Growth of a Seed
"Speaking"
"Radio"
'Thoughts'
Location
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Chapter 7
Planet: Milvayne
System: Gyrica
Region: Inner Rim
3 months BBY
The planet Milvayne was an unimpressive world. It orbited an average yellow primary, was of average size with average gravity, and possessed an average variety of environments and biospheres. It did not reside on any of the major hyperspace lanes so in-system traffic was fairly light with trade limited to what industrial goods the planet exported and imported.
The planet did possess a number of industrial factories, the most important of which is a Sienar Fleet Systems manufacturing plant. Its manufacturing line focused mostly on spare parts and ship components that are shipped off-world, but it did produce a handful of TIEs each year. Milvayne also possesses several minor durasteel and quadanium steel refineries. But again these hardly set it apart as such facilities existed on thousands of worlds.
But these facilities were enough to get an Imperial garrison on the planet. And it was this garrison that made Milvayne a target for a Rebel strike force, much to the irritation of two of the pilots participating in the operation.
Flashback
"What do you mean we're not in the prison break operation?" Yzak yelled at Winter.
Kira gripped Yzak's shoulder in the event he needed to quickly restrain the temperamental Coordinator. "Calm down Yzak, she has a reason."
"Yes," Winter agreed to the statement. "Currently the two representatives are being held in the Abregado-rae prison. While the prison is used to incarcerate a number of Rebel sympathizers, to the Empire's knowledge none of them have enough value to warrant a rescue attempt using advanced new machines. Using the mobile suits in this situation would just tip the Empire off that there was someone there of importance. An investigation from there could lead the Imperials back to the other representatives, which would lead back to Alderaan and potentially the Alliance. We cannot underestimate Imperial Intelligence in this situation."
"If we're not part of the operation than how are Mir and Shiho getting out of there?" asked Dearka.
Winter held up a palm-sized circular device that when activated projected a holographic image of a furry bipedal creature that wore armor, a bandoleer, and a headband. "By luck Captain Lochacca, leader of the Void Wings pirates, wasn't captured with his crew due to a delay caused by a speeder accident. We managed to keep his ships out of Imperial hands and he has agreed to work with us to break open the prison to retrieve his crew, your people, and any other enemies of the Empire locked away there. The operation will be designed to look like the vengeful strike of an angry Wookie."
Yzak took a look at the holographic image and pointed out a serious flaw in the plan. "He's a pirate, how can we trust him?"
"Aside from it being mutually beneficial, Wookie's are, by societal traditions, one of the most honorable and loyal creatures in the galaxy to their allies and one of the most terrible foes to their enemies. As it stands all Wookies hold resentment to the Empire for the occupation of their home world and the enslavement of their people. And while the Void Wings are pirates they aren't known to commit the atrocities that other pirate gangs are famed for."
"OK, then what do you need us for?"
Winter tapped a button the holo-emitter, changing the image from a Wookie to a planet. "This is Milvayne, home to a small number of Imperial controlled manufacturing plants and a military garrison. Alliance High Command has determined the garrison on this planet is a prime target for an assault. The basic outline of the plan is to enter the system, subdue the defenders, raid the Empire's garrison and warehouses for weapons and material, leave a SpecForce cell to disrupt future Imperial activity on Milvayne, and leave the system"
"Is the material that important?" asked Dearka.
"While the material will help us, there's nothing essential that we can't acquire through other means," answered Winter.
"Than what's the point!" said Yzak, shouting once more.
It was Kira who answered, "For image and morale. Right now the Alliance, the largest known armed resistance organization, doesn't even have a millionth of the Empire's resources or man power, and the fight for freedom seems hopeless against the Imperial War Machine. But if the Rebel's show that they can fight and win with numerically inferior forces, and not just this time but also the next time, and the time after that, and the time after that, than others across the galaxy, entire populations, planets, systems, and sectors, will rise up against the Empire. That is the Alliance's goal."
Dearka whistled, "Damn Kira, since when have you been so good at this strategy stuff?"
Winter also looked impressed and gave a brief nod of her head to Kira's analysis. "You're correct Commander Yamato, but you forgot something. If the operation is successful, than the Empire will be faced with two choices, they can either reinforce Milvayne with additional garrisons and ships to defend it against future attacks, drawing military resources away from other locations, or pull its army out to focus on more important worlds and leave Milvayne's defense to local security which will allow the Alliance to operate more freely in that system."
While Winter was adding her piece to Kira's analysis Yzak and Dearka conferred with each other. It went against their nature to hold off and let someone else rescue the girls; they wanted to be there to make sure it was done right and as Dearka said not going cost them an invaluable opportunity to be the girls' knights in shining armor. But ultimately they had to listen to reason and agree that everything they had been told made sense.
"All right," said Yzak, voicing the two's decision to concede. "What's the plan of attack?"
Flashback End
As Milvayne continued on its orbital path a number of contacts appeared, exiting hyperspace by using Milvayne's mass shadow to pull them from the sub-dimension.
The ships are part of a Rebel strike force that is composed of one modified CR90 Corvette, four GR-75 Gallofree transports, 12 Z-95 Headhunter starfighters, 6 BTL Y-wing starfighters, and 6 brand new T-65 X-wing starfighters.
And while any observing Imperials may or may not recognize the X-wings, there were two more machines that they would not have recognized. In fact if they were using knowledge of what they were familiar with they probably would have considered the machines to be some sort of prototypes that were left over from the Clone Wars.
But these were not 20 year old droid prototypes. These machines were brand new and were controlled by a human hand.
And through various monitors and sensor equipment Winter was keeping an eye on the pilots and their vitals. Yzak Joule and Dearka Elsman had only a week to prepare for this battle, and six of those days had been spent aboard the corvette, the Sundered Heart, traveling to get to Milvayne. The two had adapted to their machine quite well, surprisingly well considering the differences in performance. But such a transition wasn't unheard of; it was well known in the Alliance that pilots familiar with a T-16 Skyhopper could pilot an X-wing with no additional training due to the similarities of the flight controls. And an X-wing was a completely different beast from a Skyhopper.
Still, despite their apparent skill this would be the first battle, simulations aside, where the two would exit hyperspace, engage the enemy in space, then descend through the planet's atmosphere to engage the enemy on the ground, re-ascending and exiting the atmosphere, and finally jumping through hyperspace to get away from the system. So Winter had been tasked of monitoring the Coordinator's progress, though due to the sensitive nature of her work everyone else had been informed that she was an engineer assigned to monitor the prototype machines, which she was so the Alliance could gather data for their own mobile suit development.
"Captain," the sensor officer alerted the Sundered Heart's captain, "Imperial patrol cruiser on an intercept course. They're querying us for identification and our purpose in system."
Ramyus Antilles, temporarily reassigned from his post aboard the Tantive IV, called up a holo-image of the approaching ship. As expected of the planet's defenses it was a Tartan-class patrol cruiser. Introduced shortly after the establishment of the New Order these 250 meter long vessels had high speed engines and were armed with 20 laser cannons. Though possessing only a fourth of the newer Lancer's firepower Tartan's were still excellent ships for countering starfighter raids.
"All starfighters and freighters pull away 20 degrees to port and continue towards primary target. Helm, pull us forward, we'll be their shield. Initiate ECM protocols and jam their transmissions." A Tartan's cannons and targeting computers had greater range than a starfighter's, allowing the patrol cruiser to engage at range, weakening the strike force as TIEs were called up from the planet. But in a one on one engagement a standard CR90 is considered an even match for a Tartan.
The ships did as he commanded and rolled down and to the left. At the same time, the Sundered Heart's modified engines roared, propelling the corvette forward to place itself between its fellow Rebel vessels and the patrol cruiser. But one other machine followed along.
"Captain Antilles, I have a plan to deal with the Tartan," said Dearka as the Solar pulled up alongside the larger vessel.
"What plan, Lieutenant?"
"A plan to take the ship as a prize. Work with me to bring down the shields and let me take care of it from there."
Raymus looked to Winter, knowing her true purpose aboard the ship, silently asking for a recommendation on whether or not to follow the Earthling's lead. Winter nodded her approval that they follow Dearka's plan and Antilles granted it.
"Enemy is within weapons range."
"Activate the N-Jammer and tell gunners that they are free to fire until they have a confirmed shield drop."
With those orders the powerful N-Jammer that was installed in the ship was activated, generating a disruptive field with a radius over twenty kilometers that interfered with traditional communications, sensors, and targeting systems. The Sundered Heart however had been modified to compensate. Its targeting computers now supplemented by visual data cameras and targeting lasers to provide firing solutions and additional lasers were used as line-of-sight communication intermediaries for short range communication.
Once activated the gunners oriented as many of the ship's turbolasers and laser cannons on the Tartan as was possible, and let loose upon the Imperial ship, releasing crimson bolts of energy as quickly as the energy capacitors could recharge.
In response the Tartan's port laser cannons began spewing emerald bolts of energy at the CR90. Its bolts weren't as powerful but were numerically superior.
When the hostilities started Dearka flew the Solar two kilometers straight up to get out of the two ship's line of fire, than angled himself to face the patrol cruiser that was still a good 10 kilometers out. Dearka smiled as the Solar's computer bracketed the Tartan and used the threat assessor and data stored in its memory to high-light critical sections such as the laser cannons and deflector shield emitter. A secondary monitor popped up showing an estimation of the ship's estimated shield strength. Ruby turbolaser bolts soared toward the Imperial patrol cruiser, some missing their mark while others hit, splashing across the shields.
"Let's go," Dearka shouted as he pushed the Gundam forward and down on a direct course for the Tartan. Several laser cannons redirected to fire upon the mobile suit, but a little four-directional sliding was more than to avoid the sensor jammed weapons. When the rangefinder said that the distance between the Gundam and the ship was two kilometers, Dearka maneuvered the mobile suit to swing the legs forward. "Go Solar!" The Gundam's eyes flashed as the AI deployed the DRAGOON pods which rushed to their assigned points as concussion missiles raced from the leg-mounted launchers.
The eight missiles accelerated at a tremendous rate thanks to the Solar's momentum, crossing the void in a matter of two seconds to impact upon the Tartan's weakened shield. The first six to strike generated brilliant explosions of energy that shined brilliantly thanks to the reflective nature of the deflectors, and were enough to bring down the shields as the last two impacted the hull. The second it was confirmed the shields were down the DRAGOON pods fired, the beams destroying multiple laser cannons, the primary communications array, and the deflector shield generator.
Tremors rocked the ship as the multiple explosions occurred. Sending a brief "stop attacking" message to the Sundered Heart before it could demolish the now shield-less Imperial craft Dearka closed the distance to this ship in moments, halting right in front of the bridge. The Solar gripped the ship to maintain its position as the cameras directed their vision through the transparisteel window into the bridge where the crew had paused in shock. Dearka than opened a comm line to the ship.
"Imperial patrol cruiser, this is the Rebel Alliance, almost half you guns and your shield generator are destroyed. Surrender and leave the ship via escape pods and no further harm will come to you. Continue fighting and I will blow open the bridge and every other section of the ship. You have one minute to decide."
Turns out they didn't need to wait one minute. As soon as Dearka had finished speaking the captain had hightailed it out of the bridge with his command crew only a second behind him. 30 seconds later escape pods began jettisoning out into space. Within two minutes the Tartan was clear of life signs, according to the Sundered Heart's sensors after the N-Jammer was momentarily disengaged.
"Good work Elsman," congratulated Antilles as the Sundered Heart was brought alongside the Imperial craft. "We're deploying a team to sweep the ship and jump it so a safe system. Regroup with the others."
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As the Sundered Heart and Solar were dealing with the patrol cruiser, the starfighters and freighters were approaching the planet at combat speed.
As they approached the upper atmosphere the pilots were alerted to 6 vessels rising through the atmosphere that the computers identified as TIE fighters.
'Only six,' thought Yzak as he analyzed the situation. 'The cruiser must have called for reinforcements before we jammed it. But there's not even a full squadron. Must have been on patrol and sent ahead. Chances are the garrison is scrambling the rest of their fighters.' Yzak's wasn't the only one thinking that as the Major who was second in command of this operation ordered Green Squadron, the six X-Wings to intercept while the main battle group went on ahead. From what Yzak knew this was a fairly sound judgment as the 6 starfighters pulled away and accelerated. Those X-wings were fresh off the assembly line and were among the first to be used in actual combat. The chances the pilots of this garrison were familiar with X-wing capabilities, let alone trained to fight against them, were exceptionally low. Even if they did, these were new model X-wings with a few surprises.
The distance closed between the X-wings and TIEs as they approached each other in a head to head attack vector.
The two starfighter groups approached each other at an angle. The X-wings had positioned themselves so the TIEs would be silhouetted by the planet's reflected light. The TIEs picked up speed as they continued towards the Rebels main fighter group, no doubt intent on carrying out a slashing attack the freighters.
Yzak had little doubt that the Imperial pilots were intending to hit the large freighters before using their superior speed to run away rather than get into a dogfight with the numerically superior Rebel force. But they should have been more wary of the X-wings. Too far away for lasers Green One and Green Two acquired a visual lock, aided by the planet's light, and launched a proton torpedo each at the two leading TIEs. The Imperial fighters began jinking but it was too little too late as the nimble munitions bared down on them. The first managed to jink out of the way, but the torpedo's proximity sensor detected the starfighter as it passed and detonated the warhead. The resulting shockwave ripped the quandanium steel of the nearest pylon and damaged the engine, sending the TIE careening out of control in a death dive into the planet's gravity well.
The second TIE was hit directly; blossoming into a cloud of debris and fire that a third TIE that was just a little further behind had the misfortune of flying through. A reasonably intact solar panel rammed into the cockpit, and because of the opposing high velocities the two masses were flying, crashed thought the viewport and crushed the pilot.
Having been reduced by half and facing insurmountable odd the remaining three pilots opted to make a tactical withdrawal, adjusting their course to fly back down to the surface where reinforcements were no doubt gathering. The X-wings were in hot pursuit, trying to close the gap to laser weapon range, but the TIEs superior speed kept them well ahead. The only way to overtake the Imperials was to ignore safety protocols, which was what Yzak was going to do.
As they hit the upper atmosphere Yzak set the controls to full manual, cut power to the repulsorlifts by half, and shunted all available power to shields and the phase shift armor. It didn't go unnoticed as the Nebula's velocity increased it started to glow red from friction heat.
"Nebula! What are you doing!" shouted Green Leader. "You're going too fast and your reentry angle is too steep!"
Keeping most of his attention on the controls and sensors Yzak sent back a response. "Don't worry; my people have handled this degree of reentry before." 'Granted I've never successfully done it. But if Zala can do it in a ZAKU than I can do it in the Nebula.'
Even with the cooling systems working overtime the cockpit temperature quickly skyrocketed, soaring to temperatures that would have killed an ordinary human. Fortunately Yzak was not ordinary. As a Coordinator his body could withstand greater degrees of stress, but even he felt that he was pushing the boundaries of his body's limits as it was pushed back into the pilot's chair by the G forces that had overwhelmed the inertial compensator. But the effects were quite noticeable as he pulled ahead of the main group, and even overtook the TIEs, though he was in no position to shoot them down.
Finally, when he reached the optimal descent range, just before he felt like he was going to pass out, Yzak brought power to the repulsorlifts, slowing down the Nebula. From his vantage point he could make out the Imperial garrison. As he expected from the briefings the structure was large and divided into three sections. The lowest section consisted of six individual levels and was well over sixty meters tall. It was a hexagonal shape hundreds of meters long and wide, with a single heavy laser cannon mounted at each point of the hexagon. The second section, consisting of levels 7-8, was composed of three hangar/launch chute structures, and each had a duel heavy turbolaser cannon. The final section was a tower that housed long range sensors and communications.
As he got closer he could identify TIEs launching from the second section while troops and ground vehicles deployed from the lower section and began taking defensive positions in trenches and defensive walls that had strategically placed around the base.
Yzak aimed the Nebula towards his chosen landing point, a section of ground situated between the wall and defensive fortifications. It would box him in, but to land farther out would risk encountering anti-tank mines. He had less than a minute to cause as much damage as possible before the starfighters arrived. The Y-wings would bomb the ground while the Z-95s and X-wings sought to eliminate the TIEs to achieve air superiority for when the Rebel ground forces finally managed to unload from the freighters and arrive.
The base's cannon emplacements rotated up and opened fire on the Nebula, forcing Yzak to execute several hard maneuvers to avoid the deluge of fire. The TIEs swarming around, about fifteen according to his computer, had yet to take an interest, focusing instead on forming a screen that would protect the base from an air attack. That probably had to do with the jamming field being produced by the freighters' N-Jammers. By now the freighters would have split into individual groups that would land at roughly equidistant points surrounding the base, generating a jamming field that completely surrounded the garrison.
But he wasn't completely ignored as three AT-STs and a pair of 2-M Saber tanks moved to surround his estimated landing zone, each vehicle angling their weapons to target the Nebula. Yzak rolled his mobile suit to avoid the first barrage of laser fire and concussion grenades, pulled out his four ranged weapons, and put on a burst of speed. The rail guns fired upon the scout transports as he concentrated the beam pistols on the tanks. The high velocity rounds tore through the thin armor of the AT-STs like wet tissue paper, demolishing their oversized heads.
The deflector equipped tanks were tougher, but their small generators couldn't hold for long. With two shots the shields were down allowing the third shot from each pistol to strike their respective targets' main turret and power supply.
With the site cleared Yzak landed, but he couldn't stay still. Having seen the mobile suit take out five assault vehicles in just a few seconds the Imperials were already responding. Yzak could make out more tanks and walkers moving to intercept as the nearest trooper squads turned to train their weapons, which ranged from everything from blaster rifles to E-Webs to ground mortars, on him.
Firing a quick CIWS burst into the nearest trooper formations; Yzak ignited the thrusters and nudged the repulsorlifts, launching the Nebula forward. Grabbing a beam saber he cut through a fourth AT-ST before using the CIWS to target several light land speeders. Another Saber tank came around the corner of the base and trained it's turret on the mobile suit, but the laser cannon blast was blocked by the shield before Yzak used two rail guns and a pistol to retaliate and destroy it.
Now the TIEs were interested in him and it looked like they had all been launched. They shot away from the base and maneuvered to circle back to do a strafing run against him. But before Yzak could get boxed in the Rebel starfighters arrived.
The Y-wings used their ground assault targeting packages to strafe the ground with their laser and ion cannons, obliterating the Imperial fortifications, concentrating their attack along the roads running to the garrison, the only approach avenues clear of mines and the route the ground forces would take. Z-95s and X-wings fired their lasers into the crowd of TIEs, forcing the Imperial starfighters to scatter and regroup. While the Imperial pilots were disoriented and adjusting to the situation the Rebel pilots sought to press their advantage, using their fighters' superior atmospheric mobility to get behind the TIEs into what's known as the kill zone.
At this point the garrison's cannons had opened fire upon the rebel starfighters, but aiming was difficult as it had to avoid the TIEs in the melee. The Y-wings countered by firing proton torpedoes, lasers, and ion cannon blasts at the shielded base. Fiery explosions bounced off the base as the garrison's power manager diverted more energy to the shields.
Without having to pay so much attention to the sky Yzak turned his focus on an AT-AT, the massive walker was at a side profile to the Nebula, presenting an irresistible target. Yzak fired the rail guns but to his surprise the rounds didn't penetrate. They left dents and it looked like the cow-like walker was about to tip over if the operator hadn't readjusted the legs. The assault transport ponderously turned to attack the Nebula, but even with its articulated neck it was far too slow. In the time it took to turn enough to aim the Nebula had crossed the distance and sliced off its head with a beam saber.
A sudden alert was all the warning Yzak had to bring up the shield before heavy lasers struck him. Three more AT-ATs had come around the corner and doing their best to pin the Nebula. And Yzak could see why as several AT-STs, 2-Ms, TIE ap-1s, and other ground vehicles his computer didn't immediately recognize moved to surround him. On his own this was an extremely tight situation.
"Need a hand?" Fortunately he wasn't alone, and the Imperials learned that the hard way as green energy beams rained down on them. Not missing a beat Yzak jumped the Nebula up and over the AT-ATs and from behind immediately set to work cutting the hind legs off the metal beasts. Now unbalanced the back heavy walkers fell into uselessness, right before Yzak sliced off their heads.
He finally took the time to look up to see Dearka and the Solar, with DRAGOONs buzzing about as they shifted from one target to the next. Yzak noted that the DRAGOONs were much slower under the effects of gravity and fired fewer shots before returning to the Solar to recharge. Coming up behind the Solar was the Sundered Heart, its turbolasers pounding on the base's shields.
Between the Y-wings and the Corellian Corvette it was too much and the shields finally collapsed. The Sundered Heart then targeted the lasers and communications tower, destroying them all in quick succession.
By this point the ground forces had arrived. T-2B repulsorlift tanks led the charge with foot soldiers right behind. With most of the heavy vehicles out of the way the ray-shielded tanks made short work of the light repulsorlift vehicles that had stayed out of the mobile suit's way. Though there were still a few dozen scattered across the field they did not last long, especially after the Solar and Sundered Heart turned their weapons on them. Many were destroyed, while the smart (or at least more cowardly) pilots went for the hills.
Yzak turned his attention to the sky, flying up to join the fray. It was mostly over up there. Because of their solar panels TIEs have quite a bit of trouble with wind resistance when yawing or rolling or basically any maneuver that is not forward, back, up, or down. And with the various ECM devices in effect, fouling up their targeting computers, the TIE pilots were just unprepared to deal with ships that beat them in maneuverability, had effective ECCM for the N-Jammers, and were protected by shields.
Still four Z-95s and a Y-wing had been lost. But losses were expected in any military operation and these were well within the range of acceptable casualties.
"Good work men," said Antillies. "Now we need to break down the death fence and breach the doors."
"I'm on it," said Dearka, moving the Solar to stand several dozen meters before the main entrance. The Solar combined its two beam rifles into a heavy beam cannon that unleashed a powerful red, white, and blue beam of highly charged particles. The beam tore through the death fence and the thick doors that guarded the entrance, and probably destroyed anything that was set up behind the doors as a nasty surprise.
"Good, now I want four Headhunters to fly into the hangar bays. Use your cannons if needed, but wait for the shuttle to bring up troops. We'll hit them from both ends."
With three-fourths of the rebel troops preparing to invade the garrison, the remaining one-fourth was tasked with taking the freighters, accompanied by the mobile suits and the rest of the Headhunters, to the manufacturing district on the edge of the capital city that was fifty kilometers north-west of the garrison base. Between the three Imperial controlled factories they could expect to encounter local security forces and at least one company of soldiers, 2 AT-STs, and 6 light ground combat vehicles that had been placed there by the garrison for quick response defense.
Lacking air support or any heavy weapons the defenses quickly fell to the Rebel forces, though several troopers were lost.
Once it was safe the freighters were set down by the various warehouses. With their current configuration the Gallofree medium transports could hold up to 17,000 metric tons of cargo for a total of 68,000 tons between them. The total weight of the refined durasteel, quandanium steel and finished spaceship parts equaled to a little over forty thousand. Since there was room to spare the accompanying engineers and support personnel worked to load any and all pieces of equipment they could carry, which was substantial with the mobile suits aiding in the heavy lifting that couldn't be done with the repulsorlift sleds.
Overall the operation to clean out the warehouses took about 3 hours. During that time they found a real prize in the Sienar Fleet Systems facility in the form of four GAT-12/h Skipray blastboats. The management of the facility must have been seeking to expand their production capabilities and constructed the ships to prove that they could handle full ship production and not just parts assembly. They were fully functional and only lacked coordinates in their navigation computers and munitions in their missile launchers. Fortunately there were men among the troops that had the training necessary to pilot the ships back to the rebel base.
By that point it was time to return to the garrison where the majority of the assault force waited. The fighting to take control of the garrison had been fierce but there had been far more Imperial casualties than Rebel since most of the 2,000 personnel who remained in the base were command and support personnel. Many of them survived since they remained on the command floor on level six while the Rebels only sought to control levels 1-4, 7, and 8. Levels 1-4 gave them access to the armory, which was raided, the motor pool, which was raided for parts, and the detention cells, where they released the prisoners, a number of whom were active rebel sympathizers, to cause future headaches for the on-world Imperials. Level 7 was where the hangars were located where the Rebels found two Sentinel-class troop transports and a Lambda-class shuttle.
These gems were added to the Rebels pool of loot as spare pilots were transferred from the Sundered Heart to fly the transports in formation with the rest of the rebel battle group. The mobile suits surprised some of the Rebels when they took positions directly on top of a freighter, one each, both kneeling on one leg to stabilize their stance as a turret. The pilots stated a desire to conserve fuel and the freighters had more than enough power for the additional weight.
With everything they came for gathered and the SpecForce unit safely digging themselves a nice hideaway in the city the Rebel force was ready to leave the planet.
As the ships broke through the atmosphere Antilles felt it was appropriate to address the troops.
"Good work everyone," he said over their comm. frequency. "Today we struck a significant blow to the Empire. While our efforts today may seem insignificant to the uninformed, a bug bite on a colossus, in the grand scheme our actions were significant. Because today was just a precursor of what is to come. The Imperials couldn't stop us today, nor will they the next time. And with each victory like today's the Alliance draws closer to our ultimate goal of overthrowing the corrupt system that is the Empire."
Antilles ended on that note. Giving speeches was not really his thing but after having served Bail Organa for so long he had picked up a thing or two and thought that he put what he learned to good use there.
Suddenly alarms started blaring. "Captain!" called one of the officers on sensor duty, his tone controlled yet urgent. "Two ships have jumped into Milvayne's gravitational shadow!"
"Jam any transmissions. What's their configuration and position?"
"One Vindicator heavy cruiser and one Imperial II frigate at 162 Port, 43 down. They are not on a direct path with us but could intercept us before we reach the primary outbound hyperspace jump coordinates."
"We are being hailed by the Imperial vessels," said the communications officer. "Currently it can't break through our jamming but I would wager it says to surrender or be destroyed."
"Imperial vessels have altered their trajectory. They are now on a direct intercept course with us on our current vector."
Antilles considered how they could be here. He quickly discounted a distress call unless that garrison had more equipment than anticipated. No, with that Imperial II frigate it's more likely that they had come to pick up cargo and the Rebels had had the misfortune of selecting a time table that would intersect with theirs. So it was just bad luck.
"TIEs are deploying, 3 squadrons from the Vindicator and 1 from the Imperial."
Not their full complement but under normal circumstances more than enough. The Rebel's own starfighters were drawing close to half their fuel. Another protracted dogfight could lower their fuel levels enough to make it impossible for them to get back to base. And they were outnumbered 2 to 1 with capital ship support that could tear through the Sundered Heart and the freighters like wet tissue. Normally they would need at least of squadron of Ace pilots in X-wings to get out of this. But they will have to make due with two Aces in Gundams supported by a motley group of starfighters whose pilots had high moral.
Antilles opened up a communication line to all ships, but his words were directed to just two. "Nebula, Solar, how does the situation look to you?"
"Let's see," began Yzak, his voice calm and speculative. "Forty-eight mobile armors with another potential 72 waiting in the wings with two big lumbering ships for support against two Gundams piloted by ZAFT Reds…"
"I'm a former Red," Dearka interjected.
"With our own support of 20 mobile armors and a smaller yet faster ship." There was a brief pause. "I like those odds."
"We have faced worse," added Dearka.
Since this was over an open communications line everyone in the small Rebel force heard these declarations and it honestly confused them. They had seen the effectiveness of the machines back on the planet but the Rebels believed that this situation would be too much.
Antilles and Winter were the only ones who did not share this belief, Antilles because he had personally witnessed what these two men could do in inferior machines, and Winter because she had been informed about how while on paper a Coordinator in a mobile suit was equal to 5 Naturals in mobile armors, in real life the difference in power could be as great as 1 to 100. She had also read the reports about the battles from the Bloody Valentine where Coordinator piloted mobile suits, particularly the units called Gundams, had obliterated vastly numerically superior enemies without suffering a single casualty.
"Very well," said Antilles, "any suggestions on how we shall support you?"
"Activate all N-Jammers, use the Sundered Heart to protect the freighters, let Dearka and I go first to break their formation. We'll draw their attention and when that happens have the starfighters come in. X and Z's are to follow me while the Y's fly with Solar."
Antilles followed the recommendation. The N-jammers he would have activated anyway. He then ordered all fighters to form a screen for the freighters alongside his own ship. He also discreetly ordered his pilot to prep a secondary vector that could be used to escape if needed.
After the few seconds it took to prepare everything had passed the two mobile suits stood atop their individual freighters and took off; it wasn't as effective as a linear catapult but the freighters' momentum did aid their acceleration. In another few seconds the Gundams were ahead of the leading Rebels fighters and were on a direct head to head course with the enemy TIEs. There was little fear of the Imperial capital ships opening fire yet as the distance was too great for them to be accurate and the space was too congested with their TIEs to target such a low number of smaller targets.
That was just fine with the Coordinators as they closed the distance to the TIEs.
"Ready Dearka," asked Yzak as the Nebula's railguns and pistols were deployed, the range to fire drawing ever closer.
"Oh yeah," smirked Dearka, drawing on his personality from the First Bloody Valentine. Red targeting reticules dotted his monitor as the DRAGOONs deployed once more. "Kira, eat your heart out."
The range to fire meter hit zero with a warning tone and in response the two Coordinators fired just about everything they had. The Nebula fired its rail guns and beam pistols, the Solar fired everything except his remaining missiles. Fiery explosions blossomed in the TIEs' formation as over a squadron's worth of TIE fighters were destroyed. The TIE pilots near the explosions reflexively pulled away, temporarily breaking their formation before reforming to cover the newly formed gap. TIE pilots were trained in a manner that they accepted the loss of comrades easily. They were trained to turn their fear into aggression and direct it at the enemy.
With bloodlust coloring their eyes the TIE pilots opened fire with their laser cannons on the Rebel machines. With precision that only a few non-genetically altered humans and aliens could mimic the two Coordinators weaved through the laser fire and charged straight into the swarm of TIEs where they halted their forward momentum. Seeing the mobile suits as the biggest threat at the moment the TIEs swooped and swerved to surround the enemy, creating a twister of identical starfighters. Though the Coordinators didn't know it they were entrapped in one of the most effective TIE combat formations, the Force Multiple Orbit formation, or Atom where TIEs use their superior speed and mobility to fly crisscrossing orbits at staggered distances around the target giving the impression of an atom with multiple electrons.
To an inferior number of starfighters or any ship that had limited possible firing solutions it was a deadly formation, but the Solar and Nebula were well suited to quickly altering the angle of attack, rendering some of the formations advantage null. The Coordinators made it doubly hard for the TIEs by staying back to back, preventing attacks to their most vulnerable spot.
Dearka was particularly deadly as his DRAGOON pods constantly changed their position in a bid to acquire a new target. More than half the beams didn't hit and were mostly to keep TIEs at bay for the second part of the plan. "Is it me," began Dearka, "or are more TIEs being deployed?"
Yzak had already seen what Dearka was referring too. The capital ships had deployed their remaining starfighters, another 4 squadrons' worth, while at the same time were moving into position to go around their TIEs and attack the Rebel freighters. "It won't matter in 3…2…1…"
Red laser fire entered the twister of TIEs, knocking out over a squadron, thanks to the efforts of the Rebel starfighter squadrons who had left their post guarding the freighters to attack the distracted TIEs. With their numbers reduced to almost nothing Dearka used his Dragoons to finish up the last in less than 10 seconds.
"Alright," said Yzak, "everyone line up on your mobile suit." The X-wings and Z-95's formed up behind the Nebula which accelerated to intercept the second group of TIEs while the Y's followed the Solar to intercept the Vindicator. "You may fire when ready."
All of the Rebel starfighters were, in space, slower and less maneuverable than a TIE fighter. Z-95's and Y-wings had a further disadvantage in that they have weaker laser cannons. But there were two things that gave them and edge. The first was shields, the second was missiles.
A barrage of missiles was launched from the starfighters when they were in range. Six proton torpedoes and nine concussion missiles hit the formation of TIEs, blowing away more than a squadron as ten torpedoes from the Y-wings, plus the Solar's six, hit the Vindicator, more than enough to bring down the shields and cause massive damage to the armor underneath. The Y-wings followed with a barrage of ion cannon fire to disable the ship as the Solar struck the weapon emplacements that were firing on the starfighters in an attempt to drive them off.
With the TIEs reeling from the first blow they were unprepared when they found the Nebula in their midst, using a solid sword to crush the fragile starfighters it chased down while shooting others with a beam pistol. Their numbers were further reduced by the Rebel starfighters that met them in a head to head clash, favorable for the Rebels because of their shields. The Imperials lost 7 fighters to one additional loss of a Z-95, without counting the losses being racked up by the Nebula.
As these two groups duked it out the Sundered Heart had entered a slugging match with the Imperial II frigate. While far less heavily armed than the Vindicator, it was normally still more of a match to any model of Corellian Corvette in a one on one fight, but the Sundered Heart wasn't alone. The four captured Skiprays were brought in to join the assault and while lacking their missile ordnance their heavy lasers and ion cannons proved to be a game changer on this front. The frigate's plight was further exasperated when the remaining 8 Headhunters were sent by Yzak to aid in the assault, his Nebula and the X-wings more than enough to finish the last 12 TIEs.
Though the Rebels had been caught completely by surprised by a force that outnumbered and outgunned them, they had maintained control of the situation up to the point when all of the TIEs were destroyed and escape pods were launched from the two capitals thanks to the N-Jammers and mobile suits.
Dearka and Yzak had both been adamant to take the ships as prizes (making the score "2-1" as Dearka put it), and they had delivered the same ultimatum Dearka gave the Tartan. It had been another several hours' worth of work to ensure the ships were still functional enough to make a jump through hyperspace (everyone had been careful to avoid the bridge, engines, and power plant), making sure they were clear of any remaining Imperials (there were a handful that claimed they wanted to defect), and prepping them for the trip. Antilles had to use the entire primary and secondary officers go to pilot the ships while he himself took the helm of the Sundered Heart, the largest ship that could be piloted with one person.
By the end of it the Rebel soldiers were starting to get tired from the delayed time schedule. The fighters had been kept out in space on standby in case there was more trouble, thankfully there wasn't, and the pilots were exhausted and their ships were running low on fuel. Fortunately they were able to use the captured Imperial ships as carriers, which gave the pilots a chance to relax aboard large ships that had at least semi-decent R&R equipment.
Even Yzak and Dearka took a place aboard the Vindicator, but even when the ship entered hyperspace they didn't relax. They were actually tenser now than the start of the mission. Though the attack had been a success, a greater success than anticipated, to them it was the less important of two objectives. And now that they didn't have the mission to occupy their minds they couldn't help but worry about how well the prison break was going.
()()()()()()()()()
Author's Notes: Kira's speech in the first scene may make it sound like the Alliance hasn't been doing much, but they have. They just haven't been able to engage the Empire's military on a level playing field. Now that is just my own determination of the Alliance's strength based on my knowledge of Star Wars history, but there is a lot of contradicting material. Generally with Star Wars I consider the hierarchy of canon to be Movies-Books-Video Games with comic books floating somewhere between books and video games depending on content. There are some exceptions such as Knights of the Old Republic which is equal to the novels. So if I rely on canon information that is the order I rely on. But since this is fanfiction I can throw anything I deem fit for the story in there. Such as the Tartan-class which is one of my favorite ships but only appears in Star Wars: Empire At War. And if anyone wants to learn about the Vindicator and Imperial II frigate check them out on wookiepedia. As far as I know the Vindicator has only appeared in a video game and the Imperial II frigate in a comic book that starred Biggs Darklighter but I liked them so I included them.
By the way, the Battle of Milvayne does appear to be a canon event, or at least the Alliance's intent to attack it was. For whatever reason, a few months before the Battle of Yavin Mon Mothma decided that it would be a good target to attack, but the sources I looked over never gave a reason why aside from how that garrison was the key for the Empire's control of the Gyrica system. Anyway what made that event (whether it happened or not) significant was that Garm Bel Ilbis disagreed with Mon Mothma's decision as he believed the planet had an Ubiqtorate base so the planet would be much more heavily guarded than what Mon anticipated. Now, while he was alive Bail supported Mon Mothma so Garm's actions were limited, but after Bail's death Mon Mothma gave the order to attack and Garm felt that she was overstepping her boundaries. Long story short the quarrel escalated to the point that Garm and those loyal to him split from the Alliance to form their own splinter group to continue fighting the Empire and step forward in the event Mon Mothma established herself as "Empress in all but name."
Part of the reason I chose Milvayne is that by accelerating the time of the battle that could prevent Garm from splitting from the Alliance. Additionally there is no information on the battle itself (that I can find) so that leaves me free to make it as I wish.
Lochacca – This is an OC character I decided to create for the prison break. His crew, the Void Wings, is apparently a semi-canon group established by the role-playing games, however there is no information on them aside from their name and the time period they operated, giving me free reign to shape them as I see fit. At the moment Lochacca is a minor OC character that is being used for the prison break. I don't really have any plans to use him afterward except mention that he continues pirating as a privateer in service to the Alliance.