Ironwake

When the Prometheus drive fails, Commander Darius Vex wakes from cryosleep alone. The Ironwake drifts in a starfield that should be moving but isn't. Her crew is scattered across coffin-pods that aren't waking in sequence, and the vessel's spine is dark. Something is coming. Commodore Reina Solenne takes command from a bridge held together by scar tissue and discipline, racing to restore life support, weapons, and communication with the convoy. Chief Engineer Voss pins failing conduits with steady hands even as the pressure drops around him. Pilot Rook Melas pushes the Ironwake through maneuvers the hull was never built for. But the Vethari Sovereign-class vessel closing on their bearing outmasses them three to one, and Admiral Taren Cross , aboard the flagship two thousand kilometers off their port bow , has already committed the convoy to a counterstrike that will use the Ironwake as a shield. The chain of command is fracturing. Convoy Commodore Yara Deltori weighs her political exposure against her sister's life; Lena Deltori, trapped on the Ironwake's lower decks, fights a private war against fires and decompression. Lieutenant Commander Pell's recorded logs document the slow collapse of doctrine and discipline. Darius Vex , caught between a commodore willing to buy victory with his crew and an admiral willing to buy survival with the convoy , must decide whether the Ironwake dies on orders or on her own terms. Some ships wake to a mission. This one wakes to a ledger of who survives.