Battlefleet Datura moved to the Alvisa Starzone, where the besieged supply base was located. Admiral Falkenhausen rang out an order:

“Attack!”

That word itself was clarity. Ten thousand vassals of Battlefleet Datura charged forth from the rear. Abbas’ heart was pounding, and so was Henry’s. The Ninth Fleet was ready, however, and their remaining warships enveloped the outnumbered Battlefleet Datura from all sides.

“Form a sphere formation, hold them off,” Admiral Falkenhausen said calmly while sipping his coffee.

The Black Rose didn’t shy away from action. It was leading the fleet from the front, facing the part of the Ninth Fleet that was rescuing its comrades. Any time now, the rest of Battlefleet Datura would come in.

On the Imperial side, Admiral Valentina was watching with delight. The young, promising admiral believed there was nothing to fear. When her gunners spotted the distinct Black Rose, her orders were clear:

“Fire on the enemy flagship! We’ll break their coherence!”

Her flagship, the Imperia, had landed several hits on the Black Rose, but the black-painted flagship held. A few minutes later, the remainder of the Republic forces attacked, and the Imperia was shattered to pieces by ion cannon fire. Admiral Valentina, only twenty-six, only barely escaped death via an escape shuttle. A piece of glass had been embedded deep in her skull, sending her into unconsciousness.

In the bridge of the Black Rose, however, chaos reigned. Imperial ion cannons had shaken its bridge, sending the fleet’s key officers flying. Alarm bells rang.

Abbas could barely stand, but the rest around him were laying down. “This is bridge, this is bridge—requesting medical assistance at once.” Abbas’ eyes diluted in horror.

“Captain al-Salem, you take command of this part of the fleet,” Admiral Falkenhausen’s voice remained calm as ever, even in the face of his arm being lacerated by a thousand glass shards.

“Understood, Commander.” Abbas’ heart was trembling, especially after seeing the unconscious form of his friend, Henry. Vice Commander Vice Admiral Fulham laid dead, and Chief-of-Staff Vice Admiral van Roijen’s breath was failing.

“This is acting commander, Captain Abbas al-Salem. Admiral Falkenhausen is currently injured. All ships, follow the plan,” was the urgent communique sent by the communications officers via a series of flash codes of blue and red lights.

However, if the condition in the Republic’s fleet were chaos, then no sufficient word in the Standard Galactic language could hope to describe that of the Empire’s fleet. Trapped by the fleet they thought they had trapped, ambushed from all sides, they looked upon the Imperia for guidance. But there was no answer by the dead husk. Fighting devolved into ship-to-ship combat, one which the confused and demoralized Imperials stood little chance winning.

Three hours later, the Ninth Fleet had been reduced to just ten thousand vessels, trapped within isolated pockets. Individual ships had begun to flash white lights—a sign of surrender. Abbas breathed a sigh of relief. The adrenaline of war had died down. Another hour later, the Ninth Fleet was almost completely wiped out, save for four thousand vessels, escaping after a daring attack led by one Commodore Radbruch.

Abbas felt sick. He was a lover of space, but war was a cruel mistress. Hundreds of thousands must have died that day, if not more. His hands were bloody. Suddenly the “boring” simulations, training, and rear-guard duties he had previously felt comforting.

“A-acting Commander! A new enemy fleet spotted!”

“What?” Abbas’ voice was suddenly sharp.

“It’s the Imperial Twelfth Fleet, Acting Commander!”

“How far are they?”

“Half an hour!”

The officers and enlisted men of the Black Rose grew pale.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“Disable the remaining ships of the Ninth Fleet. Send news to the other fleets. Form a sphere formation!” The sphere formation was the supreme defensive formation, like a porcupine baring its quills. Its maneuverability, however, was awful.

The Ninth Fleet must have somehow managed to contact its allies, Abbas thought. His heart was pounding again.

On the Imperial side, the Twelfth Fleet picked up Commodore Radbruch’s shattered forces. Its commander, Count Arlesheimer, was furious. “Come! Let’s show those commoner bastards how imperial nobility fight!”

His officers, almost all of noble birth, laughed. The only one of common birth, his advisor Commodore Thompson, frowned slightly. He was a man of thirty years old, and had seen firsthand the difficulties of war many times.

When meeting Battlefleet Datura’s formation, Commodore Thompson adviced the standard counter-formation: a siege formation that involved all besieging ships spreading apart, in order to maximize fire and chip away at the opponent slowly. Another alternative was pinning them down on one side and attacking from another.

Count Arlesheimer banged his command table. “Impudent mockery! We outnumber them! Frontal attack! Crush them!”

The Twelfth Fleet clumsily charged. Count Arlesheimerm, a lover of wine and parties, was never one to take much value in military discipline or orderly formations or, really, anything that might construe the proper way a fleet should be run. Commodore Radbruch, having rearranged his fleet, shook his head.

“What a disgrace of a fleet!” he had told his subordinates. “Let’s just hope we’re not just sending the Reps another fleet to destroy ....”

Ion cannons and missiles were vomited out of the battleships of both sides. Battlefleet Datura held its own. Count Arlesheimer was afflicted with the sickness of nobility—the feeling that his wishes ought to come true, no matter what.

Abbas made use of the theories he learned at the academy, and rotated his fleet in three shifts to minimize exhaustion. When one of the Imperial attacks nearly cracked his center, he flanked them from port and starboard, forcing the Imperials to withdraw.

“Why haven’t we simply crushed them!” The poor innocent table was banged upon a few more times.

Two hours of more inconclusive combat followed. In the Twelfth Fleet, a group of commonborn officers, having had enough, had launched a tide of protests to Count Arlesheimer. The Count had shot one of them, and a riot was on the verge of breaking out.

It was at this moment that Republican reinforcements arrived from their allies’ starboard. Jade-colored ships and turtle-shaped ships charged from the coldness of the space. The Twelfth Fleet’s detection systems should have seen it from far away, but in the quarrels nobody noticed.

The reinforcement fleet was Battlefleet Chiyou, commanded by the one-eyed, slightly unhinged, legendary Admiral Tang. From the bridge of her flagship, she sent in her battle-hardened fleet to slaughter the tactically deranged Twelfth Fleet wholesale. Count Arlesheimer put down the mutiny and ordered another frontal charge, which only hastened its demise.

“Who’s the commander of the Twelfth Fleet, again?” she asked her chief of staff, Rear Admiral Yue.

“Count Arlesheimer, Commander.”

“Man, these aristocunts sure suck at battle,” Admiral Tang mocked. “On the other hand—hmm. A sphere formation? I never thought Falkenhausen’s a defensive admiral.”

Seeing the change in the battlefield—belatedly—Abbas ordered Battlefleet Datura to charge forward. The Twelfth Fleet finally formed a defensive sphere, after Commodore Thompson’s insistence, but it was too late. The combined firepower of the Republic’s forces broke the thin lines. Commodores Thompson and Radbruch struggled to keep order.

But together they had spotted the weak link of the Republican onslaught: Battlefleet Datura. They organized the remaining ships, formed a spindle formation, and tore through. Both commodores were seriously injured—the price for the escape of two thousand ships, out of two fleets that had comprised forty thousand altogether.

“What the fuck is Falkenhausen doing? Why is his formation so shit?” Admiral Tang hurled her fearsome fist at her command table.

“Surprisingly sloppy for such an experienced commander,” Rear Admiral Yue commented coldly. “It is a great victory, regardless. We should contact Battlefleet Datura.”

“Battlefleet Chiyou is grand, isn’t it? It allows rear admirals to mock full admirals,” Admiral Tang said, grinning. “Not many can handle you as their chief-of-staff, Rear Admiral Yue.”

“I’m just saying the truth. Not many admirals can handle that,” Rear Admiral Yue replied. “And it’s not as if you’re the easiest commander to work under, Admiral.”

On the bridge of the Black Rose, Abbas sat down on the floor with nutrition-fortified milk on his hand, still trying to process what just happened these past hours. “Capt—er, Acting Commander, Sir! Battlefleet Chiyou is opening communications with us!” one of the communications officers said.

“Open the channel,” Abbas said weakly. He forced himself to stand, even if he’d like to sleep.

The screen showed the strong form of a saluting Admiral Tang. Abbas saluted at the same time—he wasn’t quite sure who should’ve saluted first, or if they should’ve saluted on the same time. “Wait, who’re you? Where’s Admiral Falkenhausen?”

The thunderous voice of Admiral Tang cowered Abbas a little. He mustered his resolve and replied, “I’m Captain Abbas al-Salem, Acting Commander of Battlefleet Datura. Admiral Falkenhausen was injured early in the battle; he’s currently recovering in the ship infirmary.”

Admiral Tang’s brow raised up. “I see. Send him my well wishes. You can retreat to Qatash. My fleet will clean the battlefield and rescue survivors.”

“Understood.”

Abbas did as best as he could and retreated the fleet.

“Captain Abbas, huh? Interesting,” Admiral Tang said to herself. “Let’s see if you’re a cat or a tiger cub.”

And so, another Imperial invasion was sent back running.