Leviathan

Fourteen

“Admiral,” Lieutenant Castries reported in amazement, “the fleet has detected a jump point for Hardinga.”

Geary checked his display. The jump point had popped into existence over five light-hours away, leading to a moderately-well-populated star system near this binary. Near as interstellar distances went, anyway. “How long—”

“It’s unstable,” Castries continued, then realized she had interrupted Geary. “I’m sorry, Admiral. Our sensors assess that the jump point is unstable. I’ve never seen that before.”

“You’ve never been in a close binary star system before,” Desjani said. “Look at that. Our sensors are estimating the jump point has an eighty percent chance of collapsing within seven hours of coming into existence.”

“And it came into existence five hours ago,” Geary said. “How can our systems estimate that sort of thing? The life span of an unstable jump point?”

“Somebody must have studied unstable jump points,” Desjani said. “Maybe remote observations from surrounding star systems that gave them some astronomical data to work with. Or maybe someone just ran the math for interactions of gravity fields for two stars, and that ended up in our ship systems as part of the baseline data for jump point analysis.”

“We couldn’t go anywhere anyway until we recovered Mistral,” Geary said, “even if there was any chance of that jump point still being there by the time we got there.”

With the dark ships still about an hour from any possible intercepts, Geary checked the status of the Marines. The sooner they got their job done, the sooner he could focus exclusively on battling the dark ships.

The stacked tiles of virtual windows showing views from the Marine armor revealed what were now slightly time-delayed images, over a minute old due to the distance between the fleet and the government facility. The Marines were inside, some progressing without resistance down corridors and into rooms that mostly had a feeling of having never seen human presence since being constructed.

But other Marines were traveling into areas of the facility that had actually been used. There were signs of wear on walls and floors, occasional bits of trash that had so far evaded the small housekeeping robots, and here and there rooms bearing signs of hasty departure. Scattered clothing littered floors and furniture, abandoned snacks and meals rested on desks and tables, and unmade beds bore in the shape of the sheets traces of the people who had once used them.

“What happened to them?” Geary heard a Marine ask her platoon leader.

“Best guess is they ran for it, and their ship got nailed,” the officer replied. “Everybody look for signs any of this stuff has been disturbed since it was abandoned in place. We need to know if there is anyone left here.”

The lieutenant’s question was rudely answered seconds later as nearby Marines finally encountered opposition. Geary switched his view to one of those Marine officers, seeing a wide corridor ahead that was sealed by blast doors at the far end. “It’s automated defenses or someone directing fire,” a captain was reporting to his superior. “We can’t tell which yet.”

“Hold your positions. We’ve got units working around the flanks of this passage, and two platoons from Second Company on the next level down.”

Geary involuntarily jerked as bursts of fire came from the vicinity of the blast doors to lash the area where these Marines were hunkered down. “Can we return fire?”

“Not unless you see a target. Hold position.”

Switching his attention back to the big picture, Geary saw that Delta One’s battle cruisers were maintaining their position near the main Alliance formation, which was proceeding along a shallow curve that would eventually form an orbital path around Star Alpha if they stayed on it. The Dancers were nearly a light-minute away and above the Alliance warships, gathered into a group but not engaging in any of the playful maneuvering that they were famous for.

The five dark ship formations were all lined up to hit Geary’s formation, aiming for near-simultaneous intercepts along the path ahead. The earliest of those intercepts was forty-two minutes away.

“Ideas?” he asked Desjani.

“We need to know if there’s anything on the facility that will unblock that gate,” she replied. “If there is, we need to stall and wear out the dark ships like last time, which will be a lot harder this time. If there isn’t, we need to figure out how to close with them and kill more of them than they kill of us.”

“You’re recommending I avoid action until we know which tactics we need to follow?”

“Yes, sir,” Desjani said, nodding, her eyes on her display. “We’ve got at least fifteen minutes before we should maneuver to mess with their plans. Why don’t you see how the Marines and that woman are doing while I watch the overall situation?”

“Good idea.” He refocused on the Marine action.

Spotting some Marines proceeding cautiously up a set of emergency access stairs, Geary linked his view to the armor of their platoon leader. An enlisted Marine was kneeling at an access hatch, working on the lock, then gave his lieutenant a thumbs-up.

“We’re ready to go,” the lieutenant reported, her breathing deep and regular as she prepared for action.

“Hit ’em,” the order came back. “Through the hatch and left. You’ll take them in the rear.”

“Got it. Through hatch, left. Are we weapons free?”

“If they fire, you are cleared to engage. The brass wants live prisoners, though. See if they’ll surrender when they realize they’ve been flanked.”

“Roger.” The lieutenant repeated the orders to her platoon, then as the nearest Marine yanked open the hatch, the entire force charged through, the Marines in their heavy combat armor having to duck and twist to get through an opening intended for typical human sizes.

The Marines emerged into what Geary recognized as another section of that broad corridor, this part on the other side of the defended blast doors. Several men and women wearing reinforced survival suits were crouched near the doors. They did not realize at first that there were Marines behind them, but when one turned and cried a warning the rest jerked around rapidly to face this new attack

“Drop your weapons!” The voice of the Marine lieutenant, amplified by her battle armor, boomed through the corridor.

One of the defenders brought up a weapon to aiming position, and died a second later as several Marines put shots through him.

The rest stood frozen before dropping their weapons hastily.

“We got six prisoners and one body,” the lieutenant reported.

The six survivors, whose reinforced survival suits bore a private security contractor symbol, sounded terrified, not defiant like the agents Geary still had detained aboard Dauntless. “We didn’t sign up for this,” one announced. “Don’t want to fight no Marines. We’re on the same side.”

“Uh-huh,” the lieutenant replied. “Who’s in charge? This guy?” She indicated the dead defender.

“No, no, it’s the suits! They only talk to us to give orders. They’re holed up in the command center.”

“Pack ’em up,” the lieutenant told her platoon. “And get those blast doors open.”

“Wait!” another one of the private security guards cried. “We can help you guys! I heard what they’re doing. They’re getting ready to fry all the files in the system! Sanitize the records, they call it. If they know you’ve made it past us, they’ll set off magnetic pulse bombs all over the station!”

“Captain?” the lieutenant called.

“I heard. We’ve got hack and cracks breaking into the systems at remote locations and trying to sever the links from the command center. Hold your position and see what else those guys can tell you.”

The captured contractors had no qualms about spilling their guts since they had been told to stay behind when most of the other occupants of the facility had tried to flee. “No room, they told us. They said they’d send somebody back for us. Then we saw them get blown to pieces. Ever since then, we’ve been hiding in here, hoping those damned ships wouldn’t notice us.”

Geary pulled his attention away from the Marines again, hoping they would successfully prevent the “suits” from destroying all of the records on the facility. “Any changes?” he asked Desjani.

“They’re a bit closer, that’s all,” she said. “How are the grunts doing?”

“They’re working it.” Geary rubbed his lower face with one hand as he considered the situation. “I’m thinking we should—”

“Admiral,” the comm watch-stander announced loudly, “we have a message coming in from one of the dark battle cruisers!” He cringed before Desjani could even direct a withering glare at him, then spoke at a normal volume. “I’m sorry, Captain.”

“I’m the only one who yells on this bridge,” she informed him, “and no one likes it when I do.”

“Yes, Captain. Admiral, what should I do with the message?”

Geary had controlled his initial reaction, managing to just nod in response. “Send it to me.”

The image of Admiral Bloch appeared before him. He had last seen Bloch at the Syndicate Worlds home star system, Prime, when the defeated Bloch was taking a shuttle to the Syndicate flagship to plea for a deal to save the rest of the apparently doomed Alliance fleet. He had thought that Bloch had died that day, along with the other senior fleet officers, murdered by Syndic special forces.

But the Syndics had not wanted to kill a captive whose knowledge might prove valuable. They had kept him, and when the war was over and Bloch’s living presence offered a chance to disrupt the still-hated Alliance, the Syndics sent him home.

Then, having nearly lost the war for the Alliance, and having made little secret of his belief that a military dictatorship overseen by him would cure the ills of the Alliance, Bloch was received by some as a champion. And as someone who might be a counter to the immense popularity of Black Jack Geary. Faced with Black Jack, a hero whose achievements and fame were seen as threats to the government, parts of the government reacted by embracing Black Jack’s antithesis.

It hadn’t gone well for the government, and as Geary looked at Bloch’s image, he saw that it hadn’t gone well for Admiral Bloch, either. From appearances, Senator Unruh’s suspicions that Bloch had already regretted getting what he wanted were extremely accurate.

Bloch was in a compartment that looked like a fairly luxurious stateroom fitted out with a ship’s bridge command fixtures. The lavish compartment was messy, though, with empty ration containers strewn about.

Admiral Bloch himself looked as bad as he had when he left Dauntless on that day at Prime when he was supposed to arrange a surrender of what was left of the Alliance fleet. Geary remembered how dead Bloch’s eyes had seemed then as his dreams of power and glory crumbled. But now his appearance was at least as bad. Admiral Bloch’s eyes held the terror of a small mammal held in a trap.

“Black Jack,” Bloch said with forced familiarity. “Admiral Geary now! Congratulations on that and… and on your many… many victories. I am in a… difficult situation. The ships under my… uh… that are supposed to be under my command… have… uh… malfunctioned.” His lips bent in a weak attempt at a smile. “Mutiny, you could call it.

“Most of these ships have no provision for crews,” Bloch said, gaining some composure as he described technical matters. “Except this one. The flagship. We have a small area with life support for me and my staff.” His eyes shifted, avoiding looking toward Geary. “We have… had… two shuttles in the dock on this battle cruiser. For the use of me and my staff. Also fully automated. No pilots.”

Admiral Bloch swallowed uncomfortably. “My staff… took one. To try to get to the government facility. They… did not make it. Once the shuttle got clear of this ship, it apparently registered as a target for the surrounding ships of the Defender Fleet.”

“That bastard,” Desjani said in a low voice. “He told them to go first so he could see whether or not the dark ships would target a shuttle from his flagship.”

“After which he would take the second one,” Geary agreed.

“You need to know something, Black Jack,” Bloch continued, his attitude now defiant as if he realized what his audience’s reaction would be to his earlier admission. “You’ve been too clever. I can still see what is happening outside of my flagship. Outside of my stateroom. I saw you destroy the docks and warehouses on which my fleet is dependent. Yes, you knocked out the support system for the Defender ships. But even though I cannot control them, I can monitor their decision processes. Do you know what you have done, Admiral? Destroying their support facilities here at Unity Alternate has activated the Armageddon Option in their programming.”

“Armageddon Option does not sound good,” Desjani murmured.

“Once they have destroyed your fleet,” Bloch said, “the Defender warships will proceed to Unity, which their programming now assumes is enemy-occupied, and they will destroy everything at Unity. Then they will move on to other important star systems in the Alliance, destroying as much as they can while their fuel cells and expendable weaponry hold out.”

“Ancestors preserve us,” Geary whispered.

“It gets worse,” Bloch added. It was obvious that he wasn’t enjoying reciting this information. “The largest of the Defender ships, the battle cruisers and the battleships, are equipped with the codes necessary to override the safe-collapse systems that have been installed on the hypernet gates. When they are unable to continue their attacks, those ships will trigger the collapse of the gates in whichever star systems they occupy and devastate those star systems. I did not want that option to exist. I told everyone that it should not be placed on an automated weapons platform. But some people demanded it be installed. I don’t think many others even know it is there. But I found out it had been installed, and now I have told you.”

“And what the hell are you supposed to do about it?” Desjani asked Geary, appalled by what Bloch had revealed.

“You can’t let them get out of this star system,” Bloch pleaded. “They will tear the guts out of the Alliance. I’m not a perfect man, Admiral. But this was not supposed to happen. I never would have agreed to accept this assignment if I knew how many flaws existed in the Defender concept. I can help you beat the Defender ships. I know more than you about their programming. About how to outsmart them. We can work together, and win this battle, and save the Alliance together.”

Desjani growled something in a voice so low that Geary could not make out the words.

“I am senior to you, Admiral Geary,” Bloch continued, trying to firm his voice as he spoke. “But even though I am the senior Alliance fleet officer in this star system, I will not insist upon assuming command of the forces here. Your command, your status, is safe from me. I have one shuttle left, which I can use to try to escape… my flagship. When the opportunity arises, I will use the shuttle to reach your forces or perhaps the government facility. I see you have Marines there. Excellent. Cover me as best you can. Together, we can destroy the Defender fleet.”

Bloch paused, his eyes haunted. “You may hesitate to accept my offer. I understand. You must realize that I know things. I can tell you who approved all of this, what orders I was given, and what understandings existed with which particular people. You want that, I am sure. And, most importantly for you, I know where Captain Michael Geary is.”

Geary wasn’t sure whether or not Tanya had gasped. His own attention was riveted on Bloch’s words.

“I can tell you where they’ve got him,” Bloch continued. “The Syndics. Just help me get off this… off my flagship and I will—”

His image vanished.

“What happened?” Geary demanded.

“The signal cut off clean,” the comm watch-stander said. “It must have been stopped at the source.”

“Admiral Bloch’s flagship figured out that he was plotting against it,” Desjani said. “Once enough word matches and phrases were identified, it pulled the plug on him. What’s the matter, Lieutenant Castries?”

“I’m sorry, Captain,” Castries replied, looking ill. “He’s a prisoner on his own flagship? The idea of our ship turning against us, controlling us—”

“Yeah,” Desjani said. “Why would we give it the power to do that? Ask the idiots who keep coming up with the idea.”

“Do we know which ship the transmission came from?” Geary asked.

“Yes, Admiral. This one.”

On his display, one of the dark battle cruisers that had not been at Bhavan glowed brighter.

Geary shook his head, not sure whether to be angry or frustrated. “That confirms that whether or not Bloch came up with that ambush plan, he was not in command at Bhavan. But we can’t get him off that ship he is trapped on. All I can do is keep fighting the dark ships, and if Bloch sees a chance while I’m doing that, he can take it.”

“He wouldn’t have told you where Michael Geary was even if his flagship hadn’t cut Bloch off,” Desjani said. “That’s his biggest lever to get you to act on his behalf. He could always be lying about your grand-nephew being alive and in some Syndic labor camp,” she added. “Just to manipulate you to help him escape.”

“There’s no way of telling, and there is nothing I can do about it anyway. Do you think he was lying about the Armageddon Option?”

Desjani hesitated. “It sounds way too plausible. And it’s not like you needed more motivation to defeat the dark ships. But giving those ships the codes to enable them to use hypernet gates to destroy entire Alliance star systems? Who would do that?”

“Someone determined to pull everything down around them if they were losing,” Geary said. “It’s happened before, strategies designed to ensure that the victor inherited as little as possible, no matter the cost to the people on your own side. There are people I have met who I believe would adopt that idea. If the Syndics are going to own everything, destroy as much as you can to keep it from benefiting them.”

“How many billions of people in Alliance star systems would die?” Desjani demanded.

“If you’re a narcissist, that’s not the important thing,” Geary said, surprised at the viciousness in his voice. “All that matters is that you’ve lost, and you don’t want the winner to enjoy the victory. A few powerful people who didn’t care what would happen to many other people were in the right places to make that happen. We have to assume Bloch did not lie about the Armageddon Option and the gate codes. The dark ships must be destroyed before they can do those things.”

“Yes, sir.” Her smile held no humor, just agreement. “I don’t know how we can survive this, but we can do our best to ensure none of the dark ships survive, either. As long as we manage to take out one of the dark ships for every one of ours that gets destroyed, we’ll get the job done.”

He stared at his display as if concentration on it would somehow change what it portrayed. “Everything I was trained, everything I was taught, was to avoid that kind of fight. No decent commander engaged in that kind of ugly math.”

“What about a decent commander whose back is to the wall?” Desjani asked. “You got taught not to trade ship for ship. Your training has served this fleet well. But what’s our objective, Admiral?”

“Save the Alliance.”

“How do we do that, this time, without paying the necessary price? Doesn’t the decent commander do what is necessary to ensure that the sacrifice of his or her people is not in vain?”

He nodded. “That is true. But if I don’t set my attacks up right, we’ll lose our ships without taking out enough of the dark ships.”

“So do it right, Admiral.”

“Four formations,” Geary said. “Plus the Dancers. We’ll see how the dark ships handle that.”

With Desjani’s help and the simple-to-use features of his maneuvering display, Geary swiftly set up four formations, using all of the ships in his main body plus those which had been in Delta One. “All units in First Fleet, immediate execute, assume Formations Gamma One, Two, Three, and Four.”

The two Alliance groupings disintegrated, the hundreds of warships weaving onto new vectors to take their assigned places in the four new subformations. Each was in the shape of a thick coin or section of a cylinder, layers of warships that could engage in all directions and help defend each other.

Dauntless, Daring, Victorious, and Intemperate were joined by Illustrious and Incredible along with half of the remaining heavy cruisers and a quarter of the destroyers to constitute Gamma One under command of Captain Desjani. Captain Tulev’s battle cruisers and those of Captain Duellos as well as the other heavy cruisers and another quarter of the destroyers formed Gamma Two under Tulev’s command. The Second, Third, and Fourth Battleship Divisions gathered with half of the surviving light cruisers and a quarter of the destroyers into Gamma Three commanded by Captain Jane Geary, while the Fifth, Seventh, and Eighth Battleship Divisions took the rest of the light cruisers and destroyers into Gamma Four under Captain Armus.

The four fat discs of Alliance warships were arrayed in a vertical diamond, Gamma One and Three in the middle, Gamma Two above, and Gamma Four below.

The Dancers had stayed well above Geary’s ships, and now were above and slightly ahead of Gamma Two.

The five dark ship formations were all coming in from behind the Alliance ships. As Geary’s forces swung through their wide arc, the dark ships were cutting across that arc, aiming to intercept the Alliance warships by slashing through the rear of the formations at an angle of about thirty degrees.

Geary took a moment to call Captain Tulev, Captain Jane Geary, and Captain Armus. “You need to know everything we have learned about this situation.” He described what he had been told by Admiral Bloch. “That defines our mission. We must stop the dark ships here. If Dauntless or myself are unable to continue the fight, you must do so, and all of your individual ship commanders must do so. Every ship must continue this fight until every dark ship has been destroyed.”

They all nodded, Jane Geary looking stricken, and Armus bleak. Only Tulev replied in words. “To the last, Admiral.”

“To the last,” Geary agreed. The three captains saluted, he returned the gesture, then faced the battle once more.

Rearranging the Alliance warships had taken time, and Geary had held his velocity down to point one light speed during that period to help his ships take their assigned stations. He was also tired of running.

He gazed at his display, nerving himself for the sort of battle he had always sought to avoid. If they had to fight a battle of attrition, he was going to fight the best damned battle of attrition he possibly could.

“Ten minutes until the first of the dark ship formations overtakes us,” Lieutenant Castries reported. “All dark ship formations are projected to pass through the rear quarter of our formations within a span of five seconds, separated by an average of one second.”

“Textbook attack,” Desjani scoffed. “What are we going to do?”

“Mess up their textbook,” Geary said. “And then complicate their next moves.” He was entering maneuvering commands rapidly. “All units in Gamma One, Two, Three, and Four, execute attached maneuvers at time two five.”

With the dark ships racing to hit the Alliance subformations, Geary’s warships pivoted again under the push of their maneuvering thrusters, facing the enemy almost bow on, then using their main propulsion to shift their vectors. The coin-shaped formations had turned edge on toward the approaching dark ships.

The dark ships tried to adjust their own vectors to continue their planned attack, but Geary’s warships were already changing their approach again, aiming to counter the move that Geary knew he would have made if he were commanding the dark ships, the move the artificial intelligences would have been programmed to use in this situation.

He had concentrated his attacks against the dark ship formation containing four battleships, using each of his formations to slice through the array of dark ships in even quicker succession than the dark ships had aimed at the Alliance forces. The dark ships were trying to shift vectors again, trying to bring their other four formations onto paths that would allow them shots at the Alliance formations that were ducking inside the curves of the dark ships’ approaches.

Gamma Four went through first, ten of Geary’s battleships against four of the dark ships. Despite the advantage in numbers, the superior firepower on the dark battleships and the accumulated damage on Geary’s battleships meant the forces were roughly equal. The battleships on both sides threw avalanches of fire at their enemies as the Alliance formation cut edge on through the rectangular dark ship formation.

If that had been it, the engagement would have been inconclusive. But on the heels of Gamma Four came Gamma Three, eleven more Alliance battleships hammering at the dark battleships that had just been flayed by Gamma Four. Overstressed shields collapsed on the dark battleships, hell lances and grapeshot penetrating to flash against the dark ships’ armor.

Reeling from those blows, the dark ships immediately faced the seven battle cruisers of Gamma Two. Battle cruisers didn’t have the same punch as battleships, but they were hitting dark ships that had already been struck by two attacks within seconds. Tulev’s and Duellos’s warships slammed shots into the dark warships, then as they raced onward, Gamma One came through, another six battle cruisers striking enemies reeling from the prior blows.

As the Alliance formations and the dark ship formations separated and tore away in different directions, Geary ordered more course changes even before seeing the results of the attacks. Gamma Four stayed on the same vector, sliding in a vast curve opposite its former path. Gamma Three pushed its main propulsion units, forcing its warships into a tighter curve, and also angling upward. Gamma Two let momentum carry its ships in a wider curve and down. And Gamma One began coming about under full thrust from its battle cruisers’ main propulsion to climb between the other three formations at an angle to them.

Then he looked back, seeing what had happened in those flashes of combat.

Two of the dark battleships were knocked out, one drifting helpless and the other one torn apart. The dark ship formation had also lost two heavy cruisers, three light cruisers, and a dozen destroyers.

Gamma Four, the first Alliance formation to face the dark battleships, had not come off unscathed. Amazon had taken the brunt of the dark ships’ fire and was rolling slowly through space at a slight angle to her previous vector, unable to maneuver, many of her weapons knocked out. Captain Armus’s Colossus had also taken a lot of hits but was in good enough shape to remain with the formation and continue in the fight. Heavy cruiser Turret was gone, along with light cruisers Chase, Corona, and Foin. Amazingly, only one destroyer, Annellet, had been lost.

An image appeared before Geary, an officer in a survival suit, on the darkened and damaged bridge of a battleship. “Commander Choiseul reporting in. Captain Penthe is dead. Amazon’s power core is damaged and unstable. We are conducting an emergency shutdown. All propulsion is out. Most weapons destroyed. Given dark ship targeting of escape pods in previous engagements, I have refrained from ordering personnel to abandon ship, but if it becomes obvious that Amazon is about to be destroyed, I will order the escape pods launched. To the honor of our ancestors, Choiseul, out.”

The image vanished.

One of the dark ship formations, the one holding ten battle cruisers, had bent through the tightest turn it could manage, clearly aiming to finish off Amazon.

“They’re giving us an opening,” Desjani said quickly.

“I see it.” The two Alliance battleship formations could not alter vectors quickly enough to engage the dark battle cruisers, but Geary’s battle cruisers could. “Gamma Two,” he sent, “intercept the dark battle cruisers targeting Amazon. Gamma One will assist.”

Geary looked over at Desjani. “Captain, this one is yours.”

“Yes, sir.” She didn’t sound as exultant as she usually did when given such an opportunity. Tanya instead radiated grim determination as she gave orders that continued Gamma One’s turn and bent the vector downward again.

Gamma Two had dramatically tightened its turn, also coming up, as Tulev’s Leviathan led the charge to assist Amazon’s survivors.

“Amazon has shut down her power core,” Lieutenant Castries said. The battleship was completely helpless now, a derelict doing a ponderous, uncontrolled tumble through space.

With the dark battle cruisers sweeping down and only minutes from firing, the wreck of the Amazon began volleying out escape pods as her surviving crew sought whatever tenuous safety the pods might offer.

Something in the Marine views distracted Geary for a moment. He moved one hand to close them out, then paused as he saw Marines moving into a large compartment filled with command equipment. The room resembled the primary command center on Ambaru Station at Varandal, but was even larger. Several individuals in generic civilian suits like those of the man and woman Geary had arrested at Ambaru were standing around, hands raised, except for one who was repeatedly and angrily swiping at what must be virtual controls in the air before her. She spun about and began berating the Marines. Even though Geary wasn’t listening to the exchange, he could tell the woman was trying to assert authority over the Marines. More Marines entered, along with Victoria Rione and Colonel Rico. Rione said something to the woman that caused her mouth to snap shut, then Rico ordered some of the Marines to restrain her.

He couldn’t spare the time to find out the details, but the frustration on the part of the suits’ leader and the purposeful way Marine hackers were moving to the facility’s command locations made it clear that the data destruction sought by the agents had not been achieved.

Realizing that it no longer mattered whether Victoria Rione found the critical information needed to restore access to the hypernet because fleeing and leaving the dark ships able to use the gate to attack Unity was not an option, Geary minimized the Marine windows and focused all attention on the clash of battle cruisers that was about to occur.

The dark ships flashed past the wreck of Amazon, pouring fire into the derelict. With Amazon’s power core shut down, the only way to destroy what was left of her was by an overwhelming number of blows that shattered her armor and hull. Ten dark battle cruisers had enough firepower to accomplish that.

Amazon came apart under the merciless barrage, breaking into large and small pieces that spun away from each other.

Even though nearly every dark weapon was aimed at finishing off the battleship, shots from some of the smaller dark ships targeted the escape pods, knocking out or destroying several and certainly killing the men and women inside.

“Damn them.” Geary did not realize he had spoken those words aloud, but he knew that he wasn’t aiming his wrath at the cold minds of the dark ships but at the people who had programmed them and the people who had decided to trust in such weapons.

The dark battle cruisers had only seconds to enjoy their victory. Tulev did not attempt to clip a corner of the dark formation, instead smashing nearly straight up through one side of it, seven human-crewed battle cruisers against five automated dark ships.

Geary barely had time to register explosions before Tanya took Gamma One through the same portion of the dark battle cruiser formation, slashing downward.

Dauntless rocked with hits but kept going.

He tried to focus on his display, tried to take in the results of the two attacks.

Geary heard Desjani breathe a single, despairing word. “No.”

Gamma Two, going through first, had taken the brunt of the enemy fire.

Leviathan was gone, reduced to a stream of wreckage spreading out along her former vector.

“Good-bye, Kostya,” Desjani murmured. “Your war is over.”

Captain Parr’s voice sounded, but his image did not appear before Geary. “Incredible got shot to hell. We’ve lost practically all systems except maneuvering. That’s damaged. We can keep up for now, but that’s all we can do. Fire control and weapons are all off-line, life support barely functional, comms marginal, numerous hull penetrations.”

One battle cruiser destroyed, and one out of the fight.

Clouds of debris marked the fates of two of the dark battle cruisers. Another had taken a lot of hits but still appeared operational.

It took all of Geary’s effort to put aside thoughts of Captain Tulev and set up the next engagement. The battleships on both sides had been out of the last fight, but now Gamma Three and Four came together to sweep past just below and just above one of the dark formations containing six battleships.

In the wake of that engagement, a single dark battleship swerved away from its companions, moving erratically, then abruptly exploded.

But as Gamma Three maneuvered for its next turn, the battleship Revenge lurched off vector, broadcasting massive damage.

“You’re doing what you have to do,” Desjani said, her voice steady, her eyes burning. “We’re taking out one of theirs for every one of ours we lose.”

He wanted to tell her that he didn’t know how much longer he could live with that kind of fighting but realized it did not matter. The odds that he would be living at all for more than a few additional hours appeared to be vanishingly small.

Victoria Rione’s image appeared before him. The battle had carried Dauntless more than three-quarters of a light-hour from the government facility, too far for a comfortable conversation under current conditions. She spoke without pausing for any replies from Geary, looking steadily forward, her voice as firm as her bearing. “Admiral, we have found files that confirm what Admiral Bloch told you. The Armageddon Option is real, and the most powerful so-called Defender Fleet ships do have the codes necessary to weaponize hypernet gates. At the moment we are locked out of all hypernet gate functions and are trying to access any of them that we can. We are still looking for any codes that might disable or divert the dark ships, without success. Every file on this facility is being copied on portable storage devices and also transferred directly to Mistral’s databases. We have discovered a large number of files pertaining to research on how to copy the Syndicate method of gate blocking, but any results were either never listed here or scorched-earth deleted from the systems before we reached this facility.

“We have found no command personnel and no researchers, contractors, or representatives. Records indicate the station had nearly four hundred people here before an emergency evacuation order was given. The remaining security personnel, who are all private contractors, have been disarmed and detained. The Marines have also freed a dozen prisoners from a high-security detention center, along with some medical personnel who stayed behind to look after the prisoners when the rest of the staff unsuccessfully tried to flee.

“We have discovered vast areas in the facility that have been untouched since construction. They contain equipment that is in working condition but decades obsolete. If the government had ever shown up here, they would have been in for some unpleasant surprises.”

Rione took a deep breath. “And we found my husband. The Marines are estimating they will be able to depart the facility in another hour, but Commander Young on Mistral says they will need to be sure they can reach the protection of your ships before they leave the dock.”

He wondered why Rione had provided no details on her husband, why she didn’t look happy at having found him, but had no time to dwell on either issue.

“They haven’t found anything on the facility to help us,” Geary told Desjani. “They did find files that confirmed what Bloch told us.”

“The one time I wanted him to be lying, he wasn’t. Do we go get Mistral now?”

“It will be at least another hour before Mistral can get underway.”

Desjani frowned. “I just thought of something. You should tell Mistral to stay in that dock. She is safe there, safer than if she tries to rejoin us while the dark ships are conducting attack runs on us.”

“Good idea.” He called Commander Young. “Stay in the dock until we call you out. If none of our warships survive the action, we will have hopefully destroyed enough of the dark ships to allow Mistral to make her way home. The information and the people you carry must make it back to the Alliance.”

The dark ship formation with three surviving battle cruisers whipped by Revenge, inflicting a lot more damage but not shattering the massive battleship.

Captain Duellos, now in command of Gamma Two, caught those dark battle cruisers and tore one apart, but at the cost of Implacable taking so much damage that she had also lost maneuvering control and most of her weapons. “Power core unstable! Abandoning ship!” Commander Neeson sent. Escape pods leaped from Implacable as her crew sought safety.

The Dancers were harassing the larger dark battle cruiser formation, making rapid individual passes to pick off cruisers and destroyers. But they had lost five ships and were suffering increasing damage.

Implacable, still racing through space, abruptly exploded as her power core blew. There was no way of telling yet how many of her crew had made it off Implacable or whether Commander Neeson was among them.

Geary directed Desjani to hit the larger of the two dark battle cruiser formations again, the Alliance formation angling past one edge to knock out a couple of destroyers and inflict heavy damage on another dark battle cruiser. But in the process Daring and Victorious both took a lot of hits, and Dauntless suffered lesser but still-significant damage.

The battleships were coming around again, all of the dark ships concentrating on Gamma Four, while Gamma Three tried to swing over and down in time to support the other battleship formation. Geary wondered which Alliance warships would be lost or disabled this time, which men and women would die, as the beleaguered First Fleet fought what would likely be its final, remorseless battle.

A different alert sounded on Geary’s display, accompanied by an urgent pulsing highlighting the last object he had expected to be worried about in this star system or any other. The alien superbattleship captured from the Kicks. “What the hell is happening on Invincible?”