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9 BBY: M4

Chapter 5: The Invasion of Brentaal

"Admiral, Sir, our ships are ready to begin the engagement." Motti looked toward the Captain of the Steel Talon, Voskamp.

"Very good Captain, begin operation." Motti relished giving the command, for fighting in a real war again. He had gone soft since the reconquest of the rim, spending far too many hours in offices and far too few hours on a starship's bridge.

'Today' He thought to himself, 'Today that changes.'

Motti had been planning this battle out for several weeks now. He had studied the variables and devised a brilliant 3 stage campaign to whittle the defenders down while minimizing his losses. Stage one, using long-range turbolaser fire, bait out as many ships from the cover of the defensive ring. Stage two, engage all remaining ships at extremely close range to prevent the stations from participating for fear of friendly fire. Stage three, overwhelm each Golan I Station with massed attack ships.

The enemy forces included a number of Venator Class Star Destroyers, three in total, and 15 other various support ships. A quartet of Trireme Class Flak frigates, a pair of Marauder Cruisers, six Arquitens cruisers, a pair of Acclamator Star Frigates, and an old Pelta Class support frigate. In open space, it was a well-put-together task force and would be capable of engaging just about anything. It wouldn't stand up to Motti's fleet of massed firepower.

He had brought 27 Vindicator Cruisers, 10 Gladiator Light Star Destroyers, and three Escort Carriers, plus an amalgamation of Tartan Patrol Frigates and six Vigil Corvettes. In open space, he would tear their fleet to shreds. He was half tempted to rush the defenses with what he had and see what would happen.

Motti mentally shook his head. 'No no, we can't just brute force this. This fleet is powerful but fragile, and those stations were designed to fend off attacks like this.' he turned back to Voskamp. "Captain, set Vindicator Squadron one, four, and seven to engage maximum range plus half. We'll bombard the area and shake them up some.

The Vindicator Cruisers had a fairly decent range, and technically any projectile would fly forever. Unfortunately, Turbolasers wouldn't. Motti never bothered himself with the physics behind it, something about the bolt's energy containment failing and dissipating the energy into open space. Firing beyond maximum range meant that the power of the shots would begin to fade away, at half beyond maximum, the shots would do little more than be pretty light shows. There would be just enough energy to make shields flare but do little appreciable damage.

The 27 Vindicators were organized into squadrons of three ships, totaling 9 squadrons. Each squadron had a commander in charge to direct the flotilla and had standing orders to take each target down with massed fire.

The nine ships formed up and began their bombardment. Veridian turbolasers began crashing in amongst the enemy formation. Each ship was ignoring their standing orders and attempting to hit as many targets as possible; Motti was gambling on the enemy commanders to panic and attack. Several moments passed as the bolts continued to strike, but the enemy fleet did not move.

Eventually, Motti had ordered his ships to cease their fire. "These hardliners may be clinging to a dead dream, but they certainly aren't lacking in determination or experience. No clone is leading this armada." Motti turned to Voskamp and ordered. "Captain, do we have any intelligence on the enemy commander?"

Voskamp pondered for a moment, and shook his head, "No sir, but his ships may have identifying markings we could use." He turned towards the trench that ran down the main bridge. "Scanners, locate any ship, fleet, or personal insignia on those ships and cross-reference a list of known enemy combatants or historical records."

The order was attended to and Motti turned his eyes to the fleet across from him. "Now we wait," he thought to himself.

(Republic Defense Fleet, Brentaal IV Orbit)

Admiral Hector Rex stared out confidently at the Imperial Fleet arrayed in front of him. It was an impressive bunch of vessels, more than 60 in total. He was sure if the situation were anything but this he wouldn't stand much chance in open combat without a serious force multiplier.

"Well, I suppose that all depends on how arrogant this Imperial is," he mused. "We just have to maintain our discipline, they'll have to commit their forces and lose, OR retreat and lose. Either way, as long as we defend, we have won today."

The Republic's whole strategy relied on defending. It didn't sit well with him, he made his naval career on attacking, flanking, encircling, and destroying. Maneuver warfare may have been invented for wet navies in real water but in space it meant everything. So many naval commanders tended to think in two dimensions, Hector Rex strived to never fall into that trap. It still grated on him to be idle, and he knew sallying forth with ships or fighters would lead to pointless casualties. Zsinj's strategy for the Republic Navy was all about attrition.

They had cut the heart out of the Empire's ship production, they would have completely crushed it had that Thrawn character not held onto Rendili so stubbornly. Regardless Rex knew that if they could maintain their stranglehold on Kuat and Fondor then they could overcome the core and restore the Republic. His part in that plan was to maintain that chokehold by defending Brentaal from Imperial attacks. Imperial doctrine was all about overwhelming firepower, but it could be subverted, especially by those they didn't suspect. Hector Rex was a legend among the Republic Navy, and perhaps invoking it against his opponent would stunt his morale, but Rex preferred not to use it and instead allow his opponents to assume victory, before he snapped it away from them.

His personal appearance reflected that, for such a distinguished admiral with over 30 years of service, his uniform was never adorned with the many medals he had been awarded. His greying hair was always kept neat and regulation length and his average height belied his ferocity behind a task force. From a distance, he would have been mistaken as an older but much lower-ranked individual. Not a dedicated admiral that could match the best of the CIS and Republic at their prime. Even his demeanor was a bit too casual for an admiral, never unnecessarily harsh, with an affable attitude. He was a Krayt Dragon hiding underneath a Womp Rat, and that was exactly how he liked it.

"Sir," a clone naval officer called out, "Enemy ships are advancing in all sectors."

"And so it begins," he thought. Aloud he said, "The fool has run out of patience."

He turned toward the holo table that dominated the rear section of a Venator Star Destroyer's bridge and began preparing orders for his ships.

Motti had run out of patience. Their scanning teams hadn't discovered any sort of identifiable markings on the ships, and their opponent clearly wasn't willing to announce themselves. He had ordered an immediate switch to phase two of his plan. He would have to risk his ships and engage at extremely close range with the enemy. This would allow them to focus on destroying the fleet while minimizing chances for the defense stations to engage his fleet. They had just reached maximum range when a frantic report rang out from sensors.

"Sir, we have detected incoming weapons fire. Proton Torpedos are being launched at the task force from the stations."

Motti gaped, "Torpedos?! Golan I stations don't have torpedo launchers!"

But even as he delivered the reply a purplish explosion tore a turbolaser battery from the front end of a Gladiator Cruiser. Three more sets of explosions blossomed on the ship, near one of its forward missile bays, another into the hanger bay that sat between its bow prongs, and the third smashed into its bridge. The ship shuddered with internal explosions as the torpedos must have damaged the internal magazine for its concussion missiles. The hanger shot likely penetrated deep into engineering as well. The doomed ship started to slowly sputter out of formation before blowing apart.

Motti hadn't remained transfixed on the sight. He turned to give orders immediately.

"All Ships, bring shields down to half and divert all spare power to propulsion. Get close to the enemy ships as fast as possible."

Communications was quick to relay the order. It was a calculated gamble on Motti's part. Shields and propulsion took the majority of a ship's power, and by cutting shield power by half their speed would get a sizable increase. The cost would come at shield strength, but proton torpedo batteries would bypass their shields anyway.

Several minutes passed and nothing was to be heard but the damage reports from other ships and the roar of the Steel Talon's engines. The enemy station gunners were combining their torpedo volleys to cripple the armada one ship at a time.

The order for more speed had thrown one wave of torpedoes off course, beyond what their tracking could compensate for. The Golan I gunners had compensated and now ships were beginning to fall. Three Vindicator Cruisers had been damaged beyond use and had turned around, while a Vigil Corvette and another Gladiator had been destroyed entirely. Now they were entering weapons range, and electric blue turbolaser bolts began to fly amongst Imperial ships.

But now the Imperial ships could return fire, and did so in earnest. Motti's fleet began to take up positions and firing point-blank into the enemy. A brutal melee battle for starships. They had taken some additional casualties from the enemy ships, but now the battle began in earnest.

Republic ships had taken up a strange set of positions. Unlike the Imperial fleet which was arranged in a scattered delta formation that had enough depth that each ship could fire over the ship in front of them, the Republic fleet was arranged in a half-spherical shape. One Venator was positioned in the bottom middle of the sphere, and the other two were positioned at the top, but rotated upside down to keep their primary turbolasers facing correctly. The frigates and cruisers were interspersed between these three ships, rotated in such a way that their outer hulls faced away while their guns angled inward.

The formation was akin to a giant mouth the Motti's ships had sailed into. He didn't see the jaws closing until it was too late. The bulk of Imperial Cruisers smashed their way into the sphere, guns firing at the closest targets. Already the Republic lost both of their Marauder Cruisers, a Trieme Frigate, the Pelta, and an Arquitens.

As the heavy guns of his Star Destroyer reverberated throughout the bridge, Motti closed his eyes and let the sounds of battle wash over him"

"Power cell on battery 6 has overloaded, gunnery is working on it. Cruiser 19, two torpedos coming in at point-two-six, vector point defense systems to intercept. Tartan Squadron 4 has been destroyed. Arquitens Cruiser vectoring, bow guns may fire at will." The voices began to intermingle with the ever-present whump whump whump of heavy turbolasers, it brought a smile to Motti's face. This was where he belonged, this was what he was made for. There was a voice now trying to cut over the sounds of warfare.

"Sir, Sir!" Motti opened his eyes to see Voskamp staring at him, eyes wide in fear. "Enemy Star Destroyer has outflanked us, Admiral. Cruisers 17, 20, and 21 have lost their engines."

He had missed something.

Motti had, in his eagerness, overlooked the formation of the enemy ships. He had not seen it for the strategic positioning it was. While his ships were diving into the center of the enemy fleet to protect themselves from the stations, the Republic ships were moving to surround him. As they settled into their position one of the Venators had dived and positioned itself behind Motti's ships, firing its turbolasers into the engines of the task force. They were now surrounded and taking fire from every direction. Fighting would mean destruction, as he looked out he could see now that his ships were being picked off one by one. While Motti's ships had engaged every target in sight, they had spread their fire too thinly, most enemy ships were superficially wounded or still had shields up. He would have to retreat if he wanted to survive this battle.

First, he would have to break out of this encirclement, either back through the enemy Venator that had come down behind them, or out the other side where the stations could hit them with all their weapons. As the Steel Talon shuddered from the fire coming in every direction, the decision had to be made now.

It was an easy decision, " All ships come about! Move out of the battle zone now."

The Navigation officer was ashen-faced with fear, "Sir we're blocked in by that star destroyer, we risk a collision if we try-"

"THEN COLLIDE WITH THE BLASTED THING," Motti Roared, "Get-Us-Out-Of-Here." The navigator nodded, and collision alarms began blaring throughout the Star Destroyer. "Communications, have all ships that can fall in behind us. All Power to engines, and all hands brace for impact."

The triangular design of Imperial Star Destroyers was a well-known silhouette in the Galaxy. What many did not know was that the design had been constructed with some unconventional tactics in mind. The Steel Talon's prow was heavily armored and would have no trouble ramming aside another warship, even one of similar size. With her engines at maximum, the Steel Talon smashed right through the prow of the Venator. The sound of tortured metal screeched through both ships as the force of the ISD sheared off the starboard bow of the Venator. Its dorsal hanger bay doors were torn off and the hanger was exposed to vacuum, while the main body of the Venator was physically pushed out of the way.

With Republic turbolasers flashing at their rear shields, the Imperial Fleet followed the Steel Talon out of the bubble of Republic ships and back into open space, leaving a trail of wreckage and crippled ships in their wake. The enemy ships did not pursue. Motti turned toward the fleet display and took stock of what remained of his fleet as damage assessments were called for.

Over 60 warships had started this fight, and less than 18 were left, and almost all of them bore severe damage. Eight Vindicators were in various states of severe damage, two Gladiators, though one looked to be venting atmosphere, the three escort carriers were left to the rear and hadn't taken appreciable damage, four Tartan Patrol ships, and a single Vigil Corvette remained of their escorts.

The Steel Talon was in better shape, being more heavily shielded and armored, but she was also going to be limping into drydock and would be sidelined for months. Two decks were gone, and another three were exposed to open space, most of their guns were offline or destroyed, and there were fires in many compartments. There were 3 bodies on the bridge and medical personnel were attending to a wounded Voskamp, hit with shrapnel from an exploding console.

The rest of his ships were destroyed or captured, several ships had their engines crippled and had been left behind. Already Motti could see some of the smaller Republic ships moving amongst his own. He sighed heavily, "There will be no victory here today," he called out, "Damage and casualty assessment, find out what ships are still hyperspace worthy." The Crew rushed to carry out his orders and he turned toward the viewscreen and took in his defeat.

The Emperor would not be pleased.

AN: Hello everyone, sorry for the delay on this chapter. A mixture of my injury, and then holiday stuff started pouring in. Luckily my work year is just about over, so I should be able to get some more writing done before the end of the year. Bentaal marks our very first Imperial defeat, there will be repercussions for this. Also, we took a moment to peek into the mind of our Republic Admiral Hector Rex, he might be a one-off, I'm not sure.

Also, I'm a very big technical buff, and clearly not a combat writer. I will be focusing more on the broad strokes of battles while getting insight into key moments. I hope I captured that well here. This is planned to be quite long, and if I did every battle in minute detail we'd be here forever. Still, any feedback on levels of detail is welcome!

Happy Holidays to everyone!