• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

“Good.” Harrsk rubbed his hands together. “My personal Star Destroyer will remain off to the side, so as not to draw direct fire. We will confuse them by having you lead the charge. Don’t let me down.”

“I would never let the Empire down, Supreme Warlord,” Daala said.

She gave orders to the navigator, and the Firestorm edged to the front line of battleships. The three damaged Star Destroyers remained in eclipse, huddled in the shadow of Harrsk’s hot world. The eight remaining ships followed Daala’s hyperspace coordinates as she gave the orders to launch for the fortress of High Admiral Teradoc.

A rocky swath of planetoids orbited in a disk around a lavender-and-white gas giant. The crumbling, ice-laden ring system looked beautiful from far away, reflecting distant gold sunlight—but Daala saw it as a tactical challenge. The rubble created tens of thousands of possible targets, all places the High Admiral could have chosen to hide his fortress.

“Let’s see if your spies provided good information,” Daala said into her comm system linked to Warlord Harrsk’s on the Whirlwind.

“It better be—we paid enough for it,” Harrsk said. “A significant portion of my budget was devoted to bribing other Imperials to get that information.”

Daala’s expression did not change, though disgust welled up inside her. It should never have been possible to bribe Imperial soldiers. That kind of unprofessional behavior had brought the Empire to its knees—corruption, dishonesty, and criminal lack of vision.

“Very well, Warlord,” she said. “We are heading directly into the ring systems, on target. All turbolasers are primed and ready.”

Like projectiles shot from a gun, the Star Destroyers plunged into the ring plane, swooping toward their target. Large ice shards and reflective rocks cruised around them. The fleet came on at full speed, hoping to pounce before Teradoc could muster his forces again.

Daala imagined that the High Admiral must now be celebrating, his commanders retired and relaxing, expecting no retaliation so soon. They would get a surprise, she thought with a smile—and so would Harrsk.

As Daala led the attackers on their high-speed assault, two of the planetoids in the rings exploded, proximity charges rigged to detect the passage of incoming hostile ships. The flaming debris from the detonations sprayed in all directions, hailing upon Harrsk’s Star Destroyers, crippling one and destroying two others.

Five left, Daala saw. What a waste.

“They know we’re here, Admiral,” her tactical officer said.

Harrsk was shouting over the comm system, his voice reedy with excitement. “Admiral Daala, what happened? Why didn’t you predict that?”

Daala blanked the sound on the transmission, enjoying the warlord’s livid face as he wordlessly continued to shout at her.

“We are locked on to Teradoc’s fortress right now, Admiral,” the navigator said.

On a screen in front of her, high-resolution diagrams of the ring system flashed up: one nondescript, medium-size rock blinked to indicate the site of the High Admiral’s stronghold.

“Victory-class Star Destroyers approaching!” the weapons sergeant shouted.

Daala gripped the bridge rail, studying all components of the situation. She saw that dozens of the small planetoids were in fact garrisons, hollowed-out rocks that served as hangars for the crimson Victory ships. The smaller warships emerged and began their pursuit, some newly refurbished, others still battle-scarred from the recent attack on Harrsk’s molten world.

“Do not engage them,” Daala said.

The tactical officer sat up, his black eyes glittering and startled. “Excuse me, Admiral?”

“I said, do not engage,” she snapped. “Those Victory-class ships are not our target. We have a much more important mission to accomplish, and we cannot afford to be drawn away by their amateurish attempts to distract us.”

Behind her, in the tattered remains of her phalanx of Star Destroyers, Harrsk ignored her orders and commanded his gunners on the Whirlwind to shoot at the pursuing Victory ships.