The Sith ship started moving straight toward the Unity, acting as a shield for half a dozen fighters, shuttles and freighters. It had been able to keep the Republic fighters at bay just long enough to allow the second round of escaping ships to assemble and now was going to make another run. Captain Wash Moklam had no intention of letting it succeed.
He had felt bad, denying the Jedi any back up fighters when they had given chase to two ships back down into Hoth's atmosphere, but that had been the deal from the moment they had jumped into system and realized who they were actually dealing with. The Jedi would take care of the Sith and any ships they might have, while Moklam and his task force concentrated on the Pirates. Of course, had he actually had any fighters to spare, he would have sent them.
Their main hindrance so far had been their orders to capture prisoners first, but finally, they had gotten some decent sensor readings to go along with the Jedi's previous assessment. No life forms were detected aboard the small Sith capitol ship.
"Concentrate all firepower on that cruiser!" Moklam ordered. "Turn it into slag, then resume ion cannon fire on the rest of the enemy vessels," he added. Up until this point they had been relying on the ion cannons, but for some reason it seemed to have little effect on the big ship. In return the ship's accurate turbo laser fire had been able to keep most of the Republic fighters at bay.
Within moments, concussion missiles and proton torpedos began streaking from various Republic ships toward the Sith cruiser. Explosions lit up the view screens on the bridge of the Unity as the ordinance slammed into the shields of the enemy vessel.
Still, the ship came on, cannons blazing in the blackness of space, spouting darts of green in all directions.
Captain Moklam watched as it came on, the distance between them closing rapidly. This time his ship and the other Hammerhead-class cruiser, the Protector, were ready for the suicide-like run. Neither ship needed to take evasive action. Instead, they continued to pour laser and missile fire into the enemy.
For a moment, Moklam thought it just might break through as it's shields seemed to be holding up to salvo after salvo. Then all at once, missiles no longer detonated just prior to impact but began striking the hull instead.
"It's shields are down!" cried an ensign at a sensory station, and loud cheer went up from the entire bridge crew.
Moklam sat back in his command chair, breathing a sigh of relief as he watched gouts of flame and debris pour from the gaping holes which appeared in the surface of the vessel which had vexed him during two separate engagements now.
Quickly, the guns aboard the Sith cruiser quit and what was left of the ship began a slow tumble toward deep space, having been knocked off it's course by the explosions and no more engine power to correct it.
"Ignore that ship," Moklam ordered with a slight smile. "Neutralize the remaining enemy craft with ion cannons and issue an order to surrender."
He listened with satisfaction as calls began to come in, asking to surrender even before his orders had been carried out.
The Twilight Stalker continued to tumble out into deep space, even as it began to break apart. Moklam watched as it did so. It wasn't exactly what he had hoped for, but a win was a win.
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