Meanwhile, Eumenes, who had gathered a small army in Cappadocia, had entered the coalition of Polyperchon and Olympias. He took his army to the royal treasury at Kyinda in Cilicia where he used its funds to recruit mercenaries. He also secured the loyalty of 6,000 of Alexander's veterans, the Argyraspides (the Silver Shields) and the Hypaspists, who were stationed in Cilicia. In the spring of 317 BC he marched his army to Phoenica and began to raise a naval force on the behalf of Polyperchon. Antigonus had spent the rest of 318 BC consolidating his position and gathering a fleet. He now used this fleet (under the command of Nicanor who had returned from Athens) against Polyperchon's fleet in the Hellespont. In a two-day battle near Byzantium, Nicanor and Antigonus destroyed Polyperchon's fleet. Then, after settling his affairs in western Asia Minor, Antigonus marched against Eumenes at the head of a great army. Eumenes hurried out of Phoenicia and marched his army east to gather support in the eastern provinces. In this he was successful, because most of the eastern satraps joined his cause (when he arrived in Susiana) more than doubling his army. They marched and counter-marched throughout Mesopotamia, Babylonia, Susiana and Media until they faced each other on a plain in the country of the Paraitakene in southern Media. There they fought a great battle −the battle of Paraitakene− which ended inconclusively. The next year (315) they fought another great but inconclusive battle −the battle of Gabiene− during which some of Antigonus's troops plundered the enemy camp. Using this plunder as a bargaining tool, Antigonus bribed the Argyraspides who arrested and handed over Eumenes. Antigonus had Eumenes and a couple of his officers executed. With Eumenes's death, the war in the eastern part of the Empire ended.