"Roll the ship, get the damaged battery out of the line of fire."

Jerry orders into the flurry of activity that was his bridge in combat.

A lucky pirate boarding torpedo had pierced their shields, rocketing at them with incredible speed. The less than lucky women aboard must have been excited. Right up till the retrorockets that were supposed to slow the torpedo down and allow it to safely impact a hull failed to start their burn.

The boarding torpedo has ended up as a massive kinetic kill weapon and it had put a capital grade laser cannon turret out of action.

Slowly the titanic freighter rolls it's dorsal side away from the plane the bulk of the fighting was taking place on. Sensing a possible weakness, pirate fighters rushed to follow, seeking out the weak spot in the Tear's shields for a few tense seconds before getting shredded by the combined wrath of the point defense batteries.

Some very lucky timing and maneuvering had gotten that boarding torpedo through, and the point defense gunnery crews seemed determined to make up for that incident. It was almost painful to watch, as laser beams, plasma bursts and cannon shells shred the fighters into cosmic dust.

The pirate fighters getting chewed up and spat out by his point defense weapons wasn't the worst mauling going on in this fight though.

For all the drama and tension of the ongoing space battle as they maneuvered, throwing off the firing of the hundreds of weapons the enemy corvette seemed to mount, clearly attempting some sort of death by a thousand cuts of their shields in an attempt to get some misguided revenge. In return the the Tear’s gunnery crews were hammering away at the enemy vessel’s hull, determined to pummel the pirate corvette for it’s hubris till it changed shape or managed to catch fire in the vacuum of space.

Jerry's eye wanders back to one of his console screens. That said, hands down, the worst mauling of the fight was the absolute blood bath emerging in one of his cargo hangars.

The wink Masha had tossed to the security cameras had gotten the feed immediately forwarded to him by Mina, one of his Volpiri wives who had taken a position working in internal security with the naval masters at arms. She figured it was a message for him, and Jerry knew she was right.

This was more or less an Apuk warrior's courtship display in some ancient Apuk rites and traditions that valued feats of valor or strength. That ‘liberating’ one's groom from his family counted as an act of valor for a good chunk of Apuk history was something best left to the wayside.

Masha was taking on a massive mob of pirates and absolutely decimating them in brilliant fashion, after a flawless display of aerospace dominance that would make the greatest of ace pilots from Earth proud. The only downside culturally speaking was that Masha was fighting weaker combatants perhaps than the Apuk liked to bother with.

The sheer quantity of weapons being fired in Masha's general direction by panicked pirate scum now on the receiving end of the terror they had likely inflicted on so many innocents more than made up for it. Both in Masha’s book clearly, but more importantly in Jerry's.

He'd acknowledge this display, it was only fair, but if Masha thought she was getting into the marriage with just a wink, smile, and some very impressive combat skills in the void and on the ground, she really didn't know the quarry she was pursuing yet.

Further if she thought her ass wasn't getting a boot shoved up it sideways for this little stunt in the middle of a goddamn void fight, she hadn't gotten rough enough treatment at the abbreviated OCS course the Undaunted had put on for the Tear's new crew.

"Goddamn, she's showing off like crazy, girl's got it bad."

Jaruna tapped into their private channel, talking into his ear piece as Jerry continued to key in taskers, generally letting his well trained crew fight the battle he'd trained them to fight. His Cannidor bride kept up the color commentary, even as the tempo of the battle starts to slow a bit.

Seeing an opening, Jerry mutes the channel and leans in.

"Ms. Wichen, it seems that the corvette's turning to run. Could you please fire one torpedo and divest them of their engines?"

Jerry's hands steeple as Wichen jumps to, eagerly popping the hatch on their first combat torpedo launch. Wichen was utterly unable to disguise her sheer jubilant glee at finally getting to use one of her favorite new toys. Sure it wasn't one of the special stealth torpedoes, but it was still a capital scale missile system that lobbed a fiery middle finger the size of a building square at whatever unfortunate thing had really managed to piss off the warship firing it.

They'd launched a few torpedoes testing their systems, and hundreds, if not thousands in simulation, but the first time you sent one down range for real was always special. The hatch for one of the launch cells moves clear, and a torpedo leaps from the tube in a pillar of axiom enhanced fire.

The missile weapon was designed for interstellar long range, and by the standards of naval stellar combat this whole engagement had been a knife fight in a phone booth. Taking place at incredible close range for anyone except pirates, who tried to aggressively go after boarding maneuvers, usually expecting much easier prey than the likes of the Tear.

The torpedo ran down the now actively fleeing corvette like a wolf chasing down a deer. It slammed home into the engines in a brilliant flash of axiom energy, followed by the second flash of the corvette's systems automatically scramming its drive core to avoid going critical or being overloaded.

A lot of pirate vessels disabled most, if not all of their safety interlocks, to squeeze just a bit more performance out of their power plants. This ship's captain was clearly a little bit more cautious than her fellows, and that had probably just saved her, and most of her crew's lives.

The small pirate vessel goes dark, red external lights indicating the ship's on emergency power as it tumbles through the void, now coasting on its momentum alone.

"Nice shooting Ms. Wichen, now..."

"Captain! Jump signature! Third ship coming in, it's another corvette!"

This corvette leaps into the void weapons blazing, blasting away at literally anything and everything it can target, friend or foe alike. Jerry winces as a few escape pods get vaporized.

Must be an internal power struggle of some sort if they're that willing to kill their own. They'd jumped in guns blazing because anything they hit was gravy as far as they were concerned.

A burst of energy from the corvette heralds some shaking that nearly rocked Jerry out of his chair.

"Damn, weapons, the hell did they just hit us with?"

"Looks like some mad woman strapped capital scale lasers and a single capital plasma cannon to that thing! If they weren't trying to kill us I'd almost respect such insanity. The power draw on the core's gotta be beyond belief for something that size."

"Looks like it’s a bit sluggish compared to the other corvettes though, I- Hurk!"

Jerry's thrown against his harness hard as the corvette rolls over the ‘top’ of the ship, seeking out the weakened dorsal section and dropping a massive barrage of energy that leaves some of its own engines shut down, momentum moving it clear of its firing position and dodging some of the retaliatory fire from the Tear's guns. The risky gamble pays dividends however, the barrage piercing the weakened shield and impacting the Tear’s hull directly, tearing it asunder.

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

"Hull breach! Automated systems have it contained."

"Casualties?"

"One of the gun crews might have been in that area trying to repair the dorsal laser turret."

"Damn it. Find out, and get me that shield patched before I... the hell?"

A massive axiom construct appears over the damaged part of the hull, solidifying just in time to catch another volley from the corvette, taking a longer range shot before powering up its engines again to attempt to maneuver and charge its power reserves. A chance Wichen's gunners didn't give them, even if half the bridge was distracted by the construct. The return fire is devastating, buckling the shields of the still slow moving ship as the kind of weapons fire that would slag a battleship pummels the corvette.

Jerry steeples his fingers again as he watches parts wither and burn on the corvette, rendered down to molten slag before drifting away as cosmic ash… or less. Wichen’s perfectly tuned plasma weapons had about as much mercy behind them as pitching something into the nearest sun for real, not just the pale imitation that was plasma weapons fire. He leans in a bit, hawking over the monitors that displayed all the readouts for the fight.

Wichen had surgically removed the Corvette’s boarding torpedo tubes and peeled off her primary offensive weapons… but the hull was intact otherwise. The ship was well made, even if the modifications were… haphazard at best. Jerry wonders for a moment just what kind of pirate scum they’d stumbled into.

“Ms. Wichen… drop your rate of fire, but prepare a torpedo if they try to run, we want to take the ship intact if at all possible, no sense wasting a possibly useful hull. The Admiral can always use another ship, even if it’s under new management. Besides… I suspect we’ll be seeing a white flag right about…”

Sharon looks up from her comm panel and calls out;

"Sir! Communication from the target corvette!"

"Right on cue. Put it on screen, commander. Let’s see who we’re dealing with."

At first there's the telltale sounds of static and electronic interference as Sharon goes through the process of isolating and boosting the transmission through her own electronic jamming efforts. Finally the signal clears up, bringing through an image of the battered corvette’s bridge.

The devastation was a bit shocking in its own right. There'd clearly been some sort of fire, and possibly some sort of explosion. If Jerry had to take a wild guess, the modifications they’d made to the ship had not been well integrated and part of their power system had a catastrophic failure.

Considering the placement of the plasma cannon right by the bridge… he suppresses a wince as a very battered Feli woman drags herself into view. She’s got a few burns and cuts, including a decent chunk of shrapnel lodged in her left shoulder. Save a few old scars and her tabby coloration, her most distinctive feature is that she’s short most of an ear. An old wound, nothing new, but a horrendous mass of scar tissue for all that.

"This is the Darl'in'cha, we strike! Ceasefire for Goddess' sake!"

Sharon gets Jerry's attention, the comm channel is two ways. Jerry takes a breath... and responds.

"Darl'in'cha, this is UCV Crimson Tear, who am I speaking to?”

“This… this is First Mate Manila.”

Her green eyes do their best to focus, and Jerry adds a concussion to her list of injuries.

"A man? Commanding?” The Feli woman’s ears wiggle about a bit before she lets out a soft groan “Catspaw goddess, humans. I told the Captain. I told her.”

“Do you have the authority to surrender this ship to me?”

“I uh… yes. The Captain got spaced, so I suppose I’m Captain now. Or something.”

Jerry suppresses any form of sympathy for the obviously rattled woman. She was a senior officer on a pirate crew. She might be having a rough day at the office, but she was still a hardened criminal, even if the Undaunted handed out second chances to such women on the regular… and might even do so for Manila herself.

“Heave to and prepare to be boarded. Have your crews assemble in the cargo bays and pile your arms. Any one resisting will be spaced. Failure to comply means we burn you out of the sky like the other pirates we just gave the opportunity to become one with the universe. You probably killed a few of my crew today, so you can consider mercy to be in very short supply. "

“I ah…”

Manila struggles to focus, clearly fighting her way through a fog from the head injury she’d received.

“Darl’in’cha, you have about five seconds to comply or you can ask your goddess for an explanation directly. You have my word, your people will be treated fairly, and you’ll receive medical attention.”

The Feli’s ears jump up again, fear crossing her face, it was very clear she had a healthy desire to not die at the very least.

“...Darl'in'cha... acknowledges. We’re complying. We don’t have much in the way of weapons left but dropping everything to emergency power. I’ll rally the crew in the port cargo bay… th-the starboard one is… vacuum at the moment."

“Good, help is on the way. Tear out.”

Jerry chops a hand across his throat, and Zombie kills the transmission.

"...Sensors, anything on the scopes?"

"There's some minor civilian traffic on the far side of the system. Nothing heavier than a very light cargo ship. They are actively rerouting to avoid the engagement zone."

"Right. Maintain general quarters till we’re sure that’s the last of them. I want repair crews and a search and rescue team up to the dorsal section yesterday. Let's get more SAR space assets up and recover life pods and extravehicular personnel. Then I want boarding parties for all three corvettes to secure prisoners, and a prize crew for the functional corvette... we'll scrap the others and get back on our way. We should have the tools to strip anything of value in a hurry so let's make it happen. I know we don't have a sufficient brig, so let's get one of the empty cargo bays locked down and ready with cots and the like... I want mech suit troops or Marines as part of the watch and I want power armored Marines on standby in case we need to break some heads to ensure compliance."

Master Chief Daclan looks up from his post. “I’ll get with the Bosun’s mates and make the arrangements skipper. Glad we’re not leaving sailors out to die, even if they are pirates.”

“Pirates or no pirates I’m not leaving living beings to die alone in the void… besides we have more than a few pirates on this crew, I’m not about to go for no quarter. We have the training, and the fire power, that we can make short work of any resistance…” Jerry gestures to two wrecks and one badly mauled excuse for a functional ship on screen. “If there’s any resistance left. Any further questions? No? Good. Execute.”

Sharon takes a breath as other parts of the crew scramble to comply, pulling the headset she normally wore while running comms and EWAR off. "Whew... that was getting dicey. I'm worried about that gunnery crew."

"I'm worried too." Jerry nods. "If that shield hadn't popped up when it did, the dorsal section could have taken some serious damage. I doubt it would have gotten deep enough to endanger the civilians, but..."

Wichen sticks a hand up. "Point of order, where the hell did that shield come from? Because it wasn't one of my systems."

Jerry strokes his chin for a moment. "Only one person could really be that powerful on this ship unless one of the crew just awoke a slumbering power deep within themselves or something. Cascka."

"Damn! She's that powerful?"

Wichen enjoyed teasing the far quieter and very shy Cacska, and in light of this revelation, was clearly reconsidering that choice.

"Seems so, I knew she was skilled, and powerful. No surprise considering her heritage, but damn. I don't think that volley even scratched that shield. Someone go find Cas-

"Captain! Sir there's a problem! The security team in the docking bay is saying they've got some crazy Apuk woman down there with them."

Jerry gives the yeoman racing towards him an arched eyebrow, causing the younger man to stop and wither slightly.

"That's not exactly a polite way to refer to a superior officer Yeoman, Lieutenant Commander-"

The Yeoman quickly raises a hand. "Begging the Captain's pardon, but the Commander is not the Apuk in question, nor is it the docking bay she's in. This report is coming from Bravo-1, the main hold we just "caught" that damaged freighter with."

Jerry cocks his head in slight confusion, unconsciously aping Mikasa as he processes that information for a second.

"...One of the Merisee Hope's crew?"

"Yessir. She's demanding to speak with Commander Sarkin immediately, that it’s a matter of life and death!"

The elation of victory quickly gives way to the sensation of mild aggravation as Jerry slowly rubs his temple.

"...Goddamnit does this galaxy ever slow down?"

"...Rhetorical question sir?"

"Yes Yeoman, rhetorical question. Tell security to run her through a screening with intelligence, assuming she's cleared, have her brought up to my office under escort... and get me Sarkin... and Warrant Officer Jaruna. Tell her to bring her bang stick. I have a bad feeling about this."