An Imperial stormtrooper does not hide.
An Imperial stormtrooper attacks.
"I am a stormtrooper. My skin is my armor. My face is my helmet. My name is my number. I am content because I am the Emperor's agent."
That was the oath he had sworn after fleeing the planet Bakura shortly after both the Emperor and Darth Vader had died.
But it was not that which led him to leave his distant and secluded homeland.
The Ssi-ruuk.
A race of lizards that literally stole the very essence of people, transferring it into their war machines.
What could be worse for someone who had grown up on a planet where, generation after generation, a tale was passed down about how faulty machines had nearly led to the death of all the first settlers?
Superstitious terror.
Fear.
Awareness of his own helplessness.
Vulnerability.
Uselessness.
Yes, Bakura had held out.
Because help had come.
Not from the Empire, of which Bakura was a part.
The Rebel Alliance, which at that time had destroyed the second "Death Star."
And with it, had begun the end of the Galactic Empire.
His name was George Lewis.
He was born and raised on Bakura.
He had survived the Ssi-ruuk attack.
And he had fled Bakura.
As far as he could imagine.
Terrified that the day would come when those lizards would return to his homeland.
After long wanderings, he found a haven.
The Ciutric Hegemony.
A place that flourished under the rule of Grand Vizier Sate Pestage and his family.
A place where, despite the external polish, class stratification was so stark that George felt it firsthand.
He could no longer remember how much time he had spent in the back alleys of the capital of Ciutric IV in a vain attempt to find at least some work, whose pay would suffice not only for a grimy little room and a couple of portions of the cheapest and most terrible slop he had ever seen in all the worlds he had visited.
From Bakura to Ciutric.
In the end, he found a way out.
The very one that he, like thousands of boys on Bakura, had dreamed of before the Empire was decapitated and began to fall apart.
He became a soldier.
In the service of the Empire.
But he was not driven by the romanticism with which recruiters usually lured young people to enlistment centers.
He had no intention of "seeing the galaxy aboard an Imperial Star Destroyer," as the propaganda flyers plastered all over the slums promised.
He just wanted to eat.
And he did not want to die.
So he went to the recruitment center.
Without much hope, of course, but…
They accepted him.
And not even into the Imperial Army, but directly into the ranks of the Imperial stormtroopers.
Yes, these were stormtroopers of the Ciutric Hegemony.
Yes, they were not led by the legendary Darth Vader.
And they were no longer the Emperor's agents, but they kept repeating that litany at formations, displaying their submission, and reworking the words of the oath in their free time in the most simplistic manner.
The Stormtrooper Corps after Palpatine's death was still a force.
After the overthrow of Sate Pestage and his execution, it became a swamp.
With the rise to power in the Ciutric Hegemony of Prince-Admiral Delak Krennel, it became merely a gang of people with nothing left to lose in life, and therefore they would follow any order.
As long as they were fed, watered, and given a roof over their heads.
George was a stormtrooper of the Ciutric Hegemony at the time when Krennel died.
He remained one even after the Hegemony bent the knee before Grand Admiral Thrawn, seeking a powerful protector for themselves in superstitious terror of the New Republic's threat.
There were very few options, so he had no objection to becoming a stormtrooper of the newly formed Dominion.
As long as there was a place to live, something to eat, and somewhere to sleep…
And then the most terrible and strange thing in his life began.
After the Ssi-ruuk invasion, of course.
As it turned out, the Dominion had no use for freeloaders and scoundrels who wore the stormtrooper uniform for the same purpose for which George had donned that white-and-black uniform.
But he knew nothing else.
He had to live up to expectations.
Lewis remembered with a shudder and cold sweat what the professional fitness test in the Dominion's Stormtrooper Corps was like.
Each of the "boys in white" was wrung out dry, as it were.
They were gathered all together, sent to hastily erected training camps on several planets of the Hegemony.
And literally put through a meat grinder.
Strength training, endurance training, running in full combat gear with heavy backpacks of extra ammunition and supplies, weapons and provisions.
He cursed the day he agreed to become a Dominion stormtrooper without even asking what would follow.
They beat them, broke them, fused them back together, and broke them again.
They pushed them to the limit of their strength and helped them overcome it, no matter what.
Instructors from among the clones and fighters who had once been part of Darth Vader's 501st Legion destroyed in them everything civilian that remained from their previous place of service.
And after some time, George realized that he no longer even thought about filing a resignation report and living out the rest of his life quietly and peacefully somewhere in the poor districts.
The clones had made a fighter out of him.
Just like themselves.
And now he was a fighter of the Dominion's Stormtrooper Corps.
A soldier who had gone through every battle in which his commanders had ordered him to participate.
And now he could proudly say about himself what he really was, at this moment.
At this instant.
"I am a stormtrooper. My skin is my armor. My face is my helmet. My rifle is my tool. I have a name. I have a number. I am a shield, guarding the Dominion, its people, and its interests. I am a sword, destroying the enemies of my Motherland. From now on — and until the end of my days, I am a stormtrooper!"
Ever since the Stormtrooper Corps of the Dominion was created, the Imperial oath had been reinterpreted for stormtroopers in countless ways.
Dozens of versions.
Perhaps even hundreds.
They circulated among stormtroopers, released for discussion and study by the Chief of the Stormtrooper Corps, the adjutant of Grand Admiral Thrawn, Lieutenant Colonel Tierce.
For the first time in the entire history of the Stormtrooper Corps, even including the Imperial era, command had asked for their OPINION.
Shock — that was what they felt.
Both the young fighters who had come here by their own conscience, and the veterans who had undergone training on Carida.
All of them took part in creating a new oath.
The final version was born in pain.
The veterans did not understand why this was necessary, and why they should decide anything besides how to effectively carry out the combat mission assigned by command.
The youth did not feel entitled to decide for everyone.
And yet, the oath was born.
A number of provisions from the pledge that every military member in the Dominion took, regardless of whether they served in the regular forces or the Defense Forces, were incorporated into it.
It was supplemented with words from the Imperial-era oath.
Combined, corrected, secondary points removed.
They created something that symbolizes the might of the restored Stormtrooper Corps, its continuity, its traditions, the purpose of its existence, and the main tasks for the sake of which they wear these white suits.
Dominion stormtroopers did not hide.
Within the state, those who did not plot evil were not afraid of Dominion stormtroopers.
Dominion stormtroopers could rightfully be proud that their position in the hierarchy of the Dominion Armed Forces corresponded to the propaganda information disseminated among the state's inhabitants.
Dominion stormtroopers could rightfully be proud that they were trained and prepared in the finest traditions of the Imperial Stormtrooper Corps.
And Private ST-7711 was proud.
Of himself and his unit.
A young man, not even having reached middle age by human standards, rinsed his clean-shaven face.
Looking in the mirror above the sink, he ran a hand over his short buzz cut.
In the mirror he saw ST-7711, what George Lewis, the fugitive and frightened boy from Bakura, had become.
The cold gaze of a professional soldier.
Slightly rugged facial features.
Several small scars on his right cheekbone — traces from fragmentation grenade splinters that had exploded near him during an operation on Mustafar last year.
His baptism of fire.
His first combat experience as a stormtrooper of the 501st Legion.
A real soldier, not a hyped-up rookie in armor from someone else's shoulder and carelessly fitted gear.
7711 dried his face and hands, passed the towel over his muscular torso, which had appeared thanks to inhuman training.
Training that had killed the boy in him and let the man, the warrior, the protector emerge.
Without unnecessary words, he pulled on his undersuit, feeling its pleasant fit against his body and its isolation from the environment.
In complete silence, he left the fresher.
The quarters of Torrent Company, to which he belonged, were no different from those on the garrison base.
Three-tiered bunks, small nightstands, weapon racks, mountings for hanging removed armor pieces.
The second and third tiers were empty.
Soldiers sat on the lower bunks, silently tidying their armor and weapons.
Yes, they were on the front line.
Yes, their place in the trenches and dugouts had been taken by fighters from another company, whom they might not even know.
As soon as rest time ended, Torrent Company would clear the quarters and leave in full force, making room for those currently in the trenches and foxholes.
Nothing extra, no unnecessary movements.
Rest time was not time to relax and drink caf.
That was what the veterans had taught them.
Both the stormtroopers who had trained on Carida and the clone soldiers who had returned to their combat posts when such an offer was made to them by the Dominion.
Used by the Empire and thrown out onto the street without a credit to their name, forced to cope with accelerated aging.
The Dominion gave them a chance to do what they did best — fight for a righteous cause.
They had returned.
7711 looked at the calm, focused faces of his battle comrades.
Several dozen "originals" good fighters, but not part of the cloning program.
The rest were clones, one way or another.
Clones of Jango Fett.
Clones of Imperial stormtroopers.
Each had a number.
Each had a name.
Each knew those lines from his identification card.
No one had forgotten.
Nothing had been erased from memory.
But while they were on combat duty, they were numbers.
When the battle was over and the command given, they would address each other by name.
Everyone knew everyone.
Despite the identical faces, no one made a mistake.
Tattoos, hairstyles, combat scars, behavioral quirks in daily life and on the battlefield.
Only civilians could confuse them.
Soldiers don't make mistakes.
Stormtroopers don't make mistakes.
7711 approached his bunk.
The two Jango Fett clones sitting on it, flaunting the silvery gray of their short-cropped hair, silently checked their weapons.
They shifted just as silently, making room for him without pausing their task for even a moment.
7711 settled in next to his battle brothers.
He glanced at the next row of bunks, where men with identical faces sat.
His face.
He knew each one by name.
He knew their numbers.
He knew they would not let him down.
And they could be certain he would not let them down.
Just like that AT-AT driver-sergeant, shot down on Mustafar, who did everything to ensure his multi-ton machine, damaged in battle, didn't just crash onto the scorching planet but was put to good use.
A battle brother from the Dominion army.
7711 silently picked up his helmet and checked the functionality of its built-in equipment with practiced movements.
As always, the electronics were in perfect order.
He put the helmet back and moved on to checking the rest of his gear.
One hundred and fifty-three soldiers of Torrent Company were preparing for battle, the approach of which only a green recruit wouldn't feel.
But there were no rookies among them.
Only experienced fighters and veterans.
They were all dressed in under-armor bodysuits.
They lived and slept in them, only taking them off for hygiene.
The undersuit was fabric armor.
In case of emergency, it could withstand a blaster bolt.
Convenient if the barracks was attacked during lights-out.
The Jango Fett clones had taught them this truth, backed by years of experience in various campaigns.
The 501st Guard Stormtrooper Legion didn't reject the experience of other fighters, even if they were biologically two or even three times older than the once-young replacements they had run through obstacle courses.
In the 501st, this experience was adopted, studied, analyzed, and disseminated among all soldiers.
At present, the 501st was the only guard legion deployed at full strength, as established by the Empire and adopted for execution by the Dominion.
Fourteen thousand eight hundred twenty-six units.
Twelve thousand eight hundred stormtroopers and two thousand twenty-five officers and junior command staff.
Over time, all guard legions in the state would be brought up to this strength, instead of the standard "Imperial" nine thousand eight hundred thirteen soldiers and officers.
Someday.
When there were more stormtroopers in the Dominion.
The Guard...
The elite of the Dominion Stormtrooper Corps.
Fighters whose appearance the galaxy had known for the last thirty years as the epitome of unyielding efficiency.
The Dominion Stormtrooper Corps Guard wore assault armor created by the Empire.
And saw nothing wrong with that.
It was excellent armor.
It would serve its purpose well.
The regular legions of stormtroopers in the regular army were supplied with repaired and standardized armor from the Grand Army of the Republic, known as "Phase II."
The armor of the Dominion's line stormtrooper legions, "Phase II."
The armor of the Dominion Stormtrooper Corps' guard stormtrooper legions.
Civilians might confuse Guard stormtroopers with the Dominion Guard — the best of the best, tasked with protecting the state's highest officials, top-secret facilities, and so on.
The military never confused them.
Neither by appearance nor by purpose.
The Dominion Guard.
Black-and-red — protection for the highest officials.
The Dominion Guard.
Black-and-gold — protection for critical facilities.
The Dominion Guard.
Black-and-blue — personal protection for Grand Admiral Thrawn.
The Dominion Guard.
Every stormtrooper wanted to get into the Dominion Guard.
And for that, you had to make a long journey from a simple stormtrooper in a line legion to a Guard stormtrooper.
And only then, if Lieutenant Colonel Tierce deemed the soldier worthy, would he be allowed to undergo the trials and training to become a Dominion Guard.
To be a stormtrooper was an honor.
It was a job for a real man.
People no longer joined just for the high pay and other allowances.
Future fighters joined out of motivation, ready to give themselves completely, to push past the limits of their body and mind.
Most would remain line stormtroopers forever, among whom, it was rumored, young clones with Jango Fett's face would soon appear again.
The veteran clones of the Grand Army of the Republic were skeptical of such news.
They had been raised by Mandalorians.
And so they were as tough as Mandalorian iron.
The veteran clones had serious doubts that the "recruits" would be equally well-trained and prepared.
Sometimes the stormtroopers of the 501st entertained themselves with conversations about how they managed to restore this recruitment source, given the clone's death and the project's closure many years ago.
There used to be many such questions.
Now, after the assault on Lura, when those very "recruits" had gone into battle as part of the Rancor Battalion, a significant number of those questions had disappeared.
There was Mandalorian spirit in the "recruit" clones.
And experience, too.
At a veteran level.
They were probably cloned the same way the outstanding and best "originals" were cloned.
Or maybe the recruitment source was different.
The stormtroopers weren't interested.
All they needed was to be sure that a battle brother in white armor — whether Imperial or "Phase II" would always understand sign language and provide covering fire.
The rest didn't matter to stormtroopers.
They were created to fight.
They lived for war.
They fought to live.
To live themselves and let the billions who chose other professions live, working for the good of the Dominion.
The company commander appeared in the barracks doorway.
Just like them.
Putting aside what they were doing, the stormtroopers fell into line at the command.
"Rest is over," the company commander announced, sweeping his subordinates with a cold, professional gaze. "One-minute readiness. Moving to positions. Full equipment. Move out."
The feeling of impending battle that had been hanging in the air finally became real.
They were going into battle.
Advancing to break a defense that no one before them had been able to breach or destroy.
It would be a brutal fight.
They were ready for it.
They lived to serve.
They died so that others might live.
Stormtroopers weren't afraid of death.
To be a stormtrooper was to live forever.
7711, like the other one hundred and fifty-two soldiers of Torrent Company, began to gear up in haste, but without fuss.
The company commander watched as the different faces of his men disappeared under identical helmets and armor sets.
Forty seconds later, laden from head to toe with weapons and ammunition, accompanied by battle droids, Torrent Company moved out toward the Juggernauts — the massive giants already shaking the night of Serenno with the roar of their powerful engines.
Today, before midnight, the rebel capital in the D'Astan sector, the city of Carannia, would fall.
And the stormtroopers of the 501st Guard Legion of the Dominion Stormtrooper Corps would be the ones to once again accomplish the impossible.
There was such a profession — to storm the enemy...
And the stormtroopers of the 501st Guard Legion did their job with excellence.
* * *
"Sir," Gilad addressed the Grand Admiral, "time is practically up. Two hours remain until the stated deadline."
"Thank you for the reminder, Vice Admiral," Thrawn said, as calm and relaxed as ever. "We are just beginning."
Pellaeon glanced at the sofa located behind both senior officers.
On it, tired of waiting for who knows what, Baroness Feena D'Asta was curled up in a ball.
Now that she was asleep, her face was serene, showing not a hint of the anger that had marked her words.
Gilad couldn't help but admire her steady breathing, her satin skin framed by the rich fabrics of her dress.
At this moment, she looked nothing like the power-hungry aristocrat who had once been disinherited.
Right now, she was just a woman unaccustomed to heavy emotional strain.
It was forgivable.
"Right on schedule," Gilad heard the Grand Admiral say.
Glancing at the viewport, the Vice Admiral paled.
From the main hangars of the Guardian, and then the Chimaera, hundreds of small craft were slipping out.
Fighters, interceptors, assault gunships, fast bombers...
They all broke into squadrons, taking up positions in space around their carrier ships.
And all while staying clear of the relentless turbolaser and ion cannon fire from the larger vessels.
A single hit from those would be enough to vaporize or disable a fragile little ship...
But Thrawn...
He just stood at the viewport, watching the bombardment, occasionally studying the data on tactical monitors.
He didn't say a word.
In Pellaeon's opinion, nothing had changed.
But apparently, he simply wasn't seeing something.
If Thrawn didn't know how to win, he wouldn't have engaged in any agreements or disputes.
And since he had...
"The enemy has diverted additional power to the deflectors," the Grand Admiral stated, almost as if talking to himself.
Gilad felt his uniform shirt start to dampen, sticking to his skin.
So the enemy had far more reserves in energy supply than anticipated.
Which, in turn, increased the time needed to bring down any of the shields deployed over the city.
Not to mention that it accelerated the switching time between the enemy's first and second deflectors.
Which meant that...
What did it even mean?
"The switching gap between shields has decreased from five seconds to two," Thrawn noted.
"Terrible news," Pellaeon sighed in resignation, taking off his cap and dabbing at the sweat-soaked gray hair underneath.
"On the contrary, Vice Admiral," the Grand Admiral's voice sounded like flowing music. "This works out perfectly for us."
'How in the galaxy does their defensive advantage work out better for us?!'
Gilad nearly screamed it at the top of his lungs.
But he held back at the last moment.
Training and experience dealing with Thrawn had kicked in.
'Calm, just stay calm,' he repeated to himself.
"It takes us thirteen minutes and ten seconds to suppress one shield," Thrawn's voice sounded.
'So what?'
"A two-second gap..."
'Still not getting it.'
"And then another thirteen minutes and ten seconds," the Grand Admiral repeated, standing opposite the viewport.
'That didn't clarify anything at all. Not a thing.'
Thrawn folded his arms across his chest, watching the strikes against Kirainia, which had yet to achieve even the slightest success.
"Two minutes have passed since the rebels raised the lower shield," Thrawn commented.
As if hearing his words, the entire mass of small craft began to move.
Pellaeon felt his eyes bulge out of their sockets.
The air wing was heading straight for Serenno.
At that speed, in ten minutes they would reach the planet's surface and...
THIS COULDN'T BE POSSIBLE?!!!
Had Thrawn completely lost his mind?!
No, he couldn't do this!
This had to be some clever plan, there was no other way...
He couldn't just throw the entire air wing at Carannia, knowing the enemy would cut them down as if they had never existed!
"Exactly right, Vice Admiral," the Chiss replied calmly to his unspoken thoughts. "We have already tried attacking the enemy shields from orbit. The results were the opposite of what we expected..."
No-no-no-no-no!
This was the wrong decision!
You can't do this!
Those were hundreds of top-class pilots!
Carannia wasn't worth it!
And there'd be hardly any effect anyway!
Better to drop thermonuclear bombs on their heads and burn the whole place to a Hutt!
"Now," the Supreme Commander of the Dominion turned his head toward him, scorching Pellaeon with the fire in his eyes, "our air wing will strike from the surface of Serenno."
Black bones of the Emperor!
You can't do this!
There must be another way!
There must be!
"While our pilots are moving into attack positions, I would advise you to cover your future wife with a blanket," the Grand Admiral stated unexpectedly. "I am sure she will appreciate the gesture when she wakes up..."
The Chiss glanced at the chronometer.
."..in eleven minutes."
'She's completely out cold? Why would she wake up exactly an hour and a half before the deadline?'
"I don't understand, sir," Pellaeon admitted. "We'll lose all our fighters and bombers!"
"Correct," Thrawn agreed. "Some machines will indeed have to be written off as losses... But the final casualty count will be orders of magnitude different from the numbers you've been imagining."
"Yes, but in which direction, sir?" Pellaeon couldn't hold back.
For some reason, Thrawn didn't deign to answer that question.
Instead, he went back to studying the data on the tactical screen, as if the objective data held the answer.
Gilad stared at the monitor, straining to understand...
"Pay attention to how exactly the enemy deflectors open during the switching moment," Grand Admiral Thrawn advised in his characteristically calm manner.
But Pellaeon had already seen this data.
And he was perfectly familiar with it.
Two shields, their domes rising ten kilometers above the city pavement.
The distance between the lower and upper shield was ten meters.
The shield design was one of the newest.
The deployment of the new shield, as well as the retraction of the old one, occurred at the center of the dome.
In this case, when the lower shield began to deactivate, the central section would be the first to disappear.
But by the time it vanished, a segment of the upper shield would appear in its place.
Exactly in the same projection.
In simpler terms, if the "melting" of one shield segment started in the center, then the materialization of the second occurred in the exact same projection, leaving no gap.
The second deflector materialized at the same speed the first shield "melted" away.
And until the new shield was fully formed, the old one wouldn't deactivate.
Like a lid on a pot.
Switching from one shield to another now took only two seconds, instead of the previous five.
And since the fire from three large ships simultaneously couldn't break through the shields in five seconds while they weren't receiving additional power, how could they possibly do it in just two?
What was he supposed to see here that would answer this nagging question?
Or was he missing something?
Something important...
"The composition of the air wings descending to the planet," Thrawn prompted, as if he had read his mind again.
Pellaeon's gaze began to wander over the surface of another monitor, comparing the characteristics and capabilities of the small craft heading to certain death, and...
The realization of the Grand Admiral's plan sent a cold sweat down Pellaeon's back, instantly making his shirt wet and plastering it to the Vice Admiral's aging body.
"No," he whispered. "Even droids aren't capable of that..."
"Of course they aren't," Thrawn agreed. "Incapable of carrying it out. And therefore, incapable of accounting for this factor. As I have said before, the overconfidence of tactical superdroids is the stumbling block we will use to shatter the defenses of Carannia."
"Sir," Pellaeon pulled himself together. "I very much doubt that Tey-Zuka will keep his word. He's quite a schemer and..."
The Vice Admiral fell silent, unable to find civilized words to express everything he thought about the relics of the Clone Wars.
He wasn't having much luck.
At least the prepositions and conjunctions in the tirade forming in his head were on the "printable" list.
Not all of them, admittedly, but still — progress.
"If he breaks the agreement, we will simply take Carannia by storm," Thrawn said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. "The 501st Guard Legion is already prepared for the assault. The air wing will clear the path for them."
Gilad Pellaeon shuddered.
He felt a chill from the realization of what was about to happen.
Trying to gather his scattered thoughts, the Vice Admiral decided to follow the Grand Admiral's advice.
Taking a blanket from the locker, he covered the sleeping Baroness, feeling himself that the atmosphere in the admiral's salon was a bit cool.
Or was it just that he himself was starting to shiver?
No one had ever done this.
No one!
Ever!
Because it was sheer madness!
"Kathol," Thrawn's voice intruded into his thoughts again, sounding once more like an answer to his unspoken question.
It sent chills down his spine.
Was Thrawn really not a Jedi?
Gilad looked at the cage with ysalamiri standing nearby.
Even if he was channeling that Hutt-forsaken Force, it certainly wasn't helping him now.
"Beg your pardon, sir?" Gilad flinched.
"You are pondering that my plan is madness," Thrawn explained. "And that doing such a thing is impossible. Kathol is a planet in the Unknown Regions where, shortly before my return to the explored part of the galaxy, I applied this very tactic."
Gilad felt his lips go dry.
Before this, Thrawn had said very little about what he did during his forced absence from the Empire.
And he had certainly never mentioned specific world names or tactics...
"Was it worth it?" Gilad asked cautiously.
"Completely," Thrawn replied without hesitation.
"Did the enemy surrender?"
"No," Thrawn's voice sounded like the tone of a judge reading a death sentence to a defendant.
"Then maybe it's not worth...?"
That was all the Vice Admiral could manage.
He simply didn't have the strength to continue — neither physical nor moral.
"The enemy did not surrender, Vice Admiral," the Supreme Commander continued. "The enemy was routed and destroyed."
Gilad flinched.
Thrawn was not known for cruelty toward his enemies, unlike most other Imperial Grand Admirals.
He preferred to defeat the enemy, not incinerate them like Grand Moff Tarkin (may the bastard suffer in the afterlife, if one existed), who had rid the galaxy of Alderaan.
But to destroy...
"He must have been a formidable enemy..."
"Correct," Thrawn agreed. "We — both you and I — have already dealt with him before."
Pellaeon frowned.
What was that supposed to mean?
"Poln Minor," Thrawn named another astronomical object.
Pellaeon grimaced as if forced to eat an entire basket of sour fruit.
One of those episodes in life he didn't want to remember, knowing he had been close to death back then.
"You mean to say that..."
His throat seemed to seize up.
And he had been wondering what had become of it.
"Exactly right, Vice Admiral," the Supreme Commander of the Dominion nodded almost imperceptibly. "On Kathol, I destroyed the warlord of the Unknown Regions, Nuso Esva. And today, I will crush the tactical superdroids. The civil war in the D'Astan sector is practically over. All that remains is to wait," Thrawn looked at the ship's chronometer, "a mere three standard minutes. After which, Carannia will be doomed to be conquered by us."