Admiral North accepted the report from Jess, sending the reply for everyone to hear and reinforcing that any other ship claiming the same failure had better actually be destroyed.
It took another ten minutes for the fleet to be ready. Jess was on edge the whole time waiting for someone to push their luck, but no one did. Finally the entire fleet signalled it was ready, and Admiral North gave the order to enter jump.
Jess held the Wanderer back, knowing it could easily catch up with the fleet within jump space. Close to thirty ships didn’t jump on cue, but it only took a few seconds for them to notice the Wanderer was still there and disappear into jump themselves. The Wanderer checked the jump signature from every ship in the fleet and confirmed they were all on the correct heading.
“Th
