"We're heading back to the capital," Accari said. "Set our course for the DeLonges System." He looked over at Marcum as the new course was programmed in. "You're sure this is a good idea, sir?"

"Nope," Marcum said, still smiling. "But what the hell, right?"

"What the hell indeed, sir."

31

"Accari checked in, Admiral. The enemy did show up in a manner we find highly suspicious. He was able to get most of the fleet out of there. A few were incomplete hulls, a few more wouldn't fire up."

"Thanks," Jackson said as Barrett handed him a coffee mug. "What did he do with the non-performers?"

"Put a Shrike into each on his way out of the system." Barrett smiled.

"Good man," Jackson said. "And he got himself and everything else out without incident?"

"Yes, sir," Barrett said.

The Nemesis had gone through four complete watch rotations as Kohl's drone ships plodded down into the system. They were nearly halfway to the planet Xinjia and, so far, the defense fleet seemed unsure and hesitant to meet them. There had been a flurry of broadcast messages sent requesting they pull off, demanding to know if they were acting on orders of the president, and finally responding to threats they'd not followed up on.

Jackson's CIC crews still searched for the controlling source, the assumption being it would almost certainly be the ship Kohl was on but, so far, they'd had no luck. Since the ESA had yet to develop their own non-RF based com system, the area was flooded with radio waves across the spectrum. It meant they'd have to carefully sift through it all and try to isolate the command signal they were using to trigger actions in the Tritons.

More than finding out where the control ship was, the thing Jackson really wanted to know was why? Why do this at all? Vadim Kohl had used drone ships before and seemed to like the tactic, but those were small, stealthy ships. A handful of century-old destroyers didn’t amount to much given their lack of speed, maneuverability, or destructive power.

"Xinjia's fleet is moving," Hori reported. "They're older ships but have been retrofitted with RDS pods so we're tracking them in real-time. CIC will update projected enemy positions based on what the defense force does."

Eleven ships peeled away from Xinjia, breaking their high parking orbit and flying on a direct intercept course towards the incoming Tritons. The old 1^st Fleet destroyers were still broadcasting their old ident beacon codes and burning towards the planet at full thrust. The acceleration profile of the Xinjian ship was tepid but modern standards, but their advantage over the older thrust ships was stark. It would let them ignore the fifth planet for their intercept while their targets would need to respect the gravity pull and arc their course around it.

"Are the Triton's running active sensors?" Jackson asked.

"Negative, Admiral."

"Sir?" Barrett asked.

"The incoming ships just adjusted course. If they're not running active sensors, they wouldn't be able to see the Xinjian ships coming up to meet them for at least another fourteen, fifteen hours," Jackson said. "If the remote ship was in the outer system, they'd have an even longer detection delay. They have a spotter down near the planet or they're down there themselves."