Chapter 14
Major Petrova crept through the small tunnel, 15 of her men and women behind her along with several members of the Free Confederacy. The path had been dug a while ago and led to the basement of the Imperial Headquarters, which they intended to assault soon.
"How are you doing Hans?" Petrova asked over her comlink.
"We're in position. The explosives are set, and we have five minutes left." He replied.
"Go ahead and start. We got into position early." She said. Already she had heard that Johnson and his fleet were charging across the edge of the sector. It was time to start the uprising on Garnizon.
In front of the ground based Imperial Sector Headquarters were 12 new buildings, offices and housing for some major Imperial officials. They were large and tall, and even better, uninhabited and unguarded. Thousands of Stormtroopers and dozens of walkers marched down Imperial Street (this was one of the most common street names in the galaxy) in between the new tall. buildings.
Early in the morning under the cover of darkness, members of Petrova's platoon had planted explosives on eight of the buildings and scouted the remaining four for good hiding spots. Later in the day, the explosives would be detonated, sending the eight buildings down on to the unsuspecting Imperial troops. The members of the platoon and the free confederacy would wait in the remaining buildings and open fire on the surviving Imperials. They would also target a large outdoor banquet with many high ranking Imperial officials in the region, such as the sector's Moff Hjentis Flag.
They were in position, and now Hans had permission to begin the attack.
"Snipers get your targets. On my word, fire on your targets and blow the buildings." He said, giving the soldiers under his command a few moments to prepare themselves.
"Fire." He ordered as a louch thunderclap could be heard. His binoculars were trained on the podium where the banquet was being hosted. He could see multiple Imperials dead on, including Moff Flag. Looking elsewhere, he could see the buildings collapse into rubble. The explosives had been placed so they would fall into the street, killing the marching Imperials.
He could see their well organized formations dissipate in fear as the stormtroopers fled imminent death. Some got lucky and avoided the falling rubble, but most would be crushed under it. But even those who escaped soon found themselves under fire from the members of the platoon and the free confederacy.
Petrova heard the blasts from the secret tunnel, which entered into a maintenance shaft below the road. After a brief walk, they reached the underground access door to the base. Bunt unlocked it, and they entered the headquarters.
Their goal was to head to one of the hanger armories to detonate the stock of proton torpedoes and bombs. This explosion would heavily damage, if not outright destroy the entire base. Once that was done, they would join the rest of the uprising on the main street.
They move silently through the lower levels of the base, undetected by the Stormtrooper patrols. Most were responding to the commotion outside. Petrova smiled as she heard the explosions and blasterfire outside. The only good Imperial was a dead Imperial (or a surrendered one).
Only a few troopers were encountered on their journey to the hangar, and they were all completely defeated before they could call for backup. The hanger armory was in a separate room, and therefore they could sneak in undetected. However, it held an alarm that would sound when they would enter the room, so they had to protect the room as long as possible without being killed in the upcoming eposion.
"Bomb is set for five minutes. Let's get the hell out." Taylor said. She had hidden between four boxes of proton torpedoes. It would be a hell of an explosion when it went up.
The group ran to the nearest stairwell that they had planned to escape through which was blocked by Imperials. By the time they would be able to defeat them, they would be dead.
"Come this way." Taylor said. She fired several shots from her rifle and then hit the window. It broke and Petrova looked out. There was a sliding roof that was about ten feet above a to a deserted street.
"You got to be fucking kidding me." Petrova uttered.
"You got a better plan?" Taylor said sarcastically.
Petrova tossed a few grenades down the roof so they would hit the ground, hopefully eliminating any Imperials that were down there. With only a few minutes left before the explosion, the soldiers jumped off the roof onto the ground and took off running away from the headquarters.
By the time the Imperial installation went up in a fiery mess, they were safely out of the blast.
"Wow. That's huge." One of the free confederacy insurgents said.
"Thank you for finding that path. We'd probably be dead without it." Petrova said to Taylor.
"No problem." She replied. "Just doing my job."
"Let's find the rest of the force and kick those Imperials seven ways from Sunday," Petrova said to sheets from the rest of the soldiers.
The orbit of Jkilia II, Zoloch Sector
Admiral William Johnson sighed as he sat down at the desk in his quarters. He would be meeting with Harrington and Zut Gorky about the progress of the invasion. The screen soon lit to life and he joined the secure video call with the leaders of Earth and its allied forces.
He was soon greeted by both of them and they exchanged pleasantries before getting down to business.
"So what's your progress Will?" Harrington asked.
"We've taken four systems without firing a shot. Grostme, Hecan, Conder, and Jkilia. Everyone has surrendered when we meet them with our superior forces. So far, we have captured a Dreadnaught heavy cruiser, a strike medium cruiser, a carrack class light cruiser, four arquitens light cruisers, five Nebulon B frigates, 18 various corvettes and 30 systems patrol craft. That doesn't count the several orbital stations we have captured as well. On Grostme, Hecan and Conder, all the Imperial army installations have surrendered, but several garrisons are refusing to. I will likely need to send in the marines." Johnson said.
"I'm sure they are ready for that." Harrington chuckled. "What else?"
"Several civilian ships were in the sector while we attacked, and some entered the system while we were here. They are being told they are not allowed to leave until we strike our next targets, but otherwise they will be left alone. There were a few Imperial auxiliaries, which have been captured as well. And I heard Major Petrova and Captain have begun their uprisings on Garnizon and Zoloch, aided by local free confederacy units. Already it has been rumored that a large Imperial banquet on Garnizon was shot up and several high ranking sector officials, including Moff Flag." Johnson said.
"A major victory and a critical objective neutralized. What is your next move Will." Harrington asked.
"The hyperspace lane we have used to get this far splits here. I've been massing forces, a total of eight task forces with two others in reserve that will stay here. That doesn't count the forces still defending Earth as well as some special units and detachments. I'll be leading four task forces to the Nmjok system, the first major system we will take during this campaign. The recon drones that were dispatched indicated that there were two Imperial Star Destroyers as well as an older Venator Star Destroyer and Victory Star Destroyer, along with over two dozen other ships. The information that I gathered on the commander of the system forces was that he was an Imperial hardliner, and likely won't surrender. Additionally our electronic warfare superiority will be lost, as the Golan Defense platform has a specialized suite for that. We might be able to temporarily jam comms, but it won't last long. Additionally, there are over 100,000 Imperial personnel on the planet, though we don't know how many are combat maneuver units. It is going to present a challenge, but one we are ready for."
Johnson paused before continuing again. "The other four task forces under the command of Hong Admiral will continue to Fygilia. It is lightly defended, but more so than the systems we have encountered. However, it will be a walk in the park for those four task forces. Next they will head to Hvant, which is a similar deal to Fygilia. After that, they will attack Dydra, which is well fortified, even more than as well as Nmjok. It has two Imperial Star Destroyers and three Victory Star Destroyers. It won't be easy, but they have fewer escorts than Nmjok. That should give us an advantage. Then each fleet will continue a few more systems until they reach Garnizon II or Zoloch, which have the highest concentration of Imperial units. It will be difficult, but definitely not impossible to defeat them. Once we have secured those systems, it is only a matter of time before the sector falls completely to us."
"Impressive." Gorky said, pulling up a map of free confederacy assets in the sector with lines marked and displaying it. "We intend to attack these locations. I won't call them out since you can already see them, but suffice to say you will have help at Garnizon and Zoloch prime."
"Good. That will be useful to have help with." Johnson said.
Major Petrova rounded a corner of the new Imperial building, her rifle drawn. She could see dozens of dead Imperials, blaster bolts scorching their armor and uniforms.
She looked up to see Hans and several other members of the platoon waving at her. As she was looking up, she could see several vulture droids flying overhead. Hiding manned starfighters was difficult, especially when Imperials were looking for them. But droid fighters were a lot easier to conceal. The free confederacy had had several hundred in nondescript warehouses across the planet, waiting for the right moment.
These were not the dumb, unreliable vulture droids of the past though. Most had been built from scratch on production lines aboard the larger ships and had updated programming which was far more intelligent and designed specifically to counter tactics the Imperia pilots used. There was also a degree of artificial intelligence in the ships, through a network all of the fighters could transmit data to one another and learn from the lessons of each other. This networking allowed for an unparalleled level of coordination and efficiency in battle, allowing the fighters to use themselves efficiently. with frightening levels of effectiveness.
There were a number of other improvements such as a much longer flight time that was made possible due to swapping the old fuel slug generator with a micro reactor and battery that produced and stored a lot more power. It's armament had also been improved, with it's old blaster cannons switched out for much newer and more capable ones. The old energy torpedo launchers had been replaced with multipurpose launchers that could hold a number of different missiles and torpedoes depending on the situation.
She and the others bound up the building until they reached it's roof.
"We saw the explosion from here. Is the entire place gone?" He asked.
"Yeah, basically. If there is anyone left, they are buried under dozens of meters of rubble." Petrova said.
"Colonel Zark has reported there are uprisings across the world. The empire is not exactly very popular here." Hans said.
"Gee I can't tell." Taylor said sarcastically.
"So what happened here?" Petrova asked.
"Everything went according to plan. All Imperials on this street have been neutralized." Hans said.
"When will they counterattack?" Petrova asked.
"We don't know. The vulture droids are reporting some scattered units about a kilometer away, but they have mostly been suppressed from the air. Some armed civilians were seen coming in this direction, we don't know if they are friendly or not. We've scavenged plenty of ammunition from the dead troopers and should be able to hold against a much larger force." Hans said.
"Good." Petrova said. "I'll get in contact with the Colonel and figure out what he wants." She headed downstairs and pulled out a handheld holoprojector, dialing Zark.
"Major, congratulations on your victory." He said as they connected.
"Thank you. We have almost totally eliminated Imperials from the area. The casualties are in the thousands, plus massive losses in material and supply." She replied. "How have the other attacks been doing?"
"Good, we have hit dozens of installations across the world with a high rate of success. Many in the civilian population are rising up alongside us, with few standing with the Empire." He said.
"What about the Imperial fleet in orbit? What's to stop them from ordering a base delta zero in this world?" She asked.
"Maybe they will eventually, but by then Johnson and his fleet will be here." He said. "They will also provide us with whatever reinforcements we need to finish off the Imperials." He said.
"How long until he gets here?" Petrova asked.
"I don't know, but it shouldn't be long." He replied. "Ask him. He's in your military after all, not me."