you and not talking to you.”
“Why didn’t you ever tell me that?”
Geary shook his head, smiling ruefully. “You know the reason as well as I do. Aside from the fact that you were refusing to talk to me, I’m the commander of this fleet. I can’t do anything with anyone that isn’t professional and business-related, not unless I know they want it. I have too much power for it to be otherwise, even if every person under my command isn’t already off-limits for other reasons.”
“And every single person in this fleet is under your command,” Rione noted. “Save one. I’m not off-limits.”
“No, but…even you can’t forget the authority I wield. No one can look at me and see just me. They see the fleet commander. They see someone who could misuse their power to coerce or to reward for the wrong reasons. I have to avoid even appearing to misuse my authority that way. That’s just the way it is.”
“Many of them look at you and see Black Jack Geary,” Rione noted.
“Yeah.” Geary shrugged. “Being perfect in every way, Black Jack wouldn’t even consider doing the wrong thing, I’m sure. No matter how much he liked a woman.”
“Oh? Do you like me so much, John Geary?”
He couldn’t help grinning. “When you’re not driving me insane.”
“Then why do you fear to show it even now? Will you just talk, or will you act?”
He had thought there had already been plenty of surprises, but that startled him even more. Geary stared at Rione again. “What?”
To his further surprise, she smiled. “We’ve already agreed that I’m not off-limits to you. We’ve already agreed that we’re both lonely people in need of comfort, people who have both lost those we cared about. We’re both people who have responsibilities that they cannot share. Therefore, I’d like you to show me how much you like me.”
Geary had been prepared for many things to possibly happen while the fleet was in Sancere Star System, but this hadn’t been one of them. Caught totally off guard, he just stared at her.
Rione shook her head, still smiling. “You act like you’ve never kissed a woman before.”
There couldn’t be any doubt. She meant it. He’d resigned himself to a lack of physical contact to match his emotional isolation, but it seemed he had been wrong about that. “I have, but it’s been a century since I did that last.”
“I trust you haven’t forgotten how.”
“I hope not.”
“Then show me. For a dashing hero, you can be very hesitant at times.”
Oddly enough, the kiss did feel to Geary as if it was the first in almost a century. “What’s going on, Madam Co-President?”
Rione shook her head, looking upward again, this time in apparent despair. “Madam Co-President will not answer.”
“I’m sorry,” Geary stated with mock formality. “Victoria, what’s going on?”
“I’m trying to seduce you, John Geary. Haven’t you figured that out yet? How can you be so oblivious with me when you can guess what the Syndics are going to be doing three star systems down the line?”
He gazed at her for a moment longer before he thought of an answer. “The Syndics are easier to figure out. Why, Victoria?”
She sighed. “You must be the only sailor in the universe who’d ask a partner that before the act instead of after. I don’t know why. Maybe because we both gazed into infinity today and ended up surviving the experience. Why does it matter?”
Geary took another moment to answer. “I guess it matters because I think you matter.” Rione smiled in a very genuine way, which made her look very nice, so he kissed the smile. Before he could pull away again, her arms were around him, and he decided that he didn’t want to move away.
As it turned out, kissing wasn’t the only thing Geary remembered how to do. By the time Victoria Rione’s body arched beneath his, Geary had recalled a few other things well enough to satisfy his partner. As they collapsed together, spent, Geary realized that this was the first time since being thawed out from the survival pod that he couldn’t sense any trace of ice inside his body or soul. The discovery both elated and frightened him.
HIS communications alert sounded and Geary jerked awake, rolling to slap the control and remembering only at the last instant to keep the video off so no one would see he wasn’t alone. “Geary here.”
“Sir, Captain Desjani sends her respects, and wishes to inform you that Colonel Carabali is expressing concern regarding the movements of Alliance fleet Formation Bravo.”