The full might of the Umojan Fleet quickly disposed of the three battlecruisers. The drop pods the Dominion shot at the Umojan ships were largely intercepted in midair. The capital ships quickly followed the fate of the drop pods. Two of the ships were forced to flee. The third one tried to leave as well when things got too bad, but it got fully surrounded by Umojan fighters. Its warp drive was ripped apart, and the entire ship, along with thousands of soldiers and crew members, was reduced to floating debris in the endless space.

The sacrifice of the three ships barely delayed the twenty or so Umojan vessels, but by the time the Umojans got through, the Dominion Fleet was already closing in on the Hyperion. The Raiders have slaughtered the boarding parties to the last, and their ship was doing its best to put more distance between itself and the impending red fleet.

Jean noticed that as well. Her eyes flickered as she waved her hand and passed down an order.

“F-1 Squadron. Terminate the Dominion Fleet.”

Inside the hangers of all twenty battlecruisers, five hundred starfighters activated their systems.

These fighters were special compared to standard vikings and wraiths. For one thing, they literally did not have cockpits. In other words, they didn't have pilots.

Warden starfighters.

Programming the AIs for Warden marines and marauders was much more easier than programming those for starfighters and armors. When she was with the Raiders, Jean was limited by knowledge and resource to make trials. Thankfully, after joining, or rather taking over, the Umojans, she had the necessary components.

She put the AIs in place a while ago, but she quickly realized simply modifying the vikings and wraiths to fit the AIs was inefficient. Instead, she decided to design a completely new type of starfighter.

Sure, she was no expert with fighter development, but the Umojan Protectorate was a big place, and with a leader as determined as Jean who was capable of utilizing all the resources ruthlessly and efficiently, the power of the Protectorate was fully utilized. Within weeks, the army of Umojan scientists have designed a new type of starfighters capable of fully putting the advantage of the AIs to effect, and when Jean was busy getting killed and getting brought back to life, the Umojan factories were producing these fighters.

These Warden starfighters, which Jean lazily named F-1, were flatter than vikings and wraiths. They were sharper in the front, which allowed them to minimize the air resistance in a combat situation with atmosphere. Its most impressive feature was its agility. The thing with human pilots was that they could only handle so much pressure. Bring the starfighter to the fastest speed it could possibly get without falling apart, and the pilot would be dead long before the enemy.

Plus, the top speed of starfighters was way beyond what human pilots could handle. Any human being, no matter how experienced they were or how much stimpack they took, would likely smash their ship into things like friendly fighters or asteroids on the way to the battlefield.

Warden AIs didn't have the same concerns. Their AI reflexes and advanced sensors allowed them to handle the speed of the starfighters and their lack of body meant they could handle the pressure.

Each F-1 starfighter was equipped with a pair of laser batteries on the wings and a dozen torpedoes in its hull that could be launched from the bottom of the ship. An energy core was in the center of the fighter and powered the entire vessel.

F-1 fighters didn't have much armor. Too much armor meant too much weight, which meant less agility. In most cases, the F-1 fighters wouldn’t get shot by anything like a missile or a torpedo. Too many laser shots could be a problem, but once again that shouldn’t happen to Warden AIs. A few stray shots could be deflected by the F-1 fighters’ basic armor.

This wasn’t ideal, but Jean wanted a swarm of quick fighters that could be mass produced with a single command and would rip apart any foe in an endless wave of attack. She wasn’t exactly looking for fighters that could take a Yamato round to the face and shrug it off.

These five hundred F-1 starfighters charged out of the Umojan hangars like lightning. With a speed much faster than normal vikings and wraiths, the F-1, despite their later start, reached the Dominion Fleet much quicker.

“Terminate all hostile terran targets.”

A Warden Command AI embedded in one of the F-1 shells quietly ordered.

The first enemy these fighters faced was what was left of the Dominion fighter squadron. These fighters have went through both the Hyperion batteries and the Umojan firing. The fighters were damaged, out of supply, and scattered, and the pilots were exhausted.

Still, at a single command from Admiral Princeton, four hundred or so fighters still formed a formation inside the firing range of the Dominion battlecruiser guns. The Umojans did massive losses to the attacking Dominion fighters just a while ago, and now the admiral wanted to return the favor. If these filthy Umojans wanted to use their fighters to take the field, they needed to charge into a sea of guns. Even the high-tech Umojans didn't have what it takes to survive....right?

The Umojans didn't, but the Wardens did.

F-1 fighters spread out in the ideal formation. As soon as they got close, the experienced Dominion pilots and crew members realized something was wrong. The Umojan starfighters were much quicker than they were supposed to be.

“These pilots must be taking stimpack. Don’t worry, they can’t last long.” Admiral Princeton had no choice to speak up. Just like his men, he noticed the issue, but he knew what was important now was to give his men some confidence. An army without confidence could never be victorious. “Open fire when ready.”

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In less than ten seconds, the five hundred Warden starfighters dove into the Dominion web of death.

“Open fire!”

All the laser batteries, torpedoes, and missiles were launched. Vikings remained in one position and tried to function as flying turrets. Wraiths, much faster, fired a round before engaging full thrusters in an attempt to pursue the Warden ships.

It turned out badly for the red terran.

The Wardens unloaded a full round of torpedoes, which automatically locked on to all the hostile fighters. The Warden tactical network meant in one split second, the ships’ sensors could identify the target, lock the missile onto the target, decide if a second torpedo was needed to finish the kill, and upload this information to the Warden data net. This prevented overkill.

Following a series of explosions, nearly a hundred Dominion fighters disappeared from the Dominion arsenal forever.

Admiral Princeton frowned. Something was definitely fishy. If the abnormal speed could be explained by stimpack and a few maniac pilots, there was no way a few suicidal pilots could wipe out more than one fifth of the Dominion ship count in the first round. Usually, the initial round of missiles could only wipe out a handful of fighters in the front, and the rest of the ships from both sides would spend their time trying to chase down each other. Something like this was rare.

Now he only hoped the Dominion missiles could do a similar thing.

Because most of the Dominion fighters were stationary, they were hit first despite the fact that they shot first. The F-1 fighters, on the other hand, continued flying with full speed. Torpedoes and missiles, locked onto the fighters, chased after.

The speed of the Warden ships allowed them to maintain a safe distance from the flying missiles. This was something human fighters could never accomplish.

Simultaneously, all the fighters in the back suddenly turned their laser batteries around. The Warden AIs dispatched a portion of their CPU to control the guns, which started unloading on the flying missiles.

It was an easy process. Advanced targeting system from the AIs and the inability to dodge of the missiles quickly spelled an end to that round of projectiles. Only three Warden fighters were caught in the explosions.

All the while, Dominion battlecruisers continued to unload on the fighters. Orange lasers painted a beautiful trial after the fighter horde. One or two of them hit the target and destroyed it, but most of them were deflected or dodged.

The F-1 fighters turned back around. This time they targeted the battlecruisers.

The run led to the death of 12 F-1 starfighters and the destruction of 35 laser batteries. One of the battlecruisers took a series of torpedoes in the bridge. The shield and the armor gave out, and Admiral Princeton found himself with a maimed ship that had pretty much no ability to move or defend itself.

“Target Easy neutralized. Lower its targeting priority.” The Warden Command AI keenly noticed that. That maimed battlecruiser was pretty much a floating prison for the Dominion personnel onboard. It was no longer a threat, at least for the moment. The Command AI decided to prioritize in taking out the remaining resistance before returning to clean up the last survivors. Target Easy was the temporary Warden identification tag for the maimed battlecruiser.

Inside the bridge, Dominion officers started panicking. They were proud, but they weren’t blind.

“Admiral Princeton! Our ships are ripped apart! Our batteries are picked off! we need to pull back!”

Princeton’s eyes narrowed. Before he came here, he made a personal promise to Emperor Mengsk that he would terminate the Queen of Blades. While promising him a bright career, Mengsk also not so subtly warned of the consequence of failure. Initially, Princeton wasn’t too bothered. With all the advantages, including a much superior fleet and agents among the enemies, no one with any intelligence would fail. But now…

He shuddered to think of what would happen if he returned a failure. Mengsk wouldn’t hesitate to use him as an example for other Dominion generals.

“Direct all fighters toward the Hyperion. Focus fire on the bridge and take it out at all cost!”

“But sir...we have no way of pulling our fighters back after the hit!” Facing the rapid Umojan fighters, sending the fighters out of battlecruiser cover was suicide. “They have already lost half their numbers inside our own guns! If they get out...”

“This is an order!” Princeton’s voice turned dangerously low as two of his personal guards took a step forward. “Comply. Disobedience is punishable by death.”

The officer remained silent for a second before delivering the order.

The Dominion pilots lucky enough to still be alive received the order. Some remained silent while others raged, but all obeyed. Fight, and they would die an honorable death. Their family would be treated with respect. Flee, and there was no way they could escape this place with a fighter without any warping capabilities. They would die anyways, and their family would live in disgrace for an eternity.

They darted toward the Hyperion, fully expecting to be gunned down immediately.

To their surprise, the Warden starfighters remained fighting the Dominion battlecruisers. A few vikings got destroyed, but most wraiths and vikings survived.

Admiral Princeton’s eyes widened with surprise and excitement. He sent the fighters out as a last ditch effort, and frankly speaking he was surprised it might work. “Unload everything at the Umojans! Keep them occupied!”

The battlecruisers continued firing. Even the Yamato Cannons were charged up. The Warden units got out of the way before the cannon rounds could even be sent out, but they were held back nonetheless.

When the Dominion fighters were halfway between the Dominion ships and the Hyperion, the Raider scanners finally picked them up.

“Commander Cassidy, this is Captain Horner! A squad of Dominion wraiths is coming our way! We need immediate assistance!”

The Hyperion was practically defenseless. After the sabotage, the Dominion fighters, and the Dominion Minotaur, the Hyperion’s guns and armor were practically gone. The frontal armor that protected the bridge was practically gone.

The last card in Captain Horner’s sleeves was a defensive matrix that just came back online a few minutes ago. If the Umojans failed to reinforce in time, that might be his last saving grace.

“Affirmative. Sending our fighters now!” Jean replied immediately. A total of fifty F-1 fighters deviated from their previous attack course and speeded toward the Hyperion.

Seeing the pursuers, the Dominion moved as quickly as possible. They had no intention to stand and fight. These men have seen what the “Umojan” ships were capable of, and they knew they would die anyways. Instead of dying to take down a handful of these fighters and kill the pilots inside, it was wiser to die after wiping out the command structure of the infamous Raynor’s Raiders.

“Come on…” Inside the Dominion lines, one of the wraith pilots whispered as he closed in on the Hyperion. A second later, his ship exploded in a wave of lasers.

The Warden ships have already caught up.