Conquerors' Pride Author:Timothy Zahn It is the duty of a prisoner of war to attempt escape--even in alien space, completely cut off from his own kind. — The four ships were small and milky white in color, shaped like thick hexagonal slabs of random sizes attached to each other at random edges. Alien as hell. — Like everyone aboard Kinshasa, one of eight ships in the Peacekeeper task ... more »force, Commander Pheylan Cavanagh was tense as they transmitted the standard first-contact package. There was always a chance the message wouldn't get across.
This time it didn't.
Unthreatened, unprovoked, the bogies attacked. A double flash of light cut across the bow of the human flagship, vaporizing the metal of her hull. Kinshasa's crew went into action immediately, but not quickly enough. the alien ship opened fire with a dazzling display of multiple lasers; within moments Kinshasa was dead.
All hands headed for their ejection pods and abandoned ship to await rescue, but there would be no rescue. The aliens systematically picked off the unarmed pods, turning a military victory into a slaughter. in less than 40 minutes it was over; Pheylan Cavanagh was the only survivor ...« less