Above Brentaal IV, an Imperial fleet surged into action. Great ion engines ignited, turbolaser batteries came to life, and TIE squadrons began belching out of their hangars. The Deep Core Defense Fleet was going into battle again. Following the orders of Captain Masal, who himself was following the orders of Inquisitor Andorak, the fleet assumed Spear Formation.
The fleet's flagship, the ISD Adamant, took point. Flanking her were the TSDs Torrent and Tantamount. The Tectors were the latest additions to the Deep Core Defense Fleet and this was their first time going into combat with the rest of the fleet. Gossip among the officer lounges of the rest of the fleet were unfavorable towards the Tectors. They were widely mocked as being green compared to the rest of the fleet. Now Torrent and Tantamount sought to prove their mettle.
Arranged in a diagonal cross just behind the lead ships were the four Victory-class Star Destroyers of the fleet. The VSD-II Pacer, Relentless, Boundless, and the VSD Peregrin.
This was the tip of the spear. Seven star destroyers would plunge straight into the enemy's lines, scattering their order of battle. Then came the rest of the spear. Three lines of ships. The fleet's Ton Falk carriers in the inner lines and protected by the outer lines, made up of six Vindicator heavy cruisers, three Arquinten light cruisers and four Imperial-II type frigates. The remaining Gozanti corvettes of the fleet escorted the carriers.
As the Deep Core Defense Fleet sailed towards the rebel controlled moon, ignoring questioning hails from the rest of the system defense fleet, the battle for Brentaal IV was already underway. Rebel starfighters and landing craft flew down towards Oradin, the planet's starport. While the famed 181st Fighter Wing was leading a sortie to intercept them, TIE interceptor squadrons from the Deep Core Defense Fleet had been dispatched to assist them.
Meanwhile, the rebel moonbase focused their attention on the incoming assault. Newly installed ion cannons began drawing up targeting solutions on the incoming star destroyers. Pilots rushed to their starfighters and the rebel fleet, which until now had put the moon between them and Brentaal IV, emerged from behind the moon.
As this happened, deep within the superstructure of the Adamant, an Inquisitor worked a ritual. Magic circles and glyphs were drawn, blood was spilled, words were chanted, the Force flowed, and a link was broken.
In the Imperial Palace, a man felt that link break and set his backup plans into motion.
Five minutes before Masal's thirty minute estimate was up, I re-entered the bridge. My left arm below the elbow was bare except for pink tinged gauze I had wrapped around the bacta patch. I had been right and that breaking counterspell Jerec had given us did hurt like a bitch and did cause further wounding.
Nothing that wouldn't heal in time. The personal medical droid I stored in my quarters had confirmed that. Through my command of the Force, I'd only have a diamondish shaped scar as a memento to that fucking alien freak's stone.
The Dark Side burned through me and I relished it. Yiaso was going to get his. I fucking swore it. I was going to repay everything he owed me with interest.
Fucking alien freak!
"Report!" I barked out.
Masal and his aides snapped to attention. "Sir the fleet is in formation and we will be entering our outer firing range momentarily."
I saw Masal look down at my bandaged arm. I felt the question form in his mind, but he didn't voice it.
"And the rebels?"
The captain consulted his datapad before answering. "The rebel strikeforce is engaging the garrison over Oradin as we speak. Our interceptor squadrons will be entering that battle in one hundred and thirteen seconds. General Benzenti has confirmed that his divisions are ready to launch for ground support."
"Give him the signal to begin landing operations." I ordered. "Reinforce the key sectors of the spaceport and hold them. The rebel strike teams will come to him, so tell him not to go looking for them."
"Understood sir." A call from the gunnery officers in the bridge pit drew Masal's attention. The fleet was in range of Brentaal's moonbase.
The Force twinged. I looked over to see a gigantic blue laser slam into the Adamant. The decks lurched under my feet and damage alerts began to wail from consoles.
"Ion cannon!" The men stationed on the shield consoles reported. "Direct hit midships. Shields are down to half."
Then two more ion blasts zipped past the bridge. Then a fourth one glanced off the Pacer above us.
I frowned. This was bad.
"The rebels must have installed more ion cannons than we knew about." I said to Masal, lowering my voice instinctively.
"Yes sir. But they must have overcharged the capacitors to lower our shields that much." Masal replied, his brow furrowed in concentration as he stared at the moon. The once small ball was growing larger and larger as the fleet closed the distance. "I reckon there's going to be a significant delay between their next volley. They'll need to vent heat to prevent an overload."
I pulled at the Force for knowledge. Masal may have the right of it.
"Then take us in and destroy those ion cannons." I gave Masal the reins of the battle. He would handle the nitty gritty while I commanded the Force to show me opportunities the fleet could exploit. A tried and true tactic that had seen me and Masal through the last few years of fighting.
"Condense the spearhead and overlap shields!" Masal barked out. "Gunnery, being firing on those ion cannons. Tighten up our fighter screens, the rebels are going to be bearing down on us. Sensors, what's the status of the rebel fleet?"
The officer in command of the sensor section didn't look up from his work when he replied. "Rebel fleet is coming out of the dark side of the moon, level with the moonbase. We're reading three mon calamari heavy type star cruisers at the lead. Variety of other frigates and cruisers as well."
"Not good enough, get me specifics." Masal replied.
"Yes sir. Rebel snub fighters are deploying from the moonbase." The same officer followed up.
"Full speed ahead, for the moonbase, and scramble a hundred TIEs to intercept the fighters." Masal ordered. Meanwhile, I was watching the space where I could sense the rebel fleet emerging from behind the moon. Instead of hooking around the poles, they were swinging wide on the lunar equator.
Green turbolasers emerged from our fleet and raced towards the moon.
"Captain, we've identified one of the Mon Calamari ships, it's the Independence." An aide reported. I ran through the mental list of noteworthy rebel targets I had.
"That's one of Ackbar's flagship." I told the bridge. Masal's signature in the Force grew grim. I understood. For an alien, Ackbar was a fearsome foe. No Imperial force that I knew had managed to defeat him since he had entered the war. Outside of Vader's personal command of course.
Time for the plan to change.
"Bring us into the rebel fleet." I gave the order. "Send a frigate and two heavy cruisers to support the fighters dealing with the moonbase."
"As you will." Masal orders were quickly transmitted and a trio of smaller ships split off from the formation. Then the Adamant swung starboard and the star destroyers arrayed around her followed suit. As the fleet presented its port side to the moon, another volley of ion fire came our way.
"One frigate has had its shields overloaded." The report came in.
"Continue the present course. All turbolaser batteries fire on the moon base, rolling volley." Masal replied. I watched as the portside turbolaser batteries belched out a volley, then the Torrent with the same and so on down the formation. We had closed enough with the moon that I could see the great plumes of rock and dust the bombardment threw up.
In the wake of the volley, a hundred TIE fighters flew on an intercept course to engage the scrambling rebel starfighters from the moonbase, escorting ships flying hard behind them. The turbolasers of the heavy cruiser and frigate firing continually at the estimated locations of the ion cannons.
"The rebel fleet is opening fire." Came the report as we finished adjusting our heading for a dead on interception of the rebel fleet.
"Match them." Masal ordered. "Focus fire on the star cruisers."
Above the Adamant, I saw the pin sized engine flares zip away from the Peregrin's missile batteries.
"Three GR-75s have been destroyed by missiles." Came the report. "Nebulon frigates intercepted the rest, minimal damage to rebel ships."
"Continue firing." The distances shrank from thousands of kilometers, then down to hundreds, then to tens of kilometers away, then the spear was among the rebel fleet.
"Concentrate power in the forward shields!" Masal barked, now intently staring at the rebel fleet as they fired away at us. Some hits had gotten through, but Masal's decision to condense the formation had proven to be the right one.
"Status of our fighters?" I asked.
"Still engaging around the moonbase, Perpetual has reported that a rebel troop convoy tried to run the gauntlet and was destroyed but the moonbase's defenses are holding off our ships while the fighter engagement continues."
I made a decision. "Have them pull back towards our lines and disengage the rebel forces around the moonbase. Even at full speed they'll be too late to intercept. What about our fighter screens?"
"Continuing to ward off rebel bombing runs. Casualties are mounting however, the rebels will manage to break through soon." The officer warned as he traced the IFF movements of our TIE squadrons as they surged in and out of the formation, blocking squadrons of X-Wings, A-Wings, Y-Wings and B-Wings from making attack runs into the fleet.
I commanded the Force and it answered.
"Masal, take us in. Straight at the flagship." I ordered. "It's time to give the rebels a remedial lesson in how war is fought."
"At once Inquisitor!" Masal replied with audible glee in his voice. The decks of the Adamant continued to rumble as the star destroyer finally breached the rebel lines. The forward guns swatted a Nebulon-B frigate into pieces and a Pelta frigate was rammed into two pieces by the Adamant's prow.
"Intensify firepower on the mon calamari ships!" Masal yelled out. "Break those shields and close the distance!"
Deep and deeper we plunged into the rebel fleet, screens and cruisers being broken under the reckless charge of seven star destroyers. I could feel the combined bloodlust of the Adamant's crew as they worked to do their part in killing the Empire's enemies.
I judged the rebels to have initially panicked at our aggressive maneuver as the thrust of our spear formation into them sent their lines reeling and a dozen ships being destroyed outright. But Ackbar, or whoever he had commanding in his stead, kept his head. The rebel fleet began to give ground, allowing our formation to go deeper into their lines, and also allowing more of their fleet to draw firing coordinates on us. At the same time, the Mon Calamari star cruiser retreated.
"They're trying to sucker us in then pounce." I muttered to Masal as we stood shoulder to shoulder, watching our advance. I had never seen such a massive exchange of turbolaser fire in my life. Our batteries fired, their batteries fired, and both of our decks were starting to take more and more hits as the shields were overloaded bit by bit.
"Yes. We'll need to isolate a capital ship, kill it, withdraw and make another run." Masal offered.
"Perhaps." The Force obeyed my will and I knew. "All ion cannons, target the Independence.."
The order was transmitted and the Pacer, Relentless and Boundless sent a continual stream of ion bolts into the prow of the Independence.
A minute passed and our advance continued. Reports flew thick and fast in the bridge pit and up to Masal. Rebel fighters were going around the star destroyers and engaging the rear of the formation. Most of our fighter cover had been redirected to fight them off. The Adamant shook as a bombing run got through.
Two minutes later, the Pacer's bridge had taken a direct hit. The captain was dead and command was being re-routed to the secondary bridge further in the ship. Orders remained the same: keep firing the ion cannons. Our shields would hold, despite the increasingly concentrated rebel fire coming from every direction.
Three minutes later, we caught it. The ion cannons finally overloaded something critical and I visibly saw the deflector shields shimmer in and out of existence. The star cruiser's backwards speed dropped and it dropped out of formation with its two sister ships.
"All batteries fire!" Masal saw it too. It seemed to me that our speed increased that much more, our guns fired just a smidge faster.
The Deep Core Defense Fleet overran the Independence that day over Brentaal IV. The Mon Calamari ship was raked prow to stern by the Adamant, then the Torrent and three Victory star destroyers took their turns. Shields were overwhelmed and failed. The armor couldn't withstand such punishment and it broke. The Peregrin swooped down and emptied its missile banks into the burning wounds the rest of the fleet had left in the Independence, causing explosions to wrack its interior.
From the bridge of my flagship, I saw the Independence die to that close range missile barrage. But when the fleet swung about hard to port and flipped, presenting our underbellies to the rebel fleet and burning hard back towards our side of the system, the Tantamount snapped the star cruiser's engine block just to be sure. When I last saw it, the oblong ship was burning and disgorging its complement of escape pods.
But its death had brought the rebel fleet time to regroup and reform, shaking off the disorder our brazen charge had forced into their battleplans. Now they were holding firm, continuing to fire into our formation, hurrying us out of the combat zone. We collected our detachment that had been containing the moonbase and rejoined the rest of the system defense force on the other side of Brentaal IV.
"Not a bad showing." I told Masal as we watched the rebel fleet interpose itself between the side of the planet we were on and the moonbase. It had been two hours since the day's fighting had ended.
"But not a decisive one." Masal grimly said. "Four ships destroyed and three too damaged for anything but rearline duties. And that includes one of our star destroyers."
We lost the remainder of our Arquintens and one Vindicator to the rebel starfighters during the charge. The two Vindicators that had gone to engage the moonbase and the Pacer were our invalids. Masal didn't mention it, but I knew that our corvettes had been halved in the same fighting that sank the other four ships of our fleet.
"What's more important is the situation in Oradin." I said. "Admiral Isoto saw fit to pull the 181st out of that engagement to defend Vultin. Our interceptors took a mauling from Rogue Squadron once that happened. Black Squadron is down to just a dozen effectives."
"General Benzenti?" Masal asked. He had been busy on the naval engagement so I hadn't bothered to keep him up to date on the situation planetside.
"He managed to land." I confirmed. "Currently he's fending off rebel probes of his position while the local garrison is trying to force the rebels out of the spaceport entirely."
"Will they succeed?"
I shook my head. "Highly unlikely, the spaceport is too big. The rebels will hunker down and wait for the next attack if they have to."
I sighed in frustration. "Meanwhile our good admiral is throwing a fête at Vultin. Our great victory must be commemorated."
"We could try jumping out of the system and attack the rebels from behind." Masal offered. I inwardly smirked. It seemed my tactics were starting to rub off on him.
"Isoto has directly ordered us to hold our current position." I told him. "His victory has put him in a magnanimous mood, it seems, and he told me that in the spirit of his victory, he will be overlooking my minor insubordination in engaging the rebels without his direct authorization. He also stressed that we're not to do it again."
Masal scowled.
"So what's next, sir?"
"We wait. I'm going to send my report of our engagement back to Imperial Center." I told him. I turned to leave but then remembered something from the reports from Oradin. "One of our interceptor pilots shot down a Rogue. Black Four I believe. Confirm the report and then give him the bloodstripes."
A dead Rogue is always cause for commendations to be handed out.
"Yes sir."
Now the defense of Brentaal IV, through the man's direct orders, lay solely on the weak and flabby shoulders of Lon Isoto. Pestage must be pissing himself.
A/N: I am aiming for the battle of Brentaal to be four chapters, but we'll see how things pan out.