Star Wars: From the Clone Wars to Starfaring Heroes

Chapter 12 - Style
Tes orbit, Tes galaxy.

Bucksell Sector.

As Raine and his group approached the Garden Planet Tais, the familiar hissing sound from the holographic projector behind them gradually subsided.

The atmosphere around Tys was shrouded in a purple hue, interspersed with enormous hurricanes—

Those enormous spiral cloud formations that stretch across the continents can be seen from space.

“Is it wise to start communications now?” Renn said, clenching his fist. “Anyone who is paying attention can track your ultrasonic signal. You’re basically announcing our location to any sharp-eared person looking for us… like Jabba.”

Just then, footsteps approached from behind.

Renn tensed up.

“We need to hurry,” Ventress said, the expected hiss of lightsabers igniting did not materialize. “Count Dooku informed me that the Jedi Luminara Unduri has just left Tatooine and is hunting us.”

Renn frowned—this was too fast.

They haven't even landed yet!

Either Dooku misread the itinerary and revealed the information to Jabba too early, or someone had poor radio discipline.

In this galaxy, the world is smaller than you might imagine.

Given the right channels and the right leads, it's possible to track down almost anyone.

Determining their exact location will be more difficult, but that's not the point.

Jabba, and the Jedi—all you need to know is that they're in Teth.

Their planetary scanner can handle the rest.

"Too fast, there must have been a leak—I'll check my ship for unauthorized hypersonic communications,"

Ryan used a soldier's respectful tone to mask the accusatory undertone.

It seems like his robot was itching to do something; the leak is definitely a problem on Ventress's side.

However, Ryan wouldn't say it out loud; he still wanted his head to stay firmly on his shoulders.

Even so, he would still conduct an inspection of his spaceship.

One must never be too careless, and more than one defective robot has already been found on his crew list.

Their "generous" sponsors are all stingy people.

“We are approaching the planetary coordinates you provided, Commander,” Raine’s holographic repeater flickered as the engineers automatically switched from sub-light-speed propulsion to atmospheric propulsion. “How large should the landing force be?”

“It needs to be enough to make our presence and location obvious,” Ventress said slowly, “but not so much that they wouldn’t dare to land.”

Ryan wanted specific numbers, but he thought that might be asking too much.

It is quite possible that Ventress never attended a single officer training lecture in his life.

“I’ll prepare a lean battalion for you—seven hundred soldiers, some spider robots, without heavy armor,” Raine’s fingers flew across the tablet. “Little Tower, go and make the arrangements. One landing ship will suffice.”

“Begin entering the atmosphere,” Taylor announced, “transferring energy to the abdominal ray shield.”

As they penetrated the middle layer, the "Repulsion" began to roar.

Although the ray shield absorbed and dissipated most of the heat, the raging flames could still be seen through the green tinted viewing window in the cockpit.

“Activate the atmospheric control surfaces,” Ryan ordered. “Slow down above the designated drop zone, Commander. The landing craft is ready on the main engines.”

Ventress nodded vigorously, then turned abruptly and left, leaving behind the words, "Don't mess up your mission, Bontrie."

“Excuse me for speaking frankly, sir, my task is relatively easy,” Ryan said.

He only needed to ambush the Jedi after they sent in their landing squads, which was much easier than directly confronting the Jedi—something best left to other lightsaber users.

As for an ambush... well, he does have a few ideas.

Taking the opportunity, Ryan stood up and gave Tess a good look. Although he served in the Navy, he hadn't taken much shore leave.

During his term, he stopped in orbit around many planets and traversed many more star systems, but he never actually set foot on alien lands.

Explore a completely new and unfamiliar world?
Aside from Weng Delun, he could count them on one hand.

If you want to do these things, you should join the military, not the navy.

He would at most glance at the planet's atmosphere—its color, outline, continents, and so on.

But over time, they all become more or less the same.

This is a rare opportunity for him to see what an alien planet looks like up close.

The sky over Tess is purple, which can be seen from a distance, but it is even more wondrous when viewed from below, almost magical.

Towering, pointed rock formations jut out from the dense jungle below, entwined by winding vines.

On the summit of one of the mountains stands a magnificent fortress.

No, it's a monastery.

Ventress will set a trap for the Jedi there.

The rest of the area was shrouded in a thick fog, which prevented him from flying too low.

Renn grew up on Earth, which, by the standards of this galaxy, is a primitive planet.

Growing up, no one told him that he would be able to see a distant world in the future.

He never imagined that the next planet was so close, like a bus stop.

Although he knew that a completely new life awaited him, and that once all this was over, he could travel to many planets at will... simply gazing at the purple sky above still gave him a dreamlike feeling that made him hold his breath.

“The transport ship has been dispatched.” Little Tower walked towards him along the slope.

Renn saw C-9799 heading toward the monastery's helipad.

“Let’s get out of here.” Ryan turned around.

We've seen enough sights today.

As the "Repel" began to ascend, Raine started searching the Confederate Undulli's combat records in the unified military database.

After all, to strike an opponent unexpectedly, you must first understand their weaknesses.

Let him see... Luminara Unduri.

He participated in the First Battle of Geonosis and was known for his rational and disciplined command style—the exact opposite of Anakin Skywalker.

Her flagship was the Victory-class cruiser HMS Tranquility, which also served as a mobile base for the 41st Elite Legion. A Republican Legion consists of approximately 40,000 soldiers, meaning Onduli either brought only a portion of them or led an entire task force.

As for the 41st Elite Corps itself, as its name suggests, they excel at fighting in harsh and rugged terrain and are renowned for carrying out missions on some of the toughest planets in the galaxy.

In other words, Tais was just an ordinary combat zone for them.

Either it was just an extremely unfortunate coincidence, or the Jedi knew in advance that they would come to Teth, which is a question worth pondering.

Fortunately for Ryan, it was Ventress's problem, not his.

The problem for Ryan is the Tranquility itself, and he will likely have to confront it.

His frigates could hold their own against the Victory-class cruisers in a melee, but he was concerned that the Tranquility might be equipped with anti-ship light attack aircraft, such as the BTL-B Y-wing fighter.

However, he was willing to take a gamble. Since the Tranquility was mainly used as a troop transport ship for the 41st Elite Corps, most of its deck space should be reserved for LAAT gunboats.

That said, even with reduced features, a single Victory-class cruiser could carry over 400 light attack aircraft.

Each of his frigates could only carry forty-eight aircraft, or even fewer.

Because of this mission, the "Repulse" modified some C-9799 landing craft, and two entire squadrons of Vulture robot fighters were also removed.

All his frigates combined could not match the carrying capacity of a fully equipped Victory-class cruiser.

Ryan leaned back in his chair, his face contorted in thought.

“Little Ta, calculate the time it would take for a 'Victory-class' cruiser to arrive in Teth if it departed from the Tatu system—” He checked the local planetary time, “—one hour… no, two hours ago.”

The tactical robot stared at him for less than a few seconds before replying, "At top speed, expected arrival time is 23:09 local military time."

Raine pressed a button on the armrest, which projected a holographic star map in front of him, a magnified simulation of the Tess Galaxy.

This planet is marked by a flashing red dot, orbits a star, and has two moons orbiting it.

He adjusted the time until it matched the little tower's expected arrival time.

He had to prepare for the worst.

Suppose that Luminara Unduly will come with her entire fleet, including the Tranquility, the Guarara, and even more Cheerleader-class cruisers.

He only has three escort ships available.

Without an extremely clever plan, he would be eliminated.

This is just a hypothesis.

“Mark the exit of the hyperspace passage as zero degrees,” Ryan said.

A clock-like ring appeared around Tess, with evenly distributed markings.

This is a directional marker.

At 23:09 local time, the Tais-1 satellite will be located at 308° and the Tais-2 satellite will be located at 331°.

Although the two satellites differ greatly in size, their orbits are not far apart.

Strangely, the TIS-1 satellite rotates in a retrograde direction, while the TIS-2 satellite rotates in a forward direction.

“We’ll maneuver around behind the satellite,” Ryan said, biting his lip unconsciously. “Because Onduli is in a hurry, she’ll perform an automatic evacuation at the edge of the planet’s gravitational well. Taylor, connect the navigation computer to the simulation system.”

A translucent bubble unfolds around Teth, revealing a simulation of the planet's gravitational well.

A shimmering dot appeared at the edge of the bubble, at the 000° position—that was where Anduri would jump out of hyperspace.

Renn squinted.

From that position, there is a narrow blind spot—undetectable by vision and scanners, obscured by the TIS-1 satellite.

“Take us to that blind spot,” Raine ordered. “Port echelon formation, minimize our outline. Unless Ventress leaks more information than I think, the Jedi won’t think this is a Separatist operation—at least not before she lands on the planet, and they won’t expect us to be here.”

“From this position,” Little Tower hummed, “we can’t get close enough to engage in close combat before they move their fighters.”

“I know,” Ryan repeated in a low voice, “I know.”

He read Luminara Unduly's notes again.

The Force is always an unquantifiable variable, but he had to believe he could glean some clues from her personality... Wait, she's going to land on a planet, which means there will be a clone captain commanding the warship.

In his experience, clones are just as creative as robots.

Standard training, standard tactics —

He can strike them unexpectedly by making some bold and outrageous moves.

He must believe he can do it.

In a past life, his brother once said in a casual conversation that clones only gradually developed their own style in the later stages of the war.

To this, he could only say that seeing is believing.

He did it at Sarapin, Krant, and Kewell.

He can do it here too.

This time, he had three ships, and they were operating almost independently.

He does not need to obey the orders of any commander or general.

Ryan turned off the recording.

“Then we won’t get close to them,” he said, zooming in on Tess on the holographic star map. “We’ll approach Tess-2 at top speed, using Tess-1 as cover. There, we’ll use its gravitational well slingshot effect to fly towards Tess-1, while the enemy fleet should be busy with their atmospheric landings. We’ll shuttle between the two satellites, using Tess-1’s retrograde rotation to create another slingshot effect, this time heading towards 000°. Before they can react, we’ll be right above them.”

A dashed line is drawn on the holographic star map, simulating the theoretical flight path and forming an almost inverted S-shaped flight trajectory.

“Two gravitational boosts would make us too fast,” Taylor turned his head. “We’d either fly right over the enemy fleet or crash into a planet. Our reverse thrusters aren’t enough to slow us down in time.”

"We're in space!" Ryan waved his hands. "Adjust the ship's direction during the maneuver and slow down using the sublight thrusters!"

“We need extremely precise calculations to control the ambush’s trajectory and speed,” Little Tower warned. “Any deviation could cause us to miss the enemy fleet or crash directly into the planet. One gravity boost is already dangerous—we’re going to do it twice in a row, and at this theoretical speed, our real-space control surfaces will be out of range.”

“We’re like turning ourselves into a beam of explosive energy,” Taylor added, agreeing with Tahl’s point. “Even if they spot us during our maneuvers, we can’t stop or change course; everything has to be perfect.”

Renn glanced at the time again.

It's almost noon.

He gave a cold laugh. "Fortunately, you still have half a rotation cycle to complete these calculations. Just like you said, to do it perfectly—you haven't disappointed me yet."

(End of this chapter)