Dauntless

SIX

“Captain Desjani, I’m afraid I have to agree with your estimate.” Geary totaled up the ships that had so far been seen exiting the jump point. A swarm of HuKs led the way, with multiple squadrons of heavy cruisers right behind. Since the Alliance fleet was looking straight back at the jump exit, the leading Syndic ships tended to obscure those behind them, but several squadrons of battle cruisers and battleships had been confirmed bringing up the rear. “There’s a lot of junk blocking the view of the jump exit.”

Desjani grinned. “You ordered mines placed at the exit, sir.”

Oh, yeah. Geary took another look. “How many did we get?”

“They swept the mines with HuKs and light cruisers, sir. The hard way. We estimate they lost or suffered severe damage to about fifteen ships. The debris fields we can see correlate to the destruction of most of those.”

Coming out of jump space and running right into a minefield. They probably never knew what hit them. “Do you think what we can see is everything?”

Desjani gave him a look that implied she thought Geary wanted more enemies to fight, then studied her display. “There could be a follow-on wave. But if this is it, we can take this force.”

Geary noted that Desjani’s voice seemed torn between excitement and worry at the prospect. All of her training called for charging into action, but the last time the Alliance fleet had faced a major Syndic force, it had gotten its butt kicked hard.

“We could,” Geary stated with a confidence he didn’t really feel. After watching his fleet make a mishmash of the engagement with minor Syndic forces, he wasn’t looking forward to a much bigger battle anytime soon. But he knew he had to outwardly express confidence in the fleet. If word got around (and it surely would) that he’d even implied the fleet lacked the ability to win, it could cripple the fleet’s chances before the next shot was even fired. “But we’d have to turn back to engage them. I don’t see any reason to do that.” He tried to make it sound like the pursuing Syndic forces weren’t worth the trouble. “I hadn’t planned on any more battles in this system.”

Apparently, he succeeded to some extent. Desjani and the watch-standers on the Dauntless’s bridge all nodded knowingly.

Geary fiddled with his controls, trying to make the display calculate the chances of the Syndics catching up with the Alliance force. “Have I got this right?” he muttered to Desjani.

She looked over, then after a moment nodded again. “Yes. We’re only about four light-hours from the jump exit now. Forty hours of transit time if we stay at .1 light speed, but even if we had to slow for some reason, we’ve got a very big lead. We’ll be at the jump point to Kaliban well before they can catch up to us and delay us further.” Desjani grinned. “Some of the fleet captains questioned why we didn’t take more time to loot this system. This should answer them!”

Geary smiled briefly, unsettled both by Desjani’s endorsement of what she clearly saw as Black Jack’s once-again demonstrated infallibility and by the news that some of his captains had been grumbling about his decisions openly enough for someone as clearly loyal to him as Desjani to have heard. Then he finally noticed something else on his display. “What’s this? Who’re these guys?” Geary pointed at a group of ships coming up at an almost leisurely pace from the direction of the inhabited world. Even though the ships were moving slower than the Alliance fleet, they’d been coming from ahead and so were on course to intercept the Alliance force. “They’re Syndic, but they’re marked as nonthreatening?”

Desjani curved the edges of her lips in a very brief smile. “That represents the fruit of our Co-President’s efforts at diplomacy. Twenty merchant ships, supposedly loaded with food and other materials we asked for.”

“Twenty ships?” Geary couldn’t help grinning. “That’ll be a decent amount of supplies.”

“Yes,” Desjani agreed with visible reluctance at the idea of being in debt to Co-President Rione.

“How are we set up for the rendezvous?”

“They’re merchants, so they can’t accelerate worth a damn, but they’ve been told to use their propulsion systems without regard for economy, and they appear to be doing so. By the time we meet up with them, they should’ve been able to get up close to our speed. If we have to brake, it won’t be by much.” Desjani’s finger raced across the display, pointing out details. “The merchants are headed to join up near the positions of our big auxiliaries. That’ll minimize the time needed to transfer the supplies over.” She paused. “We’ve confirmed their identity as merchant transports by visual and full-spectrum scans. No weapons are visible.”

Geary nodded, feeling a surge of relief that everything had been handled well, even though he’d been dead to the world. “What about security?”

“I took the liberty of contacting Colonel Carabali. Detachments of Marines will take boarding shuttles to each of the merchants, conduct searches for hidden weapons, and maintain a watch on the crews.”

“Very good. That’s exactly what I’d have told the Colonel to do.” Desjani beamed at the praise in a way that seemed incongruous in a woman her age. “Where’s Co-President Rione now?”

“I believe she’s resting.” Desjani made “rest” sound like an unmilitary activity, apparently forgetting that Geary had just spent several hours doing the same. “She did record a report for you.”

“Thanks.” Geary pulled up the file.

On the recording, Rione looked weary. “Captain Geary. After substantial negotiations, hindered by our distance from the inhabited planet, I convinced the Syndicate Worlds authorities that we would be willing to forebear from annihilating them if they would provide suitable tribute. Captain Desjani’s crew provided me with an estimated number of large cargo ships in this star system as well as how many had been seen in time-late images near the inhabited world. This information enabled me to insist on twenty such ships carrying supplies listed on both our real and false needs lists. The Syndicate Worlds authorities provided remote signing of an agreement not to attempt any action using the cargo ships against the Alliance fleet in exchange for our promise not to launch further attacks within the system before our departure. The text of that agreement is attached. Please do not hesitate to contact me if questions arise.”

Geary read through the agreement, finding nothing that raised alarms in his mind. Rione seemed to have covered everything. Then it’s just a matter of trusting the Syndics at this point. And I’d be crazy to trust the Syndics. But what can they pull with Carabali’s Marines breathing down their necks?

He looked back at Captain Desjani. “Those merchant ships are a little farther from the jump exit than we are, but they must’ve seen the arrival of the pursuit force by now.”

“But they’re not altering course,” Desjani agreed, answering Geary’s unstated question. “Perhaps they’re afraid we’ll run them down if they try. They’re close enough and cumbersome enough that by the time they managed to get turned and going away from us, we could have destroyers all over them. Or perhaps they’re afraid that if they run, it’ll provoke an attack on the inhabited planet.”

“Good possibilities.” Despite the appearance of the Syndic pursuit force, everything seemed well in hand. Unfortunately, it’s usually just when you think everything’s under control that everything and its brother starts going to hell in a handbag. So what can go wrong? Titan? She looks like she’s not in trouble for once.

“Sir.” Both Geary and Desjani turned at the operations watch-stander’s hail. “Titan reports she has another primary propulsion unit back on line.”

“Praise our ancestors.” Geary had tensed in dread as Titan’s name came up on the heels of his worries. It had taken him a moment to realize it wasn’t bad news after all. Now he checked the statistics for Titan, noting its best acceleration had improved significantly. But she’s still too damn slow. What idiot labeled those ships Fast Fleet Auxiliaries? The only thing fast about them is how quickly they can get into trouble. “What are the chances Titan can strap on a few extra primary propulsion units at some point?”

The operations watch-stander looked startled, then glanced at the engineering watch-stander, who also looked surprised, then thoughtful. “It might be possible, sir.” His face began to take on the glow of an engineer presented with a complex problem that he might have the means to solve.

Geary leaned back, taking in the entire situation slowly, trying to make sure he hadn’t missed anything. But aside from the Alliance fleet itself, the Syndic pursuit force and the twenty merchants headed steadily for their rendezvous, nothing else seemed to be moving in Corvus Star System. All the other Syndic shipping had headed for the nearest place to dock and hope the Alliance fleet didn’t send any ships that way. Dauntless’s combat systems were estimating that the Syndic pursuit force had pushed up to an average velocity of slightly more than 30,000 kilometers a second, but against the vast scale of space, that still left them crawling at not much more than a tenth of light speed. “They’re not trying to catch us,” Geary noted.

Desjani frowned, her eyes darting to the representation of the Syndic warships. “They’re not?”

“No. Not if these readings are right. They’re not accelerating anymore. Not that they could catch us before we reach the jump point even if they did push up to point two light. But they’re not trying.”

“They’re … just chasing us?”

“Herding us,” Gearing corrected. “They want us to keep going.”

“To the jump point?”

“To Yuon. I’d stake my life on it.” Come to think of it, I am. Worse, I’m staking the lives of every man and woman on these Alliance ships on it. What if the Syndics have already guessed that I won’t run straight for home? What if they know Kaliban is the best alternative?

No. They can’t risk this fleet getting safely through Yuon, so they’ll be there in force. They don’t have any choice.

But they still might’ve seeded Kaliban with enough mines to rip this fleet to shreds. Has there been enough time for that? Would the Syndics have that many mines close enough to Kaliban to get them there before we get there? Have they even considered the possibility that we’ll go there?

There’s no way to know. I can’t afford to second-guess this. I can’t afford to let the possibility of disaster keep me from making and acting on decisions, because no matter what I do there’ll always be that possibility.

He took a long, deep breath, momentarily blocking out his surroundings. When Geary opened his eyes, he saw Desjani giving him an approving look.

“I don’t know how you can be so relaxed at times like this,” she confessed. “But I know it impresses my crew.”

“It’s, um, something I work at.”

It gradually became obvious that nothing was going to happen for a while. Geary checked the timeline for the rendezvous with the Syndic merchants and saw that the Marine shuttles wouldn’t launch for another two hours. Fighting off an irrational urge to keep watching everything for fear it might come unraveled without his personal attention, Geary stood up. “I’m going to get something to eat,” he told Captain Desjani. She nodded. Geary noticed as he left that the watch-standers on the Dauntless’s bridge were all watching him admiringly. Ancestors help me if I ever start to believe everything I do is as perfect as these people think. If I tripped and fell on my butt, they’d probably think it was Black Jack Geary’s way of preparing for action, and they’d all start doing it.

However, the interaction with the personnel on the bridge had reminded Geary of the importance of letting the crew see him. He’d been thinking longingly of holing up in his stateroom again and gnawing on a ration bar, safely hidden from the eyes of both those who worshipped the decks Black Jack Geary trod and those who thought John Geary was an ancient relic totally out of his depth. Instead, he walked to one of the mess areas, joined the line and got a meal, then sat down at a table with several sailors at it.

They watched him with wide eyes as he took a bite of something tasteless. “How are you folks doing?” Geary asked. Instead of answering, they all looked at each other. Geary glanced at the petty officer sitting next to him and asked the one question he could be sure would get a clear answer. “Where are you from?”

“Ko-Kosatka, sir.”

The one thing you could always get sailors to talk about was home. “The same as Captain Desjani?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ve been to Kosatka.” The man’s jaw actually dropped in amazement. “It was a while ago … of course. I liked it. What part of the planet are you from?”

The man started talking about his home. The others got drawn in, as Geary learned another one of his tablemates was also from Kosatka. As in Geary’s time, each ship seemed to draw much of its crew from one particular planet, with the rest of the sailors from places scattered across the Alliance. The others were from planets Geary had to confess he’d never visited, but just his expressions of interest kept the sailors happy.

Eventually, one of them asked the question Geary knew would come. “Sir, we’re going to get home again, aren’t we?”

Geary finished chewing a bite that had suddenly gone dry as well as tasteless. He took a drink, not willing to risk his voice cracking. “I intend bringing this fleet home.”

Smiles broke out on all sides. Another sailor spoke quickly. “Any idea how long, sir? My family … well…”

“I understand. I don’t know for certain how long it’ll take. We’re not going straight back.” Smiles faded into stunned silence. “The Syndics would expect that, you see. They’d set another trap.” Geary smiled in what he hoped was a confident way. “Instead, we’re going to bedevil them every light-second of the way home, go places they don’t expect, hit them by surprise.” He’d been thinking how to phrase things right, how to make a desperate retreat sound like a victorious march. “We lost a lot of friends in the Syndic home system. We had to leave in a hurry, as you know. But we’re not going to let that stand. We’re going to jump around, hit the Syndics again and again, and we’re going to make them pay. By the time we get home, the Syndics are going to wish they’d never messed with the Alliance.”

There were smiles all around the mess area now. Geary stood up, praying to his ancestors to understand why he’d said something he knew misrepresented things, and kept his own smile in place as he left the compartment.

Apparently, his little speech spread through the ship faster than he could walk. Hardly surprising, since any one of the sailors within earshot could’ve recorded it with their personal comm units, and several undoubtedly had done so. Geary found himself speeding up, trying to get to his stateroom without looking like he was running, trying to get away from all the sailors and officers who believed he’d somehow be able to make true everything he’d said.

An hour later, he forced himself out of the sanctuary of his stateroom and returned to the bridge. Desjani was still there, studying something on her palm unit. The position of the Syndic pursuit force relative to the Alliance fleet hardly seemed to have altered, though if the Syndics had done something different within less than four hours, the light showing the images of that event wouldn’t have reached Dauntless yet. The Syndic merchant ships bringing the supplies the Alliance fleet had demanded were much closer, though, their paths through space forming wide arcs that were converging steadily on the course of the Alliance ships.

The merchants had come from the inhabited world, ahead of and beneath the Alliance fleet’s track through space, but because of the Alliance fleet’s velocity, they had been required to aim for a point even farther ahead in order to achieve a rendezvous at matching speeds. During the merchants’ slow journey, the fleet had swung past the orbit of the inhabited world, and now the merchants were coming up from only slightly below, still moving ahead but slower than the fleet, so that their courses were curving gradually up to meet the Alliance ships.

Captain Desjani shook her head over what she was reading, made some notations, then turned to Geary. “Personnel issues,” she confided to Geary. “I wish someone would figure out how to keep crew members from forming disruptive personal relationships.”

“My first commanding officer wished the same thing,” Geary responded dryly. “Not about me personally, though.”

Desjani looked shocked. “Of course not, sir.”

Geary very briefly considered the idea of jumping Tanya Desjani right there and then in order to convince her that he was in fact human. It had, after all, been more than a century since his last physical encounter with a woman and that was a long dry spell no matter how you counted it. The thought gave him enough perverse amusement to lift his mood a bit. “It could’ve been about me. There was this raven-haired lieutenant who I thought was hotter than a plasma field. Fortunately for good order and discipline, she thought I was a geeky young ensign without many redeeming qualities.”

Desjani smiled politely, clearly not believing him. “Colonel Carabali asked that you contact her before the Marine shuttles launch. I was just about to have you paged.”

“Glad to know my timing is good.” Geary called up the Colonel, momentarily surprised to see that Carabali wasn’t in combat gear herself. But then she couldn’t be. Her responsibility is to exercise overall command of the teams going to the ships. She can’t go along with one of them. “Yes, Colonel?”

“Captain Geary, I wished to know if you had any special instructions for my Marines before their shuttles depart.”

“I don’t believe so, Colonel. My experience is that Marines know their jobs better than I know their jobs. I assume there’s no need to say I don’t trust the Syndics.”

Carabali grinned. “My people will be in full combat load-out. Even if those merchant ships are packed full of Syndic assault troops, my Marines will be able to fight their way out.”

“If that happens, Colonel, I assure you that my warships will make certain none of those merchant ships survives. But hopefully it won’t come to that. I’d like to have those supplies they’re carrying.”

“Understood, sir.” Carabali glanced to the side. “Ten minutes to shuttle launches. I’ll keep you informed of any developments.”

“Thank you.” Geary relaxed again, reassured by Carabali’s cool competence. It’s damn good to have the Marines backing you up. He scanned the fleet display, noting which warships were in the best positions to engage the Syndic merchants if necessary. It looks like we’re ready for anything. The thought brought to mind his old executive officer, long dead now even though Geary’s memories of him were only several weeks old. Geary had said the same thing to him once, only to have his XO look worried and comment that it made him wonder what they might’ve overlooked. Well, Patros, you’re safe with your ancestors now, and I’m still wondering what I might’ve overlooked.

Geary spent the next few minutes trying to fight off the dark mood that remembering his old shipmate had thrown him into. Patros didn’t belong here on the bridge of the Dauntless, but then neither did Geary. Two ghosts. That’s what Patros and I are. What the hell am I still doing here, alive and fighting a war that belongs to our descendants now?

The Marine shuttles finally began launching on schedule, giving Geary something else to concentrate on, each shuttle being tracked as it arced toward the particular merchant ship that was its target. Geary felt himself tensing as the shuttles, small and swift next to the large, ungainly merchant ships, swooped down toward the merchants.

It felt oddly like watching a volley of specters homing on their targets, until the shuttles turned and began braking instead of accelerating to impact, as missiles would have. Geary, sweating for news of the Marines, belatedly remembered the video panel available to him and punched controls until it popped up again. Twenty screens flashed into existence next to Geary’s display, each showing the view from a Marine squad leader.

This time there wasn’t anything else he should be watching, so Geary watched, fascinated, as the Marines entered the merchant ships, conducted searches and posted guards in important areas like engineering and the bridge. It all went smoothly, with no resistance from the Syndics, who acted stiff and formal but not openly hostile. Unlike the large crews of warships needed to handle the special requirements of combat and combat damage, the merchant ships only had crews of about a dozen each, making it easy for the Marines to keep an eye on them all.

Geary had seen the interiors of Syndic merchant ships before, during the period before the war when his ship had been ordered to conduct inspections of ships passing through Alliance space. He recognized some of the features on the Syndic merchants here, causing him to wonder if the ships themselves were that old or if the design features had been retained for so long. He guessed either possibility could be true in a system bypassed by the hypernet.

One by one, the Marine squad leaders reported in, declaring the merchant ships to be to the best of their knowledge unarmed and proceeding peacefully to the rendezvous. But Geary noticed that the Marines watching the Syndic crews didn’t relax, remaining on full combat footing. Once again, he had a moment of empathy, wondering how it felt to the merchant sailors to have the armored figures of Marines looming nearby, alien visitors to the familiar compartments of their ships. As long as they don’t try anything, they’ll be safe. They should know that, after the way we handled the prisoners at the base. That should keep anyone from doing anything foolish.

The merchant ships crawled closer to the Alliance fleet, Geary watching the streaming images of the Syndic merchant crews as seen by the Marines on one side, while on the other his display showed the twenty Syndic merchant ships proceeding at what felt like a leisurely pace toward their rendezvous with the Alliance auxiliaries.

Nothing seemed to be wrong. Nothing at all. What could I be overlooking? Geary searched his brain for anything, but he kept coming up empty. Maybe for once we did cover everything.

“Captain Geary, this is Colonel Carabali.”

A new window had appeared, showing Carabali’s face. She didn’t look happy. “Sir, there’s something about this I don’t like.”

And maybe we didn’t. Geary glanced toward Captain Desjani and gestured for her attention. “The Colonel’s unhappy about something.”

Desjani frowned and keyed into the conversation.

“Go ahead, Colonel,” Geary ordered.

Carabali pointed at something Geary couldn’t see. “Are you watching the video from the Syndic ships, sir?”

“Yes.”

“Does anything seem odd about their crews to you, sir? As a fleet officer, sir?”

Geary frowned, too, and studied the pictures more closely. There was something odd about them, now that Carabali had drawn his attention to it. “Are the senior merchant officers all supposed to be on their bridges?”

“Yes, sir, they are.”

Desjani made a brief noise. “The Syndics seem to grow their senior merchant officers very young, don’t they?”

Carabali nodded. “Yes. Exactly. I assume the Syndics called for volunteers to crew these ships, but as far as I can tell from visual examination, there’s not a man or woman aboard those ships older than their twenties.”

“Interesting batch of volunteers,” Geary said slowly. Most of the merchant captains I knew wouldn’t have left their ships to someone else, even for a run like this.”

“I’ve questioned my Marines. They indicate there was a definite lack of familiarity with the ships by many of these so-called crew members. They thought that was due to volunteers being assigned to the ships from the pool of available merchant sailors, but I’m not so sure that’s the reason.”

Geary thought about that and didn’t like it. Merchant ships tended to have older officers, people who’d learned their jobs and worked their way up through long years of experience. It was a very different kind of professionalism than the fleet officer kind, but strong enough in its own way. He took another look at the alleged merchant crews. “Young and physically fit, too, aren’t they?”

“Look at their eyes, sir. Look at the way they carry themselves,” Carabali urged.

“Damn.” Geary exchanged a glance with Desjani. “Those aren’t merchant sailors. They look like soldiers.”

“I’d stake my career on them being military,” Carabali agreed. “And not just any military. They’re trying to slouch around and act like civilians, but they don’t really know how to relax like that anymore. They’ve been too highly trained. They look to me like the sort of people you find in shock troops.”

“Shock troops.” Geary inhaled slowly. “The sort of troops you send on desperate missions.”

“Or one-way missions. Yes, sir.”

Desjani looked ready to order mass murder, and for once Geary didn’t blame her. “Alright, Colonel. What do you think they’re planning? Some sort of attack?”

Carabali chewed her lower lip. “Not a conventional assault. They’re too few, they’re not in armor, and they can’t have weapons easily accessible because we’d have found them. If there were sailors guarding them, they might still be able to overwhelm the guards, but not with my Marines on watch in full combat gear.”

“That’s what I’d think. Then what? We’ve confirmed there’s no weapons on those merchant ships.”

Desjani jerked as if struck by a thought, then leaned toward Geary and spoke in a low but urgent voice. “They have a weapon, sir. Their power cores.”

Geary blinked, trying to digest the information and seeing Carabali pale slightly as she heard Desjani’s statement. “Their power cores. Do you think they mean to overload their power cores when they get close to our ships?”

Carabali nodded vigorously. “Captain Desjani is right, sir. I’m sure of it. Look at the eyes of those Syndics, sir. They’re on a suicide mission.”

“I concur,” Desjani stated. “We all agree those aren’t merchant crews. They’re combat troops, and they have only one weapon available to them on those ships.”

Well, damn. Geary fought down an urge to curse loud and long. “Agreed. How can they overload their power cores while the Marines are watching?”

Desjani spoke again. “They’d have to have some sort of remote trigger rigged.” Carabali nodded. “It could be anywhere and look like anything.” Another nod.

“So should we take the crews down? Get them off the ships?”

Carabali shook her head this time. “If we start trying to herd them off the ships, they’ll probably trigger the overloads right away. Your big ships might be safe enough, but we’d lose every Marine and all the boarding shuttles.”

“What about killing them?” Desjani asked calmly.

Geary considered the question, and he considered what those Syndics were planning. “Yes. How good an option is that?”

Carabali grimaced. “Chancey, sir. We might be able to take them all down fast enough, but if they’ve got triggers tied to dead-man switches it’d just doom my Marines anyway.”

“Dead-man switches? Couldn’t we see—?”

Geary stopped speaking as Carabali shook her head again. “No, sir,” the Marine stated. “The switches could be implanted and linked to their nervous systems or their hearts. If the Syndics died and their hearts or nervous systems shut down, it could well trigger the overloads.”

“I see.” That’s an advance over what was available in my time, though I wouldn’t call it an improvement.

Carabali’s face brightened. “But there’s another option. My Marines have a riot control load-out because we expected to be dealing with civilians.”

“Meaning?” Geary pressed.

“Among other things, they have CRX gas dispensers. It’s riot suppression gas, not riot dispersal, so it’s odorless, colorless, and a tiny amount inhaled knocks someone out cold in a moment.”

“You’re suggesting we knock them out.”

“Yes, sir. They’ll be unconscious before they know we’re acting.”

“And you’re certain this CRX won’t cause some physical reaction that might trigger a dead-man switch?”

“Fairly certain. I can check with my medical personnel.”

“Do so, please.” Geary waited, trying not to let his impatience show, while the seconds crawled by until Carabali’s image focused back on Geary.

“Medical staff says the CRX will be safe.”

“Will be safe or probably will be safe?” Geary pressed.

Carabali grinned. “I asked them if they’d stake their lives on that assessment, and none of them hesitated.”

“They’re Marines,” Desjani noted dryly.

“Not the medical staff,” Carabali reminded her. “They’re all seconded to the Marines from the fleet, so even though associating with the Marines so closely causes a bit of us to rub off on them, they’re still not part of the same mind-set.”

The brief exchange brought a grin to Geary’s face. “Alright, then. We’ve established that the medical staff aren’t quite as willing to die in the line of duty as the average Marine. So we can assume we can take down those alleged merchant sailors safely.”

“That doesn’t mean there still won’t be a threat,” Desjani interjected. “The ships could be rigged in a dozen ways to automatically overload their cores when they get near our big ships. A few smart proximity fuses hidden on the hulls would do the trick, and there’s no way to guarantee we’d find them all in the time we’ve got.” Desjani paused. “Merchant ships don’t carry all the equipment that warships do, but they still have lots of different systems. There’s no telling what else might’ve been rigged to set off the power cores.”

Like maybe if we change the course or speed of those ships without some special input from the Syndic crew. I’ve got twenty flying bombs heading for the most vulnerable and valuable ships in this fleet. Geary thought about the situation. “Okay. Say we use the CRX. That’ll leave us with twenty ships we can’t let get close to our big units and twenty crews of unconscious Syndics.” He knew Desjani was watching him, waiting for his decision and wondering how he’d square that decision with his expressed concern for prisoners. After all, he’d be justified in any action against people who planned a sneak suicide attack. But that doesn’t mean I have to do anything I don’t want to. And what I do want to do is to make life difficult for the people who planned this, who sent those shock troops on a suicide mission while they’re sitting safe and happy back near that inhabited world. “How long do we have to work with?”

Carabali looked toward Desjani, who tapped rapidly on her controls. On Geary’s display, large spheres appeared surrounding each Syndic merchant ship. “That’s the estimated damage radius if one of those merchants blows its core. You can see the damage radius for each merchant bulged slightly to one side because of the movement vector of that ship. If our ships are farther away than that, their shields should be able to handle any debris that gets to them.”

Geary judged the distances and the time left until the merchants got too close to the auxiliaries. The time remaining wasn’t much, but hopefully it’d be enough. “Very well, Colonel. Here’s what we’ll do.”

Twenty minutes later, Geary watched on the remote video feeds as the last of the unconscious Syndic crew members were dumped unceremoniously into the escape pods on their ships. Since none of them were strapped into the seats, they’d get banged up a bit when the pods blasted away. But since they were planning on dying, I don’t think they’ll have any legitimate grounds to complain about bruises and broken bones.

The pod hatches were left open as a precaution against a booby trap, and the Marines hastened back to their boarding shuttles, being met at the airlocks by the rest of the Marines in the boarding party who’d come from downloading instructions to the autopilots on the bridges of the merchant ships.

Geary let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding as the shuttles pulled away from the merchants. He checked the time, willing the shuttles to move faster, wanting them as far as possible from the merchants and their damage radii before the automated instructions that had been sent to the Marines to download finally kicked in.

“Thirty seconds,” Desjani advised unnecessarily.

Geary just nodded, his eyes flicking from the Marine shuttles to the damage radii around the merchant ships to the Alliance fleet auxiliaries that were drawing ever closer to their rendezvous with the merchants.

“Mark.”

Geary held his breath again, waiting to see if the instructions given the merchant ships’ automated systems to seal the escape pods would trigger the ships’ destruction. The Marine shuttles should be far enough away now to be safe, if their estimates were right. But “estimate” means it can be wrong.

“Pods should be launching,” Desjani announced.

“There.” Geary pointed at his display, where the Dauntless’s systems were tracking the escape pods that had shot out from the merchants. They had another moment to wonder if launching the pods would cause the ships’ power cores to overload. But once again, the merchants continued on, heading for the Alliance fleet in a steady way that was almost unnerving. “Let’s see what happens when we play with the merchants’ courses.”

Moments later, the instructions the Marines had downloaded ordered the merchants’ maneuvering systems to start kicking them down and around. The big, slow merchant ships, heavily laden with the stores the Alliance fleet had demanded, swung ponderously until their bows were pointed down and away from the Alliance fleet. “One more event left,” Desjani noted.

The main drives on the Syndic ships lit off, pushing against the mass and momentum of the merchant ships to change their path through space. Geary tried to judge their progress as the merchants continued getting closer to some of the Alliance ships. “Should we maneuver Titan and Jinn to make sure those things don’t get too close?”

Desjani pursed her lips as she studied the relative movement of the vessels, then shook her head. “We should start seeing distances opening any minute now. Unless something causes those main drives to shut off, those merchants won’t be a threat much longer.”

The drives didn’t shut off, continuing to push with all their capability against their ships. Slowly, the projected courses for the clumsy merchant ships began altering, the changes becoming clear as the actual courses diverged from the original paths, then changing faster as the big ships picked up speed in the new direction as fast as they were able.

“Where are they going?” Colonel Carabali’s image asked.

Geary gave her a tight-lipped smile. “Home.”

Carabali frowned.

“No, Colonel,” Geary assured her, “we’re giving the Syndics back their ships, but they won’t appreciate the gesture. We had to do something with those twenty ships, and the people who launched the attack on us needed to get paid back. There are two military facilities orbiting the inhabited world. The orders we had your Marines download into the merchant maneuvering systems direct ten of those merchant ships to keep accelerating as fast as they’re able, aimed directly at the point where one of those facilities will be when the merchants get there. The other ten are aimed at the other facility.”

The Colonel’s frown changed into an open smile. “Ten merchant ships packed full of cargo charging all-out at one target in a fixed orbit? The Syndics might have a little trouble stopping them all.”

“They won’t be able to stop them all, Colonel,” Geary assured her. He gestured toward the images of the lumbering merchants. “Under normal conditions, the merchants would be too slow to worry about and easily destroyed on approach. But these ships won’t be slowing down as they approach orbit. They’ll keep speeding up as best they can until impact.”

“And,” Desjani added with her own smile, “any hits on the merchants will have a lot of mass to divert. If they manage to blow the merchants apart, they’ll have to deal with all the cargo and wreckage still heading their way.”

Geary smiled, too. “After all, we do need to conserve our supply of long-range weaponry. If in the process of breaking their word, the Syndics hand us something that will do the job of punishing them, they’ll just have to live with the consequences.” He glanced at the display. “We’re just over thirty-two light-minutes from the inhabited world. It’ll take a half hour for them to see that their suicide attack didn’t come off as planned. Give them at least another ten minutes to track the merchants and figure out where they’re headed. I’ll wait a half hour to avoid tipping them off and then broadcast a message.”

“Which will reach them in about an hour. That’s far sooner than the merchant ships can reach their targets. They’ll have time to evacuate their orbital facilities,” Desjani sighed.

“Can’t be helped,” Geary noted with a shrug. “They’ll have no trouble seeing the merchants coming long before they get there. Besides, any CEOs on those facilities would’ve gotten off first anyway. Not that I think they’ll get off free. They’ll have to explain to their superiors how they lost every Syndic space military asset in this system, and why they caused the destruction of the majority of the large merchant ships in the system as well, all without inflicting any losses on us or impeding our progress.”

Carabali’s smile grew grim. “Perhaps they’ll be trading their boardrooms for labor camps.”

“Maybe,” Geary agreed. “And wouldn’t that be a damn shame.”

At the half-hour mark, Geary sat straight in his chair, making sure his uniform looked good, but not too good. He didn’t want to look like one of the finely tailored bureaucrats who ran things in the Syndicate Worlds. “Begin transmission. People of Corvus Star System,” he stated in his best command voice, pitched a little lower and louder than his usual speech, “this is Captain John Geary, commander of the Alliance fleet.” He paused a moment, letting the fact of his identity sink in. He suspected that since the Alliance believed Black Jack Geary to be a savior, the Syndics would see him as a boogeyman or at least a threat with an air of the supernatural about him. It made him uncomfortable, but he wasn’t about to discard something that could possibly help the fleet’s chances of getting home.

“I wish to inform you of two things. The first is that the merchant ships we arranged to meet us here turned out to be booby-trapped. We negotiated with your leaders in good faith. They broke their word, and as a result those ships are forfeit. Even now, they are being returned with a vengeance to those who sent them. I want it clearly understood that even though we were betrayed by your leaders, we do not seek retribution against you.”

“The other thing I must tell you is that the crews of the merchant ships were placed unharmed within the escape pods of the ships and ejected en route to your world. We did not sabotage or booby-trap those pods in any way. We did not turn them into weapons. They contain only your crew members.”

“We could’ve killed the crews of those ships, who by planning a sneak attack while disguised as civilians placed themselves outside the protections granted by the laws of war. We could’ve retaliated against your world. This fleet had it within its power to wipe all traces of life from this system. We did not do any of those things. The Alliance fleet showed more concern for the lives of the citizens of Corvus System than did your own leaders. Remember that.”

“To the honor of our ancestors,” Geary recited, using the old formula even as he wondered if a phrase already old-fashioned in his day had become totally outdated by now. “This is Captain John Geary, commanding officer of the Alliance fleet. End transmission.”

He relaxed, noticing as he did so that Captain Desjani had a small smile on her lips. “That should give the Syndics something to think about until the merchant ships start slamming into their targets. Especially the fact that you used the old, formal ending for your message.”

“It isn’t used anymore, then?”

“I’ve never seen it outside of historical documents.” Desjani nodded, her smile not varying. “Yes. It’s the sort of small touch that’ll scare the hell out of the Syndics, because it’ll make it clear that Black Jack Geary has returned.”

Geary nodded as well, keeping his own thoughts to himself. Yeah. Great. Knowing I’m probably something out of a nightmare to lots of people isn’t something I ever wanted.

But you use the weapons you’ve got.