"Enemy fleet detected, Jarl Ylva," the sensor operator said in anticipation.

"Start pulling us out of the gravity well," she commanded.

You can do this.

Stormraven shook as its engines burned hard to sell the idea that they had been caught off guard by the enemy's arrival.

Ylva kept an eye on the tactical screen, and soon enough, red dots started to appear. She cursed when she saw their positions, however. The Xin fleet had jumped well clear of the planet's gravity and had spread itself out to cut off any escape away from the gas giant.

When the plan had been discussed, she knew that was a possibility. "Pilot, cut thrust and slingshot us around the moon; we need to pull them into the moon's gravity field."

The fleet followed her, and the ships dove dangerously close to the moon, accelerating fast thanks to the gravity assisting them.

Just as her forces began to wrap toward the back side of the moon, the enemy accelerated in pursuit. It was a chase now, and the enemy couldn't afford for them to get another gravity assist from the gas giant. If she did, her people could clear the gravitational disturbance before the Xin ships could jump to block off their retreat.

Ylva had seen a pirate pull the maneuver once, and the bastard managed to get away because of it. She wasn't planning on running, however.

"They are inside the range of the stealth missiles," her weapons officer declared.

Ylva grinned from ear to ear and sent a quick comm message to Lagertha Char, Admiral Krieger, and Captain Voss. "Mission is a go."

"Flip us around and start decelerating. Let's keep the bastards here as long as possible." That wasn't part of the plan, and neither was retreating farther into the gravitational pull of the gas giant, but sometimes plans had to change. Her maneuver was risky, but it was also their best chance to keep the enemy engaged so they could destroy as many of them as possible. The Shican had to believe they were a credible threat to send more forces toward them and away from the true target.

She knew many Asgardians would die, but a good life lived and an honorable death were more than most got.

"Activate the missiles," she ordered.

The enemy saw the drive plumes ignite on the missiles and realized it was a trap, far too late. Some tried to accelerate to clear the gravity, or flip and escape, while others attempted to shoot down the incoming weapons.

The problem was, once the missiles lit off their engines, they could go dark again, making their trajectory nearly impossible to predict.

To add to the chaos, missiles started slamming into the rear of the enemy formation, each weapon directed to a very specific point at the rear of the outdated Coalition-designed ships, which allowed one missile to breach the reactor room.

Catching the Xin forces off guard was the only reason they could exploit such a vulnerability in the outdated ships' design, but exploit it they did.

Eighty-four of the enemy ships were knocked offline by the surprise attack from Kane's stealth ships, while two hundred and ninety fell to the stealth missile barrage.

It was far less than they hoped to get, but the spread-out nature of the Xin fleet had allowed them to pick off more of the missiles as they tried to maneuver.

Ylva was able to exploit that to her advantage. As soon as the first ship came into range, the lasers on her destroyer lashed out and slagged the poor bastards. She wasn't alone either.

Her forces filled the space between the fleets with missiles, lasers, and projectiles from older ships' autocannons. Another two hundred or so vessels fell to her fleet's concentrated fire before the enemy finally got into range to fire back.

With over five hundred ships still remaining, the incoming fire was intense. PDLs and PDCs worked hard to knock the enemy missiles out of the fight. Despite having more advanced ships, the Union fleet was taking heavy losses.

All of the ships that Krieger had given her went first, their doom brought on by the fact that they sacrificed themselves to save manned vessels. Then the older Asgardian ships started to fall.

Stormraven shook as a series of autocannon rounds peppered its armor.

"Where the fuck are they?"

The battle had been raging for over a minute, but the other Asgardian ships had yet to arrive. Just as she was about to curse their lineages, the remains of the Union fleet flashed into existence behind the enemy fleet, and dangerously close to the disrupting influence of the moon's gravity.

The comm screen came to life, and an annoyed-looking Lagertha glared at her. "We would have been here sooner, but your reckless choice to turn and fight forced us to make two separate jumps to come in at a better angle. Report."

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Ylva took the rebuke and gave Char an update on the deteriorating situation.

"Can you withdraw without losing too many ships?" Char asked as her fleet started picking off enemy ships with their range advantage.

"I doubt the Xin forces would let us at this point," Ylva replied.

Char grunted. "Then I guess we'll see who lives today, and who joins the halls of Odin. May Odin favor you, Jarl Ylva." Then the Lagertha cut the connection.

As the battle dragged on, and the distance between her fleet and Xin's closed, the Xin forces struck Ylva's ship more than once. Kane's miraculous armor was weathering the brunt of the damage, but she was getting reports of systems going offline. Ylva was also sure she was going to have a concussion from all the shaking after everything was over.

She watched a countdown, showing when the fleets would be passing each other. Thankfully, her ships were much lower in the moon's orbit, while the Xin fleet was attempting to accelerate and flee, the same way she had pretended to during the start of the fight.

Because of that, her fleet had its engines pointed toward the surface to keep its orbit, while the remains of the enemy fleet were forced to keep heading toward the gas giant, exposing their aft to fire.

Weapons reached out toward the weaker side and rear armor of the Xin vessels, while they tried desperately to finish off Ylva's ships as they fled from the much more powerful ships in Char's and Krieger's fleets.

Quite a few enemy vessels survived the passage, but even with the gravitational acceleration, the flagships of the Union fleet were still gaining on them, flicking ship after ship out of the fight with impunity.

The scene brought a smile to Ylva's face as she coughed up blood. Two dozen enemy rounds had finally pierced through the armor of Stormraven. She had taken some shrapnel to the chest as one of the rounds nearly pierced the last layer of armor around the bridge, sending deadly shards bouncing around the room.

Some of her crew were screaming for a medical team, while others continued their duties against the enemy. Ylva couldn't have been more proud of her people as she felt rough hands unbuckle her from her seat and drag her off to the med bay. Her vision went black halfway to the door, a smile still on her face.

***

LOCATION: STO MUSTERING GROUNDS

SYSTEM: MAELTHORN

Senior Captain Bell looked over the data with a critical eye before answering the Admiral. "I don't wish to throw doubt on our intelligence people or you, Admiral Dufresne, but are we certain this information is reliable?"

"You tell me, Bell. I put you in charge of fleet operations against the Xin. Have you noticed any odd movements lately?"

The information they were discussing was a report from BSE. A year ago, the company would have been meaningless to Bell, but now every captain in the STO knew who BSE was thanks to their Kcomms. It was why he could have a real-time chat with the admiral, even though he was on the border, pushing back against Xin's fleets. That didn't mean Bell trusted information coming from the rising corporation.

Bell pondered the question. Scout ships had been reporting a larger-than-average buildup of Xin forces over the last few months, but that all stopped recently, and a large chunk of the Xin fleet left just a few days ago.

He looked at it as an opportunity to rotate ships out and do needed repairs and rearming, but if the data was accurate, there might be a much darker purpose to the Xin ships being recalled.

"I can't say for sure, Admiral, but we have noticed movement within the Xin positions. That could indicate they are preparing to pull back. If BSE's report is accurate, we need to stop more from breaking off to join them. I would say we should reinforce Kane's fleet, but we barely have enough forces to protect the border as it is."

"Thank you for being candid, Captain Bell. We suspected as much about Xin's forces, but we needed someone on the front line to verify it for us. The Chairman of the STO has granted us full power to go after Xin and ensure this hypergate is kept offline, but I agree, we don't have the forces necessary to make that happen. How many ships do you have that are combat-capable?"

It only took Bell a few seconds to probe his thoughts for a number. "A little less than three hundred, sir."

"Not ideal, but it's the best we can do. We have other ships heading your way, but we can't afford to delay if Xin is already moving his fleets to counter BSE and the Union. I don't want you to throw your people's lives away, Captain, but we must do something. Do what you can to keep the remaining Xin forces from retreating to reinforce against Kane and the Union fleet. It'll be up to them to ensure the Shican can't activate that hypergate."

Bell saluted the admiral. "I'll see to it that we are victorious, sir."

Dufresne nodded and returned the salute. "Good luck, Captain Bell."

Once the call ended, Bell declared a yellow alert and got the ball rolling to finish rearming, repairing, and moving out.

***

Ylva woke up hours later, with a stern-looking Lagertha staring at her.

"We need to talk about your reckless desire to prove yourself," the woman declared.

"Did we win?" Ylva managed to rasp out.

"Stop trying to talk, you idiot, you have a punctured lung."

After admonishing her, Char paused in consideration, then blew out a breath before answering Ylva's question. "We did, but it might have been a Pyrrhic victory. Your reckless improvisation led to more deaths than we had accounted for. Only thirty-seven of your ships survived, and of those thirty-seven, only six have no damage."

Ylva winced at the news. She knew it would be bad, but not quite that bad.

Lagertha Char continued. "As for the enemy, we simply didn't have enough weapons to whittle them down completely before they managed to jump. Over a hundred enemy ships escaped the engagement and will be bringing word of our tactics and technology to any additional Xin ships that are on the way. We no longer have enough vessels to give chase, so we'll need to wait and see if the Shican think we are a large enough threat to commit more forces to stopping us. Either way, we are stuck making repairs and waiting to see how they react."

Ylva wanted to respond that they had won and that's all that should matter.

Char continued before she could muster the energy to respond. "As for you, if you don't have a good reason for your actions after you recover, I'm going to drop my support for you as Jarl. With the war ongoing, challenges are suspended, but we both know what that'll mean after the war concludes. And before you think dying in combat will get me to forgive this transgression, think again. I expect you to do your duty as Jarl, but I also expect you to apologize to me in person after the war is won. Dying in battle when there are no other options is one thing, but you had both options and a brain. I expect you to use both of those next time. To make sure you do, think on the lives you wasted before you decide to do something so monumentally stupid ever again."

With that statement, Char turned and strode out of the room, leaving Ylva to stew in her failure.