by David Weber
Han's face was like a sculpture as she thought furiously. Could she win if the battle resumed? Yes. With her fighters rearmed and the range too short for the Rim's HBMs to be decisive . . . yes, she could win. She felt certain of it-and she suspected this Desai knew it, too. Yet Desai was also right. Her own battle-line had been savaged, the relentless attacks of the Rim screen had hurt Magda far worse than had been allowed for, and Jason's force was devastated. And she had little idea just how much fight those looming supermonitors still had in them-three were gone, others badly damaged. One hadn't fired in minutes. Was it any more than a hulk? She knew she could take them, avenge Second Zephrain's blot on the Fleet's honor . . . and yet . . . and yet there was that edge of uncertainty and her ignorance of how matters stood with the Rump pincer. And there was the terrible knowledge that even victory would leave her on her knees, without the strength to follow through against Zephrain. . . .
But still . . .
Damn it, where was Trevayne? Was he really dead? They'd hardly admit it, would they? And, her dogged honesty demanded, why did she care?
Aloud she temporized. "Such an agreement might exceed my authority. At the least, you're asking me to assume a heavy responsibility."
"No heavier than I'm assuming myself."
"On the contrary; you're occupying four planetary systems of the Terran Republic which I'm under orders to recover-"
"And I am under orders to reopen contact between the Innerworlds and the Rim Feder . . . the loyalist systems of the Rim." Desai's stiffness relaxed just a trifle. "Now that we've each recited our position papers, let's turn to reality. You and I are in command on the scene. We both know our orders can't be carried out-not without a degree of slaughter which passes the limits of sanity and decency. Shall we make our governments aware of that reality? Or shall we continue to carry out our orders in spite of it?" Her eyes bored into Han's. "In the end, I suppose it comes down to a question of where our duty really lies. That's a question many of us have had to face over the last few years, isn't it?"
Two pairs of dark eyes locked. I can win, Han told herself. I can win the decisive battle of this entire civil war! Or do I think that because I want to win so badly? And if I do, why? Out of duty . . . or hatred? Shame that a man who may not even be alive over there once beat me? Or for the glory? And what "glory" is there in being the woman responsible for such slaughter?
And could I kill them all? Her thoughts turned ever inward. Could I wipe them out-because that's what it comes down to; this Desai will no more surrender if I reject her offer than I would. Even after all that's passed, even if I have the capability to treat them like Arthur Ruyard, could I do it? After Ian Trevayne didn't do that to me?
And almost before she realized she was speaking, the quiet words came.
"Very well, Admiral Desai. I agree."
Vice Admiral Li Han stood in a strange cabin, hands by her sides. Her eyes were dry, but her face was strained and drawn. She sank into a chair, her lips trembling briefly in a tired smile. She'd lost three sets of quarters now. She was once more down to a single battle-stained vac suit . . . her painfully reassembled possessions drifting atoms.
Her face crumpled as realization hit. Arrarat was gone. All those people. Twenty-five hundred friends. Chang.
She buried her face in her hands, feeling her nails press into her temples as she fought the tears. She wouldn't weep. She wouldn't! Chang had chosen the way he died. . . .
But he had died, she told herself sadly. Died under her command-with thousands of others aboard the ships she'd commanded. And she hadn't even won! She'd renounced victory, held her hand in the name of 'humanity.' But what of her debt to those who had died, trusting in her to win the battle?
She straightened her spine and stared into a mirror, her cheeks dry, and scarcely recognized the wan face that looked back at her from those brilliant black eyes. No tears, she told herself. No tears for Chang, for the dead, for the lost victory. The past was past, and the future pressed upon her.
She reached for the com panel and began to punch Magda's code, then stopped. Her hand fell into her lap, and she leaned back in the chair, closing her eyes.
Not yet. She must speak to Magda, must plan and confer. But not yet. Please, God, not just yet. . . .
An odd numbness gripped the officers in Togo's briefing room. It went beyond the inevitable aftershock of battle-even of one such as this.
Sonja Desai looked at the faces of the people who had come so far and given so much for the victory which had been denied them. It wasn't defeat. Not really. But it wasn't victory, either, and the price they'd paid was terrible enough to demand victory.
Sean Remko sat staring dully at the deck, his face working with emotion. He'd learned what had happened to Trevayne, and no assurance that he'd done far more than his "duty" could reach him in the darkened chamber to which he had withdrawn and which held but one thought: he had failed the admiral.
Yoshinaka and Kirilenko sat side by side. They'd come from Nelson (along with Sanders, who was even now preparing for his departure) and had arrived a few minutes late, after receiving assurances that Sandoval's condition was stable. Mujabi was present in his new capacity as CO of BG 1-what remained of it. So were the other ranking survivors, including Khalid Khan, who was the first to react.
"What you're saying, Admiral, is that we're simply to keep station here in Zapata until we get orders to the contrary?"
"Correct," Desai nodded. "So are the rebels. This is the precondition to the cease-fire. All major Fleet units must remain in place. Of course, noncombatant supply vessels aren't included, nor are light combatants . . . like the rebel destroyer which will take Mister Sanders to the Innerworlds."
They all stared at her as if she had, inexplicably, left out the most obvious point. It was Kirilenko who blurted it out.
"But, sir, what about the admiral . . . er, Admiral Trevayne?"
Desai's face was at its most flinty. "Nelson is, of course, covered by the cease-fire terms and must remain here. But I am advised by Doctor Yuan that Admiral Trevayne can be maintained aboard Nelson indefinitely in his present condition. So there's really no problem. Any other questions?"
The stares changed subtly, as if these people were looking at a thing they couldn't comprehend, and were fairly sure they did not want to.
Kirilenko stiffened, and his mouth began to open. Under the edge of the table, Yoshinaka gripped his forearm, very tightly. Kirilenko's mouth closed again, and he subsided.
Desai stood. "If there are no further questions, ladies and gentlemen, please carry on."
She walked to the door, then paused and looked back. Everyone was still seated.
Desai looked straight into the eyes of Sean Remko, the senior man in the room. For a bare instant, he stared back with an unreadable expression. Then he lumbered to his feet and said, in a voice like a rockslide, "Attention on deck."
They rose slowly to attention. Desai nodded very slightly and stalked through the door.
Her expression and posture remained equally stiff in the intraship car and through the passageway to her quarters. The sentry snapped to attention, and she nodded crisply to him as she pressed the door stud and entered.
The door closed silently behind her. She stood a moment, her face wearing a vague look which slowly turned into one of pained bewilderment. Something happened inside her, something whose possibility would have been flatly denied by those who knew her. Her features collapsed into a mask of inconsolable grief, and a harsh, low cry welled out of her like the plaintive wail of a maimed animal unable to understand its pain. She hurled herself onto her bunk, burying her face in the pillow as she wept convulsively, and the sound of her empty, tearing sorrow filled her cabin.
A moment later, the door slid open with its usual soundlessness to admit Remko and Yoshinaka. They stopped, frozen with amazement, at the sight of the sobbing woman on the bunk. The woman neither of them had ever thought of as a woman at all. Remko turned to Yoshinaka an
d opened his mouth, but the commodore put a finger to his lips and slowly shook his head.
They departed as silently as they'd come, leaving Sonja Desai alone with her grief for the man she had loved silently and hopelessly for years.
CONFERENCE
"Thank God I have done my duty."
Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson, Orlop Deck,
HMS Victory , Battle of Trafalgar
Oskar Dieter studied the strained faces of his Cabinet, remembering the day the first mutiny had been reported, and shuddered. This was almost worse. There'd been no treason this time, yet Fourth Fleet had lost more tonnage in two hours of close action than had been taken from Admiral Forsythe, and the shock cut deep. Even Amanda Sydon was gray-faced and stunned.
He sighed and tapped the crystal table with his knuckles.
"Ladies and gentlemen, for the record-" he looked at Sky Marshal Witcinski "-I should like to say that I concur entirely with Admiral Desai's actions." A rustling sigh ran around the table. "Even if she'd continued the action and won, it would have cost more than we can stand. Admiral Trevayne's-" his voice faltered briefly on the name "-ships are both our most powerful single striking force and our sole technical advantage. Had Admiral Desai won at the expense of crippling damage to Fourth Fleet, we would have been unable to follow up her 'victory.' Had she lost, the Terran Republic must inevitably have captured sufficient examples of the Rim's weaponry to duplicate it."
He felt his listeners' stab of surprise as he deliberately used the term "Terran Republic" instead of "rebels"-and their horror as they considered the consequences of the Republic's acquiring weapons in advance of anything they could produce.
"I would like to ask Sky Marshal Witcinski and Vice Admiral Krupskaya a few questions," Dieter went on quietly. "First the Sky Marshal. With Fourth Fleet halted, whether by a cease-fire or the destruction of its units, what are the chances for Operation Yellowbrick?"
"Nil," Witcinski said. His voice was like a gravel-crusher. "Whoever planned the rebels'-" he stressed the word deliberately-"tactics knew what he was doing. I still don't know how they guessed our plans, but they've put up a web of fortresses and fighters that's stopped us cold. I've suspended operations after taking only two of our target systems, Mister Prime Minister. We could still take the other three our ops plan calls for, but not and have anything left at the end.
"As for Fourth Fleet"-he shrugged-"I can only endorse your own estimate. Trevayne's ships are unique. Now that I've examined Vice Admiral Desai's report, I am even more convinced that they represent a qualitative breakthrough of the first magnitude. Trevayne and Admiral Desai managed to destroy almost fifty percent of the force engaged against them, but the rebel admiral knew the sort of action she had to fight. Trevayne's force lost at least as much as she did. As nearly as we can estimate, almost twelve million tonnes of shipping were destroyed-not damaged, destroyed. We don't know about the rebels, but Fourth Fleet lost over forty-one thousand dead. I think that's an effective answer as to whether it can carry out its part of the plan. Without the Rim to meet us more than halfway-"
He shrugged again.
"I see." Dieter turned to Susan Krupskaya. "Admiral Krupskaya, what are the odds of the Republic recognizing the futility of further operations on our part?"
"Excellent, sir," she said after a very brief glance at Sanders. "Analysis of our losses must tell them Operation Yellowbrick bled us white. They've been hurt, too-badly-but not as badly as we have."
"I see," Dieter repeated. "And how quickly can they duplicate Admiral Trevayne's weapons without actual samples?"
"It's hard to be precise, sir, but my analysts estimate eight months, maximum, before they have working models." Someone gasped, but Krupskaya plowed on. "We've been looking at the data Mister Sanders brought back, and they're very, very close to the variable focus beams, judging from their new primary. With that head start and the data they must have recorded during the Zapata engagement, they can have that weapon in three to five months. The HBM should take considerably longer-we've no evidence that they've begun experimenting with grav drivers-but their new shields offset that. And we," she smiled thinly, "have no way of obtaining hard data on their new systems, since they've carefully used them only against the Rim. It will take us much longer to duplicate them. And, Mister Prime Minister-" she paused and drew a breath "-it is my duty to point out that, judging from their order of battle at Zapata, our previous estimates of their construction rates may be as much as fifteen percent low, so even our numerical advantage is in question."
"Thank you, Admiral," Dieter said gravely, and looked back at his shaken colleagues. "Ladies and gentlemen, I already knew what Sky Marshal Witcinski and Admiral Krupskaya were going to say, and I had them plug that data into our computers. According to the new projections, we stand a sixty-five percent chance of losing the war within one year." The room was deathly silent. "If we hold out for another year, we have a seventy percent chance of final victory-but the computers project a war which will continue for another twelve to fifteen years. With losses," he finished quietly, "which will make the Battle of Zapata look like a children's picnic."
The political leaders stared at him in shock. The military leaders weren't surprised, but their expressions were those of people who'd just bitten into something spoiled. No one questioned his statements.
"I think, my friends," he said very, very softly, looking straight at Amanda Sydon and her "war party" adherents, "that under those circumstances, we cannot justify continuing this war if there is the least possibility of any other acceptable resolution. Even victory can cost too much at times."
Sydon glanced at her supporters, but they refused to meet her eyes. The glare she turned on Dieter was fulminating, yet she said nothing. There was nothing she could say, and the voice of protest came from another source.
"But, Mister Prime Minister!" Witcinski protested. "Victory is the only 'acceptable resolution!' Yellowback should have succeeded-would have succeeded if the rebels hadn't figured out what was coming and managed to ambush Admiral Trevayne. I'm not faulting him, sir-it was a brilliant ploy, obviously something they spent months arranging. But now that they've stopped us, they'll exploit. No strategist worth his salt would stop now!"
"Indeed, Sky Marshal? What do you think they'll do, then?"
"They'll leave their forces in the Zapata System exactly as they are," Witcinski predicted. "As far as we can tell, they committed less than ten percent of their assault carriers there-the others are still available for offensive strikes, backed up by their surviving Frontier Fleet fleet and light carriers, while we cut our defenses to the bone for Yellowbrick. They can achieve crushing local superiority wherever they choose, and they know it. They'll go on the offensive and chew us up, hoping for a knockout."
"That would certainly be their most logical course," Dieter said softly, "but they're not going to do it."
"Why not?" Witcinski demanded hotly, feeling his professional judgment called in question.
"I think because they don't want to destroy the Federation," Dieter said slowly.
"No?" Amanda Sydon laughed harshly. "They only went to war against it!"
"Agreed-but I think they just wish to be left alone," Dieter replied. Sydon stiffened angrily, and some of the others joined her, but he raised a hand and his voice was stern with hard-earned authority. "No, hear me out-all of you! From the beginning, the Fringers have been reacting to what they considered an intolerable situation. They reacted militarily because all political avenues seemed closed. They-" He shook his head firmly. "Enough. The point is that they never sought to conquer the Innerworlds. Arguably, they lacked the ability to do so, but it would seem that's no longer true-they have the ability to conquer us if they act promptly. The Sky Marshal's arguments are most cogent, but to succeed, they must act at once. Surely none of us is so foolish as to believe that their strategists are less competent than our own? They must know their advantage is fleeting-that they must act before we make good
our losses. Yet they aren't going to do so.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I have received a communication from Ladislaus Skjorning." The atmosphere in the conference room was so brittle it could have been chipped with a knife. "He offers"-his eyes bored into Sydon's-"an immediate armistice for the purpose of concluding a general peace." Some of the people at the table looked as if he'd just punched them; others suddenly sat straighter, their eyes bright with hope. He didn't try to estimate the numbers which felt either way. "His message is accompanied by an analysis almost identical to that we have just heard. But in pursuit of his armistice, he has ordered a two-month unilateral suspension of all offensive operations, pending our reply. In short, my friends, he has voluntarily given up his best chance for outright victory to prove he desires peace!"
Ladislaus Skjorning sat in the first-class lounge of TRS Prometheus and watched the blue and white planet grow. It had been six years since last he saw that world, and the sight stirred something within him.
It had been hard to induce the Republic to send most of its executive branch into Federation space aboard an unarmed passenger liner, but he'd done it. His Cabinet had been relatively easy to convince, but not Congress. Only the fact that the Federation had voluntarily offered a quarter of Battle Fleet as hostages for the safe conduct of their guests had outweighed congressional memories of Fionna's assassination.
Now Prometheus slipped into orbit around the motherworld, and Ladislaus hid a grin. One of the more ticklish decisions during the past several months had been choosing the site of the conference. But then he'd remembered that one spot on Old Terra herself was neutral; the tiny country of Switzerland, which had maintained its traditional independence for eleven centuries.