“We didn’t set this mess into motion,” Desjani said. “You’ve been keeping your superiors aware of what you’re doing, you’ve been following orders, and I know better than anyone that you have constantly questioned whether or not you are doing the right thing. The people we’re dealing with have been lying to a lot of people and keeping what they’re doing secret, so no one could question it and whether it’s actually all that smart. They’ve lied to us, they’ve lied to the people of the Alliance, and odds are they’ve lied to a lot of people in the government itself.”
Geary gave her a surprised look. “You think some of the senators don’t know what’s going on?”
“Yes. Which is weird coming from me, I know. A year ago I would have been certain they were all rotten and plotting against the fleet.” She made a face. “But talking to you, and having a chance to actually get to know some senators, have made me realize that it’s like evaluating good tactics and strategy for a situation. You have to learn as much as you can about whom you’re facing, and not depend on preconceptions or prejudiced judgments or stereotypes, when deciding the best courses of action. You’ve told me you think Navarro is all right, and I saw enough of Senator Sakai to form my own judgment.”
“And Senator Unruh,” Geary said, recalling how she had impressed him. “But then there are people like Senator Wilkes, who struck me as a total opportunist. I think that Senator Costa is sincere in her beliefs, but she’s also willing to let anyone else pay the price necessary for what she believes has to be done. I admit that I haven’t entirely figured out why Senator Suva would have gone along with this stuff.”
“She’s scared,” Desjani said, her tone making it clear what Tanya thought about people who made decisions based on fear. “Scared of people like you and me, who don’t fit into the way she thinks the universe ought to be. Scared of a universe that isn’t working the way it ought to, whatever way that is. People do dumb things when they’re scared. But I actually like her better than Senator Costa, who tries to come across like she’s the number one supporter of the fleet but just wants to use us for her own games no matter how much that might cost the men and women she claims to support with all her heart.”
Geary sat back, thinking, not really looking at his display for the moment. “Victoria Rione told me more than once that the government is like a clumsy giant, with one big hand and lots of little minds trying to make the hand do what they want. If enough of the minds are in agreement, the hand can get things done, for better or for worse, but if the minds are focused on fighting each other, then the hand just flails about.”
Tanya never liked it when he brought up Rione.
“That woman has been involved enough in such things to know all about them! Admiral, in this case it seems to me that some of the minds managed to get the hand doing things without a lot of the other minds knowing what was really going on. Suva thought the dark ships would keep her safe, but Costa probably just wanted a new, dangerous toy that would follow orders and not ask questions.”
He looked at her. “That attack on Indras, which could cause the Syndics to retaliate against us. We’ve talked about that, but we haven’t been able to figure out why someone ordered something so stupid.”
Desjani inhaled deeply, then met his eyes. “Looking at this situation now, and what else may have been done to our comm systems, I think our problem was we assumed that everyone else would realize how stupid it was. The Syndics have been violating the peace agreements in lots of ways, including covert actions coming out of Indras. Someone figured the appropriate response to that was retaliation.”
“That’s an appropriate response when you’re at war,” Geary said.
“So? People today don’t know peace. They know war. A lot of people don’t know how to handle peace, so they’re responding as if the war is still on. A war that justifies them and what they want to do, a war that keeps things just like they’d been for a century.” Desjani looked away, then back at him. “Even people in this fleet. Roberto Duellos is facing a tough decision that never would have come up if the war hadn’t ended. He doesn’t know what to do. He’s not the only one.”
Geary shook his head. “No. That doesn’t make sense—”
“It doesn’t make sense to you,” Tanya said forcefully. “To you, war is still an aberration, a temporary, unusual state of affairs. To us, war was how things always were. You, the legendary hero, threw out the certainties of our lives and replaced them with uncertainty.”
“Tanya, the Alliance was on the verge of collapsing from the costs of the war,” Geary said. “The Syndicate Worlds has collapsed in many areas, and—” He paused as he remembered something.
Desjani nodded firmly to him. “And the Syndic leaders have been trying to get the Alliance to attack again because the war justified them, too. The Syndic government wants everyone in Syndicate Worlds space to see us as the threat and themselves as the protectors. Whoever ordered the attack on Indras might have given the Syndic leaders what they wanted, and maybe the people on the Alliance side who gave those orders wanted the same thing as the Syndic leaders, an active enemy to validate what they want to do.”
Geary looked away, fighting off an impulse to reject her words. “You’re right. I can’t put myself in the same mental and emotional state as people today. I can’t imagine wanting to perpetuate war because of feeling that’s the way things should be. But I have seen the disruption that peace has caused, the people like Duellos who feel unmoored, and Duellos is lucky because he hasn’t been downsized and kicked out into star system economies reeling from the costs of the war and the sudden cutbacks in Alliance spending as defense expenditures were slashed. But I can’t imagine anyone seeking war as part of some cynical plan—”
“No.” Desjani shook her head, wearily this time. “You still don’t get it. They’re not being cynical. They’ve convinced themselves that they are doing the right thing. You and I met those former Syndics at Midway, people who have spent their lives serving the Syndic despots and an ugly, dictatorial system. Only a few of them struck me as evil, the sorts of people who did what they did because they wanted power and money and didn’t care who suffered and died. Most of them seemed like average people, who somehow rationalized serving the Syndics. I don’t know all of their reasons, but I suspect they were doing what they thought was the best thing. You met Captain Falco. How do you think he saw himself?”
“I know how he saw himself,” Geary said. “As the savior of the Alliance. As someone who knew the right things to do and would do them. He was wrong on all counts, but he was sincere. You think that’s what we’re dealing with?”
“You already said it,” Desjani replied. “Back at Atalia. They thought the dark ships were the perfect solution to all of their problems. And now that perfect solution has come home to roost.”
His eyes went back to his display. It would be hours before he knew whether or not the two destroyers had followed his orders. Or whether they would hold their ground, determined to do what they saw as their duty.
Usually, waiting was the worst part. This time, the worst part was knowing what was going to happen.
TWO
“ADMIRAL Geary, what’s going on?”
Admiral Timbale sounded as if he was torn between confusion and rage. His expression reflected the same tangle of emotions. “I received a fragmentary message from you, which then disappeared from the comm system. My comm techs were trying to find it and discovered that several messages had gone out under my name countermanding something you had sent even though I had no record of whatever that was. I don’t know why you’re heading for the hypernet gate so fast, or why comms between me and most of the ships in this star system are as messed up as if we had a corps of Syndic meegees at work here. I am requesting that you detach one of your destroyers to physically courier your latest messages to me, so I can be sure I have them and know what they say. Timbale, out.”
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“He hasn’t even picked up on the threat, yet,” Geary said, appalled. “He thinks it might be the Syndics.” The term “meegee” was an ancient one, derived from an old acronym for electronic warfare techniques like intrusion, jamming, and interference. The equipment employed had changed considerably since the term was first introduced, but the basic concepts for sabotaging and confusing enemy comms and sensors still applied.
“How could he understand the threat if the software is deleting anything that might clue him in?” Desjani asked.
“Could there be Syndic meegees at work here? Or is this all the work of our own meegees?”
She laughed. “The lines blurred on that so long ago that no one knows. Our people weaponize some code, their people find it and mess with it a little and shoot it back at us, then we rework what they did and fire it at them, and who the hell knows where most of it came from anymore? There are more viruses on our systems than there are viruses in our bodies, and the ones in our computer systems keep evolving a lot faster.”
“All right,” Geary said. “But Timbale had the right idea. I’ll detach Hammer to carry my information to him.”
Her eyes were on her display. “She won’t get there in time.”
The dark ships were only ten hours’ travel time away from the hypernet gate as they held their velocity at point two light speed. Two light-hours’ distance. Roughly two billion kilometers. It was a very, very large distance. But in this case, it wasn’t nearly large enough. From where Geary’s ships were, the destroyer Hammer would take nearly seven hours to reach Admiral Timbale at the vast orbiting complex named Ambaru Station. A message sent from Ambaru to the two destroyers guarding the hypernet gate would take four hours to reach them. Even if Timbale sent that order immediately, it would get there an hour too late.
Geary sat morosely on the bridge of Dauntless as he watched the inevitable taking place, the dark ships getting closer and closer to the oblivious destroyers at the hypernet gate. The only good thing was the number of his own ships here, battleships, heavy cruisers, light cruisers, and destroyers, who were calling in to acknowledge having downloaded the software fix, usually accompanied by startled questions as to what the dark ships were and what were they doing at Varandal.
But with the dark ships only five hours’ travel time from the hypernet gate, Geary frowned as a sudden thought came to him. “Tanya.”
She was still on the bridge as well, of course, looking totally unruffled by the hours spent up here. “Yes, Admiral?”
“Suppose I were commanding those dark ships—”
“As best we know, the artificial-intelligence routines running them are based on what you’ve done,” she pointed out.
“Exactly.” Geary pointed at his display. “I know I’m being pursued. I know that if I flee through the hypernet gate, I will reveal the place where my base is located, allowing the enemy to attack it and cut off my entire fleet at the knees. What do I do?”
Desjani frowned as well. “You? You sure as hell don’t use the gate. Not you.”
“No.” Geary sat up straighter, glaring at his display. “I realize that I can’t get away without betraying the rest of my fleet, so I have to stay here, and since that means being destroyed, I have to do whatever damage I can here before all of my ships are lost.”
She stared at him, then focused on her display, hands flying as she tested courses and actions. “Ancestors preserve us. They’re going to go for Ambaru, aren’t they?”
“Yes. If we keep charging after them, and they turn aside from the hypernet gate at the last moment and head for Ambaru, we won’t even see the maneuver for nearly three hours. My battle cruisers won’t be positioned to be able to intercept them before they reach the station and blow apart the central command-and-control node for this star system.”
“Why not just throw some rocks at it?” Desjani demanded, using the fleet nickname for kinetic bombardment projectiles, which really were little more than smoothed hunks of metal. “No one could—They’ve run out, haven’t they?”
“Yeah,” Geary said. “I think so. They used up their rocks beating the hell out of every possible target at Indras and Atalia. So they get us out of position chasing them, then charge at Ambaru and take it out at short range with their hell lances. They’ll know exactly what to target on the station.”
Her expression hardened into anger. “Because they’ll have blueprints for every ship and station. Because the Alliance government was so worried about internal threats, it assumed its own military installations might have to be potential targets.”
“That’s what I think,” Geary agreed, studying his display. “But if I’m right, we’ve still got time to mess up their plans. It won’t be easy, though. I can move battleships to blocking orbits, but against something as maneuverable as the dark ships, that may not be enough.”
“Focus on countering what you would do,” she reminded him.
That required thinking a bit backwards. First, using the simulator on his display to figure out how to best position the battleships that could reach blocking orbits in time. Then, shifting perspective to look at those battleships and try to figure out the best way past them to reach Ambaru. It was as difficult, and as unsatisfying, as playing chess against himself. “Tanya, there’s something wrong with this.”
“What?” She leaned over, eyeing his display.
“Those dark ships are programmed to do what the programmers thought I would do, not what I would actually do,” Geary explained.
“Not entirely. They based a lot of it on the battles you’ve actually fought. But I get your point,” Desjani admitted. “You have to think like Black Jack the hero of legend as they think he is, because that’s also who the dark ships will be thinking like. So what does the great hero do here?”
He took another look at the dark ships. Two battle cruisers, one heavy cruiser, and five destroyers. Then at his plans to defend Ambaru. There were twenty-one battleships left in his First Fleet. Several of those were laid up undergoing major repairs. Several more were not in orbits that would allow them to move to block the dark ships in time. That left seven battleships he could get into blocking orbits in time to meet the dark ships if they headed for Ambaru—Warspite, Vengeance, Resolution, Redoubtable, Colossus, Amazon, and Spartan. There would also be several divisions of light cruisers and destroyers, but the battleships would form the armored shield for the defense.
“Admiral Geary,” he said slowly to Desjani, “me, that is, would swing wide and either up or down, outmaneuvering the blocking force and getting to Ambaru before the battleships could have any hope of lumbering into new positions.”
“What would Black Jack do?” Desjani asked.
“Imagine that you knew what I’d done in past engagements, but still saw me as you once saw Black Jack.”
She thought, eyes hooded, then looked at him. “That guy, Black Jack, would have gone out in a blaze of glory. Again. Seven battleships form the core of the defensive screen. And Black Jack would have five destroyers that were already running low on fuel cells.”
“Yeah. Five destroyers without crews.”
“The programming running the dark ships has to care about losses,” Desjani pointed out, “or those ships would have fought to the end at Atalia rather than taking off. They’ll try to save their battle cruisers even if they’re willing to sacrifice the destroyers.”
He ran one finger through his display, tracing a possible path. “They could do it. A firing run on Ambaru, then bend their vector toward this jump point. All right. I think I know what they think I would do. Let’s get this done.”
Just looking at it from the godlike perspective of the display before his seat, the necessary maneuvers appeared simple. Move this ship here, move that one there, and so on. In practice, changing orbits was pretty complex. Fortunately, it was a complex math problem, and computers were very good at
math. All Geary had to do was designate a ship, tell Dauntless’s maneuvering systems where he wanted that ship to go, and the necessary commands and vectors appeared so quickly that it seemed instantaneous.
He sent the commands to the individual battleships affected, as well as to the commanders of the light cruiser and destroyer divisions that would back up the battleships. Space was huge, so even the many ships he was sending out would form a very sparse screen indeed, but the point wasn’t to build a wall. It was to position mobile units so that they could move to intercept anything trying to get past them.
“What are we going to do?” Desjani asked.
“Hold course for now until we see the dark ships head for Ambaru,” Geary said.
“If we do that, we won’t be in a position to intercept them before they reach Ambaru!”
“I know. Even if we turned now, we couldn’t catch them in time. Every minute they spend heading toward the hypernet gate draws them farther away from a straight shot at Ambaru and allows us to try for an earlier intercept. We’ll wait until less than three hours before the dark ships would likely maneuver. That way they won’t see us changing our vector before their own planned maneuver. If they saw that, the dark ships would probably turn sooner and accelerate faster, and make our intercept impossible. Even if everything works right, it will be close. If the worst happens, I’ve got sixteen heavy cruisers that I can move to stop them after the dark ships clear the battleship screen.”
“Sixteen heavy cruisers?” Desjani shook her head. “Against two battle cruisers like that?” She paused in thought. “Maybe. If they at least make the battle cruisers divert their courses and mess up their firing runs—”
“It will be insurance that we’ll have time to catch those dark ships,” Geary finished.
At two and a half hours before the dark ships should reach the hypernet gate, Geary sent more orders, secure in the knowledge that the dark ships would not see his maneuver before they had very probably planned to change their vectors. “All ships in Task Force Dancer, immediate execute, turn starboard zero six four degrees, down zero five degrees.” Dauntless swung in response to the command, her maneuvering thrusters pitching her bow toward the star and slightly below it, the other battle cruisers, heavy cruisers, light cruisers, and destroyers with her matching Dauntless’s vector change.