The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Guardian

“It is possible, sir.” Major Dietz spoke with authority but no hint of boastfulness. “As I said, lurking at full stealth near the path they expect us to use, so they’d only have to use minimal power to bring about an intercept. I’ve done it to their ships. I’m force recon, Admiral.”

“I see. That makes you a much bigger expert on the matter than I am.” The group had reached another temporary air lock blocking their path. “What is this?” Geary asked.

“The fake main engineering control,” Admiral Lagemann advised.

“You’ve made a fake main engineering control?”

Lagemann opened the air lock and stepped inside.

Geary blinked at the lack of clean atmosphere on the other side of the air lock. “A fake air lock, too?”

“Naturally.” Lagemann waved around him. “This was some kind of Kick recreational area, we think. Mostly empty except for what looks like sport equipment sized for Kicks. General Carabali sent over two Persian Donkeys at the request of Major Dietz.” Lagemann pointed to a squat device resting in the center of the space. “Here’s one of them. Have you been briefed on what the Donkeys do, Admiral?”

“Yes. We used them at Heradao.” Geary came closer to the device, which didn’t look at all like a real donkey. “Marine deception gear. They can send out full-spectrum signals and signatures to mimic just about anything.”

Major Dietz nodded. “Anything from a headquarters complex to a dispersed armored ground forces unit on the advance,” he said. “Each Donkey isn’t very big, but they each carry scores of little subdecoys that can be sent out and generate all kinds of signatures that someone is there. Communications, bits of spoken conversation, infrared signatures, seismic thumps to match steps or equipment moving, other sounds of weapons and other equipment, you name it. This particular Donkey has been set to generate fake indications that this compartment is full of power-core-control equipment and people operating that equipment.”

“Nice,” Geary approved. “Where’s the other Donkey?”

“In the compartment a ways from here that will look like a bridge area to Syndic sensors,” Dietz said a trifle smugly.

Geary smiled despite the sense of disapproving ghosts hovering nearby. “A fake bridge and a fake main engineering control. These Donkeys will lure anyone sneaking onto the ship toward a place where you aren’t. Can you spot them moving here?”

“If they’re in full stealth mode?” the Major asked. “Not easily, sir. That’s why we’ve got all of the approaches to these areas laced with sensors to spot anyone coming in. We can’t cover the whole ship with what we’ve got, but we can cover the two areas that are baited.”

“Sensors can be defeated,” Geary said, recalling some of the things he had seen Marines do during their operations. “Can the Syndics spot your sensors and disable them or spoof them?”

Major Dietz definitely sounded smug this time. “They can, Admiral. But we have a sergeant who’s a bit of a tech genius in her spare time. She’s always fiddling with stuff. Sergeant Lamarr came up with decoy sensors.”

“Decoy sensors? Fakes?”

“No, sir. Much better than fakes. They look just like regular sensors of certain types. Externally, no matter how good you check them, they look like regular sensors, and if they’re active, they send out the same indications. But inside, the guts aren’t designed to do what that sensor would do. Instead, they’re designed to detect all of the ways that type of sensor could be bypassed, spoofed, or disabled without alerting people.”

Geary almost laughed. “They are designed to detect nothing but methods of defeating sensors? Methods which can usually be undetectable?”

“Exactly, sir. Normally, that sort of stuff is piggybacked onto the sensors, which means it has limited capabilities since it’s a secondary function. But on a Lamarr sensor, it’s the primary and only function. A Lamarr sensor can’t spot anything unless someone messes with it.”

“There’s a risk with using those,” Lagemann added. “If you put one of those Lamarr sensors on a hatch, and someone just opens the hatch, you don’t get any warning. But if someone spots the sensor and tries to defeat it before opening the hatch, you are sure to know. Oh, actually there are two risks. They’re unauthorized and unapproved modifications to existing equipment. We could get slapped on the wrists by fleet headquarters.”

Geary let out an exasperated sigh. “Sergeant Lamarr’s chain of command hasn’t approved that type of sensor?”

“Up to a certain point,” the Major said. “All field commands approved. But when it hit headquarters and the design-and-acquisition bureaucracy, it got shot down.”

“Surprising, isn’t it?” Admiral Lagemann murmured.