Orion started dropping back out of the line of fire between the Syndic battleships and the auxiliaries as if she had lost propulsion, even though Geary couldn’t see any damage reported to Orion’s propulsion units. “That does it. If Commander Yin survives this battle, she’s out as commander of that ship.” His eyes focused on Conqueror, still far enough ahead of Titan and Goblin to be unable to defend them from the two Syndic battleships. “Captain Casia, too. I’ll court-martial both of their worthless asses.”
Desjani stretched her mouth in a humorless smile. “Cowardice before the enemy. You can just have them shot by order of summary execution. No one could complain with the records of this engagement as the official proof.”
At the moment, with the fate of Titan and Goblin teetering in the balance, that option sounded entirely too good to Geary. If he lost those two ships because of Casia’s and Yin’s avoidance of battle, he knew he might not be able to resist the temptation to follow Desjani’s advice.
Hell lances from the Syndic battleships began reaching out at extreme range, licking at the shields of Titan and Goblin. Geary knew the shields on the auxiliaries couldn’t long withstand the punishment that a pair of battleships could inflict even at maximum range.
Flanconade weaved between the Syndic battleships and the Alliance auxiliaries, drawing Syndic fire for the few moments needed to tear apart the Alliance destroyer.
The sacrifices and the maneuvers finally added up to a decisive number as Fearless, Resolution, Redoubtable, and Warspite came within weapons range of the two Syndic battleships. The four Alliance battleships split their fire, two hammering one Syndic battleship and the other two hitting the remaining one as the Fifth Battleship Division finally engaged the enemy.
As the Alliance battleships drew away, both Syndic battleships staggered and slowed dramatically because of blows aimed at their propulsion systems. Titan and Goblin slowly pulled out of range as the hobbled Syndics tried to keep targeting them, then Tulev’s four battle cruisers came in from another angle on their second firing run and smashed the trailing Syndic battleship.
Geary blinked, trying to take in events all through the region of battle. Desjani was leading Dauntless, Daring, and Victorious against a hurt Syndic battleship. Elsewhere, Vengeance and Revenge were bearing down on the remaining Syndic battleship that had nearly destroyed Titan and Goblin. The other Syndic battleships still capable of fighting had been stripped of their escorts and were being slammed by repeated firing passes from Geary’s subformations. The Syndic formation had completely fallen apart, replaced by a trail of damaged ships and debris leading back to where the Casualty Flotilla had once existed. The only remaining organized Syndic naval force in Lakota Star System was the guard force, a mere two battleships and two battle cruisers with their escorts, far away and heading for the hypernet gate at a fast clip. “We won.”
Dauntless’s hell lances tore into the targeted Syndic battleship, then null fields from Dauntless, Daring, and Victorious dug huge holes in the enemy vessel. Desjani let out a long breath as Dauntless left her broken enemy behind, then nodded to Geary. “Yes, sir. You did.”
“We won,” Geary repeated. “This fleet won this victory, not me.”
“You did help,” Rione pointed out dryly.
Taking a deep breath, Geary called his fleet. “All ships in the Alliance fleet, general pursuit. Break formation and ensure no Syndic warships escape. Destroyers and light cruisers not engaged with the enemy are to recover escape pods from Alliance ships.”
Space in Lakota Star System was now filled with wreckage and hundreds of Syndic escape pods. Geary’s warships were pouncing on surviving but damaged Syndic warships, overwhelming them and adding to the quantity of both debris and escape pods as the remnants of the Syndic force were wiped out.
But the victory hadn’t been painless. Majestic was gone, along with the heavy cruisers Utap, Vambrace, and Fascine. The defenders of the auxiliaries had taken heavy losses. In addition to Flanconade, the light cruisers Brigandine, Carte, and Ote had been destroyed, as well as the destroyers Armlet, Kukri, Hastarii, Petard, and Spiculum. Most of the other ships in the fleet had taken various degrees of damage and lost crew members. Measured against the Syndic losses the price was insignificant, but Geary had to fight off depression as he thought of his own fleet’s dead.
“Sir, Warrior can’t be saved,” Desjani stated somberly.
He couldn’t argue that even though he wanted to debate it. Warrior had fought so well, her crew going beyond the call of duty to protect the auxiliaries. Warrior deserved to survive, to return proudly to Alliance space. But the already-damaged battleship had been riddled, its propulsion systems destroyed, every weapon knocked out, and life support left spotty throughout the hull. Looking at the readouts and images of Warrior, Geary was forcefully reminded of how the wreck of Audacious had looked. “Commander Suram,” he ordered, “you and your crew have performed in a manner that brings all possible honor to your ancestors, but Warrior is now beyond repair. Abandon ship.”
Long before a reply could have come, the communications watch called out. “We’re receiving a voice-only emergency circuit call from Warrior. It’s very weak, but we’ve enhanced it.”
Geary punched accept and listened to the message, the voice of Commander Suram oddly distorted by the electronic enhancements required to make the message understandable. “All systems are out except for emergency controls on the power core. We’re attempting a safe core shutdown. Warrior cannot continue the fight. Many escape pods damaged or destroyed in the last engagement. Those members of the crew who can be held in the surviving pods are abandoning ship. To the honor of our ancestors.”
“Continue the fight?” Geary wondered.
“With all systems out they’re blind,” Desjani answered. “They can see some explosions and signs of battle with the naked eye and the minor enhancement gear on their survival suits, but have no idea that’s just us mopping up the Syndics. We need to get some ships there to pull off the rest of Warrior ’s crew,” she added quickly, “I’d recommend—”
“Sir,” another watch-stander called in an alarmed voice. “We’re picking up indications that Warrior’s power core is fluctuating. The emergency control systems must have been damaged, too, and are failing.”
“How long until it blows?” Desjani snapped.
“Impossible to predict, Captain. It could hold until they manage a shutdown, or it could have already blown, and we haven’t seen the light from it.”
Desjani gave Geary a somber look. He nodded, knowing this was his call. Any ship trying to close on Warrior to rescue her trapped crew members would risk being caught in a core explosion. “Who were you going to recommend for crew recovery?” he asked Desjani.
“Ships from the Twentieth Destroyer Squadron,” she responded immediately. “They’re still close together and well positioned, but Warrior drifted away from the battle after she got knocked out, or rather the battle kept going and Warrior stayed about where she was. Our destroyers will require close to half an hour to get there and match speed to the wreck.”
“Okay.” Geary tapped his controls, thinking through his words. “Twentieth Destroyer Squadron, members of Warrior ’s crew are trapped on board. Warrior’s power core is fluctuating uncontrollably and may blow at any time. Request to know which destroyers in your squadron will volunteer to close Warrior and attempt to take off her remaining crew.”
The reply took only a little while, though it seemed agonizingly long. “Sir, this is Lieutenant Commander Pastak on Gavelock. Arabas, Balta, Dao, Gavelock, Kururi, Sabar, and Wairbi volunteer to assist Warrior’s crew. All ships proceeding to intercept Warrior at maximum acceleration.”
Geary checked his display. Every surviving destroyer in the squadron. “Don’t let me forget this,” he murmured to Desjani.
“I won’t,” she replied. “Did you expect anything else?”
“I don’t know. I do know I am proud as hell to command this fleet.??
?
“Estimated time for destroyers to reach Warrior is twenty-three minutes,” the maneuvering watch announced.
“Try to get a message through to Warrior’s survivors that the destroyers are on the way.”
“Yes, sir. We are now in communication with the escape pods launched from Warrior and will try to relay through them.”
Geary nodded almost absently, his mind’s eye too easily imagining the scene on Warrior right now, the few sailors who could work on the power core trying to keep it under control, the rest waiting in the ruin of their ship for rescue or death. “Is Commander Suram on one of the escape pods?” he asked, already guessing the answer.
“No, sir. The highest-ranking officer on one of the pods is a Lieutenant Rana, who is badly wounded.”
He felt curiously detached as he saw the symbols of the escape pods racing away from Warrior, his mind numb after all of the other losses this day. Escape pods were designed to boost rapidly away from their ship on the assumption that distance would be critical, and in this case that was certainly true. “How much longer until the escape pods are outside the estimated danger zone for Warrior’s power-core blast radius? ”
“Five minutes, sir. That’s the estimate based on the known state of Warrior’s power core and the readings we’re picking up on it.”
Seven minutes later, with the destroyers of the Twentieth Squadron still sixteen minutes away, Geary watched the image of Warrior blossom into an irregular sphere of light and debris. He confirmed that the escape pods were far enough outside the blast area to be able to ride out the shock wave, then closed his eyes, took a long, slow breath, and called Gavelock. “Lieutenant Commander Pastak, please alter your mission to recovery of the escape pods from Warrior. They were close enough to the core overload that many probably received some damage. Thank you, thank all of your ships, for your efforts.”
Pastak’s somber acknowledgment came a few minutes later, then Geary leaned back and closed his eyes again. “Sir?” Desjani whispered. He shook his head, denying any conversation. After a moment, her hand closed over his wrist and squeezed tightly for a second in wordless comfort before being withdrawn. She knew how he felt, and somehow that made it a little easier to bear.
FIVE
GEARY sighed as the tensions of worrying about the upcoming battle were replaced by the pains of dealing with the aftermath of that engagement. He felt incredibly weary, as though he had been on the bridge of Dauntless for most of a week instead of most of a day.
“The Syndic guard force is still about thirty light-minutes from the hypernet gate,” Desjani reported, her own voice tired. “If they keep up their speed, they’ll reach it in about four and a half hours.”
“Fine.” Geary rubbed his eyes, then looked back at his display. That Syndic guard force was now almost two light-hours away from the Alliance fleet. If it had been a lot, lot closer, he might have had to worry about a suicide charge against Dauntless or the auxiliaries, but at this distance the Syndics would take almost a day to get here after they started such a charge. “I guess we can decide what to do about them later.”
There didn’t seem to be much to worry about for the moment. The guard force was clearly going to stick close to the hypernet gate, just as it had last time the Alliance fleet was here, and that gate lay about two and a half light-hours off to port of the Alliance fleet. The habitable world that Lakota boasted was orbiting on the opposite side of its star from the Alliance fleet, almost two and a quarter light-hours to starboard. The Syndic military assets there wouldn’t be any threat unless the Alliance fleet came close to that world, and Geary had no intention of doing that.
Otherwise, the Syndic presence here seemed rapidly to be going to ground as the light from the latest engagement reached different parts of Lakota Star System. Merchant ships were fleeing for whatever sanctuary they could find, and colonies and mining operations on outer planets were shutting down equipment as they sent their populace to whatever shelters existed. Accustomed to having Alliance forces bombard Syndic worlds, the people in the system expected the worst from the victorious fleet. It wasn’t going to happen, but Geary didn’t feel like explaining that to them at the moment.
All around Dauntless, the now-widely dispersed ships of the Alliance fleet were making emergency battle repairs and running down Syndic warships knocked out but not destroyed in the battle, to ensure that their power cores were overloaded. Nothing was to be left for the Syndics to salvage. Shuttles flew between Alliance ships, carrying critically needed replacement parts for those warships requiring them. Destroyers and light cruisers darted around, finding and picking up every Alliance escape pod ejected by ships lost during the battle. Geary had already heard of one such pod, containing sailors who had abandoned the battleship Indefatigable during the first engagement in Lakota Star System weeks ago, been captured by the Syndics and taken to the wreck of Audacious, been liberated by Alliance Marines earlier today and taken to the heavy cruiser Fascine, then had to abandon Fascine when the heavy cruiser was shot up, and finally been rescued again by the light cruiser Tsuba. He wondered if those sailors regarded themselves as lucky or unlucky, and whether or not they were worried by the fact that they’d kept ending up on progressively smaller warships.
Rione stood up with her own heavy sigh. “I need to check on a few things. Let me know if you need me,” she told Geary.
Needing her could mean a number of different things. The ambiguity of the phrase made him wonder if Rione had decided it was time for them to share a physical relationship again. Then Geary spotted Desjani’s teeth clenching for a moment, her eyes rigidly fixed on her display before she relaxed herself. Apparently Desjani had interpreted the phrase the same way and hadn’t liked it. He hadn’t noticed that kind of reaction from her before and wondered if Desjani was more worried about Rione’s influence on him than he had realized.
He could scarcely discuss that now, though, so Geary turned toward Rione and shook his head. “I’ll be fine. Get some rest.”
“That’s not too likely, but I’ll try.”
Desjani visibly relaxed after Rione had left. “You should get some rest, too, sir.”
“There’s a lot of after-battle mess to clean up,” Geary replied.
“We can handle that. You’ve already ordered our ships to return to their places in Fleet Formation Delta Two once they finish their postbattle operations. They can do that without you watching them. Even Orion and Conqueror can carry out tasks reliably if they’re not being shot at.”
“Yeah, I guess they can.” Geary stood, surprised by how unsteady on his feet he felt. “Are you going to get any rest?”
Desjani shrugged apologetically. “I’m the captain of Dauntless , sir.”
“And captains of warships never get to rest.” He hesitated, then asked the question he had wanted to avoid. “How many did Dauntless lose?”
She took a deep breath, then answered in a steady voice. “Twelve. We were lucky. Another nineteen wounded, two critically.”
“I’m sorry.” Geary rubbed his forehead, meaningless phrases about honoring their sacrifices rolling through his brain. Twelve more sailors who would never again see Alliance space, never again see their homes, families, and loved ones. Twelve more just on this lightly damaged ship. Multiply that across the fleet, and the great victory suddenly felt even less worthy of celebration.
Maybe Desjani felt the same. As if reading his mind, she shook her head. “I guess we’re all a little shell-shocked, sir. Tomorrow I’ll be able to appreciate what we did here. Right now I’m just trying to keep going.”
“You and me both.” He frowned down at the deck. “What was I doing?”
“Rest, sir,” Desjani prodded.
“If you can remember that, you’re in better shape than I am. I’ll be back up here in a little while.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Call me in an hour or so.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I mean it, Captain Desjani.”<
br />
“Yes, sir.”
He left the bridge, somehow certain that Desjani had decided that she wouldn’t actually call him unless another emergency erupted but too tired to debate the issue any longer.
HIS stateroom comm alert buzzed angrily, jerking Geary awake. He’d fallen asleep in a chair and took a moment to orient himself before acknowledging the call.
“Captain Geary,” Desjani reported, “there’s a problem at the Syndic hypernet gate.”
His stomach turned to lead. “Reinforcements for the Syndics? ” His fleet wasn’t in any shape to fight another major engagement. The aliens on the other side of Syndic space had diverted a big Syndic force to Lakota the last time the Alliance fleet was in the star system, baffling the Syndics but giving them an opportunity to destroy the Alliance fleet. They’d come far too close to succeeding. Somehow the aliens had known the Alliance fleet would be at Lakota the first time, but his immediate jump back should have thrown off even whatever means of tracking the aliens were using.
“No, sir.” Geary’s initial relief at Desjani’s words vanished as she continued speaking. “The Syndic guard force is destroying the gate.”
Geary took the distance to the bridge in record time, coming to a halt beside his command seat and staring at the images on his display. It took him a moment to accept what he was seeing. As Desjani had reported, the Syndic guard force at the hypernet gate had opened fire on the gate. “They’re taking down the gate. While we’re still light-hours away.” His disbelief must have been obvious.
Desjani was checking her own display and made a gesture of contempt. “The Syndic commanding that guard force has panicked. He or she has orders to ensure you don’t use that gate, so they’re acting long before they have to act.”
“But this fleet is so far away, we’re much less likely to be damaged by the resulting energy discharge!” Geary stared at the representations of the Syndic guard force. “And his or her own ships are right there. Why commit probable suicide if you don’t have to?”