The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Guardian

by Jack Campbell

  “Good, that’s— What?” Geary moved his hand against the strain of Desjani’s latest maneuver, calling up data. “That’s all? On that many ships? That means the big ones only have two launchers apiece?”

  “And the small ones have none,” Iger confirmed.

  Geary stared at the statistics. “These ships have armament roughly comparable to our own auxiliaries. They’re a little better armed, but not much. Why the hell would anyone build a warship that big, that expensive, and that elaborate and put so few weapons on it?”

  “I . . . don’t know, sir.”

  Tanya was right. These people forgot about war-fighting when designing their ships. “Captain Desjani, your estimate about the firepower on these warships was correct.”

  “Thank you, Admiral. That’s all I need to know.”

  The threat symbols on Geary’s display were winking out as Covenant missiles ran out of power and went zooming off on their last vector, unable to maneuver and heading into endless, empty space. Desjani had brought Dauntless up and over and was now arcing back downward and to port as the Covenant formation raced to pass beneath her, making final adjustments in her track as the other warships stuck stubbornly to their own vectors.

  “Targets designated,” Desjani said, her voice loud and almost unnaturally clear. “I want these, ladies and gentlemen. Make your shots count.”

  Dauntless whipped through the outer edge of one wing of the Covenant formation, the other warships there and gone too fast for human senses to register, the battle cruiser still shuddering slightly from having unleashed every weapon that would bear.

  Encounters in space often happened far too quickly for humans to react, but automated systems could track and fire at the proper instants, choosing just the right millisecond to unleash weapons at where another ship would be when the weapon passed through that same spot. Now Dauntless’s sensors were evaluating the result of that firing pass while Desjani brought her battle cruiser sweeping back to starboard to come up behind the Covenant warships.

  One wing of the Covenant formation had disappeared. Three of the little corvettes were simply gone, their power cores overloaded by Dauntless’s barrage of hell lances and grapeshot, and the megacruiser on that wing had been broken into several large pieces, which were tumbling in the wake of the Covenant formation.

  The Covies had fired back, but Dauntless had taken most of the hits on her shields, only one penetrating to damage the hull. “Get that grapeshot launcher back online,” Desjani ordered. She sounded frustrated, not triumphant. “We didn’t get enough of them, and now we’re the ones in a stern chase,” she grumbled to Geary as Dauntless’s main propulsion units pushed the battle cruiser to ever-higher velocity.

  “We’ll get them,” he said with more confidence than he felt, one eye on the hull-stress meters, which were edging into red danger zones as Desjani’s maneuvers pushed the battle cruiser to the limits of what her hull could withstand even with the help of the inertial dampers.

  A sudden commotion behind him marked the return of the senators to the bridge. “What is going on?” Senator Suva demanded.

  “We’re defending ourselves and the Dancers in accordance with the orders given to me by the government,” Geary replied, while Desjani studiously ignored the presence of the politicians.

  “Then the weapons which this ship fired were defensive?” Senator Sakai asked, his tone as mild as usual.

  “Absolutely.”

  “We are in a combat situation,” Rione said. “Our presence on the bridge is disruptive.”

  Costa and Suva rounded on her, but before they could speak, Sakai did. “Envoy Rione is correct.”

  “She is not,” Suva insisted. “This hero has started another war while she kept us tied down with debates!”

  Rione met Suva’s eyes with cool resolve. “Who fired the first shot, Admiral?”

  “They did,” Geary said. “A volley of missiles as soon as we were within range. We had no alternative but to defend ourselves against a force that the authorities in Sol Star System have told us is unwelcome and uninvited.”

  Lieutenant Yuon cleared his throat apologetically as he interrupted the debate. “At our current closing rate, we’ll be within range of the rear of the Covenant formation in forty-two minutes, Captain.”

  “We’re chasing them?” Suva asked, disbelieving. “If they want to kill us, why aren’t we just avoiding them?”

  Geary called up the display at the observer’s seat. The Covenant formation, one wing gone, had continued on a long, shallow trajectory that crossed the path of the Dancers much farther inside the star system. “They are still pursuing the Dancers. They’re on an intercept course with them. They have indicated an intent to attack the Dancers, too. What would you have us do, Senator?”

  Suva covered her eyes, then nodded. “I am not a fool, Admiral. Our discussions with the Covenant commander have been even less fruitful than those with my companions on the grand council. Too many minds are set too firmly in opposition, and some of those minds will not stop at debate. Do what you must to save all of us. We’ll try to sweep up the mess afterwards.” She sounded defeated and worn-out.

  Costa glared at her. “Now you see why our earlier decisions were necessary to ensure the safety of the Alliance—”

  “You would talk of those decisions here?” Sakai asked, his voice still calm but somehow easily cutting across Costa’s.

  Senator Costa jerked, looking around as if she had indeed again forgotten where she was. “I . . . no.” Her gaze fastened on Rione. “Some individuals may have a voting proxy, but they do not have authorization to know everything that the grand council has done for the Alliance.”

  “I count myself lucky in that respect.” Rione sounded amused, but her voice had an iron edge under the humor. “Or do you mean everything the grand council has done to the Alliance? I might know more of that than you think, Senator. Many people may know more of that than you think.”

  Costa, very obviously not looking at Geary now, stomped off the bridge, followed by Suva, who gave Rione a questioning look different from her customary hostility as the envoy followed Suva. Behind them came Sakai, his feelings as usual masked.

  Assorted lieutenants and other watch-standers watched the politicians go, their eyes wide and their mouths wisely shut.

  “Back on task, everyone,” Desjani ordered. Even though she had not turned around or apparently paid attention to the politicians and the argument, her command came the instant the hatch sealed behind them.

  Geary did his best to put the senators out of his mind as well, focusing back on the situation. “We should get within range of them slightly before they catch up with the Dancers.” At that point, though, coming up from behind, they would face the firepower of the entire Covenant formation again, without the same ability to dodge missiles unless they turned away and failed to engage the other warships.

  A sudden intake of breath by Tanya was followed by her pointing at her display. “No, we won’t catch them before that. Look. The Dancers have turned back toward us. They’re going to run into those Covenant warships long before we catch up.”

  EIGHTEEN

  “CHARBAN! Tell the Dancers to avoid the Covenant formation!”

  “They’re a few light-minutes distant!” Charban protested, “and if I read this space display properly, they’re going to encounter the other warships very quickly because they’re accelerating toward them!”

  Geary stared at his display. Unfortunately, the former ground forces general was reading his display right. The Dancers had not simply reduced their velocity to allow the Covenant ships to close on them more quickly. Instead, the Dancers had come around and kept accelerating, killing their own velocity in one direction and building it in the direction facing the oncoming enemy. The vectors on the Dancer ships led straight into the heart of the Covenant formation. “Did they acknowledge your warning to stay clear of those ships?” he asked, feeling an agony of frustration.

 
“Yes. Very clearly. Understand. I don’t know what they’re doing.” Charban sounded very unhappy and upset as well.

  Desjani didn’t say anything, her eyes fixed on her display, her expression bleak. Dauntless was accelerating as fast as her main propulsion units could manage. There was nothing more she could do, nothing more any of them could do, but watch.

  “Captain,” Lieutenant Castries reported, her voice awed, “the acceleration on the Dancer ships is exceeding our estimates of what their hulls could sustain. If they continue at their current rate, it will have them going point one one light speed when they reach the Covenant formation.”

  “Thank you—” Desjani began, then stared at Castries, then at Geary. “The Covenant ships are going point two four light. The combined velocity when they meet will be more than point three five light.”

  Maybe there was a chance. “Unless those Covenant fire control systems are a lot better than ours, at point three five light they won’t have much chance of scoring any hits.”

  “And the Dancers are small targets,” Desjani said. “And the Covies don’t have nearly as much firepower as we’d expected.” One of her hands had formed into a fist, which was slowly, softly, rhythmically, hitting one arm of her seat.

  “One minute to contact between the Dancers and the Covenant formation,” Castries said.

  Geary blinked as the two groups of ships swept through each other. At the last moment before contact, the Dancers had narrowed their own formation, sudden changes of vectors by the Dancer ships that would have rendered impossibly hard what had already been a very difficult fire control problem for the Covenant ships. The Dancers had torn by the central Covenant ship in the formation close enough to freeze Geary’s breathing for a moment even though the Dancers were there and past before he could grasp what they were doing.

  “I know we can work with them,” Desjani said in an outraged voice, “but those Dancers are crazy.” She slapped her controls, throttling back Dauntless’s main propulsion units slightly.

  Ahead of them, the Covenant ships had pivoted and were braking, trying to reverse course in place rather than maneuver the formation through a wide turn. “They’ve got too much momentum to shed,” Desjani complained. “And they’re wasting it all.”

  “A turn-in-place maneuver looks sharper than a formation swing,” Geary commented.

  “So a peacetime fleet got used to doing it that way? Idiots. All right, everyone, we’re going to intercept them a lot faster. Let’s see if we can knock off that bird’s other wing.”

  With the Covenant ships reducing their velocity rapidly, the time to contact was shrinking very quickly as well. Desjani adjusted Dauntless’s vector to aim for the still-intact side of the Covenant formation.

  “You’re giving them a lot of warning where you’re going to hit them,” Geary murmured.

  She lowered her brow at him. “No, I’m giving them a lot of warning as to where I want them to think I’m going to hit them. I’ve been watching this guy Black Jack. He does that a lot.”

  But he still doesn’t know when to keep his mouth shut. “Sorry.”

  Desjani carefully designated targets for the ship’s fire control systems as the last minute before contact began running down. “Hang on,” she advised her crew, then whipped Dauntless onto a slightly different vector. The difference had been a tiny one, but given the distances involved and the relatively small size of the Covenant formation, that bob to one side meant Dauntless tore through the already whittled-down wing of the Covenant flotilla rather than hitting the opposite, untouched wing.

  Geary barely caught the alerts as Covenant missiles aimed at where Dauntless had been going strove to compensate for the change in her track and failed, as Covenant particle beams and grapeshot tore through empty space.

  The targets of Dauntless, though, hadn’t changed vectors, making them sitting ducks as the battle cruiser poured fire into them during the fraction of a second while they were in range before the Alliance warship was through the Covenant formation.

  Desjani had ignored the corvettes this time. Most of her fire had hit one of the megacruisers, which was now rolling out of formation, all systems dead. The remaining shots from Dauntless, including the null-field generator, had hit a second megacruiser, which was still with the formation but was now riddled with damage. The hole eaten into the megacruiser by the null field made it look as if a giant had taken a large bite out of one side of its bow.

  Under the push of her maneuvering thrusters, Dauntless was swinging up, to port, and around again, aiming once more for the undamaged wing of the Covenant formation. For their part, the Covenant ships had finally killed their velocity in the original direction and were now accelerating back toward the Dancers, who were engaging in a complex pattern of interweaving maneuvers among themselves as they headed back in the direction of the hypernet gate. But the Dancers had stopped accelerating, holding their velocity at a rate that would allow the Covenant ships to catch them again.

  “They’re acting as bait,” Geary said in wonderment. “They’re dancing in front of the Covies, just out of reach, taunting them.” And the Covenant commander, enraged, unable to come to grips with the Alliance battle cruiser which had been his original target, was locked on trying to strike the mocking alien ships dancing just out of reach.

  What had Charban complained about? He thought the Dancers were withholding something, were not admitting how well they could communicate with humans. It’s the same sort of thing, isn’t it? Dangle the objective just out of reach of whoever you’re dealing with. Is that what the Dancers are doing to us in a different way? But why? Because that’s how they do things, and they may not even realize they’re doing it when it comes to talking with us? Or are they doing it deliberately, to get us to pursue some goal they’ll keep just beyond our grasp?

  “They’re just holding formation.” Lieutenant Yuon sounded baffled.

  It took Geary a moment to realize that the lieutenant was talking about the Covenant ships. It was true. Even though the Covenant flotilla had lost nearly half of its ships, the remaining ships had stayed rigidly in formation, a now-lopsided bird with only one wing.

  Desjani spoke with dawning realization. “This is the opposite of what we were like, isn’t it? We were fighting without regard for formation, just slugging it out, before you reminded us how good formation fighting could multiply our effectiveness. But these guys are acting like they can’t imagine breaking formation. They haven’t even adjusted the formation to compensate for their losses or form a more effective defense. It’s like there’s a spot they have to be in relative to the guide ship, and they aren’t going to move from that spot even if the living stars showed up and said go.”

  Dauntless had swept through her turn and, instead of continuing on toward the undamaged wing of the Covenant formation, was lining up on the center of that formation. Desjani clearly intended to take out the flagship this time. Geary didn’t question that targeting decision.

  The Covenant ships did not pivot to face the oncoming Alliance battle cruiser, instead continuing to accelerate at their best rate toward the Dancers. Still moving fairly slowly relative to Dauntless, they fired weapons that could bear aft and down, scoring several hits this time as Desjani bored in on her target.

  Specter missiles leaped away from Dauntless, the entire volley aimed at one of the megacruisers, then the battle cruiser tore through the Covenant formation again, hammering the megacruiser from which Mister Medal’s transmissions had come.

  As Dauntless began another wide turn, her thrusters pushing her down and to starboard this time, Geary watched the Covenant flagship explode. Near the site of the flagship’s destruction, the megacruiser targeted with specter missiles had taken multiple hits on its stern and was spinning wildly away from the formation.

  “One more run ought to do it,” Desjani said.

  “Captain!” Lieutenant Castries called. “Escape pods are launching!”

  “From which ship?�
� Desjani asked sharply.

  “Um . . . all of them.”

  Once again, Geary found himself watching his display in disbelief. The megacruiser badly hurt on the second firing run was spitting out escape pods, as was the megacruiser that had lost propulsion on this attack run. But so was the so-far-untouched last-surviving megacruiser, as were the three remaining corvettes. “They’re panicking.”

  “They’re . . . ?” Desjani gave him the look that meant his words made no sense to her.

  “Their commander is dead. They may not even have known why he attacked us. Most of their ships have been destroyed. They know they’re outmatched in firepower, maneuverability, and tactical skill. They’re panicking.”

  “What?” Desjani repeated. “That— What? They’ve taken losses, so they’re giving up?” She sounded far more confused than Yuon had been earlier.

  Looking around the bridge, Geary saw the same incomprehension on the faces of everyone else. “They’ve never fought a real battle,” he said, speaking slowly. “Just practice fights, against fake enemies who probably always lost. Because no commander wants to lose, and in practice battles senior commanders always place themselves in charge of the ships playing their own side. This is the first time they’ve faced an enemy who didn’t cooperate with them, an enemy who wouldn’t roll over and play dead because that’s what the plan called for, an enemy experienced in real combat who played for keeps. This is the first time they’ve seen ships destroyed in battle, the first time they’ve seen comrades die, the first time their training and their weapons haven’t worked the way they were supposed to. Everything they’ve been told was right has turned out wrong, their officers probably have no idea what to do when things don’t go exactly according to plan, and discipline has simply disintegrated on those ships as everyone tries to save themselves.”

  Desjani shook her head. “The next time they want to fight, they’d better be ready for a real fight. We could walk over these guys, couldn’t we? An Alliance fleet could wipe them out while they were still fainting at the sight of blood.” She sounded angry as well as contemptuous.