“I’m afraid you’re right, XO,” Celesta said. She knew Barrett’s choice of words was deliberate and meant to not only state his opinion but to put it on official record that the Icarus was being forced to defend herself against a force that CENTCOM and the Federation Parliament considered an ally. But they were hundreds of lightyears from the capital and her first responsibility was to the ship and to the crew.

“Tactical … fire the Shrikes.”

“Missiles one and two away,” Adler said.

Two Shrike nuclear penetrators fired from the aft tubes and fired their engines. In reality they were decelerating from the relative speed they carried from the Icarus and waiting for the Ushin ships to meet them, but on the tactical board the tracks showed two missiles racing to their targets.

The Darshik had learned quickly to look for, and intercept, the small Terran missiles that packed such a big punch, but the Ushin were hopelessly ill-prepared for what was coming. Each Shrike slammed into the prow of its respective target, plunging deep into the guts of the cruisers before the warheads detonated. Both ships were instantaneously turned into clouds of expanding debris.

Celesta didn’t know whether the Ushin ships could have actually harmed the Icarus. She believed the likelihood was low given that the Ushin appeared to be herding the Terran ships to where the Darshik were waiting, but it was a risk she wasn’t willing to take given how bizarrely off the rails the mission had gone since arriving in the system.

The helmsman executed the braking maneuver as scheduled and the Icarus was slowed down to ten percent below her maximum transition velocity before the engines were shut down and secured. Celesta ordered all the tactical systems safed and the active sensors turned off as she took one last look at the threat board, the Darshik cruisers still pursuing but now too far back to be a threat. She hoped that out of all the com drones and ships that had returned to the Juwel System that CENTCOM would soon be getting a picture of how badly things had gone. She didn’t pretend to understand what it all meant, but it was clear the Ushin had been manipulating the situation either on behalf of the Darshik or for their own reasons.

“Stand by for warp transition!” the nav specialist called as the fore and aft distortion rings formed and began to stabilize, arcing out from the lateral emitters until the gravimetric energy created a visual effect on the main display. With a harsh shudder the Icarus disappeared from the system with barely a flash of light to mark her passing.

After breathing a sigh of relief at escaping what was behind them, Celesta now had to worry about what was ahead of them.

****