Chapter 14: A Ballroom Blitz
39:4:27 GrS
Constancia, The Deep Core
Imperial-I Class Star Destroyer: Adamant
At the very least, I had been given the right coordinates by Dark Side summoned by the -what I will admit was an every so slightly botched- ritual.
Another Raider-class corvette met its death under the Adamant's guns. Verdant green turbolasers impacted the middle of the craft, destroying its meager shields, then its durasteel hull before puncturing the interior of the corvette, breaking its spinal superstructure in two. The corvette's shattered remains then imploded as the ship's broken reactor went critical, engulfing the wreckage and the space around the killed vessel in a ball of blue heat before winking out. Now only shards of heat warped metal was left where a once mighty vessel of the Galactic Empire had once been.
"Confirmed kill on target sir." The chief gunnery officer called up to Masal from the bridge pit. It was the fifth Raider-class that had fallen to the guns of the Adamant. This system seemed to have an abundance of the class, the fleet had sunk five but three more remained, clustered around the four enemy Vindicators that where currently facing off with the Pacer and Relentless, who had their own escorts. That showdown was taking place above Constancia's north pole, the flash of green turbolasers cutting through the upper atmosphere as ships and fighter squadrons would dip into the thermosphere in their various attack runs. It was a proper bout of ship to ship combat, both sides being more or less equivalent in Adamant had fallen away from that engagement, Masal seeming to entrust that fight to Captain Gravsol of the Pacer. So if Masal trusted Gravsol, who I knew to be a career military officer from Corulag based on the man's service records, then I wouldn't interfere with his direction.
Our, meaning the Adamant and her escort of four Imperial-II frigates, had a different fight. In front of us loomed a behemoth of a structure. It was the second largest structure in the system, only being four hundred meters shorter than the Adamant. Its almost octagonal shape afforded its turbolaser suite an excellent broadside angle, which it was currently taking advantage of to rake viridian fire across the Adamant's shields. Flying in tight circles around its hangar bays, TIE fighters defended their master like lesser pack members defending the alpha of the pack, preventing an attack run against the turbolaser batteries, the hangars, and the sensor arrays. It was a Golan Space Defense SpaceGun, colloquially referred to as the Golan I series. Whoever was in command of the station was good, even my And it was my foremost foe in this fight.
The Golan boasted a turbolaser suite that matched the two Victory-class Star Destroyers in my fleet, and shields that prevented the Adamant from simply overwhelming it while taking the station's turbolaser fire. So we were forced to skirt around the station in wide passes, looking for weak spots that either the ship's guns or our own fighter squadrons could exploit. Unfortunately, Masal's efforts had been frustrated by the Golan's commander. Annoying Raider-class corvettes and accompanying TIE squadrons had intercepted the probing spearheads, merging with the station's guns to throw our attacks back.
The tenacious defense was proving to be a problem, considering that the Golan was the only Imperial installation in the system that would have access to Harrsk's closed HoloNet. So if I wanted those codes, I had to get people inside to physically download the hyperspace stuff. Unfortunately I had decided to err on the side of caution when confronted with the station commander's unexpected competency, and as such had removed myself from any boarding ops against the Golan.
I had also decided not to send the 666th in either. Why? Because properly trained stormtroopers were hard to get a hold of. Also some nebulous moral reasons. Turns out that when you fight directly besides your own oath-sworn men is good for their elan and esprit de corps.
Luckily I had a more...disposable source of manpower. Enter the ranks of the much maligned and oft forgot Imperial Fleet Regiments. The, regularly, armed forces of the Imperial Navy who served the dual role of being the military police onboard star destroyers and a star destroyers main defenders in the event of boarding. After all, what captain worth is rank tabs would willingly let such a filthy group of groundpounders like the Imperial Army defend his ship?
The naval troopers were also trained for offensive actions, though they rarely put that training to good use. And these ships in the Imperial Navy that were in the higher tonnage had at least a regiment of these troopers. So I, being a benevolent commander, had an idea.
"Masal, order the Ton Falk carriers to fall in right behind us and for them to prepare their naval troopers for a boarding action. One of our own Fleet Regiments as well." I then got into a brief discussion with Masal about extremely obscure ship tactics, which I remembered as the Thrawn Maneuver and he eventually recognized, being hampered by my lack of a specific naval education, as the Yularen Gambit. Though I was proposing to use it in a new way. Masal did express some doubts as to the success of this gambit but we did agree that it was the quickest way to achieve our objective in this battle. So the selected Fleet Regiment onboard the Adamant was rushed to their action stations, in concert with their sibling regiments on the Ton Falks.
You aren't normally supposed to feel the engines of a spaceship working, as a general rule of thumb. If you could feel the engines working, it usually meant that something critical was about to explode, especially on a military vessel such as the Adamant. But when I registered the dull whine and resonating feeling that felt like a hard beat, it only meant that Adamant was ready to move. To fight, to kill.
"The Ton Falks are ready to launch boarding shuttles sir." A junior officer reported to Masal, who turned to look at me. Well the star destroyer certainly felt ready and I sensed nothing but the pulse of battle in the Force.
"Bring us in for an attack run captain and have the Ton Falks push their engines to the limit so they can stay close enough to avoid the station's guns." I said, maintaining an air of disinterest in the going ons around me. I'd observed high ranking imperial officers do this before I had been elevated to command of the Adamant, and had adopted a similar attitude, figuring that it was just how those in command were supposed to act. So far, nobody had corrected me.
"Of course my lord." Masal replied. "I do suggest holding onto something, this maneuver will put strain on the artificial gravity and we may experience excess g-forces on the bridge."
"I'll stand Masal."
"As you will my lord."
Masal wasn't kidding about the increased gravity. When the Adamant advanced, first it dipped down, pointing the tip of its superstructure at the bottom of the spire that extended down from the center of the Golan, the light of Constancia highlighting the jagged nature of spire, which looked to be filled with a true menagerie of sensors. Then the engines kicked it into gear, burning fuel as quickly as possible for exactly twenty-seven seconds(one of the pit lieutenants was counting them out) before cutting the acceleration. It felt like I had been placed in front of a strong headwind, a weight pressing onto my chest. Not uncomfortable but definitely noticeable. The helm proceeded to swing the prow of the Adamant back up, and surprisingly the sudden addition of weight pressing against my head wasn't great for my balance but a quick and forceful use of the Force kept me as immovable as rock. I was rather proud of that considering that even Masal, a life long spacer, had rocked back and forth on his heels during the maneuver.
After the two second realignment had been completed, two things happened in near unison. The ions guns of the Adamant let loose a volley, a loose arrow of cerulean bolts that cut through the void of space to wreak havoc on shields of the Golan, weakening them considerably. A millisecond after the ion cannons had fired, the engines kicked back into action, launching the star destroyer towards the Golan on a near collision course. Our seemingly suicidal charge was met, to the credit of the station's gunners, with a harrowing and constant stream of red turbolaser bolts. Impressive effort but ultimately futile, there simply was not enough turbolaser batteries, at the angle of our approach, that could even take aim at us. Masal had chosen an excellent angle of attack.
"The Ton Falks are keeping pace with us and remain inside our slipstream." Masal said next to me, passing the news from his datapad.
"Good." I replied, keeping my focus on the rapidly approaching station. "Launch the boarding craft."
Two more cerulean arrows blazed out from the Adamant, the first one ripped apart the weakened shields of the Golan, and the second volley, which only just managed to outpace the Adamant, slammed into the vulnerable turbolaser batteries and hanger point defense guns, shutting them down. And as the Adamant crested over the top of the Golan like a metal shark breaching the surface of the ocean, the Ton Falks that she had been shielding the approach of peeled off to left and right, skirting the station before quickly circling back to rejoin the Adamant detachment of the fleet. The carefully preserved corvettes and fighters that the Golan's commander had gathered simply could not stop either the Adamant or the Ton Falks without the support from the station's big guns.
But they were able to cut down the number of boarding craft that issued out of the ship's hangers, judging by the sudden flare of death directly below me that I sensed in the Force. Such was the risk of boarding ops.
It was time for the Adamant to make her final move, so I stopped focusing on flares of death in the Force and back to my ship. The seconds crawled by as I pulled at the Force, commanding it to show me the right moment to act, and the Adamant increased the distance between it and the station.
Then I felt a prod hit my mind and the eagerness I felt in the Force perfectly reflected what I was feeling.
"Execute the maneuver!" I commanded, dramatically throwing my left arm forward to point at the vastness of space.
No answer was given to my command, not even by Masal. It wasn't needed, because the sudden shift of the star destroyer's flight path was all the answer needed. The engines were cut, and the helm swung the rear end of the ship out to the right, rolling the ship with the movement as well so that the top of the star destroyer was now facing the Golan instead of the rear. The Adamant had maintained her acceleration in the maneuver, was still at the same diagonal angle of approach that had coasted us just barely over the Golan but now the main heavy turbolaser batteries of the Adamant had the Golan within their sights instead of the other way around.
"Take out the station's turbolaser batteries before the shields recover and divert power to the auxiliary deflector shields." Masal commanded the gunnery officers below us in the bridge pit and the electro-technical officers off to the rear. Then the Adamant unleashed hell upon her enemy. Viridian turbolaser fire rammed into the soft structure of the Golan's defenses and left holes of slagged metal where once there had been an operational turbolaser. The surface of the Golan devolved into a pitted wasteland of broken metal with their shields still overloaded from the previous ion fire. By the time the shields had recovered and the Golan was once more protected, it had been reduced to a state of uselessness.
Masal seemed quite pleased at the results. A feeling I shared, now it was just a matter of waiting for the Naval Regiments that had boarded the structure to return with the technical information we needed to jack into the closed HoloNet Harrsk had set up and we could return to our regularly scheduled convoy raiding.
"Should I order the destruction of the station upon the return of the away teams my lord?" Masal asked.
"No." I decided. "Better to let Harrsk waste time and precious resources on repairing it." Harrsk didn't seem like the kind of man who could accept a hole in his personal defenses, so he'd repair the cornerstone of the defenses for the approach to Kallist IV, the capital of his breakaway state. The survivors would also require any pursuing forces to waste time recovering their stranded comrades.
"Status on Gravsol's detachment?"
"Yes my lord. He reported the complete destruction of the majority of enemy forces he was tasked with engaging shortly before the Adamant executed its Yularen Gambit. The remainder have fled into the lower planetary atmosphere out of combat range. We now have complete control of the planet's high orbit airspace. He awaits your next order my lord."
"Does the planet have any military installations?" I asked, wondering if it would be worth it to engage in the landing operation to seize equipment and supplies.
"Nothing noteworthy my lord, the standard Army bases all planets have." Masal reported, looking through his datapad again.
Ah well, not worth the risk then. "Then Gravsol will commence with a light orbital bombardment of the planet's major population centers, let's remind the inhabitants that they face the might of the Galactic Empire and that these traitors will not be enough to protect them. With luck, they'll reconsider their allegiances." A light punishment for the natives, the victory today had me feeling generous.
"Standard procedure my lord?" Masal asked, referring to the selected targets of the bombardment. Standard Navy procedure in orbital bombardments held that governmental zones should be priority targets.
"Standard procedure captain, but have Gravsol put a few into the industrial zones." I affirmed, it'd deny Harrsk's forces of local manufacturing to aid in their repair efforts to the Golan.
With the sight of the crippled Golan before me, and the knowledge that my fleet was now in control of the system, I began to feel that orders the Ruling Council had saddled me with might not result in my untimely demise.
But then again, Victory was the opiate of the overconfident.
A/N: Ah man it has been a while, again. The only thing I can say is that I got a sudden hankering to replay Dragon Age: Inquisition and its DLCs again, and that I've spent my recent time finishing that instead of writing. But the chapter got out and I think the battle scene turned out well(hope the title reference makes sense too) but I am sad to say that time of Andorak in the Deep Core is slowly coming to an end, so we can progress the timeline some more soon. Exciting I know. Comments are, as always, appreciated and I'll see you all next chapter.