Ayla watched the map of the ship on one of the screens in front of her like God would look at the universe. Impotent with a growing sense of despair. It displayed in soft blue unmanned areas, in bright green areas with people in them, in grey zones that were just gone, in orange conflicted areas and finally in red areas that had been taken by the grey battle drones. It was easy to notice how the edges of the map seem to be all grey, how the red was spreading while the green rapidly shrunk. She didn't need to listen to the panic and chaos in the bridge to know that they were losing the ship. Not even half their forces had been able to reach the generator room yet and the main drone swarm was arriving now.<br/><br/>The ship shook slightly, telling her how another high-powered laserbeam from one of the saucer-shaped attack crafts had hit them. The attack ships had begun to return fire, raining death in light-speed form at them from a great distance. Most of the blasts missed or were deflected by the transport's cruisers plating, but a noticeable number hit and slowly tore away at the ship's systems and armaments. Ayla quietly mused how that battle was actually going quite decently, one of the other ships had managed to destroy one of the attack crafts and crippled another, leaving only three to be a real threat, but the assault ships were adjusting their tactics and now used evasive manouevres. Ayla quietly watched in frustration as another mass-accelerated bolt vanished into the clouds of the gas giant below.<span style="color: green"> "I hope that one hits your base..."</span>she muttered.<br/><br/>She still wished the attack had come an hour or two later, then she would be out there piloting one of their mobile powered armor suits and defending the ship's core from drones in person instead of sitting here at the bridge carefully adjusting the course of the transport cruiser. She felt so useless here, stuck listening to the panicked chatter. She could even hear the fear seeping in her captain's voice, something which terrified her more than the woman sitting sobbing at the panel next to hers. She knew the girl was in charge of sensors and long-range communication, things which weren't exactly useful in close-quarters combat such as this so didn't bother to try and snap her out of it.<br/><br/>Ayla sighed, the panel in front of her claiming her attention again as they prepared to have another shot at the assault ships.<div class="messageTextEndMarker"> </div>