"Yes. According to feedback from the deep-space probe, twelve hours ago—that is, at 07:28 standard time on August 23—a fleet jumped from Dawn Passage DL33 into DL32. It numbered between twenty-five and thirty ships. In addition, an analysis of the ships' mass projections confirmed that it included the Clear Sky cruiser and the Unicorn aircraft carrier, which the shameless people of Earth have arrogantly renamed the Aurora and the Saratoga," the chief of staff reported.
Since the war began, the prey the soldiers of the Galactic Empire had dreamed of capturing most fervently wasn't any of the Independent-class dreadnoughts, nor even the returning Lord-class ships. It was, of all things, the Thirteenth Fleet's Aurora and Saratoga.
The Earthlings had seized them from the Empire during the "era of peace." More importantly, according to official history, there was no such place as Kelnar City in the Far Shore Nebula. The real Clear Sky and Unicorn had crashed during testing, and Marquis Odegard had died in a training accident.
In short, the Commonwealth had never fought a war during peacetime.
Which meant that even after those two warships had been stolen, the Empire had been forced to swallow its anger.
Worse, the Commonwealth had used the two ships as models for the development of the Dawnlight and Saratoga classes—and then assigned them directly to the Thirteenth Fleet.
During the previous Marauder Campaign, that fleet had brazenly flaunted those two beautiful warships right in front of the Imperial Army, darting back and forth and testing the patience of ordinary Imperial soldiers every moment of the day.
Wasn't that like some punk showing off his affair with your wife right in front of you every day?
To be fair, the fact that the Imperials hadn't blown their tops under those circumstances was proof of