Victorious tlf-6

by Jack Campbell

  He could tell that Costa was burning to ask what he was doing, but Sakai remained impassive, offering no support for that, and Rione had a look of calm confidence that implied that she knew what was happening.

  “The enemy is five light-minutes distant. Estimated time to contact is approximately twenty-five minutes.”

  Sakai shook his head. “The Alliance’s first encounter with an intelligent, nonhuman race, and we must refer to them as the enemy.”

  “It’s not by our choice,” Rione reminded him. “But if Admiral Geary chooses to offer the aliens one last chance to veer off and avoid battle …”

  Desjani flicked a sour look back at the politicians, but Geary shrugged. “It doesn’t hurt to say it again.” He tapped the broadcast control again. “To the armada of nonhuman ships proceeding through this star system. You will not be allowed to pass this fleet without a fight, you will not be allowed to attack humans or human property within this star system, you will not be allowed to seize control of this star system. Veer off now and return to the vicinity of the jump point from which you arrived if you wish to avoid senseless loss of life. To the honor of our ancestors. Geary out.”

  “Do we have to keep offering them outs,” Desjani muttered too low for the politicians to hear, “or is it okay to kill them now?”

  “It’s okay to kill them now. Damn shame, though. Think what we could learn from each other if they’d just talk.”

  “We can talk after they’ve learned not to mess with us.” At a combined velocity of point two light speed, the two groupings of ships bore onward, neither altering course or speed. “Ten minutes remaining to contact.”

  Geary nodded, letting his mind feel the right time for the maneuver. He had ordered his ships into their combat formations close to an hour ago, giving the aliens plenty of time to assume they knew what he would do. Now his final maneuver had to be at the last moment, so the aliens wouldn’t see the change in targets in time to alter their own plans. If he had guessed wrong about the alien plan, then the pass might be a fiasco, but that was the worst case unless the aliens did have secret wonder weapons they hadn’t employed yet. “All units in formations Merit One, Merit Two, and Merit Three, at time three five alter course down zero one five degrees. Fire as targets enter engagement envelopes. Geary out.”

  On the display to one side of him, the one relayed from the auxiliaries with systems still contaminated by alien worms, the maneuver he had just ordered looked just as Desjani had described, a suicidal dive by the Alliance fighting subformations between the second and third layers of the alien armada, facing two-to-one odds and fire from top and bottom simultaneously. On his clean display, it showed the Alliance attack forces would be heading downward at the last moment toward the alien ships in the second layer, with the firepower advantage at the point of contact four to one in the Alliance’s favor.

  He thought about the tragedy that this first alien contact was, as Sakai said, with enemies. But Geary also thought about all of the Syndic ships that had been destroyed by the aliens in the last century, ships whose crews had not known how badly they were handicapped by the alien worms. The aliens had possessed a huge advantage and apparently had not hesitated to use it.

  At time three five, the three Alliance subformations tilted downward while the subformation with the auxiliaries maintained course, soaring past safely above the fray. “Turn up, you bastards,” Desjani whispered, then whooped with glee. “Here they come!”

  Unable to see the last-moment Alliance course change in time, the entire alien formation had tilted upward, swinging up so that the ships in the second layer could have hit the Alliance warships aiming at the alien craft in the illusory third layer.

  But the Alliance ships weren’t aiming there, instead coming down to meet the rising aliens.

  The close encounter came and went, and Geary let out the breath he had been holding. No alien superweapons had compensated for the loss of their worm advantage. Dauntless was still intact, though he could hear reports of hits being passed.

  The worm-driven picture from the auxiliaries showed no change in the alien armada after the encounter, but the fleet’s uncontaminated sensors were rapidly updating their own assessments. The second layer of the alien armada had been devastated, caught unawares by greatly superior firepower, roughly three-quarters of its ships either destroyed outright or reduced to helpless wrecks.

  The aliens seemed to have concentrated their own fire on Alliance battle cruisers, ignoring the escorts and battleships, but their barrage had been weakened as their own ships were destroyed. Invincible’s curse remained intact, that ship having been hit hardest and left barely maneuverable. Illustrious had also been hurt, as had Ascendant, Auspice, Formidable, Brilliant, Daring, Dragon, and Valiant. The other battle cruisers, like Dauntless, had taken hits but not serious damage.

  “This is Admiral Geary, formations Merit One and Merit Four come up one nine zero degrees at time four two, formation Merit Two come port one nine zero degrees at time four two, and formation Merit Three come starboard one nine zero degrees at time four two.” The four subformations began wide turns, the formation centered on Dauntless coming up and over to pursue the aliens, while those formations to either side turned outward and around to face the enemy again as well.

  It apparently took the aliens a few minutes to realize just how badly things had gone and see the Alliance maneuvers, but then the surviving alien ships bent down at a jaw-dropping rate, twisting onto a vector that would take them below and past the three Alliance subformations trying to trap them into another firing run.

  “We can’t catch them, Captain,” the maneuvering watch-stander reported with dismay. “They turned too fast. They’ll pass under us while we’re still coming over.”

  “We can still chase them out of this star system,” Desjani suggested.

  Geary considered that, then shook his head. “No. That might just reinforce for them how superior their maneuvering capability is compared to ours. Let’s allow them to leave with the fact that we beat them uppermost in their minds. Besides, we’ve got some hurt alien ships to exploit.” The helplessly drifting wrecks of many alien ships would offer a treasure trove of information. Alien bodies certainly, and hopefully living aliens with whom they could conduct real dialogues, and alien equipment that could be copied and learned from. “Have we seen any escape pods from the alien craft?”

  “No, sir,” the maneuvering watch-stander reported. “Nothing has come off those alien ships.”

  “They must have some life-raft capability,” Desjani objected.

  “If they do, they’re not using it. Let’s get some ships over to those wrecks—” Geary began. His words cut off as alerts flared on his display. “Ancestors save us. They’re all blowing up.”

  Every alien wreck had exploded at the same time, bright lights blossoming to mark the total destruction of the ships and whatever, as well as whoever, had been aboard.

  The engineering watch-stander studied his own display closely. “Sir, the characteristics of the detonations roughly match a core overload on our ships, but are significantly more powerful, especially for ships that size.”

  “That stands to reason,” Desjani remarked, her voice and face hard. “For them to maneuver like that, they’d need more powerful energy cores. I guess mass suicide is acceptable to them.”

  “Captain,” the engineer continued, “I don’t think it was suicide. The core overloads weren’t quite simultaneous. The times of the explosions were staggered milliseconds apart in an expanding wave pattern. Someone sent a signal to cause those detonations, and the wave looks like it propagated from the surviving alien ships.”

  Desjani’s expression shifted into anger. “Those cold-blooded snakes. They blew up their own. Whoever was in charge of the aliens blew them all to hell to make sure we didn’t learn anything. Those merciless scum!” The watch-standers on the bridge clearly agreed with their captain’s sentiments.

  “You’re judging them
by our standards,” Rione said, though the reluctance in her tone made it clear that she, too, agreed with Desjani.

  “And I intend continuing to do so,” Desjani replied shortly.

  Geary looked back toward the engineering watch-stander. “Will there be anything left of those wrecks that we can learn from?”

  “Doubtful, sir. All we’re seeing is debris so small it registers as dust. Maybe analysis can yield some good ideas about what alloys and other materials they use, though.”

  “Ruthless and efficient,” Geary said to Desjani. “A bad combination.”

  “What about,” Sakai asked, “what they’re made of? It would be useful to at least know if they were carbon-based life-forms.”

  The engineer scrunched up his face in thought. “I don’t think so, sir. If you blew this ship to dust, there would be a lot of sources of possible organic material. Our food supplies alone would really contaminate the samples; then there’s clothing, parts of furniture, and a lot of other things.”

  Geary stared at his display, wondering what kind of mind-set would go to such extremes to keep anyone else from learning anything about them. “Madam Co-President, should I send some parting words to our hastily departing alien acquaintances, or should that be a function of the political representatives aboard?”

  “I would recommend you do it, Admiral.” Rione looked angry, too. “Whatever they are, the extremes they are willing to go to in order to keep us from learning anything more about them means finding out more is not going to be easy. They may be extremely xenophobic, or paranoid. That may feed their territoriality, or spring from it. I fear a strong defense will be necessary while we try to establish the right means for further contact with these aliens.”

  Geary heard Desjani mumbling something about “more hell lances and grapeshot” under her breath. He had to admit that he shared something of those sentiments after watching the wholesale destruction of any possible alien survivors. How could they ever deal with, ever trust, someone willing to do something like that?

  It wouldn’t be easy. He wondered to what degree losses in combat would dissuade a race willing to annihilate its own rather than have them either captured or examined. Maybe the aliens didn’t care about individuals the way humans did. Right. We care about individuals. Except when we drop rocks on them from orbit or send them off to die. And yet we do care. I suppose aliens would have a hard time figuring us out, too.

  He thought through his words, then transmitted a final message to the fleeing aliens. “This is Admiral Geary of the Alliance fleet. We have this star. We have all stars occupied by humanity. We do not have stars occupied by you. We do not seek war with you, we will not try to take from you, but we will defend what we have. We seek peace. Come in peace, to talk, and we will talk. This is what we want. But if you come for war, to fight, then we will fight. Any further attacks on humanity will be met with equal force. Aggression in any form and any place will not go unanswered by us. If you attempt to destroy any more of our star systems by collapsing hypernet gates, we will exact a high price from you. To the honor of our ancestors.”

  Rione sighed heavily. “That was well said. The sword in one hand and the olive branch in the other. Hopefully, they will choose the offer of peace.”BOYENS entered the shuttle dock, his Marine guards halting at the hatch. The Syndic CEO walked steadily toward the shuttle, then stopped to face Geary. “I owe you thanks, Admiral Geary. Thanks from me and thanks from every human being in this region of space.”

  “Your thanks should go to everyone in the Alliance fleet, and we didn’t do it for you personally.”

  “I know. But you didn’t have to do it at all.” Boyens nodded to Rione, Sakai, and Costa. “There’s a lot of very ugly history between our peoples right now, but this is an important start to something different.”

  “You can save the speeches for later,” Costa said.

  “I mean it.” Boyens gestured around. “The star systems on the border with the aliens need you. We know that. The central authorities now trying to run what’s left of the Syndicate Worlds will have their hands full trying to defend and maintain what they still control. We can’t expect meaningful help from them for a long time. But there are good shipyards at Taroa. That’s one of the star systems we’d have had to abandon if Midway had fallen. Even those shipyards will take time to turn out a decent number of warships, though, especially with supply lines disrupted by the ongoing collapse of the Syndicate Worlds’ central authority. We’re going to be on our own, and not able to muster a strong defense for quite a while.”

  Sakai gestured in turn. “Do you speak of your star systems being something still part of the Syndicate Worlds, or of something else?”

  “I don’t know.” Boyens flashed a grin. “I have to watch those candid statements. It’s going to depend on what people here want. I can guarantee you that folks in this region are very unhappy at being left high and dry by the Syndicate Worlds while their defensive forces were stripped from them and sent to fight the Alliance. But there’s new leadership at Prime, now. So maybe people will be willing to stick with the Syndicate Worlds, but that might mean demanding more autonomy, forming a regional confederation here that isn’t tightly tied to whatever remains of the Syndicate Worlds. More like what the Alliance does. I promise to keep you informed.”

  Boyens looked at each of them, then twisted his lips ruefully as if he had clearly read their reactions to his last statement. “The promise of a Syndic CEO. I know what that’s worth. But it’s my personal promise. I’m not stupid. We need you. And we owe you for saving us this time. I won’t forget that.”

  “You apparently dealt with us honestly,” Rione answered, “though not always as candidly as you should have. That will be remembered.”

  “What will happen to you now?” Geary asked.

  Boyens gave him a bemused look, and Geary realized that the Syndic hadn’t expected any of the Alliance officials to care what happened to him. “I don’t know for certain. Standard procedure calls for putting me in an interrogation facility to see if I gave out any information while a prisoner, followed by questions about how I got away or why I was released, usually followed by a public trial for treason, concluded by an execution or maybe a very painful prison exile. But the situation is a little different than usual. Gwen Iceni is a decent person for a CEO, and she’s smart enough to see that we need to break with some past practices given what’s happening all over Syndic space and given what you did here. So, I don’t know. Maybe I’ll end up in a cell, maybe I’ll be appointed an ambassador to you, maybe I’ll be given command of some of our new mobile defensive forces as they get built, maybe I’ll be shot. You’ll hear sooner or later.”

  “We could use access to this star system,” Geary said.

  “I’m not sure anybody can stop you from coming if you really want to,” Boyens replied with a wry look.

  Rione had her best poker face on, and her voice stayed carefully neutral. “Nonetheless, an agreement granting such access would be of great advantage to the people here as well as to the Alliance. Tell your people that the Alliance would be interested in pursuing such an agreement on the basis of mutual self-interest.”

  Boyens eyed her with a similarly unrevealing expression. “Even if the people here decide to go their own way from the Syndicate Worlds, I doubt that they’d be interested in becoming part of the Alliance.”

  “The Alliance doesn’t force or demand association,” Sakai answered this time. “There are many levels of cooperation short of that.”

  “All right. I’ll pass that on.”

  Rione and Sakai nodded to Geary, while Costa scowled but said nothing. Geary held out a data disc to the Syndic. “This contains descriptions of the alien worms. How to find them, how to deactivate them. You’ll probably find just about every system on your ships and planets infested with the worms. That’s how they stayed invisible to you and how they avoided being hit in battle.”

  Boyens stared at the disc, then reach
ed slowly to take it as if expecting it to be yanked away at the last moment. “Why are you giving us this?”

  “Because you can’t conduct an effective defense of the border without it,” Geary explained. “And as a sign of goodwill to the people here.” He didn’t mention that he, Sakai, and Rione had concluded that with what Boyens could tell them, the Syndics here were eventually likely to figure out on their own that the worms existed. This way the Syndics would hopefully feel a debt of gratitude to the Alliance. But he also hadn’t wanted to leave Alliance warships behind, isolated far from home and dependent on the goodwill of Syndics, to ensure that the aliens didn’t run roughshod over the Syndics in the near future. Far better that the Syndics be given a tool to allow them successfully to face the aliens. “That disc doesn’t explain how the worms work, because we don’t know. If you figure it out, we’d appreciate your returning the favor and telling us.”

  “I’ll certainly encourage my people to do that.” Boyens stared glumly at the data disc. “We’ve been in contact with them for a century, and we never figured this out. How did you do it?”

  “We were looking at the problem from a fresh perspective. Maybe that helped. We didn’t have a century of experience and assumptions that pointed us in the wrong direction. It was perfectly plausible that the aliens possessed something on their ships that blocked your ability to see them, and a hundred years ago the means to identify the quantum-probability worms might not have been available. You reached conclusions that drove all of your research from that point onward.”

  Boyens nodded, his expression rueful. “Like that ancient saying goes, sometimes it’s not what you don’t know that’s dangerous, it’s the things you think you know that aren’t really true.”