The next stage of the system’s prediction showed the Compact’s ambush beginning almost exactly as Saevor Drann had planned.
Varensk’s forward fleets entered the Talis Verge while chasing what appeared to be a retreating Compact patrol group.
The patrols withdrew through the broken moon belt, drawing their pursuers deeper into a region filled with debris, sensor interference, and carefully placed mines.
Once enough Varensk ships crossed the final marker, the Compact’s hidden fleet attacked.
Thousands of ships emerged from concealed positions around the moons. Their opening fire struck Varensk from three directions, destroying several command vessels and cutting the leading formations away from the rest of the fleet.
The Compact crews fought with the confidence of people who believed they had finally found the battle that would save them.
For the first two hours, it looked as though they were right.
Varensk’s forward line broke. Several fleets tried to retreat through the moon belt, only to find the routes blocked by mines and Compact attack groups.
The Compact pushed harder, encouraged by the damage they were causing and by Drann’s repeated orders to finish the enemy before it could reorganize.
Then Marshal Taran arrived.
His three elite fleets entered the system from a route the Compact had failed to watch closely enough.
The first wave struck Drann’s exposed left side while most of his heavy ships were still chasing Varensk’s broken formations.
The Compact fleet tried to turn.
It did not have enough time.
Taran’s ships were better organized and carried stronger weapons than most forces operating in that part of Kharov space.
Several hundred near-Tier IV ships formed the front of the attack, while true Tier IV command vessels coordinated the fleets behind them.
The Compact’s surprise disappeared within minutes.
Their fleet had been built for one clean ambush, not a battle against two forces at once.
Varensk recovered quickly once Taran entered the fight. Ships that had been retreating turned back, while surviving command vessels restored enough order to press from the other direction.
The Compact became trapped between them.
Aurelian watched the projection without moving as the predicted battle continued.
Morale kept the Compact fighting longer than expected, but morale could not repair broken shields, replace destroyed ships, or create an escape route where none existed.
Within a day, the hidden fleet that Drann had spent years building was reduced to scattered groups trying to escape the Talis Verge.
Within three days, most of its heavier ships were gone.
After that, the outer Compact defenses began to collapse.
The prediction showed Saevor Drann refusing to admit the scale of the disaster. He announced that the ambush had been a great victory because Varensk and Taran had lost more ships in total.
That part was technically true.
It was also meaningless.
Varensk could replace those losses.
Taran could still continue the offensive.
The Compact could not rebuild its hidden fleet before the enemy reached its inner systems.
Drann recalled the surviving ships to the world holding Sanctuary Ardent. He ordered the sanctuary’s engineers to prepare the sanctuary’s remaining technical archives for evacuation and demanded that Vaela Renn select the most useful specialists to accompany him.
The lower preservation halls were not included.
According to the prediction, Drann intended to take the awakened engineers, several thousand technical workers, and as much information as he could carry.
Before leaving, he would destroy the deeper halls and collapse the mountain above them.
He believed he could find another world, rebuild his fleet, and one day return to reclaim the Compact.
The people he left buried behind would simply become the price of his survival.
Aurelian’s expression grew colder as the prediction reached its final stage.
Drann’s chosen escape route was also important.
He did not intend to retreat deeper into Compact territory because he knew Varensk would follow.
Instead, he planned to move toward the outer systems near Mournveil, where several old survey records suggested the existence of habitable worlds and weak frontier settlements.
Those records were incomplete, but one of them pointed toward Larkspur Haven.
Aurelian almost laughed when he saw it, though there was no humor in the situation.
Drann was preparing to destroy hundreds of thousands of sleeping Humans, steal the people he considered useful, and then flee directly toward the Crownward March.
If nobody stopped him at the sanctuary, he would eventually arrive at Aurelian’s territory with several thousand ships and the surviving people from Ardent trapped aboard his transports.
He would not get far.
The prediction showed his fleet entering a controlled March system and being surrounded by Astra, Solenne, and the defensive ships stationed near Haven.
Drann attempted to fight his way out, but his damaged fleet lasted less than an hour.
The transports carrying the sanctuary specialists were caught in the crossfire.
Many of the people Aurelian was trying to save died before the battle ended.
That was unacceptable.
Waiting for Drann to come to them would be easier, but it would save only a fraction of the sanctuary’s population, and even those survivors would remain in danger until the final moment.
They had to reach Ardent before the Compact fleet returned from the ambush.
Aurelian closed the system and remained seated in silence while he went through what he had learned.
The battle would begin soon.
Drann’s fleet would commit almost everything it had.
The sanctuary would be left under a smaller security force, which made it vulnerable. At the same time, those guards would still have enough strength to kill the people inside if they realized they were losing control.
The best moment to act would be after the ambush began but before Taran entered the battlefield.
During that window, Drann would believe he was winning. He would have no reason to destroy the sanctuary, and most of his forces would be too far away to interfere.
Aurelian called Eirenne back into the room.
Her projection appeared beside the planning table.
"Have you found anything else?"
"I believe I have a workable approach," Aurelian said. "We move as soon as the Compact begins its ambush, not after we know the result."
Eirenne studied him. "That would give us the largest period before their fleet could return."