“Yes, sir.” The lieutenant hesitated. “This may not work, sir. And they’re not going to be grateful for being released. We may just end up fighting them again.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. A few sailors more or less shouldn’t make a big difference to the Syndic war effort.”
“That’s true, sir.”
“One other thing,” Geary added. “I could tell that you were reluctant to suggest this course of action to me. I want to know when the Intelligence section has ideas. If I don’t want to follow them, I’ll decide that after I’ve heard them.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you never know, Lieutenant. On the one hand, those sailors may spread rumors that we’re all demons. On the other hand, we treated them decently. If enough Syndics learn that we’re not demons, maybe that will help, too.” He left, thinking that in a few more days the fleet could leave Sancere, having taken everything it could carry and destroyed everything it couldn’t. About a billion Syndic citizens would be looking up at the stars and breathing easier. They would also be worrying about the Alliance fleet possibly reappearing someday. That wouldn’t be possible, their leaders would assure them, but then it should have been impossible for the fleet to show up here even once. One way or another, this fleet had given a lot of Syndics a lot to think about.
Of course, Syndic Force Alpha was still out there. Sooner or later, Geary was sure Force Alpha would try something. It couldn’t let the Alliance fleet leave without trying an attack of some kind, not if the CEO in charge of it wanted to keep his or her head on their shoulders.
NINE
“SYNDIC Force Alpha’s moving.” The warning from a Dauntless watch-stander came almost simultaneously with an alerting message from Alliance Formation Echo, which was currently charged with blocking any attack by the surviving Syndic flotilla.
Geary rubbed his chin, studying the sightings coming in. The Syndic flotilla had been cruising along the outer edges of the star system for days now, watching from very long range as the Alliance fleet systematically looted supplies and repaired damage to its own ships. Now it had finally come around and begun accelerating toward the inner system. “Too early to tell where they’re aiming for.”
“Yes, sir,” Captain Desjani agreed.
“But even after the damage Task Force Furious inflicted, they’ve still got eight battleships and four battle cruisers.” Geary checked the display again. The two battle cruisers shot up by Task Force Furious had jumped out using different jump points over the last two days, doubtless going to notify the Syndic leadership that the Alliance fleet had shown up at Sancere and to call for reinforcements. One of the HuKs had also jumped out, heading for a third destination. It would be about a week’s transit time for all of them to their objectives, plus time to gather more warships, then a week back. More Syndics would be coming, but Geary planned to have the Alliance fleet long gone before they arrived. “Plus eight heavy cruisers and five HuKs. They outgun any one of our subformations, even though they don’t have nearly enough escorts.”
He pondered the situation. The Syndics had been about three and a half light-hours out from the star Sancere when they turned inward. Alliance Formation Echo was outside the orbit of the fifth world, only thirty light-minutes from the sun. The Syndics had been accelerating toward the inner system for three hours before any Alliance ship had seen them. Three hours’ time delay left a lot of room for as-yet-unseen changes.
On the other hand, even if the Syndics ramped all the way up to.2 light, it would still take them at least fifteen hours to even reach the area where Alliance Formation Echo was located. If they were aiming at any other Alliance formation, the time required to intercept at even.2 light ranged from twenty hours to well over a day. Nothing was going to happen immediately. But eventually things would happen quickly.
Don’t act too fast. But don’t put off acting, either. Do I want to stop all exploitation activity in this system to confront Syndic Force Alpha? But if I do, what’s to stop the Syndics from just racing through the system at.2 light or even higher? How long could they keep that up, denying me the chance to engage them and keeping my forces from continuing to loot the supplies we need? It would be the smartest thing they could do. Good thing they didn’t think of something like that sooner. “Captain Desjani. Assume the Syndics are planning to hit a smaller Alliance force, but will avoid action indefinitely if confronted with a larger force. What would you recommend?”
She considered the question, gazing at her display. “We can try seeding mines in their path, but at the speeds we would need to be going to ensure intercepting their track, the odds of planting a decent minefield are pretty low.”
“What about high-speed engagements? Could we manage to inflict much damage that way?”
Desjani grimaced. “If they’re going point two light and we’re coming in fast to meet them? Then the combined velocities would be, maybe, point two five light to point three light or higher. The relativistic distortion would be ferocious. Even the tiniest errors in compensating for it would mean clean misses.”
“So we have to slow them down to engagement speed and meet them with a more powerful force,” Geary concluded.
“I don’t think that’s going to happen,” Desjani suggested unhappily.
Co-President Rione’s voice came from behind them. “Why do military minds always focus on one alternative?” Geary looked back at her. “The way to slow them down is to offer a target that seems attractive.”
“I don’t care for sacrificing units that way,” Geary stated flatly, earning an emphatic nod of agreement from Desjani.
Rione leaned forward. “You’re too honest in your thinking, Captain Geary. You, too, Captain Desjani. Make it a trap.”
Geary exchanged a glance with Desjani as he spoke to Rione again. “What kind of trap?”
“I’m not a military expert, Captain Geary. Surely you can think of something.”
Desjani’s eyes had narrowed as she studied the display. “There might be a way.”
“Even with the Syndics able to see everything we’re doing?” Geary asked.
“Yes, sir. The trick would be making it look like we’re doing one thing when we’re actually planning another.”
Rione nodded. “Yes. Excellent. Present one image to the enemy while keeping your true intentions hidden.”
Geary kept his expression controlled while nodding back. Hearing Rione recommend that course of action was a little unsettling, given his doubts about her intentions toward him. “We can’t make the force we’ll use to bait the Syndics too powerful. They’ll spot that without fail.”
“I am thinking,” Desjani stated slowly, “of a star named Sutrah.”
Geary frowned at her, then his expression cleared. “That would be poetic justice, wouldn’t it?”
In the end, it required an awesome amount of analysis for the maneuvering systems to come up with the movement plan needed to implement Desjani’s idea. All six Alliance fleet formations had to swing through space, in some cases trading ships that would follow their own tracks for a while, some of the ships and formations passing through certain small areas where the Syndics were judged most likely to transit given the movements of all of the Alliance ships, most particularly Alliance Formation Gamma. This all had to be done without making it apparent to the Syndics why they were moving in that particular way, and presenting a credible image of part of the Alliance fleet girding for an engagement with the Syndics while other portions tried to continue looting Syndic assets. Formation Gamma had to be maneuvered in such a way as to present an attractive target while looking like it was unaware of the fact that it was exposed to Syndic intercept if the Syndics altered course away from battle with the larger force being assembled to meet its current path.