Jack Campbell - Perilous Shield

“He was coming this way already,” Rogero said. “To escort us back to the jump point for Atalia.”

“He’s accelerating ,” Ito pointed out caustically.

Tension levels ramped up even higher, suspicious looks aimed at Bradamont as she studied the movement of the Alliance warship.

Bradamont suddenly began laughing, drawing shocked looks from everyone. “ Bandolier is moving to foul the approach of the commando shuttles. Look, she’s not only accelerating but also bending her track a bit. Her vector is going to carry her short of us, but across the route that would have to be used by anything coming toward us from Ambaru. See that light cruiser? Coupe is doing the same though she’s coming in from farther out. The commando shuttles can avoid them, but the extra maneuvering will slow them down a little.”

“How do they know where the stealth shuttles are?” Garadun asked skeptically.

Bradamont shook her head. “I won’t give you the details of how the Alliance tracks its own stealth equipment. I wouldn’t expect you to give me details of how the Syndicate Worlds does it. But you know you can track your own gear, and so can we.”

“Those warships are buying us time?” Rogero asked.

“A little. Not much, but hopefully enough.”

He watched the data as the shuttle off-loads proceeded with now-frantic haste, and the vector data on the clumsy freighters showed them very gradually building up velocity, headed outward away from Ambaru station and toward the jump point for Atalia. But Rogero’s mind was consumed by other matters as well. “How did you learn about the commando launches?” he asked Bradamont.

“Admiral Timbale warned us.”

“I don’t understand. Are you saying the Alliance forces here are working against each other? That some of them are not obeying orders?”

Bradamont nodded heavily. “I told you that. They’re not obeying Admiral Timbale’s orders. The Alliance military is badly fractured. Force levels and funding are being chopped, and the different branches are fighting to keep as much as each of them can. The fleet and the Marines have the advantage of being firmly allied, while the ground forces and the aerospace forces distrust each other as much as they do the fleet and the Marines. Right now, in this star system, the ground forces commander and the aerospace forces commander are no longer working with the fleet commander, Admiral Timbale, even though he’s supposed to be in overall command. I don’t know what they think is happening, but they’ve been convinced to try to stop us.”

She looked at Rogero, her expression bleak. “You know what the war did to the Syndicate Worlds. Do you think the Alliance paid less of a price? We won. That didn’t replace the dead, repair the destruction, or pay the costs. The strains of the war tore apart the Syndicate Worlds. I don’t know what those strains may yet do to the Alliance, but the military is as frayed as everything else.”

Rogero’s mind was filled with images of the revolt at Midway, Syndicate unit against Syndicate unit. “Are you talking fighting? Combat between Alliance forces?”

“No!” Bradamont seemed shocked at the suggestion. “I don’t see any of the forces involved shooting at each other. Not over this. Not over anything . But that means none of them will shoot to protect these freighters. The fleet units are trying to delay the commandos without engaging them, and doing it in a way they can claim was accidental. That is the best we can hope for.”

“The fixed defenses,” Garadun said harshly. “The Alliance must have a lot in this star system. Whose orders are they responding to?”

“Ground forces or aerospace,” Bradamont answered. “But even these freighters can dodge shots fired from at least several light-minutes away. We’d be in trouble if we were heading for a site being defended, but we can avoid those.”

“What about a barrage?”

Bradamont shrugged irritably. “That might be challenging. All we can do is try to dodge.”

“We?” Ito asked.

“I’m aboard this ship, too.”

Garadun gave Bradamont an appraising look. “Every one of these freighters has talented personnel on board, people who can make mobile forces dance to their tune. If we have to, we’ll show the Alliance how it’s done.”

“When will we know we’re clear of the commandos?” Rogero asked.

“When they don’t get here,” Bradamont answered. “If we started accelerating soon enough and can prolong their approach long enough, they’ll have to turn back because of fuel constraints. They can’t sustain a long tail chase. I’d guess that if they haven’t caught up with us in an hour, we can breathe easier.”

Rogero turned to Foster. “Lieutenant. All soldiers are to go to full-combat footing. Armor sealed and weapons powered. Threat is Alliance commandos boarding from stealth shuttles. As soon as the last passenger shuttle breaks free, all hatches on the freighters are to be sealed and guarded.”

“The commandos are likely to be in stealth armor, too,” Bradamont said. “And they can get in by other means than using hatches.”

He looked at her, startled by the sudden catch in her voice, and saw that Bradamont looked as if she were physically ill.

She met his eyes. “They’re Alliance,” she said in a low voice.

Of course. Her own people. Bradamont was helping him prepare to fight those she had fought alongside. If the commandos boarded, some of them would die, and many if not all of Rogero’s soldiers would die.

And, quite possibly, Rogero, too.

“You should go to your quarters,” he told Bradamont. “It would be safer.”

“I will not hide down there,” she said. “I will be here if they enter this command deck.”

He had to accept that because he knew she would not bend on it.

Ito gave him a speculative look, though, and glanced at Bradamont.

“The last five Alliance shuttles are mating for the transfer now,” Lieutenant Foster said. “Their pilots are complaining about our acceleration.”

“Just tell them to get our people off those shuttles,” Rogero said. “As soon as the last is clear, they can head home.”

“The shuttles are off-loading very quickly,” Lieutenant Foster commented.

“Good old-fashioned fear-of-death motivation. It’s the Syndicate way.”

Everybody on the command deck but Bradamont laughed when Rogero repeated a joke that was old in the Syndicate Worlds, though the laughter held some nervousness as eyes kept straying to the display, as if the Alliance stealth shuttles would miraculously become visible on it.

“An hour?” Garadun asked Bradamont as he studied the freighter’s acceleration rate with a disgusted look.

“That’s just an estimate. I can’t be certain.”

“I hate being stalked by invisible enemies.” His eyes grew shadowed by dark memories. “Like the enigmas. How did Black Jack beat them?”

“We found out they’d been messing with your sensors,” Bradamont said. “Ours, too. Worms in the systems controlled what we saw whenever the enigmas wanted to be invisible.”

“What kind of worms couldn’t be found by our security scans?” Ito demanded.

“Quantum-coded worms,” Bradamont replied. “Don’t ask me how. I don’t think anyone human has figured out how to do it, yet. But we figured out how to cancel them out.”

“I suppose Black Jack figured that out, too?” Garadun said, his tone bitter.

“No. Captain Cresida. One of the battle cruiser commanders.” Bradamont closed her eyes for a moment. “She died in the battle with your flotilla when her ship was destroyed.”

Nobody said anything because there wasn’t anything that could be said. Instead, they all watched the displays where the vectors of the freighters grew longer with agonizing slowness as the clumsy ships accelerated at the snail’s pace that was the best they could manage.