Frost-Belt Hub’s freight rail had been built to move ore. Now its magnetic coils held energy captured from Wu Ji’s own attack.
Tie Kuang stood at the controls with Dara Voss beside him. Chonker loaded blunt tungsten blocks. Pug waited with one paw over the launch pedal.
“Targets are weapons mounts and drive fins only,” Tie said. “No hull centers. No crew decks.”
Dara checked the public target log. “Confirmed. Life support is excluded. Rescue corridors are open.”
Pug pressed the pedal.
Twenty metal blocks crossed the dark at thirty-four kilometers per second. They did not explode inside the ships. They sheared off gun spines, cut launch rails, and disabled thruster assemblies. The attacking cruisers drifted out of formation with their lights and heat still on.
Austin’s core absorbed the returning energy. Its mass and spin rose again.
He added fifty pounds of lead and raised the dampers. “That shaved fourteen percent off the smelting plant’s charging schedule,” he said. The work felt controlled. The consequences did not.
