Robert Meta
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Star Wars: Rise of the Battlemage - Chapter 245
🕑 Added 2025-07-14 15:46:03 +0000 UTCTatnia was the first person to speak up after I confirmed that I would be able to find the Deceptor, as long as it was in the general area that Clan Galti claimed to have narrowed the station down to.
"A Victory-class ship is not a joke to take on in a slugging match," Tatnia pointed out. "Even with the newly updated 3rd Group. Are we sure that's all the station has protecting it, because if there is more waiting for us, there is a large chance we get our asses handed to us."
"As long as we properly utilize the starfighter squadrons, the Hope is more than a match for a Victory-class," I assured her, quickly clarifying." If we release the usual lockdown on proton torpedoes, that will massively increase their effectiveness."
Because of how rare they were to find from non-military buyers, I preferred not to let my people get too dependent on proton torpedoes or concussion missiles. By default, they were banned from being used, though each squadron and Group leader had been given permission to remove that ban if the situation required it.
One of Miru's most important projects was coming up with our own version of the high-yield missiles, which we could produce and use on our own. Unfortunately, she was stuck finding an alternative to the explosive they used, since that was a very specific material we did not have access to, and was heavily controlled. There were explosive materials we could get our hands on reliably, but most of them were mining explosives and were too low-yield to be effective.
Thankfully, we did have a slight stock of missiles, gathered by emptying magazines from starships and fighters before we sold them, but considering how rare they were, we still kept their use to an absolute minimum.
"On top of that, we can load the Hope with any available extra squadrons, specifically one or more Heavy Arc squadrons, and pack in two squadrons of our reprogrammed Hyena-class bombers… hell, let's take some tri-fighters as well," I added. "Between them and the Heavy ARC squadron on the Forge, that's a lot of heavy firepower. Hell, with the four squadrons of A-wings or more covering them, I'd give them even odds against a full star destroyer, and that's not even counting the firepower that the Hope, Forge, and Anvil bring directly. With the Tool Trio and the Wonder as cover… I give them good odds against a Star Destroyer and a Victory-class together."
"And if they get even more than that?" Tatnia asked.
"Then we pull back and jump away," I said with a shrug, looking over at Vi. "As interesting as a secret deep space storage facility is, I am not about to get in a slugging match with a numerically superior force. That is not how we work."
"I wouldn't expect you to fight something like that," She assured me. "But why not bring the lucrehulk?"
"At this point, Boxi's Fury has become more than a warship. It functions as a space station above Vercopa, playing the role of protection, production, storage, temporary home, and repair facility," Ahsoka explained before I could formulate a response. "Calling it away puts a significant strain on Vercopa and the Skyforged. If lives were at stake, we would call it into service without hesitation, as we did when your people were in danger, but for a planned assault like this, it is too costly to move."
"Now, if you had discovered an empty, ready to steal Star Destroyer, or a repair yard of some kind, maybe a couple dozen mothballed cruisers, the answered might be a bit different," I explained rather bluntly. "as it is, our forces should be strong enough to take on a small defensive force and disable the station."
Thankfully, she seemed to understand our explanation and my assessment of our forces, as she nodded and leaned back.
"I believe you are correct. While our… informant ultimately refused to reveal several important pieces of information, showing a shocking power of willpower, mind you, I did get the sense that the station's main defense was being hidden, rather than any impressive defense force."
"Good. Alright, I need to make some calls and get in contact with home," I responded, getting a nod of understanding in return. "It will take them a little while to prepare properly, and then a few days to arrive. "Once everything is set and our forces are moving, we can get started."
The clan leader agreed, and we quickly left. I called back home immediately, informing the rest of 1st Group and the entirety of 3rd Group that we now had a mission. I also notified Tarre's Pride, along with Sabine and Ezra's team, inviting them to come along with us. I wanted another ground team on board in case the station was larger than anticipated, but since I didn't want to bloat the fleet we were forming with too many small starships, the rest of the 4th Group stayed behind.
On top of the Tarre's Pride and the accompanying ground team, I orchestrated a large-scale shuffling of starfighters. If there was anything that the Skyforged Vanguard had plenty of, it was starfighters, since we had made a point to increase and refine our starfighter production capabilities. We could now produce around three modified A-wings per week, and if Miru's estimations were correct, around two Heavy ARCs in the same time.
We were in the process of mothballing or selling off any starfighter squadrons that weren't produced or modified in-house, but if anything, that just led to a surplus.
By the time I had finished working with various captains, mostly the captain of the Fury, I had transferred two extra squadrons of both our modified A-wings and Heavy ARCs, as well as two squadrons of tri-fighters and Hyena-class bombers.
Within five hours of me notifying them, the large fleet of ships had jumped to hyperspace and were only a few days away, set to meet us on our own journey. During that time, my crew and I worked on triangulating the location of the station. This was, by far, the most finicky and precise use of the Clairvoyance spell to track interstellar objects we had attempted, but thankfully, we had done some work improving the process.
Rather than working with Racer, and the droid just grabbing my hand and using a hologram to get a decent grasp of the proper direction, Miru had come up with a proper device that was now being spread out through our whole fleet, so that I could track interstellar objects no matter what starship I was on. On top of that, I worked hard to modify my Clairvoyance spell. Building on the experience I gained from creating the Conjure Shield spell, I carefully modified the Clairvoyance spell. I changed the arrow symbol into a much longer, pointed line, as well as making it visible to others.
Meanwhile, Miru developed a clamping system that would wrap around my hand, adjusting and manipulating it into position before locking it perfectly in place. Then, once I cast and held the spell, the device would use precise computer scans to perfectly read its bearing. Initial testing showed an incredible increase in precision, greatly expanding the range I could triangulate objects through space. There were still some limitations, as even the tiniest deviation could ruin the process when scanning for something too far away, but it was still a considerable improvement.
With any luck, it would be enough to locate a single ship in deep space.
Getting everything to collate and align was a task I handed to Tatnia and Vi while I focused on locating the actual station. The idea was to triangulate in smaller and smaller sections, by taking the large section of space the Mandalorians were able to convince their unfortunate informant to reveal and whittle it down. Essentially, we would make three jumps, take three measurements, and find where the three lines met. We would then jump around that point, passing it by a large margin, but still getting closer.
Once closer, we would make three more measurements and calculate a new, refined spot, before jumping around and past that one. It was a long process, but each series of measurements made our triangulated spot more and more precise. This allowed us to get tighter around our target, without actually jumping to the center and potentially revealing ourselves too early. It also prevented us from jumping in and appearing inside sensor range but outside immediate attack range, losing any semblance of surprise.
Eventually, when two different batches of measurements showed almost no deviation and meshed with the mean of all the other previous measurements, we were relatively certain we had located the station.
After that, it was all about gathering our forces one last time, everyone meeting up for a final thirty-minute jump to our target. Here, our large starfighter complement, at least the ones with their own hyperdrive, left their carrier ships behind, spreading out across space around us, forming loose formations. A rather potent trick I picked up from Luke during a visit a month or so ago, which the Rebellion heavily took advantage of. By arriving already deployed and ready to fight, Rebel starfighters could easily take advantage of the element of surprise. Where most forces took time to deploy their starships, within seconds of arriving, the Rebels could fire volleys of proton torpedoes, destroying their target before their target could even react.
While the Rebellion achieved this simply by frequently sending their starfighters out alone for day-long hyperspace trips, sometimes even longer, we could get the same effect by stopping just before our targets, deploying our fighters, and letting them jump the last bit themselves.
While our starfighters were deploying, our ground teams prepared for insertion. While we had several ships that could carry our troops and ground teams, we had no idea what sort of hangar space this facility would have. That meant sending us in with as small a profile as possible, which in this case meant a group of eight LAATi Space Gunships. These would carry all of the ground teams, as well as Clan Galti's warriors, to the station, where we would engage and clear out any threats. We also had five more LAATi stuffed with as many commando droids as we could fit, ready to act as backup, should the station prove significantly oversized.
Given Palpy's obsession with overindulging in his secret special space stations, I wouldn't be surprised to find something substantial on the other side.
Once the station was ours, we would start transferring whatever we wanted to take to either a group of freighters, conveniently stored in the massive hangars of the Hope, or transfer it directly to the Hope itself.
This was by far the largest fleet the Skyforged had ever fielded in a space battle at once, and while I confidently stood on the bridge of the Hope, I was nervous about keeping track and fighting such a potentially dangerous target. If we played this wrong, the Victory-class could do a lot of damage to the Hope before we destroyed it.
"Coming in on the last few minutes, sir," One of the bridge officers called out.
"Thank you. Comms, put me on."
I could see another officer nod, and after a moment of focusing on his screen, he looked back up and gave me a thumbs up. I took a long breath, letting it out slowly before beginning to speak.
"Alright, everyone, look alive! We are coming down to the last minute quickly. You know what's happening already, so I'll keep it short and sweet. Heavies, focus fire on the Victory-class until ordered otherwise. Lights, keep the starfighters from picking the heavies off. Remember, trust your leaders, trust your fellows, trust yourselves. May the Force be with you, and kick some ass."
I motioned to the comms officer, and he nodded, before making a cutting sound. Once he confirmed the comms were cut, I ran my bridge crew through some checks.
"Weapons?" I called out, not turning around as I looked out the forward viewport.
"Charged and ready, Sir."
"Shields?"
"At one hundred percent!" Another officer called, this one a woman. "Twenty percent over original system strength."
"Engines?"
"Full power, Sir. Fifteen percent higher than our original system.
"Alright, everyone. It's showtime."
I leaned forward on the viewport, staring out into the glowing tunnel of hyperspace. Behind me, after a few moments, one of the crew began counting down first by tens, then down from nine. Finally, just after one, we dropped out of hyperspace, the glowing tunnel shrinking at the streaks of lights turned back into individual stars. I looked left, then right, up and down, carefully scanning the area beyond the large swarm of starfighters and fleet starships for the station and its defensive ships.
There was nothing. Just empty space as far as I could see. I cursed, realizing that we must have missed our target. I mentally prepared myself for another round of triangulation while standing back up straight. We would be wasting more time, while our fleet would be wasting fuel, losing the edge of preparedness we had worked up to. We-"
"Sir! We overshot! The station is behind us!"
Immediately, I whirled around, jogging to the holoprojector that stood at the far back of the bridge. Sure enough, pretty much smack dab behind us was a large space station, the Victory-class that we expected. There were also two Arquitens.
"Signal everyone to turn around, bring us up and around fore first to get our weapons on target asap!" I ordered, watching as most of our ships were already turning around. "Put the Forge and Anvil on the Arquitens, deploy the hyenas and tri-fighters from our port hangar bay. Have them assist the Forge and Anvil!"
As I called our my orders, several people shouting "Yes Sir!" in response, the Hope began to move, the floor vibrating subtly as its engines fired, pulling the fore up and around, spinning the ship on its centerline, so the firing arc of our heavy weapons opened quickly and stayed open.
"The Heavy ARCs have fired their opening salvos, Sir," someone called out. Several seconds passed before he continued. "Confirmed impact on shields."
"Keep up the fire," I responded, watching the holoprojector closely, until finally we were facing our targets.
Blue beams of energy fired from our heavy turbolaser, impacting the already glowing shields of the Victory-class. I could also see our large dreadnought, the Forge, chasing down the Arquitens, the Anvil right beside it, a swarm of starfighters, the hyenas and tri-fighters keeping pace with them, dozens of explosions scattered over the enemy shields.
"Sir, both the station and Victory-class are sending out their starfighters… looks like TIE fighters. One… two squadrons so far, but climbing."
"Pull the Wonder forward to keep any stray bombers off of us, warn the Forge and the Anvil," I ordered. "Eyes up, everyone! The fun is just starting!"
Comments
George Wright
You are God Damned Right
George Wright
In war the greater economy, induatrial complex and logistic train win Having an "agrement" to not field certain wepons cuz its unfair or for fear of having them used on u is stupid and asinine... And clearly an invention by somebody that doesent know what the fuk they're talking about
Heidao
Everyone keeps talking about explosives and why things like nukes and the like aren't considered or a widespread alternative to Proton torpedoes/bombs. And while pouring over any possible reason(s), the most I can get was the Ruusan Reformation, another of those mistakes born from the Republic's hubris. In their efforts to neuter the Jedi of their power and military might, they too de-militarized so hard that their forces were swapped out to a weaker galaxy police force. The Reformation also dictated the size, strength and number of turrets a ship could equip, the amount of armaments like missiles and bombs which in turn gutted the galaxy's military industrial complex. It was only until the decades before the rise of the CIS, when the Trade Federation sneakily started arming their ships with weapons they argued for in the Senate for protection from pirates and adding more hard hardpoints to mount more later, did weapons in an already withered and heavily regulated market start to pick up. By the time of the Empire's rise, all shipyards and factories had been subsumed and "nationalized" into Palpatine's control as Chancellor. Things like nukes were long removed and frowned upon in society from these changes, though it never stopped the Empire thanks to their control over the media and internet
Trevor Perry
I had a thought while reading the earlier part of the chapter about their lack of access to explosives. Could a proper Star Wars guru explain why fission or fusion weapons don't seem to be used in the star was galaxy? It should be ridiculously easy to find and enrich either uranium or plutonium in orbital environments. Hell, even antimatter should be doable. Why do we not see this stuff?
