Boundless

by Jack Campbell

  “One of them tried to kill the admiral while he was on the ground at Unity,” Desjani said.

  After a moment of shocked silence, Duellos shook his head. “That sort of thing shouldn’t be a problem with our sailors. The crews of our ships have seen the Dancers fight alongside us. They know the Dancers may have made the difference between us winning or dying at Unity Alternate. To them, the looks of the Dancers don’t count. What matters is their reliability when you need a tough ally.” He paused, glancing at Colonel Rico. “It’s similar to how sailors think about Marines, I suppose.”

  Rico flashed a very quick smile. “And how Marines feel about sailors. If ugly gets the job done, then ugly is what you want.”

  * * *

  EIGHT days after that meeting, the shipyards still idle while Admiral Barnhorst continued her review, the courier ship returned from Unity.

  Geary expected to receive a message from the courier as soon as light could carry it to where Dauntless orbited near Ambaru Station. What he didn’t expect was to see Admiral Timbale delivering the message.

  “Greetings, Admiral Geary,” Timbale said. “I’d barely arrived at Unity for my new assignment when orders came for me to hustle to meet this courier ship and return to Varandal. I’m to immediately relieve Admiral Barnhorst and send her back to Unity. As soon as this message goes out I’m going to broadcast my orders to all units in Varandal, and get things going again. To the honor of our ancestors, Timbale, out.”

  Geary laughed with relief, then immediately called Captain Smythe. “You’ll be hearing from Admiral Timbale any moment now. Get those shipyards going again as fast as you can.”

  Normally, he hated throwing his weight around. This time, though, it felt good. He hadn’t dared hope that Timbale would be reassigned here, just asking for someone willing to get the job done.

  Hopefully Timbale wasn’t too unhappy about being yanked around.

  * * *

  THE weeks that followed were an unending string of days packed with inspections and reports and planning and preparations. His orders from the Senate gave him a lot of authority, but that meant he also bore a lot of responsibility. The staffs that operational admirals had once carried around with them, officers who’d handle much of the running of a command, had been pared down throughout the war to feed the insatiable maws of the war and Fleet Headquarters, replaced by automated assistants. Normally, the automated assistants could handle many of those functions fine. But this wasn’t normal.

  “We’re staging an intervention,” Captain Duellos informed Geary one afternoon during a meeting the senior fleet captains had requested. “You need help. Since you haven’t listened to your flagship captain,” he added with a nod toward Captain Desjani, “we’ll try to get through to you.”

  “You can’t do it all yourself,” Captain Badaya said. “You’ve helped all of us, even me, learn some important things. Now it’s time we helped you.”

  “We can handle some of these tasks,” Captain Armus said. “Delegate. It’s what admirals do.”

  “I have some lieutenants who are underemployed,” Duellos said. “They’d be happy to pitch in.”

  “Really?” Geary said.

  “I haven’t actually asked them yet,” Duellos admitted. “Asking for volunteers instead of assigning them just complicates things.”

  Jane Geary nodded. “And you need to know these responsibilities will be covered when you go on leave, Admiral.”

  “I’m willing to accept your proposals,” Geary said, realizing how relieved he suddenly felt and wondering why he’d needed this to grasp the importance of delegating some of the preparations. “Thank you for working them up. But I’m not going on leave, so that aspect of things is already covered.”

  He saw the others glance at Tanya Desjani, but decided it would be wiser not to ask why.

  * * *

  COURIER ships arrived with regularity, bringing news and information. Senator Wilkes had been formally charged with treason. The head of one of the major Alliance intelligence organizations had been arrested. At least a half-dozen AI-controlled courier ships were unaccounted for, possibly destroyed at Unity Alternate, but possibly still moving about, mimicking other ships. Their fuel cells would run low at some point, but for now all security forces had been alerted.

  The modifications to the emissary ship were proceeding on schedule. The ship should arrive at Varandal about two weeks before the projected departure date.

  Accompanying the emissary ship would be General Carabali, her Marines, and the assault transports Tsunami, Typhoon, and Haboob. The Senate had decided it was important to replace the Marines with ground forces normally stationed on Unity so that conditions would appear normal again despite the security risk that might still pose.

  Sailors were leaving the fleet as their enlistments expired, and new recruits were coming in, just as Master Chief Gioninni had warned. Fortunately, the numbers appeared to be well less than one-third of the fleet’s sailors. Unfortunately, they might end up being as high as one-quarter of the total number. Which required scheduling more training in the midst of everything else.

  Geary was going through another batch of status reports, and trying to fight off a looming headache, when his hatch alert chimed. “Come in.”

  Tanya Desjani entered, glancing at his display. “That’s no fun.”

  He gave her a sour look. “Since when are you concerned about fun? You run one of the tightest ships I’ve ever seen and you work longer hours than I do.”

  “But I do let my crew enjoy themselves when appropriate.” She sat down opposite him, holding up her left hand so the ring was visible, their signal that the conversation would be about personal matters. “We need to talk.”

  “About?” Geary asked warily.

  “You, me, honeymoon, Glenlyon Star System.”

  “What?” He waved a hand in denial. “I admit I’d enjoy a honeymoon—”

  “Thanks.”

  “But Glenlyon is . . .”

  “Your home.” She let the words hang for several seconds.

  He felt his shoulders hunching in defensive reaction. “Tanya, you know what’ll happen if I go back to Glenlyon.”

  “Crowds. Adoration for their hero. Awkward moments. A few public appearances.” She shook her head. “The same things you experienced at Unity.”

  “And which I did not enjoy at all!”

  “Jack, your home world deserves a visit.”

  “Isn’t my life hard enough without going through that?” he said.

  “It’s your duty.”

  Geary flinched. “Tanya, that’s a low blow.” Because she knew that was one button she could push that he had few defenses against.

  “Am I right?” she asked.

  “I also have a duty to ensure the fleet is ready to depart on time.”

  “Both Badaya and your niece Jane will be here while we’re gone. Either one can handle things at Varandal for a few weeks. I’d prefer Jane Geary just because you never know what Badaya might decide is a good idea, but he’s surprised me a lot in recent months. And since Admiral Timbale has settled in again we’re not having any problems with the shipyards. Captain Smythe informed me he can handle anything that might come up.”

  “I know that, but I should—”

  “Are you indispensible, Admiral Geary?”

  He paused, realizing that was exactly what he’d been thinking without realizing it. “No. I shouldn’t be. No one should be indispensible.” He spent a few more moments trying to muster additional arguments, and failing.

  “Jane has asked me about it,” Tanya added.

  He felt his last defenses crumbling. “Jane wants me to go back to Glenlyon?”

  “She’s wondering why you haven’t.” Tanya leaned forward. “It means a lot to her. She got the chance to meet the real man behind those heroic stories we were
fed. She wants others close to the Gearys to have the same chance.”

  There were times when surrender was the only right course of action. “Three days.”

  “That’s too short. One week. Not counting any time in transit or orbital transfers.”

  “When you add in travel time,” he complained, “that’ll have us gone more than three weeks even if we manage to get perfect scheduling from commercial passenger ships.”

  “It’ll take twenty days,” Tanya said. “I’ve talked to the other captains and my officers, and all agree we should take Dauntless. Arriving home in your flagship will show the proper respect for your ancestors.”

  “I can’t just haul a battle cruiser to my home world so I can have some time off there!”

  “Training, testing, and evaluation,” Tanya said. “We’ve got new sailors to integrate into the crew, and some system work that requires operational testing. Both of which can be accomplished by a TT and E voyage within Alliance space. We have to go somewhere. Why not Glenlyon?”

  “Your crew—”

  “Will be treated like royalty by the good people of Glenlyon. It’ll be their best liberty ever.”

  She’d planned and prepared the whole argument as if it were a campaign, covering every contingency. He had only one argument left. “If we take Dauntless, we’ll be on duty the whole way there and back. That means no honeymoon while we’re traveling.”

  She sighed. “Yeah. We’ll have to make up for it while we’re there.” Seeing his reaction, she laughed. “I guess you like that idea.”

  Which was how he found himself riding Dauntless toward the hypernet gate, worrying during every second of the light hours the trip took that something would go wrong or not get done while he wasn’t here.

  Along the way, he realized how right Tanya Desjani had been to insist on this. Because no one should be indispensible, no single person should be critical to accomplishing a mission. But he’d talked himself into believing that he was even though his officers were experienced in repairing ships and preparing to carry out missions.

  He still wasn’t looking forward to Glenlyon, though. Aside from issues and memories that he’d tried to avoid confronting, he was certain there’d be a statue of him there. And who in their right mind would want to come face-to-face with a statue of themselves?

  * * *

  A century was a long time in terms of human lives and the things they built. To a world, a century was the blink of an eye.

  To the naked eye, from orbit, the planet named Glenlyon looked much as it had when he’d last left it. The primary orbital facility, though, had at least doubled in size.

  He got up from his fleet command seat on the bridge, feeling disquieted at the idea of facing the changes a century had wrought on the surface, of directly confronting the ghosts of a past that still felt recent to him. “Have fun,” he told the watch standers before leaving the bridge, listening to Tanya giving last-minute instructions to the officers who’d be in charge of each of Dauntless’s three watch sections. Each day, one watch section would be responsible for the ship, while the other two got to leave the ship for liberty. In order to even out the chances for every sailor to experience the same number of days off, Geary had agreed to extend the visit to the planet to nine days.

  He went back to his stateroom, grabbed the satchel with his few small possessions in it, and then headed for the shuttle dock.

  The sailors he passed looked and sounded happy, obviously looking forward to a few days as celebrities because of their status as part of the flagship’s crew.

  At the shuttle dock, some officers, several senior enlisted, and a lot of sailors were already lined up for the first liberty shuttle. Tanya arrived to the shout of “Captain’s on deck!” from Master Chief Gioninni, all of the sailors coming to attention.

  She walked to the nearest comm panel and activated the general announcing system so her voice could be heard throughout the ship. “All hands, this is the captain. I expect the sections on duty to be focused on their tasks and keep the ship safe. Those on liberty are authorized to have a good time. Remember while on the planet that you represent not just the Alliance fleet but also this ship, and Admiral Geary himself. Conduct yourselves accordingly. Anyone who takes any action that blemishes the name of the fleet, this ship, and me will regret the day they were born. In case anyone is in doubt, excessive use of alcohol or other legal intoxicants is not an excuse for doing something stupid, illegal, or dangerous. Stay safe and stay smart.” Desjani looked about her at the sailors within sight as if to assure herself that they were listening. “And now it is my pleasure to sound liberty call.”

  As she stepped away from the panel, cheers erupted throughout the ship.

  Desjani turned to face the other ship’s officers present, as well as the senior enlisted. Pointing at Gioninni, she moved her forefinger to one eye and then back at him in a clear gesture of warning to which the master chief responded with a look of surprised innocence.

  Glenlyon had sent a special shuttle to rendezvous with Dauntless. Already uncomfortable, Geary was embarrassed to discover the shuttle was a VIP model decked out with every possible luxury. “I shouldn’t be riding this down when the crew is using standard fleet shuttles.”

  “They won’t begrudge you the experience,” Desjani said as she took a seat and strapped in. “They know when food got short you ate Danaka Yoruk ration bars just like they did.”

  The drop through atmosphere was unusually smooth for someone used to the rougher rides of military shuttles, the view on the displays of the outside shading from the black of space to the twilight of the upper atmosphere and then to the blue of the sky on a world inhabitable by humans. The final landing took so long to come to a gentle rest that Geary found himself waiting impatiently. “Would it kill somebody important to feel a little bump on landing?”

  “You never know,” Tanya said. “Now stop complaining and get your happy face on.”

  “Sure,” Geary muttered as he got up and turned toward the hatch.

  “You can do it,” Tanya assured him as the hatch cycled open.

  He smoothed out his expression, and made sure they were walking side by side down the ramp from the hatch, not wanting to make it seem as if she counted less than he did. He had a confused impression of many people and the familiar scorched scent of a landing field as he tried not to trip on the way down the ramp.

  At the foot of the ramp, an honor guard awaited, two lines of Marines in replicas of the original Glenlyon Marine uniform. The honor guard conjured up unpleasant memories of his visit to Fleet Headquarters on Unity, but otherwise there was nothing to cause concern. The vast crowds visible beyond the landing area held no sense of menace or tension, of being narrowly balanced against tipping into chaos, as the crowds at Unity had. Instead, their cheers sounded only jubilant.

  He blinked against the light of the sun. A lot of people from a lot of other planets said the light of other stars never felt quite right, that only the light from the sun someone grew up under would feel like it had just the right cast. Maybe that was true, but at the moment the sun low in the sky just felt uncomfortably bright.

  “Their hero has come home,” Tanya murmured just loudly enough to be heard over the happy tumult.

  Planetary VIPs waited at the end of the honor guard ranks, all of them beaming at the chance to greet Geary and get pictures with him. “Welcome back, child of Glenlyon,” Council President Kennedy said as he embraced Geary. “And welcome to the new daughter of Glenlyon you’ve brought to the world that is now her home as well,” he added, giving her the same quick official hug, arms exerting little pressure, upper bodies barely coming into contact.

  Various council members gave their greetings one by one, followed by the heads of the local ground forces and star system defense offering salutes.

  Geary found himself facing the watching crowds, a vir
tual microphone ready to broadcast his words to all of them, as well as to those watching from other locations on the planet and elsewhere in this star system. The speech he’d rehearsed in case it was needed vanished from his mind, leaving him groping for words. “I’m sorry it took me so long to get back to Glenlyon. I’ve been . . . busy with a number of things.”

  The laughter surprised him, but gave him a moment to collect his wits as well. “I hadn’t realized how much I missed this world. So much . . . so much I knew probably isn’t here anymore. The people I knew . . .” He had to pause, collecting himself, the watchers silent as they waited. “But much remains. All of you remain. Every battle we fight is both for the present, and for the future. And every battle honors those who fought for us in the past. Anything I’ve done is because of those who came before, and for those who stand here now. Please remember and honor all of those who could never come home, who gave all they had. They deserve more than I ever will, because they gave more than I ever have.”

  What else to say?

  “I’m glad that I finally made it home,” Geary said, stepping back to signal he was done speaking because he couldn’t think of anything else to say. The thunderous applause surprised him, and it kept up as the VIPs of Glenlyon led him and Tanya to a caravan of official vehicles.

  They were escorted into a limo also holding the two senior military officials, who seemed tongue-tied as the car began moving between lines of cheering citizens. The ground forces officer finally spoke up. “It’s late afternoon at this location on the planet. We’ve only scheduled one event for the rest of the day so you can take time to adjust and rest.”

  The star system defense head nodded. “It’s a buffet for veterans. We thought that should be the first thing.”

  “That was a good decision,” Geary said. “How bad were Glenlyon’s losses?”