“We know that, Admiral,” Dr. Shwartz said. “We regret that it had to be so. It’s not a criticism of your actions.”
Dr. Setin didn’t look as if he entirely agreed with that, but if so, he had the good sense to remain silent.
“What about the six living bear-cows, Admiral?” Dr. Shwartz asked. “We keep being told the matter is classified.”
“They’re recovering, as far as we can tell, but remain comatose,” Geary said. “They’re totally isolated from human contact to try to keep them from panicking if they wake up. That’s all I know right now.”
After that call ended, Geary sat staring at his star display, thinking that he should try to rest. Or maybe do something just for fun. Read a book—
His comm panel buzzed.
Dr. Nasr, the senior fleet medical officer, looked like he hadn’t slept in days. He probably hadn’t, despite Geary’s orders that everyone stand down for a day. Doctors had always considered themselves above the military discipline that governed everyone else, making no secret that they thought their oaths as physicians held more important status than the rules binding other officers. “You left me a message, Admiral?”
He had? When? Prompted by the doctor’s statement, Geary finally recalled. The message had been cached in the comm system on Dauntless, set to transmit when the fleet left jump days ago. Neither he nor the doctor had experienced the luxury of time for dealing with that message until now. “It’s about one of the fleet’s officers. Commander Benan.”
“Benan?” Nasr’s eyes went vague as he searched memory. “Injured during the battle?”
“No. This pertains to the reasons for his difficulties in adjusting to having been liberated from the Syndic labor camp at Dunai.”
Nasr sighed. “Admiral, I fully appreciate your concern for all of your officers, but we’re still heavily engaged in dealing with combat injuries right now.”
“Doctor”—something in Geary’s voice caused Nasr’s gaze on him to sharpen—“what do you know about mental blocks?”
The doctor stared silently back at Geary for several seconds. “Not much.”
“Do you know if the nature of blocks has changed in the last century?”
The doctor paused again for a long while before replying, his face increasingly grim, then finally shook his head. “In every way that matters, no.”
“But they’re being used now.” Geary made it a statement.
“You know that, Admiral?”
“I know that. I didn’t know it until very recently.”
The doctor closed his eyes, then opened them again to focus on Geary. “Officially, on an unclassified level, and even for most levels of classification, blocks are not used. I couldn’t discuss this with anyone else but you, because you’re the fleet commander. I’m not blocked, I would have left the service rather than agree to that, but I have taken an oath to follow security procedures.”
“Commander Benan also could only discuss it with me because I was the fleet commander.”
“Commander Benan? Why would a line officer—he has been blocked?”
“Yes.” Geary wondered what else to say, what else he could say. “Purely by chance I satisfied the conditions under which he could tell me.”
“He couldn’t tell me.” The doctor slammed his open palm onto the table before him, his face working with anger. “Damn! Do you know, Admiral, that by discussing a specific case of mental blocking with me, you are violating security regulations?”
“Are you telling me that security regulations don’t allow you to know what’s wrong with one of your patients, a patient who is a fleet officer?”
“I’m not even allowed to tell you that.” Geary had grown used to this doctor’s being professionally unflappable, but now Dr. Nasr was openly bitter. “There might be one or two other medical personnel in this fleet who know about the use of blocks, but even I don’t know who they are.”
“Ancestors preserve us,” Geary said. “Does that at least mean the use of blocks is rare?”
“As far as I know.” The doctor loaded that statement with irony as he tapped a query into his console. “It certainly explains the problems we’re seeing in Commander Benan. Personality changes, problems with controlling anger and impulses, occasional confusion.”
“He had a good record before he was captured by the Syndics,” Geary pointed out.
“Did he?” The doctor pulled up some records, scanning them rapidly. “I see. Yes. He reported aboard his new ship, and three months later, he was captured. Two weeks’ leave prior to reporting to that ship, and about three weeks in transit before he joined the ship. All told, a little more than four months.” The doctor paused, his brow furrowing. “Yes. Six months. That’s the usual time before symptoms of a block start manifesting clearly. Commander Benan got captured before they showed.”
And if he hadn’t been captured, his performance aboard his ship would have deteriorated, he would have committed offenses against discipline and good order, all for no known reason, and eventually he would have been expelled from the service. “I remember something about suicide,” Geary said slowly. “When I went through commanding officer capture and interrogation survival school a century ago, they didn’t tell us much about blocks, but there was something about suicide when they talked about why blocks weren’t used.”
“Yes.” The doctor’s mouth worked with distaste. “It’s common in blocked individuals. They’re suffering from the symptoms, they know what’s wrong, but they literally can’t tell anyone else, any attempts at treatment fail because the real underlying cause isn’t known to those directing treatment, and . . .” He shook his head. “An impulsive decision, the only way out, the only way to find peace, and that’s it. I’m about to make a statement that would get me in great trouble with security, Admiral.”
“Feel free. I’ll defend you.”
“Thank you. It has occurred to me on those rare occasions when I thought about blocks that they are indeed aimed at keeping secrets by the oldest and surest means. They eventually drive those given blocks to suicide, and once those individuals are dead, the secrets they carried can never be divulged.”
Dead men tell no tales. How old was that saying? Geary let out a slow breath, trying to calm himself. “Why not just kill them?”
“But we are civilized people, Admiral. We wouldn’t kill someone out of hand.” This time, the doctor’s voice dripped with sarcasm.
“I see why they keep this so secret,” Geary said. “If more than a very few people knew about Alliance use of mental blocks, then the facts would come out somehow, and the blowback would be ferocious. How often do the Syndics use mental blocks?”
Dr. Nasr shook his head. “They don’t. I’m sure I would have been told if they did. Being less civilized than we are, the Syndics apparently simply shoot anyone who inconveniently knows the wrong things. It’s a much more efficient way of eliminating the problem if you look at it in a sufficiently cold-blooded manner.”
What could he say to that? “Thank you for your information, Doctor. With what you now know, can you provide any better treatment for Commander Benan?”
“There are some measures I can try, but I doubt they will help much. The block has to be lifted, Admiral. Then we can try to start undoing the damage.”
“Can I order you to lift the block?”
“No, Admiral.” The doctor spread his hands helplessly. “Even if you could, I don’t know how to do it. I know, in a theoretical way, how blocks are impressed upon individual brains. I don’t know how to do it in practice, though, and I wouldn’t have accepted such training. That means I also have no idea how to lift a block.”
“So Commander Benan has to wait for effective treatment until we get home.”
“If he lasts that long, and if once we get there, you can get authorization to have the block lifted. The only ones who will know how to do it will also be people who will only do it if they receive proper orders through proper channels.” Dr. Nasr s
hook his head. “I am sorry, Admiral.”
“It is in no way your fault.”
“If that is all, I’m needed in surgery in fifteen minutes.”
“Are you getting enough sleep?”
Dr. Nasr paused. “My patients need me, Admiral. If you’ll excuse me, I have to—” He stopped speaking, staring to one side as another message came in to him. “One of the bear-cows became fully conscious, Admiral. He is now dead.”
“Dead.” Geary felt a bitter taste in his mouth. “As soon as he realized he had been captured.”
“Yes. He shut down his entire metabolism. I don’t know how. But given the isolation in which we’ve kept them by the time we could react it was too late.”
“I had hoped that one of them would take the time to realize that if we had patched them up, tried to make them well, it would indicate we didn’t mean them harm.”
The doctor hesitated again, then spoke heavily. “Admiral, the creatures here, the . . .”
“Spider-wolves.”
“Yes. Have you considered the possibility that they eat like the spiders with which we are familiar?”
“To be perfectly frank, Doctor,” Geary admitted, “I’ve tried not to think about what they eat and how they eat it.”
“That’s understandable.” Dr. Nasr grimaced. “Some spiders don’t kill their prey at once, you know. They paralyze it, perhaps, or just wrap it in webbing to immobilize it. Then they leave it, keeping it handy for when they want to eat. They don’t want their prey injured. They want it alive and ready for consumption.”
He didn’t get it at first, then the doctor’s meaning washed over him. “The bear-cows might have encountered the spider-wolves and learned that the spider-wolves liked eating their prey alive, and that they considered bear-cows prey?”
“It is something we must consider,” Dr. Nasr said. “We don’t know. But it is a possibility. We don’t know that these bear-cows didn’t deal with predators like that on their own world before they achieved dominance. We don’t know whether or not they’ve encountered other species who like the taste of bear-cow. Humans do not usually consider themselves prey, Admiral. But when we do get that feeling, that we are nothing but something’s next meal, it is a very horrifying feeling. I wondered at first why a sentient species would develop the means of shutting down its own vital functions, of willing itself to die. But these bear-cows are prey. They have always been prey. They may have developed the means to will themselves to death at the same time as they developed intelligence. I can imagine the physical pain of being eaten, but I cannot imagine the mental pain of knowing I am being eaten. Under such circumstances, the ability to cease suffering would be a welcome option.”
A buzz sounded in Dr. Nasr’s office, and he jerked in reaction. “My surgery. Admiral, I must go.”
“All right, Doctor. Make sure the remaining five bear-cows are kept sedated, kept unconscious.”
Dr. Nasr paused in midreach to end the call. “You realize that we know so little of their physiology, of how they react to medications, that we might easily kill them by trying to keep them sedated.”
“I understand, Doctor.” Damned if we do and damned if we don’t. “Unless we want the other five to kill themselves, or die of other causes, I don’t see any alternative at this point.”
Geary sat brooding after the call ended. What could he do with the bear-cows? An attempted humanitarian gesture had turned into a need to keep them in a state of living death to keep them from actually dying. Would letting them die be the humane thing to do?
He realized that he was thinking of them as bear-cows again, not as Kicks, after speaking with the scientists and the doctor. But no matter what they were called, the same problems remained.
And the talk with Dr. Nasr about Commander Benan hadn’t exactly been comforting, either.
He had no doubt that someone, or more likely a number of important someones, had convinced themselves that the use of mental blocks in a few cases was a justified and humane way to handle knowledge too explosive to risk its ending up in the wrong hands.
But at least one someone who knew about Benan’s involvement in Brass Prince hadn’t been blocked, and had been able to use their knowledge to blackmail Rione. Furthermore, everything pointed to that someone being a very high-ranking individual in the fleet or the government.
It was long past time to shine some light on an ugly shadow. He could ask Lieutenant Iger about proper security procedures, and would undoubtedly be told that proper procedures required Geary to say nothing to anyone though he did wonder if even the intelligence officer knew about this particular thing. No. He wouldn’t do that. “Don’t ask the question if you don’t want to know the answer,” a chief had advised him when he was just an ensign. It felt like that conversation had taken place a hundred years ago.
Actually, he realized, it had taken place a hundred years ago. But it would take a lot longer than that for him to forget that particular wise advice.
When I get back to Alliance space, there will be changes made, and people like Commander Benan will be helped. I’ll tell anyone I need to in order for that to happen. Security is not a license for people in authority to hide tactics they would never openly admit to using.
THE next morning, he was stopping by Dauntless’s bridge, trying to look rested and confident while he checked on the latest status of everything. He could have done those same checks from inside his stateroom, but leaders had to get out among their people, had to show that they were engaged and involved.
“I hope to hear today that we’ve got clearance to head home through spider-wolf-controlled territory,” he told Tanya.
“Good,” she replied. “Before you make any agreements with them, though, Lieutenant Yuon has something to tell you.” Desjani gestured to her combat systems watch-stander.
Lieutenant Yuon blinked, stood a bit straighter, then nodded toward his display. “Admiral, Captain Desjani asked us to take a real good look at the jump points in this star system. There wasn’t anything we hadn’t seen already at the one we arrived at, but we eventually found something at each of the other ones.”
Geary saw new symbols appear on his display, glowing red with familiar danger markers. “Mines?”
“A mine, Admiral. Just one. At each jump exit. Hidden by some really impressive stealth technology. A really big mine.”
That made no sense at all. One really big mine? Geary bent a puzzled look on Desjani.
She waved toward Yuon again. “Make your report, Lieutenant.”
“Yes, Captain. I had the sensors report everything on the mines, but nothing unusual registered. So then I had them scan the areas right around the mines for anything unusual. And eventually the fleet’s sensors spotted some space-time distortion.”
“Space-time distortion? Around a mine? How could—? Wait a minute. Space-time distortion. Isn’t that what happens close to a hypernet gate?”
Desjani mimed applause. “You got it. Or rather, Lieutenant Yuon got it.”
“They’re weaponized versions of the gates, Admiral,” Yuon explained eagerly. “No transportation capability, just a means to set off incredibly powerful bursts of energy.”
“What do the weapons engineers say about this?”
“We asked Captain Smythe,” Desjani said. “His people first denied that you could put that sort of thing in something the size of those mines, big as they are, then conceded that really good engineers might be able to do it.”
“Really good engineers,” Geary repeated. “Like the spider-wolves.”
“And that,” Desjani concluded, “is why the bear-cows haven’t just waltzed through this star system and jumped onward. If anybody tries to use one of those jump points without spider-wolf permission, it’s boom boom out go the lights. I thought you should know that.”
“Thanks. And thank you, Lieutenant Yuon. That was an impressive piece of research and analysis.”
Yuon beamed, and Lieutenant Castries raised a congratula
tory fist toward him.
“Just remember when dealing with these guys,” Desjani said, “that they have tricks up their sleeves. And they have more sleeves than we do. How do we know what they’re thinking?”
“The civilian experts believe that the spider-wolves think in patterns, and that they see us as having a role in keeping that pattern stable. As if we help anchor the pattern.”
Desjani raised her eyebrows skeptically. “A stable pattern? You mean, like, everything?”
“Yeah. Everything. Life. The universe.”
“How can they think that’s stable? There’s nothing stable about life, the universe, or anything else. Everything is always changing. They can’t believe that some pattern exists and never alters as long as it is anchored well enough.”
“No,” Geary said. “They said something about the pattern changing but remaining. It can change. But to them, reality is that pattern.”
“Hmmph.” Her skepticism was clear enough. “I’m not saying they’re bear-cows, or enigmas, but they’re still aliens.”
“You don’t have to remind me of that.”
Her reply was interrupted by an incoming call from Rione, with Charban visible in the background. “The spider-wolves are willing to let us transit their territory,” Rione told Geary slightly breathlessly.
“Thank the living stars. How soon—”
“There’s more.” The corners of her mouth bent upward in a triumphant smile. “They have a hypernet. They will use some of their ships to escort us through it to some location much, much closer to human territory.”
Geary stared, unable to believe their luck. “That’s absolutely wonderful. When—”
“There’s more,” Rione broke in again. “They have two conditions. The first condition is that one of their ships, carrying a diplomatic delegation, accompany us home.”
The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Invincible Page 21