Imperial High Command
Coruscant



There was no fanfare as the private shuttle and its two TIE Defender escorts were pulled from space by the standing immobilizer net. Codes were exchanged between the arrival and orbital control and its journey continued into the atmosphere and down into the heart of Imperial City. Down and down the shuttle descended, its wings folding up and landing gear extending below. From the starboard window the passanger viewed a pair of Fleet-Assault Corps soldiers atop the Palace beginning to raise the a grand admiral's flag. He averted his eyes and keyed his comlink.


" Take it down."


Wordlessly, Baron Telan Desaria exited the shuttle and allowed himself to be swallowed up by the darkness of the Palace's corridors. One turn followed another until he reached his office and then locked himself inside. A squawk came from the desk mounted comm unit, announcing the arrival of Marshal Murat. Desaria moved his hand and muted the device without reply.


Light, horrible unfeeling light accosted the Grand Admiral's sanctity - his personal server droid was activated to shut all the blinds then as quickly as he was called into action shut off by remote. Surrounded by the darkness pierced only the soft light from his emerald-shaded desk lamp, Desaria poured himself a glass of cognac.


My arrogance got many men killed today. I expected the enemy to fight the same way I would have - with some measure of decorum. They did not and ten thousand men paid the price. We were cheated of victory not by the enemy...


...but by me.


Desaria closed his eyes and cursed the Coalition. Then he cursed himself. He had made the fundamental mistake of any commander: he failed to appreciate the enemy. He engaged them on their terms on their field and was suprised by new weapons and new tactics.


The two factors which had any positive status failed to alleviated the guilt Desaria felt. True, they had hurt the enemy a great deal more than they themselves had bled. True they had captured over four hundred enemy soldiers who, due to their disgraceful conduct in battle would not be protected by the Guard: instead, Intelligence and ISB were conducting a string of brutal interrogations and sparing none. For this Desaria had no guilt. Any enemy a Guardsman engaged could be protected if surrendered and sent to a private POW colony. But that was only for those who had held true the purest warrior ideals. These defilers of the Coalition were being torn limb from limb and vital information was being extracted on the locations of bases, ships, and most importantly, these new weapons.


None of this could make the Grand Admiral feel better, though. He knew what he had to do.


Gloria Imperium.


The Grand Admiral removed his sidearm, inserted a new magazine...


...and fired.

Death was a strange feeling in that he was entirely conscious of his passing. From time to time he could hear bits of words, strange strings of faint voices imploring one another to do this thing or that. Taken together they were incoherent but individually he knew: as the End drew near, medics and doctors were trying to save him.


As a man, Telan Desaria had tried to live an exemplary life. Born an aristocrat, he had been taught early on the precepts of honour, dignity, and chivalry and had lived up to every word of his training. From battle to battle he had earned decorations for his actions and scorn for his gallantry - he alone on many fields was willing to extend the honours of war to defeated soldiers and was oft derided as soft. Through the ranks he had toiled until he held the highest position to which a naval officer could aspire: Grand Admiral.


The Coalition had broken his formula - they had an advantage and they had exploited it. For that they could not be faulted for any wise commander would have done the same. However, they had been offered a chance to depart without loss and transfer power without contest - this offer they had not rebuffed as true warriors but ignored. That is where they contravened every rule of war in existence. In that single act they proved dishonourable.


But the mistake was mine - the Coalition is a democracy. They do not value honour as we do.


Consciousness mutated into blindess. Suddenly, where black and dominated light vanuished dark and all was bright before the Admrial's eyes. The light contained itself and then, Baron Desaria chided himself for laughing at mystics who claimed there lay a tunnel before passage to Eternity - here a tunnel there was.


Something was wrong, though - drastically wrong. The light winked from existence and darkness returned. A voice came that void. " Grand Admiral Desaria?"


A tinge of pain washed over his body then without rhyme or reason feeling returned to his extremities. The eyes which had viewed so pure a path to Oblivion now blinked and a figure came from the darkness. The being could not be a God for it wore an Imperial uniform.


A wave of realization slammed against the Grand Admiral force furceful than the broadside of a thousand Star Destroyers - I have been cheated of my death!!!

" Grand Admiral -can you hear me?"


The voice was faint as things came into focus. The process was slow, agonizingly so, but the end was inevitable. His vision cleared and his ears perked as all manner of sounds accosted unused drums. Droids were milling about and chittering as they went, though being medical droids in what was obviously a medical facility, their tones were hushed to give the injured and dying some measure of peace.


" Where..." Baron-Desaria's voice was strained, a feeling coming from his throat as if he had not used his vocal chords in weeks.


" You are aboard the Respite."


Desaria closed his eyes, searching for the name. Respite was a medical cruiser, an old Mark II Victory-class Star Destroyer scheduled for decommissioning and a trip to the breakers that had been given a new lease on life as a floating hospital. At last report, she was around Commenor.


A growl came from the Grand Admiral's lungs, a jumbled angry expression at the incapacity he felt. The last memory he possessed as a coherent stream of thought was being in his office, ashamed at the failure of Tynna. He had finished off an excellent bottle of cognac, drew his pistol...the rest was no longer recorded in his mind.


" What happened." There was no raise of tone to signify a question. The authoritative demand for information that came with a Grand Admiral's uniform returned.


" Malek, your bodyguard, broke into your door." Desaria tried to turn his neck, the reply not the same voice as before. " He knew you might do something and stunned you when he saw you. The bolt hit just as you fired - you vaporized a good portion of your cheek."


Laborious as the process was, Desaria moved his head and looked to see Grand Marshal Kaine standing next to his bed, several doctors and aides behind him. The Marshal snapped his fingers and soon the accompanying people departed the room.


" Just what the hell were you doing?"


The bluntness did not suprise the Grand Admiral, though Kaine's presence did. " I was trying to give the Empire some dignity. I lost at Tynna - I did not want the Empire to bear responsibility for the disgrace. If I were dead, the results could be blamed on me and the Empire would receive no shame. I alone would bear that burden."


" Grow up, Telan. We have all lost battles - had you stayed, more men would have died. As it is, you brought us an impressive haul of prisoners, examples of new Coalition technology, and a thorough recording of their ships in action. We now know a great threat to us, and we can thank you."


" But...I lost!"


" Yes you did," Simon replied. " But you also won. Being a Grand Admiral means that you cannot take the easy way out of command. You bear a responsiblity few have known. Were you some low ranking flag officer no one would miss you - but wearing that uniform means you must learn from your mistakes, not run from them."


To that, Desaria could rebut nothing. He had erred at Tynna, there was no mistake of that. He had been overconfident and he had unwarranted expectations of his enemy's conduct. Perhaps he is right - no, he must be. He outranks even me.


" You have only one day to get off this ship - you have had enough bacta swathed over your face to repair the damage you caused. At the end of that time I expect to see you back on duty. I will not sat this never happened because maybe now you understand that defeat comes as easily as victory. Gloria Imperium Telan - get back to work."


Kaine departed, leaving his protege wordless and shrouded in silence. Desaria fell asleep staring at his uniform, hung on the wall nearby. Indeed he would return to work - he would address his mistake and never let another command make the same ones again. An idea struck him as sleep commandeered his eyes...


Negate speed, negate their advantage...

Five days later...


" They're greatest advantage is speed."


Grand Admiral-Baron Desaria felt his eyes narrow; anger welled up inside him. Four days ago he had sent off a message to General der Pioneeren Otto Hustart demanding a counter to the new wave of Coalition warships. He had drawn up himself a series of projections and conjectured vessels the Empire might encounter and now - he was being told exactly what he already knew.


" I do hope so very much are are summarizing the problem and not annmouncing some revalation as to the enemy's capabilities."


Hustart chuckled and shifted in his seat. Quickly he surmized that the Grand Admiral was in no mood for joviality of any kind. Indeed he looked like a man possessed. Or this is how one looks after two hours of sleep a night and daily intake of a gallon of caf.


" Of course not, sir - this is what we must counter. The Coalition ships have made the most of a specific design philosophy. Are you familiar with the Maxim of Design?" A nod to the negative bade him continue. " Maneuverability and speed, armor and defense, guns and hitting power. These three concepts are the key pillars on which all warships, vessels and vehicles are created around - the maxmim says you can only have two to operate effectively. Imperial ships concentrate on guns and armor - these new Coalition ships maximize guns and speed."


" I hope, General, that you have developed a counter for this." Every connotation of ominous ends that came with the authoritative reply were fully meant by the dour Grand Admiral.


Unflinching, Hustart grinned. " Of course, Your Excellency. May I interest you in a trip to Yaga Minor?"

It had been sometime since had lain eyes on the swirling grey-green mass of Yaga Minor. At last encounter, Yaga Minor was an Imperial fortress world, one of two in the Braxant Sector. Her evenly distributed swamps and savannahs on the surface were interrupted by planetary turbolaser batteries spaced competently enough to bring three guns to bear at any attacker. The world itself was protected by a trio of massive battlestations that drifted lazily just ahead of a rather powerful shield. Moving about nearly a dozen sprawling civilian constructs above the atmosphere were two squadrons of powerful warships supported by an entire fleet of craft from the Imperial Customs Bureau: on the fringe, criminal activity was rampant.


Not much had changed. The world was still fortified and still abustle with activity, the only difference being an increase in population from six to nearly seven billion inhabitants, the majority humanoids.


The bulk of the Suvarov, to which Grand Admiral Desaria had returned his flag, moved from its reversion point deeper into the system. It exchanged a full-broadside's worth of communications signals and various authorization codes with orbital control and went about its way, three Hammer-class Light Cruisers in its wake.


" The Department has our staging area at the second moon. An orbital repair and refurbish-yard is stationed directly overtop and synchronized with its orbit. We're quite proud of it."


Desaria let loose a sustained growl that only he could hear, but any onlooker could see a distinct aura of irritation. General Hustart was one of the heads of the Imperial Department of Military Research and had a hand in designing the Reign-class Destroyers. Despite being six decades' worth of years, though, he still acted as if he were an adolescent college-level architectural student.


The Suvarov journeyed around the planet and fired off a quick reply when the garrison commander's ship saluted the Grand Admiral's flag. Yage, the primary moon, stood off in the distance, a cold and irradiated reminder of a war-long passed. The Star Destroyer yawed to port and the second moon came into view. The facility on the surface was a massive complex, easily home to a hundred thousand soldiers and engineers; due the lack of gravity outside the complex, the repair facility was only a few kilometers from the surface. In it - dwarfing it, in fact - was a Victory-class Star Destroyer.


" Grand Admiral, the 101-B. She's served as our testbed for the last year or so."

Desaria stood from his command chair and pointed towards the hideously transformed battleship. " What are those grates on the dorsal hull?"


" Those, Your Excellency, are the GDS emitters."



General Hustart and the Grand Admiral had made their way towards an observation platform at the forward most-part of the superstucture. There, sipping on fine brandy, Desaria watched the 101-B cast off its moorings and slip into space. It made a leisurely jounrey towards a buoy and then stopped.


" Unfortunately, the GDS requires a massive amount of reactor power, preventing anything like appreciable speed." Hustart activated his comlink. " Commence primary ignition."


Nothing happened. Desaria turned to see Hustart staring at his creation with another smug smirk pasted on his face. Just as he was contemplating the joy deriveable from removing said expression, the Suvarov began to shake uncontrollably. He grabbed his own comlink from his belt. " Report!"


Captain Voltaire's voice replied," we're trapped in some sort of gravimetric anomoly. Our equipment is registering g-forces increasing faster than our inertial dampeners can compensate."


" The GDS is active. It is projecting a field twenty-five kilometers from each emitter, a sphere fifty kilometers wide. Ships inside the field are not trapped as your Captain said, but simply slowed down. Consider wading through waist-deep mud."


Desaria arched an eyebrow on his face - he was half pleased, and half bemused. A question came to his lips but before it was transformed from neural impulse to spoken sound, the 101-B exploded spectacularly.

Grand Admiral Desaria was finally able to mentally filter out the high and low-toned chittering of the medical droid next to him. He winced almost immediately after his glorious achievement: he was unable to ignore the droid's touch or the suturing needle which it seemed to enjoy poking into his eyebrow.


" Your design is flawed, General."


Shaking visibly with more rage at his own failure than fearful of a Grand Admiral's wrath, Lieutenant General Hustart bit off a terse reply into his comlink and faced Desaria. " The design works perfectly, you felt it for yourself. The test-ship was flawed. There was a malfunction."


" Obviously. Have you ascertained the probLEM!" What began as a question ended as an exclamation. The suture was finally done but not before an even-deeper prod by the Four-one-bee Medical Droid. Desaria gritted his teeth and cursed himself for losing balance. It could have been worse though, he comforted himself, for a scant few centimeters to the left and he would have lost his eye on the nearby-table.


" We are gathering the data right now. I have called to duty every officer in the base. The GDS will be operational as planned."


Baron Desaria chuckled odiously to himself. " Famous words, General. See that you do."



Palace of Moff Arell Gerion
Yaga Minor

Twelve Hours Later...


Grand Admiral Desaria was pleased to be in the company of a fellow sophisticate for a change. The short man who sat opposite him in a large drawing room was thin but not weak. He was actually identical in proportions to his arrived guest, both having shared an affinity for shockball during their respective stays at the Imperial Academy. Both men shared a noble background and both were men of keen minds and a singular goal: the betterment of the Empire.


" You no doubt heard of the day's events."


" Indeed," Moff Gerion replied, bringing flame to the end of his hand-rolled cigarra. " Has the Department ascertained the cause of this...malfunction? or do they suspect something more underhanded?"


The taller of the two men sipped at his brandy and relaxed against the deep crimson fabric of a high-backed chair. " Hardly, Arell; nothing so devious. The system they are designing worked as expected but drew far too much power from the reactor. They had designed a newer control system that automatically drew excess energy from other areas and had not shut it down. When the GDS demanded more from the reactor, the droid-brains gave it willingly but the growing demand overloaded the cricuits and it blew."


A sigh from the sector Moff. " The end of your anti-Coalition experiment, then. Pity - I had such hopes for the increased security deployments success would have brought to this sector."


" Moff Gerion, have you ever known me to quit so easily? The design worked - the problem lies in sufficient reactor capacity. Moff Kraken has just decommissioned his last two Mark II Star Destroyers and was sending them to Corellia for breaking-up. I commandeered them and they are en-route here. I had an idea I have ordered General Hustart to make work."


" I should have known." Gerion ran a bare-hand through his dyed-white hair. " You always were persistant - to a fault."


" Mark my words, Arell - this system will enable us to bring the Coalition into our playing field when war breaks out, and break out it will. Trust me, you will get your deployments and substaintially impacted economy. When this system is fully operational I am having it installed on the first of the Conqueror-class Destroyers. You are unfamiliar and rightfully so: suffice it to say when it arrives, headlines will be made and you will see first-hand the Angel of Death that will visit itself upon the Galactic Coalition."

Several Days Later...


And I thought it looked hideous on the drawing board. Alone in the passanger compartment of a shuttle specially designed for yard-work, Grand Admiral Desaria did not hide his disgust. His thoughts ran parallel to the admirals of millennia before who believed that warships should not only be models of efficiency and functionality but also things of beauty. To them as well as him, form should run hand in hand with functionality. An Imperial-III class Star Destroyer was an intimidating beast who looked as powerful as she really was.


Then there was the oddity around which the shuttle scurried. It had began life as an Imperial Star Destroyer but had since its arrival in the Yaga Minor system had lost all grace with which she had slipped from her first berth. The powerful ship appeared to have been cut in half, the two sections drawn apart by a distance of almost a thousand meters. A metal frame stretched from one end to the other; the great space between the ends was being filled by a long construct that was slowly coming together.


All prototypes are hideous, Desaria reminded himself as the small craft made its way towards the in-tact command tower at the vessel's aft. The shuttle turned right and made a quick loop arounnd the superstructure than began an ascent to the top of the yard-itself, giving the Grand Admiral full view of the ship. From one end to the other she was twenty-five hundred meters, the triangular shape of a Star Destroyer replaced by horizontal lines amidships that covered the nine-hundred meter expansion. The outer-layer was being patched together from various slabs of steel around the very heart of the expanse: an improved and expanded reactor. Around it was being installed no weapons, no quarters, no life support systems whatsoever, only girders to keep the power-plant in place.


Running along the port-side of the multi-coloured amalgamation was the grid-lined reason for the lengthening of this battleship: the GDS.


" Her ugliness belies her true power and purpose. In this ship beats the pulse of the device that will bring our enemies to their knees."

[/b]

" All readings are normal, General. Furious has crossed the last marker and is now clear of the yard complex."


" All stop - bring reactor to twenty-percent."


Appearing elongated and quite different from the schematic to which her hull was laid down, the Furious slowed down perceptibly and emitted a soft blue glow from her bow where a bank of recessed thrustered flared to life. At that moment, she was dead in space. Aboard there were no more than three-hundred men a hundred of which were confined to the conning tower while the remainder bravely trapsed about the expanded reactor and to a man prayed to success. Failure lead to only one Fate and it was a grisly one at that.


" Helm answering all stop."


General Hustart cast a glance out the triangular bow viewports. Off quite a distance sat the Reign-class Star Destroyer Suvarov, her search and recovery teams on hot standby. Farther still was the Imperial IV-class Star Destroyer Privadorn, the sector Moff watching eagerly from her bridge. Several other ships from the sector fleet were about, ready to plunge in should disaster strike yet again. The engineer shook his head and placed the ominous portents from his mind.


" Reactor status?"


An older Corellian Master Chief Petty Officer turned to answer. " All systems normal."


" All right: reactor to fifty percent, thats the nominal power of an ISD. When we have fifty percent, engage the GDS."


Alarm klaxons sounded and where the fearless crew dared venture red lights flashed on and off. A warning message went out to the spectator-ships and those men of faith incanted the favor of their gods.


" GDS engaged!"


Hustart sat back in the captain's chair and closed his eyes. This is where things had gone wrong before.


" Alert!!! We're registering reactor over-draw."


Hustart snapped up. " Increase reactor to seventy percent. Continue GDS power-up."


As if grabbed by an invisible hand, the Furious began to shake. Welds started to come loose and at least one piece of steel came loose and broke off into space.


" GDS to full power. Reactor overdraw still reigstering!!!"


Hustart felt sweat bead on his forehead. The expanded reactor was now exceeding the design limitations of a brand-new ISD II and pupming out more energy than most circuits aboard were designed to handle.


" Overload - node 725!!! Overload!!!"


" Shut down that line and reroute power through grid 400," snapped a young Ensign as the shaking crew with a terrifying speed.


" GDS active - field complete!"


" Reactor at eight-nine percent and holding! We've got stress fractures across the board and a thousand different circuits fried..."


The General interruped the damage assesment. " We can deal with that. This ship"- he tapped the chain -" was not made for this kind of stress. We know the GDS will work. Transmit our success to Desaria and abandon ship before she tears herself apart at the seams. Shut down the reactor and the GDS."



Captain Voltaire marched from the communications console at the mouth of the aft control corridor and snapped to attention behind the seated Grand Admiral. Upon hearing the familiar clicking together of jackboot-heels, Desaria turned about, his eyes little more than slits.


" Report from Lieutenant-General Hustart."


The Grand Admiral accepted the flismiplast and scanned it several times before realization set in. His eyes grew wider than a school-boys on seeing his favorite new toy.


Success!!!

It was the like seeing with unshielded eyes the majesty and caprice of the Gods that man could develop a vessel as hideous as that which the Furious had become and as beautiful as the Suvarov. The latter vision of raw power and grace sat three hundred meters directly above the disfigured warship, tethered to one another by fifty woven steel cables. Any on-looker might have assumed towing to be the task at hand were it not for the array of seven small frigate-sized craft near by.



" All systems reporting ready, Your Excellency." Captain Voltaire starightened himself in the starboard crew pit, his manner second only to the Grand Admiral in fastidious devotion to maintaining a pristine uniform.


" Excellent. Open a channel."


From the aft control corridor, a Chief Warrant Officer signaled an affirmative; Grand Admiral Desaria stood and moved forward to the two-dimensional figure projected on the tallest viewport. " Mr. Taris, you are looking well."


" Go to hell," came the biting reply to which the recipient batted not an eye.


" Anger does not become you, Taris - you always were a cunning opponent. Listen carefully for now is the only chance you will have to regain your freedom."


The man dressed in the unmistakable light-blue shirt of a prison-convict ceased speaking. Captain Voltaire, looking on, thought he saw his ears perk up. The Grand Admiral continued.


" You and the men on the seven ships around you are all men condemned to die or spend your lives rotting in Imperial jails. You are scum to a man and have been forgotten by the galaxy. I have no love for any of them - especially you. " Desaria eyed the former pirate with a gleam in his eye the other man did not notice.


" Today you have one chance to win your freedom. We will be conducting a military exercise and you will oppose us. You will attack this ship and if you disable our guns you may continue on unimpeded. The ships you currently man as by now you know are fully armed and operational. The shields are fully charged and your guns are on maximum power - these are not training ships. The vessels you are on are fast - ridiculously so - and I suggest you use that to your advantage because they are not heavily armored."


The pirate sneered again. " What is to stop us from simply running?"


" The planetary defense force and a few of your acquaintences in the Customs Bureau are standing by in case you try."


" Why should we aide in your twisted game?"


" Because if you don't," the Grand Admiral replied," you will be destroyed anyway and my gunners will get some practise. You have five minutes to ready yourselves to engage. Either try to fight or die regardless. Desaria out."


The transmission was cut. Desaria returned to his seat and listened with great glee as the ship reported full combat readiness. When the chrono counted down to zero, the doomed men bent to the whim of the aristocratic Guardsman - all but one who tried to run in the opposite direction and was quickly set on by six lurking missile-boats.


" Enemy in-bound. They are in weapons range."


" Light firing, forward guns only. Is Furious ready?"


" Yes sir!"


" Engage the GDS!"


The frigates came on as fast as their engines would allow, firing every gun as wildly as any possessed crew could. Shots registered on the battleship's armor but none penetrated her hull. Only one battery of turbolasers was replying and that was having difficulty tracking the nimble ships. Around the Suvarov the enemy danced like a flock of birds at a slain beast. Until...


...the GDS bound their wings to the ground. Every ship twenty-kilometers from the tethered pair shook with a terrible ferocity until it felt like every weld and bolt would be torn apart by the very Gods themselves. Then the shaking subsided and all was normal. The structural integrity fields returned to full strength and those fallen soldiers stood once more.


The nimble craft however, sat immobile off the sides of the mighty Star Destroyer and its bastardized brother. They continued to move but at a dreadfully sluggish pace. The trouble the gunners had at tracking their movements evaporated like a lake on Aridus.


" Orders, Admiral?"


Grand Admiral Desaria looked down at his flag-captain. " The GDS is operational. Ready a report and affix my signature and send it priority to High Command. Maxmimum scramble."


" And them, Your Excellency?"


" Fire at will."


The Supreme Commander of the Imperial Guard departed the bridge with the light of six explosions washing over his back.

The journey Corsucant took two days at full-steam for the Suvarov and its crew was tired. For almost a month it had remained on station at Yaga Minor and participated in no action save that of the very end - an action that lasted little time indeed. Daily routine had seriously drained the crew as shore-leave was forbidden to maintain secrecy. The trials of a new weapons system were now done and the flagship of the Guard was home.


The men and officers of the Suvarov were exhultant when, after debriefing by a team from Imperial Intelligence, they were granted a five-day reprieve in which they could release the tension built up over their deployment. Many would visit the bars so common to sailors throughout Imperial City while others would frequent the brothels tightly regulated by the Interior Ministry, each one safe in the knowledge that bureaucrats had assured them a respite with clean and healthy ladies of fortune.


Relief was acheived not only for the crew but for the flag officer aboard as well. His came not in the bustling neon lights and flashing signs of the lower-levels but in delivering a report in person to Grand Marshal Kaine. When the older veteran took the caligraphized document from the Kuati man's hand, a wealth of pressure hissed out. The dead of Tynna now had new life in their vengeance, the instrument of which was at present being installed in the massive warship under-tow to Yaga Minor. Marshal Kaine offered Desaria leave and a monetary reward for the splendid success which would aide in the inevitable war to come: the Grand Admiral refused both.


Grand Admiral Desaria had work to do. Before the war, he had his own vendetta to settle in the calm before the storm. He had been defeated at Tynna but he too would have his revenge. The circle would come around in time and he would find the man in command of the enemy formation and hand him a diaster of his own. Intelligence needed to be gathered, prisoners taken, systems reconnoitered. Remembering his brief time as Chief of the General Staff, Grand Admiral Desaria threw himself upon the task at hand. The Conqueror would not be ready for two more weeks and in that two weeks, thought Desaria as he sat down to his desk:


I have hell to raise.