Valiant

All around Dauntless, the now-widely dispersed ships of the Alliance fleet were making emergency battle repairs and running down Syndic warships knocked out but not destroyed in the battle, to ensure that their power cores were overloaded. Nothing was to be left for the Syndics to salvage. Shuttles flew between Alliance ships, carrying critically needed replacement parts for those warships requiring them. Destroyers and light cruisers darted around, finding and picking up every Alliance escape pod ejected by ships lost during the battle. Geary had already heard of one such pod, containing sailors who had abandoned the battleship Indefatigable during the first engagement in Lakota Star System weeks ago, been captured by the Syndics and taken to the wreck of Audacious, been liberated by Alliance Marines earlier today and taken to the heavy cruiser Fascine, then had to abandon Fascine when the heavy cruiser was shot up, and finally been rescued again by the light cruiser Tsuba. He wondered if those sailors regarded themselves as lucky or unlucky, and whether or not they were worried by the fact that they’d kept ending up on progressively smaller warships.

Rione stood up with her own heavy sigh. “I need to check on a few things. Let me know if you need me,” she told Geary.

Needing her could mean a number of different things. The ambiguity of the phrase made him wonder if Rione had decided it was time for them to share a physical relationship again. Then Geary spotted Desjani’s teeth clenching for a moment, her eyes rigidly fixed on her display before she relaxed herself. Apparently Desjani had interpreted the phrase the same way and hadn’t liked it. He hadn’t noticed that kind of reaction from her before and wondered if Desjani was more worried about Rione’s influence on him than he had realized.

He could scarcely discuss that now, though, so Geary turned toward Rione and shook his head. “I’ll be fine. Get some rest.”

“That’s not too likely, but I’ll try.”

Desjani visibly relaxed after Rione had left. “You should get some rest, too, sir.”

“There’s a lot of after-battle mess to clean up,” Geary replied.

“We can handle that. You’ve already ordered our ships to return to their places in Fleet Formation Delta Two once they finish their postbattle operations. They can do that without you watching them. Even Orion and Conqueror can carry out tasks reliably if they’re not being shot at.”

“Yeah, I guess they can.” Geary stood, surprised by how unsteady on his feet he felt. “Are you going to get any rest?”

Desjani shrugged apologetically. “I’m the captain of Dauntless, sir.”

“And captains of warships never get to rest.” He hesitated, then asked the question he had wanted to avoid. “How many did Dauntless lose?”

She took a deep breath, then answered in a steady voice. “Twelve. We were lucky. Another nineteen wounded, two critically.”

“I’m sorry.” Geary rubbed his forehead, meaningless phrases about honoring their sacrifices rolling through his brain. Twelve more sailors who would never again see Alliance space, never again see their homes, families, and loved ones. Twelve more just on this lightly damaged ship. Multiply that across the fleet, and the great victory suddenly felt even less worthy of celebration.

Maybe Desjani felt the same. As if reading his mind, she shook her head. “I guess we’re all a little shell-shocked, sir. Tomorrow I’ll be able to appreciate what we did here. Right now I’m just trying to keep going.”

“You and me both.” He frowned down at the deck. “What was I doing?”

“Rest, sir,” Desjani prodded.

“If you can remember that, you’re in better shape than I am. I’ll be back up here in a little while.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Call me in an hour or so.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I mean it, Captain Desjani.”

“Yes, sir.”

He left the bridge, somehow certain that Desjani had decided that she wouldn’t actually call him unless another emergency erupted but too tired to debate the issue any longer.

HIS stateroom comm alert buzzed angrily, jerking Geary awake. He’d fallen asleep in a chair and took a moment to orient himself before acknowledging the call.

“Captain Geary,” Desjani reported, “there’s a problem at the Syndic hypernet gate.”

His stomach turned to lead. “Reinforcements for the Syndics? ” His fleet wasn’t in any shape to fight another major engagement. The aliens on the other side of Syndic space had diverted a big Syndic force to Lakota the last time the Alliance fleet was in the star system, baffling the Syndics but giving them an opportunity to destroy the Alliance fleet. They’d come far too close to succeeding. Somehow the aliens had known the Alliance fleet would be at Lakota the first time, but his immediate jump back should have thrown off even whatever means of tracking the aliens were using.

“No, sir.” Geary’s initial relief at Desjani’s words vanished as she continued speaking. “The Syndic guard force is destroying the gate.”