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VII Gemina took no part in the operation that broke the deadlock. That was the greatest strike ever launched. Ten Guardships assailed the world where the methane breathers had evolved.

They thought highly of it. They shielded it with an unimaginable array of war machines. It took the Guardships six months to clear those and sterilize the planet.

Till then no Guardship had been lost. In that struggle seven perished.

In the end, Guardship soldiers stormed and captured a huge orbital fortress. They degraded its orbit. Four Guardships hammered it with Hellspinners till a self-sustaining reaction started. They let it go down to start a world afire.

There were no offers of surrender, no pleas for an armistice. Plainly, the struggle would go on for years.

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