The Armageddon Inheritance

“And take on a million ships when you get there?” Hatcher said.

“Tough odds, but I’ve got a mousetrap pla

“That’s our problem. Even if we zap the vanguard, that still leaves what I think of as the ‘main body’: almost as numerous and with some really big mothers, under their supreme commander, a Great Lord Tharno.

“Now, the vanguard and main body actually keep changing relative position—they ‘leapfrog’ as they advance—and their rendezvous are much more tightly spaced than the scouts’ are. Again, this is to allow for communication; the scouts can’t pass messages laterally, and they only send one back to the closest main fleet rendezvous if they hit trouble, but the leading main formation sends couriers back to the trailing formation at each stop. If there’s really bad news, the lead force calls the trailer forward to link up, but only after investigating to be sure they need help, since it plays hell with their schedules. In any case, however, at least one courier is always sent back and there’s a minimum interval of about five months before the trailer can come up. With me so far?”

There were nods, and he smiled grimly.

“All right, that’s our major strategic advantage: their coordination stinks. Because they use hyper drives, their ships have to stay in hyper once they go into it until they reach their destination. And because their maximum fold-space com range is barely a light-year, the rear components of their fleet always jump to the origin point of the last message from the lead formation. Even in emergencies, the follow-on echelon has to jump to to almost exactly the same point, assuming they mean to coordinate with the leaders, because with their miserable communications they can’t find each other if they don’t.”

“Which means,” Marshal Tsien said thoughtfully, “that your own ships may be able to ambush their formations as they emerge from hyper.”

“Exactly, Marshal. What we hope to do is mousetrap the vanguard and wipe it out; I think we’ll get away with that, but we don’t know where the rendezvous point before this one is. That means we can’t stop the vanguard’s couriers from telling Lord Tharno about our trap, meaning that the main body will be alerted and ready when it comes out.

“So we probably will have to fight the main body. That pits seventy-eight of us against one-point-two million of them: about fifteen thousand to one.”

Someone swallowed audibly, and Colin smiled that grim smile again.

“I think we can take them. We may lose a lot of ships, but we ought to be able to swing it if they pop into n-space where we expect them.”

A long silence dragged out. Marshal Tsien broke it at length.

“Forgive me, but I do not see how you can do it.”

“I’m not certain we can, Marshal,” Colin said frankly. “I am certain that we have a chance, and that we can destroy at least half and more probably two-thirds of their force. If that’s all we accomplish, we may not save Earth, but we will save Birhat and the refugees headed there. That, Marshal Tsien—” he met the huge man’s eyes “—is why I’m so relieved to know we’re sending one of our best people to take over Bia’s defenses.”

“I am honored by your confidence, Your Majesty, yet I fear you have set yourself an impossible task. You have only fifteen partially-ma

“But Dahak is our ace in the hole. Unlike the rest of us, he can fight all of our unma

“And if something happens to him, Your Majesty?” Tsien asked quietly.

“Then, Marshal Tsien,” Colin said just as quietly, “I hope to hell you have Bia in shape by the time the incursion gets there.”

Chapter Twenty

“Hyper wake coming in from Sol, ma’am.”

Adrie

Adrie

“Captain, we’ve got a very faint wake coming in from the east, too,” her plotting officer said, and Lady Adrie

“Emergence times?”

“Bogey One will emerge into n-space in approximately seven hours twelve minutes, ma’am; make it oh-two-twenty zulu,” Fleet Commander Oliver Weinstein said. “Bogey Two’s a real monster to show up at this range at all. We’ve got a good hundred hours before they emerge, maybe as much as five days. I’ll be able to refine that in a couple of hours.”

“Do that, Ollie,” she said, relaxing again. The vanguard wasn’t as far ahead of schedule as she’d feared, just a bigger, more visible target than anticipated.

Adrie

“Herdan,” she said aloud.

“Yes, Captain?” a soft soprano replied, and Adrie

“Assume Bogey Two has sca

“Computing.” There was a brief pause. “Probability approaches zero.”

“How closely?”

“Probability is one times ten to the minus thirty-second,” Herdan responded. “Plus or minus two percent.”

“Well, that’s pretty close to zero at that, I guess,” Adrie

“Comment not understood.”

“Ignore last comment,” Adrie

“Acknowledged,” Herdan said, and Lady Adrie

“Scout emergence into n-space in fourteen minutes, sir.”

“Thank you, Janet,” Senior Fleet Captain Tamman said, wishing he could share his tension with Amanda, and wasn’t that a silly thought when he’d taken such pains to insure that he couldn’t? Well, he admitted, “pains” was the wrong word, but he’d only gotten away with it because he’d found out about Colin’s compulsory perso

He thought she would forgive him someday, but he’d almost lost her once in La Paz, and then a rifle slug went right through her visor aboard Vindicator. It was only the Maker’s own grace it hadn’t shattered, and she’d used up most of her helmet sealant and all of her luck. He was taking no chances this time.