Courageous tlf-3

by Jack Campbell

  “That’s good enough to keep up with the auxiliaries. I’ve got a special assignment for Warrior, Commander Suram. I’m putting you in command of Orion and Majestic as well.”

  That got a startled reaction. “Sir?”

  “I need those auxiliaries protected, Commander Suram,” Geary stated with grim intensity. “If we lose them, this fleet is dead. You know that. When we mix it up with the Syndics again, those two flotillas are going to be coming at us from multiple directions. It’ll be very difficult for me to make sure that Titan, Witch, Jinn, and Goblin aren’t damaged or destroyed. I want Warrior, Orion, and Majestic to stick to those auxiliaries like you were tied to them by a short rope. I want you to physically block any Syndic fire at the auxiliaries if necessary and destroy any Syndic warships that try to get at the auxiliaries. Can you do that, Commander Suram?”

  Suram’s jaw set. “Yes, sir.”

  “You understand I’m giving you the most important job in this fleet. I don’t have a single major warship to spare. No minor warships to spare either, for that matter. I need to know that you’ll do whatever it takes and stick with those auxiliaries.”

  “Warrior will be destroyed before those auxiliaries are harmed,” Suram stated. “We know we have something to prove,” he added in a rough voice. “Myself and the crew of Warrior. We left Polaris and Vanguard at Vidha. We won’t leave these auxiliaries, not while we have any capability left. I swear it on the honor of my ancestors.”

  Geary knew that anyone he asked would tell him he was insane to trust Warrior, let alone Orion and Majestic, but his instincts told him that no other ships had as much to prove. That didn’t mean he would have given this mission to Commander Yin on Orion, of course. That really would have been insane. “If I didn’t believe you capable, I wouldn’t have given you the mission, Commander Suram. You tell your crew that. I know that Warrior can carry it out or die trying.”

  Suram nodded again, then saluted. “Thank you, sir. We will regain our honor or die in the attempt.”

  Geary smiled. “Do us both a favor and regain your honor without dying. I want Warrior back in the front of battle. Are you comfortable with the commanders of Orion and Majestic? Will they follow your orders?”

  “Every officer and every sailor on Orion and Majestic will know their mission and the opportunity they’ve been given, sir,” Suram promised. “Thank you again, sir. Our ships will justify your trust in us.”

  One day out from the jump point. He spent hours just gazing at the simulator, where a depiction of the current situation hung, the huge Syndic Flotilla Delta now arranged in what seemed a traditional Syndic box formation, though in this case the box was very shallow. The lid of the box pointed toward the Alliance fleet like a thick wall that overlapped the Alliance formation on all sides.

  Syndic Formation Bravo had altered its box formation as well, making it shallow to match that of Delta and tilting it up to mimic the wall of Delta, though Bravo’s lesser numbers made for a much smaller wall. Even after getting pummeled by the Alliance fleet near the Branwyn jump point, Bravo still boasted fifteen battleships and ten battle cruisers, though. Bravo had lost a lot of smaller combatants, too, but it only looked smaller compared to the twenty-three battleships and twenty battle cruisers in Delta.

  Geary was surprised that Bravo hadn’t made any lunges toward the Alliance fleet just to shake up the Alliance sailors and maybe cause the fleet to lose more ground as it dodged the feints. They’re confident again, aren’t they? They think we’re trapped, and the outcome is inevitable.

  We’ll see.

  One hour until Syndic Formation Delta intercepted the track of the Alliance fleet. Geary sat down on the bridge of Dauntless and nodded in acknowledgment of Desjani’s greeting. Rione sat at the back, only her eyes betraying her tension.

  “Syndic Flotilla Bravo is accelerating,” the maneuvering watch reported.

  “Planning to catch up with us at the same time Flotilla Delta gets here,” Desjani remarked, sounding as if she were commenting on a simulation rather than a real tactic by an overwhelming Syndic force.

  “No doubt,” Geary agreed. “Let’s try to mess up their plans.” He punched his communication controls. “All units in the Alliance fleet, assume Formation Omicron; execute immediately upon receipt of this message. Station assignments are being sent to you now.”

  “Formation Omicron?” Desjani asked. She fixed her eyes on her display, knowing that, as the flagship, Dauntless would be the guide for the rest of the ships to form on and wouldn’t be doing any maneuvering herself right now. “Sir? A cylinder?”

  “Yes, that’s really it.” He could understand her surprise. “We’ve got two advantages. As a smaller force we can make it harder for the Syndics to employ their full numbers against us all at once. Those box formations of theirs can’t adjust quickly enough to counter that.” I hope. “And since we’re slower, we can turn this formation tighter.”

  The ships of the Alliance fleet collapsed into Formation Omicron. Instead of a number of separate subformations, Omicron held every ship in the fleet in one grouping. And instead of dispersing the warships with plenty of distance between them, Omicron used minimum safe distances. The cylinder was only small by comparison to the big Syndic formations, but most of the Syndic wall formed by Flotilla Delta wouldn’t be able to engage his fleet, even if the two forces swept through each other.

  Geary had also abandoned the standard practice of having the lighter escorts between the major warships and the enemy. That was what they were for, normally, but he didn’t intend to fight a normal battle. The outside of Omicron’s cylinder was made up of battleships at the front and back, the battle cruisers forming a belt in the middle between them. Inside the cylinder were the destroyers and light cruisers. Heavy cruisers blocked both ends of the cylinder, one end stiffened by the two scout battleships. Also inside it, as well protected as possible, were the damaged warships and the auxiliaries, Warrior, Orion, and Majestic in close company.

  “Thirty minutes to contact with Syndic Flotilla Delta,” the combat systems watch announced. “Twenty-eight minutes to contact with Syndic Flotilla Bravo.”

  The last Alliance warship slid into place in the formation, the cylinder of the fleet pointed down along the track toward the jump point for Ixion.

  “The commander of Delta is going to let Bravo soften us up and take the brunt of our first volleys and then move in to finish us off and get the credit,” Desjani observed. “I always disliked commanders who did that sort of thing.”

  “This one’s going to be disappointed.” I hope. Geary sat and waited, trying to judge the right moment. “All units, reduce speed to point zero seven light.”

  The Syndic ships were close enough now to have seen the Alliance fleet changing formation only a few minutes after it had begun, but they’d been forced to wait until the shape of the new Alliance formation could be made out before they could make any counterchanges to their own formation. Now Geary saw the formation for Syndic Flotilla Delta compressing, the wall getting shorter and thicker so that more Syndic ships could engage the Alliance fleet at any point. But Geary’s speed reduction was causing the Syndics to rush to contact faster than they’d anticipated.

  “Ten minutes to contact with Bravo. Twelve minutes to contact with Delta.”

  That was close enough. Bravo, conducting a stern chase, was gaining slowly, while Delta came tearing in from the side, still at point two light. He’s going to have to brake now. “All units in the Alliance fleet, pivot formation down nine zero degrees and turn starboard seven zero degrees at time three one.” Another very complex maneuver, with ships simultaneously swinging the cylinder so it pointed down, and bringing the cylinder around onto a new course.

  “Delta’s braking,” Desjani noted on the heels of Geary’s order as Dauntless swung around to push herself onto the new heading.

  At their velocity, Delta had a hard time viewing the Alliance fleet well and, already committed to a hard braking man
euver, they couldn’t do much about it anyway.

  Bravo, coming on behind the Alliance fleet, tried to turn to match its maneuver but swung wider, losing distance.

  A blizzard of missiles and grapeshot fired by the Delta Flotilla tore through the empty space where their combat systems had predicted the Alliance fleet would be.

  Delta’s thick box rushed past the place where the Alliance fleet would have been, while the vertical Alliance cylinder swung by to one side at extreme hell-lance range.

  “Nice,” Desjani said approvingly, but she kept her eyes on the display, knowing that this was just the first move.

  Geary had his eyes there, too. The Syndics would follow. Bravo will continue around, ready to pounce when we steady out. Delta will go up or down, I think, to simplify coordinating another joint approach. That means I need to take this fleet … there. “All units, turn starboard one nine zero degrees, time four four.”

  Delta was turning upward as Bravo once again failed to match the Alliance fleet’s turn and lost yet more ground. “All units, alter course down two zero degrees time four nine. Pivot formation up seven zero degrees at time five two.”

  This time the Alliance cylinder came back close to horizontal relative to the system plane and raced past far beneath Delta as Bravo began braking hard to bring its own velocity down far enough to match the turn radius of the slower Alliance ships. Geary waited until he saw Delta start another strong braking maneuver as well. “All units, turn starboard nine five degrees and accelerate to point one light at time zero two.”

  As the Syndic formations brought down their speed and turned inward toward each other again, Delta from above and Bravo to one side, to try to grapple with the Alliance fleet, the Alliance ships tore away toward the Ixion jump point.

  “That is the strangest engagement I ever fought,” Desjani remarked in a wondering voice.

  “It’s not over,” Geary replied. “They’ll sort themselves out, accelerate again, and come after us.”

  “They’ll both be in a tail chase now.” Desjani ran the maneuvering solution. “But they’ll still catch us before the jump point.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you think that will work again?” Rione asked.

  “Dodging?” Geary shook his head. “We did that sort of thing sometimes, in the old days, having fun and justifying it by claiming it taught us how to anticipate the movements of other formations. Maybe it did. But it won’t work next time. The Syndics will expect us to evade, and they’ve got enough ships to spread their formations wide enough to keep us from avoiding contact next time.”

  Rione looked unhappy, but Desjani got it and smiled like a cat. “Spreading out formations will mean the Syndics have less firepower at any point.”

  “Right. And we’re going through one of those points.” Geary gestured at the display, which the Syndics showed accelerating in pursuit again. “It looks like they’re merging Bravo and Delta. I need an estimate for the flagship’s position.”

  “He should be in the center,” Desjani commented.

  Geary nodded. The place of honor. The place most likely to catch the brunt of an enemy attack using the head-on tactics that had been common practice. It wasn’t the smartest way of doing business, but just like the Syndics, he was still constrained by the practice, since everyone in this fleet would be horrified if the flagship wasn’t in the center of an attack.

  In the wake of the Alliance fleet, the huge combined Syndic formation spread out, thinner in all places but stretching so that the wall now reached far enough above, below, right, and left of the Alliance fleet’s track that no feasible maneuver could evade it. You want to catch us? Fine. Prepare to learn what happens when you try to close your hand on a hornet.

  ELEVEN

  Timing was critical again. Geary waited, watching as the Syndics chased after the Alliance fleet, their velocity now up to point one four light, gradually closing the distance. The jump point for Ixion was just over an hour away now, but the Syndics would be within engagement range much sooner. When will they fire missiles and grapeshot? Wait a little longer. We’re entering the outer edges of their missile engagement envelope. They’ll wait a little to give a margin of error in case we try a last-minute burst of speed. Hold it … now. “All units, change formation facing one eight zero degrees, turn up one four degrees, brake speed to point zero five light at time four seven. All ships open fire as the enemy enters engagement range.”

  As the Alliance ships swung their bows to point toward the Syndics and cut in their main propulsion systems to kill velocity, the closing speed of the enemy force grew rapidly. The Alliance ships were now moving backward at point zero five light, the Syndics tearing toward them far faster. Instead of overtaking the Alliance ships at a relative velocity of point zero four light, the Syndic speed advantage had increased to close to point one light and the two forces were now rushing together.

  The Syndics, caught by surprise again and with only a short time to react, were spitting out missiles and patterns of grapeshot, but only those fired by the ships closest to the point where the Alliance fleet was aiming had good hit probabilities. The leading edges of the Alliance cylinder lit up with flashes as weapons impacted on shields.

  Alliance warships fired as well, their weapons aiming for a relatively small point in the huge Syndic wall. Shields flared on Syndic warships in a ragged circle centered on the point where the Alliance cylinder was aimed. Not far from the center of that circle was the Syndic flagship. At a relative closing velocity of just under thirty thousand kilometers per second, one moment it seemed the enemy formation was far away and the next it was behind them as the Alliance cylinder went through the Syndic wall like a bullet through a board.

  The moment of contact came and went. Geary let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding, feeling Dauntless shuddering from hits the Syndics had scored in that fraction of a second when the forces were within range of all weapons. “Shields down slightly, spot failures, minor hit aft, no system losses,” the watch-standers on Dauntless reported rapidly.

  “All units in the Alliance fleet, change formation facing one eight zero degrees, accelerate to point one light at time five nine.”

  “We’re going back through them?” Rione asked, sounding shocked.

  “That’s the idea. If they brake to match our speed, we’ll be in big trouble, but hopefully they’ll assume we’re going to keep heading away and accelerate toward us again.” Geary’s eyes were on the display, watching the damage readouts for both fleets as sensors tallied the results of the moment of contact.

  “Two battleships,” Desjani noted approvingly. “Three battle cruisers knocked out, too. One of those was probably the flagship.”

  “Let’s hope so.”

  Only ten or twenty more passes just as successful, and they’d have evened the odds in this star system. It wasn’t exactly grounds for getting cocky. “We didn’t take much damage, but it’ll be worse next time.”

  The Alliance ships had swung their bows completely around again, facing the jump point for Ixion and toward the Syndic formation. Geary watched the Syndic movements, hoping they’d do the natural thing and reverse course in place to pursue his fleet.

  They did, but not quickly enough.

  “They’re coming back at us, but we’re going to pass through them at a relative speed of only point zero two light,” Desjani reported.

  That would mean a longer time within enemy weapon range and easier targets for the missiles and grapeshot that the enemy still had in far greater abundance than the Alliance fleet.

  He didn’t want to look at the state of the fleet’s fuel cells after these maneuvers. It didn’t really matter. He had to burn off fuel cells now or the fleet wouldn’t survive to worry about low fuel states.

  The Syndic formation was folding in on itself, trying to thicken where the Alliance fleet would pass through, but fortunately didn’t have much time to accomplish that.

  The wall of Syndics came and we
nt, Dauntless’s shields going incandescent from enemy hits.

  “Spot failures on bow and flank shields, minor damage from grapeshot impacts, several hell-lance hits amidships, hell-lance batteries 3A and 5B out of commission, estimated time of repair unknown, casualties unknown,” Dauntless’s watch reported.

  Geary’s eyes ran over the state of his fleet. Dauntless had come off easy compared to the other battle cruisers. Duellos’s Courageous had been raked badly, Daring had lost half its weapons, Leviathan and Dragon had taken propulsion hits but were grimly keeping up with the formation, Formidable and Incredible were torn up amidships. Even his battleships had taken hits, though none were hurt as badly as the battle cruisers. Scout battleship Exemplar had been hit multiple times but by luck had lost nothing serious. The heavy cruisers Basinet and Sallet were gone, one exploded under a hail of Syndic fire and the other drifting away from the formation, badly hurt and helpless, escape pods leaping from the crippled ship.

  Light cruisers Spur, Damascene, and Swept-Guard had been destroyed or wrecked, and destroyers War-Hammer, Prasa, Talwar, and Xiphos shattered despite their protected positions within the cylinder.

  Titan had been hit again. The auxiliary seemed to attract Syndic weapons like a magnet attracted iron. But the hit wasn’t critical. Despite his pain at the losses, Geary felt satisfaction as he saw the state of Warrior, Orion, and Majestic. Their degraded shields and new damage told Geary that the three battleships had indeed done their best to protect the auxiliaries.

  The Syndics hadn’t come through the latest firing pass unscathed, thanks to the local firepower superiority of the Alliance fleet. Another of their battleships was a drifting wreck, and three more battle cruisers had been blown up or broken. At least a dozen heavy cruisers had been disabled or killed, and the wreckage of numerous light cruisers and HuKs littered space now.

  “Another pass?” Desjani asked, her voice subdued as she dealt with the damage to her ship.