“Get our shields up and weapons ready Lieutenant!” he ordered the Latina, who was already springing into action, her hands a flurry of activity over the tactical controls.


    The weapons loadout hologram hovering above her tactical station showed the armoured panels in the Invictus’ hull peeling away to expose their weaponry.


    “They’re using an Interdictor against us John!” Sparks called out in rm.This material belongs to N?velDrama.Org.


    “Put our current star system on the map Sparks” he asked her brusquely, having no time for pleasantries.


    The sultry redhead nodded determinedly and the System map snapped back to Iota-Carinae. They were on the outskirts of the system, the huge A-type star bathing the system in a white glow. The tactical map showed that they had been pulled out of hyper-warp and dragged close to Iota-Carinae Alpha, the onlyary body in the system. It was a freezing world of sub-zero temperatures, surrounded by a wide band of frozen ice chunks in concentric rings.


    Their focus was dragged away from the system map for the moment when Sparks reported they were receiving iing fire.


    “Shields at 62% Commander!” she cried out in rm “We’re being attacked by multiple targets”.


    “Boost shields and engine power, divert all energy from weapons.” John said.


    Sparks swiped her hand over the power distribution hologram to obey hismands. The shields on the damage control ovey began to pulse in a light green, showing that they were recharging and the massive engines groaned as they trembled with power, the Invictus leaping forward eagerly.


    “Alyssa, evasive manoeuvres, we’ve got to get out of their killing ground!” he said curtly.


    “On it John!” the beautiful blonde said in reply, rolling the Invictus and pulled the nose of the ship around to point at the Ice.


    “Cra, show me the tactical map!” he ordered the Latina.


    The tactical map appeared, recing the system map in the middle of the bridge and icons quickly sprung into ce as they were picked up by the sensors. Their dark grey hulled assault cruiser was centred in the map, surrounded by a destroyer, a frigate, four corvettes and the heavy cruiser. It was the pirates from the Chendar system and the hacking Sparks had done on their transponders, allowed the crew to see the full order of battle arrayed against them.


    “Those fleeing picket ships must have regrouped with the other pirate ships that jumped out!” Cra said, as she recognised the ship configurations.


    The Invictus rocketed past the destroyer, leaving it facing the wrong direction, as Alyssa made a beeline for the belt of razor sharp chunks of ice. The corvettes and the frigate gave chase, firing theirser cannons at the fleeing ship. The carefully controlled erratic dodging that Alyssa was employing was allowing the slower ships to keep up, but making it extremely hard for them to hit the Invictus with any degree of uracy. One of the corvettes managed to hit them with a few sts from itsser cannons but the rest of the pirates’ shots wentfortably wide.


    “Shields at 60% John.” Sparks called out, the shields regenerating almost as quickly as the pirates could knock them down with their inurate shooting.


    “Iing broadside from the Stalingrad!” Cra warned, as the bulky piratemand ship opened up with its starboard batteries.


    Alyssa had dipped the Invictus and was yawing to the right to avoid fire from the pursuing corvettes, which meant that the enormous shells from the Heavy cannons sailed wide, eventually detonating harmlessly a few thousand metres away from their hull with colossal explosive force. Unfortunately the beamser battery fire was much more urate, with four of the sixsers scything across the shields over the rear of the dodging assault cruiser.


    “Shields down to 28%!” the redhead cried in rm.


    “Twenty second until we reach the Ice field.” Alyssa said distractedly, as she focused nearly all her attention on trying to anticipate where the pirates would aim and making wild evasive manoeuvres to make sure the Invictus wasn’t near that spot.


    A relentless cascade ofser cannon fire sailed around the Invictus, as the pirates sprayed shots all over the ce, giving up on trying to aim and just hoping a mass of firepower would let them hit by blind luck if not by skill. It worked to a degree, with the Invictus taking a few more hits, although the shieldsfortably absorbed and dissipated the energy.


    The tactical map zoomed in to show the looming formations of ice hanging motionless and trapped in orbit around the frozen. The Invictus dived into the ice belt, leaving a frosty trail behind them as their shields pushed aside the tiny ice crystals that shrouded the whole belt in a white mist.


    Alyssa pulled the ship around in a smooth arc and put a colossal hunk of crystallised water between them and the heavy cruiser. Now they were no longer in direct line of sight to the pirates, she was able to put more distance between them and their pursuers, making use of the superior top speed of the Invictus.


    “What’s the n John?” she asked him curiously.


    “We’ll regenerate our shields under cover of the ice field and then hit the pirates if theye in after us.” he said decisively.


    Alyssa grinned at him and nodded eagerly.


    “Fantastic job reacting so fast to that ambushdies” he said delightedly, never ceasing to be surprised at just how capable his women were.


    They beamed up at him happily, loving hearing the pride in his voice.


    “Shields at 22%.” Sparks said. “That was a close one!” she sighed with relief.


    Behind them, the titanic lump of ice shuddered as it was hit by the beamsers from the Stalingrad, melting huge gouges out of the sheer ice surface facing the Heavy Cruiser. The stubborn ice block stayed together though, refusing to yield to the energy weapons. That stubbornness was abruptly overwhelmed when the Stalingrad opened up with its eight heavy cannons. The shells punched their way into the icy asteroid and caused great fractured splits, until the shells detonated momentster and razor sharp ice fragments exploded in all directions, the huge object sted into smithereens.