But she opened her eyes and looked steadily at him. “I watched it happen. I didn’t pull any triggers, I didn’t issue any orders, but I watched it, and I didn’t stop it.”

He nodded, keeping his own eyes on hers. “You’d been taught that it was acceptable.”

“That’s no excuse.”

“Your ancestors-”

“Told me it was wrong,” Desjani interrupted, something she rarely did with Geary. “I knew it, I felt it, I didn’t listen. I take responsibility for my actions. I know I’ll pay the price for that. Perhaps that’s why we lost so many ships in the Syndic home system. Perhaps that’s why the war has kept going all of these years. We’re being punished, for straying from what was right because we believed wrong to be necessary. ”

He wasn’t about to reject her, or condemn someone who’d already accepted a full measure of blame. But he could stand alongside her. “Yeah, maybe we are being punished.”

Desjani frowned. “Sir? Why would you be punished for things done while you weren’t with us?”

“I’m with you now, aren’t I? I’m part of this fleet and loyal to the Alliance. If you’re being punished, then so am I. I didn’t suffer through all the years of war that you have, but all I knew was taken from me.”

She shook her head, frowning deeper. “You just said this is your fleet, and the Alliance has your loyalty. Those things weren’t taken from you.”

Geary frowned back at her, surprised to realize he’d never thought of it that way.

Desjani gave him an intent look. “They sent you when we needed you. They gave us a second chance. They gave you a second chance, instead of letting you die in the battle at Grendel or afterward, when your escape pod’s systems would have eventually given out. We’re being offered mercy if we can prove ourselves worthy of it.”

She had startled him again, with a point of view he’d never considered, and by including him as part of them all. Not a separate hero out of myth but one of them. “Maybe you’re right,” Geary stated. “We can’t win this war by destruction unless we go all out with the hypernet gates and commit species suicide. If this war is ever to end, we’ll not only have to beat them on the battlefield but also be willing to forgive the Syndics if they’re willing to express real remorse. Maybe we’re being given an example to follow.”

She was silent for a few moments, and he stayed quiet as well. The shuttle dock internal doors sealed between them and the shuttle, then the external ones opened, and the bird lifted off, carrying its passengers to the Syndic facility. Finally, Desjani looked back at him. “I’ve spent a long time wanting to punish the Syndics, to hurt them as they’ve hurt us.”

“I can understand why,” Geary said. “Thanks for going along with me on helping those civilians. I know it went against a lot of what you believe.”

“What I believed,” Desjani amended. She was quiet for a moment longer, but Geary waited, sensing that she had something else to say. “But that cycle of vengeance never ends. I realized something. I don’t want to have to kill that boy someday, when he’s old enough to fight.”

“Me, neither. Or his father or his mother. And I don’t want that boy trying to kill Alliance citizens. How can we end this, Tanya?”

“You’ll think of a way, sir.”

“Thanks.”

He meant it sarcastically, and was sure it sounded sarcastic, but Desjani smiled slightly at him. “Did you see how they looked at us? They were afraid, then they were disbelieving, and finally they were grateful.” She stopped smiling and looked outward. “I like fighting. I like going head-to-head with the best the Syndics have. But I’ve had enough of killing people like those. Can we convince the Syndics to stop bombarding civilian targets?”

“We can try. Our bombardment weapons are accurate enough that we can certainly continue to keep taking out industrial targets while minimizing civilian losses.”

Her face was grim now. “They kill ours, and we don’t kill theirs?”

“It’ll have to be a mutual deal. When we get back, we’ll tell them, stop bombarding our people, and we’ll continue not bombarding yours.”

“Why would they-?” Desjani stopped talking in mid-question, then gave Geary a long look. “And they might believe we’d abide by that since you’ve been demonstrating the willingness to do so.”

“Maybe.”

“And if they don’t stop?”

“We keep taking out their industry and military targets.” Desjani grimaced. “Listen, Tanya, if there’s nothing for those people to build or fight with, they’re a burden to the Syndics who have to worry about feeding them and taking care of them.”

“They’ll build new industrial sites. New defenses.”

“And we’ll blow those away, too.” Geary jerked his head to indicate roughly the space outside of Dauntless’s hull. “Ever since humanity achieved routine space travel, we’ve had the ability to destroy things with rocks tossed from space far faster and easier than humans on planets can build things. The Syndics can sink endless effort and resources into rebuilding and never catch up.”

She thought about that, then nodded. “You’re right. But that same logic applied a long time ago when we started bombarding civilian populations as well as military and industrial targets. Why did we start, all those decades ago?”

“I don’t know.” Geary cast his mind back, trying to imagine the point at which the people he had known a century earlier had changed to become people like those now. But there hadn’t been any point, any single event, rather what Victoria Rione had called a slippery slope in which one seemingly reasonable decision to escalate led to another. “Maybe revenge for Syndic bombardments of Alliance worlds. Maybe a tactic of desperation when the war kept going on and on. An attempt to break the enemy morale. We studied that when I was a junior officer, but as a lesson in what hadn’t worked. Time and again in history people tried bombarding enemies enough to make them quit. But when the enemies thought their own homes or beliefs were in danger, they never quit. Totally irrational, but then we’re human. ”

“Syndic bombardments never made us want to give up,” Desjani agreed. “We’re very frustrated with our leaders, but we want them to win. We don’t want them to surrender. But not many people, especially in the fleet, still believe our leaders can win this war. That’s why-”

He glanced at her as she stopped speaking again. “Why I got a certain offer from Captain Badaya? You know about it, too?”

“Yes, sir. Of course, sir. It’s being widely talked about.”

“I won’t, Tanya. I won’t betray the Alliance that way, by accepting the offer to become a dictator. I told Badaya that.” She looked at the deck, her face expressionless. “It wouldn’t work, and it’d be wrong.”

Desjani spoke very, very quietly. “I have to ask you, have you been offered something else? If you agreed?”

He tried to remember, because whatever it was seemed to bother her a great deal, but couldn’t come up with anything.

“No. Nothing specific. It’s all been couched in very general terms.”

“You’re certain?” Her voice was angry now though still very quiet. “You haven’t been promised anything else, Captain Geary?” He shook his head, letting his puzzlement show. “Anyone else, Captain Geary?”

Anyone else? What could-? He was certain his shock showed. “You mean you?” he whispered, too stunned to speak in euphemisms.

She looked at him again, studying his face, and seemed to relax. “Yes. I’ve been urged by some individuals to… offer myself. I’ve wondered if they had offered me on their own.”

Geary felt heat in his face, embarrassment and anger rising in tandem. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so filled with rage. “Who?” he whispered savagely. “Who the hell had the bloody nerve to dare suggest such a thing to you? You’re not some prize or playing piece. Tell me who they are, and I’ll-” This time he had to choke off his words, aware that even a fleet commander couldn’t threaten to rip subordinates into tiny pieces and vent them out the air lock.