First Moves

War Captain Tor'han received the news with characteristic calm. The mission was not to be as simple as they had hoped. Instead of pacifying a primitive culture in a few weeks he would be forced to fight an extended campaign against two other forces. The arrival of Earthforce wasn't entirely unexpected. But if ELINT was correct the force was commanded by Admiral James Carstairs, a hardened veteran who had been crucial in many of the Dilgar defeats over the last year. Not a man to be underestimated.

The real wild card, though, was the arrival of a Centauri battle group. Throughout the conflict the Republic had remained carefully neutral. Intelligence believed that they would not commit forces to anything that might weaken their defenses against the ever aggressive Narn. As usual, intelligence was wrong. What were they doing here? And what was their allegiance? The ships bore the livery of House Drusella, not the Imperial Fleet. What did that mean? Tor'han pulled up what little information they had on the Centauri ships detected by his scouts. Centauri vessels were centuries ahead of the Dilgar in weapons technology. Their mastery of lasers made the crude spinal-mounted beams on the earth vessels look like toys. There would be no nimble dodging around the firing arcs of Centauri lasers - not until the battle closed to a knife fight.

Both his enemies had superior defensive technology, Earthforce with its vaunted interceptors and the Centauri guardian arrays. Simulations already showed that he would need to concentrate massive firepower to overcome these systems - far more than would normally be needed to destroy a Dilgar ship of comparable size. Tor'han made a note to brief his fighter wings on time-on-target attacks to overwhelm defensive systems, and on how to defend his own ships from incoming fire if need be. Casualties among Thorun pilots was expected to be high.

None of this would stop them. They were Dilgar, the terror of the galaxy. For two years their ships had conquered at will throughout League space, defeating every foe before them. Tor'han smiled at the memory of those heady days. It had seemed that final victory was inevitable. Even the vaunted technology of the Hyach was no match for Dilgar discipline and tactics. Then the Earth Alliance stepped in and everything began to unravel. In a short six months the blocky Earth ships retook all the territory gained from the previous two years; liberating the isolated and besieged homeworlds of the Brakiri, Abbai, Yolu...one after the other. Now the dream of a new homeworld in League space was ashes and it seemed that even Omelos would be assaulted within the year.

This system offered one last chance at survival for his people. He would not - could not - fail.

Gal'fen, his aide and executive officer broke the silence, "Sir, the fleet is in formation and ready to move on our first strategic target."

"Very well," Tor'han answered with a confidence born of years in command, "we will show these new foes why the galaxy fears our name!" Tor'han entered coordinates into the navigation computer from his command station. "Signal the fleet. We will move immediately to take this target. From there we will drown the skies in blood. This system will be our home or it will be our grave!"

All across the fleet, engines came to life and crews moved to combat stations. Once again the Dilgar were going to war.