Free Shadow of Freedom-eARC by David Weber Page A

System government, and currently in the employ of the Mesan Alignment, thought dryly. And at least they’re a lot closer to sane than that maniac Nordbrandt!
    He smiled and shook his head. He actually had nothing at all against “Talisman” and “Magpie,” when it came down to it. In fact, he wished them well, not that he actually expected things to turn out that way. Still, it was nothing personal. Only business.
    He watched the ground car disappear through the drooping gate and checked his chrono. Seven and a half minutes, he decided. That ought to be a sufficiently random interval before he headed off in the opposite direction himself.

April 1922 Post Diaspora

    “It’s an imperfect universe. Deal with it.”
    —Admiral Michelle Henke

Chapter Five
    Chris Billingsley poured the final cup of coffee, set the carafe on the small side table, and withdrew without a word. Vice Admiral Gloria Michelle Samantha Evelyn Henke, Countess Gold Peak and commanding officer, Tenth Fleet, Royal Manticoran Navy watched him go, then picked up her cup and sipped. Other people were doing the same thing around the conference table, and she wondered how many of them were using it as a stage prop in their effort to project a sense that the universe hadn’t gone mad around them.
    If they are, they aren’t doing a very good job of it , she thought grimly. On the other hand, neither am I because as near as I can tell, the universe has gone crazy .
    The first intimation of what looked like it was going to come to be called “the Yawata Strike” because of the total destruction of the city of Yawata Crossing had reached Spindle twenty-six hours ago. At that time, all they’d had was the flash message telling them the Manticore Binary System itself had been attacked and that damage to the Star Empire’s industrial capacity had been “severe.” Now the first follow-up report, with a more detailed estimate of the damage—and the casualties—had arrived, and she found herself wishing the message transit time between Spindle and Manticore was longer than eight days. She supposed she should be glad to be kept informed, but she could have gone for years—decades!—without this particular bit of information.
    “All right,” she said finally, lowering her cup and glancing at Captain Lecter. “I suppose we may as well get down to it.” She smiled without any humor at all. “I don’t imagine any of you are going to be any happier to hear this than I am. Unfortunately, after we do, we’ve got to decide what we’re going to do about it, and I’m going to want recommendations for Admiral Khumalo and Baroness Medusa. So if any of you—and I mean any of you—happen to be struck by any brilliant insights in the course of Cindy’s briefing, make a note of them. We’re going to need all of them we can get.”
    Heads nodded, and she gestured to Lecter.
    “The floor is yours, Cindy,” she said.
    “Yes, Ma’am.”
    Lecter didn’t look any happier about the briefing she was about to give than her audience looked about what they knew they were going to hear. She spent a second or two studying the notes she’d made before she looked up and let her blue eyes circle the conference table.
    “We have confirmation of the original reports,” she said, “and it’s as bad as we thought it would be. In fact, it’s worse.”
    She drew a deep breath, then activated the holo display above the conference table, bringing up the first graphic.
    “Direct, immediate civilian loss of life,” she began, “was much worse than any pre-attack worst-case analysis of damage to the space stations had ever suggested, because there was absolutely no warning. As you can see from the graphic, the initial strike on Hephaestus— ”
    * * *
    “I never realized just how much worse a victory could make a defeat taste,” Augustus Khumalo said much later that evening.
    He, Michelle, Michael Oversteegen, and Sir Aivars Terekhov sat with Baroness Medusa on the