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pulsed. “Disengage from the enemy! Power deep! Ships in orbit, change vector now !”
    Everything depended now on the Turusch hunterforce having the time to change course and speed. The enemy force would have launched their fighters within moments of dropping out of superluminal drive, which meant that those fighters, and any kinetic-kill devices they’d released along the way, would be just behind the light-speed wavefront bearing the news of the enemy’s arrival.
    How fast were the approaching kinetic devices traveling, how close on the heels of light? How far behind them were the enemy fighters? That depended on the enemy’s technology—how fast they could accelerate—as well as on how quickly Turusch scanners had detected the enemy fleet in the first place. Five light- g’nyuu’m were a great depth. Many, many g’nya might have passed before Turusch scanners—or even the automated systems they controlled—had noticed the enemy’s arrival. How long had they been out there?
    Blossom felt the kick of acceleration as the Turusch command hunter Extirpating Enigma increased speed, breaking free of synchronous orbit, and with it an answering surge of relief. If the enemy had targeted the Extirpating Enigma several g’nyurm ago, while still en route, their missiles would miss the command ship now.
    Unfortunately, Emphatic Blossom’s warning would take time to reach the other ships. Some of them might detect the threat in time and act independently, but independence of action, independence of thought were decidedly not imperatives in Turusch tactical planning.
    But it was vital that the command ship survive any opening kinetic barrage by the enemy. By boosting clear of a predictable orbit, they had—
    “ Enemy kinetic-kill missile has just passed our tail! ” the scanner throbbed. “ Speed —”
    And then the Languid Depths of Time exploded in a white-hot glare of vaporizing metal.
    In another instant, three other Turusch hunterships exploded, and two dazzlingly brilliant stars appeared against the surface of the planet, expanded, blossoming . The claw-transport Victorious Dream of Harmony staggered as a portion of its tail vanished in a flare of silent light, the shock setting the massive vessel into an uncontrolled tumble.
    Lasered messages began flashing back to the flagship, speaking of projectiles passing through the fleet at speeds just a mr’uum less than that of light itself.
    The hunters had just become the prey.
    VFA-44 Dragonfires
Eta Boötis System
1245 hours, TFT

    Gray’s Starhawk was still slowing swiftly, still traveling at nearly eighteen thousand kilometers per second—a mere 0.06 c , a snail’s pace compared to typical high-G transit speeds.
    In principle, speed in combat was as important as it had ever been in the long-gone era of aerofighters and atmospheric dogfights in the skies above Earth. However, if your closing velocity was too high relative to your opponent, there simply wasn’t time to react, even with electronic senses and AI reaction times. The target was there and gone before you could do a thing about it.
    The universe had minutes earlier slipped back into its more usual, low-velocity appearance. Eta Boötis, the star, glared dead ahead, smaller than Sol seen from Earth, but a hair brighter. Other stars gleamed in constellations distorted to Earth-born eyes; Arcturus was a golden beacon high and to the left relative to Gray’s current attitude.
    Haris, the target planet, was a tiny crescent close by the star, 1.8 million kilometers distant, growing larger moment by moment.
    At Gray’s command, the Starfighter began rearranging itself once again, adopting standard combat configuration—a blade-lean crescent, slender black wings drooping to either side of the thicker central body, the crescent tips stretched forward as if to embrace the enemy. Sleek streamlining wasn’t as necessary at these velocities as it was when plowing through near-vacuum at near- c , but there was