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A Furball rapidly formed around the flank group, but the Mandalorians had made a crucial mistake. The force of fighters that the group had deployed were roughly equal in size and strength to their own, but the predators were meant only to get such a furball going. The Gladius's had been meant to bait the enemy into attacking, their weak hulls had never been meant for extended combat.

Now the four Epsilon Bomber Squadrons shot toward the action. They'd been given extra Cluster Missile Dispensers for this mission, and now they were going to demonstrate an old technique that the Mandalorians had clearly forgotten, "This is Beta lead to fighters, execute now!!!"

Suddenly the Predators turned away from the fight, and gave the appearance of running toward their command ships. The Mandalorians bored in on their targets hoping to nab a swift kill.

In the cockpits of the forty-eight T-97s the RIOs selected twelve targets and locked them into the computers. A second later the pilot pulled the trigger. From the forty-eight T-97s a flurry of over seven-hundred missiles leapt out of their launch canisters and into the fight. With the enemy wielding only a hundred and forty-five starfighters an average of five missiles launched onto each individual starfighter. Within seconds the wing of Mandalorian fighters was decimated as the T-97s shot through the shattered formation executing the final part of a classic A-wing slash. Only a handful of mandalorians survived the sudden attack.

Then they were upon the capital ships, targeting the vessels with their computers and preparing for attack runs. They still carried Plasma Torpedoes, and the enemy had been almost completely stripped of fighter cover. Behind them the battered Predator fighters doubled back, targeting their old foes. A pair of depleted Predator squadrons raced forward to protect the T-97s, now vulnerable after their use of Cluster-Missile Pods.

"This is Beta Lead to all, commencing attack. Pick your targets and go."

"This is two... running in."
"Three... running in!"
"This is Lead running in."

The T-97 shot around and poured on full thrust as the pilot smiled coldly in his helmet, "Select Plasma Torpedoes."

"Plasma Torpedoes armed, all four are locked on target." The RIO replied behind him.

"In range... Torpedoes Away!"

The four torpedoes shot from their launch rails and sailed in toward the X-Cruiser Isis within second the blinding flash of the plasma warheads lit up the battleground, the four warheads had hit sequentially with the first three tearing down the shields temporarily allowing the fourth to pass through. That warhead blew out a whole in the ship large enough to fly a T-wing Assault Starfighter through. Two more T-97s had launched their torpedoes mere moments later, their warheads had struck home against the recovering shields and three more warheads had been able to blow through the defense. The explosions shook the ship and a huge chunk of the port side ripped three as the ship tumbled in space. Any other ship would have buckled under such a strike, but the Mandalorians fought on, bringing their shield systems back online... hoping to keep fighting. But there were forty-five other T-97s and they hadn't loosed their missiles yet.

(Aw, I had a good post but it didn't show. Oh well)

As soon as the bombers and fighters exchanging fire, then the extra craft coming in. With the temporary diversion, two of the Canderouses heaved in and unloaded payloads on the Gladiuses, eliminating two of them, while the nearby Lancers eliminated any fighters and bombers in the area. Next their own bombers came from the rear and dumped some plasma bombs on another trio of Gladiuses, killing their payload, but severely damaging, if not destroying the ship. A few of them were blasted down by the point-defense systems, but by the time the rest of the Canderouses and corvettes closed in, the right (or left, whichever one it was) was almost done for.

Now they had to worry about the destroyers.

Borill shook his head as he looked at the display, "He keeps harassing my flanks. Not that it'll do him much good. I could drop a reserve squadron of destroyers to get him to back off, but that might convince him to run all the harder."

Borill frowned at the display, "Alright he's concentrating again, All Squadrons! Flank speed!"

The formation as a whole drove forward, the assault wall of Nemesis-class Star Destroyers bearing down on the mixture of different forces that faced them, With a flash of green light their main batteries fired, each engaging their designated target. A pair of Victory IVs tumbled in space as the volley of weapons fire caressed over them, and dozens of other ships had their shields falter or fail completely from the pounding. Then from just behind the Nemesis-class vessels the sudden appearance of a cloud of missiles marked the entry of the Stalwarth-class Star Destroyers in the battle. Their missiles shot through the gaps between the Nemesis's and slammed hard into their targets. Six Acclamator-class ships evaporated under the caress of the fire, and nine of the Canderouses were put out of action.

Then the heavies drove forward, The Beldon-class Star Battlecruisers blazed away at maximum range, their hulks appearing like short and fat Executor-class Star Dreadnaughts. Their mighty guns and concussion missiles immolated three more Victory IVs. Behind the Battlecruisers the heaviest ships in fleet entered range, the Pelleaon-class Star Dreadnaughts. With a flash they delivered their opening volley utterly destroying nine Canderouses and two more Acclamators.

The Revenge II-class Cruisers hung back launching all their fighters and forming them up for a deep strike.

Then Borill turned and with a quick nod to Kusei a second element of his plan was sent into motion. One to deny the Mando'ade the type of battle they preferred, a boarding action.

With a single thought Kusei Maki engaged her cybercomm and sent out a cryptic message, to a person listening in it would sound and look like pointless static, but for the hundreds of computer systems in the Mandalorian Rammships it would look like something else entirely. They were each either products of Maki clan or copies of such a vessel and each shared an operating system designed by a Maki Cybercommando, and that commando had put in a back door, placed their to prevent vessel theft.

Now it was being used to disable every last one of the Hostile Rammships from afar. In hangers the crews would hammer their consoles helplessly as the ship's computer summararily sabotaged the vessel, unseating reactors and deactivating control software. While the pilots and crews were unharmed their ships were now useless in their cause.

Archaras trotted up the access ramp to the Twilight Ranger as ICIS primed the Engines. He sat down in the pilot's seat with a contented sigh, and activated the repulsorlifts. The Transport rose, and Archaras moved the Throttle forward, and the vessel shot from the docking bay.

He opened a comm channel and said "This is Seraphim. I'm clear. What's our status?"

((Sorry for the short post...pretty tired...))

Archaras grinned and then said "Go for it milady...I don't think its worth keeping it around in its diminished state..."

(Thanks for the post mate. Notre Dame got slaughtered)

Elladan watched as his initial wall took heavy fire, and several of his ships crashed and burned around him. He had fifteen minutes left until droptime... the expected droptime. To counter, he used a standard spear-head drive, pushing forward a little before opening his batteries, followed by a barrage of missles, than another cloud of lasers. This waver pattern set up a near-constant barrage on the immeditae enemies, allowing the smaller Canderouses to get close enough for a direct barrage. Ten of the remainding twenty or so Canderouses immediately opened up their bays and unloaded a stream of warheads at the nearest two Nemesises. As the point-defense guns beared down on the fairly easy targets, the missles suddenly collapsed into seperate warheads, and each headed for either the bridge or missle tower. Now too close to be shot at, the next instant upwards of fifty or sixty bombs rammed into the soft points of either ship, severely destroying both bridges, and sending the ships careening off course into their neighbors.
The Victories then opened fire, pouring their lasers on the underside of the ship, hammering them away from their trajecotries, and into the nearest allies. Within moments, four ships were down.

"That's the problem with close formations," Elladan answered. "They fall like dominos."

But all he got out of the ploy was four Nemesises out of nearly forty. He decided to pull back the line a bit to allow for the battle station's range, and let the planetary defenses take what shots they could at the closest ships.
While the fighters and bombers made their way over, several Crusaders and Lancers popped out of the Victories' backside, and poured covering fire for the ships, preventing anything close to their size of getting close enough, as the Victories and Canderouses unloaded their own fighters and bombers. "Stay defensive! They still out gun us, but as long as their fighters and bombers are our way, it'll be a massacre for them."

"Sir, we've got a report from the Canderouses," Sven caled. "All ramships have mal-functioned."

"Damnit! Must be his Maki girl..." The chiss cursed himself. One clan didn't head Mandalore's call. The one clan that had revenge on the mind. "Pull the Canderouses back some. We need to protect the ramships..." to pull off the decoy.

At the appropriate time Aurora activated the tractor beam and brought Freya aboard with Gunther's help. When her friend reached the cocpit she stood and hugged her, "Glad to see you're alright. The controls are yours." she said.

"I second the idea of blowing that ship to the core and back."

(Better. Thanks)

Meanwhile, the reinforcements from Taris and Mandalore arrived to help out at Contruum and found nothing short of a route. The station was taking serious damage, its shields obviously gone. Most of the ships there were in ruins, alongside the few Destroyers and frigates they managed to take down as well. Overall, things weren't looking too good...