There were more smiles around the table now. Even Citizen Captain Joubert got into the act, although Challot still seemed less enthralled by the prospect than her fellows.

“Now,” MacIntosh went on, entering more commands into his terminal, “to look at our ops area. As you know, HQ wanted a zone where things have been rather quiet and the Manties have drawn down their forces to support front-line operations, but important enough to be sure we attract their attention. I think,” he smiled and entered a final command, “they’ve found one.”

A holo display flashed to life above the table, and Giscard saw Citizen Commander Tyler sit up straight in her chair as she saw their proposed operational area for the first time. Nor was her reaction unique. Only Giscard, Pritchart, Joubert, and MacIntosh had known where Operation Icarus was aimed before this moment, and eyes narrowed and faces tightened with mingled anticipation and worry as the rest of his staff discovered that information.

Stars were sparse in the holo, but the ones which floated there had a value out of all proportion to the density of the local stellar population. A thin rash of bright red light chips indicated naval bases or member systems of the Manticoran Alliance, but all of them were dominated by the bright purple glow of a single star: Basilisk, the terminus of the Manticore Wormhole Junction where the war had almost begun four T-years earlier.

“HQ is granting us quite a lot of flexibility in selecting and scheduling our precise targets in this area,” MacIntosh went on, “but the basic plan calls for us to begin operations down here,” a cursor flicked to life in the display, “and then head up in this general direction—”

The cursor crawled upward through the stars, heading steadily towards Basilisk, and Giscard leaned back in his chair to listen as closely as the most junior member of his staff.

“I need to speak with you, Citizen Admiral. Alone.”

Citizen Commissioner Pritchart’s flat voice cut through the sound of moving people as the staff meeting broke up two hours later. More than one of the naval officers flinched—not because she’d raised her voice, or because she’d said anything overtly threatening, but because she’d said so little during the meeting. People’s commissioners weren’t noted, as a rule, for reticence. Part of their job, after all, was to ensure that no one ever forgot the living, breathing presence of StateSec as the People’s guardian. Which suggested at least the possibility that Citizen Admiral Giscard—or perhaps one of his officers—might have put a foot so far wrong that Citizen Commissioner Pritchart intended to chop the offending leg right off.

“Of course, Citizen Commissioner,” Giscard replied after the briefest of hesitations. “Here?”

“No.” Pritchart looked around the compartment, topaz eyes flicking over the officers calmly. “Your day cabin, perhaps,” she suggested, and he shrugged.

“As you wish, Citizen Commissioner,” he said, with an apparent calmness which woke mingled admiration and trepidation in some of his new subordinates. “Citizen Captain Joubert, I’ll expect those reports from you and Citizen Commander MacIntosh and Citizen Lieutenant Thaddeus by fourteen hundred.”