Not long. As Dauntless lined up for a firing run on the Syndic battleship, Geary watched the fleeing Syndic light cruiser come apart, disintegrating as its inertial compensators failed and the full stress of its acceleration ripped the ship to pieces. He didn’t want to think about what had happened to the light cruiser’s crew.
Captain Desjani had her attention focused on the Syndic battleship, which had just endured a fast-firing pass from Furious and was now using its surviving weapons to try to hold off repeated blows from destroyers and light cruisers tearing past and getting off one or two hell-lance shots on each pass. “Targeting priority on remaining operational weapons,” Desjani ordered. “Fire when within engagement envelopes.”
Dauntless shot past the Syndic battleship in the blink of an eye, her automated targeting systems slamming hell lances into the battleship’s weapons during the instant in which the two ships were close enough to fire on each other. Only a single Syndic hell lance hit Dauntless’s shields, being absorbed without effect.
But most of Dauntless’s shots had gone home. The Syndic battleship had only a single battery of hell lances still firing. As Dauntless rose past and away from the Syndic ship, Paladin came lumbering up and pumped several salvos into the enemy, silencing the last weapon and leaving it without any maneuvering control. Surrender, Geary willed the commanding officer of the stricken Syndic battleship, but even though escape pods began spitting out of it, the enemy ship didn’t broadcast a surrender.
Despite the fact that the Syndic battleship was out of action, Paladin unleashed its null-field projector as the Alliance ship reached its closest approach to the enemy vessel. The glowing ball dug a hole deep into the now-defenseless battleship.
Behind Paladin, her fellow battleship Conqueror swung in, also firing hell lances into the slowly tumbling wreck as escape pods jetted frantically away from it. Geary watched, feeling his anger rise at the punishment being inflicted on a helpless enemy, and even Desjani seemed to find the overkill distasteful. After firing its own null field, Conqueror launched two specters into the derelict as she pulled away.
That gave Geary the opening he needed. “Conqueror, save your expendable munitions for ships that still constitute a threat,” he snapped.
There weren’t any of those left within weapons range of the fleet. A quick examination of the display confirmed that. Geary pulled out the scale, seeing the entire Ixion Star System again, and felt a stab of anger. “Now we know why those capital ships had so few HuKs with them.”
Desjani took a look. “Nine more, in groups of three, stationed to use the other jump points out of Ixion.”
Geary checked their positions. “The nearest batch of HuKs is three light-hours away. They don’t even know we’re here yet.”
“They won’t enjoy the show when the light from this battle reaches them,” Desjani noted with a grin.
“I’m not sure this qualified as a battle. Okay, no threat within less than three light-hours. Let’s get this fleet back into formation, assuming I can get the Third Battleship Division to stop pummeling dead ships.”
“Give them the duty of sending teams to blow up the wrecks,” Desjani suggested. “It’s tedious work.”
“Why should I punish the crews of those ships?” Geary asked. But somebody had to take care of ensuring the Syndic wrecks couldn’t be salvaged. “Then again, it’ll keep Casia and Midea occupied for a while.” He prepared the order, then paused as he examined the damage reports. Very little to speak of, since the collapse of the Syndic formation had stripped all of the enemy warships of support while exposing them to concentrated fire from superior numbers of Allied warships. But—“Damn. How did Titan get hurt?” Of all ships to suffer damage, why did it have to be Titan?
“Mine strike,” Desjani observed. “She couldn’t turn tight enough to completely avoid the minefield.”
“Captain Tyrosian warned me that Titan maneuvered like a pig when her bunkers were loaded with raw materials.” Geary sighed. He braced himself and read the details of the damage. “Not too bad, but we need to keep the fleet’s speed down so Titan has time to fix that damage.” It was past time to return a semblance of order to the fleet. “All units, cease fire unless fired upon and assume Formation Delta Two, forming on fleet flagship Dauntless.”
Geary sat on the bridge of Dauntless watching his fleet re-form, trying to figure out exactly what was bothering him. It wasn’t the remaining Syndic presence at Ixion. Annoying as the nine surviving HuKs were, there wasn’t anything that could be done about them. Since their mission was clearly to track the Alliance fleet, they’d surely run if pursued rather than seek hopeless combat. Two of the groups of HuKs were so far off they hadn’t even seen the arrival of the Alliance fleet in the star system yet. Nor was there any other shipping to worry about. The assorted merchant traffic in the system offered no threat, and as the light from the Alliance fleet’s arrival spread through the system, that civilian traffic was fleeing for the nearest possible place of refuge.
The fleet had arrived in Ixion six light-hours from the star itself. Aside from a scattering of mining and manufacturing facilities farther out in the system, the Syndic presence was concentrated around the sole habitable world a mere nine light-minutes from its star. As expected, Ixion had suffered from not being on the Syndic hypernet, though not as badly as some of the places that Geary had seen. It still seemed moderately prosperous and from analysis of the planet’s atmosphere and surface retained a large population and plenty of industry.
There was an orbital facility about the habitable world that had been tagged by the fleet’s sensors as probably military, but it posed no danger at all to the Alliance fleet. He’d already sent off a brief message to all the Syndics in the Ixion Star System warning them not to attempt to interfere with the Alliance fleet’s passage and letting them know about the survivors awaiting rescue at Daiquon.
So what was the problem? The main Syndic combat presence in the star system had been crushed with ease. Too much ease. That was it. “The crews of those Syndic ships were totally green and unprepared for combat.”
Captain Desjani looked over at him and nodded. “That’s clear.”
“And yet they were positioned as if the Syndics clearly expected this fleet to arrive in Ixion.”
“Yes, sir.” Now Desjani frowned. “That’s inconsistent, isn’t it? If they believed you’d bring the fleet here, why did they have their least experienced units guarding the jump exit?”
“Good question. And not just a couple of sacrificial lambs, but battleships and battle cruisers. Why did the Syndics throw away those ships by leaving them to confront us?” Geary looked toward the back of the bridge. “Madam Co-President? What do you think?”
“I think there’s something I need explained,” Rione replied. “You know those Syndic crews were inexperienced because of their behavior. I remember something like that at Sancere. Some Syndicate Worlds warships barely avoiding collision. But this was much worse.”