Captain Bren returned the throttle lever to its original position, and the Scimitar-01 ceased its insane acceleration through space.
Through the transparisteel of the cockpit, the gray hulls of Victory-class Star Destroyers were already visible.
They appeared exactly where the two Interdictors were projecting artificial gravity.
Vectors Five and Six.
"Combat ready," Tomax reported.
"Assigning targets," Alex replied.
A second later he added the long-awaited:
"Proton torpedoes locked, targets acquired."
"Attacking," Tomax told the machines of his bomber squadron, turning his craft nose-first toward the bridge of one of the enemy's endmost ships.
They were clearly not where they had intended to emerge from their short hyperspace jump.
Deep in the rear of the flotilla under the command of Vice Admiral Eric Shohashi.
The enemy hadn't even thought to launch their small craft from the hangars.
Apparently, the crews of the Zann Consortium's Star Destroyers still hadn't realized how cheap a trick had just been played on them.
With a pair of simple actions, they had been stripped of the opportunity to materialize in full glory from hyperspace in front of the Dominion's Star Destroyers.
And now before them lay only darkness with distant sparks of stars.
Along with several walls of gravitational vectors overlapping one another.
Even if the enemy tried to flee from here, they would have to spend considerable time overcoming the artificial gravity that prevented them from jumping into hyperspace and escaping into the operational expanse of the Aparo sector's territories.
"First pair — launch," Tomax said, pressing the firing button with the thumb of his right hand.
The onboard computer, remembering that the pilot had switched firing modes, choosing launchers over laser cannons, obediently coughed out a pair of crimson lights from the underside.
Fiery flowers blossomed at the site of the deflector shield generators atop the ship's superstructure.
Tomax banked his craft onto the right plane, flew through the detonation flashes on afterburner, then executed a sharp turn across the right side of the enemy Victory.
Another switch of firing mode, and the laser cannons turned an enemy TIE fighter into wreckage with a double shot.
"Second and third ready to launch," Alex reported.
"Combat ready," Tomax said, adjusting the craft so its nose pointed into the opening of the Victory's main hangar.
The cannons silently fired a short burst, and two more once-Imperial fighters turned into scrap metal.
The next moment, the Scimitar launched proton torpedoes into the main hangar.
Without waiting for a reaction to the bombardment, the captain turned left.
Shots from the Zann Consortium TIE fighters that had latched onto his tail hammered against the deflectors.
Alex answered them with the rear rapid-fire cannon before Bren pulled the craft into another dash.
The moment Scimitar-01 lined up on its next target — another Victory, just like the one attacked earlier — the horror of a strike into the tender guts of an enemy Star Destroyer manifested behind the fast bomber.
A wave of fire burst from the main hangar of the defenseless vessel, destroying nearby fighters with the shockwave.
In the upper hemisphere of the Victory, breaching bulkheads and armor plating, a pillar of flame appeared.
As if someone, lacking in intelligence, had decided to mount a giant flamethrower on the upper decks.
But within a second the flame died, and the ship began to slowly drift from its original trajectory, emitting uneven pulses from its main engines at the stern.
"Looks like we clipped the reactor," Alex commented. "Fifth and sixth ready to go."
"Copy."
Tomax dodged a shot from the enemy's turbolaser cannons, trading one of the torpedoes to destroy a pair of turret emplacements.
The fast bomber, caught in a barrage of defensive fire, turned left off course while simultaneously sending the sixth proton torpedo into a shield sphere.
Finding himself behind the superstructure and leaving the detonation of the shield generator behind the Scimitar's main engine nozzles, Tomax yanked the bomber alongside the ship's hull, avoiding a dangerous approach to the giant's thrusters.
Ducking under the belly, he scattered two enemy TIE fighters to molecules with cannon fire, then, receiving confirmation, launched a pair of rockets into the ship's hangar.
No effect.
Enemy pilots had thrown themselves into the line of fire to save the ship.
Tomax realized the miss and fired four more torpedoes in succession, destroying three enemies with the same principle.
He vaporized the fourth with laser fire, and Alex sent the fifth to the next world with fire from the rear turret.
One torpedo still found its way into the hangar.
Tomax took a trajectory "below" the Victory's belly, avoiding the flame stream and shockwave from the hangar.
But he had no intention of leaving.
Soaring upward in a steep dive, he reached the upper hemisphere of the enemy ship, rising along the starboard bow.
Stabilizing his course, he launched two more prepared proton torpedoes at the combat bridge.
He spent the third and fourth on blowing up the ship's left turret battery.
The second deflector generator, as well as the Star Destroyer's bridge, vanished in fiery flashes.
"Now they've got a huge molten crater of bulkheads instead of a bridge," Alex commented.
Tomax didn't waste time on a comment.
Out of the corner of his eye, he already saw the enemy beginning to turn their starships to face the Dominion vessels approaching from the stern under Vice Admiral Shohashi's command.
The Zann forces had emerged from hyperspace in a tight formation — which, without using a gravity trawl, would have led to a tragic mistake: such actions cause collisions.
Naturally, the enemy had used the width of the channel, so their ships were a couple of units apart from each other.
Maximum density formation would have given them overlapping deflector shields — the simplest additional protection for the entire armada.
And the density of fire would have increased tenfold.
The enemy intended to strike and destroy several Dominion ships immediately after completing their jump.
But everything turned out completely differently.
No enemy in front of them.
The logic of tight formation yielded no results — only the disappointment of cramped quarters.
And the presence of an enemy at the rear.
Who was also not idle and was hosing down the Star Destroyers that had arrived from the Corporate Sector with hurricane fire.
The Dominion was completely jamming all communication stations, so coordinating their actions required much more time than under normal circumstances.
In such a constrained position, maneuvering becomes a truly complex way of controlling a ship.
High skill is required to maneuver ships in tight conditions, without communication, and without creating hazards for other allied Star Destroyers.
The enemy was doing the latter extremely poorly.
Instead of a multi-echelon fleet, the enemy's ships turned into a junkyard.
Which was exactly what the Scimitars needed to inflict maximum damage on the enemy before the active phase of the battle began.
Having looped from the stern to the underbelly of the Victory, Tomax scattered two TIE fighters charging head-on with cannon fire, then switched to PLAE acceleration mode.
Scimitar-01 surged forward.
Only to find itself next to another target.
An incoming salvo required nimble maneuvering, which Tomax handled.
The ship took a glancing ion cannon shot to the deflectors and lost its starboard shield.
Bren spun into a corkscrew, then slammed two torpedoes into the enemy ship's deflector generators.
Then two more into the superstructure.
Having executed a "loop" over the latter, he made a short dive onto the left turret battery, firing torpedoes at them and turning that part of the ship into a blazing wound on the armored giant's body.
Half the side was literally torn away in a blinding flash — anti-ship missiles loaded into launchers detonated.
The new target almost immediately lost one of its main engines, after which the ship began to yaw on its course.
Alex shot off a solar panel of a pursuing fighter, after which Tomax decided to retreat.
The element of surprise from the Dominion fleet's Scimitar raid was already diminishing.
The enemy, having taken damage on each of their starships, opened barrage fire.
And, it must be noted, the tightness of the formation helped them create dense defensive screens.
Which already multiplied the losses among the attacking fast bombers.
Tomax's squadron had lost forty percent of its pilots.
In other Scimitar units, the number of destroyed and shot-down pilots was undoubtedly no less.
But the bomber pilots had definitely achieved the objective set before them.
Each of the sixty enemy Star Destroyers had sustained significant damage.
Almost all had lost part of their artillery and shielding.
Up to fifteen Star Destroyers had been outright put out of action by proton torpedoes.
"Scimitar Squadron — pulling back," Captain Bren ordered, throwing his craft into a steep dive.
Without overthinking, the officer launched the remaining self-propelled kinetic ordnance at targets on the next enemy Star Destroyer.
Then he sharply turned the craft away.
Avoiding return fire, he performed several advanced aerobatic maneuvers.
And only then, having confirmed that the remaining pilots had left the enemy's tight formation and broken into open space, did he choose a retreat vector.
A dash of just under two seconds took his craft forty units away from the battle site.
At that distance, he was of little interest to any enemy starship or their gunners.
Especially considering that ten Dominion Star Destroyers, led by the Crimson Dawn, had emerged at a distance of thirty units from the rearmost enemy starships.
A fierce exchange of fire was already flaring up between the large ships of the warring sides.
"Bomb bays empty, all torpedoes expended for a good cause," Alex's voice held satisfaction. "Returning to the Chimaera, Commander, and resting after a tough fight?"
"Returning," Tomax agreed, steering the craft toward the carrier ship. "We'll rotate ammunition and prepare for them to ask for an encore."
"You're always so optimistic," Alex sighed.
Tomax didn't deem it necessary to reply.
And what was there to say?
He had already "rested" far too long because of his unenlightened stubbornness.
Too many battles missed.
He had a debt to the Dominion.
And Bren didn't like remaining in debt.
* * *
The tactical screen began blinking with marks of the Zann Consortium ships that had entered into an exchange of fire with Dominion destroyers.
The central computers of the starships, exchanging information with each other, formed a unified picture of the battlefield for their commanders and crews.
What one ship's sensors could reach, the others knew about as well.
The combined tactical network of onboard computers — another innovation received by ships that had undergone the latest modernization under the "Three" program.
If before each commander saw only what his ship's sensors showed him, now everything had changed.
Data in real time was received from all ships and transformed into a single three-dimensional projection of the battlefield.
This method of combat was first tested in the battle at the planet Korva, when Thrawn, using targeting data from a camouflaged Executor-class Super Star Destroyer, transmitted information about enemy ships employing cloaking systems.
That had led to the complete rout of the enemy flotilla and the acquisition of rich trophies.
The Dominion forces did not remain in debt and opened fire on the enemy, but the large ships, having received orders from Vice Admiral Shohashi, were in no hurry to destroy the enemy.
The enemy had suffered considerably.
And they could be finished off.
But was it necessary?
Fifty Victories, even if they had been in the hands of the "corporates" and certainly no longer had the pristine condition they possessed during the Imperial era, still represented value.
Destroying them was not difficult.
But why do that when there was a possibility of capturing the ships?
Which is exactly what both Venators were demonstrating with their main-caliber w-180 ion cannons.
The Chimaera had already taken several direct salvos before Captain Tschel selected his target.
The Scimitars had delivered their strikes before the enemy activated their shields, which gave their starships a brief respite in the battle with the Dominion.
Now the "Dragons" were "picking off" those enemy starships that had suffered the least in the raid and were on the direct line of fire of the Dominion ships.
They operated from rear positions behind the backs of the Dominion destroyers, stationed on the flanks.
In doing so, they kept the entire enemy group under crossfire.
Emphasis was placed on targets in the far parts of the enemy formation — those as far as possible from the Dominion Star Destroyers' positions and not under fire from the turbolasers and ion cannons of the defenders' main combat ships.
Time after time, shot after shot, the enemy ships reduced their numbers in the "combat-capable" category.
One of the enemy destroyers exploded when a lucky salvo from the Chimaera detonated the active zone of its solar ionization reactor due to the enemy's maneuvering.
The opening phase of the battle had long passed, and losses on both sides were only mounting.
Captain Tschel continued to watch the tactical screen, noting that some of the enemy ships were trying to escape the trap of their own tight formation.
Their intentions were clear — they wanted to use the crush among their own to break into open space, overcoming the surrounding artificial gravity zone.
The efforts of both Venators and their main caliber were clearly insufficient to eliminate the aspirations for freedom of such smart operators.
The rest of the Dominion squadron under Vice Admiral Shohashi's command, in order to stop such breakout attempts, would need to either immediately pass through the crowded chaos of the enemy formation or go around it.
In either case, a huge amount of time would be lost, during which the enemy could get very, very far from the unfolding battle.
Shohashi solved this problem with filigree precision.
Strike gunships of the Xg-1 type, as well as the rotating fast bombers of the Scimitar, rushed into the fight: two squadrons per each enemy ship trying to leave the trap.
The enemy did not give up and, in addition to turbolaser fire, added a counterattack on the freed small craft using their own fighters.
The escort corvettes of the Star Destroyers and the fast dreadnought moved out to intercept them, along with part of the air wings from the Dominion carrier ships.
The pilots were tasked with preventing enemy fighters from reaching the strike gunships and fast bombers.
Although, in fact, what Shohashi was implementing was the classic locking of the enemy between a "hammer and anvil."
The fact is that, despite their maneuverability, the enemy TIE fighters — clearly formerly associated with the Imperial armed forces — were not faster than the missiles that the strike gunships had rained down on them.
And even less were they capable of escaping when TIE Interceptors from Dominion ships were "looking after" them from the rear.
The small craft of the "Red Star" located the enemy on both flanks of the crowded Victory formation.
And then the slaughter began.
The Scimitars, having played the role of extras, made a dash toward their distant targets, then attacked those destroyers that intended to get away from the pile.
But again — as far as Captain Tschel's eyes could see, the fast bombers were not striving to destroy the enemy Star Destroyers.
Only stripping away shielding, damaging main engines (but not hyperdrives!), destroying turbolaser and ion armament, and launchers.
Notable in the enemy's armament was also that the sensors of Dominion ships recorded a short range for the enemy Victories' anti-ship missiles.
Furthermore, despite the absence of strikes on some batteries, the "corporate" Victories lacked part of their artillery.
Some firing posts had been outright dismantled.
Which could be understood and accepted.
If they had been compensated in another group of weapons.
For example — removed the fifth turrets from the side turret batteries but increased the number of launchers.
The "corporates" simply dismantled what they considered unnecessary, thereby castrating even more of the potential of their Star Destroyers, once gifted by the Galactic Empire.
One way or another, it all seemed as if the enemy had simply fielded outdated and end-of-life starships against them, stripped down for parts to repair more valuable ships.
The Chimaera clashed with one Victory that had turned out to be too intact to be attacked by boarding parties.
Two shuttles packed with droids were destroyed by anti-ship missiles that the enemy launched from a distance of ten units.
"Fire ion cannons at the launchers of the selected target," Tschel commanded.
There was no point in using turbolasers there — the missiles could detonate, and then an almost intact ship would turn into a piece of metal gnawed by some unknown cosmic giant.
If, of course, it wasn't destroyed altogether.
"Turbolasers, switch to destroying the enemy's artillery," Tschel gave a new order.
Watching how the enemy's remaining armament was actively trying to attack his ship's deflectors with the clear intention of overloading or destroying parts of the shield sectors, the commander of the Chimaera ordered the ship to be turned relative to its longitudinal axis.
Thus he pulled a heavily drained shield out of the line of fire but allowed the portside artillery to join the beating.
Flashes of detonations on the Victory's hull marked hits from the Chimaera's gunners on the enemy's firing points.
Relentlessly crushing the enemy's turret and barbette artillery, the Chimaera's gunners demonstrated their excellent training, accuracy, and overall superiority over the enemy.
No matter what the battered enemy Victories tried to oppose to the approaching inevitability of the Dominion ships, any of their actions yielded not the slightest result.
The beating continued.
* * *
The bridge of the Guardian had long been plunged into darkness, lit only by the dim blue of emergency lighting and the reflections from the panels of operational consoles in the "pits" and along the bulkheads.
"The enemy has just lost another destroyer, Grand Admiral," Pellaeon reported to him.
Through the transparisteel of the central viewport, the Supreme Commander could see a doomed ship perishing in a series of explosions.
A ship that could have been a valuable addition to the Dominion fleet.
"Status of the CGT," the Chiss demanded, as if the enemy fleet's losses did not concern him at all.
No, it was obvious that the Dominion had plenty of Victories modernized under the "Three" project.
And the loss of a dozen ships would not affect the final outcome of this battle, but...
"Scanning is eighty percent complete."
Thrawn, heading here, intended to orchestrate a slaughter among the Zann Consortium fleet.
Shohashi had already finished the prologue, disabling and capturing as many as ten enemy Star Destroyers.
Another five were drifting in the depths of the channel the enemy had punched through a minefield.
And despite the apparent resolution of the problem with the enemy Star Destroyers, everything was not so straightforward.
Thrawn never did anything without reason.
Pellaeon had been convinced of this time and again.
Was the crystal gravfield trap at Lur needed to verify the truth of Lady Baritha's words?
Thrawn believed so.
And Pellaeon had almost believed him, thinking the installation was necessary solely for that.
And now they were in the combat zone of Vice Admiral Shohashi's battle with the enemy fleet.
Slowly overcoming the gravitational field created by a pair of Interdictor-class Star Destroyers.
Moving toward the enemy fleet, which dreamed of escaping the trap set for the Dominion fleet.
And turned against themselves.
But Thrawn was firmly convinced that, in addition to dozens of Victory-class Star Destroyers, the enemy had also brought camouflaged ships that had previously formed the core of his strike forces in the earlier attack on the Dominion.
And in the first phase of the counterattack against the Zann Consortium's allies in the sectors north of the galaxy.
Well, the Chiss had the right to his own opinion on matters of enemy tactics.
Pellaeon had no intention of arguing with him, relying entirely on the grand admiral's sharp mind for assessing enemy actions.
"Scanning complete, sir," the watch officer appeared next to the Guardian's commander, handing the starship captain a personal datapad.
Pellaeon quickly reviewed the data displayed on the device's matrix.
He could once again state that Thrawn was right in his conjectures.
His assessment of enemy activity was correct.
The Zann Consortium had indeed brought camouflaged ships along with the Victories.
The CGT, which had a much greater information-gathering radius than standard scanners, had confirmed this.
But there was a significant nuance.
Pellaeon approached the chair in which the Supreme Commander of the Dominion sat.
"The camouflaged ships are in the channel of the minefield," he heard the grand admiral's voice as he scratched the chin of a ysalamiri.
The Guardian's commander wasn't even surprised.
"Yes, sir," he replied. "Ten Aggressor-class destroyers. They are moving toward the disabled Venator-class destroyers. I assume they intend to recover the crews."
"Do not think of our enemy as a side concerned with saving its subordinates," Thrawn advised.
Pellaeon remained silent.
He did not understand the grand admiral's remark.
"They aren't going to evacuate the crews from the powerless Venators," he explained. "But you're absolutely right — the enemy intends to dock with those destroyers under the cover of stealth and transfer the cargo. They're only interested in the equipment and the prisoners that the enemy fleet we already broke evacuated from Lura."
The commander of the Guardian, after a moment's thought, silently agreed with the commander's logic.
What does the Zann Consortium care about the crews of the ships when they're all clones?
Their fate is secondary.
It's far more important to acquire the cloning technology and specialists than to waste time now offloading the crew.
But knowing that didn't solve the problem.
"Sir," Pellaeon cleared his throat, coughing into his fist. "We clearly won't make it in time to stop them."
The Guardian doesn't have the greatest sublight speed — only forty megalights.
Those Star Destroyers, on the other hand, have a rating of sixty megalights.
It will take the Guardian several hours to reach the enemy's position, frozen in the fairway.
By that time, the Zann forces won't just finish transferring the precious trophies from the Lura system — they'll escape too.
It seems they've been outplayed after all.
Their fleet was distracted by skirmishes with obsolete Victory-class ships, while the Zann forces themselves were busy securing a far more valuable cargo.
They could have been stopped by making a micro-jump and scattering the enemy with gunfire.
But again, there was a significant catch.
An artificial gravity field had been deployed in front of the Guardian, preventing a jump into hyperspace.
To overcome it, you either had to disable the gravity well generators, or move forward at cruising sublight speed.
Which is what the Guardian is currently doing.
But, as already calculated, they won't make it.
Disabling the artificial gravity field, however, would allow the Victory-class ships to jump deeper into the sector.
And then you'd have to find them...
"That's correct, Captain," Thrawn said, barely audibly, still contemplating the battle display. "Our Guardian won't escape the gravity trap in time to interrupt the enemy's operation."
"So we've been outscored?" Pellaeon grimaced.
"Yes," Thrawn agreed, suspiciously easily, with the acknowledgment of strategic defeat. "The enemy will manage to transfer everything of value from the disabled ships before the Guardian, or any other ship in our fleet engaged in battle with enemy forces, can get close enough to stop them from stealing what rightfully belongs to the Dominion under the terms of our alliance treaty with the Lurrians."
Pellaeon looked expectantly at Thrawn.
Vague doubts gnawed at him. The Grand Admiral wouldn't just accept defeat so easily.
There had to be something else...
"Recount the Interdictors, Captain," the Grand Admiral advised, shifting his gaze to the ysalamiri.
Pellaeon followed the instruction.
"The Disrupter and the Detainer are not in position," he reported the result of his observation.
"No," Thrawn countered, looking at his flagship's captain. "I can say with complete certainty that both of those Interdictors, just like the Baneblade, are in their positions. And they are about to enter the game for our trophies."
Captain Pellaeon stared intently at the Grand Admiral.
As if the answer to an unasked question could be read on the latter's emotionless face.
And what the commander of the Guardian wanted to ask his commanding officer was, after all, quite simple.
'How long ago did he foresee this enemy move, that three weeks ago he recalled the second Super Star Destroyer operating in the regular Dominion fleet from the Kessel system?'
Equipped with a class-one hyperdrive — the only one of its kind in the entire Dominion.
Fitted with advanced systems.
Possessing stealth systems...
And a crew that, like the Guardian's, is made up of the best of the best clones and original specialists from across the entire regular fleet of the Dominion Armed Forces?
* * *
Sykes-Twenty Eight watched as the Crimson Dawn changed course and accelerated, closing in on the ships of the diversionary force.
It took him a few seconds to understand Rear Admiral Shohashi's plan.
He was inserting himself into the formation of practically disabled ships, incapable of moving, in order to land troops on the decks of the Victory-class ships as quickly as possible and claim them as his trophies.
Interesting, yes.
Not without elegance.
But, as with the ten destroyers captured earlier, Shohashi would only find battles with clones on board those ships.
Shohashi would get neither the Lurrians nor the cloning equipment in this battle.
"All ships, accelerate approach to the Venators," he ordered, transmitting the command to the entire Aggressor fleet. "Have them finish transferring equipment and slaves to our vessels as quickly as possible. Immediately after that — we get out of here."
It wasn't easy to devise tactics where there was no communication with the scattered units of your fleet.
You had to rely on the thinking of your allied commander.
Thankfully, the brilliant mind leading the Zann Consortium had foreseen this problem.
And created thirty copies of the original Jared Sykes — a celebrated but unknown hero of the Clone Wars.
Because of their nature, they could understand each other without unnecessary words or lengthy explanations.
One understood the other unconditionally.
One's thought was the continuation of the other's tactics.
So it was now.
Twenty Seven was doing everything to pin the enemy's attention on two-thirds of his Star Destroyers.
Twenty Eight intensified this interest by sending dozens of Star Destroyers to the tip of the attack spear.
The weakest ones available in the entire Zann Consortium fleet in the Corporate Sector.
All just to make sure the enemy got bogged down in the trap.
While Sykes-Twenty Eight himself would take what rightfully belonged to the Zann Consortium.
And in this, he could feel proud, because the idea of using ships this way was exclusively his.
Sykes-Twenty Seven didn't even suspect that stealth ships were present on the battlefield.
Just as he didn't know that the goal of the 'reinforcements' was to secure the cloning technologies and slaves, not to rescue their organizational comrades who had escaped the Lura system.
After all — they are all just clones, easily replaced.
They know this.
Just as they know their true purpose.
One day, the part of the Zann Consortium comprised of clones will absorb the other half, generously diluted with pirates, mercenaries, slaves, cutthroats, and other scum.
One day, a change of power will occur in the organization.
But the time hasn't come yet.
Lord Shadowspawn hasn't given such an order.
However, he did make sure that the Victory-class Star Destroyers currently dying were from the 'second part' of the organization.
Sykes-Twenty Eight saw this as a slow but steady reduction of their assets.
Maybe there won't even need to be another power redistribution — the 'second part' will be wiped out as a matter of course.
The Dominion had launched a counteroffensive against the Zann Consortium's satellite allies.
And as it happened, the forces of the 'second part' of the organization were participating in the offensive, just as they were predominantly the ones listed among the fleets guarding the satellite sectors.
From the Hydian Way to the Perlemian Trade Route stretched territories primarily controlled by the 'second part' of the organization.
Shadowspawn assumed they would all soon be captured or blockaded by the Dominion.
That's most likely exactly what will happen.
The capture of Aparo is proof of that.
That's why Shadowspawn prefers to extract the most sensitive assets for the 'first part' of the organization.
And then they will link up with the forces in the Chiloon Rift and the Tion Cluster, providing the renewed organization not only with finances but also with a powerful raw material base.
And then...
What would happen then, Sykes-Twenty Eight didn't have time to figure out.
Not because he didn't know the further course of events.
No, he was smart enough to calculate Shadowspawn's intentions with a high degree of probability.
It wasn't for nothing that Twenty Eight was considered the 'favorite' of Tyber Zann's advisor.
No, Sykes-Twenty Eight's mental gymnastics were interrupted for a different reason.
The first was the appearance above the five immobilized Venator-class Star Destroyers of a nineteen-kilometer giant with characteristic hull lines, bristling with thousands of guns.
And their strike wasn't aimed at the immobilized, powerless Star Destroyers.
The merciless green of the heavy turbolasers turned two of the ten Aggressor-class Star Destroyers — the closest ones to the Venators — into metallic scrap in an instant.
A second later, the remaining eight ships were engulfed in the flames of detonations.
Including Sykes-Twenty Eight's flagship.
No, the Executor didn't open fire on them.
The onboard sensors managed to detect the appearance of numerous, overly fast markers of small spacecraft.
"Battle stations!" Sykes-Twenty Eight shouted, as if he didn't realize everything was already decided for him.
His Star Destroyer, hit by a massive volley of proton torpedoes, was left without power or weapons.
Drifting scrap metal, slowly approaching the edges of the fairway.
A few more minutes of such aimless drifting, and the self-propelled munitions would tear the unfortunate ship apart.
Sykes-Twenty Eight, like everyone on board the Guardian, flinched and nearly fell to the deck when their damaged ship was caught in the tenacious, invisible grip of tractor beams.
Sykes-Twenty Eight glanced at the tactical monitor.
He and all the ships were in the middle of a minefield.
One hundred fifty units one way — and the same width the other way.
An ideal position for sensitive Imperial-type sensors, with a detection range of two hundred units, to register not only the appearance of the Executor in the center of the fairway.
But also its twin, positioned in the path of the Victory-class ships trying to retreat from the system.
But the worst situation was for those who thought they could escape into the Corporate Sector through the fairway.
Two Interdictor-class Star Destroyers seemed to mock all of Sykes-Twenty Eight's plans.
The Disrupter and the Detainer (they weren't hiding their transponder signals) had deployed their gravity traps right where Sykes-Twenty Eight had recently been gnawing into the Dominion minefield.
And they were calmly intercepting those Victory-class destroyers that decided to return to the Corporate Sector.
Unfortunately for the escape plan, two Interdictors and the Vindicator-class heavy cruisers that had joined them were more than enough to stop the rare deserters.
Sykes-Twenty Eight watched as the hulk of his starship was towed away from the minefield.
They probably kept him alive to try to board and extract valuable data.
But not today.
"Detonate the ships," ordered Sykes-Twenty Eight.
A pity he couldn't extract the slaves and the valuable cloning technology.
Lord Shadowspawn will be disappointed.
But far worse if he, Sykes-Twenty Eight, allowed the enemy to obtain what was stored in his ships' memory banks.
No one and nothing must learn the way to Lord Shadowspawn's secret citadel inside the Corporate Sector.
Sykes-Twenty Eight didn't finish his thought again.
But this time, it was interrupted because he, along with his fleet, was simply vaporized into atoms.