<font color=red> "Peace is not an absence of war, it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice." </font>

More wiser words had never been spoken, thought Lord Admiral Kyric Zen. They are so true—only those who know peace of the mind can find peace of his body and that of his neighbor. “That is what we are trying to do; but it has been decided that through some strange act of the force, galactic peace is quite impossible. So this is the next best thing.” The Admiral pointed a holographic image of hollowed out star destroyer, with massive generators embed in it.

“What this hybrid will do for the Jutraalian Empire will be significant. They will shut our borders down to all undesired hyperspace travel including an invasion force.”

“What bout enemy ships blowin’ ‘er up?” questioned on the master builders that Zen was talking to.

“Cloaking shields.”

“What about crystal-gravity traps?” Piped up another one of the builders.

“Anti-Matter nodes embedded within the star destroyer. Now, granted this will make the ship extra volatile but, if they enemy finds them best it be destroyed then they get their hands on them.”

“Clever,” He replied.

“The entire interior will be stripped out and replaced with generators and a backup set of generators should the primary ones be disabled, a cloak shield and twenty gravity wells. Shields will be very minimal, the engine speed will be slightly restricted, but the crew will be a few hundred specially trained engineers that can pilot and navigate an ISD as well.” Zen explained, “Any comments Viscount?”

The Supreme Inquisitor felt out of place for the first time in many, many years. He sat, in a uniform of power, at the head of a large table, the view of a massive shipyard complex to one side and a pleasing mural to another. With him sat the bext engineers and architects of the Jutraalian Empire. His mind was tactical, and he could see the needs therein. He proposed many ideas, some considered a waste, and others inspired. But these were the men who brought dreams to reality.

In truth, the Viscount felt....outclassed.

The presence of Lord Admiral Zen, a fellow naval officer, lessened the oddity. He was brilliant scientifically beyond anything the Viscount could ever hope to attin, but in uniform they were peers.

And for that, the Grand Admiral thanked the Emperor.

“ Any comments, Viscount?" Zen asked.

The Grand Admiral stood and moved to the wall-sized holoprojector the Lord Admiral was standing near.

" Yes. I would suggest reducing the size of the primary launch bay. Though this will reduce fighter capacity to three squadrons at best, if a battle around them comes to a point where its three squadrons are needed, then the self destruct has already been set. The additional room could be used to house a power converted from the ionization reactor to the gravity well generators, increasing their efficiency.

" Weapons could as well be reduced, allowing greater power feed to the generator domes.

" In addition, twenty domes would be redunant. Creating an interdiction sphere is our hope, but we can make gravity only so dense. Six or eight Immobilizer-class domes should do the job sufficiently. At full power, they would create a sphere, what, the size of a large system?"

Some nodded, some took notes, and some continued their rampant sketching, oblivious to what was being said.

" Crew quarters should as well be concentrated and lighting kept to a minimum, all of course to save energy for the domes. That said, the primary reactor chambers could be gravity free, so the internal reactor has to feed less power to the artificial projection system."

" Admiral?"

"Yes...Yes. Yes. I agree! We shall also need to graft two armored power-transfer lines here--" He pointed at one spot and "Here!" and to another nearby.

"These will be for some modified Carrack class ships that are floating batteries between the ships, to give surplus energy so the reactors are not over-worked. That is the main goal. Any last comments?"

oops

The Viscount had none, and the engineers and designers were too full of ideas to blurt any out, lest their combined aria of words distract any of their thoughts.

The Viscount smiled, a pleasant non evil one at that, rare for any Inquisitoriate officer.

" That's that then. I have ordered five Imperial II-class Star Destroyers here, and shall arrive within the hour. They are to be our prototypes. They shall be outfitted and rigged as planned. Go over the schematics, commit them to memory, and be ready to bring this idea to life.

" That being said, Lord Admiral Zen is in overall charge of the yards until the completion of this project. All construction is halted, as preparations have already been made to move the lain keels to other docks.

" I do not care how much it costs, or how many designs you have to go through. But finish it.

" That being said, we have a flotilla to build."

Thousands of workers took to the job of gutting the massive cruisers. To be honest there was actually a lot of decks and rooms within the ships and as space was beginning to open up, the fearsome destroyers were becoming even more awesome.

Gravity wells had been shipped in from interdictors that were being scrapped-- yet they hadn't arrived quite yet. Hopefully the rest of the operation should remain on schedule to get these defensive units out to the lines.

Lord Admiral Zen looked out and about at the space surronding the ships. It was littered with debris and garbage-- quite a discouraging site. Should anyone just hop insystem one would think that a battle had just occured.

The Supreme Inquisitor owed the Lord Admiral Zen a favor. So he had remained at Shipyards Bravo II to aide in what the Lord Admiral detested and disdained: administrative work.

Near the top of the office tower in the middle fof the expansive shipyard complex, the Grand Admiral had been set up with an office. While not plush, it was cozy. The Viscount had been in it for no more than twenty minutes when a young engineer arrived to speak with him.

" Enter," del Forza bade as he looked over some reports that were waiting him regarding the construction and its required materials.

The jumpsuited engineer came in and took a seat. There was not an officer in the Empire who minded the laid back atmosphere at the yards, their crewers and designers commissioned and in service, yet none using their ranks or, most of the time, uniforms.

" Yes?"

" Thir," the engineer replied with a slight lisp in his diction. " There ith a problem."

" With what? The Destroyers only arrive five minutes ago and are not even in position yet."

" Terrium thpannerth."

" Spanners?"

The engineer nodded, and it took all the Grand Admiral not to laugh.

" What's the problem with them?"

" We don't have any. Thith yard wath never uthed to make Interdictorth. We need them to calibrate each computer core. Ath we never produced anything with the gravity wellth, we were never itthued any."

" I see. So can't you do the non-interdictor work without them until I requisition some?"

" Yeth, but we made the timetable thinking could complete the theperate work and then athemble everything. If we don't thtart them now, the timetable will be puthed back by at leath a month."

" All right. I'll get some here soon. Start what you can, and I'll get some. Push the schedule back by ten days."

"OK!" The engineer smiled and bopped out of the office.

When he was gone, the Viscount laughed uncontrollably and began his requisitioning.