Chapter 15

Location: Kuat Drive Yards Research and Development Facility, Planet Kuat

The facility where the mighty warships of Kuat were born was actually a relatively new facility, only a decade old. It was tucked away in the countryside, where the complexity of urban terrain was no threat to its security. Built into the rolling hills of the open plains the gray of the building walls and black of the tinted windows stood out from the green of the grasses with stands of planted trees amongst the several buildings and on the roofs as part of a centuries-old green thumb Kuat had in place in order to preserve its planetary ecosystem. Guarding this facility was a mixture of KDY Security and Kuat Defense Force Soldiers. They patrolled the walls surrounding the facility and amongst the sensitive databanks and offices of those who toiled to create better ships of all kinds.

Most secure among all these sections was the Center for Military Development. The largest building in the complex, it stood six stories tall and covered an area of four acres. Inside were large holographic projection rooms where ship designs or sections of ship designs could be visually imaged and tested. Whole hallway sections could also be fully projected to test and envision interior spaces of these ships. There were massive databanks and design spaces for creating these ships and their components along with other things. Offices and other miscellaneous rooms also filled in the spaces of the large building, the KDY employees themselves something never even seeing or knowing about what other parts of the building had in them.

However, for one designer, a young Kuati with a short but eventful history in KDY's R&D program he only needed to know a select few. His name was Xim Main, and was a junior designer focusing on testing and being an understudy to a more senior designer. But he had a secret, his allegiances were not to the Republic, but to its enemy. His family was of a quiet sect of society with sympathies to what the Confederacy had espoused. They believed firmly that the Republic was too far gone for it to be saved. And he was intent on doing his part to see it deconstructed and its corruption destroyed. To help in that he had himself a nice position in which to do so.

"Morning Xim," his design master said as he walked into the simulator room. He saw a space station design was being tooled with on the holographic projection, "How are you young man?"

"Not too bad. I was looking to get a head start on those new destroyer designs. I had an idea for the damage control command centers, maybe place them near turbolifts to facilitate rapid movement to different decks," Xim suggested as he sat down at the control panel behind the more senior designer.

"We can test that, see what happens," the older KDY designer nodded, "Although they are effectively complete, may end up creating more problems trying to reallocate what was already there to new locations."

"Well I'd might as well get started if you don't mind."

"Certainly, go on ahead."

Xim typed in his passcode and pressed his hand against the scanner and it flashed green. He was in, and saw the beautiful arrowhead designs that he was after. One was a nine hundred meter Star Destroyer. As usual it was a classic Kuat design with a thick, four hundred and fifty meter wide hull with smooth sharply sloping armor plates. Turbolasers lined its horizontal mid-line gap along with laser cannons and turbolaser batteries on the top and bottom. A hangar for a sizeable compliment of secondary craft, starfighters, shuttles, etc. was also present along the bottom hull with the low bridge being located in the middle of lateral spine of the ship and in the dead center of the top of the hull. Four powerful engines on the rear hull portion that jutted out from the arrowhead portion, connected seamlessly, gave the ship a smooth and simple design. It was designed for the purpose of a smaller-hulled more powerful alternative to the Venator-Class Star Destroyer. However there were some problems with the design, it was hard on tibanna gas requirements, and lacked the principle batteries of heavy turbolasers that the other Star Destroyer designs sported, preferring to nestle more and smaller guns in the horizontal divide between the upper and lower hull. And it was meant to go into battle alongside a smaller escort design to protect it from faster opponents.

This design was more promising, a five hundred meter long and one hundred and fifty meters wide. It was the same basic layout, but had some more traits in common with the Venator and Imperator-Class Star Destroyers with the overlapping armor plates over the horizontal middle of the ship cut away around the hangars mid-way through the ship's length. Unlike its larger design cousin the points where the line from the front of the arrow intersected the back, this area was cut off, making the ship narrower. The design's rear was just like its bigger cousin, but with three main engines in its hull, and four armor protected secondary ones above and below them. The bridge was located in the same basic place as the usual KDY ship style dictated. But again, it lacked the heavy turbolaser batteries of the usual designs. While faster, it was still heavily armed for a ship its size, a match for the Dreadnought-Class Heavy Cruiser of Rothana.

Both designs were at Xim's fingertips now, and he intended on delivering them to his contact, who was already arranging his family's evacuation from Kuat. He had been given a special data drive with which to accomplish this. Hidden in his shoe, he'd smuggled it through security, men he knew well and men who recognized him and let him in with his device without incident. Xim had taken his drive out when he'd visited the restroom, along with a pill with which to create an excuse to leave without arousing suspicion. Using all of this he was perfectly ready to do what he needed to do.

"Mind if I take this to work on in my office's secure projector?" Xim asked as he looked at the two designs.

"Of course," his superior responded.

"I'll be available if you need me," Xim nonchalantly nodded as he downloaded the designs on an approved data drive there in the room.

With practiced precision he walked out of the room and swiped the approved data drive over his own, which used a scanning device to download the data on the two designs right onto his spy drive. He did all of this out of sight, within his pocket where security would not see the exchange happening. This was perfect, and so he reached his office, checked for the data on the spy drive, and plugged in the real one. At the same time he opened the bottle which had been placed into his office drawer. Taking a deep breath he swallowed it with the help of a bottle of water. Without much time at all he felt the sickening feeling of his purposely large breakfast coming back the way it had come.

Spewing puke all over the floor on instinct in a pained convulsion he knew he now had his excuse to leave work. This excuse was one that was well-known to be perfectly capable of getting him out of work. So, once he'd caught his breath and he was well and truly sick he decided it was time to go. Taking the data drive out he tapped the comm to the maintenance office.

"Hello, Maintenance," the man on the other end responded.

"Yes, hello, I've…just gotten sick, so sorry, umm…my office could use a cleaning," Xim said painfully.

"We'll be right up."

"Thanks. I'll get any sensitive information out of sight."

"Of course," the man on the other end responded as he cut off the call.

"Let's get out of here."

Xim took his data drive and held it tightly and shut off his computers and secured all of them. Quickly, he placed the spy drive back in his shoe. That meant that they were fine to come and clean and that security wouldn't have to preemptively check for any sort of insecure classified documents. He walked with a hand to his stomach and the holographic chamber couldn't have come soon enough. Xim got numerous looks of questioning and many of sympathy at his obviously pitiful state. This added to the social knowledge of just how sick he was and would cover his tracks for the time he needed. Walking back into the chamber and he saw his own mentor at work, and decided to have the sickness really show.

"Goro, I think I need to head home, I just puked all over my office floor," Xim said, placing the data drive in its disposal bin.

"Oh, yes of course, get home Xim, come back when you feel better," the older man said calmly, seeing that his protégé was extremely sick, "Do you have the designs?"

"Right there," he pointed, "In disposal, I'm still in control of my mind."

"If only our bodies obeyed as well eh?"

"Indeed. Hopefully I'll see you tomorrow."

The man turned and left, returning to the security checkpoint. The guards got him to the front and he sighed in relief when he managed to wretch and they sped him through with just a pat down and he was then able to get to his speeder. Getting into his personal vehicle he set it to autopilot and was hesitant to do anything but sit there and try not to throw up again. When he arrived at his residence a few miles away after ten minutes of flying low to the ground on the empty road he saw that he was free. Waiting for him was his wife and his Separatist handler, who'd pack everything up that needed to be packed. A Baudo-Class Star Yacht was there at his house, and he arrived there to see the Separatist spy there, the Twi'lek male waiting anxiously.

"Did you get it?" he demanded.

"Yes," Xim responded, "We're ready?"

"As promised."

"Good, get aboard."

Xim's wife went to him, offering a medicinal bottle for his sickness. They'd planned for just such this day for weeks. The couple walked aboard as the ship's engines started up and they began lifting off. The ship's hyperdrive spooled up and they were gone within moments of achieving orbit. Their next stop was the territory of the Separatist Alliance.

Location: Prisoner Swap Location, Planet Mandalore

Two sides, one with Clones and a single Jedi guarding a dozen Separatist high-ranking officers. Many were of alien races and many were human. They were guarded by Clone Shock Troopers and Jedi Master Kitt Fisto, who was overseeing the Republic's side of this exchange. The Separatists had four Jedi and two Clone Commanders under heavy guard by Droid Commandoes, none of them were in any real good shape.

Rear Admiral Korra Der, captured at the Battle of Harrin, could notice this from afar, standing with her arm in a sling. She was one of three admirals and a ten commodores captured by the Republic Volunteer Corps, both of the others hadn't been arranged for being swapped. She was the only one of them that was here to be swapped. For what reason she didn't know.

"Both sides shall exchange prisoners at the same time," the Mandalorian leader, Duchess Satine commanded loudly and firmly, four of her own personal body guards flanking her and a dozen gray armored Mandalorian police around the area, shields in hand, ready to take care of settling any sort of conflict by force, "Is that understood?"

"Yes Duchess," Kitt Fisto responded with a nod.

"Roger, roger," the tactical droid overseeing the exchange agreed.

"Prisoners shall return to their sides."

Der walked amongst her fellow flag officers to her own lines as the droid commandoes awaited them to return to their ranks, their fates obviously to return to command, or else they would not have traded Jedi for them. She expected to have some sort of dressing down for her failure to destroy Admiral Drexel's forces however, and when she entered friendly lines the group of former prisoners was taken to a shuttle and without much else than a command to sit down they lifted off after the formalized portion of the ceremony was wrapped up. Above the planet, facing off with a single Venator-Class Star Destroyer, was a Providence-Class Destroyer-Carrier that would take them all back to friendly territory.

Upon landing Admiral Der was told to wait in the shuttle by the tactical droid and the rest of the officers walked off as the ship could be felt to be maneuvering and the vibrations Der felt in her feet told her that the ship was about to jump. She looked out of the cockpit window, wondering what the reason for her to be held back. She hadn't been specially treated or questioned or given anything up at all to the Republic. So punishment was not what her instincts told her was coming. It had to be something that she was not yet understanding.

"Admiral Der," a deep voice she'd heard many times said from behind her, and she saw a full-size holographic image of Count Dooku, her chief of state, the ultimate authority in the Separatist Alliance, "I see captivity has done little to dampen your spirits?"

"No sir," she said, rising to full height and rolling her shoulders back, "Not in the least."

"Excellent, I am curious in your particular experience with a particular problem that faces the Confederacy, Admiral Drexel of the Republic Volunteer Corps," Dooku said, informing her of what this meeting would be about.

"Admiral Drexel was one of my instructors at the Anaxes War College, before the war. I had scored high scores in his courses, and was offered a position in several Core Worlds' defense fleets but I chose to return home. I kept up with his publications and then only had a real encounter with him after the war began at Harrin, where he lured my fleet into a trap that was far too well laid for us to break out. Our ships were sitting ducks and I was lucky to survive."

"Analysis of your tactics against the RVC at that battle show that if it were not for the arrival of the Republic's Imperator-Class Star Destroyers you would have won that battle. While failure is always lamentable, your performance has been seen as enough to be given a new chance to redeem yourself. This time, at the head of a force you shall mold for the purpose of defeating these upstart volunteer soldiers," Dooku offered, getting her attention.

"Of my own design?" Der asked, "How free am I to make such decisions?"

"Full discretion, we have acquired some meaningful tools for your use in this task. When you arrive at your new headquarters on Edusa you shall begin. To start with, you are to organize this force as a direct answer to the Republic's new volunteer formations that are assembling in great numbers. The Congress is pledging their own forces to aid in the war and counter the propaganda efforts of the Republic."

"Under Drexel's command I assume?" Der sighed, knowing how good Drexel was, and feared the result of him commanding a much larger fleet.

"Yes, however, your force is being built for one primary purpose, destroy the Republican Guard."

Location: Training Camp Delta-5, Planet Carida

The training camp known as Delta-5 was a big one, and was now home to the 3rd Volunteer Legion, which now had the name 3rd Guard Legion. All of the thirteen thousand troopers and officers that had returned were now hardened veterans, but still were going to continue training to become better soldiers. Wyatt and Eva were sitting in their platoon barracks, which was one of many rooms on their floor holding the company's platoons with another floor in their building for another company. Another line of buildings held the rest of their battalion's five companies and the single HQ company. The barracks building rested on a line of other barracks, making up their regiment which h made up their legion.

The room had two lines of bunks for the platoon, with a refresher in the back and a door in the front of the room. There was a line of tables in the middle aisle that could go up or down as needed/dictated and both were at one of these tables in their white and red armor playing some sabaac with some of their other comrades with helmets on their bunks and weapons on the gun racks against the walls in between their bunks. It was a quiet day, since, according to Lieutenant Yuno, they would be receiving replacements. Their platoon of forty-two had been whittled away to only thirty, so they needed some replacements.

"Oh there they are," Wyatt noticed when he heard a commotion in the hall.

"Wonder if they'll be Tanaab-natives," Eva said as she studied her cards, doing the math in her head as she contemplated her options.

"Hope so, we're a Tanaab unit."

Then the new arrivals walked in, wearing their full armor, shiny from recent graduation from boot camp. They held full backpacks and personal bags as they walked in, weapons slung over their shoulders. The veterans all saw their arms and nodded as they noticed that they were in fact Tanaab-born replacements. Their platoon sergeant was leading them in, and pointed them to empty bunks where they could put up their gear.

"Welcome to Echo Company rookies, get your gear put up and report to your squad leaders, rest of you, got some promotions! Gsig! Lullian congrats, you're corporals now. Quartin, Froi, congrats you're now Lance Corporals."

The platoon sergeant tossed out paper bags with the new rank insignias. The two young troopers looked at one another as they opened up their rank insignia bags. Wyatt saw that his rank insignia came with a red tile and three code cylinders, and Eva saw hers was a red tile and four code cylinders. She had authority over her own battle buddy and Wyatt now had command over his own fireteam. They'd been battle buddies now for almost a period of eight months, now they wouldn't.

"Well, we're going to be with a new battle buddy huh?" Eva sighed as she put her new insignia on the piece on her helmet and her collarbone insignia.

"Yeah, I'll have three others to be responsible for, great," Wyatt grumbled, knowing he'd probably have two of the new rookies that were starting to report to squad leaders.

"Corporal," a young male voice said behind him, and they saw a pair of young rookie troopers, a girl and a boy, barely old enough to be in the military, "Private Hal Wilven, I was told to report to you?"

"You?" Wyatt asked, pointing to the girl, a short-haired redhead.

"Private Kyly Gorri, just ready to get going Corporal," the girl said excitedly.

"Sure ya are," Wyatt smirked, "Okay, Kyly, you're with Eva here, she's your battle buddy, Hal, you're with me, I've got the Viper, so you'll be carrying the rocket launcher and spare rockets."

"Awesome," the young rookie said excitedly.

"But you're not to use it without permission, you're green, the rocket launcher has very limited shots," Wyatt reminded him, "So…I'm still in charge of its use."

"Got it Corporal," the boy nodded.

"Kyly, you're also to carry the spare power packs for the DLT-18, they're a bit heavy, but that's the most important weapon in the team, a single one can wipe out a droid company in the open."

"Roger that Corporal."

"Okay, we're waiting on orders right now, just take a load off and-," Wyatt began but was stopped when someone familiar walked in.

"Ten-hut!"

"At ease," Lieutenant Yuno said calmly, then sighed, "I know we just got back from Harrin, and you green horns just got here. But the war doesn't wait for us to be ready. Commenor's been invaded and Task Force 1 is being mobilized, gather your gear, prepare for immediate deployment."

Without much else said the platoon leader turned and left, being called out by the company commander. The squad leaders all began yelling for everyone to gather their gear and they moved quickly. Many were grumbling loudly, having just gotten comfortable. Others were excited to be going back into the fray, and the rookies were exhibited a mix of emotions. None had to pack anything, and were awkwardly standing around or sitting at their beds, looking around and waiting.

"You two were asking for this," Wyatt said to them as he and the others now got their gear ready to go.

With a word from the platoon sergeant the unit began rushing out of the doors. Their destination was the flat open airfield where their F6 Dropships were located. The craft were already warmed up, ready to lift off. Thousands of troopers rushed in lines towards their ships, and climbed aboard. Wyatt was fully aware that he had just gotten promoted and just got command of a fireteam. He wasn't ready for this responsibility, but was not going to back down from this.

Location: RVC Rendezvous Point, Humbarine System

Task Force 1 arrived within an hour's hyperspace jump to see that another RVC fleet was already waiting for them. Task Force 9, an entirely new task force not yet tested in combat, was waiting in position with its new model fleet. It was a mirror image of Task Force 1, which had also received its new ships and enlarged it by a lot. Whereas the original RVC task force setup was sixteen ships, the new Republican Guard follow-up model task force had more double that number. Each of the two task forces had the same three Venators, four Acclamators, six CR90's, two Arquitens-Class Light Cruisers and a QuasarFire Carrier-Cruiser. They were good ships, but they just weren't enough.

Now however, they had been enlarged to be composed of an escort wing eight Hammerhead Corvettes, seven c70 Charger refit Consular-Class Cruisers, and six CR90's, all commanded by a Commodore aboard the lone heavy cruiser in the cruiser wing. It had an enlarged cruiser wing of three Arquitens-Class Light Cruisers, a QuasarFire Carrier-Cruiser, and a Split-Bow Assault Frigate Mk. I-Class Heavy Cruiser. At their core, each force had four Acclamator-Class Assault Ships, three Venator-Class Star Destroyers, and heading up the whole task force was a single Imperator-Class Star Destroyer where the Rear Admiral that commanded each task force had his flagship. In total, thirty-four ships were in every Republican Guard Task Force, and here, there were two of them. The total of these two forces meant that sixty-eight ships were now about to descend upon Commenor.

Among the eight legions about to be thrust into action were two all-Commenor legions, the 34th Guards and 35th Guards Legions. Among them was Captain Challis and his freshly minted infantry company, ready to defend their home planet. They'd been specially chosen for the counterattack against what was estimated to be a Separatist fleet of a grouping of four squadrons totaling two hundred ships. They were all angered at the attack on their homeworld, and were ready to grind them to dust.

Captain Challis himself was immensely worried. He hadn't heard from his wife since the before the invasion began. That meant he was returning home to rescue his own people. Their whole unit was desperate to get to the long range comms aboard ship and contact their homes in the hope they could find out if their families were okay. But Kelrein had informed Challis that it was entirely certain that a few men may end up finding their families and homes gone, never to be seen again. Discipline would have to be instilled to a dramatic extent, and Kelrein made something else very clear to him, if there were biological Separatist troops captured and if there were civilian casualties the 34th and 35th would slaughter them. The last bit of advice Kelrein had told him was that if that happened to stay away, let the troops take their vengeance. His authority and credibility depended upon it.

"We're ready Captain sir," Sergeant Kelrein informed his company commander as he walked in to his platoon leader meeting after Challis himself had arrived from a battalion briefing.

"Excellent sergeant, keep them on busy work," Challis nodded to his company first sergeant.

"Aye sir, already done," Kelrein responded without hesitation, and saw that a holographic image of a large skyscraper, "Ah, our objective sir?"

"Yes it is, Space Ways Tower, corporate headquarters of the Space Ways Trade Corporation. Three hundred floors and several thousand rooms that we need to sweep and secure from the top down. We're taking point on this building, another couple companies will be working their way up from the ground levels."

"Seems about right sir," Kelrein said calmly, "But we'll need to be careful, the surrounding buildings are perfect for snipers and cannons. I'd recommend we keep our rockets with us."

"I agree sir," Lieutenant Eren of 1st Platoon nodded firmly, "And having our own snipers nearby will come in handy."

"I'm primarily worried about Droidekas," Challis responded, rubbing his chin, "One or two of those in a hallway can deal some real damage."

"That's why we've got grenade launchers," Kelrein responded.

"This is true," Challis chuckled, "So we're on our way, the fleet will clear the way and we'll land the platoons here, on the three landing pads on the upper five floors. It'll be a tough fight, taking this tower."

"It'll be time to test our lads soon enough," Kelrein said, "But we'll take care of business."

"I hope so."

Location: Dreadnought Basilisk

The ship arrived from out of hyperspace to join Task Forces 1 and 9, its immense bulk dropping out behind the fleet of Republican Guard ships. All of their ships were classic Guard style, all red hulls. The fleet parted so that the Basilisk could be nestled amongst them, and the formations adjusted accordingly. The Imperators went to the sides and front off the bow of the larger dreadnought and the Venators flanked them above and below with the cruisers bracketing the fleet in between and corvettes moved into formations to create an umbrella of covering fire against enemy starfighters. As the fleet prepared, a new sight graced the bridge of the Basilisk.

"Admiral on deck!"

The whole bridge went to attention, knowing that the highest ranked officer the Republic now had was on the bridge. Walking in was Grand Admiral Drexel, wearing a mostly white version of his previous uniform with a red stripe over his shoulders and down his pant legs. He felt odd in this uniform, but knew it was quite an honored position. So he did what he was ordered/asked of him by the Chancellor.

"At ease. Fleet status?" Drexel asked.

"All ships are ready, starfighters ready to deploy," the man heard in response from one of the operations officers.

"Very well," Drexel nodded, "All ships to battlestations, launch starfighters. Let's do this by the book. First wave to jump when ready. Second wave to deploy and jump after the first wave is engaged. Third wave to deploy and jump with the fleet. Ground troops to be ready for planetary assault with starfighter escort."

A flurry of orders went out and Drexel walked up to the large window that looked over the fleet. The ships of the two task forces massed here so quickly made Drexel smirk inwardly at how such a rapid mobilization was simply part of his planning. The new Republican Guard Navy was structured for rapid massing of their forces, and Guard Task Forces were perfect for this purpose. Designed to be capable of holding against much larger forces a single task force could hold long enough for more of their fellow task forces to arrive and reinforce them until their larger parent battle groups could arrive in force. However, they could also be massed quickly for whatever purpose was needed, just like now.

"All ships are reporting ready."

"Starfighters deployed, ready to jump."

"Begin operation."

I think I'll leave it there. A battle would take up at least two thousand words. I don't feel like having an eight thousand word chapter right now. Now I dropped a couple bombshells here, what with the CIS now deciding to get their own volunteer force and stealing KDY star destroyer designs. I have images that I based them off of, but I think I accurately described them enough so you guys get the picture of what they look like. If you want some links for what these ships look like I'll provide the images. As for the Split-Bow Assault Frigate that ship is the same one that you see in "The Force Awakens" at the Battle of Kamino. I figure that the Rebellion got them from somewhere, right?

As usual, hope you all enjoyed it, if you have suggestions or take issue/annoyance with anything please let me know.

Next Chapter Preview: The soldiers of Commenor return home, and the Confederacy's believers rally to their flag.