The unprotected, wide open throat of the light cruiser Abraham's impeller wedge engulfed the warhead like a vast scoop. Primary and backup proximity fuses flashed as one, and a fifty-megaton explosion erupted one hundred meters from the Masadan flagship.
Sword Simonds' face went bone-white as the impeller signature vanished. Air hissed in his nostrils, and he peered at the holo sphere for one, frozen moment, unwilling to accept it, then turned to stare at Captain Yu.
The Havenite returned his gaze gravely, but there was no shock, no horror, in his eyes. There wasn't even any surprise.
"A pity," Yu said quietly. "They should have launched from farther out."
Simonds clenched his teeth against a mad impulse to scream at his "adviser." Twenty percent of the Masadan wall of battle had just been obliterated, and all he could say was they should have launched from farther out?! His eyes blazed, but Yu flipped his own eyes to the members of the Sword's staff. Most of them were still staring at the sphere, shocked by the totally unanticipated loss, and the Havenite officer pitched his voice high enough for them to hear as he continued.
"Still, Sir, it's the final objective that matters. There are always losses, however good a battle plan may be, but Grayson has lost far more heavily than we have, and the trap is set, isn't it, Sir?"
Simonds stared at him, still quivering with fury, but he felt his staff behind him and sensed the potential damage to their confidence. He knew what Yu was doing, and the infidel was rightcurse him!
"Yes," he made himself say calmly and levelly for his staff's benefit, and the word was acid on his tongue. "Yes, Captain Yu, the trap is set ... exactly as planned."
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Bernard Yanakov's uniform tunic hung over a chair, the topmost button of his shirt was open, and he frowned at his terminal, then looked up with a weary smile of welcome as the door opened to admit Raoul Courvosier and the background chatter of printers.
Civilian clothing or not, no one could mistake Courvosier for anything but a naval officer now, and Yanakov was devoutly thankful for his presence. Not only had he made his destroyer's sensors available to Grayson, but he'd also placed his own vast experience at Yanakov's disposal. Despite, Yanakov knew, protests from certain members of his delegation that he ought to load them all aboard Madrigal and get them safely out of the line of fire.
"You need sleep," the Manticoran said bluntly, and Yanakov nodded.
"I know," he sighed, "but" He broke off and shrugged, and Courvosier nodded in understanding. Not approval, just understanding.
A fatigue-dulled mind was scarcely the best tool for his system's defense, but Yanakov couldn't sleep. Orbit Four had been joined by Orbit Five and Six, and neither of their commandants had gotten as lucky as Hill. Or, rather, the Masadans had gotten smarter. They were launching from six million kilometers or more, ranges so long the defensive missiles' drives burned out over five full minutes short of their targets. It gave the defenders longer tracking times and better point defense kill probabilities, yet sheer numbers more than made up for that by saturating the defenses. It might cost the Masadans a lot of missiles, but Grayson had already lost nine percent of its orbital resource processing capacity ... not to mention twenty-six hundred uniformed defenders and sixteen thousand civilian workers.
"You know," the Manticoran admiral mused, looking out through the glass wall across the bustling battle staff, "there's something peculiar about this whole attack pattern." He turned to face Yanakov. "Why aren't they either pulling completely out of the system or continuing straight along the belt?"
"They are continuing along the belt," Yanakov said in some surprise. "They're picking off our nodes in a straight-line sequence, directly against the belt's orbit."
"I know, but why take so much time? Why dash in, hit a single target, then pull back out again, when they could blow their way right along the belt in a fraction of the time?"
"This way they can watch us coming, then choose a different target or even break off entirely, and we can't preposition ourselves to interceptunless we spread ourselves so thin any force that does catch them will be cut to dog meat," Yanakov pointed out bitterly.
"No, that's not it." Courvosier rubbed his chin and frowned as he considered the board. The Masadan raiders tracked slowly across it, retiring from their third attack, and he shook his head. "Their sensors are no better than yours, right?"
"Probably not as good, actually."
"All right. Your orbital sensor arrays give you real-time gravitic detection out to thirty-four light-minuteseight light-minutes beyond the belt on their normal retirement vector. More than that, the Masadans know they do."
"Well, yes." Yanakov scrubbed at burning eyes, then rose and walked across to stand beside his friend and watch the display. "Of course, there's a lot of transmission lag from the more distant arraysespecially those on the far side of Yeltsinbut they're working our side of the primary, so Command Central's got real-time data where it really matters. That's why they pull back out beyond our detection range after each raid, pick a new attack vector, and come charging back in. As you say, our shipboard sensors have very limited range compared to yours. Even if we happened to guess right and place a force where it could intercept them, its commander couldn't see them soon enough to generate an intercept, and we probably couldn't pass him light-speed orders from Command Central in time for him to do it, either."
"I could buy that," Courvosier agreed, "but you're missing my point. They keep pulling back out to the same damned place after each attack, and they have to know you can see them doing it."
"Um?" Yanakov frowned, and Courvosier nodded.
"Exactly. They keep heading back to the same spot before your sensors lose them. And as they work their way along the belt, they keep extending their flight distance back to that same place with each target they hit. That not only makes them more vulnerable to interception but also vastly extends the time they're spending on the entire operation, yet they keep poking along at no more than point-three cee while they do it. Now why would they be doing that?"
"Well ..." Yanakov scratched his head. "They're throwing a lot of missiles in each attack. That has to run their magazines lowmaybe they've got colliers out there with reloads and they have to return to them to rearm. And I suppose the low velocities could be so they don't have to kill too much vee if we do manage to hide something in front of them."
"Possibly, possibly," Courvosier murmured. "But their timing suggests they had somebody hidden out there, watching when Fearless,Apollo, and Troubadour left. They may think that was our entire escort force, and they may not have any idea those ships are coming back, but they have to know there's a high probability some Manticoran squadron's likely to drop by. That should be a factor in their planning. They ought to be going for a fast decision, hoping to finish you off before some RMN admiral intervenes on your behalf."
"One already has, in a sense," Yanakov said with a tired grin.
"You know what I mean."
"Truebut I'm not too sure about your basic premise. There's no commerce between Yeltsin and Endicott. That means no information flow, so how could they know you were ever here in the first place?"