Could You Modify This For Me?

[Darth Ayra]

| [member="Coren Starchaser"] |

Emerging from hyperspace came a Jedi-class stealth fighter. As the stars slowed and came to a stop, Ella powered down the hyperdrive and scanned the system that she had flown too.

Coren Starchaser was to be the man that would modify the stealth fighter Ella was currently piloting, so as to accommodate an astromech droid into it's design. The reason behind the modification was to have a trusty sidekick, who could handle the menial tasks of space travel and other things that Ella would have done, if she was by herself. Astromechs were useful and they made good companions.

As she waited for her scan to come back, she hailed the system for Coren. "This is Jedi Knight Ella Nova, to Coren Starchaser, over."

 

[Coren Starchaser]

Receving the message from a Jedi for assistance was not something new. For a while now, Coren was pulling Jedi out of the fire and sticking it to the Sith like a good light-sider. But this one, this whole communication up until he agreed to assist, was something a bit different, and 100 times more up his alley and within the scope of his own belief systems. Starchasers, as a clan, were starship-o-philes, a clan that proved their gifts through the use of starships, and nearly everyone who came away from the family had created or modified a ship so far that it was their own, it was unique.

The Clan’s homeship, the Dawn Treader was one such example of this as well. The aging ImpStar had served the families of Warbird Wing for generations, at least three, and they all had their own gifts, but all were revolving around the use of ships. It was almost as if they were some sort of Migrant Fleet, just without exosuits and with immune systems.

He had instructed the Jedi to bring her ship to the Tyrene, a frigate he was using as his personal launching station. The Treader had a lot of families on it, and was out around Laekia, a world Coren wished to protect due to the Levantine Astro Academy, and it was providing the nomads of the Treader a bit of a home base.

Still, Tyrene had mimicked the machine shop that the ImpStar had and that was why [member="Ella Nova"] was instructed to meet him there, not too far from the Sullust system, where one of the Jedi Academy network’s institutions lay. Not being a Jedi, the Corellian preferred to work in his own way, and having spent so much time as a nomad and working with the Underground he did things his own way, protected.

And he had the specs of this ship, dealing with this technology, even if he was helping a pilot, he wanted to make sure no prying eyes were going to stumble upon them, so he had used an old explorer trick. “We see you, Nova. Please follow the instructed course and we will meet you.” Coren said, standing on the bridge of the Tyrene before making his way to the hangar. When the fighter was in range, the tractor beams would pull her in.

 

[Darth Ayra]

| [member="Coren Starchaser"] |

Receiving Coren's response, Ella lowered her gaze to the dashboard. Her scan of the region revealed the Tyrene. With the vector provided by the Tyrene, Ella guided the fighter towards Coren; and felt the cockpit buckle slightly, as the Tyrene's tractor beam locked on and began to pull her in.

Disengaging the fighters engines, Ella waited patiently as she was sucked out of space and into the Tyrene's hangar bay. Lowering the landing clamps once she was pulled aboard, Ella removed the seat belts around her body and took off her pilots helmet. She then claimed her lightsaber into her hand and jettisoned the hatch, so that she could climb out.

Climbing onto the fighters wing, Ella concealed her lightsaber onto her utility belt and waved the cloak of her robe around, so that it wouldn't be caught on anything inside the fighter. She then hopped off the wing and onto the hangar bay floor.

Walking around, her eyes fell onto the approaching Corellian. Formally, she introduced herself. "It's nice to meet you at last, Coren. Thank you for seeing me."

 

[Coren Starchaser]

The Forerunner ship, which was also linked as Event Horizon, one of the Frontiers Corps’s vessels in the signature below, that was a stock model of the Tyrene, a ship that the writer would submit sooner or later when it became needed. Right now? It wasn’t.

The Corellian made his way to the hangar before the fighter was brought in. He had worked a few different designs and aspects. The ship was tiny, but he understood what the Knight was looking for. An astromech was a valuable resource for an adventuring Jedi. Luke Skywalker had one, hell, even Coren had one that hustled around his ships.

The Jedi was coming down from the ship and Coren, in his civilian clothes, came out. “Welcome aboard the Tyrene. And it’s a pleasure to help someone from the Jedi Order.” And no, Aela Talith was not making him say this. Truthfully, the Jedi and Coren were on the same side of this. Sure, he didn’t care for them very much but if they were going to take down the Sith eventually? He’d help them out.

“Did you have an astromech model you’ve worked with before?”

 

[Darth Ayra]

| [member="Coren Starchaser"] |

"I haven't worked with droids for a long time. My familiarity with today's models is outdated. I'm open to suggestions, if you have any."

Ella was unfamiliar with a lot of things, since her recovery from the Battle of Coruscant. There was an air of rust surrounding the Jedi Knight. Almost like she seemed out of place, aboard the Tyrene. She tried to reassure Coren with a light grin.

 

[Coren Starchaser]

The modifications were easy enough to do, a bit of mimicking the skin of the ship, providing the right weight and thickness of the shell, and running extra cables. It was actually a pretty simple fix. It just took a little bit of time to do, welding, re-wiring, and making sure everything was hooked up properly again. Coren wasn’t too worried about it all.

“Well. I’ve been making my way around the galaxy with one of Industrial Automaton’s R6 units, a bit of an upgrade to the R9 capabilities, but still the right personality. Eye Ay is doing their best to reproduce their older units, to give the galaxy something familiar in these trying times.” He didn’t have the catalog on him, but well, it was pretty simple.

“They’re all decent with working for fighters and many are being given packages to link into a wide array of vessels, including your fighter there.” He nodded to the fighter, engineers, people he trusted, people from the Dawn Treader were making their way around the vessel and starting to pull the vessel towards where some of the prefabricated parts were. Knowing the ship, at least the specifications for this model, gave him a bit of an edge. Interchangeable parts gave him something more to use to provide a suite for the astromech to link into the ship.

Right behind the cockpit, wasn’t that where it was going? And moving a bit of the wiring into empty spaces below the new unit, and filling in the ship with a bit of insulation around the wiring, so nothing exploded on the pilot, or droid.

[member="Ella Nova"]

 

[Darth Ayra]

| [member="Coren Starchaser"] |

"I'll trust your word. But won't any astromech be able to fit inside? It would be good to know."

The Jedi Knight had more questions. "What about speed? I would think the extra weight would affect the fighter's performance. Maneuverability will be affected as well, won't it?"

 

[Coren Starchaser]

Running a hand through his hair, he nodded. “It should be able to work. I know Eye Ay has worked in tandem with the Galactic Republic in the past, and even the Alliance is looking to meet with them for our own fighters, however, certain models are specifically designed for a certain fighter. I believe it was the R7 units that were introduced in tandem and especially for the E-Wing starfighters.” The E-Wing was a very nice unit, even if Coren was former Imperial and still had an Exalt in storage on the Treader. Now he was using an X-Wing, at least until he fell in love with something new.

Coren liked ships, hence why he had been contacted.

Biting at his lip, he rocked his head back and forth in a ‘sort of’ motion. “I mean, you are throwing more mass around, we’re going to try to keep the extension in length below 2 meters on this, but width, you should be the same. Speed will take a little bit of a hit, in the long run, you may not notice it, especially with the advancement in the ship’s warning system the astromech will provide. I wouldn’t worry too greatly in vacuum for maneuvering, again it’ll probably be negligible. And for atmosphere, I’d rather just the airspeeder jocks take those skies, myself. Truthfully, I’m surprised this came off the line without an astromech slot.”

He thought most fighters had them, kept the focus on the fight and let the droid handled the other poodoo.

[member="Ella Nova"]

 

[Darth Ayra]

| [member="Coren Starchaser"] |

"It came across to me, when I got hold of one of these, that the design was more about the stealth, than the other systems. I don't think it was made for direct combat situations, but with the war going on and the places I am going to find myself in, I am really going to need something I can trust; and you don't find many things trustworthy, like a astromech."

"Speed should be fine, anyway. I'm not going to trust too much in the fighters stealth systems, but so long as it keeps them and with an astromech fitted into the design, speed shouldn't be too much of a problem."

"What astromech would you suggest I take with me?"

 

[Coren Starchaser]

Stealth ships were interesting. He had the ShortFin, which was his stealth ship, but not a cloaked ship, just… hidden and ready to strike. Coren could understand everything that was going on with this desire, he wanted to help, because a ship should be sensors ready. Nodding at the Knight, he looked at the ship. “Did you want to update any other systems? It’ll take time to do most of it, this I just started construction on while you contacted me.

“As for the speed, it should be fine, but with the stealth you’ll be running a low profile, I mean, if they’re observant enough they can probably spot you, especially with the Force.” He was never worried, he’d fight them off. As they say, a seven nation army couldn’t hold him back, or take him down, but that last bit was him. “The profile will change with the astromech, but in order to keep the stealth as true to form, I’m stealing influence from the E-Wings, with their concealed astromech.” Too many weird angles and it screwed up the design, That, and radar absorbing material and there you were.

“I prefer the R6, they’re basically an R2 second edition. The others are a bit… rushed.”

[member="Ella Nova"]

 

[Darth Ayra]

| [member="Coren Starchaser"] |

Ella grinned. "No. I'm satisfied with how the ship handles currently. Master Karr did a wonderful job with the core systems, it was just the astromech that was really missing."

"The R6 sounds fine. When will you begin the work?"

 

[Coren Starchaser]

Coren nodded. “Karr knows how to design a fighter, I’ll give him that.” The Starchaser smiled as he looked at the ship. “We can get to work on it this evening. Shouldn’t take more than a day or so, a bit of fitting what we need in, and buttoning her back up. Be right as rain in probably the next forty eight hours. We’re not too far from Sullust. I can arrange a trip to the Jedi Academy for you, if you’d like?”

Keep the Jedi to the Jedi.

“I know IA has a shop there, you could probably get the astromech and we can make sure they’re calibrated for your fighter?”

[member="Ella Nova"]

 

[Darth Ayra]

| [member="Coren Starchaser"] |

"That sounds agreeable. Again, thanks for your help, Coren. I'll see you in two days."

Leaving Coren behind, Ella left him to work on the starfighter, where she caught a ride to the Jedi Academy on Sullust. There, she spent a day touring the academy (she hadn't been before) and the other meditating on the Force, so as to keep herself calm and collected.