► The field of ships cleared as the Alliance task force broke through the fighting, now plunging through the scattered debris of death and destruction they had wrought.

The Odysseus, Bellerophon, and Boudicca turned on command, accelerating toward the enemy ships, but it shortly became clear that not all of the enemy were intent on doing the same. Some did, while others continued to accelerate away. Most seemed uncertain.

Amid the confusion, the Odysseus’ scanners tracked one ship maneuvering in close to one of the disabled vessels and apparently docking.

►►►

IBC Piar Cohn

► “Connections secured, Captain.”

“Good,” Aymes said. “Get as many people over to the Cohn as possible, and find the navarch. Alive or dead, I want her on this ship!”

He didn’t listen for a confirmation, instead intently watching the mess unfolding around him. The enemy were still organized—that was clear by their uniform maneuvering despite damage—but the Imperial forces appeared uncertain about what to do. When the navarch’s ship lost contact, they’d been cut off from the command structure.

This wasn’t normally a problem, but in the chaos of battle it seemed that at least two other key members of the squadron’s command had been killed. In the midst of the fighting, everyone knew their jobs well enough, so the absence in command wasn’t felt. But now that they were out of the immediate threat, the breakdown that resulted would be fatal if Aymes didn’t find someone who could command enough respect, or fear, to get everyone pointing in the same direction.

They’d left more men and material strewn across several light-seconds of space than he’d have ever believed possible, and he was the captain who’d given warnings about just how dangerous this new culture really was. They were the anomaly culture, there was no question about that, and that meant that they had survived the Drasin’s berserker attack.

So they were tough, smart, and most likely extremely angry.

Aymes didn’t know for certain if the anomalies knew the Empire had held the Drasin’s leash, but they had to at least have some idea of it. They must have acquired scans from the megastructure the same as he had, and there was no hiding Imperial design.

This is going to be a costly expansion, he thought with deadly certainty.

No one had calculated that there would be a fighting culture in the path of the Empire’s movement into Oather territory, and now there was no going back. The Empire was going to pay for every system in this galactic arm in blood and metal.

He was very glad he wouldn’t be in the place of those analysts once the realities of Imperial expansion became as clear to everyone else as they were to him.

For now, however, he just hoped to get his ship and the rest of the squadron out of this situation as intact as possible.