A week later, she began an extended tour of duty in the Central Pacific. Towing the floating dry dock , the tug arrived in Kwajalein lagoon on 2 June. Reassigned to ServRon 12, "Zuni" served as a harbor tug at Kwajalein until mid-July when she again took "ARD-16" in tow and got underway for the Mariana Islands. There, she participated briefly in the 24 July assault on Tinian before settling into a routine of shuttle voyages between Eniwetok and the Marianas. Late in September, she towed a different floating dry dock, , to the Palau Islands where, during the first 18 days of October, she provided support services to the combined forces invading Peleliu. At that point, she received urgent orders to rendezvous with after that light cruiser had been damaged by two torpedoes during a Japanese aerial blitz to answer Task Force 38's raids on Okinawa and Formosa. She relieved of the light cruiser and towed her into Ulithi lagoon on 27 October. After serving at the anchorage there for five days, the tug returned to sea with a group of oilers. Soon another set of urgent orders sent her to aid another light cruiser, , which had been torpedoed in the Philippines, off the San Bernardino Strait, on 3 November by Japanese submarine . Though the cruiser nearly capsized, the ships’ companies of "Zuni" and "Reno" combined efforts to meet the threat; and the tug succeeded in towing the cruiser 1,500 miles (2,800 km) back to Ulithi.