Geary thought about the chief’s words as he walked, though. In some odd ways, this did resemble Grendel. The Syndic flotilla here was actually fairly close in size to the one that Geary had faced at Grendel along with the officers and crew of his heavy cruiser Merlon. But here it had been the Alliance fleet’s warships that had arrived in a Syndic star system without warning, proclaiming their peaceful intent, the opposite of what had happened at Grendel. And this time the odds versus the Syndics overwhelmingly favored the Alliance forces; the Alliance actually had been invited here and actually did intend no threat to the owners of this star system. Like Grendel, but very different from Grendel.
The people of today fervently believed that he had won at Grendel even though Merlon had been destroyed. He wondered what people a century hence would believe of the coming confrontation, and what price might have to be paid.
Eventually, Geary found himself back on Dauntless’s bridge, staring at a display in which nothing important had changed even though the alien deadline had expired hours ago. Desjani, still in her own seat on the bridge, didn’t seem to have moved, sitting as intent as a great cat waiting to pounce when her prey appeared. The watch-standers on the bridge reflected the same vigilant tension, their confidence in their commanders and their abilities warring with worries about the unknown. Behind Geary, Senator Costa grudgingly gave up her place in the observer’s seat to Rione, who settled silently, apparently unconcerned.
Another hour went by, Geary’s thoughts dwelling on the battles he had commanded, on the men and women and ships who had survived and on those who hadn’t. His decisions, his responsibility. He remembered the Marine officer Carabali’s words. I’m tired of deciding who lives and who dies.
Suddenly, they were there, shocking Geary out of his memories. Space that had been empty a moment before was abruptly filled with ships.
Lots and lots of ships.
Geary could feel the tension level on the bridge shoot upward and tried to maintain his own external calm. “Looks like they outnumber us.”
“By about two to one,” Desjani agreed with an equally composed voice. He wondered if she was feigning her own calm as he was his. Desjani had always seemed to grow more tranquil as the chances for combat grew higher.
“They’re about two and a half light-hours distant from us, and what looks like an unusual distance from the jump point. Lieutenant Commander Kosti, what do the ship’s systems say?”
Kosti, seemingly glad for a chance to focus on something other than the numbers of the alien ships, studied his own displays. “They came in at a much greater distance from the jump point than our ships would. The systems can’t tell whether that’s because the aliens are using a totally different kind of drive exploiting the jump phenomenon, or if the aliens are using the same sort of drive but getting different results out of it.”
Desjani nodded. “Thank you. That means they could have longer jump ranges, too.”
“Yes, Captain. Maybe a lot longer. We can’t tell, though.”
Geary focused back on the aliens, whose armada was arranged in six subformations, each shaped like a disc. The six subformations were combined into two v-groupings, with one subformation slightly ahead of the other two. The two v-groupings were stacked one atop the other, the higher one slightly forward of the lower one. “I can’t figure out how they’d fight in that configuration. Is that the best resolution we can get on individual alien ships?” The sensors displayed nothing but vague blobs.
“Yes, Admiral,” Lieutenant Commander Kosti replied. “That’s all we can see. We can tell a ship is there, but not anything else, not even its size, let alone any details about it. I have no idea how the aliens are managing to conceal something the size of ships that well.”
“Get a link to Boyens activated. I want him seeing this but not able to hear us unless we address him directly.”
“I told you they have awesome stealth capability,” CEO Boyens announced after his virtual presence appeared and took in the information on the displays. He wouldn’t actually be allowed on the bridge, not when the prospect of combat loomed. “That’s the best picture we’ve ever gotten of the aliens. Sometimes they’re completely invisible until they reveal themselves.”
“Have you ever seen this many ships before?” Geary asked him.
“No. Nothing close to this.” The Syndic CEO’s face scrunched up in puzzlement. “Why so many? They couldn’t have expected us, the Syndicate Worlds that is, to have very much available to oppose them.”
“Do they usually appear to want an overwhelming advantage when dealing with humans?” Rione asked.
“It’s really hard to say. There hasn’t been that much contact for the last few decades, and no fighting with them that I know of for at least that long.”
“We’ll see what happens this time,” Geary said. Despite the presence of the Alliance politicians aboard Dauntless, he felt that he should be the one speaking to the aliens. This looked far more like a military confrontation than it did a diplomatic matter. “This is Admiral Geary, commanding officer of the Alliance fleet, speaking to the unknown spacecraft that have arrived in Midway Star System. You are to identify yourselves and refrain from heading deeper into this star system. We do not desire hostilities, but the Alliance fleet will take whatever action is necessary to repel any attack on this star system.”
Rione’s face was bleak as she stared at her own display. “So it will be a fight, another war.”
“Maybe. I’ll try to avoid that.”
“I know you will, but they saw us here as soon as they arrived, yet they’re still coming in toward the star. I had hoped we could talk to them, but if they outnumber us so much, they may not feel any need for that.” On the displays, the alien ships were coming around and heading inward, closing on the Alliance fleet.
“They won’t receive my message for another two and a half hours. We’ll see how they respond then.”
“But they already know we’re here, and they’ve chosen to keep coming.”
“Yeah.” There wasn’t much more he could say about that.
Rione came close to him, almost whispering. “Can you defeat so large an alien armada, Admiral Geary?”
“I don’t know. There’s too much we don’t know about them.”
Desjani spoke up, her voice louder than Rione’s. “If anyone can beat them, it’s Admiral Geary.”
Rione kept her eyes on Geary. “I’m in agreement with her again. Sorry.”
“Just try not to make a habit of it. It’s a little unsettling.”
“I don’t think you need to worry about that,” Rione responded dryly, and Desjani, her own gaze still fixed on her display, nodded.
The alien reply showed up in a little over five hours, revealing that they had taken some time to come up with their response. All three senators were present, hoping to be on the bridge when the historic communication arrived, but since they were behaving themselves, Geary didn’t ask any of them to leave.
The alien transmission showed a bridge like that of a Syndic warship, with what seemed to be humans on it wearing totally nondescript outfits. Boyens pointed. “See? It’s all fake. Our first transmissions to the enigma race were full video, of course, but they only responded at first in audio, and then only a word or two. Then we started getting images like this from them. We ran some analysis of the bridges we were seeing and were able to identify them as composites of bridges from Syndic ships that had communicated with the aliens. Same thing for the ‘humans’ we’re seeing. They’re just digital composites of Syndicate Worlds’ personnel.”