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Harlow waited with the majority of his fleet as his scouts checked the next system. It irked him that he had to move forward with much more caution now, but it was clear the Asgardians weren't taking him lightly.

That was both good and bad. He had hoped the Asgardians' desire to enter their vaunted afterlife by dying in battle would have had them throwing themselves at his fleet. They weren't doing that though. Instead, they were fighting dirty and laying traps.

As a former pirate, he could appreciate that sort of tactic. As the one on the receiving end, it infuriated him. If the Asgardians wanted to play using pirate tactics, he would show them just how woefully unprepared they were.

"The scouts are back, your eminence. They report that the enemy fleet has set up a gravity trap, but they also have their fleet coordinates."

Harlow smiled. "Get us a jump point above their position and far enough out that they can't detect us."

His fleet maneuvered and jumped to the new coordinates before turning and launching their own volley of long-range projectiles. He even included one of the plasma missiles to hopefully ensure a kill.

Once the volley was launched, they waited the appropriate amount of time and jumped into the enemy trap. One way to keep your enemy where you wanted them was to ensure they had a reason to stay there.

The fleet jumped in and began turning toward the Asgardian fleet. The enemy fleet was already firing from beyond its maximum range, but Harlow smiled in triumph. They had stayed, which is all he had desired from this engagement.

They should have realized right away that his fleet's angle of entry into the system was odd.

His fleet opened fire on the Asgardians who were already preparing to jump. Before they could, pinpricks of light sparked through the darkness as rounds hit their targets. His fleet had far more guns to fill the space with incoming ordnance, and actual coordinates to aim for, so his fleet's fire from beyond detection range had been far more concentrated.

Then the object he had been waiting for arrived as a miniature sun bloomed in the distance and raced toward one of the ships.

The larger ship jumped before the ball of plasma arrived, but the ship below it wasn't as lucky. The weapon tore through the destroyer's rear, slagging all of its engines.

He thought he might have a target to sick his assault teams on, but the ship detonated shortly before the final ship jumped.

Harlow cursed under his breath. Capturing an Asgardian ship would have been a major win. Either way, his fleet survived the encounter with only minor damage and no ships lost, while the Asgardians had lost three ships. The destroyer, a frigate, and a corvette. It didn't make up for the losses he suffered from their trap, but that didn't matter. If this came down to a simple war of attrition, he had more than enough ships to toss into the grinder.

***

Katalynn cursed internally. She hadn't thought Harlow would fall for the gravity trap, but they needed to make it look believable. What she hadn't planned for was him quickly turning around and using their own tactic to his advantage.

She had realized something was wrong as soon as Harlow's fleet had jumped in and appeared on their sensors, but by then it was too late to warn the rest of the fleet.

Wayward Soul had barely jumped in time as Harlow's newest weapon streaked toward them. One of Ylva's ships wasn't as lucky.

The other two ships that were lost belonged to Katalynn, bringing her fleet size down to only eleven ships now. Even with Ylva's ships, they were now down to only twenty remaining. The rest of the systems between here and Eden's End were empty, so she couldn't rely on any reinforcements along the route unless one of the other Jarls had managed to get some ships over to this side of space.

Considering how long it took the news to travel, she doubted that would be the case.

"We can't sustain losses like this," Vyrik stated as he frowned at the tactical display on his terminal.

Unfortunately, Kane's cruiser did not have a tactical room like Valkyrie nor did it boast this tac-display that he had spoken of. There hadn't been time to tour the frigates to see if those would have been useful in a situation like this, but she didn't have it so she needed to work with what they did have.

"I'm open to ideas," she said as she sent orders to the fleet to maneuver and jump to the next system.

"If he continues his cautious approach to the next system, we may not need to do anything. If he reverts to his aggressive posture after this win, we'll need to entice him into a battle."

She grimaced at that. No matter how well a direct confrontation went, they were going to lose ships. "We only get one shot at that," she stated. "After we're forced into a battle, we are likely to lose enough ships that he will no longer perceive us as a big enough threat to slow his approach."

"That is true," Vyrik admitted. "But we have little other choice. We can't split our fleets to pincer him, nor can we approach so long as he has those plasma missiles. Our tactics remain the same, we must pummel him at long range and hope for some kills before he returns the favor. Once we retreat from that engagement, I suggest we make our best speed to Eden's End."

"Very well. Send the updated orders to the fleet once we arrive in the next system. If we have to make our stand, I want everyone ready." They were going to lose more people, Kane better have spent that additional time wisely.

***

Harlow once again sent his scouts ahead. This time they reported that the Asgardian fleet was orbiting a large gas giant but also maneuvering to make it harder to track their exact positions.

The planet and their maneuvering would make sending blind volleys their way completely useless, but it also meant that they were trapped in a gravity well.

He knew it was likely some sort of trap to lure him into the same gravity well, but if they wanted to play, he would play.

"Get us a jump point as close to the planet as possible, preferably behind their fleet."

After the calculations were made, his fleet jumped in, but instead of finding the Asgardian fleet stuck in the gravity well of the planet, they found them arrayed further out, effectively behind them.

He cursed, they must have spotted one of his scouts and repositioned. "Get the fleet turned around, now!" he ordered.

Weapons fire tore into his ships as they did their best to reorient. One ship blew up, followed closely by another. "Get the damn mobile gravity generator ships out there, I want that fleet locked down!"

A third ship exploded in his fleet before they were finally able to turn enough and fire missiles at the distant enemy ships.

"Fire two plasma missiles," he demanded. "Aim for the two largest ships, I want them out of this fight."

As the battle evolved, the enemy fleet kept pulling away from the planet and Harlow's slow-to-react fleet.

None of the missiles made it to their targets and even the plasma missiles were destroyed before they arrived. A few of the gravity ships did make it within range, but the main cruiser quickly took care of those, nullifying the trap.

With firepower like that, this had to be one of the Jarl's flagships. He ordered all his ships to focus fire on that vessel. Before his fleet could shift fire, the Asgardians jumped, with the cruiser being the last to leave. Find more to read at My Virtual Library Empire

In a fit of rage, he smashed his fist into the closest thing he could find, which happened to be the unfortunate face of one of his attendants. The man's nose gave a satisfying crunch and spray of blood as his fist crashed into it.

Another attendant handed him a towel to wipe the blood from his hand.

"Who calculated our jump?" he asked calmly as he wiped the blood from his hand.

When nobody spoke up, he looked over at his second in command. The man nodded and walked over to a workstation where he set his hand on the shoulder of a very nervous-looking individual.

"Do we have someone who can replace him?" Harlow asked, tossing the now bloodied rag back at his attendant.

"Yes, your excellence," his second-in-command replied.

"Good. Dispose of him and retrieve his replacement."

His second in command smiled while the unfortunate man, whom Harlow had pinned this failure on, screamed while being dragged away. The man tried to put up a fight, but his second beat him senseless.

Harlow wished he had more competent men to fill out his ranks, but he needed as many ships crewed by his loyal people as possible and so had spread them across his fleets. The rest of the crews were filled with slaves or captured pirate crews from when he first took Haven. He knew that relying on slaves for anything was a bad idea, but he had no other choice if he wanted to field so many ships and fleets.

A new man was soon dragged in and shoved into the pilot's workstation.

"If you don't wish to end up like the previous occupant of that seat, I suggest you do a better job of calculating out jump exits," Harlow stated magnanimously. "Now get us coordinates for the fastest jump routes to our end destination. I'm done playing with the Asgardians. If they want to stop us, they will have to actually stay and fight for a change."

***

When Katalynn saw Harlow's fleet jump in all at once in the next system, she hid her grimace.

"Our attempts to slow him down have failed. Get us to Eden's End as fast as possible. We will make our stand there."

"Kane will not be happy about that," Vyrik noted quietly.

"That's too bad for him. We've done as much as we can to slow Harlow down. Without the addition of Kane's ships, there isn't anything else we can do."

Their fleet quickly jumped to the next system, or close to it before waiting for the jump drive to reset and jumping again almost immediately.

It wasn't recommended to do this because you could burn out a jump drive, but they needed to get to Eden's End as fast as possible to coordinate the defense of the system.

Even with their recklessly fast jumping, it took three days to arrive at the outskirts of Unokane.

"Is this really the same system we attacked?" Vyrik asked in surprise.

Katalynn was glad she wasn't the only one to be surprised by the changes. She knew some of what Kane was up to thanks to Loki, but this was beyond even what their intel stated.

Luckily, Kane's ship had a transponder and she had turned it on, so instead of being greeted by hostile fire, a message arrived from one of the nearby satellites.

"This is an automated message. Please follow the flight path provided. If no other information is included, assume your ship is not yet complete. We will discuss specifics when you arrive in a parking orbit around the moon closest to Eden's End. You may approach the planet in a single ship."

Despite the seriousness of their arrival, she snorted at Kane's words. It was obviously meant to mirror her actions at Asgard. She supposed that was only fair, but she would be bringing two ships, Kane's and Jarl Ylva's. It would be disrespectful not to include a Jarl in any tactical meetings.