“He’s crazy,” somebody whispered clearly enough to be heard in the hushed command center.
“It might work,” the supervisor suggested.
Iceni looked as if she might explode. “He’s risking the battleship… my battleship… on a harebrained scheme that can’t possibly—”
“Madam President?” a specialist asked with equal parts hesitancy and daring. “Projections are that the mobile forces facility will just clear the bombardment area.”
“What? Are you certain?”
“From the data feeds we are getting, the known mass of the facility, and the performance data on the battleship’s main propulsion, yes, Madam President.”
Iceni stared at the display, wordless now, as the mobile forces facility and the battleship towing it moved with agonizing slowness away from the danger zone. The enigma bombardment arrived, zipping very close past the edge of the mobile forces facility before skipping across the gas giant’s atmosphere and zooming off into empty space.
“Colonel Rogero told me Kontos was good,” Drakon remarked.
“Yes,” Iceni agreed, her voice not quite steady yet. “He has a great future. If I don’t kill him first.”
“There’s one group left,” Morgan interceded, as they watched Kommodor Marphissa’s flotilla moving to intercept the enigmas who had attacked the mobile forces facility. “The one heading for the gate.”
Drakon eyed them sourly. “The mysterious six ships saved us from the first group, Kapitan-Leytenant Kontos saved us from the second with some help from Kommodor Marphissa when she catches those enigmas, and now we have to depend on CEO Boyens to save us from the third.”
“Well, we’ve already seen at least one miracle today,” Iceni replied. “Maybe a second or third isn’t too much to hope for.”
As it turned out, the last group of enigma warships broke off their attack and headed for the jump point for Pele at the best speed they could, which was considerable. “They’ve had enough,” Drakon observed. He had seen that often enough with human combatants. There always came a point when the will to fight faltered and failed. The better the fighters, the longer it took to reach that point, but sooner or later almost any force would break if subjected to enough damage. Whatever else was true of the enigmas, they were like humanity in that respect as well. There was some comfort in knowing that.
Knowing things. He looked at Black Jack’s fleet, which had gone into enigma-controlled space and come back again, accompanied by the mysterious six ships as well as the massive ship being towed by Alliance battleships. “How much do you think he’ll tell us of what he’s learned?”
Iceni shook her head. “I can’t guess. He may demand a price for what he has learned.”
“What price? We don’t have a lot.”
“I don’t know.” But Iceni seemed worried, and Morgan bent a smirk her way as if Morgan knew the answer.
“We probably ought to say something to him,” Drakon commented.
“Yes. Let’s do it formally.” Iceni led him back to the private office, where he once again sat beside her. “What do you wish to say?”
What did he want to say? Drakon glanced unobtrusively at Malin, who just as subtly communicated a suggestion to defer to Iceni. All right. Better to be quiet than to sound stupid. “I’ll leave this one to you,” he told Iceni. “We do need to tell Black Jack that we’re not on good terms with Boyens and his flotilla.”
“Of course. If we can get Black Jack to commit to us, CEO Boyens won’t have a chance. Anything else?”
“No. I just want to make sure Black Jack sees us together so he knows we’re jointly deciding on whatever is said.”
Iceni inclined her head toward Drakon, then faced the pickup and gestured for the transmission to start. “We are in your debt again, Admiral Geary. I don’t know the nature of your allies, but we owe them an immense debt as well.
“My warships will engage the enigmas heading for my battleship. I cannot control the actions of the flotilla near the hypernet gate. Do not trust that the flotilla there will act in our interest, Admiral. CEO Boyens, their commander, is known to you. If you make your orders clear to him, he may hesitate to act contrary to them. It is essential that Boyens understands that he is not in control of this star system and does not dictate what will happen here. For the people, Iceni, out.”
She relaxed, then noticed Drakon looking at her. “Did I say something inappropriate?”
He motioned to Malin, indicating he should leave, then waited until the door sealed again before answering Iceni. “My battleship? My warships?”
“I said my? I thought I said our.”
“No.” A small thing, but also a clear unilateral claim on the most powerful military assets in this star system. Drakon realized that he was galled by recent events, that he had been forced to sit by with his soldiers and watch others defend and save Midway Star System. I know ground forces couldn’t have done anything against those threats. But it still annoys the hell out of me that her warships, and Black Jack’s, did all the heavy lifting.
Iceni tapped one finger on the table several times, watching it as if the gesture required concentration. “If that’s a concern, then I will modify the description of the forces when next I speak of them.” She looked over at him again, showing Drakon a poker face that left him wondering what Iceni was really feeling.
“Fine. As long as it is clear I have an equal level of control here.”
“That has never been in question.” Iceni locked her eyes on his. “General Drakon, we cannot afford to mistake who our allies are.”
“Gwen… I regret our earlier misunderstanding.”
“You mean when your officer threatened me?”
Iceni obviously wasn’t going to make this easy. “It won’t happen again. I’m going to make certain of that.”
She looked carefully at the security lights glowing above the doorway, ensuring that no one could overhear their conversation. “Artur, the only way to be certain that officer does not act that way again is to get rid of her. You know that as well as I do.”
“If you knew her history—” Drakon began stubbornly.
“I do know her history.”
That shouldn’t have been a surprise despite the highly classified nature of Morgan’s early record. Iceni had done her homework. “Morgan had some bad breaks. If she couldn’t do her job, that wouldn’t serve as an excuse. But the fact is that she does get the job done. She found that snake agent in the command center way before anyone else.”
Iceni leaned back, frowning at him. “It could have been a setup. The snakes still in hiding in this star system would have known we were closing in on that agent. They could have leaked that information to Morgan.”
“Why?”
“To deflect suspicion from her.”
Drakon had to pause, momentarily at a loss for words. “Gwen, seriously, if you knew more about Morgan, you’d know that’s impossible. She really, truly, hates the snakes. She also hates the Syndicate. They messed her up, and while she won’t admit that, Morgan wants revenge.”
Iceni pursed her lips, thinking. “Confirm my data. She was messed up as you put it by mental conditioning for a suicide mission into enigma space when she was barely eighteen.”