High Orbit, Tharkad,
Donegal Province,
Lyran Alliance

The entire ship shook as yet another Heavy-NPPC blast struck the already damaged armour leaving a horrible scar along the port side. The return salvo of Medium Naval lasers cut into the McKenna's armour bit did no real damage.

Star Captain Jo Carns felt the five-point restraint harness holding her into her seat dig into her shoulder as her command shudder again. Her eyes where fixed on the main holo-tank, and the image of her deadly opponent.

"Helm, down 5-dagrees, rotate port: we need to bring fresh armour to bare. Weapons, hit her with everything we have left: we need to keep her occupied. Air-Boss, keep up the attack: the only weakness that ship has is limited anti-fighter weaponry."

Her orders we greeted with a chorus of responses from her well train crew.

The McKenna struggled to keep up with the movements of the smaller Lola-III destroyer, while trying to fend off the wave after wave of Aerospace fighters that swarmed it defences at every turn. The rest of the Alliance fleet was keeping back, only offering fighter support to the Natures Wrath, ordered to stay out of the fight.

"Weapons, load forward missile bays with the atomics: we have to end this fight as soon as possible!" Carns crabbed the arms of her command chair as the ship rocked again, "We can not take much more of this." She took the metal key from around her neck and inserted it into the slot at the side of her chair. A light went from red to green.

The missile bays on the bow of the Natures Wrath opened, and two White Shark anti-ship missiles rocketed out at high-speed, quickly closing the distance between the two ships.

As impressive as nuclear weapons are on a planet, they are nowhere near as effective in space.

The McKenna shudder as the missile hit, then two bight flashed appeared along it port side. When the visual scanners cleared, two ugly scars could be seen on the ship's hull, but minimal structural damaged had been done.

"Hit them again! Keep hitting them: we can't afford to let them get away!" Carns' fist slammed down on her armrests as the weapons officer re-loaded the two missile launchers with their deadly cargo.

Again twin missiles stuck out across the void, and again twin bright flashes appeared on the McKenna's side. The ship seemed to visibly shake as the massive amounts of heat and energy where treasured into its hull and internal structure. Heat sinks ruptured as the coolant within flash-boiled. Fighter-craft begin to target the damaged areas, taking advantage of the hols in the monsters thick hide.

"That is it! Weapons: train every available weapon on the damaged areas! Coms, signal the rest of the fleet: tell them it's now or never!" Carns leaned forward in her seat: if they succeeded in destroying the Blakist McKenna here, it would be an advent remembered long after who remembered it died.

The first ship to break ranks and come to the aid of the Natures Wrath's aid was the Lyran Flagship Yggdrasil, a huge Mjolnir class battle cruiser that matched the McKenna in armour and firepower. It's crew; veterans of the battle against the Clan Wolf-in-Exile Flagship Werewolf, another McKenna, during the Davion Civil War knew where to hit the Blakist craft.

Next came the other ships of the flotilla, the Spirit Sight, Corvidae and Drake. Moving in fleet formation, they came in above and behind the Yggdrasil, using the larger ship to mask their approach until they where in a position to strike.

The Spirit Sight and the Drake flanked the McKenna, cutting off its line of retreat, before sending their weapons fire into the rear of the larger ship, damaging its drive.

The Corvidae moved to assist the damaged Natures Wrath while the Yggdrasil went toe-to-toe with the McKenna, its broadside Naval Autocannons eating into the larger ship's side. The Blakist ship tried to fight back with its banks of NPPC's, but the nukes had fired part of it's fire control systems, forcing it to fire them in relay rather than at once.

More Alliance ship's moved to assist their Flagship, sealing the McKenna's fate. Her captain ordered the reactors set to overload, and tried to steer his ship closer to the Yggdrasil, intent on taking the larger ship with it in a suicidal ramming attack. The McKenna surged forward at 1.5-G's of acceleration, hampered by its damaged drive system. This gave the Yggdrasil the time it needed to move out of the way, missing the charging McKenna by only a few tens of meters.

Unable to change their cores, the crew of the McKenna found themselves diving into the upper atmosphere bow-first. The friction of re-entry started to burn off the remaining armour, and the structure melting and warping as the heat rose.

Finally, before the ship could desegregate, the reactor blow, a series of explosions working their way along the ship from stern to bow, shattering the once proud craft and creating an arterial meteor storm that rained down through the night sky.

To Be Continued…