For months now Lorell’s Raiders had been striking Borderland transport ships moving across the Dragon Spine, nearly grinding commerce to a halt. Well equipped with jamming fields, heavy cruisers and high power missile launchers, they had prove themselves to be one of the best equipped, if not the best equipped, pirate group in the galaxy.
Fortunately, today that was about to end. Underworld contacts reporting directly to Grand Moff Thorton himself had given up the location of the base in exchange for who knows what. Perhaps pardons for previous crimes, or simply to get rid of a business associate. Unless they received a pardon they would be handled later – there was no room for underworld filth in this protectorate. For now, Lorell and his group were the focus.
Outside the Star Destroyer Inexorable sat five other mighty Star Destroyers. No smaller support vessels would be needed this day. Against the heavy cruisers of the pirate fleet guarding the base they would be needlessly destoryed. The flotilla’s crews were ready and the jump from the outer limits of the planetary system to the base took only six seconds.
The Raider’s base was located in an asteroid locked in an orbit around a class-D yellow star. Locked in orbit with it were several dozen smaller asteroids, almost certainly the home of defensive weaponry. This would be a tough nut to crack, though not too hard for the Imperial Fleet, especially not with the new upgrade packages the ships were equipped with.
Moments after they dropped out of hyperspace nearly on top of the base – only a few dozen kilometers separated them from it – a thick and powerful jamming field activated. Though this may have been a good strategy against normal opponents, with the Star Destroyers new Laser Communications module it was a fruitless waste of power. Because they were in line of sight communication between ships continued as normal. The only issue with the new measure was that it didn’t work if ships were hidden behind planets, other ships, or asteroids. They would have to be careful and keep any of the Star Destroyers from going behind the base and getting cut off.
Automatically the ship’s datalinks activated, working even with standard communications down. Instantly every other vessel’s sensor and targeting data was available to every other ship in the battlegroup. After some number crunching by the ship’s central computer the ranges of enemy targets were triangulated and sent to gunnery crews, providing them with slightly more accurate targeting data than if only the mother ships data was used. Automatically the datalink divided targets up between the Star Destroyers based on which one was in the best position to engage them.
Sure enough, the asteroids around the base turned out to have missile launchers on them which opened fire on them presently. Clouds of Proton Torpedoes and Concussion Missiles moved toward them and the vessel’s Phalanx Missile Defense System went to work. Though the Phalanx was very effective, there were only so many missiles it could get and many of them got through. Automatically the vessel’s central computer activated the ship’s new Two-layer particle shields. For a brief moment as power was redirected the shields were reduced the minimum level, the level kept up at all times to protect against space debris. Then the two layers were up, the outer one with only a third of the inner one. The swarm of Proton Torpedoes and Concussion missiles easily knocked their way through the first shield, but were halted by the stronger second which was much stronger. Missiles weren’t very smart – something as small as them couldn’t be – and they automatically assumed that they had passed through the vessel’s particle shields when passing through the first layer and were now impacting the hull, causing most of them to explode. Those who didn’t explode due to faulty logic – those broken or in some way defected – managed to slip through the now weakened shields, impacting against the Star Destoyer’s hull, but the vessel was more than capable of taking the punishment.
The Imperial fleet had now absorbed the brunt of what the pirates could bring to bare. It was time to go on the offensive. The Inexorable pointed itself toward an enemy heavy cruiser and moved forward, turbolaser energy leaping out toward enemies of the Empire. Things were going well – heavy cruisers were no match for Star Destoyers – when a Lieutenant appeared next to the captain. “Sir,” he reported, “Stealth Intruder detected.” The Captain looked up at a panel of displays in the bridges center where the Strategic Sensor Suite’s display was located. Sure enough out around the maximum limit of turbolaser range was a patch of read. At that range the sensors weren’t extremely specific about a location for a stealthed intruder and could only provide a general area a threat was located in. If it got closer to the ship they could get a more precise bearing. They could get a very precise reading – precise enough to target a shuttle or fighter if it were moving slow enough for the main guns – at around half of Turbolaser effective range.
This time they didn’t have to worry about that, though. “This one’s ours, Lieutenant,” the Captain said. “Moff Thorton told me we would have a stealthed observer present for this attack, and this seems to be it.” Outside there was almost nothing left of the pirate base, which was being blasted away piece by piece by Imperial Turbolasers. In his opinion this had been a very effective demonstration.
“Order fighters to look for survivors and launch shuttles to collect them,” he ordered. “We’d hate to not bring Imperial Intelligence Interrogators any company.”
Fortunately, today that was about to end. Underworld contacts reporting directly to Grand Moff Thorton himself had given up the location of the base in exchange for who knows what. Perhaps pardons for previous crimes, or simply to get rid of a business associate. Unless they received a pardon they would be handled later – there was no room for underworld filth in this protectorate. For now, Lorell and his group were the focus.
Outside the Star Destroyer Inexorable sat five other mighty Star Destroyers. No smaller support vessels would be needed this day. Against the heavy cruisers of the pirate fleet guarding the base they would be needlessly destoryed. The flotilla’s crews were ready and the jump from the outer limits of the planetary system to the base took only six seconds.
The Raider’s base was located in an asteroid locked in an orbit around a class-D yellow star. Locked in orbit with it were several dozen smaller asteroids, almost certainly the home of defensive weaponry. This would be a tough nut to crack, though not too hard for the Imperial Fleet, especially not with the new upgrade packages the ships were equipped with.
Moments after they dropped out of hyperspace nearly on top of the base – only a few dozen kilometers separated them from it – a thick and powerful jamming field activated. Though this may have been a good strategy against normal opponents, with the Star Destroyers new Laser Communications module it was a fruitless waste of power. Because they were in line of sight communication between ships continued as normal. The only issue with the new measure was that it didn’t work if ships were hidden behind planets, other ships, or asteroids. They would have to be careful and keep any of the Star Destroyers from going behind the base and getting cut off.
Automatically the ship’s datalinks activated, working even with standard communications down. Instantly every other vessel’s sensor and targeting data was available to every other ship in the battlegroup. After some number crunching by the ship’s central computer the ranges of enemy targets were triangulated and sent to gunnery crews, providing them with slightly more accurate targeting data than if only the mother ships data was used. Automatically the datalink divided targets up between the Star Destroyers based on which one was in the best position to engage them.
Sure enough, the asteroids around the base turned out to have missile launchers on them which opened fire on them presently. Clouds of Proton Torpedoes and Concussion Missiles moved toward them and the vessel’s Phalanx Missile Defense System went to work. Though the Phalanx was very effective, there were only so many missiles it could get and many of them got through. Automatically the vessel’s central computer activated the ship’s new Two-layer particle shields. For a brief moment as power was redirected the shields were reduced the minimum level, the level kept up at all times to protect against space debris. Then the two layers were up, the outer one with only a third of the inner one. The swarm of Proton Torpedoes and Concussion missiles easily knocked their way through the first shield, but were halted by the stronger second which was much stronger. Missiles weren’t very smart – something as small as them couldn’t be – and they automatically assumed that they had passed through the vessel’s particle shields when passing through the first layer and were now impacting the hull, causing most of them to explode. Those who didn’t explode due to faulty logic – those broken or in some way defected – managed to slip through the now weakened shields, impacting against the Star Destoyer’s hull, but the vessel was more than capable of taking the punishment.
The Imperial fleet had now absorbed the brunt of what the pirates could bring to bare. It was time to go on the offensive. The Inexorable pointed itself toward an enemy heavy cruiser and moved forward, turbolaser energy leaping out toward enemies of the Empire. Things were going well – heavy cruisers were no match for Star Destoyers – when a Lieutenant appeared next to the captain. “Sir,” he reported, “Stealth Intruder detected.” The Captain looked up at a panel of displays in the bridges center where the Strategic Sensor Suite’s display was located. Sure enough out around the maximum limit of turbolaser range was a patch of read. At that range the sensors weren’t extremely specific about a location for a stealthed intruder and could only provide a general area a threat was located in. If it got closer to the ship they could get a more precise bearing. They could get a very precise reading – precise enough to target a shuttle or fighter if it were moving slow enough for the main guns – at around half of Turbolaser effective range.
This time they didn’t have to worry about that, though. “This one’s ours, Lieutenant,” the Captain said. “Moff Thorton told me we would have a stealthed observer present for this attack, and this seems to be it.” Outside there was almost nothing left of the pirate base, which was being blasted away piece by piece by Imperial Turbolasers. In his opinion this had been a very effective demonstration.
“Order fighters to look for survivors and launch shuttles to collect them,” he ordered. “We’d hate to not bring Imperial Intelligence Interrogators any company.”