Jack Campbell - Invincible

“We need to teach the Kicks a lesson,” Jane Geary insisted. “Now is the perfect time and place to do that.”

“We need to get home,” Captain Hiyen grumbled in response. “The ships of the Callas Republic are part of this fleet for the purpose of defending our homes. Turning back the Kicks with a bloody nose so they can’t follow us and have no idea where our homes are accomplishes that.”

“The Alliance fleet,” the commander of the heavy cruiser Barding began, “does not turn from battle and does not settle for less than complete victory.”

“Speak for yourself,” the captain of Sapphire replied. “That’s Black Jack, remember? If he says a victory satisfies honor, then I won’t question him. How can any of us?”

“Even Black Jack was just a man,” Jane Geary said, in the manner of someone who had made that kind of statement many times before. From what Geary had learned of her, his grandniece had spent her life resenting the Black Jack legend, which had constrained her and her brother Michael, forcing them into the fleet in the footsteps of their legendary great-uncle. “We do neither ourselves nor our fleet commander any credit by not raising appropriate questions—”

“This is not a debate.” Geary didn’t realize that he had said that, in tones that sliced across the conversation, until after every face turned toward him. “I am in command. This is the plan we will follow. Are there any other questions?”

There weren’t. As the officers vanished around him, leaving only Tanya Desjani still with him, Geary struggled to get his temper under control.

“I tried talking to her earlier,” Desjani said. “She was polite enough to me but no more than that. I made some joke about being part of the family now, and the temperature around her seemed to drop close to absolute zero.”

“I don’t get it,” he said.

“I think I’m beginning to.” Tanya stood up, her lips pressed tightly together. “She hated being a Geary, all her life she hated having to live in your shadow—”

“It was never my shadow!”

“All right. Black Jack’s shadow. The point is, she might have hated it, but it was her. She was a Geary. Everyone looked at her as being part of that, even if she didn’t like it. Now…” Tanya shrugged. “Now you’re back. You’re Black Jack himself, and don’t bother interrupting again to deny it, and you suck all of the oxygen out of her world just by being here. She’s just Jane now. And I’m your partner. Chosen to be with you. Where does that leave her?”

Geary stood silently for a while. “Trying to be something.”

“Yeah. Because she thinks everything she was is gone. Something has to replace that. She changed after she went back to your home world, remember? What do you think people said there? In how many ways was she forced to measure herself against not a legend but against a real person? Now she’s going to prove she’s a Geary.”

He stared toward the bulkhead before him, seeing not the surface there but images of other captains who had sought glory. Captain Midea charging Paladin to destruction at Lakota. Captain Falco, leading Triumph , Polaris , and Vanguard to their deaths at Vidha. Captain Kila, cold-bloodedly arranging the destruction of Lorica at Padronis, while also trying to cause the loss of Dauntless with all hands.

Those officers had thought themselves heroic, and ships and crews had paid the price.

There was a way to prevent that.

“I don’t think that would be a good idea,” Tanya said.

He focused on her. “What wouldn’t be a good idea?”

“Relieving her of command.”

“How did you—?”

She leaned in, one forefinger to his chest. “I know who you’re thinking of. You think she’s like Midea? I knew Midea a lot longer than you did. Jane Geary isn’t close to that. She’s been a bit reckless, she’s pushed for more action, but she hasn’t been stupid.”

“What about Falco?”

“ Falco? Falco was epically stupid, and he thought nothing of spending ships and the lives of crews in the pursuit of his victories.” Her eyes narrowed at him. “You’re thinking of someone else.”

“You really are reading my mind, aren’t you?” At the moment, it didn’t seem a strange thing to believe at all.

“Don’t be ridiculous. Who’s the other one you’re thinking of?”

“Kila.”

Desjani glared at him silently for several seconds. “No one deserves to be compared to that murderous bitch, especially not your own grandniece. Keep this in mind, Admiral. I am death on incompetent officers. You know that. Jane Geary isn’t incompetent. She’s smart, but she needs a firm, guiding hand right now. You are her leader. Lead her.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“That’s not funny, Admiral. Now let’s go teach some Kicks not to mess with the Alliance fleet.”

“That reminds me.” Desjani paused to look back at him as Geary frowned at her. “Why didn’t you bring up to me the possibility that the bear-cows would aim at the spider-wolves when we split our fleet?”

“Because you already knew! I knew that you wouldn’t want to admit knowing that could happen, but you know I know my job well enough to spot that, and I know you know enough about tactics to spot that as quickly as I did.”

It took him a moment to work his way through her statement. “Tanya, I hadn’t seen that before it was pointed out.”

“Seriously?” She stared at him, then shrugged. “Sorry, Admiral. You’re good at tactics. You know that. I assume you know things that look obvious and, in this case, were just being diplomatic to avoid saying, ‘Better those ugly suckers than us.’”

“You need to point out things like that to me rather than assume I already know them.”

“So you can say, ‘I know all that’?” Desjani demanded.

“I’ve said that once .”

“I respectfully beg to differ, sir.”

“I— Tanya, why the hell can you sometimes read my mind and other times not have a clue as to what I’m thinking?”

“I knew you were going to say that! No, I can’t ever read your mind. Can we go fight the battle now?”

“Yes.” Unlike this argument, at least he would have a chance of winning the battle.

He took his seat on the bridge of Dauntless , trying to put out of his mind everything except the coming battle. We’ll peel away those escorts, destroy all of them if necessary, and once the superbattleships are stripped of support, we’ll go after them. It sounded very easy. Actually doing it was going to be hard as hell.

But his attempt to concentrate was interrupted by a blip from his comm unit indicating that someone was trying to call. At least that was working right now.

No. It wasn’t working right. The incoming call was from Captain Vente, who had apparently finally realized that he had been completely sidelined since the loss of Invincible . But a call from Vente should have been automatically blocked.

Should he tell Tanya? She didn’t need distractions, either.

But if Dauntless ’s comm system was acting up again, she needed to know, and he needed it fixed. “Captain Desjani, my comm settings aren’t being honored by the system.”

Her expression hardened. “Communications. The Admiral’s comms are not working properly. You have fifteen minutes to get everything functional, or this ship will have a new comm officer.”

“Yes, Captain.”

Geary made another effort to get his mind into battle readiness, only to have an alert flash red on his display. Before he could acknowledge it, the image of Spartan ’s commanding officer appeared before him. “Admiral, half of my ship just went dark. Preliminary estimate is several power junctions failing nearly instantaneously.”