The Lost Stars: Shattered Spear (18 page)

The virtual window showing Kapitan Mercia was still open. Bradamont noticed that Mercia was frowning. “What’s the matter?”

“I don’t know.” Mercia’s frown grew deeper. “Something doesn’t feel right, but I’m not sure what.” She studied something off to one side of her. “From our own look angle we can’t see much of the main propulsion on those light cruisers, so we can’t confirm their reports of damage.”

Bradamont checked her display again and did a quick appraisal. “
Pele
and
Gryphon
can see less than we do. The light cruisers are almost bow on to them. Why would the light cruisers lie about the damage they had sustained? Two of them can’t threaten a battle cruiser.”

Another alert tone, this one urgent. “The Syndicate heavy cruisers pursuing those light cruisers arrived,” Mercia noted. “Two of them, just as we were told to expect.”

Bradamont gazed at the display again; the two heavy cruisers had come in from the same jump from Lono, and had quickly steadied out on intercepts aimed at the light cruisers that had shown up earlier. The damaged light cruisers were limping toward
Pele
and
Gryphon
as fast
as they could accelerate, and Kontos was bringing his two warships toward those light cruisers at a considerably higher rate. “About three hours until they meet up,” Bradamont murmured. “Damn. Even if we sent a message it wouldn’t get there until they were almost . . .” She gave a sharp look to Mercia. “Why do I want to send a message? This doesn’t look like anything that Kontos can’t handle.”

“He’s very good,” Mercia said. “He does lack experience, but that shouldn’t matter here. The light cruisers have killed all of the snakes aboard and—” She stopped speaking, looking unhappy. “That’s part of it. Why did that executive call the snakes ISS agents? He used the formal title.”

“What was his Syndicate rank?” Bradamont asked.

“Executive Second Class, what you would expect to find in command of a light cruiser.” Mercia paused. “The commanding officer survived the mutiny. That’s unusual, but I understand some of the commanding officers survived when President Iceni led the mutinies on warships here, so it can happen.”

“How many days in jump space from Lono to here?” Bradamont asked.

“Lono to Midway? Seven days.” Mercia sat straighter, suspicion lighting her eyes. “Seven days. At least seven days after the mutiny, and there are still bodies lying around the bridge?”

“It looked staged, didn’t it?”

“I’m not too familiar with such things,” Mercia said, “but, yes, it looked like . . . exactly what I would expect to see if I was watching a vid. What are they up to?”

“I don’t know.” Bradamont hit her comm control. “Kapitan Kontos, myself and Kapitan Mercia are concerned that there is something wrong about those two light cruisers. Verify the damage they claim to have suffered and do not let them approach you too closely. We need to confirm that they are who they say they are.” She paused to consider adding more specific instructions, but that was foolish when she was observing
events from three light hours away. Kontos would have to react to events as they developed. “Proceed with caution. Bradamont, out.”

“You didn’t say ‘for the people,’” Mercia chided her, smiling crookedly to show it was meant humorously.

“I almost said ‘to the honor of our ancestors’ out of force of habit,” Bradamont admitted. “But I know you don’t believe in the same things that we do.”

“Do you mean me personally?” Mercia asked. “Or everyone out here?”

“Everyone, I guess.”

“Some of us do share that belief. Others believe in other things. And yet others accepted the belief in nothing that the Syndicate worked so hard to convince us all of.” Mercia shrugged. “Not . . . what do you call it? Atheism. But denying even a belief in that. Only the Syndicate was supposed to serve as a guide and a purpose, because there was supposed to be no other possible guide and purpose.”

“I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying I should say,” Bradamont said. “Does it look bad that I’m not saying ‘for the people’?”

Mercia smiled very briefly. “I am saying that for all our lives we were told what we had to say. Now we can choose what to say. I don’t think anyone will deny you the right to say what you wish. But you are probably wise not to flaunt your differences from us. Thank you, by the way.”

“For?”

“Taking my concerns seriously. I worry about Kontos. When someone is as naturally good as he is, it is far too easy for them not to realize how much they have to learn.”

“Agreed.” Bradamont shook her head as she looked at her display. “And all you and I can do is watch and see what he does.”

For the next three hours, she had to watch as events unfolded too far away for her to have any control over them. The heavy cruisers chased after the light cruisers, which were racing to meet
Pele
and
Gryphon
,
which were in turn charging to intercept the light cruisers. The tracks of the various warships all converged toward one point in space.

Bradamont’s unease kept growing as she watched. The Syndicate heavy cruisers in pursuit of the light cruisers were accelerating at a rate that would catch the smaller warships just after they joined up with
Pele
and
Gryphon
. There were plausible explanations for that, but it was odd that the heavy cruisers were continuing their pursuit when their own projections must have shown them that they would reach their prey too late to destroy them. And every meter the heavy cruisers drove toward Pele was another meter into a fight with a battle cruiser that the heavy cruisers could not hope to win.

It felt increasingly wrong. Kontos should see that, too. But she knew how easily a ship’s captain could be caught by such a lure, not seeing the problems or potential dangers and focusing on the chance to not only save two newly friendly warships but also to destroy two enemy warships. What an opportunity! Exactly what someone would wish for. Admiral Geary had often made a point of warning against situations that seemed too good to be true.

Half an hour remained until they would see
Pele
and
Gryphon
meet up with the fleeing light cruisers. Bradamont stood up abruptly and left her stateroom, trying to ignore the bodyguards, who fell into place behind her. The walk to the bridge wasn’t too long since the command spaces and the highest-ranking officers’ staterooms were all located near the center of the battleship in the most well-protected part of the ship.

Mercia looked over at Bradamont as she walked onto the bridge and sat in the flotilla commander’s seat next to Mercia’s own ship commander’s seat. “It stinks worse with every minute,” Mercia said.

“It does.” Bradamont brought up her display and pointed an angry finger at the two heavy cruisers. “Look at them. Coming on straight toward
Pele
. Kontos has to see that it’s a trap of some sort!”

“But what kind of trap?” Mercia asked herself as much as Bradamont. “I’ve heard that the Syndicate has employed some suicide attacks, but those used small ships, courier ships with small crews.”

“They have,” Bradamont said angrily.

“Ah. Apologies. You were with Black Jack when they did that? It’s an ugly way to fight, but the snakes always fight ugly.”

Fifteen minutes remained until they saw what had happened when Kontos had met up with the light cruisers. “How much longer until he receives my message?” Bradamont asked, gazing at the unfamiliar Syndicate Worlds controls.

“Here.” Mercia leaned over and tapped a control. “There’s the count. About five more minutes. If Kontos hasn’t already started wondering about this whole setup, that message should wake him up.”

Midway
’s bridge usually had only a low level of noise. Kapitan Mercia ran a tight ship. But it was quieter than usual now as everyone watched the events on their displays, knowing that no matter what happened, they were far too distant to influence events that had taken place three hours before.

If no other maneuvers had occurred, Kontos’s force would have passed through the two light cruisers at close range, continuing on to hit the pursuing Syndicate heavy cruisers.

“He’s detaching
Gryphon
,” Mercia noted at the same moment that Bradamont spotted the movement. Battle cruiser
Pele
had turned and was braking, while
Gryphon
had accelerated toward the oncoming light cruisers. “It’s not a direct intercept.
Gryphon
is going to pass to one side of the light cruisers.”

Bradamont felt herself smiling. “He’s going to have
Gryphon
take a good look at the main propulsion on those light cruisers before
Pele
gets to them. And
Pele
is swinging out and down to pass clear of the light cruisers as well.”

The results of those moves had come quickly. Three hours ago, as
Gryphon
and
Pele
split, the two fleeing light cruisers had also begun diverging, one aiming for
Gryphon
and one for
Pele
.

“Smart!” Bradamont said. “Kontos did exactly the right thing to force the hands of those light cruisers!”

A tactical feed from
Pele
appeared alongside the other data, relaying the communications that had passed back and forth three light hours away. Kontos had warned the light cruisers to continue onward, saying he would deal with the heavy cruisers. The same executive on the same light cruiser had called back, pleading for protection. “Our units will be very valuable to Iceni!”

As one light cruiser continued to close on
Gryphon
and the other on
Pele
, Kontos’s messages grew sharp. “You will remain clear of my ships!”

The executive had kept pleading. “The Syndicate heavy cruisers are right behind us! We need protection! Our main propulsion has been damaged!”

Mercia indicated another set of data on the displays. “
Pele
and
Gryphon
have two sets of firing solutions ready, one set aimed at the heavy cruisers and the second at the light cruisers. Kontos is ready for anything.”

At that point, three things had occurred almost at the same moment.

Kapitan Third Rank Stein on the
Gryphon
had suddenly altered vector, getting a clear look at the main propulsion on one of the light cruisers. “Kapitan Kontos! Only minor cosmetic damage is visible!”

An alert appeared, showing that the sensors on both
Pele
and
Gryphon
had picked up unusual fluctuations from the power cores on both light cruisers.

Simultaneously, the two light cruisers leapt forward as their main propulsion kicked in at full, one cruiser homing in on
Gryphon
and the other aiming for
Pele
.

MISSILES
tore away from Midway’s warships, the ones fired by
Gryphon
having such a close target that they impacted within seconds as
Gryphon
hurled a full volley of hell lances and grapeshot at the light cruiser. One moment that light cruiser was trying to bend its vector fast enough to hit
Gryphon
, and the next its entire forward section had been blown to dust, the stern section rolling wildly up and off to the side.

Pele
had a slightly longer time to shoot, but the light cruiser aiming for her was already lined up for intercept. Kontos didn’t take any chances, pivoting
Pele
to ensure every possible weapon could come to bear on the attacker. The light cruiser was hit by a barrage that immediately collapsed its shields, tore through the light armor on its bow, then ripped down the length of the ship.

Pele
continued onward, a field of small debris and dust passing astern and beneath her marking the remains of the second light cruiser.

The heavy cruisers which had been pretending to pursue the light cruisers had also altered vectors, swinging through an arc as they aimed to hit
Gryphon
before she could rejoin
Pele
.

“They weren’t planning to ram,” Mercia said, her eyes intent on her display. “The light cruisers were going to get right next to our ships and detonate their power cores.
Gryphon
would have been destroyed and
Pele
crippled, then the heavy cruisers would have finished her off.”

“There haven’t been any escape pods coming off what is left of the light cruiser that went after
Gryphon
,” Bradamont noted. “I wonder how large the crews were on those light cruisers?”

Kapitan Stein on
Gryphon
hadn’t done the instinctive thing and tried to evade the heavy cruisers, which would have only slowed down
Gryphon
and made her an easier target, instead charging right into the attack. The three ships had rocketed past each other at a combined velocity of nearly point three light speed, so fast that even their automated fire control systems could not compensate for the relativistic distortion that warped the ships’ views of each other. Every shot fired missed.

With
Pele
now bearing down on them and
Gryphon
swinging in a vast arc to intercept again, the two Syndicate heavy cruisers bolted back for the jump point. The Syndicate warships had not finished their own turn back when
Pele
raced past above them and hammered one of the heavy cruisers so badly that it began sliding off to one side, unable to maneuver.

The second heavy cruiser abandoned its comrade, accelerating all out, as
Gryphon
swung in from one side and below to hit it in another swift pass.
Gryphon
rolled out and began a huge, graceful arc aimed this time at the crippled Syndicate heavy cruiser, while
Pele
settled onto a stern chase of the fleeing cruiser.

Bradamont watched as
Gryphon
had hit the damaged heavy cruiser again, suffering some hits herself but taking out some of the Syndicate warship’s weapons and inflicting some damage in its main propulsion. Hurt as it was and trapped inside an enemy star system, the Syndicate heavy cruiser was doomed. Bradamont waited to see escape pods begin to launch as the Syndicate crew abandoned ship.

Instead, before
Gryphon
could finish swinging up and around for
another firing run, the heavy cruiser had abruptly dropped its remaining shields and shut down its weapons.

The transmission from that ship resembled the earlier ones from the light cruiser, but did not have any feeling of having been staged. An Executive Fourth Class with blood running unheeded down one arm of his suit spoke in halting words. “We surrender to you. All snakes aboard this unit are dead. We swear it! This isn’t a trick. We won’t fire on you again. We heard that Iceni and Drakon are for the people. We surrender.”

The second heavy cruiser kept fleeing despite the very small lead it had, firing on
Pele
as the battle cruiser finally overtook it. With a fairly small relative velocity to the heavy cruiser,
Pele
was able to methodically smash the heavy cruiser from stern to bow as the Syndicate warship made futile attempts to outmaneuver its foe. Only a few escape pods launched before the second heavy cruiser’s power core overloaded because of the damage, and blew the battered warship into fragments.

Bradamont, realizing she had been sitting on Midway’s bridge for a long time watching the battle that had played out hours ago, stretched and smiled. “Kapitan Mercia,” she said loudly. “Black Jack would be proud to have such ships and such men and women fighting alongside his own.”

Mercia’s eyebrows went up. She knew that Bradamont almost always referred to Admiral Geary by his name and rank, not using the Black Jack nickname that Syndicate and former-Syndicate personnel always employed. Then Mercia gave Bradamont a genuine smile, different from her usual stiffness toward the Alliance officer. “One of his own would know.”

Another alert, this one a mild tone. Mercia gestured toward the symbol that had appeared at the jump point from Iwa. “
Manticore
has returned. Your chance for glory has passed.”

“You don’t know how glad I am to know that.”

Moments later, the first transmission from
Manticore
arrived. As
she watched and listened to Marphissa’s report, Bradamont felt any sense of relief fading rapidly.

*   *   *

DRAKON
studied Kommodor Marphissa’s report, knowing that his expression was falling into grim lines. “Which major problem are we going to discuss first?”

“Oh, why not the enigmas and their secret base,” Iceni said. She looked tired and unhappy, which wasn’t too surprising considering the matters that needed to be addressed.

“Their deep underground secret base,” Drakon said, knowing that Gwen Iceni wouldn’t want him to soft-pedal anything. “Deep, deep underground. Probably designed for defense, with a lot of angles to hide behind, choke points to funnel attackers into, and materials that will block sensors and communications by enemy forces.”

Gwen Iceni had called a meeting when Marphissa’s report came in. They all sat in another conference room at Drakon’s headquarters. With at least one potential assassin running loose on the planet, it made sense to avoid using the same rooms or the same routes or the same routines. Predictability made a killer’s job much, much easier.

“The corridors would very likely be designed as a maze,” Colonel Malin added.

“And,” Drakon continued heavily, “we would be attacking enigmas, who, according to Black Jack’s reports, prefer to blow things up rather than have them captured.” He looked toward Captain Bradamont, who had returned to the planet just in time for this meeting.

Bradamont nodded. “Ships, installations, you name it. It seemed everything we encountered was rigged with self-destruct capability. The enigmas don’t want anything left that could provide any information or clues about them.”

“You’re saying an assault by ground forces would be a suicide mission,” Iceni observed, looking steadily off to one side.

“Effectively, yes,” Drakon said, wishing he knew what Gwen was thinking.

“Do you think that those ground forces workers who were rescued by
Manticore
will be able to provide any useful intelligence?”

Drakon nodded. “They already have.
Manticore
is still a ways from reaching this planet, but my ground code monkeys were able to walk the space code monkeys through accessing and downloading the data in the battle armor. Most of the data is a lot of nothing as those soldiers lay low waiting for rescue, but they got some decent data on the enigma attack that killed most of their unit.”

Iceni gave him a look. “That attack employed distance weapons, I understand. What did you learn from it?”

Colonel Malin answered. “Madam President, we were able to confirm from the battle armor status and records that the ground forces unit they were in was not leaking electronic signals when they were targeted by the enigmas. All of their emissions were extremely low power and extremely short-range, to tie their armor into a single tactical net.”

“Which means,” Drakon said, “that the enigmas are very, very good at spotting even tiny indications of comm and active sensor activity by our forces. But when those three soldiers went totally passive, nothing went after them. That might mean the enigmas don’t routinely employ active seekers.”

Iceni raised an eyebrow at Drakon. “Why would it imply that?”

“Because our own distance strike weapons are at least dual-seeker systems. If they don’t spot anything using the passive seeker that is looking for electronic signals, they automatically switch to active, or infrared, or visual. Visual can be movement triggered or look for shape matches.”

“If they don’t use active seekers,” Bradamont commented, “that’s consistent with the enigmas’ desire to remain hidden. Active paints your position loud and clear for anyone watching.”

“But what about IR?” Colonel Gozen asked. “That’s passive. But if
the enigma weapons had automatically shifted to IR targeting they would have nailed those three soldiers.”

“IR might be a blind zone for them,” Drakon agreed. “I wish those three soldiers had gotten even a long-range look at some enigmas operating on the surface so we’d have at least a basic idea of what kind of protective suits or armor they use, and what sort of weapons they carry.” He shook his head ruefully. “I used to be unhappy about Syndicate intelligence reports that couldn’t tell me little details about new Alliance ground threats. I never realized how much basic and very important information I already knew as a matter of course.”

Colonel Malin frowned. “It is possible that the enigmas try to do all of their ground fighting at long range, beyond line of sight, so as to minimize any chance of being seen by a foe.”

“Even other enigmas?” Iceni asked. “Surely they don’t worry about other enigmas seeing them.”

“Such a strong motivation cannot operate in a vacuum,” Malin said. “The enigma desire for privacy, for remaining hidden, must influence their interactions with each other.”

Bradamont called up some images on her data pad, studying them. “When Admiral Geary’s fleet was in enigma-owned star systems we got long-range looks at enigma towns, but those looks were obscured by privacy fields over the towns. The fields appeared to be a routine thing. About all we could tell was that the towns were almost all coastal and were about half in the water and half along the surface of the coast.”

“The enigmas certainly live up to their names,” Gozen commented. “Could Black Jack’s ships have spotted deep underground installations like the enigmas are building at Iwa?”

“No,” Bradamont said. “Maybe if we had gotten in close we could have spotted traces, but getting in close would, we thought, lead the enigma population on the surface to commit mass suicide. Admiral Geary did not want to commit genocide.”

“Good for him,” Drakon commented. “But is it genocide if the other guys decide to kill themselves?”

“They’re dead either way,” Iceni said. “Even if it is second-degree genocide instead of first-degree. But after seeing those images of Iwa, I’m not sure I would have been as restrained as Black Jack was. Let me summarize. We know very little of enigma ground combat capabilities, except that they have signal detection capabilities markedly superior to our own and highly effective distance weapons. We know that they are building a base of some kind deep underground on that planet at Iwa. And we know, from what they did at Iwa, that the enigmas have not altered their basic approach to humanity.”

“Wiping out all trace of humans might be described as an approach,” Drakon said, wondering why he found the phrasing comical. “Here’s something else we can be sure of. Even if we overcome their defenses against ground attack, which I think we could do, but that has to be a guess since we know so little about the enigmas’ ground combat capabilities or how many enigmas are at this base, then from all we know the enigmas would have dead-men switches built into their gear to ensure their installation, and all of our troops, were blown to hell on the heels of our victory.”

“Dead-enigma switches,” Iceni said.

“What?”

“You said dead-
man
switches.” Iceni moved her head slowly to look at everyone else. “We’ve gone over the difficulties. Can any of you tell me how we can do this?”

“Why not just drop a big enough rock on the planet to reach however deep the enigmas are?” Drakon asked, unhappy at the idea of sending his soldiers against a foe of essentially unknown capabilities and strength.

“That would be one hell of a rock,” Bradamont said.

“It would take time,” Iceni said. “We would have to round up a local asteroid or minor planet that was big enough and boost it toward
the target planet. It would take a while to get there. Besides that, we
need
to capture some enigma technology. Maybe some records that we can exploit. We still know almost nothing about them.”

“We know they keep attacking us,” Drakon said.

“But we don’t know why!”

“General Charban, who accompanied Admiral Geary’s fleet,” Captain Bradamont explained, “thought that it was pure paranoia in human terms. The enigmas may think that as long as we inquisitive humans are close enough to the enigmas, as long as we exist, we will keep trying to learn about the enigmas, keep trying to penetrate the screen of secrecy they maintain. We tried to use that as basis for establishing a peace agreement, promising that we would never violate their privacy if they did not attack us, but they never responded.”

“Except with more attacks,” Malin pointed out. “Paranoia would cause the enigmas to conclude that we will always violate any agreement and always be a threat to them.”

“I said paranoia in human terms,” Bradamont corrected. “Whatever drives enigma thinking and actions appears to have common elements with what we’d call paranoia, but they’re not human, and their ways of thinking may have major variations on how a human with paranoia would perceive things.”