The second volley of torpedoes detonated in a curtain of ball explosions as they were hit by smaller Particle beams fired from all three Alpha Fleet ships.
Huge Laser turrets on each of the earth ships began to track, waiting for the three smaller starships to reach effective range.
"Max power to shields!" yelled Parek over the acceleration. Any unnecessary lighting dimmed momentarily as the shields attempted to fend off laser strikes.
Then, less than a handful of seconds later they were past and into the aft arc of the five Earth ships.
"Switching to cutting beams." Called out the weapons officer.
A thin white beam bisected the engine of first one ship then a second as the other two Alpha fleet ships did the same.
The helmsman continued their slingshot around the Earth ship formation until they were pointed back the way they'd came; away from Earth.
As each second passed the size of the local fleet heading away from Earth and toward them seemed to increase in size. More than a few of them launched starfighters, possibly hoping that the small craft could catch up with the three now fleeing ships.
"Aft beam turrets keep an eye out for any additional torpedoes."
"Aye sir."
"Orders?" requested the helmsman as the flotilla gained some measure of breathing room from the Earth fleets.
"We can't have an entire hostile fleet following us to our rendezvous point. Prepare for instantaneous translation."
Both the helmsman and the navigator took on concerned looks. "Sir, we're only supposed to use the IT drive every twelve hours."
"Then just make it a short jump." The captain searched through the closest uninhabitable systems. "Wolf 359 is less than eight light years from here, that'll do. We can switch to warp drive after that."
The Alpha fleet flotilla flashed into existence in close orbit around the star labeled Wolf 359 by astronomers of millennia ago.
Red lights flickered on across the drive systems displays.
"IT Drive is down sir, looks like a component failure. Both of our escort ships are reporting identical failures."
"We still have warp drive though." replied the Captain. "We're far enough away that they shouldn't be able to track us at warp speeds. If the rest of their technology is any indication at least."
Parek removed his headset while he considered their next course of action.
"Sensors I want you to begin long range scans. See if you can find any ships in interstellar space. If we're lucky we might be able to find one that we can over power."
That statement brought more than a few curious glances from his crew.
"We need to find a way to communicate with the established local civilization or humanity is doomed. If that means an act of Piracy to get hold of someone to talk for us than that's what it'll take. It may cost lives in the short term but we can't afford to take our time."
He looked to each of them in turn. "The stakes are too high for that."
Parek stepped through the door into the ship's spacious med bay. Their Doctor, a man by the name of Montoya, was one of the oldest humans in the fleet and had actually been one of the original colonists. Because of time spent in stasis, few knew how long ago the man had actually been born.
"Doctor, you wanted to see me?"
"Yes young man I did indeed. Those children up on the bridge were nice enough to send down some scans you took from the Sol system. I found something interesting."
Parek shrugged off the comment about his crew being children. No one aboard was below the age of thirty but the doctor considered anyone below two hundred to still be young.
"Can you keep this short Doctor I'm in a bit of a hurry."
"That's right, rush about not taking the time to smell the roses, or notice things like humans using a digitised brainwave pattern as the basis of their communications."
"Pardon Doctor, brain wave patterns?"
"Yes. It's a primitive mind-machine interface. There was some black market use for them when I was a young man. They were banned of course, you can potentially damage the human using it."
"But we have non-invasive mental interface systems don't we? I remember using one for some of my earliest training."
The doctor waved a hand dismissively. "These are nothing like that. If I remember correctly these normally involve a hard-line direct connection into vital areas of the human brain. Tricky work."
Parek sat down on the nearst examination table. "This... what have these people done? It sounds like some sort of abomination from the dawn of space travel. First no weapons and now this?"
"Pull yourself together Captain, remember your crew is counting on you. Besides, Earth is just one small part of a civilization that spanned whole sections of the galaxy. There is bound to be something remaining you can use. Keep your hopes up."
"Thank you Doctor. Do you think you can decode those transmissions for us?"
"Certainly young man. Just don't use that infernal IT drive for awhile. I always have to shut down the computers so that they don't get fried from the jump shock."
003
