UGT: 7th Ruan 280 a.G.A. / 8:04 p.m.

  SHF Defiance, near Tarnis-Vekk, Karesh-Ti’Varn system(yellow dwarf), Inner-Noran sector, Ruidan Raider Association, Milky Way

  Admiral Thorrison could see how the Association's fleet shifted. Their fleet had split into two wings, one on its way towards Tarnis-Vekk, the other clearly trying to cut between the FSF Aurora and the remaining fleet. Right now, everything went as planned. If one could call Captain Lunaris risky scheme a plan, that is.

  The Admiral and the remaining fleet had obviously been informed about what Captain Lunaris planned for this engagement and reluctantly they had agreed. He still didn't know the exact capabilities of the FSF Aurora, so he could only hope its crew knew what they did. Reversing the entire momentum of a Super Battleship in just minutes was nothing less than impossible, at least by Federation standards. Therefore he couldn't help but feel a little anxious about the upcoming maneuver.

  “Confirm composition of that second wing,” he ordered calmly, eyes fixed on the shifting vectors.

  “Battlecruiser, three Cruisers, two Corvettes, ten Cutters. All holding antimatter-strengthened shielding. They’re trying to form a partial wedge, but if the numbers the Aurora's given us are correct, they’re not properly aligned.” The Admiral obviously noticed the doubt in his Lookout Officer's voice.

  “Too late for them. We go forward, rotate along vector delta-nine. Bring our vanguard up but keep the rear line angled. The moment the FSF Aurora hits them, we sweep what remains. Also, I don't want to hear any doubt about our allies’ capabilities. They wouldn't lie like that,” Admiral Thorrison said and got hesitant nods all around. He barely suppressed a sigh. There simply wasn't all that much trust between the elusive crew of the FSF Aurora and the remaining SHF fleet. But there was nothing he could do regarding that either.

  There was a brief silence on the bridge, the hum of systems and tapping of keys the only sound. Then: “We have a massive energy surge from the FSF Aurora, Sir! They- They really pivoted around completely! Gods, the G-forces alone... They're accelerating hard towards the second enemy wing!”

  Admiral Thorrison didn’t look up, instead keeping his eyes on the screen in front of him. He saw how a massive salvo of attacks loosened from the ASF Aurora and shot towards the Association's second wing just as his CP announced the same.

  One moment the enemy’s Battlecruiser was there, and the next, it wasn’t. No wreckage, no debris cloud. It had simply vanished from the field. The shockwave came a heartbeat later, rippling through local space. Two Cutters were torn apart in the aftermath, one flipped over on its axis and split mid-hull, the other vented plasma until it burst in a sudden flash. A Cruiser listed wildly, then slammed into an expanding debris pocket. It didn’t explode, but it was clearly quite damaged.

  That left the remaining ships reeling, several of them without cohesion, none with proper formation.

  The Admiral leaned forward, face slightly more ashen than before. “...Did the Association just lose their command ship to a single opening strike?” Obviously, no one answered him. They had seen the full destructive power of the FSF Aurora exactly once before in the Nyxia system. Or at least they had thought so. The fleet back then hadn't loaded their antimatter shields. That had allowed the FSF Aurora to dish out such massive amounts of damage. Bot obviously, that didn't matter at all if the power they had seen just now was any indicator. The sheer amount of antimatter salvos like that must need was staggering.

  “Cruiser signatures of the enemy are splitting, Sir! One's trying to reestablish a new central lead. The rest are retreating, no, correcting... They’re scattering. Sir... they’re in chaos.”

  “They should be...,” Admiral Thorrison muttered more to himself than to his crew.

  “The FSF Aurora’s not firing again,” the Lookout Officer reported. “Weapons are recharging, most likely. Unknown for how long until everything else comes from them. The enemy won’t know that, though.”

  “Order the fleet forward. As I said, we'll clear out what remains.”

  The SHF line surged ahead. The Destroyers swept wide and fast, the Frigates more measured, more precise. The debris field was a mess of ruined metal and disoriented survivors now. The enemy’s second wing wasn’t a fighting force anymore. It was a scattered group of ships trying to survive.

  “The Association's first wing is pulling back,” Sarris said. “They’re abandoning their previous arc, no reinforcements inbound. Tarnis-Vekk station isn’t opening fire either.”

  “They won’t. Not without someone to coordinate.”

  The bridge quieted for a few moments. On the display, the SHF ships advanced, virtually unstoppable by the weakened and disorganised second wing of the Association. The remaining Cruisers tried to break free, but the lead ships of the SHF fleet were already locking missiles. The SHF knew what to do.

  “Fleet-wide,” Admiral Thorrison ordered. “Push forward. Target priority goes to disabled ships that haven’t powered down weapons. Everything else we try to take intact.”

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  Captain Rhel of the SHF Cruiser Lanceward came through first, his voice taut but steady. “Sir, we’ve got four Cutters in our sector drifting on emergency power. One’s venting life support. Request permission to dispatch boarding ships.”

  “Granted. Mark them. If any of them try something stupid, we atomize the wreck.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  Another chime, this time Captain Eren from the FSF Cruiser Valen Spire.

  “We’ve intercepted a broad-range signal from what’s left of the second wing,” she said, her voice carrying an odd disbelief. “Encoded but primitive. They’re broadcasting conditional surrender terms.”

  The Admiral blinked, then allowed a breath to escape through his nose. “Already? That’s a first.”

  “Should I respond?”

  He thought about it for a second before nodding to himself. “Yes. Accept. Standard prisoner protocols. Tell them we’ll treat survivors according to Accord Articles, so long as they stop firing immediately. If they so much as ping us, we resume fire.”

  “Aye, Admiral.”

  Admiral Thorrison watched as her fleet arc adjusted smoothly, breaking off from the main thrust and peeling toward the crippled Corvettes and surviving Cruisers.

  To his right, Commander Arik, also his CO in lieu of Commander Ashcroft's absence, stepped beside him with folded arms.

  “We’ve never had this many surrender signals in a single engagement. Not since... well. Not ever, frankly.”

  The Admiral didn’t respond immediately. Part of him wanted to feel satisfaction, or vindication. The operation had gone flawlessly. They’d baited their enemies trap, executed the pivot with terrifying precision, and Captain Lunaris had done what she always did by rewriting the rules of space engagement completely. And yet, the strange part was how clean it all felt.

  “This is what happens,” he finally said, “when you introduce First Federation force projection to a low-theater war. Both the Association's and our doctrine are decades behind. We don’t know how to counter a ship like the FSF Aurora. Especially seeing how the FSF Aurora is seemingly based on completely different space strategies altogether. The admiralty is probably buried in ancient First Federation war documentary trying to find out what the FSF Aurora truly is and how to counter it.”

  Commander Arik nodded. “We’ll adapt.”

  “Yes. But not today. I'm just thankful Captain Lunaris is our erstwhile ally.”

  The Bridge quieted for a moment as the Admiral's own fleet completed its sweep. The FSF Defiance shuddered slightly as its secondary arrays lit up and stitched a crippled Frigate with precision blasts, disabling its last active weapons without compromising hull integrity.

  A ripple of green spread across the map. Symbols shifted to neutral or surrender status. Seven ships were still drifting, waiting for boarders. Four had detonated cores in a last act of defiance before the surrender call had gone out. The rest had already opened their hangars and broadcasted distress signals.

  They had crushed a sizeable part of the Association’s reserve fleet in a single engagement. No SHF vessel was lost.

  “Status report,” Admiral Thorrison said aloud.

  “Main formation is secure,” Commander Arik replied. “We have all nine of our ships operational. No major casualties. Minor hull stress on the FSF Destroyer Caspian Writ, but they’ll manage.”

  “And the Association?” he continued, not turning from the tactical feed.

  “Seventeen ships confirmed disabled,” came Commander Arik’s voice. “Of those, four were destroyed outright in the first salvo. Battlecruiser’s gone. Another Cruiser, three Cutters, and four smaller ships followed. Nine have surrendered. The second wing is pulling back and there's no way we can catch them.”

  “And the FSF Aurora?”

  “Stationary,” the Admiral's CN replied. “They’ve left the clean-up to us. Again.”

  Of course they had. Why should Captain Lunaris waste antimatter or firepower when she could let the SHF do the cleanup? Not that the Admiral would have done it any differently in her place.

  Suddenly his comm pinged, a request from Captain Vael for a private conversation. He was the Captain of the SHF Cruiser Perseid, oldest Captain in the fleet and a great military advisor.

  “Thorrison,” he said, “if this is what First Federation support looks like, I hope you have a plan to keep that girl bound to us. There is no way I want to continue this campaign without her.”

  Admiral Thorrison grimaced slightly. “I know. But honestly, it doesn't even feel like we're leading these offensives anymore. We're little more than pawns, acting at Captain Lunaris behest. I don't think she would hesitate to sacrifice us for her own gain, if necessary.”

  Captain Vael sighed. “Trust me, I know. It's a relief that she's at least somewhat depending on us for antimatter, otherwise I would really be worried. But I hope the girl doesn't overestimate herself and for the love of God, let's hope the admiralty has some plan to deal with her should her suicidal plan to push into the heart of the Kingdom of Ferron truly be successful.”

  "You wouldn't have called me just for that. What else?" Admiral Thorrison said, instead of answering.

  “Yes. Order the others to begin interrogation prep. I think we want logs pulled, nav data decrypted, and every officer scrubbed for intel. They were willing to risk their entire reserve fleet for some reason. We need to know more.”

  “You think they were holding Tarnis-Vekk for something?” Admiral Thorrison asked sceptical.

  “...No,” Captain Vael said after a moment. “I think they were just underestimating us. But I worry about the upcoming attack on Karesh-Ti. The girl is too young, Thorrison. There's no way she's actually the Captain of that behemoth of a spacecraft. Something must’ve happened to most senior officers of the FSF Aurora, there’s no other explanation. And I worry she will miss something relevant.”

  The Admiral sighed. "We'll see what we can do. But I don't expect much from it. And I think you underestimate Captain Lunaris. At the very least, she had quite the military education. She will perform to our expectations."

  Vael signed off with a grunt, and the line went dead again. Meanwhile Admiral Thorrison turned back to the Bridge crew. The main viewport showed only a few scattered hulls now. “Order recovery teams to begin sweep,” he said aloud. “Scavenge anything with an intact data core or hypershield lattice. And pull in the surrendered vessels under tow. Prioritize engine integrity, we may press them into service.”

  “Understood, Sir,” came the prompt reply across the Bridge.

  “And prep the prison deck. The Association crews that gave up... I want them talking before they settle in.”

  The Bridge fell into quiet motion. Commands relayed, status lights blinking. Every hull they recovered was one less they had to destroy later. Every captured logbook was one step closer to knowing exactly what else the Association had in store for them.

  The Association had lost another battle and their admiralty even more credibility, but the deciding battle had not yet come.