Beyond Mandalore’s atmosphere, Tor’s fleet dropped out of hyperspace and began its descent, preparing for the assault — but first, the ground needed clearing.
A bombardment run to soften the defenses before the troop transports could land safely.
Thick gray clouds hung low over Keldabe, the ancient Mandalorian capital, the air heavy and still.
Every New Mandalorian on the ground had their eyes locked on the sky.
Then the gray clouds tore open, ripped apart by four squadrons of Kom’rk fighters.
A shrill alarm cut through the city.
The fighter squadrons burst free like wasps let off a leash, filling the sky in an instant, blue engine trails carving deadly lines across the horizon.
A fleet of steel and ruin hung suddenly over Keldabe, its presence pressing down like a physical weight on every upturned face below.
On the bridge of the flagship Iron Fist, lit deliberately dim and cold, Tor Vizsla stood before the great viewport, his broad frame wrapped in beskar armor, Clan Vizsla’s sigil gleaming on his shoulder plate in the low light.
He looked down at the planet soon to be his — a world that, in his eyes, was already as good as won.
His fingers drifted, unconscious, to the cold metal hilt at his hip.
The Darksaber.
A smile spread across Tor’s mouth, cold and utterly without warmth, baring teeth like bleached bone.
He raised a hand and opened a channel to the entire fleet, his voice deliberately lowered but trembling faintly with fanaticism, cutting straight into every public comm channel on the ground below like ground iron filings.
“Cowards of New Mandalore!
Satine’s lapdogs!
You’ve crouched under your ancestors’ glory, staining Mandalore’s iron soul with the lie of peace!
Look above you!
This is Death Watch’s will!
This is the return of Mandalore’s true blood!”
His voice climbed, fervor bleeding into open violence.
“Put down your pathetic toys!
Surrender the armor you’ve let peace rot soft!
Kneel, swear loyalty, and perhaps you’ll live long enough to serve as warriors in the new Mandalorian Empire!
Otherwise—” a low growl rolled out of him “—steel and fire will scour the shame from this city!”
At the same time, in a hastily converted command center at Keldabe’s heart, the mood was just as heavy.
A massive holoprojection hovered at the room’s center, showing every enemy signature currently in the sky above the city.
“What a neurotic edgelord.”
His voice, when he spoke, stayed quiet — and completely steady.
“Stick to the plan.”
He paused a beat, glancing toward the comm officer.
“Let them in.”
Then he turned to a specific encrypted channel.
“Wraith squadron.
Cloak and hold.
Wait for my signal.”
Below, anti-air fire and ground artillery never stopped hammering at the incoming Kom’rk fighters.
“Our job is clearing the ground!
Make room for our brothers to land!
Low-altitude sweep!
Open up with the laser cannons!
Burn every rat down there where they stand!” a squadron leader screamed into his comm.
Several Kom’rk fighters loosed their forward laser cannons, green energy pouring down in sheets, hammering New Mandalorian positions, throwing up plumes of shattered concrete and metal debris, fireballs blooming across the ground and temporarily silencing several gun emplacements and anti-air batteries.
But Keldabe’s defenders weren’t nearly as helpless as they looked.
Kurt’s “let them in” strategy had a countermeasure for exactly this built into it from the start.
Just as the Kom’rk squadrons, growing overconfident, dropped in for a second strafing run — flying low enough now to nearly clip the rooftops—
“Anti-air teams!
Fire!
Targets, low-altitude enemy fighters!” The order went out to teams already dug in behind hidden windows in gutted high-rises and reinforced bunkers tucked into street corners.
Zzzip— zzzip— zzzip—!
Bang bang bang!
A shriek of missile fire and heavy detonations erupted at once.
“Missile lock!
Evade!
Evade now!” A Kom’rk pilot’s scream vanished into the explosion that followed.
BOOM.
A Kom’rk mid-strafing run took two portable missiles simultaneously, the blast swallowing the entire fuselage whole, burning debris scattering like fireworks down into the packed ranks of Death Watch infantry below, screams rising in its wake.
Another took a dense spray of rotary blaster fire straight to the engine, black smoke pouring out as it spun out of control and slammed into a shattered, already-ruined building, taking both down together in a deafening roar.
Zzzhack!
A heavy anti-air laser beam caught a climbing Kom’rk dead-center, cutting it clean in half.
The two halves fell, trailing fire and sparking debris, toward the ground.
With part of the district temporarily secured, some Death Watch airborne troops touched down and began fortifying defensive positions.
“Now.” Kurt gave the order.
Silent death had arrived.
The Wraith squadron’s cloaking field dropped in a single instant.
No engine warm-up.
No charging hum.
The moment they decloaked, they were already attacking.
Fwsh— fwsh— fwsh—!
A shriek tore the air apart.
Twelve Wraiths dove out of nowhere like phantoms materializing from another dimension, cutting through the sky at impossible angles and speeds, missiles and torpedoes streaking from beneath their wings on long white trails — death’s own spears, driving straight into the hovering and low-flying Kom’rk fighters.
BOOOOM—!!!
A chain of earth-shattering explosions.
Massive fireballs erupted skyward, mixed with twisted metal and human wreckage.
A large Kom’rk transport took two proton torpedoes straight through its midsection, breaking in half, its burning remains raining down like fire onto the Death Watch forces below.
“Enemy attack!
Cloaked fighters!
Above us!” The comm channels dissolved instantly into panic and screaming.
The Wraiths’ fangs kept sinking in.
A second wave followed close behind, targeting the higher-altitude Kom’rks still providing strafing cover below.
Moving with uncanny agility and total surprise, the Wraiths slid ghostlike into the flanks and rear of the Kom’rk formation, laser cannons spitting lethal green fire.
Bang bang bang!
Boom boom!
One Kom’rk had its engine shredded by concentrated laser fire, spiraling into a building trailing black smoke, triggering a second explosion.
Another tried to climb clear, only to have a Wraith lock onto its tail with brutal precision — a single laser bolt punched straight through the cockpit, and the fighter dropped out of control, plowing into a mass of Death Watch troops on the ground and erupting into a fireball that consumed everything around it.