The Cobra shuddered from bow to stern as a mass driver round clanged off its barriers, a glancing hit but still enough to send warning alarms screaming through the bridge. Hundreds of solid projectiles were hurtling through the void now as the Narvorian ships opened fire, their mass driver batteries creating a deadly web.

"Barriers holding!" Hooper yelped. "Ninety-eight percent."

"Torpedoes?" Wraia demanded as the cataphract lurched, swinging left then right, manoeuvring thrusters sending it on a punishing course that the inertial compensators could only do so much to mask.

"Targeting solutions plotted!" Gallagher barked, his face a mask of stony concentration as he directed the ship's weapons. "Locked and firing."

A dull, muffled thumping from below decks signalled the unleashing of the Cobra's first salvo of return fire. Trails of cobalt blue lit up the empty space between the two sides as the torpedoes were blasted from their tubes, their sensors latching onto the enemy signatures.

Ahead of them the Merlin performed a hull-wrenching turn to avoid a broadside of mass-shot, and a moment later let loose its own ordnance.

The smaller Narvorian ships closed ranks around the light cruiser, short range point defence batteries boiling into life. Wraia watched, fingers tightening against her armrests as sprays of crimson began blanketing the nearby space. Most of the torpedoes went up in fireballs as they were swatted by the defences, but a few squeaked through.

Two exploded against the defences of the Narvorian cruiser, but the bigger vessel's thick armour withstood the onslaught. Fire washed over its hull, leaving dark scorched smears behind. Not all of their adversaries were so lucky, though.

"Direct hit!" Gallagher announced triumphantly.

She saw it. One of the smaller Narvorian defenders went listing drunkenly to starboard, a crater in its flank from where one of the Cobra's torpedoes had slammed headlong into it. Lights flickered; its engines sputtered weakly.

There wasn't much time to congratulate themselves, however. The other Narvorian ships came powering forward, mass drivers hurling fresh, furious barrages into space.

"Continue evasive manoeuvres," Wraia snapped. "Keep us pointed at them, Mr. Ratcliffe. Let's not give a bigger target than we have to."

"Aye, ma'am!"

"One Navorian defender badly damaged," Hooper interjected. "Sensors show its power down to forty-three percent. Main offensive batteries offline."

"Mr. Gallagher?"

"Bow tubes reloading. Thirty seconds."

"Ship-to-ship, ma'am," Briar exclaimed. "I have Commander Gueller."

"Hells!" Wraia snarled as another mass-shot round smacked off the Cobra's barriers, this one making the whole ship shake violently. "Damage report?!"

"Minor damage along port axis," Hooper blurted, fingers flashing over her control console. "One railgun station out of action. Hull integrity nominal."

Wraia thumped the comms button on her armrest. "Clay here. Go ahead!" She couldn't keep the anger out of her voice. The last thing she needed right now was to be micromanaged in the middle of a battle.

"Pull in on my flank, Commander!" Gueller barked. "We're making an attack run to finish off that ship."

"Sir? The cruiser-,"

"We have to eliminate the picket ships," he cut her off irately. "Single shot torpedoes won't make a dent in that armour. Now pull into formation – now!"

"Copy that." She closed the comm, swore under her breath, then nodded to Ensign Scarreth. "Bring us into flanking positing with the Merlin, helm. All ahead full."

"That's going to give the Narvies a fat bloody target!" Gallagher growled.

"I'm aware of that, Lieutenant. All starboard rail batteries to fire full defensive spread while Gueller makes his attack run. I want a full spread of torpedoes launched at all three remaining vessels. Keep their point defence occupied."

"Aye, ma'am."

In the brief instant that followed Wraia became frightfully aware of how fast her heart was beating, and the beads of sweat on her brow. She took a deep breath, straightening in her seat as the Cobra manoeuvred. Her first combat engagement – the first almost everyone aboard the Cobra – and if she didn't make the right decisions, everyone on the ship would be dead in the next few minutes.

She thrust those thoughts from her mind. Focus. So far, despite their obvious fear, the bridge crew had followed her orders efficiently. They trusted her judgement. She would not betray that trust.

They hauled themselves into position as the Merlin raced ahead of them, bearing down on the damaged Narvorian ship. One of the smaller enemy vessels moved to block their path, while the cruiser and its remaining picket ship swung around to flank them, their guns now pointed squarely at the exposed starboard side of the Cobra.

"Fire at will, Mr. Gallagher!" Wraia barked.

"Torpedoes away," he replied. "Starboard gunnery teams beginning full defensive fire."

Long trains of railgun fire criss-crossed the void in front of the Cobra. A mass-driven round moved far too fast for even the ship's tactical AI to reactively target, so instead they painted a mathematical pattern – a wall based on the probable trajectories of incoming mass-shot. More than ninety percent of everything fired in this engagement would go sailing off into nothingness, but that last ten percent was all Wraia cared about.

Small explosions began pockmarking the darkness of space as the defensive spray of railgun fire caught dozens of incoming projectiles from the Narvorians. Two rounds whacked off the starboard barriers, one of them crippling a pair of manoeuvring thrusters and the other buckling a section of the outer armour.

Damage reports flowed through the bridge. She gave her orders and waited with growing worry for Gueller to finish what he'd started.

The Merlin piled on speed, its railguns thundering to life as it drew within range of the Narvorians. The damaged vessel was trying to traverse, attempting to turn its damaged side away from the Sol-Fleet cataphract. The second hurled itself forward straight at the Merlin, almost as though it was on a collision course.

A few seconds later she realised with a jolt of surprise that it was on a collision course.

"Commander Gueller!" Wraia yelled into the comm. "You need to break off!"

"Negative. Torpedoes locked!"

"Sir, that ship is going to ram you!"

"It's a bluff, Commander. Classic Narvorian battle tactics. Now hold your course!"

Wraia had done her own reading on Narvorian tactics and she was not so convinced. Actually ramming another ship in space was a desperate thing to even attempt, and in a direct collision most likely both vessels would be destroyed.

But she also knew that Narvorian ships were built tough. Lacking barrier-tech, they were solid blocks of armour, with every deck reinforced and numerous life support redundancy systems to keep the vessel functioning even in the face of catastrophic damage. If the enemy ship did ram the Merlin, she doubted Gueller's vessel could say same.

This was not a bluff she wanted to call.

"Gallagher, bow torpedoes and gunnery positions," she snapped. "Target that ship's port engine pods."

"Not much chance of a meaningful hit at this angle, ma'am," Gallagher answered even as he passed the orders down to the gunnery teams.

"Just give them a nudge, Lieutenant. That's all."

"Aye, ma'am."

Torpedoes spat from the Merlin's bow. Several were shot down, one struck the charging Narvorian defender head on, ripping a great chunk out of the ship's bow armour, but it didn't slow down. A second torpedo caught the damaged ship a glancing strike, the explosion sending the Narvorian vessel tumbling out of control.

Wraia winced as yet another mass-shot ricocheted off the Cobra's shields. She didn't know how much longer they could avoid a direct hit – the closer they got to the Narvorians the easier a target they would be.

The Narvorian charger was not slowing, or changing course.

"Gueller!" she yelled.

"Evasive course inlaid. I... we have to-,"

The fool. Wraia gritted her teeth. The vessels were too close now. The Merlin didn't have the nimbleness or speed to get out of the enemy ship's path.

"Torpedoes away!" Gallagher announced.

She held her breath, watching as the Cobra's bow weapons spat their fury at the onrushing Narvorian. Railgun shot pepped its thick armour, raking at the plates protecting the engines on its port side. Of the six torpedoes that they fired, only one made it through.

It clipped the port armour cell and exploded.

The Narvorian ship lurched to one side. One of the bulky engine pods flared white-hot for an instant and the vessel twisted, manoeuvring thrusters along its opposite flank firing desperately to correct the course.

Just a nudge.

Wraia ignored the flurry of frantic comms that erupted an instant before the collision happened. The enemy vessel closed; at point blank range Gueller's gunners battered the Narvorian ship, igniting explosions and decompressions along its flank, but it wasn't enough.

She swallowed down a gasp as the enemy ship rammed the Merlin. The glancing blast of her torpedo had altered the course just enough, so that instead of burying its blunt prow straight into the Merlin's flank, the Narvorian ship struck high, catching the cataphract's aft section, but the results were still destructive.

The silence of space made the resulting eruption of broken metal look almost beautiful, with long, glittering shards of armour from both ships peeling off into the darkness. But she could imagine the sounds. Thousands of tons of metal mashing together at fearsome speeds, buckling, warping and fusing together in an instant.

"Oh, God..." Scarreth gasped as the viewscreen displayed it all in visceral detail.

The Merlin went spinning, engines dying in an instant. Bodies and debris tumbled from the deep gouge the Narvorian ship had torn through its upper decks. The enemy vessel didn't come out of the exchange in much better shape, its hull a mess of breaches and fires as it limped away, half its engines dead.

"Enemy cruiser is closing!" Hooper barked through the instant of stunned silence.

The words snapped Wraia back into action. If they wanted to help the crew of the Merlin, they had to finish this battle off first. She straightened in her seat, jaw tight.

"Bring us around," she ordered. "All ahead full, decrease power to aft barriers by thirty percent. Shift excess power to forward barriers. Ms. Scarreth, plot me a close pass against the last defender."

"Aye, ma'am!" Scarreth blurted, shaking hands keying in a new course.

"Easy, Ensign," Ratcliffe said firmly. "Just feed me the numbers and I'll do the rest."

"Yes, sir."

"Mr. Gallagher," Wraia continued. "Load every weapon on this damned ship. Hold until we are close enough for those bastards to look right down the barrels and wait for my order."

"Aye, ma'am."

She inhaled deep through her nose and took a second to adjust her naval cap. Her stomach lurched as the Cobra swung around, away from the Merlin and the damaged Narvorians, bringing the enemy cruiser into centre screen. Then they accelerated hard.

Mass-driver rounds continued to whip through space, but the extra power pumping into the forward barriers ensured that, for now at least, the damage was limited to vibrations and shockwaves as they stormed forward on their attack run. The bridge shuddered as one caught them squarely on the nose, sending fresh alarms blaring.

"Hull integrity eighty-four percent," Hooper reported, her voice edging towards shrillness. "Minor hull breach reported. Decompression alarms on decks twelve and fourteen. Damage control parties deployed."

"Steady as she goes," Wraia said firmly. No time for nerves or second guessing now. She was committed.

The Cobra raced forward, the Narvorian cruiser looming larger and larger in the viewscreen. They speared away to the left, towards the remaining picket ship as it moved out in front of the bigger vessel, reading to pick off any torpedoes aimed at the cruiser.

She wasn't aiming for the cruiser this time, though.

"Ready, Mr. Gallagher?"

"Ready, ma'am."

"On my word, target the picket ship."

They jinked sharply downward, avoiding a spray of heavy rounds from the mass-drivers, before Ratcliffe hauled them back upward, bringing them hurtling within barely a thousand kilometres of the Narvorian defender.

"FIRE!"

The Cobra was suddenly on fire, every gun deck along its port side venting fury into the dark. Torpedoes screamed from the bombardment decks, more than thirty of them blazing out towards the Narvorian ship. Frantic defensive fire came from both enemy vessels, but at such close range they couldn't pick off every target.

Not fast enough.

Five torpedoes struck home. Two of them detonated with glancing hits across the upper armour, a third ruptured the rear engine housing. The four and fifth hit the Narvorian ship amidships, and blew a hole the size of building in its lower decks.

Fires raged and bodies tumbled from the gaping wound. The ship lurched then pitched forward nose over tail as its thrusters and engines misfired. The cruiser reacted, lurching upward to void running over its ally.

"Get me some distance!" Wraia yelled, exhaling the breath she'd been holding and sinking back against the seat. "Comms, get me ship to ship with the Merlin."

"Channel open, ma'am!"

"Commander Gueller?" despite her dislike of the man, she couldn't keep the anxiousness out of her voice. Like or dislike, she had no desire to lose her only comrade in this dark corner of the galaxy. "Commander Gueller this is Clay. Please respond!"

"Reading you Commander," Gueller answered after a moment, his voice pained.

"What's your status?"

"Main power plant operating at fifteen percent capacity," he answered. She could just make out the frantic babble of voices in the background. "Barriers gone. We have a half dozen functioning torpedo tubes, but we're manoeuvring on emergency thrusters. I... we're affecting repairs as best we can, but we're dead in the water right now, Clay."

"Not yet you're not," she answered. "Standby." Wraia twisted the seat to the pilots station. "Ensign Scarreth, plot us an evasive course back to the Merlin. Get them behind us and then lock us onto their trajectory. If the Narvorians want to finish the job they'll have to shoot through us to do it."

"Aye, ma'am!" An edge of determination crept back into Scarreth's voice. The young ensign seemed to have grappled with the initial shock of battle, her movements crisp and decisive now. The Cobra continued its engine burn, moving in a long, twisting arc away from the Narvorian ship and looping back towards their comrade.

They raced back across debris-strewn space, until they reached the mangled hull of the other cataphract. The Cobra had taken a pounding, but nothing like the damage Gueller's vessel had sustained. It was edging along at a painstaking crawl, and Wraia could see horrific bends in its outer hull. The collision had warped the ship's superstructure beyond repair.

On the forward camera she watched the remaining foe lumber in the direction of its stricken comrades crippled in the start of the engagement.

Once in position, the enemy cruiser pivoted on its axis, swinging its ungainly bulk to shield the two damaged Narvorian ships from colonial fire. The third continued its end-over-end tumble, out of the fight, and no longer in Wraia's mind.

She licked dry lips as Ratcliffe moved the Cobra into position, facing down the Narvorian cruiser and blocking the firing line of the bigger ship, keeping Gueller's crippled vessel covered, for now at least.

Options raced through her mind as the two vessels squared up, barriers recharging, weapons reloading and targeting solutions compiling. While the Narvorian ship was larger, that made it an easier target, particularly without its picket ships to shoot down the Cobra's torpedoes. She could treat them to a full broadside, but doing so would expose her flank to the full fury of the mass drivers.

Given the damage her ship had already sustained, a few more direct hits amidships could very well snap the cataphract in half.

 "They're painting us with mass drivers," Hooper warned, her voice tight with anxiousness. She glanced across and saw the young officer wiping sweat from her brow.

"Status, all stations," Wraia barked, returning her attention to the enemy cruiser.

"Hull integrity at seventy-seven percent. Forward barriers at two thirds charge."

"Bow tubes four and six damaged," Gallagher advised. "Tactical AI's showing damaged targeting arrays along our starboard batteries. Repair teams have been deployed."

Wraia nodded slowly, clasping her heands together tight as she stared across the emptiness of space at their foe. Every scenario that played out in her mind ended with, at best, the two vessels mortally wounding each other. That would help no-one. This whole engagement was born of a misunderstanding – she knew that. She could understand it too. If she'd found a group of Narvorians next to a series of wrecked Sol-Fleet ships, would she have reacted any differently?

But Sol-Fleet hadn't killed the Narvorians; the Narvorians hadn't killed Myrr-Idol.

"All remaining railgun batteries and torpedo tubes signal ready," Gallagher declared. "Firing solutions plotted."

"Hold your fire," she barked, her hands clenching into fists.

"Ma'am?! We're a sitting target here. If we don't-,"

"Did I stutter, Lieutenant?" Wraia roared, rocketing upright and glaring a furnace at her XO. "Hold your fire, that's an order!"

Gallagher blinked, recoiling slightly from his console in surprise. Then he gathered himself and nodded. "Aye, ma'am. Hold fire. Passing the word."

"Comms," she continued, attention shifting to the shell-shocked Ensign Briar. "Comms," she repeated when he didn't immediately respond.

"Wha- aye ... yes, ma'am?"

"Open a blanket channel to that ship across all frequencies. Full diplomatic protocols."

His face crumpled with bafflement. "Ma'am?"

"Damn your eyes, Ensign, open the channel before anybody else gets killed!"