[b]Uncharted System: Surprise attack[/b]

As the missiles collided with the partially shielded arms, the field broke and the plates splintered off, whirling into oblivion. Now the Temple had no armor, and was being slowly picked apart by the warship. The cruiser got a shot off with it's Entropy Cannon, and then did something unexpected: Something shot out of its center, ripping through the body of the Ethereal vessel and continuing onwards to the Explorer, smashing through the hull where the beam had hit. It ripped through two decks, before coming to a standstill in the top center of the enemy ship, a perfect sphere still smoking from it's high velocity impact. The Battered cruiser seemed to be offline now, and both Sisters and Matrons were leaving it in the dozens, flying towards and crawling around the outside of the Valkian ship.

Meanwhile, The Conduit Ship's micro gravity minefield intercepted most of the shots, destroying some of the Matrons supporting the field. Others around the moved to replace and extend the field as wide as possible, defending the cruiser as best as they could. Three or four of the slug rounds hit various armored points in the Ethereal vessel, blowing off chunks of it's armor. The light it produced from it's high energy signal flickered, but then regained strength. It was getting weaker, and still had no response from the Home Fleet.