At All Costs

by David Weber

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  "What's the latest on our visitors?" Admiral Alessandra Giovanni asked.

  "Pretty much unchanged, Ma'am," Commander Ewan MacNaughton replied. "Their starships are still stooging around outside the hyper limit, but their platforms are dancing all over the damned place... and making sure we know it."

  He grimaced and waved one hand at the huge display showing the Lovat System's inner planets and the space about them.

  The system's G-6 primary floated at the display's center, orbited by the innermost cinder-which had never attained the dignity of an actual name, aside from Lovat I-and then the planets Furnace, Forge, and Anvil. At seven light-minutes from the primary, Forge, the system's only habitable world, would have enjoyed a pleasant climate, if not for its pronounced axial tilt. Although, to be fair, if you liked severe seasonal weather changes (which MacNaughton didn't), Forge was still a lovely world.

  It was also heavily industrialized.

  The Lovat System had originally been settled by the Aamodt Corporation, one of the huge industrial concerns which had helped build the original Republic of Haven's enormous wealth and power only to go the way of the dinosaur under the People's Republic. The current system governor, however, Havard Ellefsen, was a direct descendent of the Aamodt Coporation's founder, and Lovat had somehow avoided the worst consequences of the PRH's efforts to kill every golden goose it could lay hands on. Despite the fact that it was less than fifty light-years from the Haven System, Lovat had remained one of the unquestioned bright spots of the People's Republic's generally blighted economy, and the system's industrial concerns had played a major role in the Republic's industrial renaissance since the economic reforms Rob Pierre had forced through and the restoration of the Constitution.

  Among other things, Forge's current population of almost three billion was deeply involved in the enormous naval construction programs Thomas Theisman had initiated after going public about the existence of the Republican Navy's new ship types. To be sure, the Lovat System wasn't one of the primary yard sites. Its local industry was much more heavily committed to the construction of light units-light attack craft and the new light cruiser classes-and fleet support vessels-ammunition ships, personnel transports, general cargo haulers, and repair ships. Despite that, it was among the Republic's twenty or so most important star systems, and its system defenses reflected that importance.

  Just over eight thousand LACs were based on Forge and the system's orbital platforms. A permanent covering force of three battle squadrons-admittedly, of pre-pod types, but still a total of twenty-four superdreadnoughts-was assigned, and the system was liberally blanketed with system defense missile pods. In the last six months, Lovat had also received not just one Moriarty platform, but three, the second pair to serve solely as backups for the first.

  And, MacNaughton thought, there's also the defenses I can't see.

  All of which explained why Commander MacNaughton was as confident as his admiral that no Manty raiding force was going to stick its nose into Lovat.

  "We've got their arrays in several quadrants of the inner system," he continued, indicating the wavering icons representing the ghost-like sensor traces which were the best his platforms could do against current-generation Manticoran stealth technology. "They've been buzzing around for over sixty hours now, and we've still got hyper footprints jumping in and out all around the periphery. It's starting to get on my nerves, Ma'am."

  "Which is exactly what it's supposed to do," Giovanni pointed out.

  "I know that, Ma'am. And so do our LAC crews. But that doesn't keep it from being irritating, and Commander Lucas reports that Moriarty's gold crew is beginning to suffer from fatigue."

  "I told the Octagon we needed more personnel," Giovanni growled. "Unfortunately, we don't really have them yet-not for Moriarty. Or, rather, we could have complete backup crews... if we were willing to do without backup platforms."

  MacNaughton nodded. Admiral Foraker and her Bolthole command continued to work miracles in their training programs, but the Navy's enormous expansion was taking its toll. Despite the steadily climbing educational levels of the Republic, the Navy still had to spend far more time than the Manties did providing its recruits with the basic education needed to perform their jobs. Fortunately, Foraker had gotten very, very good at doing just that. Unfortunately, it still put a bottleneck into the availability of fully trained manpower.

  "Shall I instruct Lucas to stand the gold platform down and bring up silver or bronze?"

  "Um." Giovanni ran a hand over her dark hair, eyes thoughtful, then shrugged. "Go ahead and shift to silver. I doubt we're really going to need them, but it won't hurt for silver to get a little more hands-on experience, anyway."

  "Yes, Ma'am. I'll get on it right away, and-"

  The rest of MacNaughton's sentence was slashed off by the sudden jangle of alarms as a massive hyper footprint exploded onto the plot.

  * * *

  "Well done, Theo," Honor Alexander-Harrington said.

  Lieutenant Commander Kgari had dropped TF 81, Eighth Fleet's leading task force, into normal-space barely forty thousand kilometers outside the Lovat System's hyper limit. That was extraordinarily precise astrogation, and Kgari smiled in appreciation of her well deserved praise.

  Honor smiled back, but her true attention was focused on the huge flag bridge tactical display. She watched alertly, waiting for CIC to post any major changes, but the only differences from Skirmisher's last upload were insignificant.

  Not that it's going to stay that way if we've got things figured right, she reminded herself.

  "All right," she said. "Harper, pass the execute command."

  "Aye, aye, Your Grace," Lieutenant Brantley acknowledged, and the eight CLACs of Alice Truman's reinforced carrier squadron launched almost nine hundred LACs as Alistair McKeon's BatRon 61 headed in-system, screened by fifteen Manticoran and Grayson BC(P)s and HMS Nike under the overall command of Rear Admiral Erasmus Miller. Michelle Henke would have had the command, except that the terms of her parole precluded her from serving against the Republic. So she'd been sent to Talbott, where Honor knew she would prove enormously useful, and Michael Oversteegan, promoted to Rear Admiral, had been given her squadron. But much as Honor approved of Oversteegan's demonstrated capability, he was junior to Miller. And the Grayson rear admiral was more than merely competent in his own right, she reminded herself.

  Winston Bradhsaw's and Charise Fanaafi"s twelve heavy cruisers, eight of them Saganami-C-class ships, backed Miller up, and six light cruisers under the command of Commodore George Ullman, who'd replaced Commodore Moreau when she died aboard HMS Buckler at Solon, thickened the screen.

  It was a powerful force, by any measure, although Honor was fully aware that it was grossly outnumbered and outgunned by the system's defenders.

  Just as it was supposed to be.

  "Admiral Truman reports all LAC wings away, Your Grace," Andrea Jaruwalski announced.

  "Very good. Instruct her to hyper out to the Alpha rendezvous."

  "Aye, aye, Your Grace."

  Honor watched the carriers' icons disappear, then settled herself into her command chair, a skinsuited Nimitz in her lap, and watched her thirty starships accelerate steadily in-system.

  * * *

  "Do you think this is another Suarez, Ma'am?" MacNaughton asked tensely as he watched the oncoming icons move steadily across the plot.

  "I don't know."

  Giovanni's own eyes were slitted in concentration, and he noticed she was wrapping a single lock of hair around her right index finger. It was a mannerism he'd grown accustomed to over the last three T-years, and he waited respectfully.

  "No," she said after several moments of consideration. "I don't know why, but I don't think so. These people are really here."

  "It seems awfully gutsy of them," MacNaughton said, and she shrugged.

  "I'm inclined to agree. On the other hand, maybe they think they can get deep enough in to do
significant damage and still avoid interception. This is the strongest raiding force they've sent in yet, assuming the outer platforms' analysis is correct. It's possible they figure they've got the firepower to fight their way out past the sort of interception Admiral Giscard managed at Solon."

  "If they do, they're wrong, Ma'am," MacNaughton said.

  "We think they are, Ewan," Giovanni corrected. "Although, if they've got the sense God gave a Legislaturalist, at least they'll stay out of our inner-system missile envelope!"

  * * *

  Honor glanced at the date/time display and smiled sadly. If Illescue was on schedule, her daughter would be born in almost exactly eight minutes.

  Katherine Allison Miranda Alexander-Hamilton. She sampled the name silently, wishing with all her heart that she were there, watching the miracle of life, tasting her daughter's newborn mind-glow, and not here, orchestrating the deaths of thousands. She inhaled deeply, and sent a thought winging across the light-years.

  Happy birthday, baby. I hope God lets me watch you grow up... and that you never have to do something like this.

  * * *

  "Coming up on Point Samar in five minutes, Your Grace," Jaruwalski said.

  "Thank you, Andrea."

  Honor looked up and checked the time display. Her units had been accelerating towards rendezvous with Forge for thirty-five minutes at a steady 4.81 KPS2 from their relatively low initial velocity. They were up to 11,750 KPS, and they'd traveled just over fourteen million kilometers. They were still seventy-four minutes from turnover for a zero/zero intercept, but the one thing she felt absolutely confident of was that none of the defenders expected her to be making any zero/zero rendezvous with Forge.

  Of course, they might be wrong, she thought coldly.

  She returned her attention to the tactical plot. The old-style superdreadnoughts, which Jaruwalski had designated Bogey One, were holding their positions in-system, close to Forge, but the forward sensor drones showed that their impeller wedges were up, and their sidewalls were active. The massive LAC force their scouts had reported was also clearly in evidence. Whoever the system commander here in Lovat was, she didn't appear to have opted for the sort of deceptiveness Admiral Bellefeuille had displayed at Chantilly.

  But appearances can be... deceiving, Honor reminded herself, with a slight smile. I hope they are, anyway. I'd hate to have wasted all this preparation if this is really all they've got.

  She pursed her lips slightly, looking down at the smaller repeater plot deployed from the side of her command chair. Unlike the main plot, it was configured to show the entire system, and her gaze rested on the green sphere which represented the Lovat hyper limit.

  "Any time now, Your Grace. If we've got it figured right, at least."She looked up. Mercedes Brigham stood beside her command chair, looking down at the same repeater, and Honor nodded.

  "If it were me, I'd figure I had the patsies right about where I wanted them," she agreed. "And by now, their recon platforms have to have gotten a good enough look at us to be sure we're not just drones."

  Brigham nodded back, and the two of them watched the plot, waiting.

  * * *

  "Admiral, they're seventy minutes from turnover."

  "Very good, Ewan. Send the execute to Tarantula."

  * * *

  "Hyper footprint! We have major hyper footprints directly astern and at system north and system south," Andrea Jaruwalski reported. "Designate these forces Bogey Two, Bogey Three, and Bogey Four! They're accelerating in-system at five-point-zero-eight KPS-squared."

  "Very well," Honor said calmly.

  She leaned back in her command chair and crossed her legs, stroking the plushy fur between Nimitz's ears.

  * * *

  "Admiral, Admiral Giovanni's platforms confirm that one of the superdreadnoughts matches the emissions signature of the ship that got away at Solon," Marius Gozzi said.

  "So," Javier Giscard said softly, "'the Salamander' is back."

  He shook his head with more than a trace of sadness. Eloise had tried to hide her despair in her last letter to him, but he knew her too well. When Elizabeth Winton had accepted her offer of the summit, it had been like watching the sun come out. And when whatever the hell had happened on Old Earth and Torch crushed any prospect of a negotiated settlement, it had been like watching a late blizzard bury the frozen blossoms of a murdered spring.

  He supposed he couldn't really blame the Manties for leaping to the conclusion that the Republic was behind what had happened. It didn't make sense, in a lot of ways, yet people-and star nations-all too often did things that didn't make sense. But however well he might understand their reasoning, he still had to cope with the consequences of their actions.

  And so do they, he thought grimly, watching that outnumbered force go to military power. Not that it was going to do it a great deal of good. Its six superdreadnoughts were thoroughly outgunned by the sixteen SD(P)s and four CLACs in each of his three intercepting forces; the inner-system's missile pods were far more numerous than they'd been at Solon; and he'd been able to plot his own translations much more closely. Unlike Solon, these Manties would be unable to avoid entering the effective missile envelope of at least one of his intercepting forces.

  "Open fire, Sir?" Selma Thackeray asked, but Giscard shook his head.

  "Harrington showed us at Solon what she could do to long-range missile fire," he told the ops officer, "and she's got a lot more defensive platforms than she had then. No. We'll just follow along. We're the beaters; Moriarty is the hunter. Once Giovanni chews them up, we'll worry about cleaning up the remnants."

  "Yes, Sir," Thackeray acknowledged, and Giscard returned his attention to the plot.

  They shouldn't have sent you out with so few ships, Your Grace, he told the light code of HMS Imperator.

  * * *

  "All right, Andrea," Honor said, glancing at the time display once more. Twelve minutes had passed since the Havenite ambush force had translated in behind her. "Execute Ozawa."

  "Aye, aye, Your Grace!" Jaruwalski said, her voice sparkling with excitement, and tapped a single command into her console.

  * * *

  "There's the execute signal, Ma'am!" Lieutenant Harcourt announced.

  "Understood," Commander Estwicke replied, and looked at her astrogator. "Take us out, Jerome."

  "Aye, aye, Skipper," Lieutenant Weismeuller acknowledged, and HMS Ambuscade popped back up into hyper-space.

  Weissmuller had plotted his translation with care, and he'd had plenty of time to position his ship perfectly in normal-space before executing it. Ambuscade arrived precisely where she was supposed to be, and her plot suddenly blossomed with the light codes of capital ships.

  "Communications, pass the word to Admiral Yanakov," Estwicke said.

  * * *

  "Hyper footprint!"

  Javier Giscard's head snapped up at the unanticipated announcement. Commander Thackeray was bent over her console, fingers flying as she massaged the contact, and then she looked up, her face taut.

  "Admiral, we've got eighteen superdreadnoughts or CLACs, well outside the hyper limit, directly astern of us. Range five-three-point-nine million kilometers. Velocity relative to Lovat two-point-five-zero-one thousand KPS. They-"

  She broke off for just a moment, looking back down at her plot, then cleared her throat.

  "Update, Sir. It's twelve SD(P)s and six carriers. The carriers just launched full LAC complements."

  Giscard nodded, and hoped he looked calmer than he felt.

  Mousetrapped, by God, he thought. And the same way we did it to her at Solon.

  He shook his head in brief admiration, but well executed as Harrington's maneuver had been, it still wasn't perfect. The wallers coming up behind him were at almost three light-minutes' range. They had him deep enough inside the hyper limit that he couldn't avoid action, but their astrogation had been poor, and they'd made their own alpha translation 2.8 light-minutes outside the hyper limit. At that ra
nge, even Manty MDM accuracy was going to be significantly degraded, and he had sixteen pod-layers to their twelve. The LACs they were deploying outnumbered his, and they'd be more effective in the missile-defense role, but he was too far ahead of them, with too great an advantage in base velocity for them to overtake him.

  And Harrington was still in front of him, driving steadily deeper into the waiting defensive missiles.

  "Start rolling pods, Selma," he told his ops officer. "Fire Plan Gamma."

  * * *

  The outer-system FTL platforms reported the arrival of Admiral Yanakov's Task Force 82 to Alessandra Giovanni almost as quickly as Selma Thackeray reported it to Javier Giscard.