Reva frantically shouts at DZ, simultaneously imploring her to (1) convince Deskyl to stop turning the ship and (2) grab hold of something if she can't manage to do that.

(She doesn't particularly expect their hijacker to relent but, hey, Devika is counting pretty slowly so who knows?)

She ignores her; she's not in danger.

Then suddenly she is, and Force intuition tells her to hold the ship perfectly still: that's easily enough done.

The forward display from the vessel's forward cameras gets whited out.

Devika's SLAYER, still holding tight to the transport's front, rockets forward with the equivalent energy of a couple thousand tons of simultaneously detonated TNT...

But that cable is going to snap well before this ship goes anywhere.

It certainly is!

SLAYER towlines use some of the most advanced material science available to the colonies, but in the end humanity's science is no match for the Power Of The Force.

Devika's SLAYER levels off a couple hundred meters away, nearly getting clipped by a passing dysofrag as it does so. Its snapped tethers trail off from its hips like a slender silver sash.

The Savior Gamma remains immobile.

"I don't know how you're doing that, but if you don't stop doing it a lot of innocent people are going to die."

The Savior Gamma resumes its spin.

Devika will target its cockpit with a quick burst from her SLAYER's autocannons?

Nope.

She will charge the stationary vessel at high speed and attempt to pierce its cockpit with a SLAYER-sized mechanical sword?

Nope.

She will back off while an artillery platform more than a thousand kilometers away takes a shot at the hijacked transport with a nuclear-powered railgun..?

Nope.

She reopens the comm channel.

"So, um... I don't suppose you've changed your mind about anything since my last call?"

   "Not especially, Ma'am, you?"

"My orders have not changed, nor has my determination to carry them out."

However, she is beginning to expect her orders might be impossible.

Evidently, she has been sent deep into enemy territory to capture or kill an immovable, unkillable woman.

Fuck. Well. She'll give it her best shot regardless.

"Would you still be interested in having me accompany you to your intended rendezvous point?"

    "She will stop you from attacking any Draco SLAYERs. And she might not be able to do that without injuring you."

"I'll be trying my best to change your mind. As long as attacking enemy SLAYERs isn't conductive to that, nor necessary to ensure my own survival, I will not attack enemy SLAYERs."

She can't believe she's doing this.

She's offering herself up to the dragons on a veritable silver platter.

But the alternative is abandoning the mission and she Will Not Abandon The Mission.

Deskyl nods.

    "She'll defend you, as well, as long as that's strategically justifiable."

She completes her turn and begins accelerating the ship.

    "I need to go back and let Team Gamma know that they can come off of alert; I'll be right back." She does, and is. "What would you like her to know?"

"That people have been getting duped by dragons for dozens of decacycles, and that they can't be trusted, and that if they win the war they won't stop until every human in existence is... under them?"

She does not have an eloquent speech prepared.

Her tentative plan is to use the transit time back to the greyed-out station to compose an eloquent speech.

Devika cannot remember if, during her childhood, she ever took an oration class but she is pretty sure she didn't.

    "Duped how? She doesn't need an eloquent speech, she's not going to decide based on how pretty you can make it sound, she just needs to know things."

"I don't know precisely what lies they use, but I know they work best on children."

(Emotion read: foggy, troubled, bitter.)

"When I was very small, a secessionist tried to abduct me and my best friend. She said we were still young enough to start over here."

Deskyl gestures to the ship she's sitting in.

    "That's not very compelling, Ma'am."