At All Costs

"We're not going to 'attempt' anything, Pat," Honor said flatly. "We're going to do it."

"Run through it for us again, please," Caparelli requested.

"A lot of our pla

"Obviously, we can't absolutely rely on any of those premises, but we believe they should all hold true. In particular, although they've got to be concerned about the security of Lovat, we've consistently shied away from hitting targets that hard. That ought to generate at least some sense of false security, no matter how good they are.

"We know from our operations over the last sixty days that they've been reacting vigorously to our scouting operations. It's pretty obvious they've been trying to identify the systems we're likely to hit and stationing forces in hyper to cover them.

"As you know, we pla

"We got one. It was a virtual repeat of what they did to me at Solon. This time, though, we'd expected what we got, and they'd pla

"The operation did several things. First, it confirmed that, at that time, at least, they were sticking with a doctrine which had worked. Second, it gave us an opportunity to evaluate how quickly this covering force, as compared to the one we encountered at Solon, responded. Third, we hope it made them even more confident that we've been essentially ru

She paused and reached for the glass sitting at the corner of her blotter. Andrea Jaruwalski quickly topped it off with ice water from a carafe, and Honor smiled her thanks before she sipped. Then she set the glass down and looked back up at Caparelli, Givens, and Hemphill.

"We ran a few other ops, similar in nature but without the electronic warfare platforms. In two cases, we drew no response at all, which leads us to suspect that in those two cases there were picket forces hiding in hyper which never got called in because they never saw a threat. In most of the others, the arrival of our scout units was the signal for courier boats to translate out, and fairly hefty response forces turned up within anywhere from forty-eight hours to four days. So, it looks like they've adopted a nodal strategy, in addition to staking out the systems they believe we're most likely to attack.

"By picking Lovat, we believe we'll be striking directly at one of those nodal forces. If we can punch it out when we hit, there shouldn't be anything else close enough to be called in on us for at least seventy-two hours, if our analysis of their previous operations is accurate. In addition, since we'll be scouting a heavily defended system, and we've established a pattern of sending diversionary scouts into systems we have no intention of attacking, we believe they'll be skeptical about our intentions. Even if they aren't, there's no reason for them to call in additional reinforcements before we actually hit them.

"And this time around, especially since we know what to look for in their system defense control net, we ought to be able to neutralize it with Mistletoe before they ever get a chance to use it. In which case, it will be our wallers and our LACs against theirs, in a standup fight without the sort of missile launch which hammed us at Solon."

"So you're confident you can neutralize their system defense command and control systems?" Givens asked, but her attention was more than half on Hemphill, and Honor smiled.

"Admiral Hemphill and I haven't always been on the same page," she began, and Hemphill actually chuckled.

"You might say that, Your Grace," she said, "if you're given to understatement. I seem to recall a rather passionate debriefing you gave the Weapons Development Board after that little affair in Basilisk."

"I was younger then, Admiral," Honor said almost demurely. "And I was mildly irritated, at the time."

"And rightly so," Hemphill said with a nod. She shook her head. "I don't believe I've ever had the opportunity to actually tell you this, Your Grace, but I always envisioned Fearless as a testbed. I never expected her to be committed to combat, especially not totally unsupported. The fact that you managed to win was an impressive testimony to your tactical ability. And the fact that you were-'mildly irritated,' I believe you said-was certainly understandable. Besides," she chuckled again, "having watched your track record over the last few years, I'm inclined to doubt you've mellowed all that much since."

"Not mellowed," Honor said with another smile. "Just gained a greater sense of... diplomacy."

This time Caparelli and Givens joined Hemphill's laughter, and Caparelli tipped his chair back.

"I believe you are about to respond to Pat's question, Your Grace?" he said.

"Yes, I was," Honor agreed, turning her attention back to Admiral Givens. "What I was about to say, Pat, is that this time around, I'm convinced Admiral Hemphill's new wrinkles will do the job. I'd hoped to keep her new toys tucked away against a rainy day, without letting the Havenites know they exist until we really, really needed them. Unfortunately, 'really, really need them' is a pretty good description of where we are right now. At any rate, we've quietly tested the new hardware in exercises at Trevor's Star, and it's performed to specs. Obviously, that's not the same as using it operationally, but the exercise results look very good. In fact, they look much better than the original projections. We're really still just begi

She smiled again, and this time there was no amusement at all in her expression.

"As a matter of fact," Admiral Lady Dame Honor Alexander-Harrington said softly, "I'm rather looking forward to the opportunity."