She shrugged. “You have to be realistic, Captain Geary. Unfortunately, there are some people who refuse to learn until they see errors literally blow up their faces.” Her voice fell, and her eyes closed. “As happened just now.”

So she was affected by the losses. Geary felt a surge of relief. As the only civilian in the fleet, the only person not under his command, Rione was the only person he felt able to confide in. He was beginning to discover he also liked her, an unfamiliar feeling for him after the isolation of being in a time a century removed from his own. After the isolation of finding himself among people whose culture had changed in many ways large and small from the one Geary had known.

Rione looked up again. “Why, Captain Geary? I don’t pretend to be an expert on the military, but those four ship commanders had seen that your way of doing things worked. The way the fleet used to fight, back in your time. They’d seen a large Syndic force destroyed to the last ship. How could they possibly believe that charging headlong at the enemy was wise?”

Geary shook his head, not looking at her. “Because, to the great misfortune of humanity, military history is very often the story of commanders repeating the same unsuccessful way of fighting again and again while their own forces are destroyed in droves. I don’t pretend to know why that is, but it’s a sad truth; commanders who don’t learn from immediate or long-term experience, who keep hurling their forces forward as if causing the same useless deaths time and again will eventually change the outcome.”

“Surely not all commanders could be like that.”

“No, of course not. Though it seems they tend to collect in the highest ranks, where they can do the most damage.” Geary finally looked over at Rione. “Many of these ship commanders are good, brave sailors. But they’ve spent their entire careers being told how to fight one way. It’ll take a while to overcome all of that hidebound experience and convince them that change is not a bad thing. Change doesn’t come easily to the military, even when that change is a return to the professional tactics of the past. It’s still change from the way things are.”

Rione sighed and shook her head. “I’ve seen the many ancient traditions that the military holds dear and sometimes wonder if it thereby attracts too many of those who value lack of change over accomplishment.”

Geary shrugged. “Maybe, but those traditions can be a tremendous source of strength. You told me some time back that this fleet was brittle, prone to break under pressure. If I can successfully reforge it stronger, it’ll be in no small part because of the traditions that I can draw on.”

She accepted his statement without any sign of whether or not she believed it. “I do have some information that may help to partially explain the actions of those four ships. Since we left jump space and the communications net became active, some of my sources have reported that rumors have been spread through ships. Rumors that you, having lost your fighting spirit, would rather allow Syndic warships to escape to fight another day than risk engaging them.”

Geary found himself laughing in disbelief. “How could anyone believe that after Kaliban? We tore that Syndic flotilla apart. Not a one got away.”

“People will believe what they wish to believe,” Rione observed.

“You mean like believing Black Jack Geary is a mythical hero?” he asked sourly. “Half the time they want to worship me, the warrior from the past who’s going to save this fleet and the Alliance by winning a war a century old, and the other half of the time they spread rumors that I’m incompetent or afraid.” Geary finally sat down, gesturing Rione to a seat opposite him. “So what else are your spies in my fleet telling you, Madam Co-President?”

“Spies?” she repeated in a surprised tone as she sat down. “That’s such a negative term.”

“It’s only negative if the spies are working for your enemy.” Geary rested his chin on one fist, regarding her. “Are you my enemy?”

“You know I distrust you,” Rione replied. “At first it was because I feared the hero worship that could make you as big a threat to the Alliance and this fleet as the Syndics. Now it’s because of that, and because you’ve proven yourself a very capable man. That combination is very dangerous.”

“But as long as what I’m doing is in the best interests of the Alliance, we’re on the same side?” Geary inquired, letting some sarcasm show. “I’m worried about what that mine ambush says about our enemy, Madam Co-President.”

She frowned at him. “What does it tell you about our enemy that you did not already know?”

“It says the Syndics are thinking. It says they’re being smart, like when they tricked this fleet into taking their hypernet to the Syndic home system so it could run into a war-ending ambush.”

“Which would’ve succeeded if not for the unlooked-for presence of the century-old hero of the Alliance, Captain Black Jack Geary,” Rione stated half-mockingly. “Found on the edge of final death in a lost survival pod, like an ancient king miraculously returned to life to save his people in their hour of greatest need.”

He grimaced back at her. “To you that’s funny, because you don’t have to live with people believing you’re that person.”

“I’ve told you that you are that person. And, no, I don’t find it funny at all.”

Geary wished he understood her better. Since being rescued, he’d been in the military environment of the fleet and had been badly surprised by some of the cultural changes wrought by a century of bitter war. But his only direct contact with civilian culture in the Alliance was Victoria Rione, and she kept much hidden. He couldn’t tell how much had changed back home and in what ways, and he really wanted to know.

But Rione isn’t likely to help me better understand Alliance civilian culture if she thinks I could use that knowledge to make myself more of a threat to the Alliance government. Maybe someday she’ll trust me enough to unwind about such things. Geary sat forward, working the controls on the table between them that still seemed a bit unfamiliar, even after months in this stateroom. An image of Sutrah sprang up, next to a larger display of the stars near Sutrah. “We’re going to go through the rest of this system very carefully. I assume the Syndics laid similar minefields near the other jump points, but we can spot them and avoid them now that we know to look.”

Rione pointed to symbols on the display. “Two Syndic military bases? Are either a threat?”

“They don’t look like it from what we can see. Obsolete, to all appearances. What we’d expect in a system not on the Syndic hypernet.” He let his gaze rest on the depictions of the Syndic bases, thinking about the hypernet that had changed things so much since what he thought of as his time. Much faster than the system-jump-faster-than-light method, and with unlimited range between the gates of the hypernet, it had revolutionized interstellar travel and left countless star systems to wither like broken twigs when they weren’t judged special enough to justify the expense of a gate.

Geary punched the update key, and the latest information on Sutrah System was presented. The only change was in the positions of the light Syndic warships, which had lured his four ships into the minefield. Those Syndics were still running, heading away from Geary’s forces at velocities edging toward.2 light speed. They’d been accelerating so fast that their inertial compensators must be badly stressed and their crews pinned to their seats by leak-through. Chasing them would be futile, since they could simply keep heading away while the Alliance fleet sooner or later had to proceed to one of the jump points out of Sutrah, but Geary still felt a tide of anger sweep over him at the sight of the Syndic ships, knowing vengeance was out of the question in this case.