The syndic pursuing force which came in after the mutineer ships returned to the lost fleet was defeated, but at a very high cost. Several ships are badly damaged, some have to be scuttled, and every ship is low on supplies.
They come upon a syndic mining system, and raid it for supplies; food, raw materials for repairs, ammo and fuel cells. The syndics also anticipate his moves, and are now wary of blindly charging at him. They work on improving their own techniques to counter his superior tactics.
In the meanwhile, Geary starts a relationship with co-president Victoria Rione, a politician on the flagship giving oversight to the military operation. Geary’s staff start investigating the nature and origin of the Hypernet gates, and surmise that there must be a third player, an unknown possibly non-human entity, who made the technology available to both Syndics and Alliance in the hope that they will destroy each other.
In this book, the action flags a little, as the focus moves sideways to Geary handling incompetent and rebellious underlings, and grappling with the logistics of command while managing a relationship on the side. The pace still keeps up, but on the whole, this book feels a little bit like a filler.