Thoughts flashed between them like lightning. Decision was reached.
-=0=-***-=0=
Commodore Howell winced as no less than six SLAM drones flashed away from the intruder. A battle-cruiser. At least a battle-cruiser, to carry that many. But if it was a battle-cruiser, where had its own SLAMs been this long?
It didn't matter. He was about to die, but stubborn professionalism drove him on. The drones were charging directly away from Procyon, and he snapped an order to his com officer. A light- speed signal flashed after them, and he bared his teeth in a death snarl of triumph. Unless those bastards were clairvoyant, they couldn't know he had the authenticated self-destruct codes. Their precious sensor data would die with their ship ... and his own.
-=0=-***-=0=
Alicia monitored the signal as it burned past her, and bared her teeth in an icy smile of her own. Monkoto's plan was back on track. Now if only Megarea could get them out of the trap she'd shoved them all into... .
-=0=-***-=0=
The AI named Megarea gathered herself. What she was about to try had been discussed in theory for years, but only in theory. No opportunity to attempt it had ever arisen, and most Fleet officers had concluded it wouldn't work, anyway. But none of them had expected to try it with an alpha synth AI.
It had to be timed perfectly. She had to get in close, cut the transmission lag to the minimum, yet launch her attack before the hostile battle-cruisers could engage her, for what she/they planned would reduce her defensive capability to a ghost of itself, but there was no other way.
She felt Alicia's warm, supporting presence and the Fury's hungry approval pulsing within her, and the chance of failure scarcely even mattered. They were together. They were one. Live or die, she knew no other AI would ever taste a fraction of the richness that was hers in this moment, and she waited while the seconds trickled past.
-=0=-***-=0=
The accelerating SLAM drones exploded in spits of fire, but Howell hardly noticed. It was down to the final handful of minutes. Either his battle-cruisers would stop the onrushing hammer of that Fasset drive by destroying the ship which mounted it, or Procyon would die.
-=0=-***-=0=-
Megarea struck.
The "pirates" had used their ability to penetrate Fleet security systems to kill her own SLAM drones, but it had never occurred to them that a Fleet unit might pierce their systems in return, and she was into their tactical net before they even realized she was coming.
The battle-cruisers' AIs were slow and clumsy beside Procyon's; by the time they could respond, she had slashed them from the net with a band saw of jamming. This was between her and Procyon, and the dreadnought's cybernetic brain roused to meet her, but she had a fleeting edge of surprise, for she had known what was about to happen.
And she wasn't alone; Tisiphone rode her signal into the heart of the enemy flagship.
-=0=-***-=0=
Howell lurched back in his chair as chaos exploded in his synth link. Cries of anguish filled the flag bridge, hands scrabbled to snatch away tormenting headsets, and one high, dreadful keen of agony rose above them all as Tisiphone left Megarea to her battle. She sought a different prey and stabbed out, searching the net for a mind which held the information she needed, and Commander George Rendlemann screamed like a soul in Hell.
Procyon's AI was more powerful than Megarea, but it was also more fragile, and she was far faster. She was a panther attacking a grizzly, boring in for the kill before it brought its greater power to bear, and she drove a stop thrust straight to its heart. She made no effort to oppose the other AI strength to strength; she went for the failsafes.
Those failsafes were intended to protect Procyon's crew from the collapse of an unstable cyber synth, not to resist another AI's attack. They didn't even recognize it for what it was, but they sensed the turmoil raging in the systems they monitored and performed their designed function.
Procyon's entire control net crashed as Megarea convinced it to lobotomize its own AI.
-=0=-***-=0=
Procyon writhed out of control, systems collapsing into manual control, leaving her momentarily defenseless as Megarea rampaged through them. Circuits spat sparks and died, backup computers spasmed in electronic hysteria, and Howell did the only thing he could. His hand slammed down on the red switch on his board. HMS Procyon vanished into the security of her shield, and he wondered if it was enough. In theory, nothing could get through an OKM shield—but no one had ever tested that theory against a battle-cruiser's full-powered ramming attack.
-=0=-***-=0=
If she'd had even a moment longer, Megarea might have stopped the shield before it activated, but she didn't have a moment. There was barely time to snatch Tisiphone out of the dreadnought's circuitry before the shield chopped off her access, and even that delay was nearly fatal.
She'd cut her margin too close. HMS Issus opened fire with every weapon, and Megarea was locked into too many tasks at once. Her defenses were far below par. She was too close for SLAMs, but at least six sublight missiles and three energy torpedoes went home against her battle screen.
The alpha synth writhed at the heart of a manmade star. Screen generators screamed in agony, local failures pierced her defenses, and elation filled Issus's captain. Nothing short of a battleship could survive that concentrated blow!
A battleship ... or an alpha synth. Megarea staggered out of the holocaust, blistered and broken, trailing vaporized alloy and atmosphere. A third of her weapons were twisted ruin, but she was alive. Alive and deadly, no longer distracted as she turned upon her foe.
Her holo projector was gone, and the battle-cruiser's captain had one instant to gawk in disbelief as Megarea stood revealed. Then answering fire slammed back. A direct hit wiped away Issus's bridge. More fire ripped past her weakened defenses, and panic flashed through Howell's squadron. Their flagship had been driven behind her shield. Cannae and her escorts had been destroyed. Issus was a shattered, dying wreck ... and now they knew their enemy. Knew they faced an alpha synth which had carved its way through the heart of their battleline. Only the battle-cruiser Verdun stood in her path, and Verdun refused to face her. She spun away, interposing her own Fasset drive, and Megarea screamed past at thirty-six percent of light- speed.
Chapter Thirty-one
The lethal chaos receded astern, and Alicia cursed herself viciously. Monkoto had planned for her to play the part of a battle-cruiser, slightly damaged in the inevitable engagement with Howell's screen, and she'd blown it. Howell had killed her SLAM drones—exactly as intended— but she could carry the same word in person ... unless he stopped her. Yet thanks to Megarea's damage, he knew what she was. Dreadnoughts were built for speed as well as power; Procyon might have overhauled a battle-cruiser with battle damage, but nothing he had could hope to overtake an alpha synth. So he wouldn't even try, and—
Her head jerked up as Megarea's drive died. The ship sped onward, but she was no longer accelerating, and Alicia's mouth twisted bitterly.
"Nice try, but you don't really think you can trick them with a fake drive failure, do you?"
"Who the fuck is faking?" Megarea snarled back. "I just lost the entire after quadrant of the drive fan!"
"You what?"
"I said somebody threw a goddamned wrench into the works!" The AI snapped as diagnostic programs danced. "Shit! The bastards took out both Alpha runs to the upper node generators!"