Captain Desjani considered the display, her eyes narrowing in thought. “I can think of three possible reasons. One would be simple stupidity if their commander is incompetent. Another would be that the five heavily damaged ships are intended as bait. A third would be that for some reason the most capable ships are needed on the outside of the formation.”
“I don’t want to assume incompetence at this point. That could make us too confident. Besides, why wouldn’t the Syndics have given coordinated orders to the two formations? It isn’t like the Syndics to let commanders operate independently.”
Desjani nodded.
Geary felt a sudden knot in his stomach. “I think your reasons two and three are both right.” He pointed. “We’re expected to charge straight for the center of the formation, like Alliance forces usually do, and the most badly damaged enemies are there waiting for us to finish them off. Bait, as you said.” He remembered watching his fleet fall apart at Corvus, where every ship had been scrambling to get in on a few kills of hopelessly outnumbered light Syndic warships. Syndic commanders who expected that kind of behavior would know what a lure those damaged ships would be to Alliance commanders seeking quick and easy kills. “And when we get close enough, these units,” he indicated those on the outside of the formation, “with the best weapons capability, go after the gate itself. They want to sucker us in close, then destroy the gate and hope the resulting energy discharge is big enough to hurt a lot of our ships.”
A moment of silence passed as Desjani considered his idea, then she rapped one fist on the arm of her command seat. “I think you’re right, sir. If the main fleet got hurt badly enough at the hypernet gate, that changes the odds in the system, and Task Force Furious might find itself the only organized Alliance fighting force in Sancere.”
Geary checked some ship statistics. “And even with the damage Task Force Furious did to Syndic Force Alpha, the Syndic flotilla still slightly outguns the task force. That’s why they’re trying to avoid further losses. So that they’ll be in a superior position if their plan at the gate works.”
“If the gate failure energy release is bad enough to hurt us,” Desjani noted, “then it’ll be bad enough to wipe out the Syndic ships there as well.”
“Yeah.” Trade a dozen big warships, about half very badly damaged, for three, four, or five times that many Alliance capital ships and who knew how many lighter combatants. To the bean counting minds of the Syndicate Worlds leadership, that probably looked like a very good business deal, especially since it might force the surviving Alliance ships to flee and leave a lot of the still-surviving installations in the Sancere Star System intact. “I wonder if the crews of those ships know?”
“I doubt it.”
“Me, too.” Geary played with his controls for a moment, then decisively punched one. “Syndicate Worlds warships at the Sancere Star System hypernet gate, this is Captain Geary, commander of the Alliance fleet in Sancere Star System. Be advised that the energy discharge as a result of destroying the hypernet gate is very likely to be so severe as to wipe out every ship nearby.” He paused, wondering if he should mention the danger destruction of the gate might pose to the planets in the system and even the planets in surrounding star systems. But, no, if the Syndic leaders hadn’t already figured that out, there was no way Geary wanted to be the one to tell them. “You face impossible odds. Your ships already bear substantial damage from earlier battles. There is no dishonor in surrender. You have my word that any personnel who surrender will be treated humanely in accordance with the laws of war.”
Co-President Rione spoke again, her voice flat. “I hope you’re not holding your breath waiting for them to surrender.”
“No,” Geary answered. “But there’s a chance, and it’d make life a lot easier for us if they did.”
“Don’t assume the crews of those ships control their own fates,” Rione added.
Geary gave Desjani a questioning look. She seemed to not understand the co-president’s statement as well. “What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Rione stated, her voice grim now, “that we believe the Syndics may have a remote command override on their ships, which would allow a Syndic CEO the means to input orders directly to the combat and maneuvering systems of ships, bypassing the crews.”
“I’d heard rumors of that sort of thing,” Desjani noted, “but nothing official.”
Rione nodded to her. “Consider this an official confirmation. We don’t know this is true for certain, but there’s classified evidence available to support it. It’s a sort of doomsday option for a Syndic CEO, rarely employed because if it was used often enough, we could detect and analyze the signals, then use the same override against them.”
Geary felt a pain in his head and tried to push it away with his fingers against his forehead. “Unbelievable.” All right. Assume that’s the case, that those crews are about to be deliberately sacrificed to lure us in and even if they try to do something about it won’t be able to stop it. That means they won’t be able to stop their ships from attacking the gate tethers. But this doomsday override can’t be flexible if it tells ships exactly what to do. “If we know what the Syndics probably intend, then we can predict what orders those ships will execute.”
Desjani’s bared her teeth. “Which means we’ll know where they’re going to be.”
“Right.” Geary called up the weapons employment system and began entering assumptions. If the Syndic ships in the best shape were ordered to destroy the gate tethers, and the destruction of the gate was supposed to be timed to catch the Alliance fleet as close to the hypernet gate as possible, where would those Syndic ships go and when would they go there? The system cranked through the math and within a second projected courses and times flashed up on the display. “We can target them. Send kinetic rounds to intercept the predicted courses, kinetic rounds heavy enough to punch through their shields and take out the ships.”
Rione was frowning. “I don’t understand. You don’t normally employ such weapons against other ships.”
“No, because the ships would just see them coming and dodge.” Geary pointed. “But if the ships have been locked onto a certain trajectory and the crews can’t override those instructions, if the doomsday override doesn’t allow for enough maneuvering flexibility, we might be able to nail a few.”
“I see.” Rione nodded. “This is the only way to keep them from destroying the gate before we get to it, isn’t it?”
Geary glanced at Desjani, who nodded as well. “I think so. It’s a chance, anyway. Captain Desjani, have your weapons specialists double-check my work and set up the engagement. I want the kinetic rounds to fire automatically at the optimum point, giving us a one-minute heads-up and countdown.”
“No problem, sir.” Desjani pointed at the appropriate watch-stander, who bent to his task.
THE wave of destruction from the Alliance kinetic bombardment arrived at and swept over first the fourth planet and then, about an hour later, the third. Gazing at the highly magnified views, Geary could see explosions rippling in series across the worlds and installations orbiting them. The under-construction warships blew apart under the impacts, pieces hurled away to spin into space or get caught in the gravity well of the fourth world to tumble to their destruction. Syndic command and control centers on the planets vanished in intense flashes of light followed by towering mushroom clouds fountaining skyward. On the night-covered portions of the worlds that were visible, flickering lights from impacts rolled across the darkened surfaces in a show that would’ve been beautiful if it hadn’t represented so much destruction.