TRIAD (excerpt)

Excerpt from TRIAD Chapter-1:

NEW blood. If we don't get it soon, we're finished.
     Trezanna Len watched the large monitors of the Solarii command center, her breath coming in tight gasps as she willed her remaining fighters to stay in the sky.
     She had assigned fifteen ships to battle the Arkosian space pirates. Seven were still holding on. To their credit, they had knocked out a dozen smaller pirate craft. Two pirate ships continued to drop hydro-bombs, the impact of the deadly missiles registering in cold numbers on the radar.
     The thought of the destruction of her colony made her stomach turn. For so long hundreds of people depended on her to keep them safe. Now she may have run out of luck.
     "Incoming!"
     The alert caught her off guard.
     "What? Where?" Trezanna jumped out of her chair, running across to the command center's main viewer. She didn't wait for bad news. "Get out! Everyone out!"
     The half-dozen people who manned the center scattered out the doors. With headset in hand, Trezanna made sure she was the last to leave. As her hand left the doorframe, the command center exploded into shards of plasteel and krete. She stumbled into the corridor, the shock driving her into the wall opposite. Her nose and eyes filled with a sharp, choking smoke.
     Almost immediately, the hallway went dark.
     Think, damn it, think!
     No power. That meant no radar, no communication, no ability to monitor. She had to find out what was transpiring overhead.
     Head spinning and her shoulder aching, she shoved off the wall in the direction of the nearest set of computers she knew of, the rec-room. People screamed in the distance, the sound echoing along the halls and rattling her spine. Despair stalked her like the trails of smoke and dust in the passageway. She did her best to ignore it as she felt her way through the dark until she reached a junction with power.
     Eyes burning, she tried to focus on her goal. Left, then another left, halfway down that hall and a sharp right. Now. More people of the Induna colony could die with every second that passed. She couldn't let that happen. She forced herself to keep moving.
     If she had been on the small command deck of her fighter, she would have blasted the pirates for all they were worth. She had chosen to stay on the ground this time, since the number of command officers not confined to the infirmary was growing short. If she could keep the generator from crashing and the shields fully operational, there was a chance to keep the base viable. How much damage did the bomb do to the command center? Did the Arkosians now have entry?
     Trezanna hurried across the debris-cluttered floor to the games console and pushed aside the remnants of a child's birthday celebration. Her priority now was to make sure that young Jahn survived to see his next one.
     She tapped in her command password and the screen blanked. The lights overhead flickered. "No! You hold on, you sorry piece of crap gennie!"….