Free The Lost Stars: Imperfect Sword by Jack Campbell

the Syndicate flotilla on
Manticore
was dropping fast as the heavy cruiser strained to pull away and escape intercept. But that rate had to hit zero, then hopefully turn negative as the range began widening again, or else
Manticore
would still be doomed.
    Kontos had brought
Pele
back again, too late to catch the heavy cruiser alone, swinging in from above to strike the rear of the Syndicate formation. The remaining Syndicate light cruiser blew apart as it tried to evade fire from the battle cruiser as well as
Gryphon
and
Basilisk
. The rest of the Midway flotilla, still in a separate formation under Kapitan Seney on
Kraken
, had bent down and back, and was coming in a flat curve at the Syndicate formation from behind and below.
    But CEO Boucher plowed on, closing the distance to
Manticore
with increasing slowness as the heavy cruiser kept increasing speed. “She knows this is the flagship,” Marphissa said. “CEO Boucher has been analyzing our comm patterns, and she knows I’m aboard
Manticore
.”
    Diaz nodded. “And she wants to make an example of you. Kill the leader, and the rest will submit. Snakes always try that even though it rarely works. There’s always another leader.”
    “I don’t think her intentions matter any longer,” Bradamont said, eyeing the display. “I think we’re clear. We’re going fast enough that the battleship will take about a week to catch us at this rate.”
    The words had barely cleared her throat before
Manticore
shuddered throughout her length.
    The lights went out, the life-support fans stopped, and the displays vanished.
    Marphissa waited in the hushed darkness for the second it took for the emergency lighting to come on. “Something happened,” she observed to Diaz, who was fruitlessly pounding the internal comm controls on the arm of his seat.
    “Engineering watch specialist!” Diaz said, his voice reverberating in the strange silence on the bridge. He lowered his voice before speaking again. “Get down to engineering and find out what’s going on. We need power back. We need
everything
back.”
    Marphissa was gazing at where her display had been. Now, nothing but the blank, armored forward bulkhead of the bridge could be seen. The entire compartment felt strangely smaller with the equipment offline and life support not offering the constant, reassuring background noise of fans and ducts and circulating fluids. The bridge was buried deep in the ship, as safe as possible from enemy fire or other threats, which normally brought a sense of reassurance. At the moment, it was creating a feeling of literally being buried.
    Senior Watch Specialist Czilla propped open a device pulled out of the emergency locker near his station. It lit, showing a series of readings. “We are still all right for oxygen and CO 2 concentration, Kommodor. Estimated time to dangerous reduction in O 2 and dangerous density of CO 2 is twenty-five minutes.”
    “We’ll hold off sealing our survival suits to conserve their life support for when we need it,” Marphissa said. “Damn! What is going on outside?”
    “We’re still moving,” Diaz said. “We’ve stopped accelerating, but the Syndicate flotilla is still in a long stern chase. Those surviving Hunter-Killers with the battleship have been burning a lot of their fuel cells. Unless CEO Boucher provides new cells from the battleship’s stockpile, those Hunter-Killers will be in trouble before the Syndicate ships can catch us.”
    “At the moment,” Marphissa grumbled in a very low voice, “I’m worried about our own people catching us. We had made it back up past point one five light speed when the power cut out, and now we’re racing outward at that velocity. If we get too far out before they can send someone to intercept us . . .”
    “We could open some exterior fittings to vent atmosphere,” Diaz said. “Pivot the ship using that method, then figure out how to light off main propulsion without power—”
    “That’s