Star Wars_ Darth Bane 01_ Path of Destruction - Drew Karpyshyn [40]
The dark side nurtured the power of the individual. The teachings of the Sith Masters would make him strong. In pleasing them, he could unlock his full potential and one day sit among them.
When the first wave of the attack came, the Republic fleet orbiting the skies of Ruusan was caught completely unprepared. A small and politically insignificant planet, the heavily forested world had been used as a base to stage devastating hit-and-run attacks against the Sith forces stationed in the nearby Kashyyyk system. Now the enemy had turned that same strategy against them.
The Sith struck without warning, materializing en masse from hyperspace: an almost suicidal maneuver for such a massive fleet. Before an alarm could even be sounded, the Republic ships found themselves being bombarded by three Dreadnaught cruisers, two corsair battleships, dozens of interceptors, and a score of Buzzard fighters. And at the head of the attack was the flagship of the Brotherhood of Darkness, the Sith Destroyer Nightfall.
In his meditation sphere aboard Nightfall, Lord Kaan was directing the assault. From inside the chamber he could communicate with any of the other ships, issuing his orders with the knowledge they would be instantly and completely obeyed. The chamber was alive with light and sound: glowing monitors and flashing screens beeped incessantly to alert him to the constantly changing updates on the status of the battle.
The Dark Lord, however, never even glanced at the screens. His perception extended far beyond the meditation sphere, far beyond the data spit out by the electronic readouts. He knew the location of each vessel engaged in the conflict: his own and those of the enemy. He could sense every volley fired, every evasive turn and roll, every move and countermove made by every ship. Often he could sense them even before they happened.
His brow was knotted in intense concentration; his breath came in long, ragged gasps. Beads of perspiration rolled down his trembling body. The strain was enormous, yet with the aid of the meditation sphere he maintained his mental focus, drawing on the dark side of the Force to influence the outcome of the conflict despite his physical exhaustion.
The art of battle meditation—a weapon passed down from the ancient Sith sorcerers—threw the enemy ranks into chaos, feeding their fear and hopelessness, crushing their hearts and spirits with bleak despair. Every false move by the opponent was magnified, every hesitation was transformed into a cascade of errors and mistakes that overwhelmed even the most disciplined troops. The battle had only just begun, and it was already all but over.
The Republic fleet was in complete disarray. Two of its four Hammerhead-class capital ships had lost primary shields in the first strafing run of the Buzzards. Now the Sith Dreadnaughts were moving in, targeting the suddenly vulnerable Hammerheads with their devastating forward-mounted laser cannons. On the verge of being crippled and left utterly helpless, they were just now managing to scramble their own fighters to ward off the rapidly closing enemy cruisers.
The other two capital ships were being ravaged by Rage and Fury, the Sith battleships. The ponderous Republic Hammerheads relied on support ships to establish a defensive line to hold off enemy attackers while they positioned themselves to bring their heavy guns to bear. Without these defensive lines they were all but helpless against the much quicker and more nimble corsairs. Rage and Fury cut in along a vector that minimized the number of cannons the Hammerheads could target them with, then swept across their bows, firing all guns. When the Hammerheads tried to change direction to bring more guns to bear, the corsairs would pivot and double back for another pass along a different vector, inflicting even more damage. The savage maneuver was known as slashing the deck, and without