Darth Ziilenlos watched the hologram displaying the situation on his controlled territory.
"Magnificent," he said, as marks for unauthorized starships — unregistered in the Silri Syndicate's logs — appeared in orbit above both planets. "Truly magnificent."
The Sith and his assault commanders standing behind him, loyal for four thousand years, reflected in the Force as calm, impeccably disciplined concentrations of destructive power.
Each one was a treasure of immeasurable value to him.
In this era, acquiring a ship, a squadron, or even an entire fleet was easy enough.
You just needed brains you knew how to use.
You could recruit a fighter, a dozen, a company, even an entire army — you just needed credits.
Warriors were bought and sold.
Few fought for honor and glory.
They were surrounded by idiots, making them easy to manipulate.
Darth Ziilenlos chuckled softly.
"He's good," the man said, watching the duty squadrons rush to meet the invaders. "Reconnaissance by fire. Expected in any other situation. But here... risking the failure of the entire mission just for reconnaissance... Are the comm channels jammed?"
"Yes, my lord," replied the commander of his division's troops, his red-and-black armor appearing beside the Sith. "Long-range communication suppression systems are operating at full power. Everything said within Kamino's and Rothana's space will remain here forever."
"Excellent," Darth Ziilenlos assessed. "Declare a combat alert on the planets and shipyards. The enemy's reconnaissance and sabotage groups must be destroyed before their main forces arrive in the system. But I need prisoners. Preferably, their commanders. Provided they survive the crash, of course. But something tells me the crash is precisely their goal."
None of those present asked unnecessary questions.
"It will be done, my lord. May I speak freely?"
"By all means," the ancient Sith agreed. "I value your opinion."
"Sir, it's unlikely the enemy will try to attack our planets without confirmation from their reconnaissance reports," the commander offered his opinion, turning his helmet toward him.
Darth Ziilenlos trusted this man as he trusted himself.
There was no more loyal or competent military commander to whom he could entrust command of his ground forces.
He didn't need to be supervised.
No need to double-check or fear he would mess something up.
Anyone else, but not the division commander who currently led his entire cloned army.
The commander of Darth Ziilenlos's Sith army.
Four thousand years had passed since their days of martial glory (counting years and decades in such a situation was a waste of time), and the equipment had, of course, grown outdated.
The armor had been designed by the computers of the Star Forge — an ancient artifact of the Rakatan race capable of replicating and manufacturing any type of technology.
This happened only after the station came under the control of Darth Revan.
The first to wear this armor were the veterans of the Mandalorian Wars and volunteers who agreed to fight against the Republic in the Jedi Civil War.
The use of this armor also continued when Darth Malak became the leader of the Empire.
Everything in it was thought through to the smallest detail.
Although the armor offered the same level of protection as the armor of Republic forces in the Jedi Civil War, its appearance was meant to instill fear in enemies.
The shell of standard soldier armor consisted of several plates of hard material worn over a tight-fitting black bodysuit.
The soldier's face was completely hidden behind a black visor, creating the impression of a faceless enemy.
Regular soldiers wore shiny silver-colored armor, possessing some ability to deflect low-powered civilian blasters, while higher-ranking military personnel of the Sith Empire under Darth Revan and Darth Malak were distinguished by semi-glossy red armor.
In the present, Darth Ziilenlos had faced great difficulties.
The technical equipment of his division was hopelessly outdated compared to modern progress.
Fortunately, Kamino had an excellent weapons workshop — Kaminoan armorers had already demonstrated their ability to create top-tier armor.
The Grand Army of the Republic could confirm that fact.
Darth Ziilenlos and his inner circle, including technical specialists, had spent a long time acclimating to modern technological achievements and analyzing what Kamino and Rothana could offer them.
In the end, abandoning the mirror finish of the armor, qualitatively overhauling the electronic components, but preserving the external design with its original intent — to intimidate the enemy — Darth Ziilenlos stuck with his own.
His entire army — both those on active duty and clones yet to emerge from the autoclaves — were equipped with numerous sets of snow-white armor, based on the Star Forge design.
Everyone, from the common soldier to the officer aboard a ship, wore the armor.
By most parameters, it resembled the Phase II armor of the Grand Army of the Republic, but even in current realities, the new protection was durable and served its wearers well.
The decision to put even the crew members in it was neither accidental nor a whim of Darth Ziilenlos.
When you don't have that many organic soldiers, and most of the crews are Devastator combat droids with additional programming, you have to take precautions.
Better to give the crew armor — especially since they are all trained clones — than not to give it and lose crew members in any firefight.
He wasn't particularly concerned that commanders still wore red armor.
Logically, this would allow the enemy to immediately identify commanders on the front lines and eliminate them.
But according to Ziilenlos's tactics, senior command-level officers wearing such red armor did not go on the attack.
They had a headquarters for that.
One like this.
"Saboteurs may include Force-sensitive beings who will report everything they see through the Force to their masters," Darth Ziilenlos cut in, watching a freighter in orbit above Kamino bravely battling the harrying duty fighters. "They sent more forces to Rothana than to Kamino. Here — clones; there — ships. Both are more than substantial targets. One of these strikes is a diversion," he decided, fully aware that attacking two planets at once, breaking through two minefields — each capable of turning into a death trap at any moment — was foolish. It split the forces, which the Dominion didn't have in abundance. Therefore, the target of the attack was one planet, no more. Take one — they'd go for the second. But which one was more of a priority for them? "That makes capturing prisoners and interrogating them all the more important. Strengthen the guard on our," he emphasized this point, "cloning laboratories. I want the soldiers from the first batch to receive weapons and armor immediately, and only then be sent to the ships. All the equipment and droids I specified should already be loaded onto the ships, correct?"
"That is correct, sir. Everything you classified as first-priority cargo is already in the holds of the 'Trustees' and 'Lucrehulks'."
"Excellent. Ensure the enemy does not deploy reconnaissance drones or relays. Destroy any found. The enemy must not get even a drop of information from us."
The last thing he needed was for those fools to spot the fleet he was keeping hidden from prying eyes among the shadows of the numerous planets, gas giants, and endless fields of asteroids filling the Kamino system.
What they saw on Kamino was nothing compared to what was in the entire system.
"It will be done, Darth Ziilenlos."
The commander of his army stepped aside, issuing short orders to his subordinates.
"Proceed to our cloning cylinders," Darth Ziilenlos ordered his apprentices. "An identical order applies to you. Kill everyone except the commanders — I need information. Our clones must be protected by any means necessary."
The Sith silently departed to carry out their orders.
* * *
An ordinary transport carrying ammunition from Ubrikkia.
At least, that's what the transponder of the freighter carrying the "Nulls" said.
Judging by the fact that they hadn't been blown to bits immediately upon exiting hyperspace, the ruse had worked.
Though the change in the patrol routes of the duty squadrons suggested the exact opposite.
"Prudii! Wring everything you can out of this tub!" Ordo commanded through the comlink.
"Working on it," the other replied.
The starship noticeably accelerated — the new engines kicked into afterburner mode, providing a boost.
The freighter shuddered as if seized by a violent tremor.
The metal sang in its own language, and even Mereel's teeth began tapping out an unfamiliar rhythm.
Right after the first shot from the inexplicably present "Delta-7," he and his brothers opened fire from their concealed rapid-fire cannons.
There was no point in playing hide-and-seek any longer — the enemy hadn't destroyed them on approach to geostationary orbit just so they could finish them off within the gravity well.
"Two hundred klicks to Tipoca City," Prudii reported over the comlink to the other brothers.
Mereel barely heard him over the roar of the gun emplacements' servos and the ship's engines.
Like sledgehammer blows, laser cannon bolts from the fighters hammered the hull.
The deflector shield, presumably, hadn't held out long.
That was understandable — when you're being shot at from all sides by a dozen swift interceptor fighters that hadn't lost their aggression in the last thirty years, no simple deflector would hold.
And they hadn't had the funds or the time to buy a military-grade one from the Mandalorians.
Besides, that's an expensive luxury for a plan that didn't involve the ship surviving.
"One hundred klicks," Prudii counted.
"Prepare for landing!" Ordo ordered.
The squad had prepared for a normal landing, an emergency landing, and a freefall, in case they were spotted by the Silri Syndicate's ground forces.
Looked like the training hadn't been in vain.
"Second engine's cooked..." A'den's voice came through.
"That's your cover zone!" Ordo reminded.
"...my cannon too," A'den continued calmly.
The enemy fighters were tearing the ship apart, unconcerned with their own losses.
Of the dozen "Aethersprites," fewer than half remained — five persistent, very angry machines.
"Shab!" Kom'rk swore. "My cannon's cooked! Fourth engine under attack!"
The next moment, they were kicked so hard in the tail that Mereel nearly bit his tongue.
But the bigger problem was that he'd missed his latest target, and the enemy interceptor got away intact.
His cannon, however, was blown apart.
"I suppose the third engine is also doomed..." he said sadly.
The starship shuddered violently again.
Smoke was coming from the stern — something there seemed to have caught fire in earnest.
And yet the freighter was gaining more and more speed.
"Thirty klicks," Prudii reported.
"Shab," came a hissing curse from Ordo.
They had planned to keep the ship relatively intact down to the one-klick mark.
A distance of one kilometer from the planet's surface was exactly what they considered a soft landing.
But thirty...
They had barely entered the upper atmosphere.
It was going to hurt. A lot.
Not to mention that Jaing's cursing indicated the loss of the fourth and final turret covering their stern.
Mereel checked his compartment and began hoping they'd get lucky.
Very, very lucky.
They were heavily loaded; they had more equipment than they'd ever used in training, and they needed to preserve themselves and the gear until the end of the journey.
Whether or not they could capture the Tipoca City arsenals, which might not even contain weapons, was the pressing question.
That's why each of them was carrying enough weapons for a small squad of mercenaries.
Was it a lot or a little — six Null-class ARCs in the very heart of hostile positions?
Any sane person would say it was madness, that they'd be wiped out in the first few minutes.
And they'd even be right.
In a way.
The thing was, all the "Nulls" weren't just smarter than the average human — they were also a little bit insane.
And so they felt no fear of seemingly impossible combat missions.
Not for the first time, incidentally.
After the First Battle of Geonosis, when they were returned to Coruscant and slated for freezing "until further notice," the six "Nulls" barricaded themselves in the barracks in full view of the entire Coruscant Garrison, preventing any attempt to storm them.
Only Skirata's intervention had prevented the situation from escalating to "heated standoff" stage.
But he wasn't here today.
And none of Jango Fett's clones would be among the attackers either — at least, Mereel and the others hoped so.
The DNA of the Grand Army of the Republic's progenitor had run out long ago, and new stock, naturally, had not been forthcoming since Jango's death over thirty years ago.
Sure, maybe Boba had shared his DNA...
But that was an even more fantastic story...
It could be said, if they didn't know that Fett had sided with the Dominion and intended to follow in his father's footsteps.
I wonder, will he end up with his head cut off by a Jedi too, or something else?
The ship shook again.
And then again.
And again.
Another kick in the rear, and now the roar of the main engine was impossible to make out.
"No more shields," Prudii reported, as if no one understood why holes had started appearing in the hull. "And, by the way, no more engines either. Hang on!"
And what, were there any other options for what to do on this fine Kaminoan day besides gripping the handles in your pod a little tighter?
This time it was like being punched in the face — the ship even slowed down, taking a frontal impact against something.
The roar and thunder of atmospheric entry was interrupted by the screech of tearing metal.
It came from somewhere in the bow and stirred dark suspicions in everyone who heard it.
"Ordo, that's not what I think it is, is it?" Mereel asked quietly.
"Prudii!" their squad leader shouted.
There was no answer.
"Shab-shab-shab!" Mereel muttered. "Ordo, I'm closest to the bow. I'll go check it out now..."
"Everyone stay put!" the Skirata clan chief cut him off. "Altitude is one klick. We work the plan."
Mereel didn't argue — he understood too well what was happening right now.
Prudii could be killed, wounded, he could have been ripped out of the starship along with part of the hull, he could have been vaporized by a proton torpedo...
Anything could have happened in the freighter's bow.
And Ordo understood perfectly that none of his remaining brothers, himself included, could get out of their seats, run to the bow, find out what was going on, and come back, possibly carrying an injured brother.
Not at an altitude of less than a thousand meters on a ship that was about to fall apart.
Mereel checked his safety straps again as multiple impacts from enemy small craft rattled against the starship's hull.
The freighter hurtled toward the unwelcoming surface of Kamino without the slightest hint of centralized control.
From his station, Ordo had the ability to control the flight from a secondary panel — as did any of his brothers.
But that was more of a safety measure than something truly necessary or actually affecting their fall.
After another series of impacts on the freighter, a series of explosions rang out throughout the ship, and the shock wave caught Mereel.
* * *
"The freighter heading for Kamino has been destroyed," the ground forces commander reported to Darth Ziilenlos.
"I can see that," the latter confirmed, peering at the hologram of a scatter of wreckage that had entered the water not far from Tipoca City. "Strange..."
"Sir?"
"The ship was clearly modified to breach our defenses," the Sith said thoughtfully. "New engines designed for sustained afterburner, decent shields, fairly skilled defensive actions by the crew... Even the hull of this wreck mostly split into large fragments rather than being shattered into pieces by the reactor detonation..."
"They turned a freighter into a mine-clearer, sir?"
"It would seem so," Ziilenlos nodded. "Honestly, I expected more from them. The attack was clearly... off."
"Should I stand down the combat alert?"
"Absolutely not," the Sith forbade. "Until the wreckage is examined and the saboteurs' bodies are found, Kamino must remain on constant alert. Are the Aqua Droids already in position?"
"They'll arrive in ten minutes. We've fixed the trajectories of every single large piece of debris and calculated the depths they'll be at by the time the scouts arrive."
"Excellent," Darth Ziilenlos praised. "How are things on Rothana?"
"The enemy had more success there. Their ship broke through to the shipyards, despite heavy damage to the vessels."
"Even so-o-o," the ancient Sith became interested. "And our protective perimeter couldn't do anything to them?"
"Ultimately, the enemy ships were destroyed. What's strange is — what's the point of such an attack if there's no way to break through? It would be more practical to use dedicated, well-armored starships. Something's off here."
"You think so?" the Sith clarified.
"Yes, my lord. The enemy has previously demonstrated much deeper preparation for combat operations. Even in situations where they didn't have full information. Silri's files contain no mention of most of Rothana's and Kamino's defensive structures — everything was edited by our agents on your orders. So the attack seems inconsistent with the Dominion's general combat profile. With our fire screen, they shouldn't have been able to get that far on Rothana. Yet they bypassed our guns and firing sectors with such precision, as if they were a step ahead. As if..."
"...As if there are Jedi among them," Darth Ziilenlos finished his subordinate's thought. "That was also anticipated, Commander. I suspect that both attacks, despite the apparent success on our part, do not match what we've seen at all. Proceed on the assumption that we were attacked not by the Dominion, but by a no less resourceful enemy. Begin searching for saboteurs on Kamino, Rothana, and the shipyards. I'm certain some of the enemy survived. And I want to know who they are, how they got the information from Silri's flagship, and also how they are connected to the Dominion. I have suspicions about their identity, but without detailed answers, these are just hypotheses. Find me at least one prisoner."
"It will be done, sir."
"And one more thing," Darth Ziilenlos spoke up. "Use counter-tactics against Mandalorians. In four thousand years, they haven't developed their martial art all that well, so at the first steps we'll understand whether we're dealing with the ones I'm thinking of. If it's the Skirata clan, then my plan regarding the Mandalorian Sector has failed and needs to be revised. Proceed. I need answers."
* * *
Darman wasn't thrilled about floating in the air for so long without protection.
But, looking at the actual circumstances, it turned out he was actually in protection.
Just not in the air, mind you.
"Passing the close defense perimeter," reported Niner's voice in his helmet, moving to his right.
In the void of vacuum, it was hard to make out the matte-black Katarn armor, designed to conceal a clone commando from any scanning radiation source.
And, since after the explosion of their ships the attackers used jetpacks only for acceleration, the defenders couldn't even spot the exhaust trails of their rocket packs.
Neither by scanners nor visually.
A three-dimensional hologram of the route was projected onto the helmet visor, marking the correct path.
The Omega squad commander, flying five meters to Darman's right, looked at him and silently showed an approving hand gesture.
Immediately after landing, dense information exchange was prohibited, so the soldiers only used their comlinks occasionally.
For the most part, only for critical notifications.
The attackers didn't have detailed information — whether the enemy had direction finders for unregistered comlinks — but they assumed the worst-case scenario for themselves.
That was a matter of habit, though.
None of the clones or their allies had ever been to the Rothana shipyards before.
And that didn't stop them from enjoying the majestic beauty of this new planet for them.
A snow-covered world with arctic terrain, located in the Kiberon Sector.
You could only get here via a hyperspace route — the Kiberon Line.
The latter ran from the Rishi Maze all the way to Kamino, and between Rothana and the clones' homeworld there was a secret hyperspace corridor, laid by Kuat Drive Yards a year after the Kaminoans began producing the Grand Army of the Republic.
The clones knew that the planet housed the production facilities of an enterprise known as Rothana Heavy Engineering.
The planet's economy was almost entirely based on shipbuilding and military technology development.
During the Clone Wars, it was on Rothana that most of the GAR's armored vehicles were manufactured — in particular, the six-legged AT-TE walkers.
An AT-TE walker.
Rothana also developed and produced the Acclamators, as well as almost the entire line of GAR ground vehicles — from AT-TEs to AT-RTs.
Not to mention the Latti in all its modifications, SPHAs, ground vehicles, tanks...
And much more that Null-type clones simply couldn't observe with their own eyes during the campaign thirty years ago.
But now they could easily enjoy views not only of the snow-covered surface of this once-secret world.
Rothana was surrounded by an extensive network of orbital shipyards and dry docks for the secret facilities of Kuat Drive Yards.
And, if it wasn't noticeable from the landing point, at a closer look you could see that the part of the complex they were heading for had never been repaired after some battle the planet had endured.
Darman couldn't recall anyone attacking Rothana during the Clone Wars.
So the damage must have occurred after the Zann Consortium's assault on Rothana.
And a good deal of time had passed since then.
Yet no one had so much as lifted a finger to replace the pierced and molten hull elements, straighten out the equipment antennas, seal the depressurized compartments...
As if the local command had decided to completely forget about this part of the complex and never mention it.
A bit foolish, considering that almost every other medium dock had the bow or stern sections of Keldabe-class battleships protruding from them.
Given that the latter was over a kilometer long, it turned out no one had bothered to upgrade the slipways for producing ships larger than an Acclamator either.
The latter was just over seven hundred and fifty meters long, which, offhand, could fit on the slipways without any problem.
On one hand, this was just an indicator that didn't affect anything.
On the other, it was food for thought.
If first the Zann Consortium and now the Silri Syndicate intended to use this shipyard for a long time, why had they limited themselves in completing the production lines?
After all, building and repairing starships on slipways of the right size was much more convenient and faster than constantly shunting ships bow-first or stern-first to the outfitting dock.
Or bringing in additional ships to support work outside the slipways.
What conclusion could be drawn from this?
Darman couldn't immediately think of anything except one thought.
It seemed that the current owners of the Rothana shipyards weren't particularly interested in improving anything here.
They were simply using the available resources — nothing more.
Darman didn't believe they lacked the funds and specialists for completion.
Throughout the Clone Wars, Rothana, which produced armored vehicles, had hardly ever left any unit of the Grand Army of the Republic without supplies.
No matter how many tanks, SPHAs, walkers, and other equipment the Separatists destroyed, the GAR warehouses always had new ones.
And, if you dug through your memory, you could recall that Rothana was the largest producer of equipment for the GAR.
Which meant there was enough equipment on the surface and in orbit to even independently expand new compartments on the slipways.
So there could only be one conclusion — despite everything, the Silri Syndicate did not consider Rothana a place worth fighting for to the last soldier or credit.
In the past, the planet was protected by a formidable star fleet of the parent corporation's corporate security.
But now, there were dozens of Keldabe-class battleships in orbit and a truly enormous number of various types of fighters.
Well-recognizable designs, by the way.
An approximate image of the planet Rothana.
And how many ships were still on the slipways...
Darman lost count after the second dozen, and even then, only because he needed to adjust his course and prepare for landing.
One careless move, the wrong vector on the jetpack nozzles, and he'd be spinning in the vacuum until he crashed into something.
And that would be sad.
He really didn't want to hit a defense platform or the heavy hull of the shipyard.
Because otherwise he'd turn into a small flash.
Darman had packed his pack to the brim.
The remaining weapons and equipment were stowed in a shock-resistant container, knee-high, which followed him, tethered to his leg by a line.
Almost all the Skirata clan warriors and their allies had similar loads.
Operations on enemy territory meant they could only rely on themselves.
And on no one else.
"Half a klick to target," Niner reported.
Time had come.
Time to brake.
A little Mandalorian finesse, and the entire squad easily hurtled toward the target feet-first, while the weak reactive streams of their jetpacks suppressed inertia in short bursts.
The contact with the hull was hard, but no one had promised a welcoming committee.
The magnetic boots did their job; experience and dexterity kept the equipment containers from slamming into the hull and potentially deforming.
Niner drew everyone's attention, signaling with gestures that they were switching to a local encrypted frequency.
It was only active so that squad members could communicate with each other over short distances without risk of being overheard.
Using it in flight was a dubious pleasure — the commandos were moving far from close to each other.
Darman changed his settings to the new ones almost immediately, then kept an eye on Venku to make sure he didn't mess up.
The boy hadn't needed supervision for a long time, but he was also in a situation like this for the first time.
A quick roll call indicated no one was lost.
And that was already a big stroke of luck.
They hadn't had much training time to become a single squad, so...
Luck, or the Force (it didn't matter now), was on their side today.
They could only hope it wouldn't change its favor.
"Atin — we need an entry," Niner ordered.
"Technical airlock a hundred meters from us," he replied.
So they'd still missed by those same hundred meters.
Korr tapped his helmet expressively, as if assaulting the old armor could fix the flaws in the electronic internals.
"Moving out."
The direction Atin had indicated was adjusted so they could move under the cover of structures — that way they'd be less conspicuous to possible witnesses.
In short bursts from cover to cover, in squads of five, they reached the required point.
Staying in cover with everyone else, Niner sent Atin to the technical passage to breach it.
The tech specialist handled it in ten seconds, after which Omega moved in first.
The airlock was small, and they barely fit inside, considering the equipment containers.
"We'll do several passes," Niner told the rest. "We're first, we'll secure a beachhead. The rest follow in squads of five. Don't leave cover without reason."
Only clicks from the comlinks came in response.
The electronics breach wasn't difficult and took only a few standard minutes.
During that time, the Omegas detached their lines from the shock-resistant containers, then left them inside the airlock.
The reconnaissance was also brief: they were in a remote part of the shipyard complex, so no guards or patrols were expected here.
Judging by the thickness of dust on the floor and the equipment, no one had been here for a very, very long time.
"You didn't pick this part of the shipyard at random, did you, Sergeant?" Fi asked quietly.
"Exactly," Niner replied. "This part of the orbital complex looks the least used, which means less chance of someone catching us at the moment of landing."
That sounded logical.
"Korr," the Omega commander contacted the fifth member of their squad, who was guarding the cargo in the airlock. "Tell the others — all clear, they can land in the airlock. Fi, Atin — secure the perimeter. Darman — will you help me move the containers out of the airlock zone?"
"Of course, Commander," he readily replied. "I'm sure we can find a good compartment in this part of the station where our people can break into the shipyard systems and find the Mandalorians."
"And also a way to blow this whole place up," Korr added.
"Let's work, brothers," Niner summed up.
* * *
The full set of information that Lady Meilis had provided shed more light on what Egon IX actually was.
In the last years of the Old Republic, the planet held a prison for war criminals.
They sent CIS soldiers made of flesh and blood here, who weren't deemed overly dangerous or prone to escape.
Special forces, militia, mercenaries, and so on...
With the proclamation of the reorganization of the state into the Galactic Empire, deserters were added to the mix.
There was no old plan of the complex, but they did have schematics obtained from the computer of one of the Alphas who had come for Alpha-66's head before he joined the Jedi Shadow.
And, it had to be admitted, this was a genuine fortress.
No wonder they hadn't left an organic garrison here — there were so many automated security systems that the words "it would take a whole army" no longer seemed like an exaggeration.
This planet's history, like that of millions of similarly tiny and remote ones, was little different.
Located near the Tion Cluster, it was conquered by Xim the Despot over twenty-five thousand years ago.
At that time, it was called Turallon, but few remembered it at all — with the collapse of Zima's state, the planet was forgotten and was rediscovered shortly after the Great Hyperspace War.
During the Clone Wars, the Confederacy of Independent Systems discovered several hyperspace routes into the system.
A droid army occupied a significant part of the Ash Worlds sector, including nearby Iego.
But the fighting didn't affect the planet until the end of the Clone Wars, when soldiers of the Galactic Republic triumphantly arrived here, restoring old prisons from the time of Xim the Despot.
Later, the Empire officially established penal colonies on the surface of Turallon, holding prisoners of war and other traitors from the Clone Wars era.
This was the information given to us by both Lady Meilis and the data from the Obroa-skai library.
According to Ubiqtorate reports, the prisons on the planet were destroyed by the Imperial fleet, which was suppressing a local uprising.
The planet's population, sparse as it was, was also exterminated.
In fact, the Imperials executed a Base Delta Zero order here, citing an outbreak of some biological weapon released by the rebels...
Simply put, they used a variation of the story of Darth Vader's orbital bombardment of the planet Follyn.
Either way, the reconnaissance drones detected no harmful or otherwise dangerous reagents in the atmosphere.
Nor in the soil, either.
But the military complex itself...
That was precisely military.
Prisons aren't built so that only a small complex of structures remains on the surface, surrounded by numerous automatic guns.
The prison on Egon IV.
Built on an islet in the center of a lake and partially on its shores, the prison least of all resembled a facility serving the Galactic Empire's penitentiary system.
"The complex was rebuilt," I stated, having finished examining the hologram constructed from surface data collected by the reconnaissance drones.
Before the defensive installations destroyed our Vipers, a lot of data was gathered.
Including the range of the light artillery.
And several planetary defense guns.
I'm sure this is only the visible part of the problems awaiting us — the ship debris in orbit indicates that various starships have visited here at least ten times.
Some bore the markings of the Empire, others still bore those of the Alliance to Restore the Republic.
Curiously, none of the archives we knew of contained even a mention of such missions.
Either deserters flew here, or operatives on such special assignments that records of their missions were never reflected anywhere.
There were other ships as well, lacking identification marks of belonging to any particular states, corporations, or races.
Smugglers, pirates, or adventurers who had intended to settle here or scavenge something that might have been left behind.
Given the appearance of the structures, whose camouflage couldn't be seen without super-powerful scanners, only truly desperate adventurers would have bitten on such ruins.
The Guardian exited hyperspace at the system's edge and immediately hid behind its cloaking field.
We couldn't detect any trace of the reconnaissance drones in the system, but there were a large number of them in orbit.
Which was, in fact, why we weren't advertising our presence.
"That's only the visible part of the iceberg," Tierce agreed.
He voiced the local version of the proverb about the tip of the iceberg.
"The planetary relay systems look new," I noted. "At least that equipment was repaired not long ago."
"I'd like to know by whom," the lieutenant colonel sighed.
"We have the opportunity to find out," I remarked.
Grodin understood me immediately.
"As soon as we decloak the Guardian, the satellites in orbit will identify us and sound the alarm."
"There's probably some kind of IFF recognition system here," I stated the obvious. "And those who flew here before us didn't know it. Otherwise, there wouldn't be debris."
The same applied if such a system was absent or malfunctioning.
"There's probably also an alarm system here that notifies the master of this place of an intrusion," Tierce suggested.
"It definitely has one," I confirmed. "Planetary defense, even automated, needs ammunition resupply, technical maintenance, and many other things. The complex must transmit telemetry about its condition. Including reporting whether the security perimeter has been breached or not."
After all, a whole fleet could have flown here, for which the loss of one or two or ten ships might be insignificant.
"Sir, I would suggest sending a naval special forces squad to the surface to locate all planetary defense points and disable them," Lieutenant Colonel Tierce said.
"I would prefer to decline the naval special forces," my stated opinion puzzled Tierce.
"What is the difference between the missions of the fleet special forces and the Assault Commandos, Lieutenant Colonel?" I asked, changing the subject.
"In the targets where the special forces were supposed to be deployed," Grodin replied.
"Yes, but in the end they were used as guards on space stations," I reminded him. "And their area of application was extremely narrow, since most tasks were preferred to be handled by Assault Commandos. The fleet special forces, like fleet intelligence, were created by the Empire solely to spite the Army and the Stormtrooper Corps, which already had such units."
"To a large extent, this was done solely to siphon more budget for the Navy," Grodin corrected me. "And most of it ended up in the pockets of naval officials."
"Precisely. Creating competing services, each pulling the blanket over themselves," I concluded. "That was the case with Imperial Intelligence and the Imperial Security Bureau. Fleet intelligence, fleet special forces as a counterbalance to scout stormtroopers, military intelligence, army special forces, and Assault Commandos. Stormtroopers designed separately for work on ice planets, magma, sand, acid, radiation, and so on... This is nothing but a waste of budget resources. Yes, many of these specializations are actually needed — an ordinary stormtrooper cannot become a frogman, and a 'sand trooper' cannot work on Hoth. Different training specifics that cannot be mastered to an ideal level in six months. But we have a completely different approach — we create professionals with integrated memories."
"We've already resolved the last point," Tierce reminded. "All 'special' stormtroopers designed for work in hazardous conditions have been consolidated into common units. Do you want to abolish the fleet special forces?"
"They perform all the same functions as the Assault Commandos," I reminded. "We stand on the threshold that will probably allow us to get our hands on not only the four 'deltas' but also many new fighters, trained more broadly than an ordinary special forces soldier or an Assault Commando, who will join our ranks. The Grand Army of the Republic relied on clone commandos and ARC troopers in various situations — in different environments, different worlds, different urban settings, not to mention space. Perhaps we should follow the same path — finally eliminate the units that duplicate each other, as was done with fleet intelligence."
"Dominion has already sufficiently mastered the practice of creating clones with specialized knowledge," Tierce agreed. "But we still cannot immediately integrate disparate memories on thematic training into clones."
Yes, we only "crawl forward" on the exceptional persistence and learning inclination of the new clones.
As a result, "multidisciplinary" specialists receive instructions from "narrow" specialists in the subjects of their future work directions.
This is how a new base of clones is formed, who, after proving themselves excellently, can become templates for memory scanning for future generations.
The process is troublesome, but we are still moving forward.
It would be a different matter if equipment appeared in our hands that could upload not a personality with memories, but only the latter.
Kaminoan clones are born with their own personality; they don't need to insert someone else's.
But information on waging war in various directions — that yes, is loaded into the brain, and then honed to perfection.
And the commandos we arrived for will unequivocally allow us to create universal fighters for special units, ready to work in any conditions, overnight.
Accordingly, the need for different approaches — special forces and Assault Commandos — disappears in principle.
"In that case, we will have to repurpose the fleet special forces units created on the model of Captain Makeno," Lieutenant Colonel Tierce reminded me.
"Their training differs from the training of Assault Commandos only by additional knowledge about ship systems and the rules of waging war in zero gravity," I simplified, but there is no point in telling Tierce the details of the differences between these two units — he already knows.
Just as he knows that our Assault Commandos possess such knowledge at an empirical level.
"Think about this point, Lieutenant Colonel," I ordered, noting that Tierce made a note on his datapad. "We will return to this project once all the missing pieces are in our hands. Right now, the agenda is Agon Nine. And the apparent impossibility of storming it by conventional means.
"Apparent, sir?" Tierce clarified.
"Absolutely, Lieutenant Colonel," I confirmed. "Agon Nine was conceived as a trap for anyone who flies here without their master's knowledge. And you know very well my attitude toward enemy traps.
"We'll fall into it, sir?"
"We'll fall into it, Grodin."