Jack Campbell: Dauntless

Desjani, unseen by Rione, rolled her eyes at the Co-President’s ignorance, but Geary just pointed at the display. “It’s a standard convention, Madam Co-President, one every sailor learns by heart. It had to be established to provide a common frame of reference in an unbounded three-dimensional environment.” He sketched the shape of Kaliban’s system. “Every star system has a plane in which its planets or other objects orbit. One side of that plane is labeled ‘up,’ and the other side ‘down.’ So up and down within the system doesn’t change regardless of how your ship is oriented. By the same token, the direction toward the star is ‘starboard’ while the direction away from the star is ‘port.’ ” Geary shrugged. “I’ve been told that early on they tried to use ‘starward’ instead of ‘starboard,’ but the older expression stuck.”

“I see. You take your orientation from the outside, not from yourself or from the aspect of the ship.”

“It’s the only way it could work. Otherwise, no two ships could be counted on to figure out what the other one meant by directions.”

“What if you meet outside a star system? Where there is no such reference?”

Desjani looked startled. Geary also felt a shock of surprise at the question. But, then, how could Rione know better? “It doesn’t happen. How could two ships meet up in interstellar space? Why would they be there, too far from the nearest star to use it for reference? Why would two ships, or fleets, fight where there was no reason to fight? Nothing to defend, nothing to attack, no jump points or hypernet gates. The weaker side could just run away indefinitely.”

Rione stared back, her own surprise visible. “You always choose to fight?”

“You saw what happened at Corvus. We just kept going, and the Syndics couldn’t catch us before we left. Space, even within star systems, is too big, and ships are still far too slow relative to that, for combat to be forced if one side refuses to engage and can’t be blocked from running. If we’d wanted to defend a planet in Corvus or deny use of its jump points, we’d have had to stay and fight, but that wasn’t the case.”

Rione’s stare shifted to the display. “As you chose to fight here.”

“That’s right. If we’d run instead, the Syndics wouldn’t have caught us.” And it increasingly looks like I made the right decision to fight. Don’t get too cocky, Geary. It’s not over yet. But we’ve done a tremendous amount of damage to them. He checked the information on his display. “They’re still headed for our auxiliaries.”

“You don’t seem worried.”

“No. If they’d immediately scattered and run after their pass through us, some of them might’ve gotten away. But now they’ve given me time to bring my ships back at them.” He didn’t add something that he knew to be true. The fate of the Syndic force had been sealed. All of those Syndic ships would be destroyed in the near future.

Desjani pointed at her display, emphasizing something to Geary. Geary’s orders to formation Fox Five Five had forced the Syndic formation to alter course to keep closing on the auxiliaries and their escorts. As it did so, the Syndic wrecks and ships that were too heavily damaged to maneuver kept going along the old course, gradually separating from their less-damaged comrades. The Syndic formation had begun to look as if it were melting, the increasingly disordered hulls of the wrecks and badly damaged ships spreading onward and outward while the remaining warships headed down, still in their rectangular block, which had lost a third of its length when the Syndic van was annihilated, and contained large ragged gaps where lost ships had once been.

He became aware Rione was watching, too, as the two groups of Syndic ships separated, the still-functioning warships continuing on their doomed charge while the wrecks diverged from their original course. “I’ve seen detailed reports of space battles, Captain Geary. Why haven’t I seen one like this?”

“It’s not over yet, Madam Co-President.”

“I’m aware of that. But this formation you used, the way you ordered your ships to move and fight. I haven’t seen that. Why?”

This time Desjani smiled at Geary, and he knew she’d declare him to be the greatest fleet commander of all time unless he answered the question himself. “Fox Five, and formations like it, haven’t been used for a long time. It took me a while to figure out why. It’s because it requires a special kind of training and experience with judging exactly when to transmit orders to forces deployed across light-minutes of space, when to have those orders take effect, how to compensate for the small, but real, relativistic distortions that can creep into coordinated time lines, how to estimate what the enemy must be doing based on time-late visual images that vary depending on which part of the enemy formation you’re looking at.” He remembered a show he’d once attended. “Think of it as a ballet in four dimensions, with the different parts staggered through different layers of time delays in seeing and communicating with them.”

Rione didn’t bother trying to hide her reaction. “Very impressive. How did you learn this skill?”

Geary exhaled slowly before answering. “I learned how to do it from old hands, officers who’d trained at it for decades.”

It took her a moment to connect the dots. “All of whom are dead now.”

“Yes.” He gave her a flat look. “Everyone those officers trained died in battle. The officers that group had started to train also died.”

“I see. Like a trade secret in the world of peace. If those who know it die before passing on their skills, the chain of expert knowledge and experience is broken. The craft is lost and must be reinvented if it is to be seen again.”

Geary simply nodded in reply this time. For decades there’d been no one left who knew the tricks and the methods. So the fleet had been forced to fall back on simple formations using simple tactics. Until I came back, like some ancient general who remembers ways of fighting that the barbarians forgot long ago.

There was nothing to do for a few minutes but watch the Alliance formations converge on the Syndics, with occasional glances at the fleet status information to see how much damage his ships had taken, as well as the latest estimates of Syndic damage and losses. So far, the two sides of the ledger were grossly unbalanced in the Alliance’s favor.

“Captain Geary, this is Captain Numos. I demand that the ships under my command be allowed to engage the enemy!”

Desjani managed to convert a laugh into a cough, then carefully avoided betraying any other emotion.

Geary grabbed for his communications controls, then stopped himself and took a few moments to think before he reached again, then spoke with a bland tone. “Captain Numos, your formation is playing an important role in this battle by blocking any Syndic retreat. Since your formation, along with Fox Five One initiated contact with the enemy in this battle, I fail to understand your implication that your ships have not engaged the enemy.”

There was a pause before the reply came, Numos’s voice this time cold instead of heated. “You have deliberately placed the ships under my command in positions where they had the least chance to engage the enemy.”

“No, Captain Numos.” Geary realized with some surprise that his voice had remained level and calm. “I ordered your formation into an attack that would’ve resulted in substantial engagements for all of the ships in that formation. Unfortunately, my orders were not followed, with the result that the formation you command found itself out of position and out of the action. If you wish to complain about your current position relative to the battle, Captain Numos, I suggest you direct your complaints to the officer in command of Formation Fox Five Two. I believe you will find him on Orion .” He cut the link to Numos, not wanting further distraction.