“Enemy fighters!” Kharill snapped. “Bearing…all around us, Captain. Swarming us. Swarming everyone.”

Samakro hissed out a minor curse. Kharill was right. There were at least fifty Paataatus fighter craft out there, buzzing around the Chiss attack force like angry weltflies, their lasers creating flashes of pale green as they cut through the rarefied interplanetary dust.

And as with weltflies, even though each individual sting was too weak to damage the Springhawk’s electrostatic barrier, a sufficiently massive barrage of such fire could conceivably take down the defenses and start eating into the hull.

“Acknowledged,” Thrawn said calmly. “Sphere One: Fire at nearest attacker on my vector.”

“Sphere One firing.” The plasma sphere blazed away from the Springhawk’s portside launcher.

And missed its target completely.

“Sphere control!” Samakro snapped. “Retune and fire again.”

“Belay that,” Thrawn said. “Helm: Yaw ninety degrees to port and bring Sphere Two to bear. Fire when ready.”

“No, wait!” Samakro snapped.

Too late. The Springhawk was already turning, angling toward the enemy ships on that side.

Turning away from the Vigilant.

And before even the plasma sphere launcher was in position to fire, the enemy fighters were repositioning to take advantage of Thrawn’s mistake, sweeping in to surround the Springhawk as it pulled away from the other Chiss ships.

“Springhawk, get back in formation,” Ar’alani’s voice boomed from the bridge speaker. “Thrawn?”

“No reply,” Thrawn said. “Fire Sphere Two.”

This time the plasma sphere flew true, bursting into its target fighter and unleashing a multicolored flash of ionic energy across the enemy’s hull as it took down the fighter’s electrostatic barrier and scrambled all the electronics within its reach. “Reload and prepare to fire,” Thrawn said.

“Shouldn’t we get back to the main force?” Samakro pressed. “Admiral Ar’alani—”

“Hold course,” Thrawn said. “Sphere Two, fire when ready. Lower barrier strength twenty percent.”

Samakro mouthed another curse, a major one this time. “May I suggest we deploy decoys?” he pressed. “It would at least divert some of the focus away from us.”

“It would indeed,” Thrawn agreed. “Negative on decoys. Yaw another five degrees to portside, then three degrees starboard.”

The Springhawk turned, then turned again. The Paataatus lasers continued to beat against the weakened electrostatic barrier, and through the viewport Samakro could see the Paataatus fighters again re-forming their attack cluster to bring more of their force to bear. “Captain, if we don’t get back to the others, we’re not going to last long,” he warned quietly, wondering distantly what had happened to the Thrawn who’d once brought renown to the Springhawk.

“We’ll last long enough, Mid Captain,” Thrawn said. “Don’t you see it?”

Samakro lifted a hand in a gesture of confusion and futility.