Kathryn cast a sideways glance at her captain as he fired the gravimetric releases. First at his eyes, focused wholly on the task before him, then at the gash across his chest, bleeding heavily through his parka.

“I don’t know what happened out there and I’m not sure I want to know. Just tell me one thing… did you get the embryo?”

Murphy nodded.

“Thank you, Captain.” Kathryn stroked his arm and turned her attention to the navcomputer. “If we make it out of here alive, I’m buying you a Centauri pint.”

“I got something else from the good constable, too,” said Murphy with a glint in his eye. The Gemstone was entering the mesosphere. He paused to activate heat shielding, then clicked on the comm. “Violet, are you there?”

“Here, sir.” The girl sounded nervous.

“I don’t suppose you’d be interested in Hughes’ fleet’s energy shield frequency?”

“Hells yeah, you have it?”

“Thank me later. Set our turret resonance to 72.8kHz and have at ‘em.”

“Aye, sir.”

The enemy fleet appeared. “Kate, let’s have some fun.”