While Naomi spoke with Yug, her hands moved swiftly, typing silent instructions to Osaka.
"So after we hand over this so-called imposter, you'll just finish us off anyway, won't you?"
"Oh, nothing of the sort," Yug said smoothly. "We'll send a lifeboat with a pilot. Place her aboard, launch her out, and you'll be free. The reward will be wired immediately to the account of your choosing. You could even run before the rescue craft arrives."
—Fleet's tightening the noose. Guess they ain't waitin' on us to reach that debris belt. High-energy readings incoming.
Osaka's message scrolled across the front monitor.
Naomi chuckled. "It seems stalling isn't going to work for either of us, then!"
She cut the mic.
"Osaka, full battle speed! Slip under cover of Asteroid One from the port side! Main Guns One and Two, rotate port. Third Main Gun, rotate starboard!"
The Grim Reaper hurtled toward the numbered asteroid Serena had marked.
On the radar, one super-battleship, three cruisers, and seven destroyers picked up speed, the destroyers spreading into a V-formation.
"Shields, full spread!" Naomi shouted.
"Four anti-ship missiles, bearing seven-o'clock!" Serena cried. "Cruisers Two and Three fired them!"
"Secondaries to auto-intercept! Prep decoys!"
Pulse lasers shrieked through the ship's hull as the secondaries unleashed interception fire. Explosions thudded outside—two missiles shredded before impact. The other two screamed closer.
"Two left! Still chasing us!" Serena warned. "Destroyers, three ships—more high-energy spikes!"
"Fire the decoy! Drift us around the asteroid! Serena, hold on tight. Three, two, one—go!"
The ship lurched violently, inertia hammering even through the dampeners, pressing them deep into their seats. As the Reaper skidded behind the asteroid, a volley of beams missed wide, streaking harmlessly into the void. One missile veered toward the decoy, another smashed into the asteroid and exploded in a fiery blossom.
"Haaah... we're safe—for now," Serena sighed.
The asteroid's scarred surface loomed across the monitors, terrifyingly close.
"Not yet! Destroyers incoming! Five, four, three, two—port guns, fire! Starboard gun, fire! Full reverse, pitch negative twenty!"
The Reaper's cannons thundered, dense particle fire ripping apart the void. The ship slid backward under Naomi's control.
"Port destroyer One destroyed! Port destroyer Two—crippled! Starboard Three—damaged! Look out, the Deathcallion—massive energy spike!" Serena's voice broke.
Naomi slammed the stick and stomped hard on the pedal.
"Directly ahead! Heat flare from Asteroid One!" Serena screamed.
"Dammit! Brace! Forward shields—maximum!"
The ship rolled like a fighter jet as Naomi pulled a twisting half-spin.
A deafening detonation filled the void—Asteroid One split apart in a blinding blast, fragments hammering their shields like a storm of warheads. Warnings blared, metal shrieked.
"Osaka, damage report!" Naomi barked, silencing the alarms.
"Only stripped some armor off the belly. Combat and navigation unaffected. That's one helluva super-warship, blowin' an asteroid clean apart with a single volley."
"Copy. We're diving behind Debris Three!" Naomi snapped.
Her instincts were sharper now—168 hours of nonstop combat drills weren't wasted.
"Destroyer Two destroyed in the blast! The Deathcallion advancing with its cruisers in tow!" Serena cried.
Naomi gritted her teeth. "So they don't even care about sacrificing their own ships. That tells me all I need to know about their 'noble' character."
The Reaper skidded back into cover, Naomi working out survival routes. Even the tactical sim admitted the odds were slim.
Meanwhile, the Deathcallion, shield blazing, simply bulldozed through the debris, cruisers at its flank. Its power was overwhelming. Even if the Reaper fired all its guns at once, they couldn't crack that defense. Both sides knew it—the Deathcallion charged in with impunity, while the Reaper had no choice but to run.
Then Naomi's eyes lit. "Wait—Osaka, do you know billiards?"
"Huh? What in blazes is that? Some kinda unit'a measure? Or a fancy fightin' move?"
"Ugh, thought so. Okay—remember that time I knocked a steel pipe loose during zero-G repairs, and it bounced around and came back? Think we could do something like that, but with debris? I want to ricochet chunks through the belt and smack that monster broadside. Not just once or twice—that'd be obvious. I'm talking chain reactions, knocking debris into debris until it slams into the Deathcallion. Can you rig that?"
Osaka's grin widened, voice crackling with mischief. "Hah! Girl, that's crazy talk... but hell yeah, I can! Gimme a sec... Aight, done. Tossin' the course up on the main screen now!"
The forward monitor lit up with trajectories: an insane chain reaction of debris collisions that, if timed perfectly, could drive a massive fragment right into the Imperial flagship. But to pull it off, they'd have to survive the gauntlet, dodge fire, lure enemy blasts into debris at just the right times—and all without looking like they were deliberately setting it up.
Naomi glanced at the captain's display: success probability, three percent.
She let out a sharp breath. "Wow... even I didn't think it'd be that bad. But hell, we've got no choice. Let's do it!"