The stars were filled with a frozen, icy blue fire from the nebula that dominated the region of the Chaos in which the Gasriese System was situated. The azure gleam of the nebula, when combined with the light from the blue star of the system illuminated the gas giant, and the ships above it, in a ghostly light.

The Class II Imperial Star Destroyer Challenge was following her stately course through the contested system, accompanied by a small escort of her support craft. Deep within the mighty warship the pilots of Battlegroup III, of which she was the flagship, gathered in the briefing chamber. The air was filled with conversation and laughter as the boisterous warriors recounted innumerable stories of their exploits, some of them even true.

When Fleet Admiral Locke Setzer stepped to the podium all conversation within the room came to an abrupt halt, such was the respect his pilots held for him.

"I am sure that even those among you who were not directly involved have heard of our recent exploratory probes of the First Order fleet poised at the edge of the system. Those probes were successful in proving, at least to the satisfaction of High Command, the observations of the First Order made by one of our newest pilots, Lieutenant Qask Merrow. He has discovered that the forces under Grand Marshall Takeda are responding with almost droid-like adherence to a standard response doctrine to all provocations. As such we can confidently control the number, compliment, and location of any response fleet from their main force.

"High Command has given me permission to use this predictably of our enemy against them, and I intend to inflict the biggest wound I can in Marshall Takeda's side, without risking our own forces. I am ordering the ENTIRETY of Battlegroup III committed to this operation. The other admirals and I believe that with our forces positioned in advance of the ambush we will be able to destroy four, maybe five, Resurgent Star Destroyers and their accompanying cruisers while taking minimal losses of our own.

"Let us not deceive ourselves, this will not stop the First Order, nor drive them from this system. But nor will it be a trivial loss. If nothing else, Grand Marshall Takeda will have a hard time explaining this loss to this supposedly reborn Emperor. You are all dismissed."

---

Five standard hours later, newly minted General Jagged Fell III was sitting at the controls of his TIE Defender as he circled his assigned area of space, waiting for the First Order to arrive. Jagged, along with all the other non-bomber type fighters had three primary roles for this upcoming engagement.

His top priority was to intercept and destroy any First Order bombers sent out against the ships of Battlegroup III. If he and his fellow pilots of the TIE Corps could not keep the mottled sky around the region free from significant numbers of enemy bombers the thirty-one ships of Battlegroup III arrayed in this ambush would experience significant losses. Not only was this unacceptable from a tactical and strategic vantage point, it would also mean the loss of many friends and comrades in arms that Jagged had come to call his brothers and sisters over these three years in the Emperor’s Hammer.

His second task was to like the first in that they were to eliminate any First Order fighter craft attempting to do the same interdiction of the bombers of the TIE Corps. Even with the full might of Battlegroup III arranged against the expected First Order response, the Emperor’s Hammer ships could not hope to match the firepower that would come to bear. It would be the role of the bombers of the TIE Corps to eliminate the bulk of the First order cruisers. Even after all these decades of war, the greatest threat to cruisers and destroyers alike in the galaxy was an attack by a coordinated bomber force.

His final goal was to destroy the exposed shield generators of the First Order Resurgent Star Destroyers. Jagged still didn’t understand the necessity of having the generators mounted to the exterior of Imperial designed destroyers. In his mind if the smaller ships and those of rebel manufacture could have them internally located, then surely the engineers of the Empire could have similarly protected these vital weak points. The shipboard technicians and engineers had repeatedly tried to teach him why they were mounted where they were, but he still didn’t comprehend their reasoning.

In the initial phases of the upcoming battle the bombers would primarily focus on the smaller Light Cruisers and Maxima-A heavy cruisers that would be supporting the First Order Destroyers, trying to delete the smaller craft and their firepower from the zone of engagement as quickly as possible. The thought being that once their supports were eliminated the much more powerful enemy destroyers would be vulnerable to flanking attacks and strafing runs. But if the TIE Corps pilots could manage to destroy the shield generators of a destroyer, all attacks would be focused upon the exposed behemoth.

Jagged was just checking his cockpit read outs for what seemed to be the hundredth time when his radio crackled to life, “The Illustrious, Thunderchild, and Hellfire have launched their assault. Expect the enemy’s arrival in three minutes.”

Jagged once more looked out over the arrayed ships of the Emperor’s Hammer. There was of course the Challenge, but also the mighty MC-90 Star Cruiser Renegade and all their support vessels. In total there was an old Arquitens Cruiser Surefire, soon to be joined by the three making the assault, a Strike Cruiser Hermes, a MC-40 Light Cruiser Roost (who Fleet Admiral Locke seemed to throw directly at any danger he could), a MC-80b Mon Cal Cruiser Torment, an Assault Frigate Citadel, the Modified Frigate Krayt’s Claw, three Frigates Bashee, Obedience, and Venom, along with fifteen corvettes of different makes and configurations. And of course, the dozens of TIE Corps fighters swarming the space between the ships. It was an impressive display of naval power, but would it be enough to overcome the First Order attack, they were soon to find out.

Once the First Order fell into their trap the Interdictor Cruiser Fairchild and the Modified Strike Cruiser Harlow would move into position and spool up their gravity well generators to hold the First Order in this snare, so carefully laid for them. All the ships of Battlegroup III would also be attempting to jam any long range communications from the First Order ships to keep them for calling for aid. But even if they did, Monsoon Squadron had laid interdictor mines along the route from the main First Order fleet that would be activated as soon as the battle commenced, there would be no rescue coming for their prey today.

“Thirty seconds. Remember your orders and fly well,” spoke Fleet Admiral Setzer over the group wide channel.

And then they were there. The three Arquitens-Class Light Cruisers reverted to realspace and took up their positions in the battlelines just as the First Order arrived. There were five Resurgent Star Destroyers, ten Maxima-A Class Heavy Cruisers, and fifteen Light Cruisers before them, just as Qask intel had predicted.

Jagged punched his throttle to maximum and closed in on the nearest Star Destroyer, intending on making a few initial assaults on its shield generators while he waited for his fighter’s sensors to pick out the enemy bombers. He didn’t have to wait long; he had barely begun his first strafing attack on the nearest destroyer’s generators when his fighter informed him that several squadrons of opposing bombers had just launched from the destroyer below him. He finished his attack run and then, rather than extending past the massive ship he inverted his agile craft and hugged its hull until passing over its prow and he sighted the bombers flying away from him.

Making sure to continue his erratic course to keep the droid controlled turrets of the destroyer now to his rear from scoring a direct hit on him, he arrowed in on the bomber formation. Letting loose on the lead bomber with a pair of missiles he switched his weapons over to his linked lasers and ion cannons and began to get to work on the hapless craft before him. It took him only a few minutes to reduce to space debris all the bombers in his area, only two of which had been able to get in range to launch some of their payload at the Emperor’s Hammer forces nearest to them. But by the time he was done he had picked up several annoying enemy fighters on his tail. Already his aft shields had been reduced by half when he was able to shift his attention to his pursuers.

“I could use a little help over here,” he called out on his squadron frequency.

“Got a few on me as well, but will see what I can do,” replied his wingman, Commander Reece Torenn.

The two TIE Corps pilots worked together to eliminate their First Order counter parts. By the time they had finished and Jagged was able to turn his attention to the wider battle he was surprised to learn that already seven of the enemy cruisers had been knocked out of the fight, either on fire and drifting or having been turned into expanding clouds of metal fragments. The Emperor’s Hammer forces hadn’t escaped without any damage however, two of the corvettes had started a slow drift to the planet below as their crews fought to bring their battered engines back online and more emergency pilot beacons than he wanted to count showed Jagged that a fair few of his fellow pilot’s had been force to eject from their stricken fighters.

But Jagged pushed all that out of his mind, he had a job to do. There were no bombers particularly close by, the First Order Destroyer before him must be having some trouble moving their reserve squadrons into their launch positions. Time to make them pay for their failure to train adequately.

“Let’s take out those generators.”

“On your wing, General.”

Jagged and Reece flew an evasive course back to the destroyer and once within range let loose with all their combined firepower on the port side generator. It blew just as they came within two hundred meters of their target. They extended past the now flaming remnants of the generator and looped around to make their assault on the starboard generator. It had already taken some damage from Jagged’s attack at the start of the battle and didn’t last long under the direct attack from the two Defenders.

“Got a big bantha ready for the slaughter over here.”

“Roger boss, thanks for opening the door, we will take it from here,” called back Jagged’s second in command, Captain GamerRat. He was leading the flight of Missile Boat bombers that was part of Typhoon Squadron. As Jagged flew towards the next nearest enemy destroyer he saw the marvelous sight of the stream of heavy rockets burning their way from the top mounted warhead launchers of the four missile boats passing below him. Just as he neared his next victim the inside of his cockpit lit up briefly in the flash of the doomed destroyer’s death.

---

Twenty minutes later it was all over. The First Order ships had all mercilessly been eliminated, there just wasn’t time to attempt the capture of any of them. Three more corvettes of the Emperor’s Hammer forces had been severely damaged, with two being deemed beyond repair by their crews and abandoned. Also, two of the frigates had smoking craters in their hulls and all four Arquitens Cruisers would need some time in a repair dock before they would be ready for action once again.

It had been far from bloodless, but the forces of the Emperor’s Hammer had dealt a major blow to the First Order. However, even this victory wouldn’t be able to stop the on-coming tide of the First Order fleet. Jagged had no idea what the future held for the besieged Emperor’s Hammer, but he knew one thing, they would fight like hell and make the First order pay dearly for every advance.