"Agreed," Montgomery said, running a thoughtful forefinger across the deep cleft in his chin. The outriders had clear visuals on both moons and all space debris within any reasonable range. Unless the enemy had something buried away underground—

"Antelope reports enemy ship rising from the planet," Smith called. "Grid Fifty-five-Delta."

Germaine had already keyed the main display for the Antelope's feed. The Zhirrzh ship rising at them was not all that big, perhaps half the size of the ships the Jutland had encountered a few light-years off Dorcas.

Still, considering how easily those four alien craft had ripped through the Jutland's eight-ship task force, the presence of even one Zhirrzh warship was nothing to be taken lightly.

And orbiting two thousand klicks away in outrider position, the Antelope might as well have been a floating bull's-eye for all the good the rest of the task force could do them. "Mendoza, you'd better get out of there," he ordered the Antelopes captain. "Mesh out, and wait for us at Point Victor."

As if to underline the order, the rising conglomeration of hexagons began spitting laser fire, splashing tiny clouds of vaporized metal from the Antelopes hull. "Acknowledged, Trafalgar," Mendoza's voice came back. "You want me to loop back around and run backstop?"

"Negative," Montgomery said. "Just run. Bravo Sector ships: deploy defense against incoming bogie. All fighters return to their ships at once, probe teams included."

"Samurai group is about to engage, sir." Schweighofer reminded him.

"Tell Samurai I said now."

"Acknowledged.

Montgomery looked up to find Germaine frowning at him. "We're leaving already?" the fleet exec asked. "Surely we can handle a single enemy warship."