The Lost Fleet Beyond the Frontier Invincible

If Armus had been the sort of person to beam with delight, he would have done so now. Battleship commanders were looked down upon in this fleet as the steady but unremarkable type, with formation command positions almost always going to battle cruiser commanders. Geary had usually been forced to follow that same pattern since he was stuck with the ship commanders he had inherited, which meant that the battle cruiser commanders were more likely to be his best commanders. Unfortunately, some of them had also been among his worst commanders.

But rather than show any sign of celebration at an opportunity battleship commanders rarely received Armus merely nodded with slow deliberation and then, almost as an afterthought, threw in a salute. “I understand, Admiral. Thank you for your confidence in me.”

After the call ended, Desjani gave Geary another glance. “Armus? He and Jane Geary are toss-ups for that assignment in terms of seniority.”

“I know.” I also know which one of them I can trust to stay with that superbattleship and its tow ships.

He didn’t say that out loud, but Tanya surely knew he was thinking it. She didn’t object or argue, though.

“All units, this is Admiral Geary. I will be dividing the fleet. The fast pursuit force will proceed to Midway to engage the enigmas while the main body of the fleet follows. Formation orders will be going out momentarily.”

“Done,” Desjani said. “How’s yours? Oh, hell, let me finish it.”

“I had to talk to people,” Geary said defensively.

“Yes. You’re the admiral. Now that you’ve told me and everyone else what to do, let us help you do it.”

Maneuvering problems that would have taxed the minds of humans and taken long hours to work out could be done in moments with the assistance of the automated systems. If the person doing the work also had a good intuitive grasp of maneuvering and what could most easily go where, it went even faster.

Desjani had a very good intuitive grasp of maneuvering.

“Check it,” she asked him.

He did a quick sanity check of her work, knowing that small problems would be corrected automatically by the fleet’s maneuvering systems. In terms of the big picture . . . “It looks great.” Two more taps on the comm system, and the maneuvering orders were flying out to every ship in the fleet.

Geary had specified an oval formation for the pursuit force, with one broad side facing forward, and the designated ships raced to get into position. Lined up along the center were the battle cruisers, where he could easily redistribute them to anywhere else in the formation. After the losses of Invincible and Brilliant he had only fourteen left, and of those, Illustrious and Incredible had been chewed up at Honor. While they were technically combat capable again after a tremendous amount of repair work, Geary had to be careful what he did with those two.

Around the battle cruisers ranged the light cruisers, while the destroyers formed up on the outer edges as well as the front and back of the formation. “All units in pursuit force, immediate execute accelerate to point two five light speed.”

The pursuit force began pulling away from the main body while the battleships, heavy cruisers, and destroyers were still getting into position in another oval, this one centered on the captured superbattleship, the assault transports and auxiliaries, and the battleships.

Geary realized that his pursuit force was rapidly gaining on the small spider-wolf formation, which had remained in the lead thus far. “General Charban, Emissary Rione, we need to notify the spider-wolf delegation that this force is heading back to Alliance space at high speed to engage the enigmas.”

Rione answered. “That message may exceed our vocabulary, Admiral, but we’ll do our best.”

What else? Something behind him. Another call. “Admiral Lagemann.”

Lagemann looked more than a little haggard but still cheerful. Given the rough living conditions on the captured ship, Geary was only surprised that the other admiral didn’t look worse. “I’m going ahead. Captain Armus is in charge of the formation around your ship. He won’t let anything through to you.”

“Thank you, Admiral,” Lagemann replied. “If something does get through, I’ve got an impressive force of Marines to defend my ship. I never imagined going into combat in something like this.”

“We’ll try to keep you out of combat.”

“Well,” Lagemann said, waving a hand around to indicate his surroundings, “if worse comes to worst, at least there’s a lot of armor and a lot of mass between us and whoever is attacking. Did I tell you that I’ve christened my ship?”

“No,” Geary said. “You gave it a name?”

“Yes. A fitting name. I’m tired of hearing my ship called BKS or LCCO or RBST or—”

“RBST?” Geary asked.

“Really Big Slow Target. I came up with a much better name.” Lagemann grinned. “This is the latest Invincible, Admiral.”