Jack Campbell - Leviathan

But the dark battle cruisers had seen the opportunity and were pouring maximum thrust from their propulsion, as was the other dark battleship formation, and Tango Two simply did not have enough velocity to avoid their charges and did not have the time to build up that velocity.

Captain Jane Geary on Dreadnaught called in, her expression that of someone facing the end. “We will make them pay, Admiral. Avenge us.”

“I will.” He had already probably lost Michael Geary, and now Jane would die as well. Because of his decisions, both of the grandchildren of his brother dead. Because they were Gearys and forced to follow in the footsteps of Black Jack.

“The dark battle cruisers are still coming around,” Lieutenant Castries said, sounding puzzled.

“Take another look,” Desjani said.

“Captain, they have passed the point at which they should have held to their vector to hit Tango Two.”

Geary and Desjani both sat up straighter, eyes going to the places on their displays where the dark battle cruisers were represented.

“What are they doing?” Desjani asked in disbelief.

“They’re still coming about, Captain,” Lieutenant Castries said, sounding as baffled as her commanding officer. “So are the dark battleships. They’ve also passed the vector for intercepting Tango Two.”

“So is the third dark ship formation,” Geary said. “Look.”

“Where are they going?” Desjani demanded. “Tell me where they’re going!”

Her lieutenants exchanged helpless glances.

“They’re finally steadying out,” Geary said. “Where is that—? Where does that vector lead?”

“Away from our formations,” Desjani said. “Why would they spend twenty straight hours trying to tear us apart and suddenly head off like that? Could Admiral Bloch have suddenly regained some control of them? Did some software routine activate that caused them to stop fighting us?”

“I think it’s software,” Geary said. “Something the dark ships did not see coming.”

“Captain,” Castries said, “the three dark ship formations are all steadying onto vectors for the jump point for Montan.”

“Montan?” Desjani stared at her display as if an explanation for the inexplicable could be found there. “What could they want at Montan?”

“It’s the nearest jump point from where we are now in this star system,” Castries pointed out. “Aside from that, the only major feature at Montan is a hypernet gate, Captain. Montan is one of the fallback star systems if Varandal had fallen to the Syndics, so it had a gate installed to allow rapid shifting of defensive forces.”

“A hypernet gate?” Desjani turned a baffled gaze on Geary. “They’re trying to get back to their base? Are they running away from us?”

“It looks like it,” he said, fighting off an immense weariness and afraid to believe that his hope had really manifested.

“If you don’t mind my saying so, Admiral, that’s pretty damned miraculous for someone who claims not to have any ins with the living stars.”

“There’s no miracle involved,” Geary said. “The dark ships are programmed for tactics, not logistics. You’ve all seen how hard they’ve pushed their maneuvers, which has also burned their fuel cells at a very high rate. Look at our own fuel cell status. Look at our destroyers.”

Desjani checked the data. “Our destroyers are low. Fifteen percent on average. That’s not surprising after all the dancing we did at maximum thrust over the last twenty hours. You think the dark ships broke off because of low fuel cell reserves?”

“I know they did,” he said, unable to keep the triumph and elation out of his voice as the dark ships continued to head for the jump point for Montan. “Some of their ships, maybe all of their destroyers, must have gone as low as ten percent fuel cell reserves. What do fleet regulations say about that?”

Lieutenant Yuon, who had probably been studying just those regulations for his fleet promotion standards, answered quickly. “Any formation containing warships reaching ten percent fuel cell reserves must disengage and refuel immediately.”

“No exceptions, right?” Geary said.

“No exceptions, sir,” Yuon agreed.

“Why would they pay attention to that?” Desjani demanded. “The dark ships shot up all of the shipping in this star system, they attacked Ambaru, they attacked Atalia, they attacked us . Why would they obey what fleet regulations say about fuel cell levels?”

“Dr. Nasr said the dark ships must have two ways of thinking. A set of firm instructions on what to do and what not to do, and a flexible set of programs intended to mimic human thought processes. Those flexible programs might well have allowed the dark ships to rationalize their way past limits they have encountered in the past. But Dr. Nasr said that if the dark ships ran into a new, firm prohibition, they would have a problem with it since they hadn’t yet rationalized their way past it. They would have to obey that rigid instruction until they worked around it.”

“Ancestors save us,” Desjani said. “I guess maybe our ancestors did save us.”

“They told me,” Geary blurted out, too tired and excited to hide it. “With a candle flame. Dodge and keep dodging. Don’t get caught.”

“I keep telling you to listen to them,” Desjani said. “So you saw that the dark ships were burning their fuel cells a lot faster than we were and just hoped they would run low enough before we did, and hoped that Dr. Nasr was right?”

“Pretty much, yeah.”

She gazed at him wordlessly, then laughed. “We owe our miracle to fleet regulations. I will never live that down.”

“Fleet regulations had to be good for something. I’ll take my miracles in any form they care to appear.” Geary spent a long moment contemplating his display, still absorbing the reality that his fleet would not be destroyed here. “It’s tempting to try to send some ships after them, to try to follow them to their base.”

“But?”

“But the dark ships would see them following. It would be far too easy for the dark ships to leave an ambush at Montan. I can’t risk that.”

“Ask for volunteers—” Desjani began.

“No. I will not send people to die for no purpose, no matter how enthusiastically they volunteer for the task. And all of our ships are getting low on fuel cell reserves at this point, too.” Geary sighed and closed his eyes, finally letting what had happened settle into his nerves and relax them. “We’ve saved Bhavan. We’ll follow the dark ships at a distance until they jump to Montan, then head back to Varandal.”

“What if the dark ships work around the fuel cell reserve regulation before they jump for Montan?” Desjani asked.

“Then we’ll be much better positioned to engage them again, and their ships will be increasingly low on fuel cell reserves. That could be our best outcome, if they turn to fight us again with their fuel nearly exhausted.”

“Let’s hope,” she agreed. “Even the dark battleships would be helpless as their power cores shut down.”

But the dark ships apparently failed to overcome their blind adherence to fleet regulations in time. They jumped for Montan half a day later, and Geary led his battered fleet back toward Varandal, ignoring the questions now streaming in from Bhavan asking whether the threat was gone and what would happen now? He didn’t try to answer those questions because he had no answers.

“It sounds like things got pretty bad at Bhavan.” Admiral Timbale grimaced unhappily. “We saw those dark battle cruisers pop out of the hypernet gate and charge for the jump point for Bhavan, but the only things we had close enough to intercept them were a few destroyers and one cruiser. Not wanting to lose any more ships in hopeless fights, I ordered them out of contact. Your Captain Duellos was very upset, but with two of his battle cruisers still in dock, he couldn’t even chase after the dark ships.”