Boundless

by Jack Campbell

  Momentum could be an ally, but it was often an enemy, dragging ships to their doom. Having done all that he could, nothing was left for Geary to do but watch, hoping no new anomalies would appear beyond the ones already seen, hoping that all of his ships could get turned in time, swinging the entire fleet way up and turning so the star was behind them, trying to get so far off the track from the jump point to the hypernet gate that they’d be clear of potential minefields.

  His captains knew when emergency commands went out to obey first and ask why later. Ambassador Rycerz had no such limits and the authority to override any barriers to her message immediately being received. “Admiral,” she said, her image appearing in a window in his display, “what is happening? We’re turning so hard people can’t keep their balance.”

  He didn’t have time for this. “We’re trying to avoid minefields,” Geary said, perhaps louder and harsher than he should have. “I’ll brief you when we’re clear!” He hit his own override, hoping it would disconnect the ambassador and remove a distraction he didn’t need at this moment.

  To his relief, it worked, the ambassador’s image vanishing, leaving him free to watch with growing tension to see if his ships would all be able to turn in time, the arcs of their movement through space bending with what seemed like glacial speed.

  If he’d placed the clumsy auxiliaries near the front of the cylinder, they wouldn’t have made it. As it was, the more agile fast transports carrying the Marines seemed like they would barely clear the field of anomalies, which was itself only a vague depiction of where the Syndic mines were located.

  Except for Tsunami, the arc of whose movement was sliding far too close to the danger area.

  The battleships leading the cylinder formation were swinging around slowly as well, but Gallant abruptly altered her swing, going wider. Gallant’s status didn’t show any problems with thrusters or propulsion, so the maneuver must be deliberate. Geary’s hand went to his comm controls to demand the reason, but paused as he realized what was happening.

  “She’s protecting Tsunami,” Desjani said, having grasped it in the same instant he had.

  The massive, heavily armored bulk of Gallant plowed through space ahead of the track Tsunami was taking, deliberately risking the mines to ensure the transport wouldn’t get hit.

  Less than a minute later the existence of minefields was confirmed as an explosion detonated ahead and just to one side of Gallant. Loaded with the ball bearings known as grapeshot, the mine hurled a tight field of metal balls toward the oncoming battleship. Moments later two more mines went off, both also firing swarms of ball bearings at Gallant.

  “Each of those mines threw off as much grapeshot as a battle cruiser could unleash,” Desjani said, her voice filled with anger and concern.

  The first mine’s payload struck Gallant’s shields, the ball bearings instantly converting their kinetic energy into a brilliant display of explosions that sparkled against the battleship’s powerful shields. On the heels of that blow, the grapeshot from the other two mines hit. Gallant’s shields facing the attack, already weakened, flared in a final effort to stop the oncoming projectiles before collapsing.

  Gallant’s shields had stopped most of the grapeshot, but the rest hurtled into contact with the hull.

  Tsunami would’ve been destroyed. Even Dauntless would’ve taken significant damage.

  But battleships were designed to endure an immense amount of damage and keep fighting. Bursts of light flared along Gallant’s armor as grapeshot hit, trying to hammer through into the guts of the warship. Trying, and failing. Her armor bearing new craters still glowing with heat, Gallant sailed onward, as if contemptuous of the attempt to destroy her.

  The rest of the fleet turned, clearing the field of anomalies now outlined with scarlet warning markers on their displays, heading away from the star Indras.

  Geary let out a long breath. “Gallant, this is Admiral Geary. Well done. Your ship deserves the name she bears, and so do all of your officers and crew.”

  Captain Pelleas of Gallant replied, smiling. “It’s what battleships do, Admiral. We were happy to offer ourselves in protection of our comrades on other ships.”

  “That was quick thinking and brilliant maneuvering, Captain,” Geary said. “Above and beyond what’s expected of anyone.”

  Another image appeared on Geary’s display, that of Commander Kahale, captain of Tsunami. “Gallant has our gratitude as well. Next port call, Tsunami’s crew will be buying the drinks for any sailor off of Gallant.”

  Those calls ended, Geary sat back, trying to relax the tension in him. Space was immense, so even the Syndics couldn’t plant enough mines to cover more than small segments of it. No new anomalies had appeared along the fleet’s current track. Unfortunately, that track was leading nowhere except deep space. “I want a recommended track to the hypernet gate, along with a full analysis of every place where we spot anomalies and every place minefields might have been laid to hit ships transiting from the Kalixa jump point to the gate. We want to leave as large a margin as possible between those areas and our new track.”

  “Get it done,” Desjani told her watch standers. “Admiral, if the Syndics planted mines right in front of the hypernet gate, there won’t be any way to avoid them and use the gate.”

  “That’d be extraordinarily risky, wouldn’t it? If we couldn’t avoid the mines going in, any ship coming out couldn’t avoid them, either. And the Syndics here at Indras have no way of knowing when new ships are arriving, so they wouldn’t know when to deactivate their mines.”

  “I didn’t say it wouldn’t be stupid,” Desjani said. “But sometimes enemies do stupid things. Though those minefields were way too smart.”

  “Way too smart,” Geary agreed. Realizing he couldn’t put it off, he called Ambassador Rycerz back.

  Ambassador Rycerz had a wide-eyed look to her. “Is that ship all right? The one that got hit?”

  “Gallant? Yes, she’s all right. Damage to her armor that might be a problem in a future fight, but nothing beyond that. No personnel casualties.”

  “I’ve seen such things in videos, but never live, as it was happening not so far from me.” Rycerz shook her head. “How bad could that have been?”

  “It depends how many mines were planted by the Syndics. The fields might not be very deep since they apparently tried to cover some wide areas. But it could’ve been bad. Those mines are new, and they’ve got a powerful punch. Any destroyer or light cruiser that encountered one would be destroyed.”

  Rycerz nodded, her eyes pensive. “We’re in Syndic territory, without permission. We had no right to be in that region, and we were warned not to go there, so we can’t claim that we were attacked. I understand your position expressed at Atalia much better now, Admiral. If you’d had to ask permission before dodging those mines it would’ve ended badly. We’ll continue the current command arrangement. Can we reach the hypernet gate safely?”

  “We’re working on a safe path now,” Geary said, trying not to think about what could’ve happened.

  The call over, he focused back on his display, seeing the outlines of warning areas fluctuating slightly as the fleet’s sensors updated their evaluations of danger areas.

  “I really want to hurt them,” Desjani said, still angry. “Do you know how many ships we might’ve lost? How many of our people might’ve died?”

  “I know.” He rubbed his eyes. “Vengeance might be nice. But Indras got badly shot up by the dark ships, remember? We could call that pre-vengeance, I guess.”

  “Yeah.” Desjani’s face brightened as she remembered the damage inflicted at Indras by the AI-controlled warships. “The Syndics here did get their butts kicked at that time, didn’t they?”

  “Those new mines of theirs are nasty pieces of work.”

  “The characteristics are part of the fleet database now. We’ll spot them ea
rlier in the future as long as we look in the right places.” She grinned. “Damn. I owe Gioninni one.”

  “Me, too. When are we going to learn that con men are best at seeing through the tricks of CEOs?”

  * * *

  WORKING up a new, safe route to the hypernet gate took a while. The sensor search for anomalies had been out of necessity set at such a sensitive state that it also identified system noise as potential minefields. Each such apparent detection had to be analyzed carefully to see if it was real or noise. Further complicating matters, the freighters that had been sedately proceeding toward the jump point for Kalixa one by one turned and braked their velocity, assuming steady orbits wherever they ended up.

  “What the hell is that about?” Geary complained, glaring at his display as if it could be intimidated into producing answers.

  “No telling,” Desjani said. “Look at this. Unless these detections are bad, the Syndics do have another minefield near the hypernet gate.”

  “Ten light seconds away,” Geary said, studying the image. “That leaves enough room to get by them.”

  “If we come in slow, at a high angle,” Desjani agreed. “That’ll increase our vulnerability to attack, but unless the Syndics have invisible ships, that shouldn’t be a problem. We’ll have to watch those freighters and see if they reposition, though.”

  “Let’s get going.” The fleet’s navigation systems had no trouble at all coming up with a recommended track, looping wide of any direct path between the hypernet gate and the jump point for Kalixa, approaching the gate from nearly directly “over” it, and then diving down to position the fleet for entering the gate. It wouldn’t pass any test for most efficient path to the gate, but it was as safe as seemed possible.

  Syndic CEO Paulson hadn’t contacted them again after the near-miss with the minefields, and Ambassador Rycerz, knowing how flimsy the Alliance’s legal arguments were, hadn’t tried sending messages to the CEO complaining about the trap.

  The otherwise normal message traffic being sent around the star system continued as if nothing were out of the ordinary, lending an air of unreality to the dangers facing the Alliance force. But the mines had impressed on everyone that those dangers were real.

  Despite the lengthened time required by the new vector, though, no other dangerous activity by the Syndics could be detected. The freighters continued to orbit, traveling around the star but otherwise going nowhere. And the Syndicate Worlds warships remained orbiting near the jump point for Kalixa.

  What were they not seeing this time?

  A nerve-racking two days later, the fleet finally reached the area “above” the hypernet gate, slowing to almost a stop relative to the gate before turning to dive down until the fleet neared lining up with the front of the gate where it could enter the Syndic hypernet.

  But as the fleet prepared to enter the gate, Lieutenant Yuon called out. “Captain, the hypernet key is showing no access.”

  “Reboot it,” Desjani said, looking at Geary.

  “I already tried, Captain. The key is not showing any destinations available through this gate.”

  “The Syndics blocked their hypernet again,” Desjani said.

  “Looks like it,” Geary said, disappointment welling up inside him. They’d feared the Syndics would do this again, but he’d hoped the Syndic leadership would want to avoid shutting down their entire hypernet given the costs that would inflict on their efforts to regain control of rebellious star systems. “All units, this is Admiral Geary, brake velocity to match movement of the hypernet gate. Assume fixed orbit.”

  His next call went to Ambassador Rycerz. “We can’t enter the Syndic hypernet. The fleet is braking velocity and matching the orbit of the hypernet gate, so we’ll be sitting here just outside it. But unless we come up with another workable option, we can’t get to Midway.”

  Rycerz nodded, her expression grim. “Fortunately, we have another option. Aboard this ship is a team of the best hypernet theorists and technicians the Alliance can muster. Maybe they can find an answer. I’m calling a meeting with Dr. Kottur’s group.”

  “I’ll get down to the conference room and link in.” Geary looked at Desjani. “The ambassador and I are going to check with Dr. Kottur’s team to find out if anything can be done. Keep an eye on things for me.”

  “Yes, Admiral,” she said. “Good luck.”

  It didn’t take long to reach the conference room, activate the security protection, and link to Ambassador Rycerz’s conference room. Moments after Geary arrived in virtual form, Dr. Kottur came into the room where the ambassador waited.

  Ambassador Rycerz looked beyond Kottur as if searching. “Where are the rest of your team?”

  “We don’t need them for this,” Dr. Kottur said. For the first time in Geary’s experience, Kottur seemed deflated. Sitting down, Dr. Kottur spread his hands in an age-old gesture of helplessness. “There’s nothing we can do.”

  “Shouldn’t we still consult the others?” Rycerz demanded.

  “We’d get the same answer. I’ve wanted this mission to succeed as much as anyone, but impossible is still impossible.”

  Geary sat, watching and listening with growing unhappiness, as Ambassador Rycerz kept probing for possible solutions and Dr. Kottur kept deflecting all of them.

  “I don’t want to accept failure,” Rycerz said, her voice bitter, “but you’ve always been helpful up to this point, Doctor. If you believe there are no—” She stopped speaking, looking up in surprise.

  As the meeting software updated, Geary saw several members of Dr. Kottur’s team entering the room on Boundless, Dr. Cresida among them. Dr. Rajput spoke up first. “We think we have some possible solutions.”

  Dr. Kottur frowned. “How can you—”

  “It’s not a hardware modification,” Dr. Cresida broke in. “We know that because it affected the gate at Midway to which the Syndicate Worlds does not have access. That means it’s an operating system modification. And that means we can try to work around it.”

  The frown on Dr. Kottur deepened. “Messing with the operating system on a hypernet gate is very risky.”

  “Isn’t that what we were going to do at Midway?” Ambassador Rycerz asked. “If your team thinks it’s possible, we should give them a shot at it.”

  “Just a moment,” Geary said as the security features in his conference room relaxed for a moment to let in Tanya. “Captain Desjani?”

  “I needed to inform you we have a time limit, Admiral,” she said. “The Syndic flotilla near the jump point from Kalixa has accelerated onto a vector aimed at intercepting us in our current orbit.”

  Ambassador Rycerz had the look of someone wondering what else would go wrong. “They aren’t that much of a threat, are they? We outnumber them by a large margin.”

  Geary shook his head. “If they hit us while we’re in a fixed orbit it will give them a substantial advantage. We don’t want that to happen. How long do we have until they reach us, Captain Desjani?”

  “Thirty-seven hours,” she said. “They don’t have to dodge their own minefields on the way here.”

  Dr. Bron, who’d just sat down, stood up again. “Then we need to get going on this. Let’s hit it.” The other new arrivals followed him out.

  Dr. Kottur spread his hands again. “I don’t have high hopes for this.”

  “We’re damned well going to try before we give up,” Ambassador Rycerz responded.

  The meeting ended, Geary cut the link. “It’s a good thing the other scientists showed up. Dr. Kottur was ready to throw in the towel.” He noticed something about Tanya. “Did you have anything to do with that?”

  “Me?” Desjani asked in mock surprise. “Maybe. I didn’t have anything else to do so I decided to call Dr. Cresida to discuss a couple of personal effects of her sister’s, and I may have mentioned that a meeting was going on.”

&n
bsp; “You didn’t have anything else to do.” Coming from a ship’s commanding officer, that statement ranked about as impossible as anything anyone could say. “What made you think Dr. Cresida and the others wouldn’t be at this meeting?”

  “I can monitor activity in this compartment from another secure location,” she reminded him. “I’m the ship’s captain, you know. And you did tell me to keep an eye on things.”

  “So I did.” He stood up, thinking. “Why do you suppose Dr. Kottur didn’t even want to try? He’s been extremely enthusiastic about this mission.”

  “He’s been asking a lot of questions,” Desjani agreed, but left it at that.

  Something else occurred to him. “Dr. Cresida talked to you?”

  “She kept her responses as monosyllabic as possible,” Desjani said. “But we talked long enough for me to get my message across, and then she was happy to have an excuse to end it.”

  “I don’t want to dislike Jaylen Cresida’s sister,” Geary said.

  “Jaylen Cresida’s sister makes it real hard not to dislike her,” Tanya replied.

  * * *

  THIRTY-SEVEN hours.

  He called another conference of the ship commanders in the fleet to bring everyone up to date.

  “There’s no chance the gate will collapse and destroy us all?” Captain Parr from the battle cruiser Incredible asked.

  “The safe-collapse system was definitely active on it before the gate shut off,” Captain Desjani said. “I don’t trust Syndics any more than you guys do, but they know what’ll happen to this star system and everyone in it if they caused a destructive collapse of their own gate. Kalixa is right next door.”

  “That’d take a special kind of crazy,” Parr agreed. “And I guess if they planned on doing that, their flotilla wouldn’t be coming this way. It would’ve stayed near the jump point so it could jump to safety after sending the collapse command.”