"Win some, lose some," Velinkar reflected to Boldness. The Azura had gotten a lot of information out of them - most of it, in honst, retrieved from a galactic net search, which while something the Azura could not do themselves, was the sort of thing that the elenthnars had already likely managed themselves since showing up the Aotrs side of the galaxy.

Still, they had something, and if nothing else, it pointed the Azura squarely at the Strayvians, who would NOT be pleased. He wasn't sure what the best case was, the Strayvians disengaging from their invasion altogether to furiously focus on the new aggressors - but then freeing up the Shardan and their allies and the Bright Accord Alliance had already taken a shot at the Aotrs - or the Strayvians continued to fight on multiple fronts and got themselves wiped out [i]again[/i].

It did not, however, seem to help them in the immediate situation by taking the biomancers out of it.

But, on the whole, he considered their diplomatic difficulties of lesser importance than getting his ground force re-embarked, by ship and [i]Gate[/i].

It was clear the situation in Tanshin was increasingly untenable, with two hostile powers - and he wasn't sure how big the Tides were at this point. While the Tides didn't appear to have demonstrated much in the way of surface-to-starship magntitude capability, there also didn't seem to be much gain in spending the time to pound Tanshin I. Tanshin II did not appear to have any strategic value other than being a habitable world, which was not immediately of benefit to the Aotrs. (If they needed a new bulwark against the Azura, there were better and closer places.)

While his - and those back on Fearmore and elsewhere - poured over what they'd recovered from the Tides, there was a little more time before the anti-magic ships were refitted. The Aotrs had kept up the steady pressure on the Azura, now latterly directed to what targets for best phychological damage by Boldness. Hit-and-fade strikes, primarily using energy weapons (and vessels like the [i]Shadowfangs [/i]and [i]Dark Fears[/i] which had little if anything else), had minimised Aotrs damage and at least confined the supply issues to repair and maintenance, rather than munitions supply. As hampering as having their primary weapons impaired. But hopefully the pressure was still telling on the Azura crews.

No, at this point, Velinkar suspected, the Aotrs' main goal would have to be eliminating the Furnace Knight, rather than claiming the system. Hell, they'd fought wars for less than they'd recovered from Tanshin I on occasion. Getting rid of him (or at least inflicting debilitating damage) would hopefully at least get the Azura to lose a lot of interest in this system. 

(If the Azure Skies chose to interfere in the other powers they'd just got data on, that was less of the Aotrs problem. Velinkar even considered, for a moment, the delightful possibility that them doing so would somehow provoke the Manual Fighters (since it as unlikely that the Blastarons wouldn't already take a shot at the Azura if the two powers happened to meet anyway, but they looked like they'd rather decisive lost that war).)

Ultimately, if the Azure Skies were nearly-out-of-context problem due to their size... Well. Damning Echo base existed, and if the Aotrs could hold that and retain themselves undead for howevr long (sadly decades or centuries) it took to work out how to use the technology... But that was a worst-case scernario a long way down the line.

For the moment, they needed to pursuade the Azura to Be Somewhere Else, and that meant dealing with the Furnace Knight. Preferrably at a great distance, and with orbital bombardment, though he was resigned that they would almost certainly need to get Boldness in.

That said... If Tanshin II was not obviously worth fighting over, then it meant they wouldn't have to worry about collateral damage (or reducing their weapons power) shooting at the surface. He'd already have been throwing railgun slugs at it, but the Azura were simply too adroit at gravity manipulation.

"A few more hours, Boldness, and the anti-magic strike ships will be ready. We seem to have cleared the board of the immediate issues and this last round seems to indicate we have accomplished about as much as I think we can here - so it's down to you. You have had full access to what we've got and where it is. If we were going to make a decapitating strike against the Furnance Knight, what would we need to do? I think it's clear at this point that you are the best asset we have for doing that, so I'm essentially putting the fleet at your disposal for a plan. You know best where he likely will be, and where your assets are. 

"I'm guessing trying to capture the Diodekoi is not going to work, but you need to get her and the Furnace Knight in the same place and on hostile terms. I think the biggest asset we have in this instance is the Azura don't seem to have a counter to our Gates, short of divination. So we could potentially use one or more of anti-magic strike team to move your toxicrene and oratus around - especially during the heat of an engagement, though we'd have to get a ship within 90 000km" - he tapped the holotable, showing the radius up on the real-time display to show her the relative distance - "to do it, but I feel like there's a very good chance the Azura won't notice a personnel Gate opening inside one of their ships." (He was farily sure, at this point, given their inability to locate Gate drive that the Azura shields were probably closer to galactic standard than advanced enough to block Gate transport, from what had transpired so far.) "That could then place them where they would be most useful, like I dunno, corrupting the Furnace Knight's immediate legion.

"But... At the end of the day, Boldness, splitting off and turning the Diodekoi is not something we can do. We don't know enough about her and Azura society is too mired in politics for an old soldier like me to even know where to begin. Which makes this, essentially, your show, I'm afraid.

"So, how do we manipulate things get you and your assets to the target?"