Chapter 364: Hardcore Boarding Maneuver! Devastator vs. Death Star! All-Out Shootout!
"These Imperial tactics are so crude and blunt—straight to a full-on firepower exchange right from the start."
Watching the chaotic space battle unfold, the Chief Warrant Officer couldn't help but scoff at the Empire's outdated approach. If this had been an operation by the Universal Megacorp's forces, they'd have used multi-unit coordination, combining forces efficiently.
They would've gone straight for a boarding maneuver.
Paul stood in silence, brows tightly furrowed, eyes locked on the spectacle of the Devastator and the Executor bombarding each other with ferocious barrages.
Both super star destroyers had fully activated their turbolaser batteries. The space between them lit up with an interwoven storm of laser fire, rapidly draining each other's shield fields.
"Divert all shield energy to the side facing the Executor. Ram them with everything we've got!"
Paul clenched his jaw and issued a grim order to the Red Queen AI, preparing for a suicidal collision. He had to break through the blockade to halt the Death Star's advance.
With the Executor blocking their path, the Devastator couldn't get through without smashing this obstacle aside.
Following Paul's command, the Devastator aligned its arrowhead-shaped prow toward the Executor, revving up for a full-force ramming maneuver.
Vice Admiral Ozzel, commanding the Executor, was visibly shaken by Paul's ruthlessness. He found himself frozen, unable to decide how to respond.
With Darth Vader currently accompanying Emperor Palpatine aboard the Death Star, the Executor wasn't under Vader's command. Ozzel had no interest in dying in a pointless collision.
Even if he survived such a clash, Vader certainly wouldn't let him live it down.
After a moment's panic, Ozzel could only order the Executor to evade, steering away to avoid a direct crash.
Exactly what Paul had hoped for.
If the Executor wasn't willing to ram back, then the surrounding Imperial Star Destroyers would have no way of stopping the Devastator 's charge.
With the breach wide open—it was a clear path to freedom.
"Now's our chance! Break through! Head straight for the Death Star, full speed ahead!"
Paul's eyes lit up. The Devastator 's prow sliced through the Imperial blockade like a blade through butter, easily shoving aside the star destroyers trying to intercept.
The Executor's hesitation gave Paul exactly what he needed to make his move. The Devastator tore out of the encirclement and barreled toward the Death Star.
However, in the process of breaking through, the Devastator 's shield field absorbed far too much damage and was starting to collapse.
The Executor, having narrowly dodged the charge, immediately turned around to give chase like a predator locked onto its prey.
Ozzel might've balked at a direct collision, but there was no way he could let Paul reach the Death Star unimpeded.
If that happened, Vader would kill him anyway.
Now battered but not broken, the Devastator blazed through laser fire, surging toward the Death Star with one goal: go down swinging and take the battle station with it.
The Death Star, as massive as it was, couldn't possibly maneuver like a warship. Once locked in, it had almost no chance of avoiding the impact.
"Max out the engines! Don't stop for anything!"
Paul ordered the Red Queen to jettison all fighter craft and heavy equipment from the hangars and living quarters to lighten the Devastator 's load.
With its shield field now completely breached, every blast that struck the Devastator tore through its hull in blazing bursts.
It looked like a burning arrow, screaming toward the Death Star.
"Everyone, take cover! We're about to ram the Death Star—find shelter, now!"
Paul's warning sent panic through the command deck.
C-3PO began flailing about, trying to find a safe place to hide. "We're doomed!"
K-2SO, however, stayed cool. "Relax. We're droids. Worst case? Salvage some parts and rebuild."
"That's easy for you to say! I don't want to be cobbled back together with someone else's junk!" C-3PO shouted, clearly traumatized by past experiences.
No matter how they felt, Paul had no choice. He had to ram the Death Star. It was the only shot at breaking pursuit and stopping its planet-killing countdown.
BOOM—!!
The Executor's final salvo struck the Devastator 's engines, blowing them out. But the ship's sheer momentum kept it barreling toward its target.
The Death Star's gunners scrambled to open fire with every turbolaser they could bring to bear, desperate to destroy the incoming ship before impact.
Unfortunately, the Death Star's superlaser was already aligned with Yavin IV, and most of its turbolasers were still charging.
Some managed to land hits, but not enough to stop the inevitable.
"It's coming!!"
The Devastator 's prow slammed into the Death Star's outer hull with earth-shattering force, piercing its armor and shield like tissue paper.
A 20-kilometer-long super destroyer rammed straight into a 160-kilometer-wide battle station. The shockwave sent debris and hull fragments flying, smashing into nearby escort ships.
The battlefield around Yavin descended into chaos.
The Devastator embedded itself deep into the Death Star, over half its structure wedged into the battle station like a dagger.
Both colossal titans—spaceborne megastructures—were warped and mangled by the impact. The Devastator 's front end was completely flattened.
The Death Star, for its part, suffered catastrophic damage. Dragging a 20-kilometer wreck inside its hull, it could no longer move.
The Rebel pilots circling the Death Star were dumbfounded.
They never imagined Paul and his crew would go to such lengths to save the Rebel Alliance.
"May the Force be with them," someone muttered.
After such a devastating crash, survival seemed impossible. The command crew was presumed dead—the attack was clearly a suicide mission.
But before impact, Paul had moved everyone into the hangar, where he and Luke Skywalker jointly created overlapping Force shields and protective bubbles.
Only then did they barely survive the seismic jolt that lasted several minutes.
"We're… still alive?"
Captain Cassian touched his intact limbs, exhaling deeply in disbelief. He never wanted to go through anything like this again.
"We have to move, now! Before the stormtroopers respond, we need to infiltrate the Death Star!"
Paul said, igniting his lightsaber alongside Luke. They carved an exit out of the hull and led the team into the maze-like interior of the Death Star.
This was perhaps Paul's most insane boarding maneuver yet—landing a ship by crashing it into an enemy station and boarding straight from the wreckage.
Without Force-users on hand, it would've been impossible. The violent shaking would've turned everyone into mush.
"Great. We just escaped one pack of wolves only to leap into a tiger's den."
C-3PO grumbled, "So what now? Are we taking control of the Death Star next, or ramming the Executor too?"
Though critical of Paul's tactics, even the droid had to admit—they worked. The blockade was broken, and the Death Star halted.
"Enough chatter. We're lucky to be alive," Luke said, still shaken. That Force shield had drained him to the core.
The Death Star's advance was now fully stopped. Until the Devastator wreck was cleared, it couldn't move.
And even if the Empire rushed emergency repairs, they'd need at least two or three days.
Paul's next move was to wait for David Martinez's Expeditionary Force and the arrival of the Starkiller Base for the final assault.
"Rest up, everyone. You'll need all your strength for the endgame."
Hearing this, Cassian and Jyn Erso collapsed to the ground and immediately fell asleep. They were exhausted beyond belief.
Meanwhile, Paul deployed a small flat-top droid to begin uploading the Red Queen virus into the Death Star's systems. He had to map the station before launching the next phase.
Outside, the Empire was busy tearing the Devastator apart, trying to recover the Death Star's functionality.
Engineers worked tirelessly to dismantle debris and patch the damaged areas. But without the Death Star, orbital bombardment alone couldn't destroy Yavin IV.
Now, containment was the priority—trap the Rebels in the system and take their time crushing them.
After resting, Paul's group slipped deeper into the Death Star.
Midway through, Chirrut stopped in his tracks. "I can sense Darth Vader and Palpatine's presence."
"They are far more powerful than I am… and they know we're here."
His words made everyone go still. Cassian's eyes widened in horror.
"What? We walked right into their lair!"
Two Sith Lords were inside, and they'd just thrown themselves into the lion's den.
"How are we supposed to escape now? The place is crawling with stormtroopers!"
Jyn Erso looked at Paul in desperation. If they couldn't sabotage the Death Star from within, the Rebels were doomed.
Just then, Paul's commlink buzzed—Johnny Silverhand's voice came through.
The Universal Megacorp main force had arrived in the Yavin system.
"Don't worry—we've got backup. And they've brought a weapon that's on par with the Death Star!"
Paul grinned and turned toward a nearby viewport. In the distance, a pristine white sphere emerged from hyperspace.
It was the Megacorp's ultimate weapon—the Starkiller Base.
The real war for the stars had only just begun.
When the Starkiller Base appeared, both the Empire and the Rebels were stunned.
It measured a staggering 660 kilometers across—over four times the size of the Death Star. At its core was a planetary-scale super cannon.
As the upgraded "Death Star Plus" loomed over the battlefield, Emperor Palpatine slammed his hand against the railing in rage.
"What is that thing? It looks just like our Death Star!"
He glared at the new arrival, seething with confusion and envy. He couldn't imagine how Anyone in the galaxy had built something larger than the Death Star.
A nervous intelligence officer examined the base and stammered, "Your Majesty… it's the Starkiller Base—a prototype upgrade of the Death Star. But… it wasn't supposed to be finished yet!"
For a moment, the Empire's scientists and officers felt the sky collapse.
Their greatest weapon had been built—by the enemy.
"You useless failures! This must be the result of the Scarif data leak! They stole the plans for the Starkiller Base!"
Palpatine's fury exploded. He waved his hand and crushed one of the intel officers against the wall, shattering his skull with the Force.
The fury was justified. It had only been half a year since the Battle of Scarif. Now the enemy had a fully operational superweapon.
Worse, Imperial intelligence hadn't picked up a single clue.
In a galaxy where the Empire monitored all raw materials, no one should've been able to build something that big without being noticed.
Even constructing the first Death Star had taken over a year of focused effort.
So where had this monstrosity come from?
No one knew.
Facing a weapon bigger and deadlier than the Death Star, Imperial high command was paralyzed.
They were used to being the hammer—now they were the nail.
Finally, Palpatine made the call.
"Fire all reactors. Destroy that counterfeit Starkiller Base immediately!"
Palpatine quickly caught on—this might just be a bluff by the Rebel Alliance, using borrowed authority to intimidate. That so-called star killer Base could very well be a half-finished prototype, lacking any real destructive power.
Of course, more pressing was the fact that the Death Star had just been rammed by Paul piloting the Devastator , and it wouldn't be escaping anytime soon. A clash between giants was now inevitable. Even if he wasn't entirely confident, there was no option but to stand his ground and exchange fire.
As the superlaser began charging, a ghastly green glow radiated from the surface of the Death Star, making it look like a grim, spectral star of the underworld.
While the star killer Base far outclassed the Death Star in terms of sheer size and scale, Palpatine remained confident in the destructive power of his own ultimate weapon.
After all, the Death Star had already obliterated Jedha, Alderaan, Scarif, and several other planets. One more overgrown battle station didn't warrant much concern.
"I refuse to believe it—aside from the Empire, what other faction could possibly build something on par with the Death Star?"
That was the bet Palpatine was making.
He wagered that there was no way the Trade Federation could've teamed up with the Rebel Alliance and, in just a few short months, built a weapon more powerful than the Death Star.
It simply defied logic.
That mysterious star killer base had to be a fake!
And yet, what caught Palpatine completely off guard was that, rather than dodging, the Star killer base made no effort to evade the Death Star's superlaser.
Instead, it adjusted its orientation, aiming its own massive cannon squarely at the Death Star—as if inviting a direct duel.
"They're actually choosing to stand and fire back instead of running?"
Palpatine clenched his teeth. Facing such a bold and unflinching enemy, a creeping sense of dread began to rise within him.
If he had bet wrong—if that so-called fake Star killer base had even half the power of his genuine one—
Then they were still in for catastrophic losses, maybe even mutual destruction.
---
At that very moment, inside the Star killer Base's command center, a massive holographic display dominated the main chamber. It was a full simulation of the Yavin system, covering the entirety of its compressed spatial layout.
At the center of the holomap stood Johnny Silverhand, flanked by top executives and senior officers from Megacorp, all calmly coordinating the operation.
In truth, with the star killer base's massive strike range, there was no need to even come this close. They could've simply stayed on the outer edge of the system and blasted the Death Star from afar, leaving the Empire dumbfounded.
But that wouldn't showcase the full might of the star killer base .
Being stabbed in the back was one thing—getting defeated head-on carried a far more impactful sense of conquest.
Now that Megacorp held the upper hand, staging a flashy, theatrical battle at the final battleground would leave an unforgettable impression across the galaxy.
"Shouldn't we at least try to get the Imperial forces to surrender first?" Galen Erso asked.
As the architect behind thestar killer base, he knew exactly how terrifying its destructive capabilities were.
A single shot could wipe out the entire Yavin system. Even if they dialed down the power output, a direct hit would be more than enough to shatter the Death Star.
But the real concern was that Paul and his team were still inside the Death Star. Were they really going to let them die alongside Palpatine?
Johnny Silverhand shook his head. Megacorp had sacrificed too much for this moment. Even if Paul was aboard the Death Star, even if V was in there too, they still had to fire that shot.
Besides, without a decisive clash here on the battlefield, the Galactic Empire would never truly accept sitting down at the negotiating table—never treat Megacorp as an equal.
"We'll adjust the star killer base's blast to a controlled level," Johnny said, "and we've already sent word for Paul to relocate to a safer zone inside the Death Star."
"As for whether they make it out alive… that's up to fate."
Of course Johnny had considered Paul's safety. That's why he had the Red Queen AI issue advance warning, guiding them to a blind spot least likely to be hit.
Thanks to meticulous calculations and system regulation, the star killer base's next shot wouldn't reduce the Death Star to space dust.
It would simply destroy its core command and mobility systems, rendering it effectively useless.
As for the star killer base itself—there was even less to worry about.
With Megacorp's current shield matrix strength, it could easily tank two or three volleys from the Death Star's superlaser without breaking a sweat.
This duel of Death Stars had already been decided.
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