The Battle Map (Short Story)

Here's the fifth part of a little story I've been writing for a while now. I didn't expect it to get this long, and at this stage, I'm thinking it could be 7 or 8 parts long by the time it ends.

Part 1 - Passage To Zun-Kulla

Part 2 - Traveling Through Space

Part 3 - Mesmerizing Daydream

Part 4 - Ambush

Part 5 - Preparations For Battle

Source

       "Two ships laying in wait, you sure about this Zebulon?" The Human asked, with a slight quiver in his voice.
       "I am. Hold off the acceleration, I don't want them to suspect us of anything. Prepare to forward all reserve power to our deflector shields and prepare to re-route power to our forward batteries. Let's blow some holes through their hull; if we hit em' hard enough we might just blast one of them out of the fight before they know it has begun." Zebulon seemed to find a lot of courage and had a good mind for what was to come.
       Merrick stood by and watched the other whip up to a frenzy. They were filled with battle fervor, a sentiment sure to be tearing through the rest of the ship like an unchecked wildfire in the height of a Scooshan Summer. Their approach was unchecked, and on the monitors, Merrick saw the two ships come ever closer. The battle map showed their position in the centre, and ahead of them were two blue squares. Every few moments a bleep would be heard and the two squares would disappear and reappear.

       "Hold your position, prepare yourselves for a boarding party." A voice came through the speakers of the ship.
       "They're going to know something is up," Merrick stated plainly and was ignored by all in the room.
       "Repeat, hold your position, and engage your mag-locks." The same commanding voice came back, this time the Zun-Kullen at the end of the comm-link was less than pleased.
       "Zebulon, am I looking on with the batteries?" The Trisken hissed, as they turned to face the captain.
       "No, if we lock on they'll be alerted. You'll have to do this manually." Zebulon replied and with that, Merrick saw the Trisken's face change. Eyes squinted and brow twisted, clearly nervous.
       "Manually," they mumbled lightly while turning back to their control desk and staring at the monitor in front of them.
       "Is that doable?" Zebulon asked, in a voice wrapped with impatience. "If it's not, then I..."
       "It's doable, don't you worry about that. I earned plenty of kills shooting manual in an old K90-Freighter," he responded. "Although, that old K90 was fitted with some decent tech. Pretty much done the blaster for itself."
       "Keep the hand steady and eye on the target, it'll be a lot tougher to deal with two of them," Zebulon said, letting out a sigh of discomfort.

       The battle map monitor was still blinking in the background and the bleeps were becoming more frequent. As he focused on the map, a terrible rush of noise started screeching. Red emergency lights began to rapidly flash as the sirens whirled.
       "They're locking onto us captain, response!?" One of the Humans shouted over the wave of noise.
       "M'Tbanni, fire when ready!" Zebulon shouted, quieting the sound of grunting and mumbling coming from some of the others on the bridge.
       "We need to get closer! These are canons, not a sniper rifle!" The Trisken complained, moving even closer to the monitor in front of them.
       "We have locked on, and are prepared to take hostile action. Shut your engines off, and activate your mag-locks. Prepare to be..." The voice came back but abruptly cut off.
       "That's enough of that, now, M'Tbanni we don't have long. Take the shot!" Zebulon commanded once more.
       The Trisken seemed like he was about to say something, but the words got caught in his throat as they were about to exit and came out as a jumbled noise that could only be described as a pained grunt.

       Two shimmers of blue light illuminated the bridge, and for a moment there was a battle between the colours. Red on the inside was turned pink for a moment of combined hue, but soon the blue reflection left the room back to the dominant red.
       Each of the blue orbs flew from the ship and grew smaller and smaller until they were only dots in the distance. A few moments passed and the Trisken fired again, this time, there was no blue, just two small blasts of orange that were eaten by the blackness of space.
       Merrick stared at the monitor, expecting to see one of the blips disappear. A few more moments passed and a bleep came through, both squares disappeared and as another bleep came in, the monitor showed both ships still remained.
       "It was a miss. I didn't hit them." The Trisken said in a deflated tone.
       "Engage our engines, full power! Reload, and fire again, this time with automatic targeting activated. Maintain our deflectors!" Zebulon shouted in a blind panic, startled by the realisation that they were in serious trouble now.

       "Captain, projectiles incoming! One of the ships is firing upon us, and the other is locking on." The Human shouted.
       The battle map showed one of the projectiles closing in on them, and the repetitive bleeps were now frantically ticking. Merrick was lost for a moment staring at the screen, until he snapped out of it to grab the nearest handrail he could find. Hoping to find the strength to hold himself up.