De Imperatoribus Galacticis: Chapter the Twenty-Fifth.
Posted: 2005-08-26 08:05pm
De Imperatoribus Galacticis
"On the Galactic Emperors"
Chapter the Twenty-Fifth.
(As continued from Chapter the Twenty-Fourth.)
Imperial Starfleet
System TRL-789252.
It was another desolate place. Three stars all orbiting each other, two massive blue supergiants and a green star scarcely smaller, casting their pallor across a great expansive of space in an entanglement of gravity. There had been a mining operation here, once, two thousand years ago. It had removed what valuable trace elements as were profitable from the tangle of protoplastic clouds surrounding the supergiants, planets which could be never formed in this gravity regime, and then left, and that was the only time that sentient beings had been here in the past five thousand years. There were many systems like it, for there were a host of uninhabited systems for every one of the fifty-five million or so inhabited ones in the galaxy, and the resources of those were far, far from being tapped. It was, in short, a place for a fleet rendezvous, and nothing else.
Ships had indeed come. Not enough, not enough by far, but there were now 21,000 regular force vessels in the Grand Fleet—many of which were not technically finished ships, but were going into battle with shipyard workers onboard. There were another twenty-five hundred civilian armed ships which were of capital strength which had arrived to Sule's call to arms, but many of these ships were very badly underarmed and scarcely protected at all against enemy fire; there were many more which were not capital ships at all, but a host of tiny modified transports of a hundred and thirty meters or so and less in length. They would, of course, be used anyway, for the enemy was thought to have around thirty thousand ships. The risks taken would be compensated for, either to the living, or the relatives of the dead, and that was that.
With the fleet mustered here, it would only be a short fourteen hour hyperjump into Coruscant, and battle. There was nervousness and drinking, and lots and lots of work, for though the crew might have their usual off-duty periods on the fortunately undamaged ships, those coming straight out of the yards or which had suffered damage at Dantooine were working their crews continuously, as hard as whip-bearing slave drivers, to make further repairs and thusly improve their chances in the battle ahead. There would be time to rest ahead. Just enough for men exhausted by days spend on eighteen hours work, six hours exhausted sleep, to collapse into bed for ten hours or so to get the rest they needed for the upcoming battle. Until that time, they were worked unceasingly.
This was the rough edge of combat. There were no spit-and-polish legions here marching into battle with their equipment gleaming. These were veterans, fighting in ships patched by ferrocrete and with random plates of armour bolted and wielded on at points of damage haphazardly, just good enough to do the job. Exhausted men with several days' growth of beard—normally unacceptable in the Imperial Starfleet—worked, sweating even in the climate-controlled locale of the deep interior of a ship, manhandling equipment into different sectors, making internal repairs, checking for microscopic fissures in bulkheads that might have been caused by shock damage, which in the battle to come could cause progressive decompression if nearby sections were vented to space.
At least the droids did not tire. But they were being worked very hard, as well, twenty four hours a day, and would go on working even as the men rested before their arrival at Coruscant, and their fates. They were certainly being worked nearly to destruction; there was no time for maintainence, unless the droids broke down, at which repair times repaired them as quickly as possible, or junked them for parts. They were kept up at the maximum pace, and though most made it fine, some did not; and for those computer-beings there was no mercy shown, for the living demanded their own existences of them. This was the reality behind industrial war.
And industrial war it was. Everything was a computation of distance, of time, of production rates, of the gathering and direction of forces. The speed at which Sule assembled his fleet was pitted against the speed at which Hamner Davion oversaw the erection of the defensive barriers around Coruscant. Each ship brought onto line counted for something, and it was repeated thousands of times over, to be matched against the minefields and prefabricated orbial batteries that Davion was having brought from everywhere they could be purchased, built, or jury-rigged, and was likewise also thrusting in almost-finished ships courtesy of the Mon Calamari Stardrive Yards of his Republican allies. Battle had not been joined by the starships, but here the Quartermasters were already fighting hard.
Yet the industrial factor was not the only one. Had it not been for politics, Hamner Davion would not have the force to contest control of the galaxy with Sule at all. Had it not been for politics, indeed, none of this would have happened at all. And for that most historically minded of Admirals, Elise Kalar-Leben, there was a real political consideration—which was simultaneously an intensely personal one—which had to be discussed with her closest friends, as much as she bitterly detested being the driving force behind the suspicion and idea now in her head. Yet in such a state as an Empire, some intensely personal matters are also ones of constitutional interest, and this was one of those points of intercession.
Thus it was that she traveled on her own Escort Shuttle through the fleet, looking at the vigorous activity; the time-expired veterans of the Starfighter Corps, recalled by promise of bonuses, drilling with their new TIE and Gunboat models, trying to get as much flying time in the new types as they could before battle; the repair work or finishing touches being still conducted upon the damaged or new starships. Cargo shuttles and lighters shifting supplies from ship to ship in a last ditch effort to make sure every vessel had a minimum of what it neeeded for the upcoming battle. And it would all be over in hours, and they would be racing through hyperspace to fight and quite possibly die. One moment this system was home to millions, the next moment it would again be dead, silent and timeless against the desperate rush of sentient effort.
Yet for all that astronomical time dwarfed their efforts, historical time was very vivid and very important to what drove Elise's considerations in this trip to the Despot. There were trillions of lives which might hinge on what she discovered, and certainly the stability of the galaxy. It was a high duty, and yet an uncomfortable one, when it involved one's closest and indeed, these days, only friends left alive (for Harlann was dead to her). In this morose sort of mood Elise arrived on the Imperial flagship, and headed at once for the suites occupied by the Emperor and the Empress, scarcely pausing long enough to acknowledge the abbreviated piping-aboard ceremony practiced in the austere and practical Imperial Starfleet, and brushing off every offer of assistance. The message soon got out to Sule's Klingon bodyguards; Elise was coming. And, as they had every time before, on the specific order of the Emperor, she simply brushed past them and on inside.
“Elise, what can I do for you?” Sule looked up from his desk, where he had been using a stylus to some Rescript or another, with a bit of surprise. He certainly hadn't been expecting a visit like this, and though Elise looked better than the last time this happened she still seemed to have that bloody-minded moroseness about her that had rarely left in the past months.
“Hi, Sule. I need to talk to Martina. Where is she?” She asked softly, but in a voice which indicated she wasn't taking no for an answer, even from the Emperor.
Sule held up his hands and chuckled in mock surrender. “She's bathing at the moment, as a matter of fact. But a husband knows better than to try and keep his wife's friends away from her, so if you don't think she'll mind your going on back there to talk to her, go right ahead.”
“Thank you,” Elise managed to reply, even as she was heading straight back into the depths of the Imperial suite, stripping off her gloves and outer jacket as she did and tossing them on a couch like she was perfectly at home here, which as a general rule, she was.
It didn't take her long to get back into their sleeping quarters—a quick glance around at the holos and the big four-poster bed showed that not all that much had changed since the villa days back on Terra—and then she pushed her way into the bathroom...
“Aiee!” A moment to recognize who it was: “What the HELLS are you doing here, Elise!?”
Blank look: “Relax. It's nothing I haven't seen before..”
“That's not the point!”
“Okay, okay.” Elise backed up and waited behind the door as Martina got out of the tub and swathed herself in rather luxuriously large towels, before sitting on the edge of the counter. “Come in, Elise. I'm sure this is important.”
“It is,” Elise answered as she stepped back inside once more and leaned against the doorjam. “Okay, I've had some suspicions—maybe it's just an intuition thing, or maybe some of the things you've been doing lately, like the fact that you've suddenly developed a taste for that raw Japanese squid dish which you previously hated, and I know that Sule is just the type to be completely one hundred percent oblivious to these sorts of things, he's nice enough, but you know military men...” She trailed off, looking at the expression on Martina's face.
“You're pregnant.”
Martina bit her lip, then nodded. “Yes.”
“Look, I know the obvious reason why you didn't tell Sule..”
“He does have far to much on his mind as it stands.”
“A lot of which would probably be relieved if you stopped this crazy insistance of following him to every battle! It's stupid enough that he goes when we don't need him, though at least he's a bit of a symbol, a morale-booster to the fleet if you will; you're just being, well..”
“I love him, Elise. You should know well enough what that means.”
Elise gritted her teeth. “Martina, 'together in life and death' is all nice sounding when you're married, or to your family, but I assure you.. There is a life after your relatives die. And you know I speak from experience there.”
Silence.
“That was very cruel of you.”
“It was very cruel to myself to bring it up, if you suffer the same, well, so be it,” she answered softly. “The fact of the matter, though, is that in supporting Sule to the Imperial throne, you need to start acting like a dynastic scion. Your child is the heir to the throne; if Sule falls in action because of his damnfool insistance to fight at the front, then it won't just be your emotions which suffer and your soul which is saddled with guilt, but you'll be condemning this galaxy to another twenty-five years of civil war.”
“I..”
“My family would still be alive if Palpatine had a legal successor. There would have been no Republic, no Imperial Civil War, etc, etc, onward and onward. Trillions of people would have lived. The Vong invasion would have been repulsed at the border by the military forces of a single Oversector. Your blood must run cold in affairs of State! And it is worse than that.
“You have a responsibility to the life inside of you, now. You can't just go off to battle, even if you don't care about the whole rest of the galaxy, and expose your child to risk out of this overdone romanticism when said child is not capable of making any sort of decision on the matter at all. This is not the field of chivalry, this is not some honourable combat. Industrial warfare does not make distinctions, particularly on ships at a range of thousands of klicks. You must seek safety.”
Martina's voice was almpost hoarse as she whispered back to her close friend. “But where? Where is a secure place..”
“Kuat will harbour you. In the worst case scenario, leave Kuat on the approach of the enemy and seek refuge at Hapes; monarchies do not turn Empresses over to the grasping hands of usurpers and republicans.”
“There will be no worst case!” Martina replied with a bitter snap of her voice. “I am doing this for the sake of my unborn child only; do not ever speak of that worst case again. But if you think it just, I will indeed go to Kuat.”
“The Kuati people are noble, honourable, and valiant,” Elise said, thinking of someone now dead, and then added with a trace of a ghostly whisper: “Without exception, at least after I took out the trash.”
“Well, you are biased on account of Mystrela, but I will trust your word all the same. How much time do we have?”
“I suggest you should be ready to depart these quarters for the hangar bay with an escort in ninety minutes. That should be enough time for you to pack with some help.”
“Yes. Alright then.” A pause, then: “Can you explain things to Sule? I don't think I can really stand to; once he knows, well, we'll have enough time to meet for our goodbyes, but..”
“Of course, Martina, think nothing of it.”
“Thank you. ...Take care of yourself, Elise, in the battle ahead.”
“I've faced longer odds before,” the old frigateer replied with a grin. “See you in a week or two.” She turned, and headed out, to the scarcely more pleasant task of informing Sule.
“Elise, how'd it go?”
“I got a shriek out of 'er,” she answered with an effacing grin, eliciting a laugh from Sule before she continued on to the serious matter at hand: “But now I've got something that I need to tell you, on Matina's behalf.”
Sule set down his forms and looked attentively, perhaps a bit concerned, to Elise. “Go right ahead, of course.”
“Martina is pregnant. You're going to be a father.”
Elise went to retrieve her gloves and jacket, grinning, as she waited for Sule to process the information and then returned. “Snapped out of it yet?”
“Shut up, Elise. I.. I.. Well, it's great news, but..” A pause. “Shit. Shit. This seriously complicates things...”
“I'm aware of that, and it's already solved. I know you're to much of a stubborn ox to leave with her, but I've got Martina to agree to seek refuge at Kuat for the duration of the battle.”
“How did you manage that?”
“Underhandedly, like most all of my interpersonal interactions. You should try being a street kid sometime, it creates a really fascinating perspective on life.”
“I'm a bit old for that.”
“Yes, so don't press any further,” Elise replied. “Suffice to say, she's going, don't question it; be nice to her when she comes out, okay? Don't get all gloomy like I do.”
“Of course.”
“Well, then, I think everything is set—you let the guard know, right? Make sure they detach a good contingent as her escort. I'm going to speak to the Captain of the Despot immediately to get this arranged. She'll have to ride in a blastboat, for I don't intend to risk the Empress in anything less well defended, and we'll give it an escort of two gunboats. Can't spare anything more than a penny-packet like that, and she's always been very tough about traveling conditions, at least.” A fond look.
“Good enough. You seem to have the situation well in hand, then. I'll leave the arrangements to you and the command staff of the Despot, and inform the guard immediately. How soon will she have to leave?”
Elise made a show of checking her chrono. “Ninety minutes, with the flight clearing thirty minutes after that. We're leaving here in three hours and eight minutes by my watch.”
“Alright then. I'll get right on it.”
“Okay, then by your leave, I guess I'll be going to take care of things.”
“One thing first, Elise.”
“Yes?”
“Thank you, Elise. This will give me a good night's sleep tonight.”
“You're welcome, Sule. Always.” Elise turned and left.
Imperial-Chiss Condominion
In Orbit of the Hand
Alerts sounded on every ship in the mustered fleet of the Condominion. Fighter squadrons were scrambled. Patrol squadrons were directed to intercept the incoming target. Shields on vessels were brought up in preparation for attack.
“Condition One! Condition One! General Quarters! General Quarters!”
All of this commotion was caused by the arrival of a single ship. It was an entirely unexpected arrival, to be sure, but the more important thing was that the single ship in question was a sixty-five metre long Vong bioship, of a heavily protected and armed assault transport type. It could well be a scout heralding the commencement of a Vong attack. Possibly a regular fleet engagement, possibly a kamikazi effort to break up another fleet threatening their battered position. Either way, it was bad news that they had found The Hand and had, in an instant, forced Baron Fel onto the defensive...
By the time he had gotten to the bridge, the situation had changed someone. Vice Admiral Kyshalara'abjh-Heral, his Chief of Staff, was looking through glowing red eyes at a report which made, even with her alien features, appear quite definitely incredulous. “Baron Fel, that ship out there is transmitting a regular Imperial identification code. It's old, but it checks out.”
Another pause, then: “The pilot is requesting permission to talk with the flagship and speak with you in person, Your Excellency.”
“This could be an assasination attempt,” Baron Fel mused out loud.
“That's what I thought, too, Baron.”
“Well, let's see about visual communications. All squadrons are to hold fire until further notice.”
“Of course.” She transmitted that order, first, then: “One moment, Your Excellency.” Kyshalara got to work on patching through the communications from the outer squadrons which had received the message directly into the flagship. It indeed only took a moment, and then...
Baron Fel froze in surprise.
“Baron Fel, I wish to speak to you in person—immediately. This matter is very urgent,” Jaina Solo spoke in a grim voice, and then added coldly: “And you may consider this request to have come from.. Lady Vader.”
It was a nasty thing to call herself, Jaina knew it. But it was the sort of declaration that would have an immediate impact on any Imperial veteran, and she knew what she had to do in this situation. The war would end, and the government thus instituted would ignore the orders and provide a counterbalance for them. It was that, or more countless centuries of evil and chaos, and this act would be the final step in the process which halted that, however grim and distasteful it was.
Baron Fel, for his part, was not sure what to make of the situation at all. But he did know that, whatever Jaina Solo was calling herself, this was clearly important enough to warrant the requested meeting. “Stand by docking instructions from my staff,” he replied, and then added: “Lady Vader.”
“I will be waiting.” The transmission blinked out.
She did not have to wait long; fifteen minutes at most. The instructions were duly transmitted, no feelings of treachery or hostility could be detected, and she duly brought the bio-ship in to the main hangar bay of the ISD-III type that she ended up docking with, her eyes not failing to notice the great host of Venators all around, providing an explaination for where at least some of that fleet of ships had gone when they had been officially mothballed by the Empire.
There were more important things to muse on, though, by the point at which she docked. An honour guard had been assembled, and they rendered her the sort of short and austere but very prestigious ceremony that Lord Vader himself might have tolerated; Baron Fel was clearly not trying to telegraph anything but welcome to her, even though she knew that in his own plans and heart he probably had no actual desire to respect that dread-claim that she had made, for sure. But she would give him other reasons.
The entry portal on the Vong ship opened. A company of Stormtroopers had been assembled, and a band, along with several senior officers. The band played the Imperial March as Jaina strode down onto the hull of the Destroyer, wearing one of Miat Temm's black capes, swirling about her, hair falling down behind it loose, the lightsabre at the belt of the jumpsuit worn below the cape giving no doubt at all to her identity. Several officers approached and bowed.
“Lady Vader, this way, please. Baron Fel is awaiting you,” the ranking officer—a Captain—said, bowing again and turning to gesture toward the exit.
“Of course. I am in a hurry, Captain.”
The Captain hurried to lead her to Baron Fel, that was for sure. The Reputation of Darth Vader was not something that would easily fade from the galactic consciousness.
Baron Fel, his Chief of Staff, the head of the Condominion's Ubiqtorate. The same group that had greeted Jagged Fel and Shawnkyr on their return only two days prior. But now they were not so stern and demanding. Now, as they saw that figure of black and red stride in, there was a thread of tension that ran hotly through the room. Baron Fel, though, was not a man easily intimidated.
“Lady Vader,” he said courteously. “Please, sit.”
Jaina sat at the far end of the table from Baron Fel, looking down to him cooly. “Baron Fel,” she began, his name like a declaration of intent. “You have mustered a fleet here for use against the Vong.”
“That is correct, Lady Vader. But we do not have accurate information on their dispositions, or the degree of damage done to them by the forces of the Warlord Sule...”
“The Emperor Sule. You will refer to him as Emperor in my presence from now on.”
“Of course, Lady Vader,” Baron Fel replied in a voice which suggested that, though he would not dispute the point here, he had no intention of putting its implication into effect anywhere else. “By the Emperor Sule's forces at the Battle of Dantooine,” he concluded.
“They are gone, Baron Fel.” Jaina replied simply. “I saw the destruction of five Worldships with my own eyes, and saw Overlord Shimmra struck down with my own eyes. The Vong are no longer a threat to the united galaxy--and I put my emphasis on united!”
“The galaxy is hardly united at the moment, Lady Vader,” Kyshalara ended up saying, if very politely to be sure.
“I am aware of that fact. It is a fact that shall be changed. The Galactic Civil War has lasted almost without interruption since the beginning of the Seperatist movement which led to the end of the Old Republic. The Civil War Ends Now.”
“To create such an end would require a great use of force, Lady Vader,” Baron Fel replied, still calm.
“Emperor Sule has mustered more than twenty thousand ships for an assault on the unified forces of the Seperatists and the Pretender Davion, along the Republicans and sundry other causes, at Coruscant. If you bring your fleet directly to Coruscant, you shall arrive in time to reinforce his cause and guarantee his victory. At that point, the galaxy shall be united.”
“Why should we back to the hilt this man, as you say?”
“Because he is the right man for the job, along with those other officers under him—and you are the right man to see to the fair government of the galaxy under his rule,” Jaina continued calmly. “There will be autonomy for the Condominion and effective independence for the Chiss, under binding terms of alliance, of course. But they must be drawn into the Empire, and your fleet must provide the striking arm of the Empire. This is a matter of pure necessity; I was raised by one of the founders of the Rebel Alliance, and I have come to these conclusions on my own. The galaxy must be brought under an orderly control. The people desire nothing else, and their very survival is at stake.”
“It is still a very grave course to undertake, Lady Vader, and you must understand if I can scarcely order it without time to consider it..”
“Baron Fel, there is no time!” Jaina snapped. “This fleet must leave soon, if you desire to have an impact on the course of battle at Coruscant.”
Baron Fel sighed heavily. “Lady Vader, what is your precise desire here, other than vague humanitarian sentiment?”
“It is time that the ways of the force belong to their practitioners, and not to the highest echelons of the government. I intend to sunder forever the connections between both the Jedi and Sith Orders and government, and power. They shall never again be connected. Force users shall serve the governments of the galaxy, but they shall be weak, and without the higher abilities which have, in connection with the places of power, caused only war and chaos. This is my intention, and I will carry it out as I see fit—and it is a government of yourself, and Emperor Sule's clique that I see as being best-intentioned and capable of carrying out the establishment of such a government, constitutionally, which by the creation and maintainence of a cadre of weak force sensitives, who are kept from knowledge, absolves themselves of the temptations of appealing to the vanity of the higher force adepts, who, in the service of power, become inevitably corrupted.”
“How are you sure that you can press this agenda with the Emperor Sule?”
“You will press it for me, Baron, and it will be the price, along with the autonomy of the Condominion, for your salvation of his own cause. He is an honourable man, and he will not ignore the directives of the ally who saved his aspirations.”
“You are very sure that is what we shall do, Lady Vader.”
“Do not underestimate the power of the force.”
“Very well. But it will take four hours to prepare the fleet to leave.”
“That is acceptable.”
“I'm not done. I have a stipulation for you. You are going to accompany the fleet. And you are going to aide it in coordination on its arrival, so that we have the advantage of surprise should the situation... Not be as expected.”
It was the terrible possibility that Jaina had forseen, that daughter would be forced to fight mother. But that was the reason she had sent her father and brother to Coruscant, and it was with a grim hope, and recognition of the necessity of the act, that she nodded once. “That is certainly an acceptable term,” she answered. “I will insure the safety of your jump into the gravity well of Coruscant, which I assume is your intent.”
“It is, Lady Vader.”
“Then let us begin our preparations.”
Allied Fleet, Coruscant Orbit
The R.N.S. Lusankya
“Wedge, is everything ready?” Leia asked quietly as she looked up to the plots on the bridge of the great Executor-class ship which General Antilles now commanded.
“It is, Your Highness,” he said with a tight grin. “Admiral Ackbar on the Guardian has finalized our dispositions. We're going to be the heavy hitters here, and it appears that the fleet strategy has evolved to hold us back for an entrapment manoeuvre—we're going to, hopefully, let Sule's forces break through the lines at one of the weaker points and then catch their striking fist in a pincer.”
“And then we can counterattack?”
“Hamner Davion has issued a directive limiting the order to counterattack to himself—I imagine you'll want to take that up with him.”
“I do, as a matter of fact,” Leia replied. “If our forces are going to be used for the pincer, then his own will have to execute the counterattack... And that's just what we want.”
“I won't argue with you there. If we can get the Imp forces to hammer each other to pieces every sour taste in my mouth is going to melt away in a heartbeat,” Wedge replied. “The trick is coming out of it just slightly on top... And keeping the survivors of both sides from kissing and making up when they realize that we have.”
“Just as impossible as everything else we've succeeded in doing, only more confusing.”
“A nice day at the office, by my standards.”
“Glad you're feeling confident about this. I'll be going to bring Hamner up on the holonet, then.” She turned away, and headed into a private room with communications equipment off the flagbridge, intended for the use of the commanding officer of a fleet for secure communications. It would work for her discussions with Hamner well enough. He had offered to let her review the battle from his command post, but she had declined—she could easily become a hostage there, after all.
Thirty thousand ships were mustered in orbit of Coruscant. They were facing an enemy far less numerous, but one that was strong in firepower, and contained many more heavy ships than their own force did. Even the last minute arrival of some brand new heavy cruisers from the Mon Calamari yards wasn't going to have enough of an impact there to make the battle a sure thing. These defences would help, but the best thing they'd be used for was the laying of a trap.
It took only a moment to bring Hamner Davion up on the holonet; or, more precisely, his head, for he had started to use the same holographic comms settings as Palpatine, Leia noted with some real annoyance and distaste.
“Your Highness,” he began politely, though. “What can I do for you?”
“Emperor Davion,” she replied with a cold politeness of her own. “I have been given to understand that you have issued a directive saying that you alone hold the right to determine when a counterattack, if any, shall take place.”
“That is correct, Your Highness. It is a serious decision, considering the firepower disparity we suffer from, and I do not think anyone else should make it.”
“Rescind it. We must have a counterattack.”
“We don't have the strength for one, Your Highness.”
“We will after we've trapped and crushed part of Sule's main body, and that's exactly what you've assigned the Republican forces the position to do.”
“If we trap and destroy part of Sule's main body.”
“We will.”
“Nothing is certain in War, Your Highness. But I will offer you one thing. If you can trap and destroy an important and significant portion of Sule's heavy warships, I give you my word that there will be a general fleet counterattack.”
Leia remained cool. “I want it in writing.”
Hamner chuckled. “Very well. I understand your lack of trust for me, and so I shall have a copy delivered—quickly, too, for I suspect that battle will be joined altogether quite soon, for the both of us, and it would be a shame of the shuttle was caught in the crossfire and lost.”
“That it would be,” Leia replied with a faux-sweetness. “I appreciate your willingness to oblige me on this matter.”
“You're quite welcome, Your Highness. Now, if you'll forgive me, I need to attend to urgent matters regarding the situation on the surface of Coruscant.” The transmission blinked out without a word further from Hamner Davion.
Leia turned and began to walk out of the room, thinking of her husband and her daughter, off somewhere against the Vong. Of all those in the Alliance who had died before.. And of how they had come, in short decades, to the point of this desperation, to ally with one Imperial faction to fight another, because of the Vong, because of how low the reputation of the Republic had sunk through mismanagement. It was a sad commentary on their best efforts, but if they had just one more chance, surely things could be corrected and the situation repaired. The Republic would live. It must.
All around, the preparations of the fleet continued unabated.
Coruscant Orbit
Imperial Frigate FPC-1167
Former USS Enterprise-E
William Riker knew that he was going to die in this battle. He didn't care, he was an old man, and old men died. There was nothing else to it. It was a pretty good way to go, anywhere; most of the crew was Milky Way, even if some were what he would have previously called traitors, and others the likes of Cardassians and Breen. He had survived the battles for the stations which had decimated the armies of resistance. With luck, Harlann would honour his promises. That was really all they had to go on, and in truth, it was a damn sight better than what they had been fighting on for the past two decades.
Two decades of terror. Two decades since the Empire came. And now they were in the Empire; or the shattered ruins of it, part of an innumerable collection of desperate factions standing firm to try and hold off the grasping hands of an Empire trying to rise up from the grave, to crush and strangle Freedom once again. There was nothing else to be done but oppose it to the last. William Riker knew that, and he wanted to the chance to take this last bite in the struggle for freedom if he could. So he had, on surviving the fight for the platforms, asked for one more favour from Harlann, and Harlann had given it to him.
He had given Riker command of his old ship. Of the Enterprise. In truth, it had not been that hard of a favour. There were many capable starship crewers in the Resistance forces, and the Imperial fleet was badly shorthanded of trained personnel. So most of the captured ships were now back in service under their former crews, so that the Imperial officers and men who had been aboard them beforehand could be dispatched to serve as the crews of newly finished vessels which lacked them. They only retained small Imperial-trained contingents aboard to handle the new systems which the Resistance men could not be reasonably expected to know the operation of.
For instance, the hyperdrive tug which had been more or less permanently attached to the Enterprise, nestled awkwardly behind her bridge. Or the mobile power generator which had been slapped down where cargo holds and luxurious quarters had once been; feeding power to the various weapons which had been added to the Enterprise, and most importantly to the shields. Of course, the majority of her armament was now in proton torpedoes, because they required the least power of any truly effective Imperial weapons to use, and thus would tax the ship the least, and require the least investment in new power generators to be bolted down.
As long as the shields held and their stocks of torpedoes lasted, they'd be a real fighting ship. After that, one shot from a very heavy turbolaser would easily shatter the ship into countless pieces. They had one good advantage—their intact warp drive. Because of it, Hamner had ordered all warp-capable ships to muster in the outer system. At the right moment, he intended to call for them to attack the rear of Sule's fleet. It would be a light distraction, only, for they had little firepower—but a group of ships attacking in the rear of a force often had a highly disproportionate effect, and that was what he was counting on. They would be aided by Hamner's own Strike-class frigates, laying in wait closer in, but under cloak, of course, with their heavy torpedo tubes fully stocked.
The Imperial Starfleet of Sule's was reputed to have been supposed to arrive hours ago. It hadn't, and they were still waiting for it. Everyone was, of course, very tense, and each minute of the wait seemed like an eternity or two. But there was nothing to be done for it. Battles, after all, required two sides, and one wasn't present at the moment. And even when they do get here, we're going to be waiting a while before we get our chance—but I guess it will be a nice lightshow watching these two bastards trying to kill each other, Riker thought, disdainful of Hamner and Sule alike, but acknowledging his dependency on the former in the state of sheer desperation to which the Resistance had ultimately sunk.
All of a sudden, they didn't have to wait any longer. The energy surge was overwhelming, like nothing Riker or any of his officers had ever seen before. The computer nearly overloaded at the number of distinct contacts it detected coming out of hyperspace.
“Sir—The computer is reporting more than eight hundred and ten thousand individual arrivals from hyperspace!”
“The hell!? Onscreen!”
An image of countless little specks of stars appeared. Except they weren't stars; they were the drive tails of an unending number of TIE fighters, Assault Gunboats, Missile Boats, Skipray Blastboats, and numerous other assault craft and small armed transports. They were as numerous as soldiers in an infantry battle, but these were fighting vessels which could match the power of a light starship of the old UFP. The magnitude of the battle was almost crushing, the sheer concentrated power of this stupendous galaxy, devoted to war.
“Second wave, sir!” The tactical officer switched the focus of the viewscreen of his own volition.
“Executors...” Riker breathed quietly. “There's got to be, what, fifteen of them there?”
“Twelve, Sir. Three of those vessels are smaller and appear to be of a distinct class.”
As they watched, thousands of smaller Star Cruisers and Star Destroyers began to arrive in their ordered ranks. From the moment the ships arrived, Executor-class on down, they began to launch hoardes of additional fighters, a whole second attack wave of fighters to follow the first starfighter wave which was even now closing with the main body of Hamner Davion's fleet. The numbers of capital ships seemed limitless, twice as many as there had been in the whole of Starfleet, or more, gathered in one place—and that if you counted little explorers which were half the size of even the smallest Corellian Corvette. Most of them were far, far bigger, several times the mass of the Enterprise.
And in the centre, those twelve Executor-class battlecruisers, massing more than every ship ever built by the Federation combined. It was a humbling experience, a dreadful one, which seemed to casually inform them of their madness as it passed by, to unnervingly make them question if it was not pure desperation which had forced them to this point, but instead incredible luck that they had lasted to reach it at all.
“We're just gnats next to those Executors..” Someone breathed in a whisper.
“Mosquitoes,” Riker replied grimly. “We're gonna sting 'em hard.” But he didn't really believe his words, as he watched the two fleets grow closer, and settled back to await his orders, if and when they came.
The Grand Fleet
Approaching Coruscant
The Hand of Thrawn
The ordered hosts of the Empire had arrived at the field of battle. Two Emperors faced each other across an expanse of several light seconds. The massively concentrated bulk of Sule's fleet pressed on as a dagger straight forward the thinly dispersed defensive lines around Coruscant that Davion had put up. Their plan was simply. They would attack, break through, and then spread out and roll up the defences, holding the main body of the Executor-class ships and the other heavies back as a reserve in case a large enemy reserve succeeded in making a major counterattack.
They were under Condition One, General Quarters. Every station was manned, the damage control parties were assembled, all fighters had been launched and were heading out toward the enemy, and the fleet was now in the process of forming up for the general advance.
“First starfighter wave is five minutes from range, Grand Admiral,” one of Pellaeon's aides reported. “Second starfighter wave is eight minutes from range.”
“Very good. I want them to keep on a three-minute dispersal between the two attacks.” A pause, a glance at the plot. “Order those armed transports which are falling behind the first wave to participate in the attack of the second wave.”
“Aye-aye, Sir.”
“Sir!” His Chief of Staff approached and saluted. “The fleet formation is complete. All Task Forces are in assigned positions.”
Pellaeon nodded once. “Very well. Fleet Signals: 'Advance to missile range. Half fleet acceleration only. Prepare for missile engagement with the enemy at range.'”
“Understood, Sir,” his Chief of Staff replied, and turned away to have the orders transmitted in a general fleet broadcast.
Pellaeon waited, until he could feel the drives of the Hand of Thrawn begin to rumble with their awesome latent power, for the fleet to start to move forward enmasse, a body of tens of thousands of ships, with millions of starfighters out ahead of them, driving on slowly toward the enemy.
Now it was time for the next segment of orders: “Signals to all skirmish lines--'advance to designated scouting areas and commence operations to test the enemy defences.'”
“Understood, Sir!--Transmitting at once.”
Ahead, space around the great sphere of Imperial Centre, grimly dark, was beginning to light up with the massed energy fire of the defensive batteries as the first wave of starfighters entered range and accelerated on their attack runs against the outer defences. Hundreds of thousands of starfighters were coming in, dashing down through that fire with their deadly loads of anti-ship warheads, and more than a million more were following them in on their heels.
The Fourth Battle of Coruscant had begun.
De Imperatoribus Galacticis will be continued in Chapter the Twenty-Sixth
"On the Galactic Emperors"
Chapter the Twenty-Fifth.
(As continued from Chapter the Twenty-Fourth.)
Imperial Starfleet
System TRL-789252.
It was another desolate place. Three stars all orbiting each other, two massive blue supergiants and a green star scarcely smaller, casting their pallor across a great expansive of space in an entanglement of gravity. There had been a mining operation here, once, two thousand years ago. It had removed what valuable trace elements as were profitable from the tangle of protoplastic clouds surrounding the supergiants, planets which could be never formed in this gravity regime, and then left, and that was the only time that sentient beings had been here in the past five thousand years. There were many systems like it, for there were a host of uninhabited systems for every one of the fifty-five million or so inhabited ones in the galaxy, and the resources of those were far, far from being tapped. It was, in short, a place for a fleet rendezvous, and nothing else.
Ships had indeed come. Not enough, not enough by far, but there were now 21,000 regular force vessels in the Grand Fleet—many of which were not technically finished ships, but were going into battle with shipyard workers onboard. There were another twenty-five hundred civilian armed ships which were of capital strength which had arrived to Sule's call to arms, but many of these ships were very badly underarmed and scarcely protected at all against enemy fire; there were many more which were not capital ships at all, but a host of tiny modified transports of a hundred and thirty meters or so and less in length. They would, of course, be used anyway, for the enemy was thought to have around thirty thousand ships. The risks taken would be compensated for, either to the living, or the relatives of the dead, and that was that.
With the fleet mustered here, it would only be a short fourteen hour hyperjump into Coruscant, and battle. There was nervousness and drinking, and lots and lots of work, for though the crew might have their usual off-duty periods on the fortunately undamaged ships, those coming straight out of the yards or which had suffered damage at Dantooine were working their crews continuously, as hard as whip-bearing slave drivers, to make further repairs and thusly improve their chances in the battle ahead. There would be time to rest ahead. Just enough for men exhausted by days spend on eighteen hours work, six hours exhausted sleep, to collapse into bed for ten hours or so to get the rest they needed for the upcoming battle. Until that time, they were worked unceasingly.
This was the rough edge of combat. There were no spit-and-polish legions here marching into battle with their equipment gleaming. These were veterans, fighting in ships patched by ferrocrete and with random plates of armour bolted and wielded on at points of damage haphazardly, just good enough to do the job. Exhausted men with several days' growth of beard—normally unacceptable in the Imperial Starfleet—worked, sweating even in the climate-controlled locale of the deep interior of a ship, manhandling equipment into different sectors, making internal repairs, checking for microscopic fissures in bulkheads that might have been caused by shock damage, which in the battle to come could cause progressive decompression if nearby sections were vented to space.
At least the droids did not tire. But they were being worked very hard, as well, twenty four hours a day, and would go on working even as the men rested before their arrival at Coruscant, and their fates. They were certainly being worked nearly to destruction; there was no time for maintainence, unless the droids broke down, at which repair times repaired them as quickly as possible, or junked them for parts. They were kept up at the maximum pace, and though most made it fine, some did not; and for those computer-beings there was no mercy shown, for the living demanded their own existences of them. This was the reality behind industrial war.
And industrial war it was. Everything was a computation of distance, of time, of production rates, of the gathering and direction of forces. The speed at which Sule assembled his fleet was pitted against the speed at which Hamner Davion oversaw the erection of the defensive barriers around Coruscant. Each ship brought onto line counted for something, and it was repeated thousands of times over, to be matched against the minefields and prefabricated orbial batteries that Davion was having brought from everywhere they could be purchased, built, or jury-rigged, and was likewise also thrusting in almost-finished ships courtesy of the Mon Calamari Stardrive Yards of his Republican allies. Battle had not been joined by the starships, but here the Quartermasters were already fighting hard.
Yet the industrial factor was not the only one. Had it not been for politics, Hamner Davion would not have the force to contest control of the galaxy with Sule at all. Had it not been for politics, indeed, none of this would have happened at all. And for that most historically minded of Admirals, Elise Kalar-Leben, there was a real political consideration—which was simultaneously an intensely personal one—which had to be discussed with her closest friends, as much as she bitterly detested being the driving force behind the suspicion and idea now in her head. Yet in such a state as an Empire, some intensely personal matters are also ones of constitutional interest, and this was one of those points of intercession.
Thus it was that she traveled on her own Escort Shuttle through the fleet, looking at the vigorous activity; the time-expired veterans of the Starfighter Corps, recalled by promise of bonuses, drilling with their new TIE and Gunboat models, trying to get as much flying time in the new types as they could before battle; the repair work or finishing touches being still conducted upon the damaged or new starships. Cargo shuttles and lighters shifting supplies from ship to ship in a last ditch effort to make sure every vessel had a minimum of what it neeeded for the upcoming battle. And it would all be over in hours, and they would be racing through hyperspace to fight and quite possibly die. One moment this system was home to millions, the next moment it would again be dead, silent and timeless against the desperate rush of sentient effort.
Yet for all that astronomical time dwarfed their efforts, historical time was very vivid and very important to what drove Elise's considerations in this trip to the Despot. There were trillions of lives which might hinge on what she discovered, and certainly the stability of the galaxy. It was a high duty, and yet an uncomfortable one, when it involved one's closest and indeed, these days, only friends left alive (for Harlann was dead to her). In this morose sort of mood Elise arrived on the Imperial flagship, and headed at once for the suites occupied by the Emperor and the Empress, scarcely pausing long enough to acknowledge the abbreviated piping-aboard ceremony practiced in the austere and practical Imperial Starfleet, and brushing off every offer of assistance. The message soon got out to Sule's Klingon bodyguards; Elise was coming. And, as they had every time before, on the specific order of the Emperor, she simply brushed past them and on inside.
“Elise, what can I do for you?” Sule looked up from his desk, where he had been using a stylus to some Rescript or another, with a bit of surprise. He certainly hadn't been expecting a visit like this, and though Elise looked better than the last time this happened she still seemed to have that bloody-minded moroseness about her that had rarely left in the past months.
“Hi, Sule. I need to talk to Martina. Where is she?” She asked softly, but in a voice which indicated she wasn't taking no for an answer, even from the Emperor.
Sule held up his hands and chuckled in mock surrender. “She's bathing at the moment, as a matter of fact. But a husband knows better than to try and keep his wife's friends away from her, so if you don't think she'll mind your going on back there to talk to her, go right ahead.”
“Thank you,” Elise managed to reply, even as she was heading straight back into the depths of the Imperial suite, stripping off her gloves and outer jacket as she did and tossing them on a couch like she was perfectly at home here, which as a general rule, she was.
It didn't take her long to get back into their sleeping quarters—a quick glance around at the holos and the big four-poster bed showed that not all that much had changed since the villa days back on Terra—and then she pushed her way into the bathroom...
“Aiee!” A moment to recognize who it was: “What the HELLS are you doing here, Elise!?”
Blank look: “Relax. It's nothing I haven't seen before..”
“That's not the point!”
“Okay, okay.” Elise backed up and waited behind the door as Martina got out of the tub and swathed herself in rather luxuriously large towels, before sitting on the edge of the counter. “Come in, Elise. I'm sure this is important.”
“It is,” Elise answered as she stepped back inside once more and leaned against the doorjam. “Okay, I've had some suspicions—maybe it's just an intuition thing, or maybe some of the things you've been doing lately, like the fact that you've suddenly developed a taste for that raw Japanese squid dish which you previously hated, and I know that Sule is just the type to be completely one hundred percent oblivious to these sorts of things, he's nice enough, but you know military men...” She trailed off, looking at the expression on Martina's face.
“You're pregnant.”
Martina bit her lip, then nodded. “Yes.”
“Look, I know the obvious reason why you didn't tell Sule..”
“He does have far to much on his mind as it stands.”
“A lot of which would probably be relieved if you stopped this crazy insistance of following him to every battle! It's stupid enough that he goes when we don't need him, though at least he's a bit of a symbol, a morale-booster to the fleet if you will; you're just being, well..”
“I love him, Elise. You should know well enough what that means.”
Elise gritted her teeth. “Martina, 'together in life and death' is all nice sounding when you're married, or to your family, but I assure you.. There is a life after your relatives die. And you know I speak from experience there.”
Silence.
“That was very cruel of you.”
“It was very cruel to myself to bring it up, if you suffer the same, well, so be it,” she answered softly. “The fact of the matter, though, is that in supporting Sule to the Imperial throne, you need to start acting like a dynastic scion. Your child is the heir to the throne; if Sule falls in action because of his damnfool insistance to fight at the front, then it won't just be your emotions which suffer and your soul which is saddled with guilt, but you'll be condemning this galaxy to another twenty-five years of civil war.”
“I..”
“My family would still be alive if Palpatine had a legal successor. There would have been no Republic, no Imperial Civil War, etc, etc, onward and onward. Trillions of people would have lived. The Vong invasion would have been repulsed at the border by the military forces of a single Oversector. Your blood must run cold in affairs of State! And it is worse than that.
“You have a responsibility to the life inside of you, now. You can't just go off to battle, even if you don't care about the whole rest of the galaxy, and expose your child to risk out of this overdone romanticism when said child is not capable of making any sort of decision on the matter at all. This is not the field of chivalry, this is not some honourable combat. Industrial warfare does not make distinctions, particularly on ships at a range of thousands of klicks. You must seek safety.”
Martina's voice was almpost hoarse as she whispered back to her close friend. “But where? Where is a secure place..”
“Kuat will harbour you. In the worst case scenario, leave Kuat on the approach of the enemy and seek refuge at Hapes; monarchies do not turn Empresses over to the grasping hands of usurpers and republicans.”
“There will be no worst case!” Martina replied with a bitter snap of her voice. “I am doing this for the sake of my unborn child only; do not ever speak of that worst case again. But if you think it just, I will indeed go to Kuat.”
“The Kuati people are noble, honourable, and valiant,” Elise said, thinking of someone now dead, and then added with a trace of a ghostly whisper: “Without exception, at least after I took out the trash.”
“Well, you are biased on account of Mystrela, but I will trust your word all the same. How much time do we have?”
“I suggest you should be ready to depart these quarters for the hangar bay with an escort in ninety minutes. That should be enough time for you to pack with some help.”
“Yes. Alright then.” A pause, then: “Can you explain things to Sule? I don't think I can really stand to; once he knows, well, we'll have enough time to meet for our goodbyes, but..”
“Of course, Martina, think nothing of it.”
“Thank you. ...Take care of yourself, Elise, in the battle ahead.”
“I've faced longer odds before,” the old frigateer replied with a grin. “See you in a week or two.” She turned, and headed out, to the scarcely more pleasant task of informing Sule.
“Elise, how'd it go?”
“I got a shriek out of 'er,” she answered with an effacing grin, eliciting a laugh from Sule before she continued on to the serious matter at hand: “But now I've got something that I need to tell you, on Matina's behalf.”
Sule set down his forms and looked attentively, perhaps a bit concerned, to Elise. “Go right ahead, of course.”
“Martina is pregnant. You're going to be a father.”
Elise went to retrieve her gloves and jacket, grinning, as she waited for Sule to process the information and then returned. “Snapped out of it yet?”
“Shut up, Elise. I.. I.. Well, it's great news, but..” A pause. “Shit. Shit. This seriously complicates things...”
“I'm aware of that, and it's already solved. I know you're to much of a stubborn ox to leave with her, but I've got Martina to agree to seek refuge at Kuat for the duration of the battle.”
“How did you manage that?”
“Underhandedly, like most all of my interpersonal interactions. You should try being a street kid sometime, it creates a really fascinating perspective on life.”
“I'm a bit old for that.”
“Yes, so don't press any further,” Elise replied. “Suffice to say, she's going, don't question it; be nice to her when she comes out, okay? Don't get all gloomy like I do.”
“Of course.”
“Well, then, I think everything is set—you let the guard know, right? Make sure they detach a good contingent as her escort. I'm going to speak to the Captain of the Despot immediately to get this arranged. She'll have to ride in a blastboat, for I don't intend to risk the Empress in anything less well defended, and we'll give it an escort of two gunboats. Can't spare anything more than a penny-packet like that, and she's always been very tough about traveling conditions, at least.” A fond look.
“Good enough. You seem to have the situation well in hand, then. I'll leave the arrangements to you and the command staff of the Despot, and inform the guard immediately. How soon will she have to leave?”
Elise made a show of checking her chrono. “Ninety minutes, with the flight clearing thirty minutes after that. We're leaving here in three hours and eight minutes by my watch.”
“Alright then. I'll get right on it.”
“Okay, then by your leave, I guess I'll be going to take care of things.”
“One thing first, Elise.”
“Yes?”
“Thank you, Elise. This will give me a good night's sleep tonight.”
“You're welcome, Sule. Always.” Elise turned and left.
Imperial-Chiss Condominion
In Orbit of the Hand
Alerts sounded on every ship in the mustered fleet of the Condominion. Fighter squadrons were scrambled. Patrol squadrons were directed to intercept the incoming target. Shields on vessels were brought up in preparation for attack.
“Condition One! Condition One! General Quarters! General Quarters!”
All of this commotion was caused by the arrival of a single ship. It was an entirely unexpected arrival, to be sure, but the more important thing was that the single ship in question was a sixty-five metre long Vong bioship, of a heavily protected and armed assault transport type. It could well be a scout heralding the commencement of a Vong attack. Possibly a regular fleet engagement, possibly a kamikazi effort to break up another fleet threatening their battered position. Either way, it was bad news that they had found The Hand and had, in an instant, forced Baron Fel onto the defensive...
By the time he had gotten to the bridge, the situation had changed someone. Vice Admiral Kyshalara'abjh-Heral, his Chief of Staff, was looking through glowing red eyes at a report which made, even with her alien features, appear quite definitely incredulous. “Baron Fel, that ship out there is transmitting a regular Imperial identification code. It's old, but it checks out.”
Another pause, then: “The pilot is requesting permission to talk with the flagship and speak with you in person, Your Excellency.”
“This could be an assasination attempt,” Baron Fel mused out loud.
“That's what I thought, too, Baron.”
“Well, let's see about visual communications. All squadrons are to hold fire until further notice.”
“Of course.” She transmitted that order, first, then: “One moment, Your Excellency.” Kyshalara got to work on patching through the communications from the outer squadrons which had received the message directly into the flagship. It indeed only took a moment, and then...
Baron Fel froze in surprise.
“Baron Fel, I wish to speak to you in person—immediately. This matter is very urgent,” Jaina Solo spoke in a grim voice, and then added coldly: “And you may consider this request to have come from.. Lady Vader.”
It was a nasty thing to call herself, Jaina knew it. But it was the sort of declaration that would have an immediate impact on any Imperial veteran, and she knew what she had to do in this situation. The war would end, and the government thus instituted would ignore the orders and provide a counterbalance for them. It was that, or more countless centuries of evil and chaos, and this act would be the final step in the process which halted that, however grim and distasteful it was.
Baron Fel, for his part, was not sure what to make of the situation at all. But he did know that, whatever Jaina Solo was calling herself, this was clearly important enough to warrant the requested meeting. “Stand by docking instructions from my staff,” he replied, and then added: “Lady Vader.”
“I will be waiting.” The transmission blinked out.
She did not have to wait long; fifteen minutes at most. The instructions were duly transmitted, no feelings of treachery or hostility could be detected, and she duly brought the bio-ship in to the main hangar bay of the ISD-III type that she ended up docking with, her eyes not failing to notice the great host of Venators all around, providing an explaination for where at least some of that fleet of ships had gone when they had been officially mothballed by the Empire.
There were more important things to muse on, though, by the point at which she docked. An honour guard had been assembled, and they rendered her the sort of short and austere but very prestigious ceremony that Lord Vader himself might have tolerated; Baron Fel was clearly not trying to telegraph anything but welcome to her, even though she knew that in his own plans and heart he probably had no actual desire to respect that dread-claim that she had made, for sure. But she would give him other reasons.
The entry portal on the Vong ship opened. A company of Stormtroopers had been assembled, and a band, along with several senior officers. The band played the Imperial March as Jaina strode down onto the hull of the Destroyer, wearing one of Miat Temm's black capes, swirling about her, hair falling down behind it loose, the lightsabre at the belt of the jumpsuit worn below the cape giving no doubt at all to her identity. Several officers approached and bowed.
“Lady Vader, this way, please. Baron Fel is awaiting you,” the ranking officer—a Captain—said, bowing again and turning to gesture toward the exit.
“Of course. I am in a hurry, Captain.”
The Captain hurried to lead her to Baron Fel, that was for sure. The Reputation of Darth Vader was not something that would easily fade from the galactic consciousness.
Baron Fel, his Chief of Staff, the head of the Condominion's Ubiqtorate. The same group that had greeted Jagged Fel and Shawnkyr on their return only two days prior. But now they were not so stern and demanding. Now, as they saw that figure of black and red stride in, there was a thread of tension that ran hotly through the room. Baron Fel, though, was not a man easily intimidated.
“Lady Vader,” he said courteously. “Please, sit.”
Jaina sat at the far end of the table from Baron Fel, looking down to him cooly. “Baron Fel,” she began, his name like a declaration of intent. “You have mustered a fleet here for use against the Vong.”
“That is correct, Lady Vader. But we do not have accurate information on their dispositions, or the degree of damage done to them by the forces of the Warlord Sule...”
“The Emperor Sule. You will refer to him as Emperor in my presence from now on.”
“Of course, Lady Vader,” Baron Fel replied in a voice which suggested that, though he would not dispute the point here, he had no intention of putting its implication into effect anywhere else. “By the Emperor Sule's forces at the Battle of Dantooine,” he concluded.
“They are gone, Baron Fel.” Jaina replied simply. “I saw the destruction of five Worldships with my own eyes, and saw Overlord Shimmra struck down with my own eyes. The Vong are no longer a threat to the united galaxy--and I put my emphasis on united!”
“The galaxy is hardly united at the moment, Lady Vader,” Kyshalara ended up saying, if very politely to be sure.
“I am aware of that fact. It is a fact that shall be changed. The Galactic Civil War has lasted almost without interruption since the beginning of the Seperatist movement which led to the end of the Old Republic. The Civil War Ends Now.”
“To create such an end would require a great use of force, Lady Vader,” Baron Fel replied, still calm.
“Emperor Sule has mustered more than twenty thousand ships for an assault on the unified forces of the Seperatists and the Pretender Davion, along the Republicans and sundry other causes, at Coruscant. If you bring your fleet directly to Coruscant, you shall arrive in time to reinforce his cause and guarantee his victory. At that point, the galaxy shall be united.”
“Why should we back to the hilt this man, as you say?”
“Because he is the right man for the job, along with those other officers under him—and you are the right man to see to the fair government of the galaxy under his rule,” Jaina continued calmly. “There will be autonomy for the Condominion and effective independence for the Chiss, under binding terms of alliance, of course. But they must be drawn into the Empire, and your fleet must provide the striking arm of the Empire. This is a matter of pure necessity; I was raised by one of the founders of the Rebel Alliance, and I have come to these conclusions on my own. The galaxy must be brought under an orderly control. The people desire nothing else, and their very survival is at stake.”
“It is still a very grave course to undertake, Lady Vader, and you must understand if I can scarcely order it without time to consider it..”
“Baron Fel, there is no time!” Jaina snapped. “This fleet must leave soon, if you desire to have an impact on the course of battle at Coruscant.”
Baron Fel sighed heavily. “Lady Vader, what is your precise desire here, other than vague humanitarian sentiment?”
“It is time that the ways of the force belong to their practitioners, and not to the highest echelons of the government. I intend to sunder forever the connections between both the Jedi and Sith Orders and government, and power. They shall never again be connected. Force users shall serve the governments of the galaxy, but they shall be weak, and without the higher abilities which have, in connection with the places of power, caused only war and chaos. This is my intention, and I will carry it out as I see fit—and it is a government of yourself, and Emperor Sule's clique that I see as being best-intentioned and capable of carrying out the establishment of such a government, constitutionally, which by the creation and maintainence of a cadre of weak force sensitives, who are kept from knowledge, absolves themselves of the temptations of appealing to the vanity of the higher force adepts, who, in the service of power, become inevitably corrupted.”
“How are you sure that you can press this agenda with the Emperor Sule?”
“You will press it for me, Baron, and it will be the price, along with the autonomy of the Condominion, for your salvation of his own cause. He is an honourable man, and he will not ignore the directives of the ally who saved his aspirations.”
“You are very sure that is what we shall do, Lady Vader.”
“Do not underestimate the power of the force.”
“Very well. But it will take four hours to prepare the fleet to leave.”
“That is acceptable.”
“I'm not done. I have a stipulation for you. You are going to accompany the fleet. And you are going to aide it in coordination on its arrival, so that we have the advantage of surprise should the situation... Not be as expected.”
It was the terrible possibility that Jaina had forseen, that daughter would be forced to fight mother. But that was the reason she had sent her father and brother to Coruscant, and it was with a grim hope, and recognition of the necessity of the act, that she nodded once. “That is certainly an acceptable term,” she answered. “I will insure the safety of your jump into the gravity well of Coruscant, which I assume is your intent.”
“It is, Lady Vader.”
“Then let us begin our preparations.”
Allied Fleet, Coruscant Orbit
The R.N.S. Lusankya
“Wedge, is everything ready?” Leia asked quietly as she looked up to the plots on the bridge of the great Executor-class ship which General Antilles now commanded.
“It is, Your Highness,” he said with a tight grin. “Admiral Ackbar on the Guardian has finalized our dispositions. We're going to be the heavy hitters here, and it appears that the fleet strategy has evolved to hold us back for an entrapment manoeuvre—we're going to, hopefully, let Sule's forces break through the lines at one of the weaker points and then catch their striking fist in a pincer.”
“And then we can counterattack?”
“Hamner Davion has issued a directive limiting the order to counterattack to himself—I imagine you'll want to take that up with him.”
“I do, as a matter of fact,” Leia replied. “If our forces are going to be used for the pincer, then his own will have to execute the counterattack... And that's just what we want.”
“I won't argue with you there. If we can get the Imp forces to hammer each other to pieces every sour taste in my mouth is going to melt away in a heartbeat,” Wedge replied. “The trick is coming out of it just slightly on top... And keeping the survivors of both sides from kissing and making up when they realize that we have.”
“Just as impossible as everything else we've succeeded in doing, only more confusing.”
“A nice day at the office, by my standards.”
“Glad you're feeling confident about this. I'll be going to bring Hamner up on the holonet, then.” She turned away, and headed into a private room with communications equipment off the flagbridge, intended for the use of the commanding officer of a fleet for secure communications. It would work for her discussions with Hamner well enough. He had offered to let her review the battle from his command post, but she had declined—she could easily become a hostage there, after all.
Thirty thousand ships were mustered in orbit of Coruscant. They were facing an enemy far less numerous, but one that was strong in firepower, and contained many more heavy ships than their own force did. Even the last minute arrival of some brand new heavy cruisers from the Mon Calamari yards wasn't going to have enough of an impact there to make the battle a sure thing. These defences would help, but the best thing they'd be used for was the laying of a trap.
It took only a moment to bring Hamner Davion up on the holonet; or, more precisely, his head, for he had started to use the same holographic comms settings as Palpatine, Leia noted with some real annoyance and distaste.
“Your Highness,” he began politely, though. “What can I do for you?”
“Emperor Davion,” she replied with a cold politeness of her own. “I have been given to understand that you have issued a directive saying that you alone hold the right to determine when a counterattack, if any, shall take place.”
“That is correct, Your Highness. It is a serious decision, considering the firepower disparity we suffer from, and I do not think anyone else should make it.”
“Rescind it. We must have a counterattack.”
“We don't have the strength for one, Your Highness.”
“We will after we've trapped and crushed part of Sule's main body, and that's exactly what you've assigned the Republican forces the position to do.”
“If we trap and destroy part of Sule's main body.”
“We will.”
“Nothing is certain in War, Your Highness. But I will offer you one thing. If you can trap and destroy an important and significant portion of Sule's heavy warships, I give you my word that there will be a general fleet counterattack.”
Leia remained cool. “I want it in writing.”
Hamner chuckled. “Very well. I understand your lack of trust for me, and so I shall have a copy delivered—quickly, too, for I suspect that battle will be joined altogether quite soon, for the both of us, and it would be a shame of the shuttle was caught in the crossfire and lost.”
“That it would be,” Leia replied with a faux-sweetness. “I appreciate your willingness to oblige me on this matter.”
“You're quite welcome, Your Highness. Now, if you'll forgive me, I need to attend to urgent matters regarding the situation on the surface of Coruscant.” The transmission blinked out without a word further from Hamner Davion.
Leia turned and began to walk out of the room, thinking of her husband and her daughter, off somewhere against the Vong. Of all those in the Alliance who had died before.. And of how they had come, in short decades, to the point of this desperation, to ally with one Imperial faction to fight another, because of the Vong, because of how low the reputation of the Republic had sunk through mismanagement. It was a sad commentary on their best efforts, but if they had just one more chance, surely things could be corrected and the situation repaired. The Republic would live. It must.
All around, the preparations of the fleet continued unabated.
Coruscant Orbit
Imperial Frigate FPC-1167
Former USS Enterprise-E
William Riker knew that he was going to die in this battle. He didn't care, he was an old man, and old men died. There was nothing else to it. It was a pretty good way to go, anywhere; most of the crew was Milky Way, even if some were what he would have previously called traitors, and others the likes of Cardassians and Breen. He had survived the battles for the stations which had decimated the armies of resistance. With luck, Harlann would honour his promises. That was really all they had to go on, and in truth, it was a damn sight better than what they had been fighting on for the past two decades.
Two decades of terror. Two decades since the Empire came. And now they were in the Empire; or the shattered ruins of it, part of an innumerable collection of desperate factions standing firm to try and hold off the grasping hands of an Empire trying to rise up from the grave, to crush and strangle Freedom once again. There was nothing else to be done but oppose it to the last. William Riker knew that, and he wanted to the chance to take this last bite in the struggle for freedom if he could. So he had, on surviving the fight for the platforms, asked for one more favour from Harlann, and Harlann had given it to him.
He had given Riker command of his old ship. Of the Enterprise. In truth, it had not been that hard of a favour. There were many capable starship crewers in the Resistance forces, and the Imperial fleet was badly shorthanded of trained personnel. So most of the captured ships were now back in service under their former crews, so that the Imperial officers and men who had been aboard them beforehand could be dispatched to serve as the crews of newly finished vessels which lacked them. They only retained small Imperial-trained contingents aboard to handle the new systems which the Resistance men could not be reasonably expected to know the operation of.
For instance, the hyperdrive tug which had been more or less permanently attached to the Enterprise, nestled awkwardly behind her bridge. Or the mobile power generator which had been slapped down where cargo holds and luxurious quarters had once been; feeding power to the various weapons which had been added to the Enterprise, and most importantly to the shields. Of course, the majority of her armament was now in proton torpedoes, because they required the least power of any truly effective Imperial weapons to use, and thus would tax the ship the least, and require the least investment in new power generators to be bolted down.
As long as the shields held and their stocks of torpedoes lasted, they'd be a real fighting ship. After that, one shot from a very heavy turbolaser would easily shatter the ship into countless pieces. They had one good advantage—their intact warp drive. Because of it, Hamner had ordered all warp-capable ships to muster in the outer system. At the right moment, he intended to call for them to attack the rear of Sule's fleet. It would be a light distraction, only, for they had little firepower—but a group of ships attacking in the rear of a force often had a highly disproportionate effect, and that was what he was counting on. They would be aided by Hamner's own Strike-class frigates, laying in wait closer in, but under cloak, of course, with their heavy torpedo tubes fully stocked.
The Imperial Starfleet of Sule's was reputed to have been supposed to arrive hours ago. It hadn't, and they were still waiting for it. Everyone was, of course, very tense, and each minute of the wait seemed like an eternity or two. But there was nothing to be done for it. Battles, after all, required two sides, and one wasn't present at the moment. And even when they do get here, we're going to be waiting a while before we get our chance—but I guess it will be a nice lightshow watching these two bastards trying to kill each other, Riker thought, disdainful of Hamner and Sule alike, but acknowledging his dependency on the former in the state of sheer desperation to which the Resistance had ultimately sunk.
All of a sudden, they didn't have to wait any longer. The energy surge was overwhelming, like nothing Riker or any of his officers had ever seen before. The computer nearly overloaded at the number of distinct contacts it detected coming out of hyperspace.
“Sir—The computer is reporting more than eight hundred and ten thousand individual arrivals from hyperspace!”
“The hell!? Onscreen!”
An image of countless little specks of stars appeared. Except they weren't stars; they were the drive tails of an unending number of TIE fighters, Assault Gunboats, Missile Boats, Skipray Blastboats, and numerous other assault craft and small armed transports. They were as numerous as soldiers in an infantry battle, but these were fighting vessels which could match the power of a light starship of the old UFP. The magnitude of the battle was almost crushing, the sheer concentrated power of this stupendous galaxy, devoted to war.
“Second wave, sir!” The tactical officer switched the focus of the viewscreen of his own volition.
“Executors...” Riker breathed quietly. “There's got to be, what, fifteen of them there?”
“Twelve, Sir. Three of those vessels are smaller and appear to be of a distinct class.”
As they watched, thousands of smaller Star Cruisers and Star Destroyers began to arrive in their ordered ranks. From the moment the ships arrived, Executor-class on down, they began to launch hoardes of additional fighters, a whole second attack wave of fighters to follow the first starfighter wave which was even now closing with the main body of Hamner Davion's fleet. The numbers of capital ships seemed limitless, twice as many as there had been in the whole of Starfleet, or more, gathered in one place—and that if you counted little explorers which were half the size of even the smallest Corellian Corvette. Most of them were far, far bigger, several times the mass of the Enterprise.
And in the centre, those twelve Executor-class battlecruisers, massing more than every ship ever built by the Federation combined. It was a humbling experience, a dreadful one, which seemed to casually inform them of their madness as it passed by, to unnervingly make them question if it was not pure desperation which had forced them to this point, but instead incredible luck that they had lasted to reach it at all.
“We're just gnats next to those Executors..” Someone breathed in a whisper.
“Mosquitoes,” Riker replied grimly. “We're gonna sting 'em hard.” But he didn't really believe his words, as he watched the two fleets grow closer, and settled back to await his orders, if and when they came.
The Grand Fleet
Approaching Coruscant
The Hand of Thrawn
The ordered hosts of the Empire had arrived at the field of battle. Two Emperors faced each other across an expanse of several light seconds. The massively concentrated bulk of Sule's fleet pressed on as a dagger straight forward the thinly dispersed defensive lines around Coruscant that Davion had put up. Their plan was simply. They would attack, break through, and then spread out and roll up the defences, holding the main body of the Executor-class ships and the other heavies back as a reserve in case a large enemy reserve succeeded in making a major counterattack.
They were under Condition One, General Quarters. Every station was manned, the damage control parties were assembled, all fighters had been launched and were heading out toward the enemy, and the fleet was now in the process of forming up for the general advance.
“First starfighter wave is five minutes from range, Grand Admiral,” one of Pellaeon's aides reported. “Second starfighter wave is eight minutes from range.”
“Very good. I want them to keep on a three-minute dispersal between the two attacks.” A pause, a glance at the plot. “Order those armed transports which are falling behind the first wave to participate in the attack of the second wave.”
“Aye-aye, Sir.”
“Sir!” His Chief of Staff approached and saluted. “The fleet formation is complete. All Task Forces are in assigned positions.”
Pellaeon nodded once. “Very well. Fleet Signals: 'Advance to missile range. Half fleet acceleration only. Prepare for missile engagement with the enemy at range.'”
“Understood, Sir,” his Chief of Staff replied, and turned away to have the orders transmitted in a general fleet broadcast.
Pellaeon waited, until he could feel the drives of the Hand of Thrawn begin to rumble with their awesome latent power, for the fleet to start to move forward enmasse, a body of tens of thousands of ships, with millions of starfighters out ahead of them, driving on slowly toward the enemy.
Now it was time for the next segment of orders: “Signals to all skirmish lines--'advance to designated scouting areas and commence operations to test the enemy defences.'”
“Understood, Sir!--Transmitting at once.”
Ahead, space around the great sphere of Imperial Centre, grimly dark, was beginning to light up with the massed energy fire of the defensive batteries as the first wave of starfighters entered range and accelerated on their attack runs against the outer defences. Hundreds of thousands of starfighters were coming in, dashing down through that fire with their deadly loads of anti-ship warheads, and more than a million more were following them in on their heels.
The Fourth Battle of Coruscant had begun.
De Imperatoribus Galacticis will be continued in Chapter the Twenty-Sixth