Rione smiled. “Very good. Vague enough yet also firm. That should cover all possibilities. I will gather Sakai and Costa and establish communications with the Syndics.”
“And I’m going to continue the fleet on a path to join up with the strike force and intercept the Syndic battleship as well as the flotilla. If everyone remains on their current vectors, that means you have a bit less than twenty-three hours to resolve things. If you haven’t by then, that flotilla is either going to run, or it’s going to get hammered.”
“I’ll keep that in mind, Admiral. You should keep in mind that we no longer need the former Syndic Executive Council members on the battleship. As long as they are alive, they pose a threat to the negotiations.”
“I’ll remember that.” Geary wondered if his voice was as cold as it sounded to him. “I won’t murder them, though.”
“I doubt that you’ll have to do that, Admiral. The members of the former Executive Council seem very likely to be caught in a three-way cross fire. If they somehow survive that, the Syndic officers on that battleship are very likely to execute the members of the former Executive Council on the spot rather than risk their return to power, just as those members once ordered CEO Shalin to murder the Alliance officers led by Admiral Bloch.” Rione’s smile was as icy as Geary’s tone had been. “The living stars sometimes act slowly, but they do tend eventually to provide fates appropriate to the deeds of men and women.”
THE Syndic flotilla must have seen by now that the Alliance fleet was on its way, but the Syndics weren’t running, instead still aiming straight for an intercept with the battleship fleeing for the Syndic primary world.
“They want the battleship,” Geary told Duellos in a message the captain wouldn’t see for over an hour. “They have to chase it, so we want that battleship undamaged and heading as fast as it can toward the inner planets. That will force the Syndic flotilla to engage the rest of the Alliance fleet. Try to slow down the flotilla, hit its edges, and in particular watch for the Syndic battle cruisers breaking off to try to run down the battleship before it can get near us. Once we come to grips with the Syndic flotilla, the welfare of that battleship is no longer an issue for us.” Was there something else? “Try to remain out of range of the battleship’s weaponry. We have been told that it will not initiate combat with us, but we can’t trust in that, and even if it does intend to abide by that promise, if you get too close, the battleship might think it’s about to be attacked and open fire anyway. Geary out.”
Desjani was sitting in her command seat again, looking rested, relaxed, and cheerful as the fleet and the enemy flotilla closed on each other at a combined velocity of about point two light speed. “A Syndic HuK came out of the hypernet gate a little while ago. It looks like it’s going to hang around the gate.”
“A courier.” The HuK had transmitted its message and would wait at the hypernet gate until a reply was received to carry back. “I wonder what it thinks about all of those mines at the gate, and all of the merchant ships with FACs hanging off them.” Geary peered at his display questioningly. “Speaking of which, I wonder why the merchant ships haven’t moved yet.”
“They’re too slow to get anywhere in time to accomplish anything,” Desjani pointed out. “All of the Syndics, no matter whom they’re backing, know that as well as we do. Once we wipe out the flotilla, we’ll have plenty of time to go back and wipe out the FACs and their merchant mother ships.”
The Syndic battleship heading in their direction was just off the port bows of the Alliance ships, its relative bearing staying steady as the Alliance ships aimed for an intercept as soon as possible. Farther off to port, the Syndic flotilla was closing on the battleship and the Alliance fleet, its bearing drifting steadily starboard. Almost dead ahead, the battle cruisers and escorts of the Alliance strike force were also heading straight for the battleship. But it would be another six hours before the strike force reached the Syndic battleship and soon after began tangling with the Syndic flotilla, and fifteen hours before the Alliance fleet got close enough to the Syndic flotilla for a battle. “Do we want to take out that battleship even if we don’t have to?” Geary murmured to himself.
Desjani heard and gave him an approving look. “Am I rubbing off on you? Yes, let’s do it. It will be one less battleship for the Syndics to use against us in the future.”
“But we don’t want anarchy in Syndic space,” Geary reminded her. “We might end up with that if we destroy every means of defense.”
“That’s still an enemy ship. Our job is to destroy enemy ships.”
“The Syndic flotilla may try to destroy it as well.”
“That will make it easier for us. We help them destroy it, then we destroy them.”
Desjani’s suggestion did have the virtue of simplicity. “We’ll see what happens,” Geary told her. “I admit that I’m tempted, but I won’t blow them away if that battleship avoids firing on our warships.”
She looked dissatisfied, then nodded. “Hitting them when they were abiding by a truce would be a Syndic thing to do, wouldn’t it? Fine. We’ll be civilized and only kill them after they provoke us.”
“You’re an interesting woman, Tanya.” Geary rubbed his eyes. “I think I really will try to get some sleep now.”
Perhaps it was simple exhaustion, or perhaps it was the relief of knowing a decisive engagement would likely take place, but Geary had no trouble sleeping this time. He only got four hours instead of his hoped-for five, though, before a message came in from the strike force.
Duellos appeared relaxed. It was still hard to recall that he was on the bridge of Inspire now, and not Courageous, which had been lost at Heradao. “My intent is to bypass the battleship and its three-cruiser escort. The Syndic flotilla is currently arrayed with the battleships on the outer edges and the battle cruisers in the center, making it a very tough nut for my strike force to crack. CEO Shalin may be dishonorable and contemptible, but he’s playing this smart. I’ll see what I can do to slow him down and hurt him, but we need the fleet’s battleships to really hammer that flotilla. Duellos out.”
Geary gave up on sleep for the next day or so and headed back to the bridge.
Desjani was still there, apparently ignoring Senator Costa in the observer’s seat.
For her part, Costa was concentrating on her display.
“Is this right, Admiral? Our strike force will engage the enemy in less than two hours?”
“Not exactly,” Geary explained as he took his own seat. “In a little less than two hours our strike force will intercept the Syndic battleship heading toward the primary world. We do not intend engaging that battleship unless it attacks us first.”
“There won’t be a battle soon, then.” Costa seemed disappointed.
“I hope not. I need everything those battle cruisers have got for their fight with the flotilla, and battleships are very tough targets even when one has only three escorts with it.”
“I came up here during a break in negotiations in the hope of observing firsthand our brave sailors engaging the enemy,” Costa complained.
He glanced at Desjani, who was trying to look like she wasn’t aware of the conversation. “Senator, the strike force will be almost a light-hour distant from us when it does encounter the enemy. We won’t see what happens until an hour after it happens.”
Costa frowned. “Yes . . . of course . . . that goes without saying. Please notify me before the strike force encounters the Syndic flotilla. I assume the strike force will attack the center of the enemy, where their own battle cruisers are located.”
“No, Senator, we will not do that.”
The senator’s frown deepened. “You just said that battleships are tough targets. I understand that battle cruisers are not designed for one-on-one fights with battleships. Why wouldn’t our battle cruisers engage the Syndic battle cruisers?”
He took a long breath before replying. “Because aside from being outnumbered sixteen to nine in battle cruisers, plowing o
ur strike force through the center of the Syndic flotilla would expose our battle cruisers and their escorts to fire from all sides from the battleships on the corners of the Syndic formation, as well as to fire from the overwhelming number of Syndic escorts. The sixty-one heavy cruisers in that flotilla would by themselves be a difficult challenge for the strike force.”
“Why isn’t our strike force stronger then?”
Geary took another look at Desjani, who seemed to be enjoying herself. Rione said that politicians and military officers stopped talking to each other. If this is an example of how the conversations went, I have no trouble understanding that. Every time he gave Costa any details, she asked for more without applying anything learned from the previous answers. Maybe the answer was to avoid any detail the senator could use for further attempts to question his own judgment. “That was my decision as fleet commander, Senator.”
After a long moment spent thinking that over, Costa stood up. “I’d better get back to the negotiations.”
After waiting until she left, Geary turned to Desjani. “You set me up.”
“I merely informed the senator that there were certain questions the fleet commander was best equipped to answer, sir.”
“Thank you, Captain. I’ll be sure to return the favor sometime.”
Desjani gave him a measuring look. “Are you worried? Duellos won’t go up the middle. A year ago, we would have done that. Not now.”
“What about Kattnig? If he sends Adroit through the middle of that Syndic flotilla, how many other ships will follow him?”
“Hopefully, not many. When did you last eat?”
“I . . . can’t remember.”
She pulled out some ration bars. “You can’t give your body sleep, but it needs food, too.”
Geary took the bars cautiously, remembering some of the horrible-tasting ones he had been forced to eat during the fleet’s return to Alliance space. “Bulgorin?”
“They’re pretty good. I’m not sure where they eat bulgorin, but it’s not bad.”
“What’s in it?”
“I have no idea, and no intention of looking. Just eat them. You need to be alert for at least the next twelve hours, so your body needs fuel.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Desjani narrowed her eyes at him. “If you’re not at your best, Admiral, the personnel and warships of this fleet will suffer.”
He couldn’t deny the truth of that, so Geary ate the bars, which did taste pretty good for ration bars. After that he tried to relax as he watched the Alliance and Syndicate Worlds’ formations moving on his display. The Syndic flotilla had ramped up its velocity to point one five light speed, or roughly forty-five thousand kilometers per second, yet with the scale pulled far out, the depictions of the ships barely seemed to be moving against the huge distances of a star system. But zooming in close presented images of warships that appeared totally motionless with nothing for the eye to measure their movement against.
The Syndics were coming in from an angle at the battleship, which had managed to plod up to point one two light as it headed toward the primary world. It should have been able to accelerate to a better velocity than that though. I wonder what modifications the Syndic Executive Council made to that warship over the years to enhance their own comfort, at the cost of important capabilities.
He must have inadvertently asked that out loud. Desjani answered immediately. “That might explain something. Our sensors estimate the mass of that battleship as significantly higher than comparable Syndic battleships, but the armor doesn’t appear to be any more massive. So there’s something very heavy inside it.”
“A citadel?”
“That’s what I’d guess. Something with very thick walls made of the densest material the Syndics could manage without dealing with radioactives. The Syndic leaders wanted someplace where they could fort up in an emergency.”
“Idiots,” Geary grumbled. “Making a battleship even slower so it can’t get away from pursuers, and doing that in the name of protecting themselves.”
The encounter of the strike force with the Syndic battleship was something of an anticlimax, the two formations tearing past each other outside weapons range without pause or action. But only two light-minutes beyond the battleship was the Syndic flotilla.
“Damn.” Geary clenched his fist in frustration. “The Syndics are holding to point one five light speed.”
Desjani made a helpless gesture. “They’re overtaking the battleship at an angle, so their speed relative to it is only point zero eight light speed. Plenty good for targeting.”
“But Duellos is going to have to brake hard, or he’ll cross their path at a combined velocity of point three light speed! What kind of hits could he get at that speed?”
Desjani passed the question to the combat-systems watch-stander, who shook her head. “Compensation for relativistic distortion would be inadequate, Admiral. Hit probabilities would be a maximum of five percent, and most likely lower.”
“He’s braking,” Desjani commented.
On his display, Geary saw the same information. An hour and five minutes ago Duellos had pivoted his ships so the main propulsion units pointed forward, then begun killing velocity as fast as the ships’ structures and inertial dampers could handle it.
“Duellos cut it close,” Desjani added in admiring tones. “He should get down to a decent combined velocity relative to the Syndics just in time to pivot his ships bow forward again for the firing pass.”
Geary had to admit that the familiar Syndic box formation had been shrewdly put together this time. The Syndic CEO had arrayed his ships in a shallow box, with the broad side facing forward. Each corner was anchored by three battleships. In the center, all sixteen battle cruisers formed a cluster in which their massed firepower would compensate for their lighter armor and shields. The sixty-one heavy cruisers were distributed to reinforce the already-formidable battleship groups in the corners as well as the battle cruisers in the center. Spread through the areas between the battleships and the battle cruisers were the swarms of light cruisers and Hunter-Killers. There simply weren’t any weak points that could be hammered by the battle cruisers in the Alliance strike force. “It looks like Duellos angled to hit one of the lower corners.”
Desjani nodded. “You tend to favor hitting upper corners, so he probably chose a lower one to throw off the Syndics.”
“I tend to hit upper corners?” Developing a pattern would be dangerous, since the enemy could exploit knowledge of that to counter his moves.
“Yes. I was going to talk to you about that.”
“Thanks. Next time bring something like that up a little earlier.” The words were light, but inside Geary’s guts were knotted with tension. Whatever Duellos had done had happened an hour ago. He couldn’t do anything to influence the events he was seeing. He knew that. But it didn’t make watching it any easier. Especially when he saw Duellos’s formation start to shred in a way that didn’t seem planned. “What’s that—Adroit. Where is Adroit going?” Kattnig was doing what they had feared, changing course to head directly for the Syndic flotilla instead of following the glancing firing run Duellos had set up.
But within moments, Geary’s outrage changed to disbelief as Adroit’s track became clearer. “What the hell.”
From her baffled tones, Desjani felt the same way. “Adroit is turning away, opening her distance to the Syndic formation.” She turned a shocked expression to Geary. “He’s avoiding action.”
Agonized, Geary watched helplessly as the other four battle cruisers in Adroit’s division made initial moves to follow her track, then wavered onto new vectors as their individual commanding officers tried to compensate for their maneuvers away from an intercept of the Syndics.
In the very little time available to react, some of them overcompensated.
“Damn,” Desjani whispered through clenched teeth, as the Alliance strike force whipped past the Syndic flotilla, Assert and Agile curving on paths that b
rought them closer to the Syndics than the rest of the Alliance warships.
Assert came apart as she caught a concentrated barrage from the three Syndic battleships forming that corner of the enemy formation. Agile, frantically trying to live up to her name by bending back upward, nonetheless staggered from dozens of hits and tumbled onward, maneuvering and propulsion lost along with many other systems and surely many members of her crew.
The confusion among the battle cruisers following Adroit lessened the Alliance blow against the Syndics. One Syndic battleship shuddered under repeated blows, but despite taking heavy damage to one area, kept going with the formation.
It had all happened in less than the blink of an eye as the formations tore past each other, and now Duellos was bringing his formation around and trying to re-form it while the Syndics raced onward toward the battleship.
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