Guardian

Nine

Simur had never been an exceptional star system, and the twin blows of the war and the creation of a Syndic hypernet had done nothing to improve its prospects. Close enough to the border region with the Alliance to be the target of occasional attacks, and never that wealthy a star system to begin with, Simur had been hit especially hard by the creation of a hypernet gate at Sobek. Most of the traffic to and from the rich Sobek Star System that used to have to jump through Simur on its way had been able to go directly to Sobek thanks to the gate. For the last several decades, Simur had been declining from the not-particularly-well-off state it had once enjoyed.

Intelligence collected during the last Alliance attack to strike Simur, which had been eight years ago, had shown stretches of abandoned facilities, abandoned towns, shrinking cities and still-unrepaired damage from a previous attack six years before that. Simur only had a half dozen planets worthy of the name, and four of those were either hot rocks whirling too close to the star or icy rocks too far from the star. Of the remaining two planets, one orbiting a light-hour from the star was barely large enough to qualify as a gas giant, while the last orbited seven light-minutes from the star but was barely habitable by humans, with an axial tilt high enough to keep the northern hemisphere uncomfortably warm and the southern hemisphere uncomfortably chilly.

“At least the lack of worthwhile targets will help us hold back if we’re tempted to retaliate for more attacks by bombarding them,” Desjani remarked, as they waited for Dauntless to exit jump. “Unless the Syndics pumped a huge amount of money and resources into Simur since the last time the Alliance was here, there’s not much even worth a rock dropped on it from orbit. Why hasn’t Simur been abandoned?”

“Maybe it was cheaper to let it slowly dwindle than it would have been to evacuate the remaining inhabitants,” Geary suggested. “Let’s hope there’s nothing there waiting for us. It’s possible the Syndics concentrated all of their efforts at Sobek.”

“Do you really believe that?”

“No.”

“One minute to jump exit,” Lieutenant Castries said.

“All weapons ready, shields at maximum,” Lieutenant Yuon added.

“And,” Desjani grumbled, “we’ll enter normal space barely moving.”

“If anything will throw off a Syndic surprise,” Geary said, “that will.” I hope.

He watched his display, waiting for the moment when Dauntless and the rest of the fleet would leave jump space, for the moment when the featureless, endless gray would be replaced by the spangled black of familiar space and its countless stars.

The strange lights of jump space always came and went at unpredictable times, but as Geary watched, several bloomed near Dauntless, off to one side.

“A cluster?” Desjani asked in disbelief. “Jump-space lights never appear in groups. Do they?”

“Not that I ever heard,” Geary said.

“There have been more of them this time,” Lieutenant Castries said hesitantly. “More than usual. That’s what the old hands say.”

Did the presence of the Dancers with the human ships have any relationship to the unusual behavior of the lights in jump space? Geary almost spoke the question out loud, then saw that there were only a few seconds left before jump exit.

Desjani saw that, too. “Everyone focus on your jobs!”

The moment came, Geary striving to fight off the disorientation that entering and exiting jump always caused. He had been doing it enough lately that his recovery periods were getting shorter and now spanned only a few seconds.

He heard combat systems alarms blaring before his eyes could focus.

But as he struggled to see his display, one other fact penetrated.

None of Dauntless’s weapons were firing. Whatever the alarms warned of, it was not close enough to engage, meaning the threat also was not close enough to fire upon Dauntless or hopefully any of the rest of his fleet.

Not yet, anyway.

Geary finally managed to get a clear look at his display, then had to study it for a few seconds to grasp what he was seeing. “Freighters?”

“Junk freighters,” Desjani growled. “And obsolete warships.”

Directly in the path of the fleet were several ships ranged close to the jump exit. None of them were going anywhere. “They’re almost on top of the jump exit,” Lieutenant Castries reported. “They must be using their own maneuvering systems to stay on station. We’re getting power core readings from them. They’re all live ships.”

“They may be live,” Desjani said sharply, “but they’re limping. They look like they were hauled out of a breaking yard. Six light-seconds distant. If we’d come out of jump doing point one light—”

“We’d already be in the middle of them,” Geary finished. “At point one light, we couldn’t have turned fast enough to avoid them even if the maneuver had been preprogrammed.” He hadn’t absorbed all of the information on his display, but he had picked up that there was nothing directly above the Alliance ships. “All units in First Fleet, immediate execute, turn up zero nine zero degrees.”

Dauntless pitched upward, thrusters firing to alter her trajectory into a climb straight above the plane of this star system. Geary watched the paths of his other ships doing the same. Not all could alter vectors as quickly as Dauntless, so his neat formation was smearing across a wide expanse of space, but thanks to the very low velocity at which they had exited the jump point, none of his ships would come within the danger zones surrounding the old freighters and warships positioned directly outside the exit.

That maneuver would get the fleet clear of the potential threats directly in front of the jump exit, but bring it closer to some of the other threats being highlighted on the displays.

Four groups of ships, none of them particularly large, all three light-minutes from the hypernet gate, evenly spaced as if they occupied the corners of a vast, imaginary square centered on the gate.

Three of the small groupings held a single heavy cruiser, two light cruisers, and five Hunter-Killers. The fourth had two heavy cruisers and six HuKs.

“Our systems are assessing those warships as being brand-new,” Lieutenant Castries reported. “Minimal signs of wear, and they’re all the latest Syndic models of each kind of warship. But… Captain, they’re broadcasting identity codes that are not Syndic.”

“Another star system that revolted?” Geary wondered. “Maybe this reception committee is here in case a Syndic force aimed at suppressing their rebellion came from Sobek after using the hypernet gate to get there.”

“I don’t like it,” Desjani replied. “Where would a star system that revolted get all of those new-construction Syndic warships? They didn’t build them here. And there’s no sign of combat damage on any of those ships. Did you read the reports Captain Bradamont sent about the fights at Midway when they revolted?”

“Yes,” Geary said. “Some very bitter fighting and some ugly events. You’re right. The condition of those warships doesn’t match what we should see if Midway was in any way representative of what revolt is like for Syndic-controlled star systems.”

An alert beeped, and next to Geary a virtual window appeared in which Lieutenant Iger could be seen. “Admiral, everything coming from the old ships directly in front of the jump exit is totally routine, as if they were conducting normal transits or operations. All of that has to be faked given the poor condition of those ships.”

“What about the new ones?” Geary asked, eyeing the two groups closest to the upward-bending path of the fleet.

“Their identity codes claim that they are all units of the Strike Combat Attack Forces of the Simur Star System.”

Desjani’s snort of derision was loud enough for Iger to hear. He nodded in agreement. “There is a lot of interesting message traffic flying around this star system, Admiral,” Iger continued. “But nothing that would indicate a revolt against Syndic authority. What we are picking up was transmitted prior to our arrival and consists of speculation about what the Syndic warships were doing here. Those warships showed up a couple of weeks ago and have apparently refused to communicate with anyone in this star system.”

“They haven’t communicated with anyone?” Geary asked. “Not even the senior Syndic CEO in Simur?”

Iger smiled despite his best efforts to suppress a grin. “Since the Syndic warships were hanging out near this jump point, messages sent to them came right where we could pick them up, too. We’ve got one of them. It’s coded, of course, but we could break enough of it to indicate that the senior CEO here is demanding to know what their mission is. There’s a fragment of the message that may indicate that the senior CEO received some sort of instructions from the Syndic warships and is disputing those instructions.”

“There’s no doubt in your mind,” Geary said, “that those ships are still Syndic despite claiming to belong to this star system?”

“Don’t answer that, Lieutenant,” someone interrupted before Iger could speak.

Desjani clenched her teeth but stayed silent as Geary turned to see that Rione was on the bridge. “Why shouldn’t Lieutenant Iger answer that question?” Geary demanded.

“Because, Admiral,” Rione said, looking and sounding as if she were explaining the obvious, “the Alliance has a peace agreement with the Syndicate Worlds which limits our possible actions against any ships or star systems of the Syndicate Worlds. The Alliance has no peace treaty with the Simur Star System. If those warships claiming to belong to Simur and not to the Syndicate Worlds act in a hostile or just a threatening manner, you can act in whatever way you wish without concerning yourself about the legalities of the peace agreement with the Syndicate Worlds.”

That could be useful. Geary kept one eye on the nearest groups of Syndic warships as he spoke again. “Why would the Syndics give us that opportunity?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps they simply didn’t think of that possibility. There is a great deal that we don’t know. All we can be certain of is that the Syndics very likely are trying to lure you into doing something that you don’t want to do.”

Another alert, this time from the displays, as Lieutenant Castries echoed the information. “Ship groups Alpha and Bravo are accelerating on intercept tracks.”

The fleet’s automated systems had designated the four groups of new warships as Alpha, Bravo, Cable, and Delta. Alpha and Bravo were the two groups at the top of the imaginary square, and the two groups closest to the Alliance fleet as it climbed away from the threat posed by the suspicious old ships in front of the jump exit.

“More suicide attacks?” Geary asked. With the new warships fairly close and accelerating toward intercept, they were only about twenty minutes from getting within range of his ships. And his fleet was still crawling along at point zero zero three light speed, putting them at a disadvantage. “All units in First Fleet, immediate execute increase velocity to point one light speed. The warships approaching us are assessed hostile. You are authorized to engage and destroy them if they enter your weapons envelopes.”

Another transmission, this one on standard coordination and emergency frequencies. “To the unknown warships approaching the formation of the Alliance First Fleet, you are forbidden to approach within weapons range of any Alliance ship. If you come close enough to engage, we will fire upon you and take all other necessary measures to defend ourselves. There will be no further warnings.”

And what were the Dancers up to?

The six Dancer ships were doing loops around Invincible while matching the movements of the massive Kick superbattleship as Invincible was towed along with the fleet. Whatever the reasons for their actions, as long as they stay close to Invincible, and Invincible is kept deep inside the Alliance formation, I don’t have to worry too much about the Dancers.

Desjani shook her head, her expression bleak. “Normally, it would be hard as hell to stop a heavy cruiser on a suicide run. But with us starting out so slow and them accelerating from so close, our engagement velocity will be way under point two light. With the amount of firepower we can bring to bear, we’ll massacre them.”

“That bothers you?” Geary asked, startled.

“I don’t mind killing Syndics. But I don’t enjoy the idea of people ordered to kill themselves by bosses who are a long, long ways off and perfectly safe.”

Yet another alert, calling attention to a high-priority message. Geary saw who it was from and hit the accept command.

Jane Geary looked out at him. “Admiral, what if this isn’t a suicide attack? What if those warships intend to survive?”

That was the entire message. Geary frowned at where Jane Geary’s image had been. “Tanya?”

Desjani frowned as well. “If they intend to survive? The only way they could do that— Damn! They’d hit some unit or units that are exposed on the edge of our formation.”

Geary’s surprised check of his formation revealed that he had plenty of those in the region where the Alpha and Bravo warship groups were headed. Several destroyers and light cruisers were on the outer boundary of the formation, screening higher-value units farther inside the formation. But if those destroyers and light cruisers were themselves the targets, they were dangerously exposed. Even those small groups of Syndic ships could take out a destroyer or two in a single pass if they concentrated their fire on one Alliance ship on the outside of the fleet’s formation.

“It looks like you were right, Tanya.” Changing tactics aimed at slowly wearing down this fleet, taking it down piece by piece and ship by ship, until it was weak enough for the Syndics to try a conventional attack to finish off the remnants. “The Syndics can’t hide in space the way ground forces can on a planet, but they’re still trying to keep us off-balance with constantly shifting threats and tactics.”

There was no time to call out individual ships or plan maneuvers on the display. “Fourth Destroyer Squadron, Seventeenth Destroyer Squadron, Tenth Light Cruiser Squadron, immediate execute turn port zero… three zero degrees. Eighth Heavy Cruiser Division, immediate execute turn starboard zero one zero degrees.”

It would take precious seconds for the command to reach the ships, then more seconds for the orders to be understood and carried out. He could only hope that there would be enough seconds left to make a difference, and that these sudden alterations of position among those ships would not expose the formation as a whole to greater damage if the Syndics really did try suicide runs again.

“She really is a Geary,” Desjani murmured in admiring tones as she watched her own display. “The rest of us were thinking about what had happened last time, but she thought about what could happen this time.”

“What does that make me?” Geary asked, mentally lashing himself for not seeing what Jane had, for making assumptions about what the enemy would do, for being—

“Not perfect,” Desjani replied. “And smart enough to listen when someone reminds you that you might have missed something.”

Watching the two groups of new warships racing to meet his formation as it climbed above the plane of the star system, Geary could not find much comfort in her words. The exposed destroyers and light cruisers were moving, their vectors curving in toward the mass of the formation, while the warships of the heavy cruiser division nearest those destroyers and light cruisers were curving out slightly to help cover them. Had he acted in time, had Jane Geary’s suggestion been right, what would the Syndics actually do…

Groups Alpha and Bravo shot past the Alliance formation, their tracks changing at the last moment to curve outward, weapons slamming shots toward the Alliance light cruiser that was still most exposed.

“Pectoral took a hit through her shields,” Lieutenant Yuon announced. “Minor damage. One hell lance off-line.”

Groups Alpha and Bravo were still turning, arcing up and over in a maneuver Geary knew very well. “They’re going to make another run.”

Another alert pulsed on his display.

“Groups Cable and Delta are accelerating onto intercept courses,” Lieutenant Castries said.

Geary glowered at his display, knowing his options were limited. If I send a pursuit force after any of those groups, I expose that pursuit force to attack by the other three groups while the group it targets avoids contact. If my pursuit force is strong enough to handle that threat, it will be too slow to catch the highly maneuverable groups of Syndic warships, and it will weaken my main formation.

Tanya was watching him, confident he would order some sort of pursuit, but Geary shook his head. “They’ve got us reacting to them. They want me to send ships out of the formation to chase them. I’m going to do the opposite, to give us time to think.”

The necessary formation was the oldest in the book, a sphere. But he needed to designate where his units would go on the surface of that sphere, and how large it would be. “Armadillo,” he told Desjani.

“What?”

“Formation Armadillo.”

“Is that real?” She entered the request, then started in surprise. “Are you serious? A perfect sphere? That formation is—”

“Lousy. It disperses firepower. Against a strong opponent, it’s a disaster because the opponent can concentrate against any point on the sphere. But if your opponent is a lot weaker than you, it offers no vulnerable points to attack. Everything is equally well defended.”

“We’re going on the defensive?” she asked, her voice growing sharp. “They’ll see this and think we’re afraid. They’ll think we’re curling up in a fright ball and too scared to fight them. The fleet won’t understand that kind of behavior before the enemy.”

He felt a stab of anger at her tone of voice and the pointed questions she was asking. “Yes, Captain Desjani, we are going on the defensive until I have time to think and evaluate what’s going on in this star system. We are going to frustrate the Syndic tactics aimed at destroying our escorts, and we’re going to frustrate whatever plans the Syndics have to stampede me into making decisions.”

She subsided, flushing slightly. He thought Desjani might be angry, but from the way she avoided his eyes, it was more likely embarrassment. “My apologies, Admiral.”

“That’s all right. If I wasn’t having to react to your anger, I’d probably be mad as hell myself. Help me set this up. But I’m going to make our attackers’ job a little more difficult while we’re doing that.” Geary tapped his comm controls. “All units in First Fleet, immediate execute down one eight zero degrees.”

That would bring them back toward the threatening derelicts right at the jump exit, but on the other side of them since the fleet had curved upward and now would bend downward, looping high over the old ships. He would still have to watch for any unit getting too close to those old ships, though.

Unless…

“I’m seeing that the old ships near the jump exit are not broadcasting any identification. Is that correct?”

“Yes, sir,” Lieutenants Castries and Yuon replied in unison.

“Emissary Rione, does anything in the peace agreement with the Syndics restrict any action by me against hazards to navigation?”

She looked puzzled. “I will have to check, Admiral.” Rione began entering queries, studying her display intently.

Desjani paused in her work arranging ships around the sphere of the Armadillo formation. “Hazards to navigation? Does that mean what I think it does?”

“I hope so,” Geary said, drawing a slight smile from her. Maybe this particular Tanya storm would pass quickly.

Rione blinked as she refocused on Geary. “Admiral, all the peace agreement says is that standard navigational practices are to be respected. I believe that is only in the agreement because it’s part of the boilerplate for treaties.”

“Thank you, Madam Emissary. Captain Desjani, have the rules for dealing with navigational hazards changed in the last century?”

She shook her head, smiling wider. “No, sir. Any ship encountering a navigational hazard to the movement of other ships is to either post warn-off beacons or take necessary steps to eliminate the hazard.”

“I don’t think we need to expend any warn-off beacons,” Geary said. “Especially since those derelicts are so close to the jump exit. An arriving ship might not have time to avoid them in response to a warn-off.” He studied his display briefly, watching the increasingly shabby formation of the First Fleet as it came over and headed straight down relative to the plane of the star system.

The way the fleet’s formation was now arranged, one of the battle cruiser divisions would be on the side closest to the old ships as they went down past the jump exit.

“Captain Tulev, this is Admiral Geary. The ships I have just designated as derelicts pose a hazard to navigation. You are to alter the course of the Second Battle Cruiser Division sufficiently to target and destroy the derelicts using specter missiles. Do not close within hell-lance range. Return to the formation after firing missiles. Geary, out.”

Ten seconds later, Captain Tulev called from Leviathan. “I understand. We will destroy the derelicts.”

Desjani nodded approvingly. “Those small groups of Syndic warships won’t want to tangle with Tulev’s division of battle cruisers. Permission to ask a question?”

“Dammit, Tanya—”

“I’ll take that as a yes, Admiral. Why are we destroying those things? Not that I object to destroying them.”

He gave her an annoyed look. “We’re destroying them, Captain Desjani, because I don’t want to have to worry about them anymore, and because I can eliminate what are very likely Syndic booby traps without the Syndics being able to object or complain.”

Rione broke in. “You are certain those derelicts are dangerous?”

“I am, Madam Emissary. You remember what we did at Lakota, rigging badly damaged ships to explode? You told me while we were at Midway that President Iceni said high-level Syndics had seen detailed reports on the tactics I used after I assumed command of the fleet.”

“And you think the Syndics are trying to use your own methods against you?” Rione asked.

“From what we heard at Midway, I think they’re going to do their best.”

The sudden reversal in the track of the Alliance fleet had forced the four groups of Syndic ships to make dramatic changes to their own vectors. Groups Alpha and Bravo found themselves far out of position, required to alter course to dive in pursuit of the Alliance formation. Groups Cable and Delta, coming up toward the Alliance ships, faced the opposite problem as their intercepts with the Alliance fleet abruptly threatened to occur much sooner and at much higher relative velocity than planned.

Geary watched Cable and Delta closely, wanting to see how they reacted. Would they adjust their tracks on the fly to manage a quicker and riskier encounter or pull off to come around again under more controlled conditions?

“Scared them off,” Desjani commented in a neutral voice as Cable and Delta both curved outward, avoiding contact with any Alliance ships. “What do you think of this?”

He looked over the work on the Armadillo she had done to supplement his. The Alliance formation would shrink in, forming a fairly tight ball, the assault transports, Invincible, and the auxiliaries in the center, battleships and battle cruisers spaced around the outer shell to reinforce tight lattices of smaller warships. “It looks good to me. Are you buying into this now?”

“Yes, sir.” She shrugged. “Whatever they’re up to, they won’t expect this. I’ve never seen it used.”

“Neither have I. It’s one hell of a big target. We’ll hold it long enough to figure out what to do next, and not a moment longer.” He watched Tulev’s battle cruisers, Leviathan, Dragon, Steadfast, and Valiant, sweep outward from the current formation, altering their track enough to come within missile range of the derelicts. The old ships must still have some maneuvering capability in order to stay directly in front of and that close to the jump exit, but whatever that capability was it wouldn’t be enough for those half wrecks to avoid missiles.

“Are there any crews aboard them?” Charban asked. Unnoticed, he had also come onto the bridge.

Desjani waved toward Lieutenant Castries, delegating the answer to her.

“It’s doubtful there are any crews on any of them, sir,” Castries said. “Automated systems would have easily handled the maneuvering to keep those old ships on station, and we’ve received no indications of any living crew aboard.”

“Thank you,” Charban said. “What if there are people on board?”

“If there are… Sir, if there is anyone aboard any of those ships, they will see the missiles coming in plenty of time to get into an escape pod.”

“Which would not do them much good if the Admiral’s estimate is right and those ships are rigged as bombs,” Rione pointed out.

Geary turned enough to give her a pointed look. I know she agreed with my decision to take out those derelicts. Sometimes that woman is contrary just for the sake of being contrary. “If the ships are rigged as bombs, anyone on board would know that. We can’t be responsible if they get caught in a trap they intended for us.”

He watched as missiles launched from Tulev’s four battle cruisers, two specters for each derelict. Geary’s hand twitched toward his comm controls. The auxiliaries have been manufacturing replacement weapons for all they’re worth, but we’re still not fully up to strength on missiles. I should have told him to only use one per ship—

“Admiral,” Desjani said, “you can always count on Captain Tulev to do the job right without being told exactly how to do it. By using two missiles per target, he’s overkilling some of the derelicts but ensuring that every target is eliminated just as you ordered.”

This time he looked at her suspiciously. “How do you know…? Never mind. You’re right. We’re even.”

“I’m not keeping count.”

“The hell you aren’t.” Geary let his hand complete the motion to his comm controls this time. “All units in the First Fleet, this is Admiral Geary. At time two zero, all units come up zero eight zero degrees, come starboard three five degrees, assume Formation Armadillo as attached to this transmission. Geary, out.”

The fleet would simultaneously swing back up and slightly to one side, aiming for the next jump point, while also compressing down into the Armadillo. It was the sort of maneuver involving hundreds of ships that humans would have required days to work out, but the fleet’s maneuvering systems could come up with a coordinated solution within seconds.

The questions began coming in less than a minute later. Geary squinted at the list of incoming transmissions. Almost every senior officer in the fleet was calling, and it didn’t take a genius to know what they were calling about.

Desjani glanced toward his comm inbox, gave him an “I told you so” look, then returned to studying her own display.

I thought I was done with this kind of thing, Geary thought crossly. Being open to advice and input is one thing. Having my decisions questioned is another.

His hand hovered over the comm controls, but something made him look over toward Desjani. She was giving him a sidelong look that spoke volumes. Are you sure that you want to do that, Admiral?

Geary lowered his hand, thinking. No one is challenging my right to command. Not anymore. At least, no one is doing that openly. They are expressing concern about my proposed course of action. These are good officers for the most part. They’ve followed me and done their jobs well. I need to respect their concerns instead of telling them to shut up and do what they’re told. Taking a deep breath, he hit the fleet-broadcast command that would send his words to every commanding officer in the First Fleet.

“This is Admiral Geary. I understand that there is some concern regarding our currently ordered movements. Be assured that the purpose of the new formation is to confound any Syndic plans against us here at Simur. After ensuring that the Syndics cannot successfully attack us, we will analyze the situation here and determine just what the Syndic plans are. Then we will change our formation and take any measures required not only to frustrate those plans but also respond as appropriate. Geary, out.”

He paused, thinking again. “Madam Emissary, would you contact the senior Syndic CEO in this star system and register a formal complaint about aggression by those warships against an Alliance fleet?”

Rione raised her eyebrows at him. “You know what the answer will be. The senior Syndic CEO will claim those warships are not Syndic.”

Geary nodded. “Yes, but those warships are also claiming to be under the control of this star system. That would make that senior CEO responsible regardless. I want to see what they say about that.”

“An interesting suggestion, Admiral.” Rione beckoned to Charban. “Let’s go send that message. We’ll talk about how to word it on the way to the conference room.”

But she paused as the specter missiles from Tulev’s battle cruisers began impacting on the derelicts. Some of the explosions were appropriate to the impact, the warheads of the missiles combining with the kinetic energy of the missile itself to blow apart ships that were already rickety.

Of the seven derelicts hit, however, four blew apart with much greater force than missile warhead and impact could explain. Geary watched the spread of shrapnel and high-velocity particles from the explosions, feeling cold satisfaction at having guessed right. Those derelicts had been weapons, planted across the path of the Alliance fleet, kept on station by maneuvering capabilities that mines could not match.

Rione sketched a brief, half-mocking salute Geary’s way, then left the bridge with Charban.

Geary kept his eyes on his display as the fleet coalesced into the tight sphere of the Armadillo formation. The four groups of new Syndic warships, apparently uncertain as to what the Alliance ships were doing, had all swung off from intercepts and were proceeding to positions at different points around the Alliance formation. He had a mental image of frustrated mosquitoes swarming around an impenetrable mesh of netting.

No. That’s wrong. That image assumes that those Syndic warships aren’t still a danger. I can’t be sure of that. I don’t know what else the Syndics might pull now that they can’t fight me on conventional terms. They used suicide attacks, a boarding operation, and a minefield at Sobek. That’s what we know of. What else is here?

“So far they haven’t repeated themselves,” Desjani mused.

Had he spoken that last aloud or was Tanya reading his mind again? “What else can those warships do?” Geary asked.

“Distract us?” She asked that as alerts sounded.

The vectors of all four groups of warships were changing as they swung around and accelerated toward different parts of the Alliance formation.

“They shouldn’t be able to damage the hide of the Alliance Armadillo!” Desjani observed with overstated bravado. Muffled laughter sounded from the back of the bridge as assorted lieutenants and other watch-standers absorbed their captain’s joke.

Geary ignored the mockery as he ran a couple of quick simulations. “Even if they go onto suicide vectors, we’ve got a tight enough formation with enough firepower on the outside to be able to blow them apart before they penetrate our, uh, formation.” He had almost said “hide,” which would have only reinforced Desjani’s joke.

As it was, he had a bad feeling that he would be hearing comments about the Alliance Armadillo for years to come.

Despite his certainty that the defensive arrangement of ships would frustrate the Syndic attackers, Geary still felt tense as the four groups of ships swung in against different parts of the outer shell of the Alliance formation. The Syndics bored in, entering the Alliance missile envelopes, and specters began leaping from the nearest Alliance warships.

But the Syndics pitched around and climbed or dove away almost as soon as they had entered missile range. Geary watched, angry, as dozens of missiles were wasted, their targets zooming out of range. “I should have guessed they’d do something like that.”

“They won’t get away with it again,” Desjani assured him. “I recommend you tell the ships to hold missile fire until the Syndics are too close to evade out of range.”

“Yeah. Good idea.” He transmitted the orders, glaring at his display. It wasn’t a stalemate. As long as the Alliance ships kept moving, they would reach the next jump point and leave Simur. But it felt like a stalemate as the Syndic warships bent their vectors back toward the Alliance formation again. “They may not be able to hurt us, but they’ve got the initiative. I don’t want to give them time to think up something.”

“Hmmm,” Desjani murmured. She hesitated as a thought struck her, then leaned toward her display, watching intently as she entered commands. “They’re using automated maneuvering. I’m sure of it.”

“How can you be sure?” Geary asked.

“The movements are extremely precise. Every ship moves at the exact same moment, and every maneuver is identical for every ship. Do a replay of their tracks when those four groups last came at us, then overlay the tracks of all four groups on each other.”

“Identical,” Geary said. “Not just each ship, the entire formation. The exact same approach vector and the same avoidance vector.”

“They’re new,” Desjani insisted. “Not just the ships. The crews. They don’t have the training to maneuver manually, so they’re letting their automated systems handle everything. Maybe they’ve got orders to do that. But if they’re using automated systems, then those systems will have patterns.”

“How long will it take us to analyze those patterns?”

She paused, then made an uncertain gesture. “A while. We’ll need examples of their attack patterns. I don’t know how many. Eventually, our combat systems will be able to predict their movements.”

“Eventually.” Hanging around Simur waiting an indefinite period while Syndic warships made repeated passes at his formation didn’t sound like a worthwhile strategy. His fleet wouldn’t be happy with remaining on the defensive while the Syndics nipped at the Alliance formation, but if the fleet kept heading home, that should counteract the unhappiness to a considerable extent. He still had to worry about getting the Dancers, and Invincible, safely back to Alliance territory. “Tanya, let’s aim for the jump point for Padronis. Circuitous path, just in case there are any more surprises in this star system.”

Desjani paused again, but whatever she planned to say was interrupted by a call to Geary from the intelligence compartment on Dauntless.

Lieutenant Iger looked almost apologetic. “Admiral, there’s a new POW camp here. A really big one, on the habitable planet, and there are Alliance military personnel there.”