"Nav! Get me a course correction that puts us over Xi'an at seven hundred and twenty-five kilometers at thirty-two degrees inclination," Jackson ordered. "Helm, execute immediately."

"Yes, sir!"

"What are your thoughts, Captain?" Celesta asked.

"I want us coming over the planet as far away from that incoming fire as we can manage, but we still need to see what they're protecting," Jackson said. "Is that drone ready to fly?"

She confirmed the status quickly on her terminal. "Yes, sir.".

"Good," he said. "Launch it as soon as we're in range. I have a bad feeling they're either protecting something on the surface we don't know about or clearing the way for something coming up."

"That's ominous-"

"Contact!" Barrett called out, interrupting Celesta. "Big contact! Something is coming up three kilometers across, roughly hemispherical."

"Helm, hard to starboard!" Jackson barked. "Get us away from this planet, ahead full!"

"Engines ahead full, steering away from the planet, aye!" The helmsman angled the Ares over sharply, so she was pointing almost perpendicular to their previous course, and thrust hard away from Xi'an.

They were still being influenced by Xi'an's gravity, so their course flattened out from a steep orbital insertion to a shallow arc that would send them over the northern hemisphere on their way past the planet.

"Another contact! Identical to the first, coming up five hundred kilometers south of the first contact," Barrett said.

"OPS, get optics on the new contacts, and put it on the main," Jackson ordered.

"Optics coming up." Davis worked on controlling the Ares's external optical sensors.

The image of Xi'an was soon on the main display, slightly blurry as the computer searched for the new contacts and tried to focus on them. The results were terrifying.

"Tactical, confirm what we're seeing." Jackson didn't want to believe what he was looking at.

"Confirmed, Captain." The blood drained from Barrett's face. "Two Alphas are coming up from Xi'an, stern-first."

"OPS, display our orbital track," Jackson said. "I need to know how close we'll pass. Coms! Broadcast a warning to the rest of the fleet. Tell the Brooklands to get the hell out of this system."

"We'll sling around Xi'an well away from the Alphas thanks to our steep orbital inclination, but we've decelerated so much that we're still at risk." Celesta pointed out their projected course as Lieutenant Davis put it on the main display.

"Nav, correct course to straighten us out, and sling us around the primary," Jackson said. "Helm, full acceleration when you get the new course. OPS, give me a location for the squadron to rally away from Xi'an and broadcast a recall order to the fleet. Tactical, bring all weapons online."

Jackson took a moment to compose himself and not make any rash decisions. He was now looking down the barrel of two ships like the one that had torn through this region of space unopposed some four years ago. He had a much more powerful ship at his disposal, and four more just like it fully armed and in the system, but he held no illusions about standing toe-to-toe with either of the leviathans pushing up slowly out of Xi'an's murky atmosphere.

"Now we know what they were protecting," Celesta remarked as the Ares groaned under heavy acceleration.

"We also know those Prowlers weren't as thorough as we'd originally thought." Jackson's voice was bitter. "We've left this planet alone for a few years while they built two more of these monsters."

"Captain, we've ordered the squadron to form a heliocentric trailing orbit behind the sixth planet," Lieutenant Davis said. "The Artemis and Hyperion have checked in-all Bravos destroyed, no casualties. Third Fleet units are exiting the system."

"Very good, Lieutenant." Jackson stood. "Tactical, I don't want you to take your eyes off the Alphas other than to blink, understood?"

"Understood, sir." Barrett's eyes didn't come off his displays.

"We're now in optimum range to deploy the surface drone," Celesta said.

"Deploy," Jackson said. "Have it broadcast real-time, since we may not be able to come back and pick it up, assuming it even survives its mission."

Celesta sent the command down to Flight Ops. "Drone away. Lieutenant Davis, I'm sending the telemetry feed to you."

"Yes, ma'am." Davis didn't up from her station as she controlled the flow of information to and from the bridge.

"What's the plan, sir?" Celesta lowered her voice. "Can five Starwolf-class ships take on two Alphas?"

"It's possible," Jackson said. "It would take some inspired tactics and more than a little foolhardiness. Unfortunately, we've had such little time with this ship, I'm not inclined to push it to the edge of its performance envelope just yet. This is a disputed system with zero civilians and zero strategic assets. There's nothing to be gained by taking on such an overmatched opponent. We'll regroup further out, observe as long as possible, then report and withdraw."

"Very good, sir." Celesta kept her voice completely neutral. While she didn't directly say it, her relief at his plan was obvious.

Jackson couldn't blame her. There wasn't a single crewmember that had served on the Blue Jacket currently in the Xi'an System that ever wanted to engage an Alpha again, much less a pair.

The Ares quickly accelerated away from Xi'an, angling up and away to swing around the primary star and fly out to the rally point with the rest of the Ninth Squadron ships. Capable of over seven hundred G's of acceleration, the new destroyer would be able to make the rendezvous on the other side of the system in thirty hours without even taxing the engines.

Their best intel on the Alphas, mostly extrapolated from the Blue Jacket's recovered sensor logs, have their best acceleration at significantly less than the new ship was capable of. The issue, however, was that the giant killing machines weren't hampered by Newtonian physics and were able to accelerate to any point within the system in a straight line, completely ignoring the gravitational pull of the star and its planets.

"Coms, message the rest of the squadron and order them to go silent," Jackson said. "Thermal and radio emission protocols are now in place until otherwise stated."

"Aye, sir," Lieutenant Keller said from the com station.

Jackson, now technically a senior captain, was in charge of the Ninth Squadron when it was deployed on its own. The Confederate Senate, with the intent to show their constituents they were taking the threat seriously, tried to make him an admiral and put him in charge of the Fleet response to the Phage. After the initial shock and horror of the idea wore off, he'd appealed directly to CENTCOM Chief of Staff Marcum and asked to be put back on the bridge of a starship. After some back and forth, a compromise was reached to promote him to senior captain and give him the first operational Starwolf-class ship off the line: the TCS Ares.

A few well meaning officers and ranking Senate members had lobbied to have the new ship christened the Blue Jacket, but Jackson had steadfastly refused. His previous command would be remembered for her crew's bravery and sacrifice. Resurrecting the name wouldn't bring them back and could only diminish their legend. Besides, he rather liked the name of his new ship. Ares: God of War.

While he felt a burning need for vengeance, his hard-won experience told him the current situation in the Xi'an System was a fight he probably couldn't win, and wasting ships and lives to spit in the eye of the Phage would be the height of foolishness. One of the main reasons he had stopped watching the news, and most broadcasts from Haven in general, was because much of the programming these days still centered around the initial Phage incursion into Confederate space and his ship's efforts to stop it. The highly dramatized propaganda about his "victory" couldn't be healthy, and he was worried he might begin to believe the bullshit about the "implacable Captain Wolfe" and get more good men and women killed in the process.

Deep down, he felt like a fraud. His risky gambles borne from desperation and fear were being portrayed as strokes of genius, cunning, and courage. The fact that so many people were looking to him, their eyes gleaming with hope that he would save them, terrified him more than the two Alphas just breaking out of Xi'an's ruined atmosphere.

The bridge remained tense as the Ares continued to pull away from Xi'an and the two Alphas that were now sitting in low orbit. The destroyer was still running her engines at full , and they were painfully aware that they were lighting up the sky with an impressive thermal plume, should the two alien ships decide to give chase.

"Captain, you'll be interested in this." Lieutenant Davis had been analyzing the sensor logs of these new Alphas, the first to be seen since the initial encounter the Blue Jacket had. Jackson climbed stiffly out of his seat, put weight experimentally on his prosthetic left leg, and walked over to her station.

"What do you have, Lieutenant?"

"I'm not sure these Alphas are even combat capable." She pulled up some high-resolution optical scans and overlaid them with the radar picture and thermal spectrograph images that showed the ships in multiple wavelengths.

"You have my complete attention, Lieutenant." Jackson leaned in to look at her monitor. She took a breath before continuing.

"If you'll look here at the stern and see that I've divided the view into quadrants, the radar is showing that the areas under the hull, where the plasma charges originate, are hollow spaces," she said. "The thermal scans back this up-the four areas are significantly colder than the flanks. In fact, visual spectrum shots seem to show the hull material is very thin, almost translucent."

"This is quite interesting," Jackson said. "Conclusions?"

"Impossible to reach any with this small amount of information, sir," she said. "But when taken in the context of the wild shots fired from the surface and the fact that they haven't pursued us, I would have to say that we've interrupted the construction of these two, and they're pulling them off the planet before another nuclear bombardment."

"I'm inclined to agree with your assessment," Jackson said. "But let's do this right. Send all this down to the engineering and science sections, without your own conclusions attached, and let's see what they come up with. I'm willing to bet they'll agree with you as well."

"So what can we do with that information?" Celesta had walked up behind them while Davis had been talking, the acoustics making it impossible for her to hear the conversation from her seat.

"For now, nothing," Jackson said firmly. "I won't turn and attack with a single ship while they're in orbit over Xi'an. They've demonstrated already that there's something down there capable of lobbing high-energy plasma bursts into orbit. I'd rather not find out the hard way that the new outer hull armor can't withstand what the Tsuyo engineers say it can. We also have no way to determine if the entire ship is unarmed or if it was just the stern that didn't have plasma weaponry installed... or however the hell they put them together.

"For now, the plan remains the same. Meet up with the rest of Ninth Squadron and reassess the situation then. It's possible that we can gather more data from the drone and make a run at these two. Taking down two Alphas would be a huge victory but not at the cost of five of our most advanced starships."

"Yes, sir," Celesta acknowledged while Davis just nodded.

"Keep at it, Lieutenant," Jackson said. "Commander Wright, let's stand down first watch and get everyone rested and fed now that we have a good idea that those two Alphas won't be pursuing us anytime soon."

"Aye, sir."

Jackson took the time to grab a proper meal from the wardroom and go to his quarters for a shower and a change of uniform. Before entering the shower, he sat on a seat he'd had installed in the head and carefully detached the prosthetic leg from what was left of his real leg below, about four inches below the knee. He set the mechanical apparatus aside and began carefully cleaning the connections on the metal cap that was surgically attached to his leg.

The cap had a locking socket on it that the prosthetic snapped into as well as inductively coupled electrical connections that allowed it to send nerve impulses so he could control the actuators. In a lot of ways, it was as good, if not better, than his real leg had been. There were much more advanced procedures available that would allow him to have a real leg grafted back on at the knee, but the rehabilitation was far too time consuming for him given the seriousness of the challenges he'd faced after they'd fished him out of the Blue Jacket's wreckage.

The mechanical prosthetic might not be pretty, and certainly made people uncomfortable to look at it, but that actually made him like it all the more. Despite the accolades that had been heaped upon him of late, he still felt like an outsider looking in, the dirty Earther who was being tolerated as long as he was useful. After performing a few maintenance tasks on the leg, he climbed into the shower and reveled in one of the luxuries the brand new ship afforded him: unlimited hot water in Officer Country.

He didn't come out of his quarters for another five full hours, and when he did, he was rested, clean, and ready to look at the problems from a new angle. The reassuring thrum of the engines and the calm demeanor of the crew he passed were also welcome as he nodded to the Marine sentry and walked onto the bridge.

"Captain." Lieutenant Davis nodded to him as she vacated the command seat. "Nothing of note to report. We're getting ready to lose line of sight contact with Xi'an as we cross behind the primary star. As of forty-six minutes ago, the Phage Alphas were still in low orbit over the planet and showing no unusual thermal activity."

"Very good, Lieutenant." Jackson took his seat. "You're relieved. Get below deck and grab some rack time."

"Yes, sir," she said. "Here's to a quiet watch."

"Indeed."

Jackson pulled up the ship's status on his terminal and checked specific details from each department. He sent a quick message to Commander Singh, his Chief Engineer and best friend, about meeting up for dinner before their rendezvous with the rest of the squadron. He answered another dozen messages to different department heads, mostly about mundane ship's operation, and marveled at how calm the atmosphere aboard was as they had two ships of a planet-killer class sitting nearby. Maybe they really had come a long way in a short time.

"Nav! How long until we reach the rest of the squadron?" he called out.

"We'll reach the rendezvous coordinates in seven hours, forty-five minutes," the specialist at the station answered immediately. "The Artemis and Hyperion will arrive approximately three hours after us." Jackson already knew all this from looking at his status board, but he'd never seen the specialist second class on the bridge and wanted to see if the young man was paying attention to his surroundings.

"Thank you, Specialist." He pretended not to notice the thumbs up the com officer gave the young enlisted spacer.

They were now cold-coasting. Having burned hard to change orbits and slingshot around the star, they were now able to fly purely on momentum, virtually disappearing into the surrounding space to anyone who was looking for them.

"Tactical, have we reacquired the Alphas after coming around the primary?" He looked over the telemetry data from the drone that, miraculously, was still flying over the planet's surface.

"Yes, sir," the ensign sitting at the tactical station answered. Her name was McCollum, and she'd scored especially well during training when they were all coming up to speed on how to operate the new ship.

"And?"

"Uh... they're still orbiting over Xi'an, sir," she said with uncertainty.

"Make sure you give me all the information you have, Ensign," Jackson snapped. "Don't make me drag each detail out of you."

He wasn't deliberately harassing the tail end of second watch, but he knew from his own experience as a young officer that things tended to fall into a comfortable routine. They needed to be able to do their jobs no matter who was on watch and who was giving the orders. He keenly felt the pressure to make sure they were ready for what was coming... and the fact the Phage had now begun pushing into Confederate space in earnest meant he was running out of time.

He passed the last few hours before they needed to reengage the engines by drilling his bridge crew before their first watch counterparts came on duty. When Lieutenant Commander Barrett walked onto the bridge, Ensign McCollum practically flung herself out of the seat to give turnover as fast as she could and escape. Barrett gave his captain a questioning look but said nothing as he slid into the seat and began reconfiguring the station to his preferences.

"You're on duty early, sir." Celesta walked onto the bridge and began taking inventory of the ship's status and personnel.

"Wanted to get a feel for the new spacers we picked up when they turned the ship over to us." He left it hanging.

"How do you feel they performed?" Ship's personnel was her responsibility, and she took it as a personal affront when they didn't meet expectations.

"They're trying," he said diplomatically. "They're young and inexperienced, but they take their jobs seriously and don't repeat mistakes. It's hard to ask for much more than that."

"Perhaps, sir," Celesta shrugged noncommittally. "I'd prefer they were a little better trained before we got them, but I suppose circumstances didn't permit that."

"They'll be fine, Commander," Jackson insisted. "We're about to fire the engines and begin our final braking maneuver. Hopefully the Atlas and Icarus are there waiting for us like they're supposed to be."

"How long until the Artemis and Hyperion make the rally point?" she asked.

"A few hours after us unless they pushed a little harder than originally planned," he said. "Once we're there, we can have a conference with the other command crews and figure out how we want to handle our two interlopers."

"I went below after my watch. Commander Singh is itching to try out some of the new weapons," she said. "Specifically the rapid-fire mag-cannon."

"He turned out to be a lot more bloodthirsty than I would have imagined," Jackson deadpanned.

Celesta's willingness to disobey orders for the greater good and back up Jackson as captain of the Blue Jacket instead of removing him from command had brought her into the fold with Daya Singh. During his own recovery and the shakedown of the Starwolf-class prototype, the pair had cemented their friendship. Jackson sometimes worried that it led to some lapses in professionalism, but the tradeoff was worth it, and his own interactions with the Chief Engineer were often far more personal than Fleet customs and courtesies would dictate.

"There'll be plenty of fighting to go around before this is all over. Right now we have a real opportunity to learn something rather than charge in and start peppering those two Alphas with cannon shells and nukes."

"No argument here, sir," she said.

Ninth Squadron made their rendezvous without incident. All five of the destroyers moved into a loose formation and initiated a tight-beam com laser connection with the ship on either side to allow two-way communications between all the vessels. At the request of the other COs, Jackson allowed for a five-way conference, despite his suspicion that it would be a complete waste of time. After the Ares had stabilized in her holding position, he, Commander Wright, and Lieutenant Davis were looking at each of their counterparts on the divided screen in the command deck conference room.

"Our best information indicates that both Alphas are still orbiting Xi'an and making no move to leave the system." Jackson opened the meeting with no preamble, wanting to get it over with and get his people moving as quickly as possible. "The drone we launched during our flyby has been destroyed, but before that, it was able to transmit images of what look to be the shipyards, for lack of a better term, where these two Alphas were constructed and launched. It also confirmed that the weapons fire that cleared the path to orbit originated there." He looked around to gauge the response of his audience.

"So our options are to continue observations from far orbit as we are now, or take this opportunity to destroy the two Alphas that we have surmised are incomplete and possibly without armament."

"I think the choice is obvious," Captain Levitt said from the Icarus' conference room. "Observation and reporting is grand for a scientific expedition, but taking the risk that those two Alphas could leave the system and be completed elsewhere, only to return to Confederate space, is unconscionable. They must be destroyed here. Now." "Captain Wolfe, while we all respect your experience with this type of enemy ship, could your hesitation to attack be overcautious given the current circumstances?" Captain of the TCS Hyperion, Olivia Forrest's voice dripped with disdain.

"What hesitation would you be referring to?" Jackson kept his face and voice neutral. "This is simply a forum for you to voice your opinions as we regroup. A meeting called at your request, I would remind you. I may, or may not, follow the consensus reached here depending on what I feel is the best course of action."

"Nobody is suggesting that we're hesitating," Levitt said quickly, despite the fact that Forrest had said just that only moments ago. "But... we do need to figure out fairly quickly what we're going to do."

Jackson suppressed the urge to yet again point out that it was their desire to talk the issue to death that was the cause of the delay. He held his tongue as he recognized it for what it was: they were all scared. More accurately, they were shitting-their-pants-terrified. They wanted to save face by letting him be the one to order the withdrawal.

The conversation continued for the next twenty minutes with Jackson more or less staying in the background. He'd already made his decision, but it wouldn't hurt to get a read on his other captains and allow them to feel like they had a say in the plan. Thankfully, the four were divided down the middle, so Jackson could decide either way and only piss off half his subordinates.