He still wished he could have used this tactic against the Federation's capital as had been his original plan, but this would probably be just as satisfying. If he were being honest, he disliked the Asianic Union about as much as he did New America and Britannia, but the Warsaw Alliance simply didn't have the strength to stand on its own against the AU and the Federation.

Perhaps that would all change once he was done here.

* * *

"There's another synchronized course correction, sir" Barrett stood in front of the main display with his hands on his hips while Jackson sat in the Nemesis's familiar command chair, rubbing at where his prosthetic leg was irritating him. "OPS?"

"Course change was executed by all twelve ships within fifteen milliseconds, about the same as the last two," Lieutenant Commander Hori reported. She was pulling a double watch, and her eyes were bloodshot and twitchy from the amount of caffeine she'd consumed.

"Drone ships," Jackson grunted, frowning. "They're becoming more and more common in the battlespace lately. OPS, have CIC see if they can detect a remote signal source at this range. It's possible they're moving based on pre-programmed courses, but more likely there's a ship out there controlling them."

"Aye, sir."

"Seems like a lot of trouble to convert old hulks like that into remote controlled ships," Barrett remarked.

"Less so than you'd think," Jackson said. "Most of the hardware and software is already there, you just need to design the interface. If you don't need them to do anything but follow basic fly-to commands, it's only a day or so worth of work. We've used the same type of setup as testbeds for decades. It's the only reason we keep decommissioned ships intact instead of recycling them for their refined metals."

"So, what would you do with twelve drone ships made from Phage War-era destroyers?" Barrett asked.

"Something horrible," Jackson said. "The real question is whether they're going for shock value, misdirection, or just wholesale destruction."

"CIC reports that there's— Standby, sir," Hori said, pulling her headset fully on and speaking rapidly into it. "Admiral, there's a system-wide broadcast coming from the lead ship."

"Coms?" Barrett asked.

"I have it, sir."

"Put it on."

"—I repeat, this is the United Terran Federation warship, Scarab. I am Admiral Winston Davies. My taskforce is here in response to a rash of Alliance attacks along Federation-held systems." The voice coming over the speakers definitely had an Anglo-accent that was common in Britannia, but the cadence was odd. It sounded too mechanical, as if it was a computer recreating the voice or someone reading off a script.

"I have a series of demands I will broadcast shortly. Do not attempt to impede my ships, do not attempt to engage us with your Homeguard fleet. Any aggressive actions on your part will be met with overwhelming force. Standby for further instructions. Scarab out."

"It's just looping from the beginning, sirs," the com officer said, shutting off the message.