‘What have we got?’ called Valance as she stepped onto the bridge. They’d gone to red alert when she was in the turbolift, now much closer to the danger.

Rourke gave her a brisk nod and gestured her to the seat at his right. ‘Mining station in the Proxidium system sent out a distress call; they say they’re under attack by a B’rel-class. Apparently they dropped out of cloak, hit the outlying facilities hard, then once the station raised it defences they called on them to lower shields and let their stores to be emptied by transporter. The station told them to screw themselves and called for help.’

Valance’s brow furrowed. ‘What’re they mining?’

‘Tritanium. Nothing fancy.’

Airex, stood at Science, looked displeased. ‘I don’t see how a B’rel-class could have the cargo space to make a raid like this worthwhile. We’re not that close to the border. This is high-risk, low-reward.’

‘If they have another ship,’ said Kharth, ‘then they’ll be cloaked, too. It makes sense to keep your hauler hidden.’

Airex nodded. ‘I’m running scans to try to pick up any other raiders, but I’m getting nothing so far.’

‘That is the purpose of a cloak,’ mused Valance.

‘It’s very rare,’ said Rourke, ‘for pirates using stolen or salvaged Imperial ships to keep them so finely-tuned we don’t notice anything on our sensors, though. Still, absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence, but let’s not jump at shadows just yet.’

Lindgren pressed a finger to her earpiece. ‘Nearby Starfleet ships are asking if we require assistance.’

‘Give them our thanks, but we can handle one bird-of-prey,’ said Rourke, and nodded forwards. ‘Let’s help these people.’

They dropped out of warp minutes later, Valance grasping the armrests of her seat as the deck lurched underneath in the fall to impulse. The viewscreen shifted from the local map to the sight before them, showing the mining station in orbit of one of the outer moons of the Proxidium system, built to process ore brought up from the barren surface below. And nearby, nothing but a dark emerald speck against the black, the shadow of a Klingon-built bird-of-prey raining disruptor fire that crackled harmlessly against the station’s shielding.

‘What are they screwing around with?’ Kharth said irritably.

‘Scans of the bird-of-prey confirm it matches the profile of a ship decommissioned by the Klingon Empire six years ago,’ Airex read coolly from his scans. ‘Someone stole this husk and gave it a new lease on life.’

‘And they’re not stupid enough to ignore us,’ said Kharth. ‘They’ve stopped firing. They’ve come about, but they’re not getting closer.’

Rourke stood and glanced to Lindgren. ‘Elsa, how’s the station?’

‘They don’t know the extent of their losses on the outer facilities, but everything’s locked up tight now. They can wait this out.’

‘Good. Hail the bird-of-prey.’ At the inevitable lack of response, he sighed. ‘Then put me on an open channel.’ Rourke took a deep breath as the comm systems bleeped. ‘Bird-of-prey, this is Captain Rourke of the Federation starship Endeavour. You must have figured out now that you don’t stand a chance against an Obena-class. Power your systems down and prepare to be taken into custody.’

Silence fell, then Arys shook his head. ‘They’re turning to run, sir.’

‘Pursue,’ Rourke said calmly. ‘Launch the Black Knights and tell them to catch up and harry them, and keep them under long-range fire, Kharth. I don’t want them cloaking and these bastards are getting arrested. You don’t waltz this far over the border just to be chased off like they’re in our back yard raiding our bins.’

‘Aye, sir,’ said Kharth, hands drifting over her controls. ‘Keeping them under pressure. We’re too far out for me to reliably target their engines.’

‘Full speed. At the least we chase them off from the station.’

‘Sir.’ Arys’s voice was apprehensive. ‘They’re heading deeper into the system. Looks like they’re aiming for the network of moons around the eighth planet.’

‘Guess they don’t want to try to beat us in a sprint in open terrain where we can take more pops at them,’ sighed Rourke. ‘Let’s wrap this up before they pull us into a game of cat-and-mouse, people.’

Endeavour thundered under them, the deck humming as she blazed along at full power. Valance kept her grip on the armrests tight; while this encounter was nothing to severely press the might of their ship, she never took anything for granted. Especially not with the vast unknowns of pirate factions.

‘Yeah,’ said Arys after a minute. ‘They’re heading for the gas giant.’

‘Black Knights are in weapons range,’ Valance reported, looking up from her panel. ‘I’m ordering them to engage at a distance so they don’t get in our way. They can move to tie them up tighter if they try to give us the slip.’

‘Good,’ said Rourke. ‘Let’s close this gap -’

‘Sir.’ Airex’s voice held a fresh urgency. ‘I’m picking up significant readings of antimatter in a condensed spot ahead of their path. I think there’s…’ He hesitated. ‘I think there’s a mine out there.’

Rourke scoffed. ‘Sneaky bastards. Kharth, do you think you can hit that?’

A pause as the tactical officer ran the calculations. ‘Yeah. Yes, I can do that.’

‘Have the Black Knights fall back, and get us as close as is safe so they don’t realise we’re onto them. They’re going to try to lure us into the mine’s path. But when they’re close to it, hit the mine and detonate it.’ Rourke shrugged. ‘They probably won’t get near enough for it to take them out, but it’ll give them a hell of a bad day.’

Valance nodded with a tight smile. ‘I’ll have the Black Knights split off to look like they’re trying to cut them off.’

‘So if this doesn’t work,’ Rourke mused, ‘at least the Black Knights can cut them off.’

‘Bird-of-prey’s path is coming up about as close to the mine as they can risk,’ Kharth called minutes later.

Rourke nodded. ‘Fire.’

It was a low-yield torpedo that was launched – enough firepower to trigger another explosion, with all of the precision the torpedo allowed against a stationary target. Valance watched on her arm panel as the torpedo soared past the bird-of-prey, then hit the target that had been only manually tagged on their sensors by Airex – then detonated.

‘That’s definitely hit something,’ she said, watching the blast of several magnitudes greater than just one torpedo.

‘Would have given us a real bad day,’ Kharth agreed.

‘They avoided the worst of it – but their shields are down, and their flight systems are damaged,’ called Airex. ‘If we move fast, they won’t have time to recover.’

‘Are there any other mines out there?’ Rourke asked.

‘Not that I can see.’

‘Then bring us in. Kharth, take out their engines, and -’

A blip flashed on the sensors, and Valance’s heart caught in her throat. ‘Enemy ship decloaking off our aft -’

Then they were hit. It must have been a full salvo of weapons fire, disruptors and torpedoes, and though Valance felt Endeavour’s shields absorbed it, the ship still rocked at the shuddering impact and the hull groaned underneath and around them.

Rourke grunted as he fought to keep his seat. ‘What’s happened?’

‘Two – no, make that three more birds-of-prey just decloaked off our aft!’ Kharth called. ‘They hit us hard; shields are down to twenty percent!’

Valance swore. ‘They were trying to draw us out. If we’d hit that mine…’

‘Then we’d be toast.’ Rourke still didn’t sound victorious. This would still be a tough fight. ‘Tell the Black Knights to disable that first bird-of-prey, then to come the hell back in to give us backup.’

‘I’m redirecting all emergency power to boosting our shields,’ called Thawn.

‘Have these bastards hailed us?’ Rourke snapped to Lindgren, but she shook her head. He braced his grasp on the armrest. ‘Focus fire on one bird-of-prey – hit them with two torpedoes from our aft launcher, then flip us around and go right for them. We’re faster than they think we are. We’ll do this one at a time if we have to, and if we do it right, we’ll scare them shitless by ripping the guts out of their friend.’

These were good tactics for raiders, Valance thought. Bring Starfleet’s might down on one lone ship and the morale and discipline of the others would break. But already these raiders were showing more resources and sophistication than she’d expect of their ilk.

‘If they’ve got all of this going for them,’ she said quietly to Rourke, brow furrowed, ‘then why didn’t they use it to make off with a prize from the mining station? Why lure us here?’

He scowled even deeper. ‘I don’t know. We worry about that later. First, we’ve got to beat the odds.’

Then the next wave of enemy weapons fire thudded into them, even as Endeavour came hurtling down to try to snap one of the new arrivals in its jaws. Its allies rained down hell on the Starfleet ship, and their prey just managed to slither out from their grasp. If anything was more manoeuvrable than them, it was these small, efficient ships.

‘They’re marked,’ Kharth said, voice rasping. ‘But they’re still going.’

‘Our shields are down to ten percent,’ said Thawn. ‘Sir, we need breathing room if we’re going to recharge.’

‘We get breathing room when we bloody them; they know better than to give it otherwise,’ Rourke snapped. ‘Call back the Black Knights to assist and stay on that raider.’

Another thump of weapons fire hitting them. A new, terse call from Thawn, ‘Five percent!’

‘We just can’t pin this guy down,’ Kharth swore.

Rourke’s lips twisted. ‘There’s no way they only had one mine,’ he said at last. ‘Evasive manoeuvres, Mister Arys. Commander Airex, find me the rest of their trap.’

‘Scanning – sir!’ Airex’s fresh dose of urgency almost made Valance’s heart close into a fist. But in a split second it was changed for elation. ‘Three Starfleet ships dropping out of warp!’

Kharth gave a low, victorious sound. ‘One Inquiry, one Diligent, one Reliant. All in formation and heading this way.’

In mere moments the formation had surged through the heart of the system, and Valance’s gaze was lifted to the viewscreen to watch as their reinforcements fell on the birds-of-prey. Endeavour could have won the fight, though it would have been vicious and it would have been costly. The raiders had no hope against equal numbers of superior firepower.

‘Raiders are turning tail,’ she reported after a moment. ‘It looks like the mine took out the cloak on the first one, so none of them are cloaking. They’re scattering and going to warp. We’d have to pick one to pursue.’ Not that Endeavour was going anywhere imminently.

‘Sir,’ called Lindgren. ‘The lead ship is hailing us.’

Rourke made a grateful sound and waved a hand. ‘Put them through.’

The viewscreen shifted to show the bridge of an Inquiry-class plunged into the crimson depths of red alert. The central seat was taken by a husky human figure, his black hair streaked with silver, good looks that must have once been boyish now weathered with age. The four pips on his collar were underlined by a bar.

‘Endeavour, this is Fleet Captain Jericho of the USS Triumph. Looks like you’re in a tight spot here – can we help?’

There was a playful, confident air to Jericho’s voice, and Rourke matched it with his own grin. ‘Pretty good timing, Captain. We had them on the ropes, but I figure if you want to play, we won’t be greedy.’ But he sobered quickly. ‘We took a battering on our shields and our power systems are strained, but nothing more.’

‘Good.’ Jericho checked something off-screen, then nodded. ‘I’m sending the Independence to chase down that damaged ship. The Nighthawk is gonna check on the mining station, see what help they need.’ Valance glanced at the sensors to spot the Diligent-class moving to follow the birds-of-prey, while the Reliant came about for the perimeter of the system, and the station.

‘That’s great,’ said Rourke. ‘Between Endeavour and the Triumph we can chase down another two -’

‘Not so fast, Captain.’ Jericho raised a hand. ‘Our timing wasn’t an accident. I expected to see you at Starbase 86, but we’re here now. Independence can follow, find where these guys are going to ground, and we’ll deal with it later. So we should talk. I’ll beam aboard.’

Rourke tensed with apprehension. ‘I… is that the most important thing, Captain?’

‘It sure is. And for one simple reason, Captain Rourke: ‘cos it’s Fleet Captain, and ‘cos I say so. You see, you and Endeavour are coming under my command now.’