Jack Campbell - Invincible

The quiet lasted for several seconds this time. Everyone knew that Tulev’s home world had been destroyed by the Syndics. The planet was still there, but the only humans left in that star system were a pitifully few die-hard survivors who had been occupying defenses in case the Syndics ever came back. Nothing else remained but craters and wreckage on a world that no longer held other life.

“I won’t argue that,” Badaya finally said, his voice stiff. “But the fact remains that we didn’t immediately attack them when we arrived in this star system. We haven’t refused to communicate. We have to treat these creatures as enemies because they give us no choice.”

“If these are herd animals,” Captain Jane Geary of Dreadnaught remarked, “and we’re predators, then let’s act our role and make them respect us.”

“Absolutely!” Badaya agreed.

Wonderful. Now his grandniece was goading Badaya, who never needed a push to start being a loose cannon. Before Geary could reply, Desjani did, her tone dryly ironic. “These cows have guns. Big guns.”

“I never liked cows,” General Carabali added. “I like heavily armed cows even less. And I like at least thirty billion heavily armed cows least of all.”

Duellos nodded. “It would take a long time to kill thirty billion of them. They have no lack of cannon fodder, and they’re plainly willing to sacrifice members of the herd to protect the herd as a whole.”

“All right,” Geary said. “We’re still mostly speculating as to the nature of these creatures. What we do know is that they possess a defense we don’t against kinetic weapons, and they have a lot of very large warships as well as a lot of smaller attack craft. Since there are a tremendous number of them, we have to assume they have a lot of resources to throw at us. Right now we’re cutting across the outer edge of the star system toward one of the other jump points in this star system. At our current velocity, which we have to maintain in any event while repairing battle damage, it will be forty-one hours before we reach that jump point. We’ll remain on our current vector while I consider options and how to get us through that or another jump point without losing half of the fleet by going head-to-head with these bear-cows.”

“What is our goal?” Jane Geary asked.

“Our goal is to exit this star system and proceed toward another star heading back toward Alliance space.”

“That’s a final goal, Admiral. As an interim goal, we need to eliminate the threat to us.”

“Our mission is to explore and evaluate,” Geary replied in what he hoped was a level voice. “These creatures don’t seem to get on well with the enigmas, either, so I see no benefit for us in weakening them. The threat they posed may have kept the enigmas from turning all of their force and attention on humanity. Nor do I know how we can defeat them without taking serious losses. If necessary, we’ll fight our way out of here and destroy anything that tries to stop us. But I would prefer not to lose any more ships or personnel.”

Captain Bradamont of Dragon tapped a control before her, and a representation of one of the alien superbattleships appeared floating in front of her, clearly visible to everyone. Bradamont said nothing, letting the image of the alien behemoth speak for itself.

Badaya stared at the image, then nodded with visible reluctance. “Those superbattleships of theirs are very impressive.”

“They look impressive,” Jane Geary countered.

“Looks are all we have to go on. We know too little about what these creatures can do.” Badaya turned a twisted smile on General Carabali. “The Marines have no enthusiasm for learning about an enemy’s unknown combat capabilities the hard way, and I feel the same way about going up against one of those alien ships. Perhaps we can learn more, learn about vulnerabilities, but until we find those, Admiral Geary is right in choosing not to charge blindly into battle with them.”

Desjani covered up a startled sound by coughing, then gave Geary a wondering look that he understood. Badaya is saying we should avoid a blind charge into battle? Maybe he’s becoming a bit less of a loose cannon.

Captain Jane Geary, seeing that Badaya wasn’t backing her, subsided, but only for a moment. “What about the enigmas, Admiral? Are we still worrying about them?”

“I’m still worried about them,” Geary said, though in truth he hadn’t spent much effort on that recently, with so many more immediate issues to deal with. “General Charban has suggested that the presence of defenses facing the enigmas indicates this species does not have good relations with the enigmas.” He turned to where the virtual presences of two of the civilian “experts” sat. “What do you think?” he asked.

Professor Shwartz and Dr. Setin exchanged glances, then Setin spoke carefully. “The enigmas pursued us through space controlled by them, but this is not their space. Maintaining their privacy seems to have been a powerful motivation for them, but of course if they are not here, there is no danger of us violating their privacy in this star system.”

“The species here was certainly ready for immediate action against anyone coming through that jump point,” Professor Shwartz added. “As far as we know, only enigmas would be expected to be using that jump point, so as the general said, the defenses there must be against the enigmas.”

“Which means we can focus for now on dealing with this species and the threat they pose,” Geary concluded. “Anything else?”

Commander Neeson spoke up again. “A suggestion, Admiral. These aliens easily diverted the standard kinetic round we fired at their nearest fortress. Captain Smythe’s engineers can fabricate some new kinetic rounds loaded with sensors. We can fire those at the nearest orbital fortress, too, one by one, and perhaps learn more about how that defensive system works by getting more readings about whatever field or force is generated by it.”

“Good idea,” Geary agreed. “Captain Smythe?”

Smythe glanced at the auxiliaries commanders. “I think we would enjoy the challenge, Admiral. We can also construct the new projectiles using a variety of casings. Different alloys, composites, and so on, to see how the defensive system handles them. I must add, however, that this will divert some of my resources from other assigned tasks.”

“Understood.” Other assigned tasks. Mainly the ongoing effort to replace equipment on every ship of the fleet that was reaching the end of its planned life span. It seemed that every time the fleet was catching up on that major problem, some other item demanded attention from the auxiliary force. “Get to it. Get my authorization before each launch, just in case we’ve seen some sort of advance in our attempts to communicate with the, uh…”

“Teddy bear-cows,” Desjani said.

“Can we just call them bear-cows?” Captain Vitali asked. “I feel ridiculous talking about fighting teddy bear-cows.”

“They are cute,” Duellos said. “Not that it matters.”

“It doesn’t,” Desjani agreed. “I can kill cute if it tries to kill me.”

“We’ll call them bear-cows,” Geary said. He wished figuring out how to escape this star system intact was as easy as deciding what to call the species that was intent on wiping out his fleet.

“I have another question,” Captain Hiyen said.

“Yes?” Geary prompted when Hiyen didn’t continue.

“Why are we even here, Admiral? Why are we scores of light-years from Syndic space and much farther from our homes? Why are we facing this situation?”

A different level of tension came to life around the table. As Geary looked from face to face, the software automatically zooming in on anyone he looked at, he saw expressions range from unhappiness to stubbornness, with all too many clearly showing sympathy for the question.