Read The Lost Stars: Imperfect Sword for Free Online

velocities. Even the universe itself partially rejected them. By the time a spacecraft reached point two light speed, its vision of the universe outside it had begun stretching and distorting. Human equipment could compensate for that, could provide a “true” image of the outside, but once beyond those velocities, once a ship reached for point three or even point four light speed, human ingenuity could not prevail against the relativistic distortion that made the universe appear to be stretched and bunched like loose, elastic fabric. And the ship itself grew heavier, its mass increasing, making it ever harder to increase velocity. The cost and complications made such velocities much more expensive for trade than the extra days needed for travel cost. In practice, only warships boosted to point one and point two light speed, and didn’t try to fight at higher speeds than that because of the impossibility of scoring hits on one another when their view of the universe was warped too badly.
    Despite the obstacles facing them, humans had found the means to travel to different stars. Jump drives that pushed ships into a different place where distances were much shorter and the rules of this universe did not apply. The hypernet that used quantum entanglement to transport ships between stars without, technically, ever moving them. Humans had used those to settle the worlds orbiting other stars, trade between those worlds, and fight wars spanning the stars.
    Wars like that of the last century, started by the Syndicate Worlds and sustained by the refusal of the Alliance to surrender and the refusal of the Syndicate to stop fighting. In the end, with both sides tottering on the brink of collapse, a man who had supposedly died a century before, the legendary Black Jack Geary, had reappeared just in time to save the Alliance fleet. Geary had annihilated the Syndicate forces sent to catch him and forced an end to the war. Defeated, with its mobile forces decimated and economy reeling from the costs of the long war, the iron grip of the Syndicate government finally slipped, and star systems began breaking free.
    Star systems like this one.
    “Five minutes to maneuver time,” the senior watch specialist announced.
    Marphissa shook herself out of her reverie. “Execute maneuver on time using automated controls. Link all ships in this formation.” The precision with which the maneuver would be executed would make it clear to outside observers that they were using the systems to control the ships. That should further lull CEO Boucher into complacency.
    “Link all ships and execute maneuver using automated controls,” the watch specialist repeated to ensure that he had heard the order properly. “I understand and will comply.”
    At the mark, every ship in Marphissa’s formation swung up and to the side, coming around under the push of thrusters and main propulsion units. The turn-together maneuver meant that every ship remained in the same spot relative to the other ships in the formation. They changed their facing and accelerated toward a meeting with
Pele
, but the box formation had not altered.
    “You know,” Captain Bradamont commented, “if Admiral Geary had required his ships to maneuver on automated controls, he would have had to fend off scores of complaints from his ship captains.”
    Kapitan Diaz gave her a skeptical look. “They only would have complained once, though. Right? Then he would have replaced them.”
    “No. It took him a while to assert authority over his ships, and even now his decisions get questioned at times.”
    Marphissa shot Bradamont an irritated glance. “Seriously? Before Black Jack came back, we saw the Alliance ships attack us in swarms rather than rigid formations, but we thought that was doctrine.”
    “In a way, it was.” Bradamont sounded angry herself. “We’d forgotten that courage needs to be paired with discipline, individual initiative with support to your comrades. Admiral Geary