Victorious

TEN

There was a sense of relaxation in the fleet conference room, the atmosphere more tranquil than Geary had ever imagined it could be. But why shouldn’t the fleet’s ship captains feel happy and calm? He knew the rumor mill would have already carried to every ship in the fleet word of the treaty with the Syndics.

Now he had to tell them that the job wasn’t done. Geary stood up, and everyone turned to look at him with smiles, but the smiles grew a little uncertain as they noted his somber attitude. “I expect you’ve all heard that the new leaders of the Syndicate Worlds have agreed to an end to the war and immediate cessation of hostilities. Verification procedures have been agreed upon. They have also promised to repatriate all prisoners of war and provide a full accounting of those prisoners who died while in Syndic custody.”

A wave of joy mixed with melancholy rolled through the men and women facing him. Those who had died in battle could never return, but their numbers would no longer be swelled by new battles. Those thought lost forever to Syndic prisoner-of-war labor camps would be returned, but many others had died of health problems or just old age while awaiting a liberation that came too late for them. Geary heard more references to the witch singing as officers congratulated each other.

“That’s the good news,” Geary continued, hearing his voice becoming harsher. Well, that reflected how he felt, angry that the end wouldn’t end everything it should. “The bad news is that the Syndicate Worlds are disintegrating. We’re going to have to deal with long-term problems of successor states, which may need to be dealt with and required to abide by the terms of the treaty.”

Commander Landis of Valiant spoke as Geary paused. “But we’re talking minor actions compared to the war, right, sir?”

“Relatively speaking,” Geary agreed. “But a lot of such minor actions, and to someone involved in them, they won’t feel minor.”

“Policing the decaying corpse of the Syndicate Worlds,” Armus grumbled.

Commander Neeson shook his head. “That corpse may spawn some regional powers that are strong enough to worry about. This is a real can of worms, but I guess it was inevitable. The Syndics depended on their warships to keep their individual star systems intimidated, and we needed to destroy those warships to win.”

Badaya snorted. “If the Syndics had shown the brains to quit a long time ago, they could have held on to their power. But they pushed it too far, and they’re getting what they deserve.”

“Scores of star systems like Heradao?” Captain Vitali of Daring asked. “The Syndics are certainly going to keep paying a price for this war.”

“Regardless,” Badaya said, “we have won, and the military threats we face from now on will be comparatively minor.”

“Except for one,” Geary said. He saw puzzlement, as he adjusted the star display over the table to show the Syndic border region facing the aliens. “The Syndics have admitted to us that an intelligent, nonhuman race exists on the other side of Syndic space from the Alliance, along this border.”

The silence was so absolute for a few moments that Geary wondered if he had suddenly gone completely deaf. “What are they?” Captain Duellos asked, in tones as if he, too, had just learned of this.

“The Syndics don’t know. These aliens have successfully hidden themselves, maintaining a quarantine so tight that the Syndics have been unable over the course of a hundred years to learn anything significant about the aliens, which they call the enigma race.”

General Carabali exhaled loudly. “Let me guess. They’re hostile.”

“Apparently, though to what extent we don’t know.”

Badaya finally recovered enough to speak. “What proof did the Syndics provide that this race actually exists?”

“I’ll lay it out for you, but one proof has been in our hands. You all recall the discovery in fleet operating systems of worms using quantum probability as their programming. Such worms were beyond our own capabilities to create, and we’ve now confirmed that the Syndics have no such ability, either. As far as we can tell, they remain ignorant of the existence of such worms, which General Carabali can confirm were recently found in the systems of wrecked Syndic warships here. Those worms must instead have been the work of this race, implanted in our ships so the aliens could track our movements and actions.”

“They’ve been working against us, or just monitoring us?”

“Working against us. They can collapse gates with some kind of remote signal. That’s what happened at Kalixa. That’s what happened here.”

“They tried to wipe us out?” Neeson asked.

“Apparently. Let me lay out everything we’ve been able to reevaluate in light of our knowledge of these aliens and what the situation is on the Syndic border with the aliens.”

He went on, outlining the evidence, showing the Syndic CEO pleading for help, and reporting what little could be said about the aliens’ capabilities. When he finished, no one spoke for a long time.

Dragon’s captain finally broke the silence. “Are we talking about allying ourselves with the Syndics against these aliens?”

“No.” Geary saw some of the tension go out of the men and women before him. “No one has suggested that we agree to defend the Syndicate Worlds. Such an agreement could be too easily twisted.” Many nods came in response to that. No one here trusted the Syndics at all. “But stopping an invasion is another matter. We don’t know what the goals of the enigma race are, and we don’t know where they would stop if the former Syndic border collapsed.”

“You’re not talking about a threat to the Alliance, are you? That’s so distant.”

“Four weeks’ travel time from the border with the Alliance to the border facing the aliens,” Desjani said. “By hypernet.”

“Can they use the hypernet?” Warspite’s captain asked.

“It’s possible,” Geary answered. “We have reason to believe that the aliens may in fact have covertly provided the hypernet technology to both the Alliance and the Syndicate Worlds.”

Everyone stared again, then Commander Neeson spoke as if to himself. “That would explain … there’s so many things about the hypernet we barely understand … and the quantum-probability worms came from hypernet keys, didn’t they?”

“Apparently so.”

“Why?” Badaya asked, his eyes narrowing dangerously. “Give both sides such technology? What was their game?”

Duellos seemed to be looking into the distance. “The hypernets provided boosts to the economies of the Alliance and the Syndicate Worlds just as the costs of the war were growing too great. They also greatly simplified fighting the war by improving logistics and allowing the rapid transfer and concentration of forces.”

“They wanted us to keep fighting?” Badaya leaned back, his face reddening, but his expression thoughtful as well as angry. “Weaken us. Both sides. Set us up for their own takeover.”

“That may be what was happening,” Geary agreed. “Our intent is to get across to these aliens that such meddling in the affairs of humanity will not be tolerated and that internal conflicts will not prevent part of humanity from striking back at any attempt to invade human space.”

“Which may require a battle,” Jane Geary said. “A battle against a foe of unknown strength and unknown resources, with unknown weapons and unknown defensive capabilities.”

“That’s right. But if we don’t fight now, we’ll have to fight some other time, when we’re weaker, and they’re stronger. We have a chance to draw a line in the sand at that border, make it clear that they cannot force humanity to retreat.”

That went over right. He could see spines stiffen at the idea of being forced to retreat. They believed that they had never retreated from the Syndics. They wouldn’t accept the idea of retreating from anyone or anything else.

“You said they’ve taken Syndic planets before this,” Captain Parr of Incredible remarked. “Planets with some humans left on them? But we don’t know what happened to those humans?”

“No, we don’t. Nothing has ever been heard from any humans in areas taken by the aliens.” That bothered everyone, he could tell. It wasn’t simply fears born of millennia of stories about alien races intent on enslaving or destroying humanity, stories that in recent centuries had come to be regarded more and more as fantasy since no intelligent nonhuman species had been discovered until now. No, Geary thought, it was about leaving people behind. The fleet didn’t do that by choice, and if it did, it always vowed to somehow return for those left behind. In practice, those vows had rarely been able to be carried out, but that didn’t mean they were any less heartfelt.

Badaya glowered at the star display. “They’re Syndics, but they’re human. Or maybe they won’t be Syndics anymore. They’ll hang or shoot the CEOs and set up governments that we can deal with. These star systems that need to be evacuated. The Syndics can’t do it, can they?”

“No,” Geary agreed. “Not enough ships, not enough time. You know how hard it is to evacuate even one star system, even drawing on all the resources of the Alliance. Millions of people would be abandoned on those worlds.”

“Then we need to get there and stop the aliens! They may have been able to mangle the Syndics, but they’ll find the Alliance fleet on full attack is a threat beyond their abilities to match!”

A spontaneous roar of approval followed Badaya’s words.

After the conference ended, Geary stayed standing, wondering how long the enthusiasm for another offensive action against another foe would last.

Duellos had remained, and shook his head, smiling wryly. “Captain Badaya sees the fleet as a hammer, the greatest hammer humanity has ever fielded. Once he saw the problem as a nail, he was bound to urge the fleet’s use.”

“Yeah,” Geary agreed. “Badaya has given me plenty of headaches in the past, but his direct approaches can be useful.” That sounded disturbingly like something Rione would say.

Desjani suddenly laughed. Noticing Geary and Duellos staring at her, she pointed at the star display. “That Syndic CEO at Midway is going to be waiting for help to arrive, expecting the aliens to show up in force at any time, and instead of a Syndic flotilla dashing to the rescue, she’s going to see the Alliance fleet come popping out of her hypernet gate. Can you imagine? She’s going to bounce so high from shock that she’ll clear atmosphere.”

It took a few days to get damage repaired as much as possible. In a perfect world, Geary would have sent off the most badly damaged ships on a journey home, but even though the Alliance was manufacturing more Syndic hypernet keys using the data taken from the one on Dauntless, none of those keys had been available before the fleet left. Only ships accompanied by Dauntless could use the Syndic hypernet, so the damaged ships would have to stay with the fleet, accompanying the auxiliaries. The auxiliaries also distributed replacement fuel cells, missiles, and grapeshot to the fleet, along with the spare parts and repair materials they had been manufacturing.

He could either jump the fleet for Mandalon or back to Zevos, and chose Zevos since that star system had a hypernet gate. Even though the Syndicate Worlds and the Alliance were now formally and technically at peace, Geary still felt like an occupying power as he led the fleet to the jump point, knowing that every man, woman, and child in the star system was watching the Alliance fleet with dread and distrust.

If Desjani was bothered by the scrutiny of distrustful Syndics, she didn’t show it. “Back to Zevos through jump space, then by hypernet to Midway. If the Syndic data can be trusted, we’ll be cutting it very fine, getting there about a day before the ultimatum expires.”

“I don’t think the Syndics will complain.”

“They’d better not.”

He called Carabali. “General, I just want to be sure we’ve off-loaded every Syndic guest your Marines picked up from wrecked warships.”

“Every one of our guests was escorted into repaired escape pods and launched toward safe locations,” Carabali confirmed. “The fleet database reported that there is one Syndic still remaining aboard Dauntless, but I was informed that he was a special case.”

“That’s right, General. We’re taking CEO Boyens back to his home.”

“What about our own POWs here, Admiral?” Carabali asked. “They surely want to go home, too.”

“I don’t want to load them now,” Geary explained. “They’d overcrowd our ships, and there’s no sense risking those liberated POWs in combat if we end up fighting the aliens. Once we finish with the aliens at Midway, we’ll come back through here to pick up our own POWs from the Syndics and take them home with us. I’ve talked to the senior POWs to explain that, and the new Syndic leaders know they’d better treat our people very well until we get back.” Geary smiled. “I personally told those Syndics that if they didn’t take good care of our people, then they’d be getting individual visits from Alliance Marines when we returned.”

Carabali laughed for the first time since Geary had known her.

Two and a half weeks later, the Alliance fleet flashed out of the hypernet gate at Midway, farther from Alliance space than any Alliance ship had ever been. They had star charts of that region of space, but none of them had ever expected to sail through it.

The first things that the fleet sensors keyed on were the streams of transports rigged with extra passenger modules, the transports strung along long arcs from the inhabited planets toward the hypernet gate and jump points for other human-occupied star systems. But indications from the planets themselves made it clear that the great majority of the human population remained on them, unable to be evacuated in the time remaining before the alien deadline expired.

There were Syndic warships present, too, but not many. A small Syndic flotilla orbited five light-hours distant from the Alliance fleet. “Six heavy cruisers, four light cruisers, fifteen HuKs,” Desjani commented. “That’s probably everything they’ve been able to scrape up in this entire region.”

“Captain?” the operations watch-stander called. “Some of those ships show signs of not being fully fitted out. It looks like they were under construction and rushed here before they were finished.”

“Their crews won’t be worth a damn then. Totally untrained and inexperienced.” Desjani turned a yearning look on Geary. “They’d be so easy to blow away.”

He raised an eyebrow at her. “I thought you preferred fair fights.”

“Well … yes. It doesn’t matter anyway. We’d never catch them unless they charged us, and I doubt they’re that inexperienced.”

“Or that suicidal. In any event, that’s not why we’re here.” As the light revealing the fleet’s arrival spread through the star system, panic would spread just as fast through the helpless transports and their human cargoes. Geary composed himself, then tapped his comm controls. “People of Midway Star System, this is Admiral Geary, commanding officer of the Alliance fleet. A peace agreement has been reached between the Alliance and the Syndicate Worlds. The war is over. We are not here to attack. We have come here at the request of the current leaders of the Syndicate Worlds to repel any attempt to enforce demands that this star system be evacuated. I repeat, we are here to repel aggression against this star system. We will undertake no action against any human ship, facility, installation, or person unless we are attacked, and then we will act only in self-defense. To the honor of our ancestors. Geary out.”

He ended that transmission, then keyed another, a tight beam aimed at where Boyens said the Syndic main command and control center would be located on the primary inhabited world. “CEO Iceni, this is Admiral Geary, commanding officer of the Alliance fleet. We have come here at the request of your new leaders to assist you in repelling aggression by the enigma race. We request that you immediately send us situation updates and any information regarding the enigma race you have any reason to believe might not have already been made available to us.”

Geary gestured to Boyens, and the Syndic CEO stepped into the transmission field. “You know me, Gwen. I was captured when the reserve flotilla was destroyed. It won’t be coming back. Everything is gone. The Syndicate Worlds have nothing to send you, but what Admiral Geary says is true. The war is over, and the Alliance has agreed to help defend this star system. Admiral Geary is a man of honor. He can be trusted. Please work with him. It’s our only hope to save this star system and the many other star systems that would have to be evacuated if this one falls to the enigma race.”

Boyens stepped back, and Geary spoke again. “We request that you order your flotilla and other defensive assets not to take any provocative actions, and ask once again that you provide all information that could be of any assistance to us in defending this star system. To the honor of our ancestors. Geary out.”

Desjani was frowning at her display. “We’re here. Where do we go?”

“I’d recommend heading over to this region,” Boyens suggested, indicating a portion of the star display. “That’s on the side of the star system facing the alien territory. If they come in, it will be somewhere around there.”

“Thank you,” Geary replied. He waited until Boyens had been escorted off the bridge again, then ordered the fleet into a vector toward the region the CEO had suggested.

Then they waited some more, while crews on the damaged warships continued their efforts to repair damage, while the fleet swept onward past Syndic merchant ships crammed with evacuees who were surely watching the Alliance fleet with mixed hope and fear.

The eventual Syndic response came as quickly as transmission times allowed. “CEO Iceni is still here,” Rione observed. She was back on the bridge, having once again timed her rotation with Sakai and Costa to try to be present when anything important happened. “I suppose Iceni deserves credit for staying instead of finding a reason to get herself evacuated first.”

Desjani mumbled something that sounded like, “Not in my book.”

CEO Iceni appeared both confused and shocked. “This is the senior Syndicate Worlds’ official in this star system. We were unaware of the signing of a peace agreement, but the documents you transmitted and the authentication with them appear to be valid. Nothing prepared us for your arrival. This is … unprecedented. But … we are … grateful for your assistance. We had no expectations of victory, or of survival. My staff is assembling any information we think could assist you. The primary item we can pass on is that the enigma-race ships are likeliest to appear at the jump point from the star we know as Pele. I have sent instructions to the CEO commanding the Syndicate Worlds’ flotilla in this star system to contact you directly and to undertake no actions against your fleet unless attacked themselves. All Syndicate Worlds’ defenses have been ordered not to engage your ships.

“I would be grateful if you would grant CEO Boyens the right to transmit communications to me separately.”

“Fat chance,” Desjani grumbled, then her expression brightened. “We can monitor anything he says and anything she sends.”

“Right,” Geary said. “Can you set it up, Captain Desjani? Please ensure that Lieutenant Iger is in the loop.”

It was almost three hours after that when they finally heard from the small Syndic flotilla. “This is CEO Fourth Rank Kolani, commander of Syndicate Worlds’ Flotilla Seven Three Four.” Kolani’s voice and posture were unusually stiff, lacking the standard false smile and real arrogance of a Syndic CEO. She looked young for her position, but then more experienced Syndic commanders had already been sent to die fighting the Alliance. Her uniform was nicely styled, though, and her hair absolutely perfect. Apparently it took more than this kind of crisis to have an adverse impact on the grooming of even junior Syndic CEOs. “I have been ordered to contact you regarding the defense of this star system.”

“And isn’t she unhappy with those orders,” Desjani remarked gleefully.

“I … request,” CEO Kolani continued, almost choking on the word “request,” “that you provide your … suggestions regarding the deployment of …” She had to pause for a moment. “… of both Syndicate Worlds’ and Alliance mobile assets within this star system.” The Syndic CEO’s eyes blazed, and her posture grew more taut. “We are prepared to die in defense of our people. Kolani out.”

Desjani’s glee had faded into a grudging smile. “That’s one tough kid. She’d be fun to trade blows with.”

“No doubt,” Geary agreed.

“Are you planning on asking them to fight alongside us?”

He glanced at her. “That doesn’t strike me as a good idea. What about you?”

“It’d be a horrible idea,” Desjani stated firmly. “Going into battle with Syndic warships within weapons range? I don’t care what the peace treaty says; I don’t care that we’re suddenly supposed to be on the same side here. You’d still have a very high chance that any number of Alliance warships would ‘accidentally’ target those Syndics.” She thought, then shrugged. “Actually, in the heat of an engagement they might really target the Syndics just out of force of habit, without deliberate intent to strike at someone we’re supposed to be at peace with now. We’ve spent our whole lives thinking of the Syndics as the enemy, as targets. That won’t change overnight.”

Desjani held his eyes for a moment, and he saw the message there. If Dauntless were within range of some of those Syndics, I might do that in the heat of battle, target them because they’ve always been the enemy. I probably wouldn’t do it on purpose, but I probably wouldn’t feel bad about it afterward, either.

So Geary nodded in a way that conveyed he understood both what she had said and what she had not said. “Thank you for your candor. It’s very important that I keep hearing things like that. Even aside from the concerns you rightly raised, I don’t think having the Syndics operate with us would work. We don’t have any procedures in place for that, nothing that would ensure we and the Syndics can follow what each other says and does.”

“There’s that, too. Are you going to tell her to keep far, far away from us, then?”

“Not in so many words.” Geary kept his voice level and expression neutral as he sent his reply to the Syndic flotilla commander. “Thank you for your offer of assistance, but given the recent state of hostilities between our peoples and the lack of mutually agreed-upon operating procedures, the chance of misunderstanding or misinterpretation would be too high. We request that your flotilla assume a position roughly one-third of the distance from this star system’s primary inhabited world to the location at which the aliens are expected to appear. This fleet will proceed to an orbit about two-thirds of the distance to the expected alien position. To the honor of our ancestors. Geary out.”

Desjani shook her head in apparent disbelief. “I don’t know how you can talk to them.”

“You mean how I know how to phrase things? I encountered Syndic warships earlier in my career, over a century ago, when we were at peace. I had to learn the wording back then.”

“That’s not what I mean.” Desjani’s jaw tightened as her eyes went distant with memories. “I don’t know how you can talk to them at all except to threaten or demand. I couldn’t. I’m not sure any other officer in the fleet could.” She switched her gaze to him, appraising now. “The living stars knew more than we imagined. They knew we’d need you to save the fleet, to win the war, and that we’d also need you now, someone without the bitterness and anger of the rest of us who’ve been fighting these bastards all of our lives. Someone who could talk to the Syndics once more.”

The mission again. He had hoped with the war over the idea that he had been sent from the past by the living stars would fade quickly. But Desjani had always held fast to her faith, and she wouldn’t be the only one who kept seeing the hands of higher powers in events. So Geary tried not to flinch at her words.

But she saw his reaction anyway. “I’m sorry. I know you aren’t comfortable with my speaking of it.”

“I’m only a man,” he reminded her.

“Only?” Desjani grinned. “Yes, sir.” He had figured out sometime ago that a simple “yes, sir” from Desjani meant she didn’t really agree. But then her grin went away as quickly as it had come. “The point is, you’re still needed.”

“I can’t be the only one who can do certain things, Tanya. Others have to learn because I can’t be everywhere, and I won’t be around forever.”

“Granted.” She grimaced. “I’ll try.”

“You’ve already done a lot more than try, Captain Desjani, and I appreciate that. All right, another six hours or so, and we’ll know what that Syndic flotilla is going to do. We’ll be in position before that. If those aliens show up, we’ll be ready for them.”

“And if they don’t?”

“We improvise, Captain Desjani.”

She grinned. “Yes, we will.”

They were in orbit and waiting when a reply came from the Syndic flotilla. The Syndic CEO in command of the flotilla had the same tight expression as during her last transmission, her words coming out like a prepared script. “The mobile forces of the Syndicate Worlds in this star system concur with your request. We will proceed to an orbit from which we can react as necessary to events. For the people. Kolani out.”

Senator Sakai leaned forward, his expression intrigued. “She used the formal, polite ending to her transmission. The Syndics stopped doing that with us over a generation ago. I only know it from viewing historical records. Perhaps this is a sign that they will be willing to speak to us again in meaningful ways.”

Desjani appeared alarmed, then determined. “Not before we do. They will not learn to talk to us again before we learn to talk to them again,” she vowed.

And then they waited. The Alliance fleet had taken up an orbit that held it motionless relative to the jump point for Pele. The Syndic flotilla, about a light-hour closer to the main inhabited world, had assumed a similar orbit. The Syndic transports, with their human cargoes of evacuees, kept fleeing, the planets and asteroids of the star system kept in motion around their star as they had for countless years, but the warships waited. The Syndics sent no more messages to the Alliance fleet, and Geary noticed that his own officers seemed to be deliberately ignoring the presence of the Syndics, as if the Alliance personnel preferred defending an empty star system to one occupied by the people they still thought of as enemies.

Restless again, Geary did one of his walk-throughs of Dauntless, going down the passageways and exchanging a few words with the officers and crews standing by for whatever might happen. Only one of them, a chief petty officer, asked the question that all of the Alliance sailors must have been thinking. “What are they, Admiral? These aliens?”

“We don’t know,” Geary replied. “That’s a big part of the reason why we’re here, Chief, to find out what they are and what they want.”

“Word on the decks, Admiral, is they want a bunch of Syndic star systems.”

“It looks like it, Chief. But we don’t know where that would stop, or how long it might be before they were knocking on the doors of the Alliance. If they’re really hostile, we want to stop them here, before they can strike at our homes.”

The chief and the sailors around him nodded. That sort of logic made sense to them. “They had something to do with Kalixa?”

“We think so.”

All of the sailors grimaced. “Ugly thing to do,” the chief said for them all. “We don’t want them trying that with an Alliance star system.”

“No,” Geary agreed. “We don’t want them even thinking they could get away with that.”

“Sort of like Grendel, isn’t it, sir?” the chief commented. “Only this time it’s not the Syndics planning to hit us by surprise. We thank the living stars that you’re here, sir, like you were there then.” More nods.

“Thank you. I thank the living stars that you all are here with me now.” He never knew how to handle things like what the chief had said, but a simple truthful reply seemed best, and the sailors all seemed happy when he walked onward.

Geary thought about the chief’s words as he walked, though. In some odd ways, this did resemble Grendel. The Syndic flotilla here was actually fairly close in size to the one that Geary had faced at Grendel along with the officers and crew of his heavy cruiser Merlon. But here it had been the Alliance fleet’s warships that had arrived in a Syndic star system without warning, proclaiming their peaceful intent, the opposite of what had happened at Grendel. And this time the odds versus the Syndics overwhelmingly favored the Alliance forces; the Alliance actually had been invited here and actually did intend no threat to the owners of this star system. Like Grendel, but very different from Grendel.

The people of today fervently believed that he had won at Grendel even though Merlon had been destroyed. He wondered what people a century hence would believe of the coming confrontation, and what price might have to be paid.

Eventually, Geary found himself back on Dauntless’s bridge, staring at a display in which nothing important had changed even though the alien deadline had expired hours ago. Desjani, still in her own seat on the bridge, didn’t seem to have moved, sitting as intent as a great cat waiting to pounce when her prey appeared. The watch-standers on the bridge reflected the same vigilant tension, their confidence in their commanders and their abilities warring with worries about the unknown. Behind Geary, Senator Costa grudgingly gave up her place in the observer’s seat to Rione, who settled silently, apparently unconcerned.

Another hour went by, Geary’s thoughts dwelling on the battles he had commanded, on the men and women and ships who had survived and on those who hadn’t. His decisions, his responsibility. He remembered the Marine officer Carabali’s words. I’m tired of deciding who lives and who dies.

Suddenly, they were there, shocking Geary out of his memories. Space that had been empty a moment before was abruptly filled with ships.

Lots and lots of ships.

Geary could feel the tension level on the bridge shoot upward and tried to maintain his own external calm. “Looks like they outnumber us.”

“By about two to one,” Desjani agreed with an equally composed voice. He wondered if she was feigning her own calm as he was his. Desjani had always seemed to grow more tranquil as the chances for combat grew higher.

“They’re about two and a half light-hours distant from us, and what looks like an unusual distance from the jump point. Lieutenant Commander Kosti, what do the ship’s systems say?”

Kosti, seemingly glad for a chance to focus on something other than the numbers of the alien ships, studied his own displays. “They came in at a much greater distance from the jump point than our ships would. The systems can’t tell whether that’s because the aliens are using a totally different kind of drive exploiting the jump phenomenon, or if the aliens are using the same sort of drive but getting different results out of it.”

Desjani nodded. “Thank you. That means they could have longer jump ranges, too.”

“Yes, Captain. Maybe a lot longer. We can’t tell, though.”

Geary focused back on the aliens, whose armada was arranged in six subformations, each shaped like a disc. The six subformations were combined into two v-groupings, with one subformation slightly ahead of the other two. The two v-groupings were stacked one atop the other, the higher one slightly forward of the lower one. “I can’t figure out how they’d fight in that configuration. Is that the best resolution we can get on individual alien ships?” The sensors displayed nothing but vague blobs.

“Yes, Admiral,” Lieutenant Commander Kosti replied. “That’s all we can see. We can tell a ship is there, but not anything else, not even its size, let alone any details about it. I have no idea how the aliens are managing to conceal something the size of ships that well.”

“Get a link to Boyens activated. I want him seeing this but not able to hear us unless we address him directly.”

“I told you they have awesome stealth capability,” CEO Boyens announced after his virtual presence appeared and took in the information on the displays. He wouldn’t actually be allowed on the bridge, not when the prospect of combat loomed. “That’s the best picture we’ve ever gotten of the aliens. Sometimes they’re completely invisible until they reveal themselves.”

“Have you ever seen this many ships before?” Geary asked him.

“No. Nothing close to this.” The Syndic CEO’s face scrunched up in puzzlement. “Why so many? They couldn’t have expected us, the Syndicate Worlds that is, to have very much available to oppose them.”

“Do they usually appear to want an overwhelming advantage when dealing with humans?” Rione asked.

“It’s really hard to say. There hasn’t been that much contact for the last few decades, and no fighting with them that I know of for at least that long.”

“We’ll see what happens this time,” Geary said. Despite the presence of the Alliance politicians aboard Dauntless, he felt that he should be the one speaking to the aliens. This looked far more like a military confrontation than it did a diplomatic matter. “This is Admiral Geary, commanding officer of the Alliance fleet, speaking to the unknown spacecraft that have arrived in Midway Star System. You are to identify yourselves and refrain from heading deeper into this star system. We do not desire hostilities, but the Alliance fleet will take whatever action is necessary to repel any attack on this star system.”

Rione’s face was bleak as she stared at her own display. “So it will be a fight, another war.”

“Maybe. I’ll try to avoid that.”

“I know you will, but they saw us here as soon as they arrived, yet they’re still coming in toward the star. I had hoped we could talk to them, but if they outnumber us so much, they may not feel any need for that.” On the displays, the alien ships were coming around and heading inward, closing on the Alliance fleet.

“They won’t receive my message for another two and a half hours. We’ll see how they respond then.”

“But they already know we’re here, and they’ve chosen to keep coming.”

“Yeah.” There wasn’t much more he could say about that.

Rione came close to him, almost whispering. “Can you defeat so large an alien armada, Admiral Geary?”

“I don’t know. There’s too much we don’t know about them.”

Desjani spoke up, her voice louder than Rione’s. “If anyone can beat them, it’s Admiral Geary.”

Rione kept her eyes on Geary. “I’m in agreement with her again. Sorry.”

“Just try not to make a habit of it. It’s a little unsettling.”

“I don’t think you need to worry about that,” Rione responded dryly, and Desjani, her own gaze still fixed on her display, nodded.

The alien reply showed up in a little over five hours, revealing that they had taken some time to come up with their response. All three senators were present, hoping to be on the bridge when the historic communication arrived, but since they were behaving themselves, Geary didn’t ask any of them to leave.

The alien transmission showed a bridge like that of a Syndic warship, with what seemed to be humans on it wearing totally nondescript outfits. Boyens pointed. “See? It’s all fake. Our first transmissions to the enigma race were full video, of course, but they only responded at first in audio, and then only a word or two. Then we started getting images like this from them. We ran some analysis of the bridges we were seeing and were able to identify them as composites of bridges from Syndic ships that had communicated with the aliens. Same thing for the ‘humans’ we’re seeing. They’re just digital composites of Syndicate Worlds’ personnel.”

Geary, studying the depiction of a Syndic bridge, nodded. “It’s all old, isn’t it? I recognize some of the features of that fake bridge from Syndic warships a century ago. The aliens never updated their images.”

“You’re right,” Boyens agreed. “We’ve debated whether the fact they didn’t change the depiction meant they didn’t care whether it gave away their game, or if they somehow didn’t realize the old, unchanging bridge image was a giveaway.”

The “man” seated in the command chair on the bridge of the alien ship smiled in a perfect re-creation of a Syndic CEO’s insincerity. “I wonder if they realize that’s an obviously fake smile?” Rione asked in a quiet voice.

“Damned if I know,” Boyens replied. “They seem to be better at mimicking false human emotions than they are at mimicking real ones.”

“Warships of the Alliance,” the human avatar began speaking, his expression now altering slightly in ways not quite matching the tone of his words. The effect was very subtle, just as Boyens had said, but it was definitely there. “Your fleet does not have this star, does not belong to it. Dealings are to be with those who occupied this star but do not have it. Leave this star, and you will have peace. Destruction will be inflicted on any who remain here. By long-ago agreement, this star is ours to have.”

Geary glanced at Boyens’s image, who shook his head. “Not any agreement the Syndicate Worlds made with them.”

“They could be meaning that it’s theirs by divine mandate or something,” Rione said. “Or that they laid some claim to this area themselves a long time ago, long before they could actually extend control over it.” She looked at the other two senators. “A claim they don’t want to fight matched by threats of what will happen if we don’t do as they say.”

Costa looked angry. “They want the sort of peace that comes when we comply with all of their demands.”

“I agree,” Sakai said. “Though that may be merely a display of aggression to open the discussion.”

“Maybe. Do you think they’re confused by our presence here?” Geary asked.

The three senators considered that, then Rione nodded.

“It may not be confusion, but they seem to be wanting to deal only with the Syndics.”

“Because of the worms in Syndic ship systems, the aliens must have gotten used to being able to track human ships. Maybe they were really surprised to see us here and are trying to bluff us into leaving. It doesn’t hurt us to keep talking and see if they back down when we don’t back down.” Geary thought for a moment, then tapped his controls. “This is Admiral John Geary of the Alliance fleet. The war between the Alliance and the Syndicate Worlds has ended. We have been asked to assist against any threat to this star system. There was never an agreement to turn this star system over to you. We do not recognize the legitimacy of your ultimatum. We do not seek a fight with you, but we will repel attacks against this star system and any other star system occupied by humanity or within the borders of those regions of space occupied by humanity. Pull back your forces, so we can discuss sending emissaries to negotiate with you and establish terms for peaceful coexistence between our peoples. To the honor of our ancestors. Geary out.”

“Fat chance they’ll withdraw,” Desjani muttered.

“Yeah, but I had to give it a shot.”

Since the alien armada kept on course toward the Alliance fleet at a steady velocity of point one light speed, the answer took less than four hours. This time, though, the first part of the reply took the form of what seemed to be a demonstration of capabilities.

The alien formations abruptly swung upward, then to the side, then back onto their original vectors, every ship moving in perfect synchronization. The speed of the maneuvers and the rapidity of the changes in direction were impressive and frightening. Geary blinked at his display. “Did they really just do that?”

“Yes,” Desjani replied, gazing at her own display, her jaw so tight that Geary could see the muscles standing out.

“Captain,” the engineering watch-stander reported in a hushed voice, “the alien spacecraft appear to have propulsion systems with significantly higher mass-to-thrust ratios than our own. They must also have inertial dampers capable of performance an order of magnitude better than ours.”

The other watch-standers on the bridge were watching their own displays, sudden unease obvious in their postures and expressions.

Desjani relaxed herself with an effort of will that Geary found as remarkable as the alien maneuvering capability, then turned casually to look at the weapons watch-stander. “Can we hit them?”

“Captain?” The watch-stander took a moment to absorb the question, then ran a hasty check of his systems. “Yes, ma’am. Our fire-control systems can handle targets maneuvering the way the aliens just did.”

“How about the specters?” Desjani asked, still relaxed.

“Yes, ma’am. If we fire them within the right envelopes.” As the watch-stander answered her, he was visibly calming, too, as were all of the other personnel on the bridge.

“They can’t outrun specters or hell lances,” Desjani observed.

“No, ma’am,” the combat watch-stander agreed, grinning by then.

“They can dance all they want, then,” she concluded, then surreptitiously winked at Geary as the watch-standers smiled and turned back determinedly to their displays.

He gave her an admiring look in response and leaned close to speak quietly. “You are one hell of an officer, Captain Desjani. Well done. Do you want to broadcast that observation to the fleet?”

Desjani smiled. “I don’t need to. The bridge watch is busy passing it on right now. Sometimes the informal comm channels work to our benefit.”

He settled back, willing himself to match Desjani’s nonchalance, knowing that every eye was on him. He wondered how well the aliens could evaluate such human emotions. Would they see calm and confidence, or arrogance and obliviousness, or nothing they could understand at all?

“Another transmission,” the comm watch reported. “The transmissions are assessed as coming from the leading subformation on the bottom of the alien formation.”

The aliens’ human avatars seemed stiffer this time, their expressions sterner. “Leave. Leave this star. You do not have this star, Admiral Geary. Dealings only are to be with those of the Syndicate Worlds. Your fleet is to leave. Destruction will be certain if you fight. Negotiations will be allowed when what we have has been left by Syndicate Worlds.”

“Admiral?” the communications watch announced. “We have another message from the Syndic CEO in charge of this star system.”

CEO Iceni appeared now, obviously trying to project calm. “Admiral Geary, the enigma race has informed us that they will not deal with you and demanded our immediate surrender of this star system. I have chosen not to reply to them. Given their numbers and their communications, it appears the enigma race is resolved to fight to gain control of this star system. I do not know under what terms you agreed to come assist in the defense of this star system, but by confronting the enigma race, you have satisfied your own honor. We will not ask you to fight a hopeless battle on our behalf. If you choose to withdraw now, none can fault you. We ask only that you do what you can during your withdrawal to keep the enigma ships focused on your fleet so that as many of our evacuation ships as possible can escape.”

Desjani broke the silence following the message. “She thinks we’d run?” Her outrage seemed to match that of the other fleet personnel on the bridge.

But Geary understood. “The aliens must have sent her a message at the same time they sent the first one to us. She has no reason to believe we want to die defending Syndic people in a Syndic star system, but she’s not faulting us for that.”

“Who does she think we are?” Desjani demanded. “This fleet does not withdraw.”

Actually, it had, at least under Geary’s command, run from the initial trap in the Syndic home star system and many times afterward. But he knew what Desjani meant, and it heartened him that her attitude probably would match that of other fleet personnel when they heard that the Syndics had given the fleet an opportunity to withdraw honorably. They might not be thrilled about defending Syndics, but if the alternative was fleeing battle, they would rather fight.

Rione was frowning at Desjani in surprise and calculation, then speaking quietly to the other senators.

Geary gave Desjani a grim smile. “No. We’re not going to run.” It didn’t make any sense, of course. The aliens grossly outnumbered them, and the alien capabilities were unknown but likely to be superior to those of the humans as just demonstrated with their maneuvers. But it was unlikely that a stand anywhere else would face different odds. Instead, the odds would get worse as the aliens seized more and more human star systems, gaining strength as they weakened humanity. Might as well see if we can hurt them bad enough here to make them stop here. How bad will that have to be, though?

He called the Syndic CEO back first. “Your concerns for the welfare of our personnel are noted and welcome, but we have made a commitment to repel aggression against this star system and will not waver from that commitment. We intend to fight if necessary, and we intend to win. I do have some experience with seemingly hopeless situations, and assure you that they are not always so hopeless as they seem. I repeat, the Alliance fleet will fight here if that is required of us. To the honor of our ancestors. Geary out.”

Now the aliens. “The fleet will not leave this star system until your ships have left. You will deal with us, or you will fight us. We will not yield this star system. Your ships will not be allowed to proceed past this fleet. We wish to talk, but we will fight if we must.”

Geary paused then, thinking, before tapping his controls again. “All units in the Alliance fleet, our communications with the ships of the alien race have so far produced no results. All units are to prepare for combat. Whatever these beings are, they’re going to be sorry if they tangle with the Alliance fleet.”

The senators were arguing, speaking in whispers but obviously agitated, as they debated, drawing annoyed glances from Desjani and the bridge watch-standers. “Do you wish to carry out your discussion in another location?” Geary suggested to the politicians.

“It doesn’t matter,” Rione replied with a sour look at the other two senators. “We have no better ideas of how to deal with this than you do.”

“Must we fight?” Sakai asked.

“Senator,” Geary answered, “I don’t want to fight these beings, not facing these odds. But I don’t know what else to do if they keep coming. They have to learn that humanity will fight to prevent further atrocities like that at Kalixa.”

“Having our fleet wiped out here won’t advance the interests of the Alliance,” Sakai said, as Costa nodded in emphatic agreement. “It appears this enigma race won’t be deterred.”

Geary was searching for the right reply when Desjani lowered her brow in thought. “Reserve flotilla.”

He stared at her, trying to figure out Desjani’s meaning, then it hit him. “The aliens didn’t attack, didn’t try to claim this star system, when the Syndics had the reserve flotilla defending this region. The border region was stable for decades while the reserve flotilla was here.”

“And,” Desjani added, “that reserve flotilla was weaker than this fleet.”

Costa and Sakai were glaring at Desjani, but Rione nodded slowly. “They could be deterred, it seems. Why was that if they had this number of ships on hand to attack?”

Alerts sounded, and Geary stared again, this time at his display, as more alien ships suddenly appeared, not at the jump point but with the armada. Three more subformations were abruptly there with the first six, forming another v, this time above and slightly ahead of the first two v’s.

Just like that, the odds against the Alliance fleet changed from two to one, to three to one.