The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Steadfast (20 page)

Duellos nodded approvingly. “Not bad. Spoken with authority, but not with enough force to get their backs up, and extending a hand for cooperation. You always say you’re not good at politics, but that wasn’t bad at all.”

“I guess I’ve spent too much time around Victoria Rione. She’s always made a point of explaining things like that to me.”

“Ah. I see. That woman.”

“Don’t you start calling her that, too. It’s bad enough that Tanya refuses to say her name.”

Duellos grinned. “I just want you to feel at home.”

“Thanks.” Geary gestured toward his display. “Can your comm people do some analysis for me?”

“Certainly. What do have in mind?” Duellos asked, intrigued.

“According to what we’re picking up so far, all of the ground and aerospace assets at Adriana are still at full strength and ready for action. But First Fleet’s warships were ordered to send out deceptive status reports about their readiness.”

“And the same might be happening here?” Duellos nodded. “But if it is, analyzing comm patterns will give us an idea of whether or not the external picture we’re getting is a true one. Yes, Admiral, my crew can get you something on that. It will take a while to assemble a good picture, but within a day or so we should be able to tell you whether Adriana’s defenses are still solid or just a hollow shell.”

 • • • 

THE
first reply came from Colonel Galland, about six and a half hours later. She looked tired, but her eyes were sharp. “Welcome to Adriana, Admiral. I see that your destroyers are already on the move. I appreciate your assistance in collecting the rest of the Syndic refugee ships. We’ve been overwhelmed by the number of ships and refugees, and my craft aren’t designed for this kind of situation. The fleet always handled things like this, usually intercepting it at Yokai. But the last fleet assets were apparently pulled out of Yokai a couple of months ago. There were two fleet destroyers still here at Adriana, but they were withdrawn three weeks ago. Since then, we’ve been scrambling to handle the refugee problem with what we have on hand.”

Galland smiled bitterly. “Half of my squadrons were supposed to be decommissioned by now, but I won a reprieve by getting the local government to raise hell with Adriana’s senators at Unity. I’m still expecting the cutbacks to take effect at some point, though, so unless you’re going to be stationed here for the long haul, we need to come up with a solution for what is going on at Batara. Once those squadrons are gone, my headquarters here will probably be downsized as well, and me with them. You might find this seat empty when you get back from Batara.”

She smiled without visible humor again. “If you don’t know General Sissons, fair warning. He’s a neutron star. No light, no warmth, just toxic radiation that destroys bodies and souls in his vicinity. He’ll want you to do everything, he’ll find reasons not to do anything himself, and he’ll take credit for everything that went right when it’s done. But he sucks up to the right people, so he’ll survive the reductions in force. He’s only got a few months left here before he jaunts off to ground forces headquarters.”

The sour smile shifted to grim resolve. “Admiral, I spent fifteen years fighting the Syndics and protecting Alliance star systems against them. My predecessor in this job died fending off an assault on this star system while your fleet was fighting its way back home from Prime. And now all that’s left is coping with refugees, getting ready to turn off the lights when the last person leaves this building, and turning in my uniform when I get downsized, too. Which is why I’m being frank with you. I’d rather go out having accomplished something than playing along in hopes of prolonging my career another year or so. There’s not much more I can do with my hands full just keeping the Syndic refugees from scattering into Alliance territory. Whatever else I can do, though, I will. To the honor of our ancestors, Galland, out.”

The reply from General Sissons came in nearly six hours after that. By checking local planetary time, Geary could see that his message had reached the planet during the night. Sissons hadn’t sent his reply until morning.

“This is General Sissons. Geary, I want full status updates on all of your ships and a briefing on your plan of action for returning the refugees to Batara using fleet assets only. My own forces have commitments that have stretched them to their limits. I see that you’ve already taken some limited actions to compensate for the lamentable lack of fleet support here in recent months. I don’t approve of unilateral decisions regarding the movements of your forces, which should be coordinated beforehand with my headquarters. For your future information, all communications with local governments, local law enforcement, local aerospace command, or anyone outside this star system, including fleet headquarters, must go through my headquarters using established channels in accordance with existing protocols. If you still have questions about my expectations and your orders, contact my chief of staff. Sissons, out.”

Geary’s first reaction when the message ended was to say a heartfelt prayer of thanks to the living stars that he wasn’t actually under the authority of General Sissons even though the general had done all he could to create the impression by his words that Geary would have to clear all of his actions and communications through him. Having finished the prayer, Geary mentally ran through a variety of entertaining responses he could send Sissons.
But I can’t really tell him off like I want to. Anything I say to him has to appear reasonable and appropriate to others. I don’t want Sissons to goad me into making myself look bad.

He formulated a reply, imagining that first Tanya, then Victoria Rione were critiquing it. “General Sissons, this is the commander of Alliance fleet forces in Adriana Star System,” Geary began, keeping his tone bland. “In reply to your suggestions, I must inform you that I will abide by standard Alliance fleet communications protocols and communicate directly with anyone I have to contact. I am always open to your suggestions for the most effective employment of the fleet forces under my command, but of course authority for such actions rests with me. Since you have been dealing with the Syndic refugee problem here for some months, and my orders specify that ground forces
will
provide security for refugee return operations, I am interested in seeing as soon as possible the contingency plans and options your headquarters must have already developed for resolving the problem using
your
forces. Geary, out.”

He was still basking in the pleasure of having respectfully told Sissons where to stick his expectations when another message arrived, this one from the Adriana Star System government.

Most of the government seemed to have assembled to stand in the background as the elderly woman in the front spoke. Thanks to medical and genetic advances, age didn’t visibly appear in people anymore until they were getting near the ends of their lives, so Geary realized this woman must have been born in the first decades of the war, making her the closest thing to a contemporary he now had.

“Welcome, Admiral Geary,” she said with formal dignity. “The people of Adriana are honored beyond measure by your presence here and cannot express too strongly our gratitude for your assistance in dealing with our current troubles. We understand that you will be very busy with your labors, and will be contacting us regarding them, but if you have any time at all for social events we wanted you to know that the Adriana Academy for Children of the Armed Forces here contains a child who is descended from one of your crew on the
Merlon
. We know you would want to be aware of that. To the honor of our ancestors, President Astrida, out.”

Once again, he found himself staring at the empty place where a message had been playing out. They wanted him to physically visit their world, their city. Everyone wanted Black Jack to do that. With rare exceptions, he had been able to avoid doing so, begging off on the grounds of duty. He had seen firsthand on Kosatka how the citizens of the Alliance reacted to Black Jack, and the hero worship there, worship for someone he knew he was not, had unnerved him and strengthened his resolve to avoid similar situations.

However, a descendant of someone who had been on his heavy cruiser during the battle at Grendel? Just what was an Academy for Children of the Armed Forces? Some sort of college or university?

Geary looked up the term and read it twice before the meaning sank in.
Orphanages established and funded by the Alliance government for those children who have lost both parents during military service in the war.

Both parents. And according to the ship’s database, there were enough children so afflicted that the Alliance had established dozens of those academies on worlds scattered throughout Alliance space. Captain Tulev . . . had he spent part of his childhood at such an academy after his home world was all but destroyed?

Geary himself had lost his entire living family to the war as well, though as an adult, when he literally slept through the rest of their lives while frozen in that escape pod. If he had been a child, it would have hurt so much more. He knew that. He didn’t want to go. He didn’t want to face those children. But . . .

Orphans. Why did it have to be orphans?

I’ll go see them. I’ll find the time. I owe them that.

 • • • 

“ADMIRAL,
I have the information you asked for,” Duellos said.

Geary looked over at Duellos. He was trying to stop the simmering anger caused by the latest reply from General Sissons, which had simply punted the problem back to Geary rather than offering either forces or solutions. The anger was aimed as much at himself as at Sissons.
I should have realized that Sissons could keep up this kind of thing indefinitely. I need a way to pressure him into supporting what it looks like will have to be my plan.

The battle cruisers
Inspire
,
Formidable
,
Implacable
, and the light cruisers with them, were only twenty-four light-minutes, or about four hours’ travel time at point one light speed, distant from the primary world at Adriana as they continued en route the planet. Geary, uncomfortable in the flag-officer quarters aboard
Inspire
, had come to the bridge to watch events and get a better feel for how
Inspire
ran. “Which information was that?”

“The true status of the military forces in this star system.” Duellos gestured a tall, trim male lieutenant forward. “Lieutenant Barber, please give the Admiral a rundown.”

“Yes, sir.” Barber called up a virtual window and began explaining it to Geary. “These are aerospace unit and base designations. Over here are ground forces unit and base designations. These lines represent all of the comm traffic to and from those units and bases that we’ve been able to identify. More traffic, thicker lines, less traffic, thinner lines. Much of the traffic on Adriana’s main planet would be by ground channels, such as buried cables, which we can’t spot from out here, but by monitoring message sequence numbers, we’re able to tell how many messages we’re not seeing.”

“That’s clear enough,” Geary said. “The aerospace units all seem to be pretty busy.”

“Yes, sir. We assess that the status reports we’re seeing from the aerospace forces are accurate and do represent the actual forces present in this star system.” Barber paused, his lips thinning as he looked to the ground forces side of the image. “But for the ground forces, some units don’t seem to be communicating with each other or with their headquarters except for those status reports saying all is well and they are at almost one hundred percent readiness.”

Geary shook his head. “You’re saying some ground forces units, but to me it looks like most of those units.”

“Yes, sir. Which is especially odd since elements of those units are supposed to be on duty at facilities off planet. There would have to be a lot of messages we could see. There’s nothing going to or from them, though, except daily status reports. One of my chiefs ran a pattern analysis on those status reports coming from units that had no other comm traffic. She found that when all reports are compared against each other, the number of minor problems reported each day, such as the number of personnel sick or percent of equipment temporarily degraded, closely matches the results produced by a simple random number generator.”

“They’re fake,” Geary said.

“Yes, sir,” Lieutenant Barber agreed. “My assessment is that those units do not actually exist.”

Geary looked toward Duellos. “Some of those units have been assigned to Adriana for a long time.”

“True enough,” Duellos said. “But that doesn’t mean they are still here.”

“The units were disestablished, but they were left in the comm systems?”

“In the entire command and control system,” Duellos corrected. “If you’re going to maintain the illusion of an army, you have to ensure the command and control system reflects that illusion.”

“My best estimate,” Lieutenant Barber said, “is that each of the two ground forces divisions still assigned here actually only have a single brigade of soldiers still active. The rest of the ground forces organization is just an empty shell that, as Captain Duellos says, produces the illusion of a much larger force than really exists.”

“Force reductions,” Geary said as he studied the image showing Barber’s analysis. “Done in such a way as to mask their impact. Ground forces divisions have three brigades these days? That means the ground forces in Adriana have been cut by two-thirds. The locals must know, though. You can’t hide all of those empty garrisons and camps. You can’t hide the lack of soldiers going out on liberty and spending money on the local economy.”

“The locals may know the truth,” Duellos said, “or they may be starting to guess the truth, but they may not wish to accept it. With what you told me about Yokai, it’s clear that the Alliance is going to extensive efforts to conceal how the force reductions have impacted its defenses near the border with the Syndicate Worlds.”

Lieutenant Barber pointed to some of the ground forces unit designations. “Sir, the locals may have been told that those missing soldiers were sent to Yokai. I saw a couple of reports that indicated the locals believe that the defenses at Yokai have been strengthened.”