Ask Battle in the Void

[Zeseth]

Bridge Ambience​

Lieutenant Zeseth, Imperial Fleet Command, Sith Empire
Raider III-class Corvette, Silent Observer
Somewhere in the Radama Void

A mouse droid whizzed across the bridge of the Silent Observer, nearly hitting the feet of the young Imperial Officer as he entered. His red eyes shifted back towards the droid with a curious gaze, before stepping fully into view of his small command wing. The four officers on the command turned to gaze at their commanding officer, he could see it in their eyes -- curiosity and contempt...interesting. After several long moments they turned back to focus on their screens, leaving the Chiss to wonder what they thought of him.

Fresh from the academy, no official flight records, no campaigns, no experience. It would be foolish to allow such a foolish mission to go ahead. The words of the Commanding Fleet officers came rushing back into thought. Captain Neyndo had scoffed at his suggestion of sending a strike force for an irrelevant planet on the edge of the Sith Territory. The planet held some economic prosperity, but the benefits didn't seem to be there on the surface. The deeper meaning always lingers beneath the appearance, the Chiss thought to himself, and perhaps Admiral Harkon had seen the same value that the Chiss had. He had been given command of a small corvette, outfitted with a single company of stormtroopers and a single shuttle. Perhaps he figures it would be a way to remove an ambitious upstart from the ranks, a suicide mission as one would say.

But, Zeseth had no plans on dying today. He had studied the astrological maps along with the hyperspace routes. A Cosmic anomaly would be moving through the vector, causing gasses and particle matter to build up and cause a storm system to brew through the area. Visibility would be low and the electron storms could ruin a ships navigation and engines if they weren't careful. But, it would keep them hidden, allowing his detachment of hand selected Imperial Agents and Sith to enter the planet with his company of troops.

Their job would be to match whatever naval occupation hung within the atmosphere of the planet. The ISB's scouting report was sparse and lacked any real concrete evidence. Only rumors and suggestions of the Old Empire's ships were in possession, with estimations being from a single corvette and a squadron of fighters to a single star destroyer. If it was the latter, there would be difficulties, but he would manage. This was a newer ship, freshly commissioned, it would be able to out maneuver the guns for a little while.

"Release the Probing beacons." Zeseth commanded as he made his way towards the edge of the bridge that overlooked the expanse of wide space. His eyes closed as he ran his mind through every possible challenge or alteration within their battleplan.

"Sir, those probes will get eaten up in that storm. You'll be wasting..."

The Chiss turned, cutting the man off. "Exactly, they'll be hiding close to the planet, most likely in it's gravitational hold and avoiding the storm. Even if we only get partial information, we won't be going in blind, and I'm banking on those probes frying within the anonymity of this storm. Their radars will never pick them up."

The Officers looked to each other before offering a nod. The Chiss' logic was sound, he had been planning it all along. A smile crossed his face as he watched two probes launch out from the hull of the ship and into the depths of the storm. This won't be the last surprise of mine. Not when I seek to bring a gift for you...

tag: @Darasuum

 

[Wiley Winnz]

Wiley Winnz was aware of Ord Radama space due to the nature of his hobbies. A famed racer or two hailed from the planet. He couldn't help but know about the world and the surrounding space from what he had heard in cantinas about a pod racer by the name of Wan Sandage. Now he was flying towards it with a squadron of starfighters moving into formation.

Joining the raider on the fight were the forces absorbed from Malicia long ago but still were loyal to Wiley. Just a set of Gozanti bulk cruisers with a few first order type TIE fighters. The pilots for each starfighter disengaged from their contacts with the auxilary ship and moved to join the dark side pilot in formation.

The bulk cruisers were not great in direct confrontation but their scanners might aid in navigating the storm clouds in the void. Furthermore they helped the small craft during the longer voyages while also holding troops once the Sith has the opportunity to land on Ord Radama. For that reason, and the fact that they were relatively disposable, but still managed to survive this long had led them to being dispatched on this mission with the Silent Observer's strike group.

First things first, the Sith Champion was garbed in his flight suit and sitting comfortably in his starblade class starfighter which flew alongside the corvette and in front of the two Gozanti transports. He had flown through hyperspace in the small craft for this mission. He had yet to fly the newer impetuous class interceptors a great deal but appreciated the smooth flying of the blackwell made starfighter. BA-10, his astromech had remained silent for most of the trip except to alert him of the occasional update.

Behind him were three similar ships of the same make and model. These and the Sith Champion gave him exactly twelve small craft at his command. But he knew to trust his pilot's capabilities in combat and had flown with him long enough. They covered his back and he took care of theirs'.

Looking back, things had changed as weeks had turned into months, and months had turned into years for the Sith. There was the Sith Eternal but that had since changed to become the Sith Empire. All the while the ex-Jazaq went from marauder to champion. Same karking junk, different day. He was just doing what he was good at so of course Wiley would enjoy himself.

"This is Reaper Leader, all systems are good. Check in reaper squadron." He said over the encrypted link between ships. The pilots would reply in turn. This was hardly the largest force the Champion had commanded but he wasn't about to complain. The small craft would wait patiently until directed further by the battle group leader, Lieutenant Zeseth. The Ossein had never met the Chiss officer in person but today would show if the blue skinned man had a cunning mind to match the reputation his people possessed.

@TWD26

 

[Zeseth]

​

Everything had been moving into place, confirmation had come in that both operations on the ground had begun and the dark agents of the Sith had secured a stealthy launch of their operation. There would be no alerts to the bridge crews of the planetary fleet system, all attacks would come as a surprise -- much to Zeseth's delight.

The probe droids's muffled beeps and tones transmitted across the bridge of the Silent Observer, causing data to transmit across the holotable that sat within the bridge. An image of a single Gladiator Class Star Destroyer had been superimposed beside the flashing blue image of the planet.

"This is a suicide mission," barked one of the pilots as he looked back to his commanding officer. "Call this off!"

"Nonsense," barked the Chiss. "The ship only has two more laser defense turrets. Their hardest weapon is those torpedoes, along with the 4 squadrons of TIE fighters that they can bring equipped to any battle. Our Ion Cannon systems will disable their shields."

The Chiss turned towards one of the buttons on the table, tapping it. "Prepare the rudimentary heat-up of our cannon." Their was a hiss and then a confirmation. But, this didn't seem to warm the hearts of the pilots on the bridge.

"That's a lovely idea cadet, but this isn't a simulation. How are you going to get us close." One of the bridge pilots huffed towards their commanding officer. But, the men would have their answer soon enough.

"Lord Wiley your fleet has my confirmation to engage. Deploy your fighters and hit them head on, we'll follow close behind." Zeseth's voice broke through the bridge as he super imposed an image of the Sith Lord in his cockpit. "We'll be taking a route around the planet's atmosphere. Try to hold around as long as possible."

The Chiss's fingers pressed the sequences and coordinates to turn their corvette away and towards the farside of the planet. He had an idea, hopefully the mathematics that he had run through would work, and if it did, it would be a glorious day for the Empire.

@Darasuum

 

[Wiley Winnz]

Spoiler: music

The Ossein was wise enough to read the mission briefing even if he did it with a sense of arrogance at the time. The pilot had plenty of experience with the limitations of space craft and void travel. In his youth the man was a slingshot pilot, relying on nothing but the gravity wells of astronomical bodies to travel sublight. Of course those days were a bit behind him as he hadn't done such a stunt since the battle of Sullust.

Now he would earn some glory to his name with the difficulties of the expected anomaly. The odds were what made this exciting for him. The Champion of the Dark Side examined the displayed image of the Gladiator class star destroyer. Its starfighter compliment was almost double what the Sith Empire forces had. But if they had the first strike, then maybe they would gain the upper hand and cripple the star destroyer and maybe even win a decisive victory. Crazier things had happened.

As the man was contemplating this he heard the voice of the Lieutenant come in over the ship to ship channel directed at him. He wasn't used to being called Lord but it certainly brought him out of his analytical mindset. "Understood, we'll bloody them for you." He said in affirmative.

Switching to speak to the squadron of starfighters under his command, Wiley would know they were formed up in three box like formations each. The TIE/FO models wouldn't have an issue keeping up with the starblades which had slightly more impressive ordnance onboard. "We're approaching the keel. Don't let their turrets track you. Avoid port and starboard sides." The man knew his ships and the Gladiator had all of its medium laser cannon batteries on the aforementioned sides of the vessel. The turbo laser turrets would naturally have trouble tracking the nimble starfighters and would be lucky to hit a ship more than anything. But Wiley hoped they wouldn't even get the chance to turn and fire. "Target the turbolasers if you can so we can get some support eventually. Let's not hog the glory." His bravado was infectious and echoed by several of the pilots.

Reaper squadron knew to not waste their laser cannon fire on the heavy deflector screen of the star destroyer. They needed to hit key points before small craft were able to deploy and make things hard. The dozen Sith starfighters sped towards the star destroyer at 120 MGLT. Meanwhile, Wiley focused on aiming at the hangarbay shield in the front and center of the ship. The charging starfighters would slip past the edges of the stardestroyers shields whilist onboard alarms rang.

Wiley's starblade fired its two ion lasers as well as the medium laser cannons. Striking the side of the ship where at its intended target. The Sith was unable to watch fully as he was moving to quickly. But the hangar bay atmosphere would be compromised and the hangar would almost immediatly depressurize. A few seconds would probably pass before emergency lockdowns were forced to seal the compromised compartment from the void.

zap zap Zap Zap
Zap ZAP ZAP ZAP


The twin green laser cannon fire of the TIE fighters struck hull platting and racked across the ship. Two of the foreward most turbo-laser cannons were blasted to clouds. The following set of turbo lasers on either side of the neck like rise of to the bridge would meet a similar fate as the other starblades that were moving with Wiley came flew by. The Gladiator class star destroyer would have to bank or come about to get any except its two rear most turbo lasers to fire on Reaper squadron. The design of the arrow shaped star destroyers were great in allowing almost all cannons to face and fire on something it was directly fiacing, which in space was fine when there was no true up or down. But it meant the enemy like Wiley could take advantage of the ship's weakspot which was directly behind it. Now, with an unlikely chance of any of their starfighters being able to scramble in time, the Silent Observer would have a better chance of being the second wave to blind side this star destroyer. So far Reaper Squadron was five for five.

@TWD26