The Battle of Grendel, also known as Geary's Last Stand, was one of the opening battles of the Alliance-Syndicate War, one of a number of simultaneous strikes against Alliance systems. The battle was a surprise attack by a Syndicate Worlds task force against an Alliance convoy, as both proceeded through the border system of Grendel towards T'shima.
The battle was largely in favor of the Syndicate Worlds, and could loosely be considered a victory by the definition of their success in destroying the ASN Merlon, but was tactically an Alliance victory as the convoy and the majority of its escorts managed to escape and warn the Alliance base at T'shima, negating the Syndicate World's advantage of surprise.
In the following years, there were a number of other battles at Grendel until the star system was abandoned.