TIE-Fighter 2: Battle Lines - Chapter 7

When Orkady Chromme entered the bridge of the „Privateer's Bane" the next morning he was in a somewhat grumpy mood.

After their encounter with Lord Vader the Lieutenant-Commander and his superior had found themselves the centre of attention. The sudden rise in popularity had been accompanied by a lot of drinks offered and Chromme's attempts at moderation had only been partially successful.

The next morning the Lieutenant-Commander had not only been suffering from a small hangover, but had also been forced to deal with a misdirected load of spare-parts for an AT-AT-battalion. As if a ship with the size and mission-profile of the „Privateer's Bane" carried AT-ATs, let alone an entire battalion of them. The administrative part that actually involved Chromme's participation would have been solved within five minutes, if he had to deal with a living being, but since the supply and support of the Imperial Armed Forces on that level was largely done by droids with very restrictive programming … . Well, between socialising with his peers in the evening and convincing a stubborn droid, that the frigate „Privateer's Bane" was not identical with the star destroyer „Bane" early in the morning Orkady Chromme had found less than four hours of sleep.

Since the beginning of his next shift was still an hour away the Lieutenant-Commander had hoped to have at least time for breakfast and perhaps an additional thirty minutes of sleep, when he had been called to the bridge by Tanikov. One look at the bridge-displays showed Chromme, that the „Privateer's Bane" had fallen in line with a number of other ships and was accelerating away from Mantoon Central.

„Right on time." hissed Tanikov, once Chromme joined him at the communications-station. Realizing, that the holo-projector was in stand-by-mode waiting for an incoming transmission the Lieutenant-Commander gritted his teeth and stood at attention next to his superior.

For the next few minutes the two senior officers of the „Privateer's Bane" wondered in silence, which pompous busybody was underlining his own importance by keeping them waiting. The sound of a gong finally provided release and the holo-projector became active, displaying the live-sized image of an Imperial Vice-Admiral.

„This is Admiral Fonada speaking. To the officers and crews of the Fourth Dreadnought-division of CRIMSON SABER, I wish you a good morning. I would also like to welcome the following ships and their crews, that have only recently joined us, among our ranks:

The destroyers

- Troth,

- Akolyte,

- Mollok,

- Scatha,

- Cu Sith,

- Managarm,

- Death's Hand,

as well as the frigates and escorts

- Privateer's Bane,

- Devotion to Duty,

- Raptor`s Tooth,

- Shadowed Knife,

- Aurodium Ignot,

- Harilin,

- Anvil,

- Praxis,

- Honor,

- Scorpion,

- Ronar Kim,

- Intrepid,

- Sandwasp,

- Doriana,

- Sting,

and finally Tarach.

Once again welcome to CRIMSABCOM. Unfortunately that was it with the pleasantries. Contrary to our original orders we won't depart in two weeks time to participate in maneuvres against the TepasiDefenseFleet. Instead we will depart now on a combat-mission, where we will be joined by our commands 2nd Division. This means we won't have the time to properly integrate our new units into our fleet."

For a brief moment the expressionless face of Admiral Fonada turned sour.

„Despite that I have the utmost confidence, that our new comrades will perform their duty professionally and with excellence. On their own, they all belong to the best. They wouldn't be here, if it were otherwise. Now they have to show, that they belong to the best as part of a larger fleet. It will be a trial by fire for all of us. We will make a coordinated jump of two hours to our meeting-point with the 2nd. You have until then to make yourself familiar with the mission. The encrypted details are now transmitted.

Good luck to all of us.

Fonada out."

Chromme looked at the chart identifying the new units. „Holy mother of all Banthas. They are really serious with this operation. Two Bellators, five ISDs, five heavy frigates including us and eleven Carracks and Corvettes. That alone is enough to devastate most systems."

„Remember, that those ships aren't reinforcements, but mostly replacements for ships in need of yard-time or which are rotated onto other positions. All combined amount to perhaps thirty percent of a Mandator's firepower and there are four of them in the 4th Division alone. Changes nothing, that it is irresponsible to sent out a task-force with so many ships not integrated. We should have been given at least two weeks, if not four to train and to conduct maneuvres together to make this a real ensemble and not a number of soloists put together." the commander of the „Privateer's Bane" complained. „Very well, the mission-details should tell us why the hurry." Ian Tanikov stated, while he fished his code-cylinder out of his chest-pocket. After decrypting the file he sent a copy over to Chromme, then settled down behind the dispay-ring of his command-station. The Lieutenant-Commander gave his data-pad a suspicious look as if expecting bad news and with a fatalistic sigh he opened the file and started to read it.

If started with a combination of audio-, video- and sensor-records from the 6th Mantoon Battle Group. And although the Lieutenant-Commander had halfway expected it, the sights and sounds from ships, that had been destroyed days ago, from men and women, who had died by the tens of thousands days ago left him with a feeling of ice-cold fingers running down his spine.

It was also the first real look he got at the planet of Mirkeeton, after having heard so much about the mysterious world over the last two days.

Mirkeeton - as the file showed - was the second out of seven planets, that orbited what seemed to be a typical yellow G-star. A single, two thousand kilometre wide moon was the planets sole companion. From what the files showed Mirkeeton appeared to be a planet with nearly a dozen small continents and thousands of smaller islands evenly spread out on an otherwise ocean-covered world. No ice-caps indicated a mild climate at the poles and tropical temperatures at the equator. The deep blue colour of water and the green of plant-life were only sparsely interrupted by a few small and isolated dots of grey mountain-tips and orange-brown deserts.

All in all Mirkeeton appeared to be a pleasant enough world and yet something about the paradise-like picture felt wrong to Orkady Chromme. And after a few, tense moments he realised, what it was. There were no cities visible, nor were there streets. Any signs of higher civilisation, especially that of a civilisation capable of destroying a third of an entire Imperial battle-group, was missing. And yet the records of the Imperial Survey Corps had shown traces of technology. High technology.

The Lieutenant-Commander turned his attention to the recorded sensor-readings of the data-package. The Sixth Mantoon Battle-Group had left hyperspace between the orbits of the fourth and the fifth planet of the system, approaching Mirkeeton with twenty percent lightspeed. The record on those scenes didn't change and Chromme started to wonder, what the team of intelligence agents and military analysts, who had put the file together, had thought wasting their and his time by lingering on that section.

„You see the yellow light?" Tanikov, who had seemed to read his thoughts, asked.

„What yellow light?" Orkady Chromme asked back, but the hint had been enough for the Lieutenant-Commander to know, what to look for. „Wait, I've seen it, too."

On the screens of the sensor- and communication-consoles aboard the ships of the Sixth Battle-Group a pale yellow light appeared, filling the entire screen and vanished again. Several seconds later the process repeated itself. Tanikov and Chromme watched the events for a little longer, before they turned to face each other.

„You've noticed it, too?" Tanikov asked. „How the colour and brightness of the impulse increased?"

„While the interval between two signals decreased. Yes, I have. What do you think that means?"

„A very advanced warning. Whoever receives that signal is getting closer and closer to someone's personal fence. And I think whatever happened to the 6th Mantoon Battle-Group was a result of crossing that fence." Tanikov explained dryly, but his face was grim.