"Greetings, commander of the Black Dragon Fleet; I'm Chu Xuan, commander of the Fifth Fleet, subordinate to the Third Corps of the Starlight Empire's Seventh Legion. Your support has come at just the right moment. Might I ask — how many ships have you brought!" Commander Chu Xuan asked in excitement.
Reinforcements had come, and that meant the 5 million people on that world could be safely evacuated!
"Our fleet has two ships," Zhao Chen said plainly.
Two?
For a moment Chu Xuan doubted she'd heard right; she looked to the female adjutant beside her and murmured, "Did I mishear '20 ships' as 'two ships' just now?"
"I… I think I heard 'two' as well." The female adjutant nodded, her expression frozen.
Chu Xuan hesitated, then confirmed it once more. "You said just now that your fleet has only two ships?"
"That's right," said Zhao Chen.
"You're only the advance fleet, surely — the main force is still on its way!" Chu Xuan tried to salvage a shred of hope.
Zhao Chen said, "The ones come to support this time are our two ships alone. As for the mission you posted, commander — apart from us, no one else was willing to take it."
Two?
Only the two ships?
All at once Chu Xuan felt her hopes plummet from the summit to the depths.
"Are your ships… T3 ships?" Chu Xuan pressed, unwilling to give it up.
"Two T2 ships," Zhao Chen answered.
Chu Xuan's face went blank at this. Perhaps… perhaps she truly should not have chosen to hold asteroid P331; she ought not, for the sake of her so-called sense of justice and duty, to let her fleet perish here.
"I'm deeply grateful you've come to support us — but with your two ships alone, there's no turning around the wretched situation we're in now," Chu Xuan said, her spirits low. "So I've decided to give it up…"
"You'd give up without even trying?" Zhao Chen asked back.
Chu Xuan was taken aback.
"You defied your lord's command and insisted on covering the evacuation of the 5 million on asteroid P331 — though it plunged your fleet into danger, and might even, through this one small stake, imperil the tens of millions on the worlds behind you. You may not be a fit commander — but you are a soldier worthy of respect. I don't believe that, so long as hope isn't utterly lost, you'd be willing to abandon the conviction you've held to." Zhao Chen looked Chu Xuan dead in the eye.
Though it was across the virtual window of a video comm, Chu Xuan felt a jolt run through her, as if from a live wire.
Gooseflesh rose over her whole body.
Chu Xuan opened her mouth…
But the female adjutant beside her cut straight in. "Captain, sir, perhaps you don't grasp the present situation. Your two T2 ships alone can in no way turn this around. You should know — what we have here are 30 T2 ships of the imperial navy! Two mere ships…"
The female adjutant had, at first, felt some admiration for this man; but now she thought him more likely another prize fool. Her lady had at last been talked round to retreating — and where had this fellow sprung from, working in a few sentences to stir her lady up all over again?
Did he have any idea who her lady was? Should any harm befall her here, the whole Arctic Fox star system might pay a bitter price for it.
"Then perhaps you'd first tell me the present situation." Zhao Chen looked to Commander Chu Xuan.
Commander Chu Xuan stayed the words the female adjutant beside her would have gone on with, and said gravely, "The situation is this. This host of interstellar hive-race came from a tier-2 cosmic bug-nest; that nest has already closed. In all, four T2 Hive Motherships and 35 T1 Hive Motherships emerged; to this point we've destroyed four T1 Hive Motherships and gravely wounded one T2 Hive Mothership. But the bugs are simply too numerous; we're already hard-pressed to hold the line."
Zhao Chen asked, "What are your fleet's losses? How much combat strength do your ships still have?"
Commander Chu Xuan was taken aback, but answered all the same. "All 30 of my fleet's ships survive; two are damaged to some degree, though it doesn't affect their combat strength. The weapons aboard still have better than 50% remaining. But our firepower is insufficient… the sheer number of the bugs…"
"Understood. I believe we have still a chance to fight." Zhao Chen cut off Commander Chu Xuan's words and said, unshakable.
The female adjutant put a hand over her face. Where in the world had this greenhorn crawled out of — cut from the very same cloth as her lady… bah, bah, bah, how could her lady be spoken of in the same breath as a man like this.
"Hey — have you the faintest grasp of the situation we're in? We can't drag 30 ships into risking their necks alongside your two here on the strength of a single word from you!" The female adjutant now dropped even her form of address for Zhao Chen and simply shouted.
Zhao Chen paid the female adjutant no mind, keeping his eyes fixed on Chu Xuan.
"What's your plan?" Chu Xuan asked him.
"There's no time now to explain much; you need only have your fleet do as I say. To defeat the interstellar hive-race before us is beyond doing — but to buy another two hours or so for the asteroid P331 behind us, that's no trouble at all." Zhao Chen looked at this young, lovely commander. "You need only tell me whether you're willing to trust me — whether you're willing, for the conviction in your heart, to gamble it all one more time!"
Chu Xuan clenched her fists and bit her lip; the war within her was plain to see.
"Are you quite done? If you want to throw your life away, no one's stopping you!" The female adjutant, past all bearing, jabbed a finger at Zhao Chen and shouted.
Zhao Chen added, "If you still don't trust me, I can give you one guarantee. The moment you judge this battle truly hopeless, you may withdraw at any time."
"Very well! I agree! My fleet is now under your command!" In that instant, the light in Commander Chu Xuan's eyes blazed forth once more, like a gemstone.
"My lady!" The female adjutant stamped her foot in agitation.
"Let me be willful just this once. If… if it truly can't be changed, then we'll withdraw when the time comes; it won't be too late," Commander Chu Xuan murmured.
The female adjutant could do nothing; she knew that once her lady had decided a thing, there was no changing it.
Her lady was of a temper brimming with justice — and pigheaded past all reason besides.
"My drone swarm will provide you cover; now have your fleet withdraw at full speed. At this position, take my T2 carrier starship as the core and form up a one-directional carrier battle formation," Zhao Chen said gravely.
"These bugs are terribly many — are you certain your interstellar drone swarm can truly hold them off?" Commander Chu Xuan asked, worried.
Zhao Chen said, his face unchanging, "Trust me, Commander Chu Xuan."
Commander Chu Xuan looked at the man before her; for reasons she couldn't name, she felt it was as though there were a light about him.
She began giving orders to her fleet. "All ships, disengage from battle; withdraw at full speed toward coordinates [redacted], and at position [redacted] take the allied carrier starship as the core and form up a one-directional carrier battle formation!"