Orbital 5 (Patreon)

Orbital
Chapter 5

-VB-

On 968 Ruus, a significant event took place. It was a quiet event that came after a big scandal, and as such, did not receive due attention. What else would require attention if the appearance of an unknown war fleet of hundreds of ships appearing in the Mid Rim did not?

More than that, the owner of this fleet went out and began contacting systems and planets, using the system of their first appearance as their base of operations.

They promised protection and safe that their fleet could give them. All they requested was the right to operate businesses in their worlds.

Many of these Mid Rim and even Outer Rim worlds saw a flotilla of warships and gladly welcomed them into their midst, though some with hesitation and reluctance. It was hard to say no to a fleet of warships no matter how politely the question was asked.

This happened quietly across hundreds of worlds in the Chommell Sector and came to be known to the locals as the Fleet Pact because a fleet of warships had always been on standby in orbit of their worlds to showcase the newcomer's military might.

In 969 Ruus*, a foreign threat came to test this pact.

The Hutt Cartel came knocking.

-VB-

The misconception the laypeople often painted in their minds was that the criminal underworld was more centralized than they thought it to be.

Sure, this kind of misconception often originated from people who lived under a centralized government, who provided an example what a functioning organization was. Truth be told, this was not the case. Back home, the Mexican drug cartels were divided into five groups for easier information consumption, but there were numerous smaller groups within each of those larger groups.

Just like the USA federal government was but a collection of fifty smaller states, so were these cartels with one caveat: these groups were nothing more than alliance of convenience to be abandoned when their needs suited them.

The Hutt Cartels of the Star Wars universe were the same. Each cartel was led either by a clan of Hutts or an individual Hutt, and they allied and competed with each other as much as they did so with foreigners from outside Hutt Space. Hutts also did not remain solely within Hutt Space, much like Mexican cartels had agents - whether they be hauler, dealers, or even enforcers - in the USA.

So when we speak of the Hutt Cartels invading the little bubble of safety we had created in Chommell Sector, it’s best to view it as multiple separate incursions of independent Hutt Cartels and associated pirate fleets striking out from multiple angles.

It was a good thing then that we had a small squadron at each of the major planets.

---

Tobruna gulped, standing by his mother’s side, as she glared at the planetside sensors. Over three dozen ships just came out of hyperspace at the edge of planet Kreeling’s gravity well. The powerful telescopic cameras used for visual confirmation showed everyone in the planetary government’s command room of the unidentified make - or rather unidentifiable due to the ramshackle and makeshift nature - of the ships.

“Pirates,” mother hissed as she whirled around and snapped towards the “QED” device the planet’s new ally had gifted them for occasion such as these. Before she activated it, she looked at the broadcast tower officer. “Hail and demand identifications from them now. I’m not going to cause an issue because we jumped the guns.”

He thought that his mother was being too cautious. Everyone knew that any ship that looked like scrap metal was more likely to be pirate than anything official or trustworthy.

“They’re not answering!”

Mother grunted. She pressed down on the QED’s activation button.

“This is Maruna of Kreeling. There are thirty-six ships bearing down on us, and they have not responded to hail. Kreeling is requesting backup,” mother requested calmly as the pirates began their descent.

There was a moment of silence before someone responded.

“{We read you, Kreeling. This is the Severance Squad in orbit of your moon. We got eyes on them right now. Permission to engage?}”

“Yes!” mom hissed. “Blow them out of orbit.”

“{Copy that, Kreeling HQ.}”

---

Kreeling was a major refinery world, but it wasn’t rich enough to afford its own planetary defense force like Kuat. It was for this reason that we had two squads in hiding rather than one.

As one, our interceptor squad lit their engines up from the dark side of Kreeling’s only moon and activated warp drive.

Unlike the hyperdrives of Star Wars galaxy, warp drive allowed us to “phase” through matter - even planets - because unlike hyperspace, warping did not interact with physical matter once the “warp bubble” was established. Now, we weren’t sure why it didn’t, but it allowed us to phase through celestial bodies.

Just like now.

Within five seconds of the call, we warped and on the sixth second, we landed no more than 200 clicks from the pirate flotilla. We immediately activated our microwarpdrives, modules that jacked up a ship’s speed and acceleration, and spun towards pirates.

---

Frodan glared at the five attack corvettes that just appeared out of nowhere.

“Those shits must have been hiding,” he grunted before he opened up a channel to all of the pirates underneath his command. “Take out those-!” His eyes widened as his sensors showed him just how fast they were moving. They went from zero to a thousand metes per second in under five seconds! What the frack?! “Take those freaks out, now!”

He did not want to know if those frigates carried bombs.

Sluggishily, his and othter ships’ turbolasers turned and began to shoot.

But then those corvettes moved damn fast!

His eyes popped out when they returned fire.

One of the ships closest to them simply exploded after taking five simultaneous volleys.

“What the fuck are those corvettes packing?!” he yelled angrily.

Then he watched as they pulled an impossible move, making nearly ninety degree turns together and began orbiting them. They moved stupidly quickly despite making ten click orbits, and fired off round after round.

They didn’t hold formation, but buzzed around them like dangerous giant wasps capable of killing a man with a single forearm-sized sting.

His ship, Depraved Danger, shook as she took another pinpoint accurate volley. Each of the gun turrets the enemy corvettes had on their hulls was worth five of theirs. A single true strike tore chunks out of the armor if it didn’t outright penetrate through the ship. All of Frodan’s pirates had already run out of their deflector shields; they were on their armors and being whittled down to their hulls.

“Fuck this shit!” someone shouted and turned their ship to leave.

But then they came.

He saw death warped into forms of metal. What would be death if it wasn’t half a dozen of those powerful gun turrets on each of the newcomers? There were also five of them.

They had more firepower than a core world planetary defense force. Frodan knew that for a fact; he used to work for one.

They lit up.

And a quarter of his fleets disappeared in explosions and the another quarter’s ships spun away, having been bisected.

“RUN!” he shouted into the comms channel before changing his ship’s course.

And then he felt his ship spin out of control as something powerful exploded on its rear hull. He spun with the ship, holding tightly onto his seat, and tried not to look outside. Instead, he looked down at the damage report provided by the ship’s computer.

He grimaced.

The ship’s entire backside with her engine was gone.

He briefly glanced outside and saw his death point their turrets at him.

Frodan screamed in rage, more at the incoming destruction of his darling ship than his death.

And then everything exploded in fire and pain.

---

As the battle came close to an end and the pirates tried to flee, a single ship from among the destroyer fleet lit up.

And then a warp interdictor bubble burst forth.

The pirates couldn’t warp out.

They were trapped.

-VB-

Across Chommell Sector, attacks came one by one. Fortune shined on us because no single standing squadron we left behind would have been able to fight against the combined might of multiple pirate fleets. We also made sure to kill off any would-be survivors to ensure that no one would recognize our tactics or ships.

We did, however, send recordings of the battle with pixelated images of our ships to those who weren’t raided but important enough within the Fleet Pact, like Naboo.

News of our successful defense soon spread like a wildfire, and soon, we began to receive attention.

But first, we expected to need to talk to Padme soon, if only to reaffirm that despite our fleet power, we would remain with her and her world.

-VB-

*969 Ruus (Ruusan Reformation) = 31 BBY