With the Ixians leading the attack, the Alliance forces smashed into the Troika defenses, sending them reeling while they covered the more badly damaged Terran ships, allowing them to withdraw. Although their arrival was an unwelcome surprise to the Troika, they quickly rebounded, redeploying their forces in order to counter the new threat. While the combined Terran-Alliance fleet outnumbered their enemy, the Troika forces held a sizable advantage in both ship size and technological superiority, which still meant swapping ships at an unacceptable rate of exchange.

Desperate to end the fight, the combined Alliance fleet counter-attacked, driving a wedge deep into the enemy lines, attempting to split them in two. It was a bold maneuver and caught the Troika off guard, but given the disparity of their forces, they blunted their thrust and threw them back. Forced to regroup once more, the Alliance attempted a feint, pulling their ships back in apparent retreat before making a savage assault against the enemy’s flank. This time it was the Troika who were compelled to fall back and rally their forces, with both sides swapping one murderous blow for another as the death toll escalated.

Admiral Van Aalst sent a frantic glance towards New Terra, as Freya shuddered under yet another blow. Even with the Alliance at their side, the situation was growing increasingly desperate. They’d heard nothing from Captain Haddad or his crew since the battle’s start, a bad omen. If something happened to them, if their shuttle had been destroyed or couldn’t breach the planet’s defenses, then the outcome looked bleak.

Holy Mother Terra, we could sure use that miracle right about now, he prayed, as they readied themselves for another assault.

Athena manipulated the holographic projection while Remi stood beside her, watching the battle unfold in real time as she highlighted the Terran forces in blue. “It would seem there are those not of your race fighting alongside your forces,” she observed. “Can they be trusted?”

“Absolutely,” he nodded. “Those are Alliance ships. It was us Terrans who helped create the Alliance.”

The AI turned to face him, arching an eyebrow. “The Hesed’Emek also had allies at various times during their history. Not all of them proved trustworthy.” She marked those ships in green, before moving onto the Troika. “And these ships?” she inquired.

“The Troika,” he growled. “They’ve terrorized this galaxy for five thousand years. The sooner we destroy them, the better.”

Coloring the enemy fleet red, she considered the tactical situation before designating several enemy vessels. “I believe we should begin here,” Athena informed him. “Do you concur?”

Peering at the display, he realized she’d marked the largest and most powerful ships in the enemy fleet. “Hell yeah,” he agreed. “How do we stop them?”

An almost feral cast came over her, waving her hand once more as another display came to life.

“Observe, Captain… the Shaddai’Tzedeq.”

Athena transmitted her command to a waiting relay, powered down and in standby mode. Upon receipt of the signal, it immediately came to life, broadcasting her orders on a secure band to other relays, which activated even more platforms, setting a cascade effect in motion as millions of automated systems were brought online. Surrounding New Terra’s sun, they had lain dormant, awaiting this moment, but now that she had roused them from their electronic slumber, they reoriented themselves, pointing towards the K4 star in their midst.

As stars went, New Terra’s was unremarkable. There were trillions just like it in the universe, hundreds of millions, at least in the Milky Way alone. Generating 2.7 x 1026 watts of energy every second, most of it radiated away into space. Only the tiniest fraction of that output, less than 0.00000001%, ever made it to the surface.

Leaving the defense system guarding the planet with lots of energy at its disposal.

Most of the swarm of satellites were collimators, designed to take in the star’s scattered rays of light and energy and then focus them in a specific direction. From there, they transmitted the beams to a reflection chamber, little more than a tube with polished mirrors on either end. Light from the star is reflected back and forth, pumping the photons and electrons into ever higher energy states, before passing them through a polarizer to give structure to the once chaotic solar rays.

Raw sunlight entered the system; high-energy particle beams exited it.

From there, the array sent them to a collection grid that combined the smaller individual beams into a single massive one, before being sent to one of many quantum gates located around the star. Energy could only travel at the speed of light, but with quantum teleportation, they avoided that limit. Targeting data was then relayed to the gate, before sending the beam on to its final destination.

In the grand scheme of things, the energy used by the Shaddai’Tzedeq array was minuscule, far less than what shone down on New Terra. Just a drop in the bucket, all things considered.

But then a star is a really, really, really, really big bucket.

Aboard the Ixian flagship Ataraxia, Paygan Xeing had troubles of his own.

“Increase to flank speed!” he shouted. “Bring us about to bearing 231 by Mark 95!”

The Alliance fleet was taking a pounding, one far worse than they’d expected. They were still holding together, albeit just barely, but four times now they’d launched an assault to force their way past the Troika line, and four times they had thrown them back on their heels. He was consolidating his forces for a fifth attempt, but if it failed, their options were few. The combined fleet could end up being forced to retreat from the field of battle, a bitter pill for any Ixian, but given the losses they had already suffered, there was the possibility the Troika would then run them down like so much weakened prey. Should that happen… the future looked dark indeed. Not the death he had hoped for.

“Paygan!” one officer shouted. “Tu’udh’hizh’ak Dreadnought bearing 016 by Mark 352! Range, ten thousand kilometers!”

A glance at the main viewer confirmed it. The massive vessel was headed straight for them and had barely been scratched. Stopping it would be… problematic. “Order Second and Third squadrons to converge on our location!” he ordered. With two additional squadrons in support, they might have a chance of blunting its attack.

“Second and Third squadron confirm receipt of their orders and are en route,” the officer confirmed, “though they state they may not arrive in time.”

The Paygan said nothing in return, for there was nothing to say. He had known it was a gamble the moment he’d issued the order, though he had hoped otherwise. Courage and audacity were king on the battlefield, though wisdom and guile played their parts as well. Here, it simply had not been enough.

So be it.

“Target the Dreadnought and fire,” he snarled. Facing such a formidable enemy was an honorable death in its own right, and…

A massive beam of energy flashed before Ataraxia, blinding him with its intensity and forcing him to avert his eyes. Several viewscreens were overloaded because of its sheer power, and when his vision finally cleared, he could only stare in disbelief.

The Dreadnought was gone, obliterated in a single blast. What little of it remained was unidentifiable, nothing more than trifling chunks of composite and armor, scattered like ashes in the wind.

“… yuutsah’zhoz…” he whispered, stunned beyond mere words.

A handful of seconds went by before another Troika vessel disappeared, this one an Eleexxi Battleship, annihilated like the first with a single blow. “Tactical,” he finally spoke, once he’d found his voice, “what is the origin of those… beams?” he inquired, though deep within his soul, he already knew the answer.

The officer checked his readings and blanched. “It came from… the Demon system,” he stammered.

Ixian warriors were renowned throughout the Perseus Arm for their courage and bravery in battle. An Ixi would often laugh in the face of death, embracing his fate with glee… but the emergence of the Demon planet’s weapons in this fight had shaken every one of them to their very core. He would gladly face any foe… but how did one battle a god?

There was something he needed to know. “Confirm… are only enemy vessels being targeted?” he interrogated the officer.

He verified his readings even as a third blast struck. “Yes, Paygan. Thus far, it has not fired on any Alliance or Terran ships.”

Nodding slowly as he forced himself to recline back in his chair, he welded a smile upon his face. “Today is a glorious day,” he told the crew, “when even the Gods fight by our side!”

For some unknown reason, the crew found no comfort in those words.

At first, the Troika’s reaction… like everyone else’s… was one of disbelief.

When the Tu’udh’hizh’ak Dreadnought Remorseless was destroyed, they assumed the enemy had simply landed a lucky blow, or that it had suffered an engineering failure of some sort. Communications during the battle were chaotic, an all-too-common state of affairs in combat. It took time for reports of the massive energy blasts originating from the Precursor homeworld to make their way up the chain, and by that time both the Eleexxi Battleship Harbinger and the Aggaaddub Monitor Ravager had been eradicated as well.

Their initial reaction was to withdraw, but they quickly realized that even retreat would offer their ships no protection. Since the mists of time, there had been a clear boundary surrounding the Precursor planet; as long as one remained outside that perimeter, you were safe. Every Troika ship knew exactly where that border lay, avoiding it with almost religious fervor.

Only now they were being fired upon far beyond that limit, which meant that nowhere was safe. Oh, it was a certainty that what the Terrans had awakened… it went without saying that the escaping shuttle must have somehow contacted the entity guarding the planet, just as they had long feared… the weapon must have some practical limitation to its range. If they pushed their ship’s engines to their limits and ran hard, eventually they were certain to find safety.

The only question was, would any of their vessels still be intact by the time they did, a theoretical exercise no one was rushing to test. This left the Troika leadership facing a quandary; if retreat was too risky to attempt, and remaining on the battlefield even more so, what options did that leave? During the never-to-be-sufficiently-cursed Battle of Sonoitii Prime, the Terrans faced a similar dilemma. Perhaps their enemy’s solution would work for them as well.

They transmitted orders to the fleet. It was a tactic of desperation, but what other option did they have?

When the Troika ships began dying, Admiral Van Aalst wanted to weep with joy, watching their prayers being answered. Captain Hadad must have gotten through and somehow contacted the artificial intelligence that protected New Terra and enlisted its aid. Frankly, it hadn’t come a moment too soon.

He was hardly alone in that sentiment. The bridge crew stood and cheered as it wiped the enemy ships from existence, a scene being repeated on every Terran vessel still functioning. The arrival of the Alliance fleet had bought them the time they’d needed to complete Hadad’s mission, and now they could sit back and watch the fireworks. The enemy had been stunned into indecision by their sudden change of fortune, a lapse that had cost them dearly. The Troika had to break off their attack and retreat now. Surely even those fools had to realize remaining here, with their most powerful ships being one-shotted into oblivion, was tantamount to suicide.

Not that running offered them much of an advantage, not with the forces combined against them baying at their heels, winnowing them while they raced for safe harbor. Still, it was a better option than staying here and dying where they stood. Either way, the battle was over.

It took less than a minute for him to curse his own stupidity.

The enemy ships altered course and closed with the combined Terran-Alliance fleet, firing as they advanced. Van Aalst realized their strategy almost immediately, and the worst part was that it might actually be effective. By bringing their ships as close as possible to the combined fleet, the Troika was attempting to use them as shields. There was no way of knowing if the ancient superweapon could shoot one and miss the other, other than finding out the old-fashioned way.

“Back off the enemy ships!” he shouted. “Keep your distance!”

Remi watched in amazement as the AI’s weapon… the Shaddai’Tzedeq, Athena had called it… destroyed one Troika ship after another, removing them from the battlefield as easily as taking pawns off a chessboard. Thank Mother Terra, his mind whispered, as for the first time in a long while, he felt a sense of hope.

But the Troika quickly adapted to the new threat, bringing their ships in proximity with the combined fleet. As they drew near, he realized that Athena had stopped firing.

“Why are you stopping?” he demanded. “They still need you!”

“The Shaddai’Tzedeq is not a precision instrument,” she informed him. “While it is possible to attenuate the beam, there is a risk the allied forces would be unintentionally targeted as well.”

“How big a risk?” he asked her. If nothing else, a Corsair knew how to play the odds. After all, they’d been doing it for two hundred years.

“The probability of any allied vessel being destroyed approaches near totality,” Athena explained, throwing up a graph on the monitor. The vertical axis displayed “Likelihood of Allied casualties”, in percentages, while the horizontal axis was marked “Number of beam projectiles fired“. The correlation was simple; the more she fired, the higher the odds Terran ships would die.

“And what happens to the fleet without your help?” he pressed her. “Do they still have a chance?”

Another chart appeared beside the first. “With the removal of the most powerful Troika vessels, the probability of Allied victory has improved. However, without the support of the Shaddai’Tzedeq weapons array, that outcome stands at 52.371% likelihood, based on current projections.”

“You’re talking about a 50/50 coin toss,” he snarled. “That’s not good enough!”

“I can resume the targeting of enemy vessels if you wish,” Athena responded. “However, depending on the number of Allied ships destroyed by the Shaddai’Tzedeq array, there is a statistical likelihood of the Alliance fleet blaming your race for their losses and attacking their vessels. Should that occur, defeat is all but assured.”

“I don’t fucking believe this!” Remi screamed. “You’re saying that even with you on our side, we still lose?”

“The current tactical situation is fluid, with numerous variables,” Athena pointed out. “It is possible that victory may still be attained by employing the Shaddai’Tzedeq array, but the probability of such an outcome is not encouraging. It may be feasible to strike a balance between the various stratagems, although…”

Athena paused in mid-sentence, cocking her head. “It would appear the tactical environment has been radically altered yet again,” she said at last.

“What? What are you talking about?” Remi said in frustration.

“Another faction has entered the theater of operations,” she replied.

“Another faction? What faction?” he asked her, now completely bewildered.

Athena updated the display. “The Arbeh’Negef,” she clarified. “Strange. Their arrival was unanticipated. They have long avoided this region of space.”

Remi could only stare at the display in sick horror.

“Holy Mother Terra,” he whispered, “... the Yīqún.”