War; What is it Good For?

[Ayden Cater]

Years of war, strife, death; none of it had done anything to hamper the continued activities of the galaxy. People laughed, played, stole, loved, murdered and in general carried on much like they had before. Some might have found it enraging that most of the galaxy was content to carry on like normal while a handful or worlds burned. Of course there were demonstrators, on just about every major world, who took it upon themselves to remind people that wars were happening. When the self-righteousness of the ego-maniacal failed to sway the quiet hearts of people, others would turn to violence.

But the truth was not that the people of the galaxy did not care. Rather, they cared too much. How was a single person supposed to weep for thousands, millions dead on one planet one day and then repeat that process again the next? Truly it was a blessing in these dark times that more people were not gifted with the sight of the Force. So many dead, with so much destruction... Ayden had learned long ago to shut that dim, anguished cry of the Force out. Even so, he could feel the pain of the people, the pain of the galaxy.

What then could he do? The weapons of war continued to be churned out in staggering numbers. He no longer had the vast resources of the Protectorate to call upon, nor did he have the industrial base of Corellia to wield in affecting change for the better of others. The galaxy needed something more, something to help it. With fights breaking out suddenly, there needed to be a way to get key individuals into and out of a battlezone. It wasn't enough to just get someone onto or off of the surface, but rather there was a need to get people across the galaxy to move about freely.

The basic concept was one he took from the Cira-class, namely that of covert infiltration. In order to ensure safe passage for certain figures, the ship would need to fly undetected by any hostile force. It was clear then that this was not a craft that would be widely produced. Even if Corellian Engineering's industrial base was still at full capacity, the cost of attempting to mass produce this craft would likely bankrupt the corporation. Rather then, it was to be a rather limited project. Thus he had a concept and scope for the project. Now he had to set about turning his concept into a reality.

 

[Ayden Cater]

The first task at hand was to generate a list of materials and components that would be necessary for the construction of the ship. Already, he knew that Corellian Engineering would need to reach out to Silk Holdings to see about acquiring a limited license for their Hypertransit package. If ever it was a question about speed or astronavigation, [member="Jorus Merrill"] was the undisputed king. That man had been to more places in ten years of his life than Ayden had in four hundred. Some people, it seemed, just could not sit still for long. They had to travel, to explore, and that was a resource that Ayden could use for this project. If he could acquire that license with the blessing from Silk then it would do much to cut back on the amount of work that was necessary to build this new craft.

It would have to be small, about the size of a freighter. The larger a ship was, the easier it would be picked up by scanners, the more material would be needed to counteract those sensors. However, it couldn't be too small either as the craft needed to have space for the myriad of systems necessary to facilitate travel and infiltration. So he settled on a rough size of sixty meters. Perhaps that length would go up or down, but it was about as close to perfect as he could imagine. So if the idea of size was set, there was then the question of defense. He briefly considered arming the ship, but decided against it almost immediately. The power build-up and firing of energy weapons meant that he could spent a planet-sized mass of credits on stealth systems and it would be for naught. As well, physical munitions presented their own problem. Chemical weapons would create a residue build-up that would eventually erode any and all attempts at stealth. Mass drivers had similar problems as energy weapons.

Speed would have to be the primary defense for the ship then.

 

[Ayden Cater]

Redundancies were another thing to consider. Normally, such systems would be barred for a ship this size. However, that was only applicable if the ship had weapons. Since it would have none, there was a wider field of considerations that could be made. First on his list then were the engines. TibannaX was a very expensive fuel. It would cost another small fortune to fuel the ship from constant use. So rather than have a single set of engines, Ayden included two within the design. The primary engines would be fueled by traditional means. That mean that while they were active, the ship would produce a traceable thermal engine wash. However, they would allow the ship to be propelled to far greater speeds for considerably more time than the secondary engines would, which were fueled by TibannaX.

The primary engines would have a controlling field that would prevent buildup around the engines from use. Thus a ship could use the primary engines to get underway and travel openly. Then, when making the jump to the target planet, they could switch over to the secondary engines and quietly cruise into orbit. In the event that the craft was discovered then, they could switch back to their primary engines and attempt their getaway. It would take a bit of space to accommodate a second set of engines, but that was why the ship was in the freighter-range.

As well, the ship could afford to have a redundant set of deflector shields. He wasn't sure if those would be needed though. After all, under ideal circumstances, the ship should never face combat. So why divert power and funds into an unnecessary system? Rather, Ayden decided to invest that money into other defensive systems that would be critical. There would be attempts to disable the craft with ion strikes or tractor beams. That was the next hurdle to overcome. Ayden remembered the gel packs that were used within the Iblis-class P.A.Cs the Protectorate used to render them relatively immune to ion cannon fire. However, there was next to no chance he could get enough of a stockpile of the gel packs to use them in this project. He'd have to raid the Protectorate stores to get that many, and that was out of the question. Perhaps an alternate crystal could be used...

The other hurdle was the tractor beam, though the solution was relatively simple enough. A few particle capsules with reflective and non-reflective material could be loaded from within the interior of the ship and launched to confuse and foil the use of tractor beams, at least long enough for the ship to escape. A simple enough fix, really, and one that would not be cost-prohibitive. Most funds then for developing a protection from ion fire then.

 

[Ayden Cater]

The initial design looked promising. Everything was coming together in it, but Ayden was not convinced that it was meeting the full potential. Speed was its primary defense and offense; indeed, it was everything that the ship was to be in order to save lives. So if speed was the ultimate goal, then they could certainly do better.

He began doing research on the market for afterburners and other modifications that might be suitable for use in the ship. He was initially dismayed to find how few corporations had anything remotely close to his needs. One came close, Arcrystal Astronautics. Their kit had the finesse and sensitivity to keep the craft in full control at the speeds it would be burning at. Of course, it was purely a control kit. He still needed to find the proper engines or afterburners to get it going.

Still, it was a start. He acquired a quick license for the kit and incorporated it into the design. The ship would have superb control now. "Roland, go ahead and begin calculating optimal points for a reaction control system. I want this thing to be able to turn on a credchit." A wireframe of the ship came up and began blinking as the AI made the necessary modifications. Of course, such a system would be unable to handle speed past a certain point. If the afterburners were engaged, the ship was going to turn more sluggishly. Still, if there was a chase going on then sometimes you just needed to bolt.

High grade fuel for the afterburners wouldn't be too hard to procure. The trick was going to getting the right mix for the engines. He'd have Roland run a few thousand simulations to find the right blend for their craft. Obviously, much like the RCS wouldn't work at high speeds, the heat generated from the afterburners would render the ship's stealth measures useless. Choices would have to be made at every turn with the ship. It was not perfect, but it's pilot would need to be to balance the systems out and take full advantage of them. But if your goal was high-risk rescue, then you'd want a damn good pilot anyways.

 

[Ayden Cater]

Perhaps the conflict represented an option, a blessing rather than a curse. Ayden found himself in the position of either having to sacrifice more room and power to situate them both, or that he would have to choose between the ship's afterburners and the TibannaX drive. The more he thought about it, the more he liked to idea of making the two mutually exclusive. If you needed to go that fast in the ship, then you weren't too worried about getting seen. Stealth infiltration was about patience. If the two used the same basic secondary tanks and engine mounts, then he had two variants to run with. One would be high speed rescue, getting in and out before the enemy could scramble a response. The other would get in and out without the enemy ever knowing about it.

Most of the other systems such as the cap drain modules and particle cloud canisters would be put on both variants. More powerful sensors would go on the non-stealth variant. Wouldn't do well to hit a ship cause you were going faster than your sensors could reasonably keep up, right? The stealth variant would give up the prodigious speed and turning for the requisite stealth systems. They'd have two different methods but a common goal. It was the best way to make the systems work for the ship.

He briefly considered the idea of investing in a cronau radiation sink. However, the sensors to detect such a spike would have to be virtually lined up with the trajectory of the hyperspace tunnel. Since it was not at all uncommon for stealth ships to come out further out than necessary and coast into orbit, the need for that kind of countermeasure was next to nothing. However, he did begin research and development for a method to get the ship into the atmosphere without creating a light show. Sure, the shields of the ship should be sufficient to prevent such an event from occurring. After all, the Fringe landed advanced troops on Eriadu with cloaked transports. But redundancies were important. Maybe it would be possible. Maybe it would be useful. Wouldn't hurt to look into it.

 

[Ayden Cater]

By now the design had been mostly finalized; two different versions of a ship to get people out of a warzone. Roland had spent a couple hundred hours optimizing the engines to give the best burns without causing any disastrous overheating or damaging of other components. The non-stealth version would easily be the faster of the two, but it was going to be pretty easy to spot on sensors as it tore across a sky, especially thermal scans. The other version would be considerably slower, slower even than traditional ships at that size range, but it would be virtually impossible to pick up on sensors.

Neither ship had any space for much of anything, apart from a half dozen passengers. To fit the requisite equipment into a ship profile this small eliminated any possible space for aftermarket modifications to add in weapons of any sort. There wasn't really even any room for the rescued VIPs to bring anything aside from their lives. This was really the absolute limit for a rescue ship this size. Of course someone could shell out the credits to pick one up and just fill every other nook and cranny with explosives, but they could get far for bang for their buck with a traditional freighter. Still, if they wanted to piss away their credits on such a purchase then he'd happily have a name to put to the purchase.

Sending the design off to the board for approval and construction was a simple matter. He doubted they'd balk at any part of the proposal since it represented a part of the market that they could quickly turn a profit on. Recognizing the failures of the market in providing a readily accessible engine modification, Ayden set Roland up to extrapolate the engine optimizations to configure an engine that would get up and go. Of course it'd have to draw power from somewhere, but Ayden's project had very specifically avoided weapons so that had no been an initial consideration. Silk Holding's massive success after moving into the parts market showed that there was a desire there. He simply had to market to it.