Jack Campbell - Perilous Shield

“Why did you want that child?” Drakon demanded.

Morgan looked steadily back at him, her expression admiring now. “You don’t get it? Really? But that was always one of your flaws. You don’t have many. You’re an amazing man and an amazing commander. But you never seem able to realize just who and what you are. You accept limits that you don’t need to live with.”

“But you know what I am?” Drakon asked.

“Oh, yes.” Morgan stood up, her eyes bright with emotion. “You showed me, you taught me. I know you, and I know what I am. Know the enemy and know yourself, and you’ll always win. That’s one of your lessons.”

“I didn’t originate that. It’s ancient advice.”

“But you understand it. And you made sure I understood it.” Morgan nodded, her smile triumphant. “You taught me many things. The wise commander makes the proper preparations and takes the proper actions to ensure that eventually her goal is achieved.”

“And what goal is that?” Drakon said in a voice gone quiet but dangerous.

“ Our child, General Drakon. A child with your abilities and mine. Able to do anything she turns her mind to, and with the will to choose to do those things.” She shook her head, Morgan’s smile now that of someone sharing her victory with Drakon. “I owe you so much, and this is how I am repaying you, with a child who combines the best of us both.”

“I didn’t ask for that,” Drakon said. “What do you think this child is going to do? Take over this star system?”

Morgan laughed. “One star system? That’s only the start. She will be a leader who will build an empire on the ashes of the Syndicate Worlds. And perhaps an empire whose reach stretches much farther than that. Do you think even Black Jack can withstand our daughter after she has been brought up to fulfill her destiny?”

“Our… daughter.” Drakon knew he was looking at Morgan with disbelief, but he couldn’t seem to react, couldn’t do anything but listen.

“She’ll be unstoppable,” Morgan said in a whisper that filled the room. “Humanity will be united. Under her rule.”

The spell finally broke under the pressure of the visions of renewed wide-scale war that Morgan’s words evoked, a war worse and more widespread than even the century of the Syndicate/Alliance conflict. “I will have a say in the destiny of any child of mine,” Drakon insisted. Borderline stable? Damn the psychs and damn their useless evaluations. Damn Malin’s surrogate mother for arranging that psych waiver out of guilt. Morgan’s loyalty to me has gotten mixed up with delusions and dreams of grandeur to create a monster. With my unwitting help.

“Whatever say you have will be up to me,” Morgan said. “She has to be strong. I’ll be sure she is.”

“I’ll find her. No matter what you do.”

Morgan paused, her expression very serious now. “What I do? General, you should stop worrying about what I’ll do. Everything I do is for you. If you want to worry, don’t worry about me, or about the citizens playing at being free, or about the Syndicate launching another attack. Start worrying about what our daughter will do.”

Drakon stood looking at her, realizing just how helpless he was at the moment, one thought intruding louder than the rest. How the hell am I going to tell Gwen Iceni about this? And what is she going to do when she finds out?