Location: Outskirts of the Valhalla system
Date: 189.08.20

Hit and run attacks by Tri-Tachyon raider squadrons and certain of the more trusted mercenary captains bleed Hegemony resources throughout the Second AI War. The entire situation has become an embarrassment to the commanding Space Marshal -- while every proper fleet battle thus far has been won, the Hegemony Navy has been forced to abandon captured stations and even withdraw from entire planets as the supply convoys are harried, scattered, and plundered by Tri-Tachyon raiders. 

A ceasefire has been called after the Hana Pacha atrocity which saw the deployment of forbidden planet-killer weapons, an act for which neither side claims responsibility and each claims was carried out by the other. While the politicians and diplomats shout accusations, the Hegemony quietly shores up its tenuous logistical situation and Tri-Tachyon deniably raids Hegemony convoys using piratical mercenaries.

The pirates, however, are untrustworthy. They only offer at best a middling chance that they will even carry out their contracted missions. When the Tri-Tachyon Strategic Modeler (TSM) requires guaranteed results to ensure future contingencies, the Company deploys phase ships from their hidden arsenal-laboratories.

As a young and ambitious executive keen to advance through Operations, you captain the Doom-class Phase Strike Cruiser at the head of a small task force. The lack of input to the TSM after the Hegemony bricked its own hyperwave communication system has led to increased variance in its Tactical Result Estimations (TREs), and it turns out that this is no convoy. This is something new: a counter-raider patrol, a hammer of fighters and converted civilian auxiliaries ready to pummel your task force on the anvil of an Enforcer-class Assault Destroyer.

If you manage to beat them, you may yet show your merit and make Vice Fleet Director. If not, then at least no one will ever question the surety of your ambition and your devotion to the Company.