If I were the swarm, he thought, I’d collect chunks of rock from somewhere and accelerate them close to the speed of light. All it would take was a simple railgun technology; the rocks didn’t even need to be very big to cause a lot of damage once they had reached relativistic speeds.

‘Three, two, one,’ Nancy counted aloud, and a second later Ty felt his heart and lungs press up against his spine while a seemingly enormous force flattened his head back against his seat. The asteroid’s surface disappeared out of his peripheral view as the launcher blasted away from it.

Thirty seconds. Nancy hit a second button and cut off the burn. The intense pressure lifted from Ty’s body and they were weightless once more. He twisted around and saw how the asteroid had already shrunk into the distance. Even as he watched, something slammed into it for a third time, cleaving it like a lump of dried clay smashed with a hammer.

‘Jesus and Buddha,’ Nancy swore, sounding like she was on the verge of crying with relief. ‘They can hear us again! I’ve got a channel open to the Mjollnir, Nathan. I think we’re going to make it.’

‘Are they ready to jump out of the system?’ asked Ty.

‘I seriously fucking hope so. They’re under attack, but no direct hits so far. Deceleration burn in ten, so get ready.’

Ty grabbed hold of his armrests as the launcher swivelled round in a slow, graceful arc until it was facing back the way they had come. No direct hits. He stared at the expanding cloud of debris that was now all that remained of the asteroid. If the Mjollnir had been hit by anything like that, there would be nothing left of it.

‘Here we go,’ said Nancy. ‘In three . . . two . . . one.’

The launcher had not been built with comfort in mind. When the rockets cut out half a minute later, Ty twisted around to see the dirty-grey and black exterior of the Freehold starship fast expanding towards them. He could also make out a faint blue shimmer around the frigate’s drive spines. More split-second bursts decelerated the launcher yet further, and soon the yawning mouth of a forward bay swallowed them up.

The bay doors slid shut over their heads and grappling arms reached out from the deck, locking on to the launcher and drawing it down into a cradle. Ty started to unstrap himself.