The Crimson Emperor/Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4. CLASH OF GIANTS.

The bridge of the Defiance grew chaotic as officers barked different orders to the crewmen and ran between stations. Admiral Ackbar hesitated for several seconds before saying anything, shocked at the gathering: from what he could see, there were at least twelve Imperial Star Destroyers in the system, and at least four of the smaller Victory-class ships. Their task force was greatly outnumbered and outgunned. Perhaps Leia was right about me being too hasty, the Mon Calamari admiral thought. But no time to worry about that now, he had a battle to fight! Speaking to into the comms for all ships to hear, he gave the first order.

"All ships, take evasive action!"

The Star Destroyers began firing at them and closing in at a rapid speed. Ackbar turned over to the navigation section, and looked at the chief navigator.

"How long before we can enter hyperspace again and retreat?" the admiral asked.

The chief looked back at some consoles, then turned back to face the Mon Cal. "Several minutes, sir."

"Work on it as fast as possible, chief," Ackbar replied. "We might not have that long!"

"Yes, sir!"

In the meantime, he would have to hold off the attacking Imperial forces. The Mon Delindo, which was on the starboard side of the Defiance. The ship was taking a heavy pounding from the turbolaser batteries of several near by Star Destroyers and now the waves of oncoming TIE fighters. Ackbar turned to the chief gunnery officer.

"Open fire on the Star Destroyer nearest to the Mon Delindo, target its guns!"

"Yes, sir!" came the reply.

"Rogue Squadron," Ackbar said said into his commlink. "See what you can do about the closest Star Destroyer."

Wedge heard Admiral Ackbar's command over his headset in his X-wing. "Understood, admiral."

"Alright, Rogues, our target is that Star Destroyer near the Mon Delindo," he told the squadron. "Two, Three, and Four, follow me. The rest of you, focus on those TIEs!"

Wedge flew his X-wing past the Mon Delindo as affirmatives from the other pilots came over his headset. Their flight of four X-wings flew past the Star Cruiser, which was taking a beating from the nearby Star Destroyer. He didn't know how long its shields could hold under such firepower. We better make this quick then, the Corellian ace thought.

As they passed the Star Cruiser, the enemy TIE fighters were on them. Four eyeballs (the New Republic pilots' term for regular TIE fighters) passed him in a square-shaped formation as they opened fire. Wedge ignored them, the rest of the Rogues would handle them, right now his target was the Star Destroyer. They had to buy time for the Mon Delindo to move away in preparation for the jump to hyperspace. He flew X-wing towards the Star Destroyer, followed closely by those of Two, Three, and Four.

One of the TIE fighters noticed them and began flying towards them, firing off some shots in their direction. But two green lasers from behind Wedge hit the TIE before he could aim for it, sending it into a wild spin before it exploded.

"Got one of the eyeballs," came Two's voice.

Right now, Rogue Two was Rhysati Ynr, a Human female who joined the squadron during their fight against Imperial Intelligence director Ysanne Isard.

"Good shot, Two," Wedge told her.

The X-wings approached the front of the Star Destroyer as turbolaser batteries noticed them and began firing in their direction.

"Pass under it, then come up near the engines. We'll take out its deflector shields," Wedge said.

Several affirmatives came over his headset. Wedge angled the X-wing downwards as they passed down and under the behemoth Star Destroyer. There were no turbolasers here that could reach them. There were no TIE fighters in the area either, as they were all attacking the other New Republic fighters and the capital ships. The flight reached the back end of the Star Destroyer and pulled up, bringing the X-wings passed the engines of the warship and near its bridge.

"Three and Four, target the one on the starboard side," he said. "We'll take the other."

"Understood, Lead," Three replied. The Twi'lek pilot Nawara Ven was flying as Rogue Three for this battle.

The X-wings split up, a pair heading to each of the deflector shield generators on the Star Destroyer's command tower. As they neared them, turbolasers down below noticed and began firing at them, but were too far away to actually hit the New Republic pilots.

Wedge's targeting computer locked on the nearby deflector shield dome and made a beeping sound as a pair of concussion missiles launched at it. Two streaks from behind him followed the missiles he had launched, coming from Two's X-wing. The missiles hit their target moments later, turning the deflector shield generator momentarily into a ball of fire, before the smoke cleared away to reveal charred pieces of broken metal.

"We got our target, Three," Wedge told him.

"Copy that, Lead, we're almost done here. Wedge turned his X-wing to fly around the destroyed deflector shield, and then back down along the back of the command tower. He was preparing to lead them back over to the Mon Delindo, but then got another idea.

"You still have several missiles left?" he asked the others.

They all replied yes, their X-wings held a total of six missiles, and they had only used two each.

"Alright, follow me. We're going to take out the bridge of this thing."

The bridge of the Emperor's Revenge was a bit crowded. Officers and crewmen went about their tasks silently and efficiently, as always, while Carnor Jax stood by the viewports along with several other commanders. General Wessel and Captain Harmon were there, along with Admiral Daala and Vice Admiral Pellaeon. As soon as their fleet assembled, Jax and Daala told them that they now were part of the Imperial Navy of the new Emperor, and that they would have the honor of striking the first blow against the New Republic in the campaign that would lead to its defeat.

And of course, the former Guardsman told them of their predicament—a New Republic task force somehow learned of their location and was on their way to them. The assembled Star Destroyer fleet waited for the doomed Rebels to arrive in order to destroy them. "Our first victory in the line of many against the New Republic," Jax had told them, "begins here, today."

Since Jax was a soldier, not a navy man, he allowed Admiral Daala and Vice Admiral Pellaeon to command the fleet during this battle. The two officers were both experienced and quite clever, proving to be very capable of the task. Their Star Destroyers ambushed the New Republic task force, which was a lot smaller than they anticipated. One of the nearby Star Cruisers was now on fire and on the verge of being completely destroyed by the Steadfast, the nearest Star Destroyer to it.

Emperor Jax tried to not listen to all of the distracting sounds around him on the bridge. Instead, he reached with the Force, feeling for the leader of the New Republic task force. And he felt a familiar presence aboard one of their ships. Admiral Ackbar. Jax had been serving aboard a Star Destroyer during a Rebel attack years ago, and it was led by Ackbar. The Mon Calamari cleverly outmaneuvered their task force and destroyed many of their ships before being forced to withdraw.

Suddenly, several flashing lights in the distance got Jax's attention. He then realized what happened. The two deflector shield domes on the Steadfast had been destroyed. How? he thought. No matter, it was only a minor problem. Jax picked up his commlink and hailed the commander of the 133rd Imperial Fighter Group—the main fighter unit in their fleet.

"Commander, send a squadron over to the Steadfast. It appears we have some trouble near the bridge of the ship," he told the commander.

"Yes, my lord," came his reply.

The former Guardsman then noticed that the New Republic ships began moving away from the battle zone, including the New Republic Star Cruiser that was taking a beating from the guns of the Steadfast. He could not allow them to escape with so little casualties.

"All Star Destroyers, focus your firepower on the nearest Star Cruiser."

He watched as the affirmatives came through from the different captains, with the Star Destroyers focusing their fire on that ship. The Star Cruiser began to fall apart as explosions and fire broke out all over their ship. Finally, a large explosion tore the Star Cruiser apart, breaking it into pieces. The smoldering wreckage of the Star Cruiser floated in different directions, with Imperial and New Republic fighters moving away to avoid getting hit.

Finally, the battle seemed to be almost over.

The canopy of Wedge's X-wing flashed briefly due to a massive explosion somewhere nearby. Their flight of X-wings was fighting off a squadron of eyeballs and squints (TIE interceptors) that suddenly attacked them as they tried to attack the bridge of the Star Destroyer. Wedge was pursuing one of those eyeballs now. It tried to move out of his sight, but Wedge angled the X-wing toward the direction it was headed and fired. The eyeball flew right into his green laser bolts, disappearing in a ball of flame.

The Corellian pilot turned his attention to the other explosion. Wedge then saw the destroyed Mon Delindo, with the ship having split into several flaming, charred pieces that were now drifting around the battle zone.

"Three, did you see what happened?"

"Yes, Lead," he replied. "The Star Destroyers targeted the Mon Delindo and completely annihilated it."

Wedge pulled up to avoid enemy fire from an attacking squint behind him, but before he could reply to what Three told him, a new voice sounded over his headset.

"All fighters, prepare to retreat," it was Admiral Ackbar. "We will be leaving the system in a minute."

Wedge pulled his fighter up and flew around the pursuing squint. The pilot of the interceptor attempted to follow him, but was unable to in time, and ended up receiving several green lasers to his cockpit. The squint exploded in a flash of light.

"Alright, it's time to go," Wedge told the other pilots.

Gilad Pellaeon watched as the last of the New Republic warships left into hyperspace. The smoldering remains of the Star Cruiser, as well as many New Republic starfighters, remained in the system as testimony to their victory. He turned to the group of people standing next to him on the bridge of the Revenge.

"Good work, gentlemen," came the voice of Carnor Jax. "The day is ours."

Pellaeon found the Guardsman to be an enigmatic figure. He wore the black and red uniform of an Imperial Sovereign Protector—the highest rank a Royal Guard could achieve—and never revealed his face. His voice was slightly distorted by his helmet, and sounded in a low tone.

"Thank you, my lord," replied Pellaeon. He was quite content to have an Emperor again, whether he was related to Palpatine or not. The Empire now had a unifying figure to rally behind, and that was what mattered to him.

Beside him, a woman spoke up. "What will be our next course of action? What have you planned?"

Carnor Jax turned to face Natasi Daala. She was a clever tactician and charismatic leader, Pellaeon had noticed, and could prove to be very useful to the resurgent Empire. They would need to rally new recruits to their cause, of course, and she would be just the one to do it. The former Royal Guard said nothing for a moment.

"We will need to go to Ord Cantrell," he said after a little bit. "I need to inform the Interim Ruling Council of these developments."

Pellaeon was a bit surprised by that. He thought that the Ruling Council perished on Byss, but apparently that was not the case.

Carnor Jax continued. "With the major Deep Core warlords out of the way, the rest will fall in line with us. The New Republic only suffered a bloody nose here militarily with the lose of its Star Cruiser and many fighters, but now it knows one thing. The Empire is back."

The new Emperor turned to Captain Harmon, who was standing behind him.

"You have your orders."

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