Jack Campbell - Invincible

But getting to that point meant getting this fleet past those bear-cow capabilities, which meant he had to understand as much as he could as quickly as he could. “Inform Lieutenant Iger that I am overriding that order. In this case, the security of the fleet is best served by figuring out whatever we can about this alien technology.”

Geary settled back again to wait. At the moment, there wasn’t much else he could do.

“Here we go,” Desjani said. “It took them less than a minute after they saw the vector we’d steadied on before they changed course to match.”

Geary nodded, his eyes on the display where the warships of the alien armada had come to port to bring about an even faster meeting with the human fleet. “Hold on. How much are they reducing velocity?”

“Quite a bit.” Desjani sounded thoughtful, one hand tracing out new data on her display. “Interesting. When we turned toward each other, it increased the combined speed we would meet at.”

“That’s right. To about point two five light speed if we both maintained our velocities. Too fast for our combat systems to compensate well for relativistic distortion.” The faster a ship went in normal space, subject to the rules of the ancient relativity physics, the more that ship’s image of the universe outside it was distorted. When it came to aiming weapons for millisecond-long engagement envelopes, even a tiny discrepancy between how the ship saw the universe and how that universe actually was would mean a clean miss. Human systems could compensate for that distortion fairly well up to point two light speed, but as velocities increased beyond that the systems increasingly developed too many errors to be accurate. “I expected them to slow at some point. But they’ve come down in speed immediately.”

“Still braking,” Desjani said. “Those superbattleships take a while to shed velocity. Lieutenant Castries.”

“Yes, Captain.”

“Keep an eye on the alien armada’s maneuvering and let me know when their velocity steadies out.” Desjani sat back, frowning now, her eyes intent as if aiming a weapon. “Earlier, they had stopped accelerating before I thought they would.” She tapped controls. “Yeah. Our combined velocities when we came together would have been… point one seven light speed.”

“Point one seven.” Geary rubbed his chin. “I thought they were waiting to accelerate again when they were closer to us, but maybe they didn’t want to encounter us going any faster than that.”

“Want to bet they’ll brake down enough to meet us at point one seven light?” Desjani asked.

“If they do…” Geary felt himself smiling. “Our combat aiming systems are better than theirs.”

“Significantly better,” Desjani said. “Why do you suppose they’re changing velocity so early, though? Why not wait?”

“Good question.” The answer might imperil his whole plan, based as it was on the enemy’s charging his fleet. Geary passed the question on to the civilian experts, hoping they might come up with some insight.

It took nearly half an hour before Lieutenant Castries called out to Desjani. “They’ve steadied out, Captain.”

“Thank you. What do the maneuvering systems say our combined velocities will be when we encounter the bear-cows?”

“If neither of us alters velocity or course again… point one seven light speed, Captain.”

Desjani laughed softly. “Got ’em.”

“Good call, Tanya.” Geary was running some updates to his plan, taking into account the newly discovered fact that the bear-cow armada would limit its speed as it closed to contact. “That makes our next maneuver in one and a half hours.”

“Admiral, someone on one of the assault transports wants to speak with you,” the communications watch announced. “You’ve got your comms set to block him, though.”

He didn’t need distractions, but Geary checked to see who it was. Dr. Setin, one of the civilian experts. “Why is my software blocking Setin?” he grumbled.

Desjani heard, turning a glower toward the comm watch. “Have the systems people check the admiral’s screening software and find out why it’s blocking the wrong contacts.”

Geary entered the override, seeing Dr. Setin’s image pop up immediately, along with that of Dr. Shwartz. “Admiral,” Setin said eagerly, “Dr. Shwartz has an interesting theory regarding the alien beings in this star system. It’s based on a wide variety of observations and analysis—”

“Doctor,” Geary interrupted, “I’m busy in the preliminary stages of an engagement with those aliens right now. Can you just summarize the theory?”

Dr. Shwartz spoke quickly. “As humans, we’re used to dealing with creatures which, when threatened or pursuing something, start out with a quick burst of acceleration, trying to either get away or catch their prey by using maximum acceleration and speed for a short period. But an intelligent creature, and here I’m speaking of something as smart as the typical predator or prey, knows once it has escaped immediate danger or failed to catch its prey on the first lunge, that a prolonged chase might ensue. In that prolonged chase, both predator and prey adopt the pace best suited for them to maintain for long periods.”

Geary thought about that, his eyes going back to his display. “That’s what the bear-cows are doing? Instead of charging at maximum speed, they’re adopting a pace sufficient to get to us using their best efficiency?”

“I think so, yes, Admiral.”

“Dr. Shwartz, that doesn’t make sense. They’re not running after us. They’re in ships. The propulsion systems won’t wear out, the fuel won’t exhaust unless their designs are ridiculously short-legged in terms of endurance. We’ll be gone from this star system long before they could run out of means to continue chasing us.”

“Admiral.” Dr. Shwartz paused, then spoke quietly. “You are assuming that these aliens only intend that pursuit to last as long as we are here.”

He had to take that in, letting the idea settle, and not liking it at all. “You think they might follow us? Through that jump point?”

“Admiral, it’s possible that they will follow us as long as they possibly can, trying to destroy us so that we cannot return and threaten the herd again. These herbivores gained control of their world. They built those fortresses. They must be persistent, able to focus for long periods on issues of security, and willing to devote whatever it takes to eliminating threats.”

“Thank you. That’s an… interesting interpretation, though I hope you’re wrong.” After the images of the doctors vanished, Geary turned to Desjani and passed on the theory.

“Oh, great.” Desjani flexed her hands as if preparing for physical combat. “I wonder if they’ve got legs enough to follow us all the way back to Alliance space?”

“Without auxiliaries to transport and produce more fuel cells or whatever else they use?” Geary asked.

“Those superbattleships are big enough to have auxiliary capabilities,” she pointed out. “Big storage capacity, manufacturing shops, that kind of thing. You know, they make more sense now that I thought of that. Maybe they even grow food on some of the decks. A self-contained warship that can make everything it needs, that has essentially unlimited endurance as long as it can pick up new raw materials occasionally as it passes through star systems.”

He looked at the depictions of the bear-cow superbattleships with new eyes. “You’re right. They may not be that big just for immediate combat capability. One more thing to worry about.”

“We can take them as far as Syndic territory and lose them there so they can run amuck,” Desjani suggested. “I’m joking, by the way.”