Ted nodded.  The alien frigates were closing in rapidly, threatening to bring their plasma weapons to bear on humanity’s frigates.  No matter the sheer weight of armour wrapped about the ships, Ted knew, the human frigates were doomed if the aliens entered firing range.  He wondered, absently, how long it would take the eggheads to come up with a directed energy weapon humans could use, one that worked better than point defence lasers.  Even a small level of armour could provide protection against the lasers.

The display flared red, suddenly.  “The enemy got a clear shot at Rio,” Farley reported.  “She’s badly damaged, sir ...”

Another icon flared red, then vanished.  “She’s gone,” Farley said.

Ted winced.  Another human frigate, a crew of thirty men and women, gone in an instant.  But there was no time to mourn.  A moment later, the analysts started twittering for his attention.  He hesitated, then keyed the switch to hear what they had to say.  They seemed to believe that the aliens had fired at extreme range, damaging Rio rather than destroying her outright.  It had been the secondary damage that had killed the ship.  Under the circumstances, Ted found it hard to care about the difference.  The ship was still dead.

“Nukes detonating now,” Farley said, sharply.  “EMPs ... underway.”

“Good,” Ted said.  If the EMPs failed, they'd just wasted a handful of nukes for nothing.  “Let me know ...”

One of the alien craft flared white on the display, then vanished.  Others seemed to stagger briefly, the sensors picking up odd flickers of energy on their hulls.  The remainder stepped down their drives, allowing the distance between them and their prey to widen.  Ted laughed as he realised that, for once, the eggheads had got something right.  The destroyed ship must have been on the verge of unleashing a full blast of plasma itself, only to lose containment as the EMP detonated.

“Deploy the second set of nukes,” Ted ordered.  On the display, the alien starfighters seemed to be pulling back, sweeping empty space rather than going after human targets.  It looked odd, almost as if they were giving up the chase ... it took him a long moment to realise that they were looking for other nukes.  “Then launch powered missiles towards the alien starfighters.”

“Aye, sir,” Farley said.

***

Kurt felt sweat trickling down his back as he pulled his starfighter around and fired a burst of pellets towards a retreating alien fighter.  They missed; he swore venomously as warning lights blinked up on the display, reminding him that he was critically low on ammunition.  The aliens, damn them, could keep firing indefinitely, but the humans needed to reload ... he glanced at the shared datanet and swore again.  He was by no means the only pilot who needed to reload his weapons.