Duellos’s battle cruisers overtook another Syndic heavy cruiser trying to join up with the surviving Syndic battle cruiser, lashing it with a barrage that tore the heavy cruiser apart. Not much farther onward lay the crippled Syndic battle cruiser limping frantically toward the oncoming but far-distant pair of Syndic battleships. Right behind Duellos’s warships came the battle cruisers of the Seventh Division, which slapped the remains of the heavy cruiser with a few more hell-lance hits as they tore past.

The Syndic battle cruiser seemed in a hopeless position, but as Duellos brought Courageous, Formidable, and Intrepid in for a killing shot, the Syndic pivoted at just the right moment and accelerated downward and to port. Duellos’s battle cruisers were moving so much faster than the Syndic that they couldn’t react in time and could only hurl a few long-range hell lances at the enemy ship.

But Brilliant, Inspire, and Opportune were far enough behind the first Alliance battle cruisers to be able to react to the evasive maneuver, and close enough behind that the Syndic couldn’t maneuver again before they got within range.

Geary tried to pull up mental images of the captains of Brilliant, Inspire, and Opportune and found himself oddly unable. Why hadn’t those battle-cruiser commanders ever impressed themselves on him? The realization bothered him, and he tried to bookmark in his memory the need to look up all three when time permitted.

The Syndic battle cruiser rolled and pitched slightly under the push of its working maneuvering thrusters. The change in aspect allowed the battle cruiser to bring its surviving hell lances to bear, and the charged-particle streams shot out, targeting Brilliant as she, Inspire, and Opportune altered their own vectors slightly to pass just to starboard and above the Syndic warship. Brilliant’s shields flared from a few hits while she and Inspire hurled volleys of hell lances into the weak shields of the Syndic ship. The Syndic’s shields collapsed under the barrage, then the Alliance hell lances lashed through the enemy battle cruiser, slicing apart hull, bulkheads, equipment, and any crew members unfortunate enough to be in the way.

By the time Leviathan, Dragon, Steadfast, and Valiant reached the Syndic battle cruiser, the enemy couldn’t maneuver and could only fire back with a single hell lance. Tulev’s battle cruisers battered the Syndic and went onward toward the battleships and lighter units trying to join up, leaving a silent hulk in their wake.

“His weapons and propulsion units are all dead, but something’s still working on him, and his crew hasn’t abandoned ship,” Desjani remarked, her voice almost pleading for an order to swing Dauntless over and get in the deathblow on the Syndic warship.

Geary nodded, his eyes on the display. “Daring is in a better position to finish him off. Let’s let her do it.” Desjani nodded, barely hiding her disappointment.

Daring angled slightly up and over, flashing by the crippled Syndic battle cruiser in another flurry of hell-lance fire. As Daring raced onward, the Syndic ship abruptly exploded as its power core overloaded. “Did any escape pods get away?” Geary wondered, suddenly realizing he hadn’t seen any.

A watch-stander shook her head. “A couple launched just before the core blew but got caught in the explosion.”

“Bastard,” Desjani muttered, clearly referring to the commanding officer of the Syndic ship who’d waited too late to allow the crew to abandon ship.

“You’re unhappy about Syndics dying?” Geary asked, surprised at Desjani’s being concerned about that. Tanya Desjani not only considered it her duty to destroy enemy ships and kill enemy military forces, but had usually seemed to derive a vengeful pleasure from the act.

Now she frowned at his question. “It’s just as well those crew members won’t be a threat to our people anymore,” Desjani explained, “but their commanding officer still had an obligation to give them a fighting chance. You know what I mean.”

He did, having given just such orders to most of his own crew to abandon ship a hundred years ago, as his fight at Grendel went from desperate to hopeless. “Yeah. I know.”

The onrushing Alliance battle cruisers, totally in their element as their speed allowed them to run down lighter enemy combatants, gleefully shattered a succession of Syndic HuKs and light cruisers, almost as an afterthought blowing apart the two remaining operational Syndic heavy cruisers nearby. Watching his battle cruisers charging through space to smash enemy ships while the Alliance battleships were still just short of reaching the Syndic Casualty Flotilla, Geary finally understood why the best officers in the Alliance aspired to command battle cruisers. It was as glorious as a charge by ancient horse cavalry on a planetary surface. But even now he couldn’t help wondering how many times battle cruisers had been ripped open in battle against more heavily armored battleships, and whether the number of engagements in which battle cruisers had been able to charge gloriously across the field of battle came anywhere close to the number times they had suffered from their lack of armor.

Behind Dauntless and the other battle cruisers, the Alliance battleships had altered courses slightly, aiming farther above the Syndic Casualty Flotilla and at an intercept with the two Syndic battleships still several light-minutes away. All around them, destroyers and light cruisers that had finished wiping out nearby Syndic ships were joining up with the battleships. In the very rear of what could loosely be called the Alliance fleet formation came the four fast fleet auxiliaries with their escorts of four battleships, Captain Cresida’s two battle cruisers, and about twenty light cruisers and destroyers. Unlike the other Alliance ships, the auxiliaries had kept their courses aimed straight for an intercept with the Syndic repair ships in the center of the flattened bubble making up the Casualty Flotilla.

“Our leading battle cruisers are two light-minutes short of those two Syndic battleships,” Desjani remarked. “They’ve been designated Syndic Flotilla Bravo. I wonder why the system didn’t just call them the Syndic Suicide Flotilla.”

She had a point, but Geary gestured to indicate the Alliance auxiliaries. “If they can somehow bull their way through to our auxiliaries, they could hurt us in a critical way.”

Desjani shook her head. “If they manage to get past everything we’ve got headed for them, they’ll be so weakened that Cresida’s ships can handle them.”

“I’m not happy with battle cruisers dueling with battleships, ” Geary noted, worried that his aggressive commanders might get carried away in the thrill of the battle so far. But he couldn’t give orders telling them not to be too aggressive. None of them would listen. He tapped his communications controls again. “All Alliance battle-cruiser formations, upon completion of firing passes against Syndic Flotilla Bravo, brake your velocity to match that of the Syndic Casualty Flotilla and await orders. All Alliance battleship formations are also to brake velocity to match the Casualty Flotilla’s speed as soon as Syndic Flotilla Bravo has been destroyed.”

As he was speaking, shuttles sprang away from the Alliance ships bearing down on the Casualty Flotilla, each shuttle bending its course toward specific targets. Most were aimed at the wreck of Audacious, but others headed for Syndic repair ships and nearby warships to ensure they were truly abandoned and safe for the Alliance ships to approach.

The shuttles were still headed for their objectives when Duellos’s battle cruisers and Syndic Flotilla Bravo tore past each other at a combined velocity just in excess of point two light speed. At that velocity, relativistic effects distorted the view of other objects enough to make targeting difficult, and the firing window when weapons were in range of the enemy was the tiniest fraction of a second.