Item from dark-forest by
The murder of four ships by one — the moment Starship Earth's five surviving captains independently realize that the dark forest applies to them too.
After the Doomsday Battle, Natural Selection and four pursuit ships — Blue Space, Ultimate Law, and two others — formed Starship Earth, intending a two-thousand-year voyage to NH558J2. Once supplies were tallied, every captain reached the same conclusion at the same time: there were not enough resources for all five crews. Ultimate Law fired first; Blue Space, alone among the others, had vacuumed its cabins and suited its crew, and survived to retaliate. Four ships died. Blue Space went on alone.
Five Stellar-class warships drifting in dark interstellar space beyond the Solar System, drives idled, instruments listening to one another with infrared. Then a single ship's torpedo bays open. The strike is silent and infrasonic, designed to kill crews without damaging hulls.
Also known as: Dark Battle, 黑暗战役