“Yeah, well, forgive me for being a little off balance.”
“We’re still three light hours from intercept with the flotilla,” Desjani said. “Fifteen hours at the current closing rate. That leaves time to exchange a few more messages with Michael, if it’s him, before the engagement, and time to think about what to do.”
As if mocking her optimism, an alert sounded on the heels of her words.
“Five more Syndic ships arrived at the jump point from Kukai,” Lieutenant Castries reported. “Two battle cruisers and three heavy cruisers.”
Geary watched the symbols for the latest Syndic arrivals appear on his display. When the new Syndic force had arrived at the jump point hours ago, they had quickly accelerated onto a vector with a clear objective. “They’re pursuing the battle cruiser which Michael Geary may or may not be aboard.”
“Looks like it,” Tanya Desjani agreed. “From the way they ramped up their speed as soon as they left jump, they’re trying to catch that ship.”
“The Syndicate used that trick at Midway,” Kommodor Marphissa said. “Ships pretending to be fleeing, other ships in pursuit. They were all part of an attempted trap.”
Geary didn’t say anything as he watched the new warships steady out on the intercept vectors they’d adopted hours ago. Dauntless’s systems had no trouble projecting the result. The battle cruiser that might have Michael Geary aboard had headed toward the primary world before altering vector to close on the Alliance ships, whereas the new Syndic warships had immediately gone for an intercept. The Syndics had also accelerated to higher velocities. At the rate Michael’s ship was traveling, the new warships would intercept it about ten light minutes short of reaching the Alliance battle cruisers.
“If that’s Michael, he should be speeding up,” Desjani grumbled.
“He said his ship had low fuel cell reserves,” Geary said. “Any significant increase in velocity might be beyond their means. But saying they were fuel limited could be part of the setup for a trap.” He sat back, angry at his options. “What if we head to meet up with Michael’s ship? How does that impact everything else?”
Tanya tapped her controls. “If we change this vector in order to intercept his ship, it will leave an opening for the other three Syndic battle cruisers to get past us.”
In a stand-up fight, Captain Hiyen’s four battleships could easily handle three battle cruisers. But the Syndics wouldn’t be trying to engage the battleships. They’d try to get past the battleships to hit the transports, and might succeed.
“If they’re trying to lure us out of position to protect the fleet assault transports,” Desjani said, “they couldn’t have configured the trap better. Michael Geary on a damaged ship that’s low on fuel cells, and the only way we can protect him is if we abandon our duty of screening the Marine transports.”
She’d said “us,” but if it was a trap, it was aimed solidly at him, Geary thought. “If Michael Geary is aboard that ship—”
“He’d expect you to do your duty,” Tanya Desjani said. “He knows the choices you face, and he wouldn’t want you imperiling the mission on his behalf.”
Geary nearly snapped at her, something about how could she know what Michael would want, but realized that Tanya knew Michael much better than he did, having served with him in the fleet. His own experience with his grandnephew had been limited to only a few short conversations before Repulse had been destroyed. “He was already abandoned once,” Geary finally muttered.
“He volunteered his ship as the rear guard,” she replied. “He did what needed to be done.”
The clearly implied message was that he needed to do the same. He felt anger growing at Tanya for pushing him on this, before realizing that she was deliberately being the voice of duty so he could blame her rather than himself if Michael was lost again. “I know what I have to do,” he said, his voice low. “How much closer can we get to the point where they’ll catch the ship that claims to have Michael Geary aboard, without leaving the Syndics an opening?”
“Wait one, Admiral,” Desjani said, running through options. “We can alter vector enough to get five light minutes closer without leaving an opening for the Syndic battle cruisers to get past us. That’ll still leave us five light minutes away when the pursuing battle cruisers catch him.”
Five light minutes. Roughly ninety million kilometers. Not that distant in terms of the immensity of space. Much too far distant to have any impact on what happened in terms of human actions. He’d be leaving Michael Geary to fight alone. Again.
How do you do it? Dr. Jasmine Cresida had asked him. How do you give orders knowing that those who must obey them will die?
He hadn’t known the answer then. He didn’t know what it was now. He only knew what he had to do to keep faith with all of those under his command. “Captain Desjani, alter the vector of this formation so we’ll be five light minutes from the intercept point but still able to cover the transports.”
“Aye, aye, Admiral,” she said, her voice more subdued than usual.
There was nothing else to be done now, not with hours to go before any changes in the vectors of the other ships could be seen. Geary stood up, trying to sound unaffected by recent events. “I’ll be in my stateroom for a while, Captain Desjani.”
The stateroom proved to be just another place that held painful memories, though. Memories of the time just after he’d gained command of the Alliance fleet, and just after he’d been forced to watch Michael Geary’s battle cruiser Repulse be destroyed as it held off Syndic warships trying to catch the rest of the Alliance warships. Memories of the brief conversations he’d had with Michael Geary before then.
This isn’t easy, is it? Michael had said after volunteering Repulse as the rear guard, knowing that his ship would have no chance of surviving. You do what you have to do, though, and it’s up to your ancestors how it all turns out.
He got up, heading out into the passageway. The members of the crew he passed all looked in high spirits, confident of victory. Thoughts of Michael Geary reminded him of attitudes in the fleet back then. Everyone he’d encountered had been confident only that they’d fight to the last, that sooner or later their ship would be destroyed with odds that they’d die as well. Confident that they’d never stop fighting while breath remained in them, even though after nearly a century none believed the war with the Syndics would ever end, let alone end someday in a victory. It had been the self-assurance of the already damned.
He’d changed that. No matter how many mistakes he’d made, he’d been able to change that. Maybe, if it was Michael Geary on that ship, he’d be able to change what seemed an inevitable outcome at this point.
There was often a short line to enter one of the worship rooms, but this time a few were open when Geary arrived. He went into one of the small rooms, sitting down to face a little table on which a single candle rested. Lighting the candle, he sat trying to sort his thoughts into a clear request for his ancestors. In the end, that request was the same one he usually made. Please help me do the right thing and make the right decisions.
Did he imagine a feeling of reassurance, a sense of resolve, that followed? Perhaps. With a silent thanks, Geary snuffed out the candle.
On the way back to his stateroom he did his best to relax, knowing that if he displayed tension it would cause tension among the officers and crew. They deserved better than that from him.
He also had to bat down waves of anger at the thought that the message might have been a fake, a false image of his grandnephew designed to trick him.
By the time Geary got back on the bridge his mood hadn’t been improved by the images of the primary world forwarded to him. Bombarded from orbit multiple times by Syndic warships, and now being fought over, the wreckage visible in what had been cities and towns offered a sickening view of total war against those who’d dared revolt against the Syndicate Worlds. How many
citizens of Kane had died because of those attacks?
Tanya Desjani nodded to him as he sat in his fleet command seat on the bridge. “I was thinking how well this was set up to be a trap for you.”
“And?” Geary replied, knowing the single word sounded more abrupt than it should.
But she continued with no sign of being put off by his attitude. “The Syndics didn’t know, couldn’t have known, that you’d be here at this time, or that our ships would be in these formations with these vectors. You told me that you’d suggested Captain Duellos command this mission, so he could’ve been here, not you. And how could the Syndics have preplanned the arrival of those additional warships from Kukai? This looks like a perfect trap laid specifically for you, but how could the Syndics have been able to precisely predict all of the specific elements?”
He stopped to think, frowning. “They couldn’t have. The Syndics here could’ve improvised a fake of Michael if they were planning to employ that someday against me, but the rest of it . . . no.” Taking a slow, deep breath, he nodded to her. “Thanks, Tanya. That should’ve already occurred to me.”
“It doesn’t mean it’s not a trap,” she cautioned him. “It wouldn’t be the first time that chance set things up to favor one side. And we still face the same physics. If we head to directly intercept the ship Michael may be on, we’ll leave the other Syndic battle cruisers openings to get past us.”
“Understood.”
“Oh, and Michael sent us an update that said the ship he’s riding has been named Corsair by the Alliance personnel aboard it.”
“Corsair?” Geary asked. “That’s not a traditional name for a battle cruiser.”
She shrugged. “You know those Gearys. Always breaking rules.”
“Admiral,” Lieutenant Castries said. “Incoming message for you from, uh, Corsair.”
Geary tabbed receive, seeing the same image of Michael on the bridge of the Syndic battle cruiser. The signs of stress on Michael were more pronounced this time, doubtless reflecting his own extended period on the bridge of the other ship, but also making the image appear to be more real. “This is Captain Michael Geary. My apologies, Admiral. I should’ve realized you’d need some confirmation. The ghost is Lyn. We were able to fool the Syndic CEO because we have someone aboard who could act the part of a Syndic officer. I mean . . . hell . . . we didn’t capture this ship on our own. That was done by our former guards, a Syndic ground forces unit. They needed us to fly the ship for them, so we made a deal to get them home if they freed us. This is their commander.”
The image of the other ship’s bridge expanded to show more of it. In the background could be seen other Alliance personnel in uniforms of varying damage. In the foreground was a woman in the uniform of the Syndic ground forces. She had a hard face marked by a prominent scar on one cheek. “I am Executive Destina Aragon,” she said. “My workers and I liberated your scion, Black Jack, and captured this ship. He said you’d respect his commitment to us. Our families and some of our friends are on the surface of the primary world here. If you are truly for the people, you will help us save them.”
Michael Geary nodded. “We made a deal,” he repeated. “Admiral, I know Syndic forces revolting seems pretty off the wall, but apparently it’s happening since the war ended. I am in command of this ship. I see you’ve got a captured Syndic battle cruiser with you. I assume that’s for some sort of false flag trick?”
He took a deep breath. “You know our current situation. I’m certain that those two battle cruisers on our tail will stay on vector to intercept us. The Syndics must be pretty mad at us for getting this far. But we can deal with them. I can do the math on what could happen if you come to meet up with us, leaving your main formation unscreened. The crew on this ship, those from Repulse and other Alliance ships and Marine units held prisoner with me, want to strike a blow here. We’ve got this. Geary, out.”
Captain Desjani exhaled a frustrated sigh. “He’s not asking for help. That’s sort of like Michael.”
“Sort of?” Geary asked.
“Michael often had a chip on his shoulder,” she explained. “It was the Black Jack thing.”
“Yeah, I got a taste of that before Repulse was lost.” Geary shook his head. “Do you think it’s him?”
“Ship’s systems now say there’s a ninety-six percent chance that transmission really showed him and isn’t a fake.” Tanya paused, thinking, her eyes on her display. “Yes, Admiral, I think it’s him.”
He turned to look back at Marphissa. “What about that Syndic officer, Kommodor? She’s pretty blunt and outspoken.”
“Aragon seems authentic,” Kommodor Marphissa said. “The Syndicate will tolerate some plain speaking if executives perform well, and here she was speaking to you, an Alliance officer, not a Syndicate CEO. But she’d have to be screened to ensure she wasn’t a snake in disguise and playing her role well. I would want to meet her in person.”
“Do you think she’s really in command of that ship?” Geary asked.
“No. If she was, she’d have been making demands, not asking you to respect the deal the other Geary made. Even if she was trying to pretend to be under his control she couldn’t have helped phrasing her words differently.”
“Michael wouldn’t cooperate with a Syndic trick,” Desjani said. “He’s very stubborn, and even though he hated being a Geary he always tried to live up to it.”
Geary sat back, eyeing his display. “What’s your advice, Captain? We can maintain this vector until the Syndics closing on Michael can’t get past us, but that’ll mean letting them hit Michael’s ship long before we can get there to help. I can split our battle cruisers—”
“No,” Tanya said, shaking her head. “If we split the force the two pieces won’t be individually strong enough to stop the Syndics going after Corsair or if they lunge for the transports. Admiral, we have to screen those transports.”
“Yeah.” He gazed at his display, the smooth curves through space that marked the paths of the various ships bearing a beauty at odds with the life-and-death nature of the motion they revealed. Saying the options out loud had helped make it clear that he didn’t really have any great choices. “His shields look to be at full strength. If that is Michael Geary, and he handles that intercept smart, he might be able to avoid serious damage.” Was he trying to convince himself of that argument, or trying to rationalize doing something he didn’t want to do?
Geary tapped his comm controls, doing his best not to let his uncertainties show. “Captain Geary, this is Admiral Geary. We will proceed to support your unit while also screening the rest of the Alliance forces.” That was an ambiguous statement, deliberately vague to prevent the Syndics from knowing exactly what he intended if despite Michael Geary’s assurances this really was a trap. He’d worried how to say the rest as well, recalling how abrasive Michael Geary had been, and knowing that Michael’s experience with fleet tactics dated to the days when they had consisted of charging straight at the enemy. “You are to prolong engagements with Syndic forces as much as possible so as to keep them tied down while my units approach to intercept.” Phrasing it that way should make it sound as important a task as it really was without appearing to be sidelining Michael’s ship. He added something else, with all sincerity and to keep the Syndics thinking he’d been taken in by their trick, if a trick it was. “Welcome back. You’ve been missed. To the honor of our ancestors, Geary, out.”
The message done, and Michael Geary’s fate possibly sealed, he sat back, rubbing his face. “Kommodor, what do you think CEO Grandon will do?”
Marphissa took a moment to reply. “If this is not a trick, he will have been informed by now that the lone battle cruiser is controlled by escaped Alliance prisoners and rebellious Syndicate ground forces. I think he will want to be in on the kill of such a target.”
Her guess was proved right within half an hour, as CEO Grandon�
�s flotilla altered its vector to also aim for an intercept of Michael Geary’s ship.
“If they’re trying to lure us in,” Tanya Desjani said, “there’s going to come a point where it’s obvious they’ll intercept Corsair well before we’re in contact.”
“And if they intercept it,” Geary said, “they’ll either have to drop the pretense that Michael Geary is in command, or inflict significant damage on their own ship. If it’s a trap.”
Desjani was manipulating her maneuvering display, frowning in thought. “Thirty-six point four minutes. Admiral, if they keep on their vectors after they’re less than thirty-six point four minutes from intercept, we’ll know they’re committed to that. And at that point we’ll definitely be able to hit them if they try to get past us to go after the transports.”
“That’s taking into account the time delay before we’ll see what they did?”
She gave him a lowered brow displaying her annoyance at the question. But her voice stayed absolutely respectful. “Yes, Admiral, of course it does. If at thirty-six point four minutes prior to their intercept we still see them on the same vector, we can safely alter our vector to head for an intercept with them.” Desjani made a face. “Which will leave Michael fighting on his own for about an hour.”
“That’s the best we can manage?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Then it will have to be enough.” He’d meant to only think those words to himself, but they came out, sounding clearly on the bridge. Glancing about, embarrassed, he saw looks of determination in response to the statement. His half prayer had turned into an inspirational declaration.
“I almost feel sorry for CEO Grandon,” Desjani said. “He thinks he knows the odds because he’s just looking at the ships involved. But he’s actually going up against two Gearys.”
“Do you want to warn him?” Geary asked.
“No. I want to be able to see his face when he finds out what that means.”
Hearing a laugh from behind him, Geary turned to see Kommodor Marphissa grinning at Desjani.
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