Chapter 136: The Clone Wars Have Begun

Chapter 136: The Clone Wars Have Begun

- Day 1: Thyferra System -

Jedi Master Rahm Kota had been watching the live feed of the Senate session, expecting there might be trouble he needed to take into consideration, when Supreme Chancellor Palpatine had been outed as their Sith Mastermind. He’d seen the Force Lightning, gaped right along with everyone else at the series of events that had so rapidly cut the feed off. To his credit, however, he’d acted nearly the instant the feed had cut, getting his fleet to ready status as quickly as possible.

More importantly, he’d been in a position to act decisively.

Having very much expected the war to kick off soon, Rahm had been placed in charge of one ‘Fleet Element’ of the Jedi Order. He had, after due and careful consideration, chosen to quietly maneuver and hide his fleet not far from the world of Thyferra. The Confederacy of Independent Systems had a strong presence just a few jumps farther down the Rimma Trade Route. Most alarmingly, they had a somewhat major shipyard present at Yag’Dhul and a massive ability to produce droids via the Techno Union’s control of Mechis III.

That planet was an entire world converted to massive-scale droid production. Currently, it produced all manner of droids for sale throughout the galaxy, much of the manufacturing there was leased out to Republic corporations such as Industrial Automation. Yet Rahm had possessed no doubt at all that the Techno Union, who actually owned the planet, both already were secretly producing battle droids there…and would start producing far more of them once a war kicked off. If the entire planet was converted to battle droid production, it would near-certainly become one of the greatest threats in the entire CIS. Which, of course, meant it was very well defended.

Unfortunately, that meant the enemy had both ships and troops in quick striking range of by far the largest producer of bacta in the galaxy. Thyferra wasn’t the only place that produced it of course. That would have been insane and foolish for the miracle drug that had been the staple of advanced medicine for four thousand years. It was, however, the primary location that bacta was made. Despite numerous attempts of varying seriousness over those same four thousand years, something like ninety percent of all bacta was still produced on Thyferra, where the plants required to produce it were native and abundant. In point of fact, the next largest supplier of bacta to the galaxy was actually the Jedi Order, with one of their more carefully guarded agriworlds focusing on its production.

That little detail aside, Rahm had taken a good, hard look at the galaxy and tried to think like his enemies. Many targets the galaxy over had jumped out at him. Shipyards and large scale weapons manufacturing plants were obvious targets. Yet they were also generally hard targets. Major shipyards, in particular, nearly always had their own massive defense fleets that wouldn’t be easily overrun. Scanning the galaxy for weak points near Separatist strong points, his thoughts had finally settled on Thyferra.

The CIS used droid armies.

Those armies wouldn’t need bacta…and the Republic’s absolutely would. Only the truly insane would burn the world out, everywhere needed bacta even just for day-to-day injuries. But capturing it? Oh yes, preventing the Republic from having ready access to bacta would be crippling. Potentially enough so to, entirely on its own, force the Republic to eventually come to the negotiating table if the CIS could take and hold the system. It was simply that critical of a resource.

So Rahm had taken his fleet he’d been assigned, making use of Jedi to navigate outside the normal hyperlanes, and parked them near the Thyferra system. The core of his force consisted of Fifty of the heavily upgraded Katana-class Dreadnaughts and twenty brand new Hammerhead frigates. The latter of which Antar 4 and Space City had begun to produce in the last year. In those, the Jedi Order had quietly taken cues and observational data from Jedi returning who had been involved in the Hutt Crusade. They’d used what those Jedi had been able to tell them to create their own version of the ‘frigate’ Hammerheads that the League of Free Stars fielded. Less advanced, certainly, but still a very solid ship. A ship they were making as fast as possible to supplement the Katannas, now rebranded Katanna IIs with their considerable upgrades.

He also had decent number of support ships, including a large number of refit Consular-class ‘cruisers,’ which he’d immediately renamed to the corvettes they properly were. He even had eight of the ES-24c carriers that they’d managed to buy quietly from the Ryloth Yards. He had no doubt the League’s intelligence service had some idea where those had ended up, but that had been far less concerning than lacking a carrier when the CIS had such a heavy fighter presence with their Vultures. Sure, the refit of the Katanna-class to the Katanna II had included bays for three starfighter squadrons…but he’d seen the numbers on the Lucrehulk-class battleship refits that the League had discovered.

A single one of those mammoth ships carried 1,500 Vultures.

Even if their own new design, the Blade-class interceptor that the Space City team had come up with, was able to take them on at the predicted 4-to-1 odds…he still needed more fighters than his capital ships could provide. Stuffing a full 400 Z-95s they’d managed to source into those ES-24Cs meant Rahm could call on just shy of 2,700 fighters total, with his capital ships having been fully supplied with the new Blades…barely. He knew they wouldn’t have parity in fighters against any major CIS fleet, and more than half of their pilots barely passed the minimum skill thresholds they’d set. But they would have enough fighters to at least screen their own capital ships against Vulture swarms. Which is the best he could hope for.

Now, as he was passed word that he’d been right to send the fleet to full alert status and scout the Thyferra system actively, he only hoped it would be enough. Calling on the Jedi throughout the fleet, he’d sent IFF information ahead of them through their scouts in system, and prepared to help with the jump. With luck, they could pin the CIS fleet between his own and Thyferra’s defenses and cut this particular thrust of the war off before it gained traction…

… … …

Day 3: Naboo

Admiral Sail’ada’s forced himself to remain calm and in control as his fleet exited hyperspace far closer to the orbitals of Naboo than should have been possible. He’d gotten used to such things during the Hutt Crusade, with Jedi or other Force-wielders helping make such impossibly precise jumps deep into gravity-wells almost routine. If a still somewhat terrifying routine for most experienced spacers.

They’d been lucky enough to be able to grab a group of veteran Iron Knights to do the job this time. He’d taken the risk of stopping to pick them up from a research project, despite knowing time might be of the essence. He hated that they didn’t have as good of intelligence as he’d gotten used to during the Crusade, but Naboo did at least have Quantum Comms, one of the few planets outside League space that did. Which meant he’d at least knew what he was wading into, something that had him barking orders as they came out within firing range of not just the extended-range Particle Beam Cannons, but within the closer-range of the Silencer-Xs that the three Miruko-class Star Dreadnaughts he’d been allowed to bring were equipped with.

“Open fire with all batteries! Mirukos, bring down that Subjugator! Paladins, Volitions, hammer the Lucrehulks!”

It was completely ridiculous that the CIS had deployed one of their Subjugator class here, of all places, supported by thirty Lucrehulks. Its utterly bullshit Mega Ion-cannon was the reason why he’d risked coming in right on top of the fleet, knowing if the super-weapon managed to fire they might be in trouble. Admittedly, their own shields were far better at handling ion weapons than anything the Republic had. Given what the Naboo had reported the output as being, however, he hadn’t wanted to risk it. Instead, he’d decided that decapitating the massive ship with an Alpha Strike was the best plan.

It was one that worked, too.

Even as he watched, twelve Particle Beams and six Silencer batteries, plus a lot of more traditional weapons, tore into the massive cruiser from the Star Dreadnaughts that anchored his fleet. At nearly the same instant, heavy ion cannon emplacements down on the planet, which had remained quiet while power was diverted to a Planetary Defense Shield that had been holding off bombardment, opened fire from below. Since he’d brought his ships in from ‘above’, upside down to the CIS fleet to bring as much firepower to bear at once as possible, the massive battleship was hammered from both sides simultaneously.

Its shields simply couldn’t take that sort of abrupt and focused punishment, falling quickly under the barrage. Moments later, for the first time since they’d been developed, the new and improved version of the ancient Silencer they’d recovered proved why it had been a superweapon when it was first built. While the Republic had eventually developed shields that could counter the original Silencer, the Silencer-X had been upgraded heavily. Worse, no practical ship armor had ever had the power to stand up to the mega-laser that the Silencer was at its core. With six of them firing into the Subjugator, combined with the plethora of other fire hitting it, the incredibly powerful battleship started to come apart almost immediately.

The ship was big enough, and tough enough, that it still didn’t die instantly. It managed to fire back…but the Mega-Ion Cannon that was its own superweapon had been slagged by the initial volleys. By the time the ship exploded in a way that said ‘multiple near-simultaneous reactor failures,’ the massive and dangerous ship hadn’t even managed to drop any of his Miruko’s down below ninety percent shield strength. Suppressing the urge to cackle something about ultimate power, Admiral Sail’ada commanded a shift of targets. The Paladins and Volitions had been dueling with the Lucrehulks, outnumbered but not outgunned. Now that he could start turning the Mirukos guns on those ships…

A quick glance, showing him that the two Veto-class Interdictor cruisers he’d brought along had managed to power up their gravity well projectors, caused him to smile viciously. No matter what else was happening elsewhere in the galaxy, this CIS fleet wasn’t getting away. Not a single ship. They could surrender, or die. Given that his Sovereign remained unconscious from his efforts to save the Republic Senate from a Sith plot, he was disinclined to grant these pricks any mercy.

He would honor surrenders and treat prisoners of war as his Sovereign would demand. But he wouldn’t shed a single tear if none of these kriffing bastards managed to get out the words of a surrender before they were all so much space dust…

… … …

Day 4: Tythe Central War Room

First Admiral of the Fleet Rana Lin had never imagined in her worst nightmares the sort of clusterfuck that had unrolled over the last four days. Oh, she’d known a galactic-scale war was coming, of course. All of the senior staff had seen the intelligence reports that indicated massive buildups on both the CIS and Republic sides of the proverbial fence. Their own building and training programs had only increased in tempo since the end of the Hutt Crusade in response, leaving the League of Free Stars with, unquestionably, the third most powerful fleet in the galaxy.

It should have been more than enough to see to their own borders while the Republic and CIS fought it out.

Unfortunately, that was before the kriffing Supreme Chancellor of the Republic had proven to be a bloody Sith, and done a runner while temporarily crippling any response from the Republic’s capital. He very obviously and blatantly had a connection to the Separatist movement as well, as they’d come out swinging just hours after the karking bastard had escaped the Senate floor. With absolutely no central coordination forthcoming, the CIS Navy, much larger than anyone had anticipated, was running wild. They were ramming their fleets down the Hydian Way, Perlemian Trade Route, Celanon Spur, and Entralla Route like a Gamorean rutting the newest Hutt slave girl.

In fact, so far, the only good news for the Republic was that the bloody Jedi had somehow acquired a decently size fleet. They’d dropped enough of it on Thyferra that, combined with that wealthy planet’s own considerable defense fleet, they’d managed to stop the Confederacy’s attempt to do the same to the Rimma Trade Route cold. There were signs that the Republic was getting its shit back together quickly enough that they might be able to stop some of the other advances, but by the time they did so the CIS was going to control far more of the galaxy than anyone had expected.

If not for Rana herself and the incredibly broad discretion she’d been given by Sovereign Midoriya before he left, it would be even worse.

Numerous desperate calls for aid and offers of switching sides to the League had come in as the CIS rampaged, and Rana had possessed the Emergency Powers to respond to the most critical of those. Some weren’t actually under threat just yet and only required a small deployment of fleet assets to ‘claim’ under their protection. Others had come under direct assault and had required major fleet interventions.

Specifically, Enarc, Naboo, Jabiim and Dac had all required major commitments of force.

Naboo had been the largest surprise, in a way. Both in that its newest Queen had run to them for aid, and that it had come under serious assault at all. Presumably the latter was due to it being Palpatine’s homeworld, a location where his family residence was already being raided to find out anything they could about the kriffing bastard’s schemes. Given that Naboo was a major trade partner, whose ex-pats (both human and Gungan) had a major presence in the League’s military, and Rana was privately sure that her ultimate boss was banging at least that one handmaiden and possibly the Senator/Ambassador?

Well, sending help for that particular world and folding it into the League had been a no brainer. Doubly so as securing it and Enarc together would, hopefully, secure the worlds between there and here in time. Which would shield Tythe itself to the Galactic West.

Jabiim and the Mon Calamari homeworld had been more firmly strategic decisions. The first was where the vast majority of the younger or not-kriffing-evil Hutts had been sent. Some Jedi Master named Fay had convinced a bunch of Hutts born in Republic space to move there and partner with the local government. Their wealth had brought in Planetary Weather Control systems that had finally allowed the world to dig itself out of the literal mud.

Doing so had been worth it for the Hutts as well, as Jabiim had quickly proven to be stupidly rich in a number of critical metals needed for warship construction. Something that everyone in the galaxy wanted right now. Knowing both of those things, Rana had acted to protect the planet. Both to prevent the CIS from gaining access to what Hutt wealth hadn’t been absorbed by the League, and to protect the strategic resource that it was as a source of those rare metals. Her own reinforcements had just barely arrived in time to fend off a significant fleet of CIS assets, and the resulting fight had technically been the first conflict between the League and CIS. Without the Jump Gates, she couldn’t have pulled it off. With the Gates cutting reaction time it had worked out…barely.

Dac, similarly, had mostly been about keeping a strategic asset out of the CIS hands and putting it firmly into their own. The Mon Calamari shipyards were impressive, even by League standards. While their design philosophy meant they were slower than most yards, Mon Calamari built ships were extremely high quality. To the point that one of the only ship classes the League of Free Stars used that wasn’t built within the League was its medical ships, which they still ordered from the Dac shipyards. Having the world fold into the League would be a major boon…even if the fighting there still wasn’t over. The CIS had committed a much larger fleet, backed by large numbers of local insurgents from the Quarren people.

Rana herself had committed a painful number of their Miruko and Paladin-class ships on behalf of the League. Combined with the fact the Mon Cal had apparently been tipped off by someone that something nasty was coming, and built according? Their combined forces were successfully holding off the CIS for now, but it was an active battle space, unlike the other three systems. The Confederacy was clearly far more deeply committed to gaining those yards than it had been the resources of Jabiim.

Rubbing her eyes and sending prayers to the Force, along with any half-reasonable deities she could think of, for the Sovereign to get his ass back here soon to take over this mess, Rana sipped at her ninth cup of caf today. She’d had less than four total hours of sleep since the fecal matter hit the rotary air impeller, and she was very much afraid things were going to get worse before they got better…

… … …

- Day 5: Taris System -

Admiral Trench gave a terrifying smile of satisfaction as his fleet sliced through the Tarisan System Defense Fleet, despite a valiant effort on the local’s part. As a somewhat wealthy ecumenopolis, and one that had a rough history with war, the Defense Forces here were by far the strongest he’d run into so far. By now, everyone in the galaxy that wasn’t living under a rock knew about the fiasco in the Senate. Truly, Admiral Trench had to admire the sheer guts of the Sith he now knew were backing the Confederacy.

To have infiltrated the Republic at the highest level before the war? All with the idea of using the very Chancellorship to subtly cripple their enemy from within, so that they could be fully conquered? It was an inspired maneuver, and one that Trench could see the value of having attempted. It certainly explained why Count Dooku, or Darth Tyranus as the man had now admitted himself to be in private and to his highest officers, had been so confident in their victory. They had, according to the Count, seen the corruption and studied their history. Only by crippling the Republic from within could they guarantee a clean victory in war, and so they had positioned themselves to make that happen.

It was truly a pity that the brilliant maneuver hadn’t quite worked out.

Still, what was happening, and what they had accomplished, was giving them change enough. Despite some measure of order being restored to the Republic at this point, for the past several days the vast hidden fleets of the Confederacy had been able to run wild, taking control of an almost unbelievable amount of territory. His fleet had been one of several pre-positioned near the recently reinforced Ord systems that were either within or near to CIS controlled space. Ord Cestus had fallen incredibly swiftly, not only taken by surprise…but with a considerable number of the high command apparently loyal to the Sith, not the Republic.

From there, Trench had been charged with working his way down the Hydian Way, one of the galaxy’s five Great Hyperlanes. Already, a dozen worlds lay behind him, their orbital defenses shattered and Lucrehulks filled with armies of battle droids busy fighting on the surface. A half dozen more were hiding behind planetary shield generators, under siege from portions of his fleet. He had enough ships to leave a dozen Lucrehulks and their support ships behind at each to maintain blockades and still press on. In truth, he and the other admirals had been shocked just how many ships the CIS actually had. The previous numbers had been faked, a still larger buildup hidden behind already impressive numbers.

As he watched the last orbital defense station above Taris die to concentrated fire, he knew that this world would be another that would require a siege force to be left behind. With their past, it was no surprise that the planet had a robust planetary shield, one that would take time and serious effort to bring down. Better to starve this particular planet out. As an ecumenopolis it couldn’t feed itself for more than a few months, at best, and he still had more than enough ships for the effort. Designating a dozen more Lucrehulks to the task, he began issuing orders that would see the remaining two hundred of the same class moving on to the next system…

… … …

- Day 6: Kamino System -

Celeste Morne was very unhappy that Kina Ha had somehow maneuvered her into giving a speech. A speech to an army of clones that had been intended to destroy the Jedi. Of course, she did understand why it had to be her. Despite being even more critical to the success of the seven-day rebellion they’d led to overthrow Kamino with those very same clones…Kina Ha was a Kaminoan. The fact that she was also a Jedi was just about the only reason the now no-longer-biochipped clones still respected her. Meaning that Celeste, who was also a Jedi but obviously human, was a far more palatable ‘leader’ for the tens of millions of clones she was about to address.

The last two weeks had been one hell of a rollercoaster to end up here. Within just a few days of their first meeting, Kina Ha and Celeste had fairly easily broken into Tipoca City and infiltrated into the deep archives regarding the Grand Army of the Republic. The Force had led them to the information they needed, though Celeste wasn’t sure she’d have been able to navigate through the Veil of the Darkside the way Kina Ha had pulled off, the ancient Jedi barely seeming to notice its effects.

The information they’d discovered had revealed critical details…such as the biochips that the natives had created just for this project. Able to avoid detection by anything short of a dangerous Level 5 brain scan, the biochips had been loaded with commands that, if activated, would suppress the Clones’ free will and force them to obey the given order.

If they hadn’t already known the Clones were a Sith plot of some sort, the orders might have seemed…paranoid and hideously unethical, yet not completely insane. With that information, however, it had been obvious that several of the orders which were marked as ‘contingencies,’ were specifically aimed to wipe out the Jedi Order. The fact that the list of orders also included several things that would allow the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic, or in specific situations a few others, to remove rogue elements was also beyond suspicious. One even included triggering a total orbital bombardment of Republic worlds to ‘keep it out of enemy hands.’ To say that Celeste and Kina Ha had been convinced they needed to do something, and quickly given how the Force had urged Celeste to Kamino, was a bit of an understatement.

Thankfully, the vast majority of Kina Ha’s species were complete and total dicks.

Normally, that wouldn’t exactly be something to be glad about. In their case, however, it had meant that the Clones hated the ‘Long-Necks.’ Their treatment had been abysmal under the Kaminoans and, with the backing of a pair of Jedi who they were programmed to revere and obey in the first place…well, it hadn’t been that hard to create a rebellion. The Clones had the numbers and the training, Kina Ha and Celeste had the override codes for the biochips, and all of them had been fresh out of empathy for the Kaminoans.

So, now Kamino was being run by the Clones. Yet, elsewhere while they had rebelled, the war they’d been commissioned and trained for had begun. For better or worse, the Clones still saw themselves as the Grand Army of the Republic…and they’d been rescued from oppression by two of the very Jedi that they’d conditioned to follow. Which only reinforced their insistence that they were still going to do their part. At least so long as they actually got paid for it. Something which Celeste knew the Republic wasn’t exactly in a position to refuse.

All of which meant that now she of all people had to give a speech. She was absolutely not qualified for this. Still, needs must when the Sith drive, and she was still just as dedicated to wiping that particular blight on the galaxy out as she had been when first recruited as a Shadow by the Jedi Covenant. So, bracing herself to fake it as best she could, she stepped up to the podium on the massive landing field. A landing field where ships called from Kuat and Rothana had arrived in response to signals originally intended to be sent by the Kaminoans. There were tens of thousands of troops on this one massive landing field, ready to embark on assault ships. Millions upon millions more were listening and watching from all over the planet. Doing her best to channel Sovereign Midoriya and Padmé Amidala, the two most charismatic speakers she personally knew, she pitched her voice to the microphones and spoke.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, soldiers of the Grand Army of the Republic. While recent days have shown you that not all was as it seemed, and that traitors at the highest level of the Republic attempted to corrupt your purpose, you have proven greater than their lies! You have struck down the traitors, freeing yourself from the yoke of their control before they could turn you on the very Republic you were decanted to defend! Go now, serve as you were taught. Make use of the skills the traitors thought would serve their own ends. Know you will be cheered galaxy wide as the Heroes who saved the People of the Republic from the darkest days! And May the Force Be With You, always.”

It wasn’t exactly the grandest speech ever given, but it seemed to be enough for the Clones, as they cheered wildly and began to chant. Then, with an almost unnerving synchrony, officers roared commands and the Battalions shifted to march. Sharp and precise, they filed into the Acclimators that had arrived to pick them up. Celeste had done her part, but she kriffing well hoped someone more qualified for this mess than her came to relieve her soon…

… … …

- Day 7: Lantillies -

Anakin spun his Blade-J through a roll that forced the pair of Vultures on his tail to overshoot, snapping a shot from the dual laser cannons of his interceptor, disintegrating one of the Vultures as it passed. Even as he did so, he tracked the firing arc of his underslung ion canon to follow the second, firing a slower but more potent burst from it that clipped the droid ship, frying its systems. The swivel mount of the ion canon was a feature exclusive to the Blade-J, the Jedi-only model of the new fighter he’d helped design and test. Regular pilots just hadn’t been able to multitask to the degree needed to use the swivel system in high-speed dogfights. Instead, the standard Blade had the same weapon in a fixed position, rigged to fire in tandem with the lasers instead of being mounted on the swivel that gave the Jedi variant a 45-degree firing arc with theirs.

Having been separated from his wingman, Master Tiin, he took the moment free of enemy fighters to take in the battle space. The overall engagement was, so far as he could tell, now firmly in their favor. Enough so that the Confederate Fleet was clearly pulling back, attempting to make an organized withdrawal. They were going to get away, unfortunately, but not without having been badly mauled. More importantly, the combined force they’d managed to put together here had stopped their rapid advancement down the Perlemian Trade Route cold.

The battle that was just winding down had been massive.

Too large, Anakin had to quietly admit to himself, for him to keep more than the tactical level fighter battle that was now wrapping up in his head. Eight Providence-class Dreadnaughts, over a hundred and eighty Lucrehulk Battleships, backed by even larger numbers of Munificent-class frigates and Recusant light destroyers. All, of course, with an utterly disgustingly huge swarm of Vultures. That had been the CIS Fleet that had slammed into Lantillies, and solidly half of it was going to get away despite the best efforts of the combined defenders.

Of course, given they’d technically been outmatched, being able to phrase it that way was a spectacular result.

Lantillies had been chosen as the place to halt the advance for a number of critical reasons. The single biggest was the fact that it was a major player in galactic shipbuilding. Not on the sort of ludicrous scale that Kuat or Corellia were, but still home to a major set of shipyards. The Lantillies Corporation, in particular, produced an extremely good system defense cruiser, and the overall system was wealthy enough to have still larger vessels purchased from Kuat in its System Defense Force. Including a quartet of Mandator IIs and double that numbers of the original Mandator design. All of which had very obviously been modified heavily to no longer comply with the Ruusan Reformations.

Not that anyone was going to complain about that, given the circumstances and the fact those dozen ships had been key to winning this battle…even if five of them had been destroyed outright and three more were floating hulks without power.

By itself, the Lantillies System Defense Force wouldn’t have been enough to stop the CIS fleet, but it hadn’t been alone. The largest single chunk of reinforcements had come from the Jedi Order. Space City, where they had been done so many of the refits for the Katanna IIs, and were now building more Katana IIs, Hammerhead Frigates, and mass producing the new Blade starfighters, was located nearby. It had, in fact, been the Perlemian Route’s rise to being one of the Five Great Hyperlanes that had killed off usage of Space City over the millennia.

The result was that the Jedi Order had been able to reinforce Lantillies with a fleet of seventy Katana IIs, thirty Hammerhead Frigates, and over 7,000 starfighters. With the Katana IIs having been heavily upgraded, three of them could realistically engage a Lucrehulk, and the Hammerheads were honestly head and shoulders above the Munificents. Added to the local mobile defense forces and defense stations around the shipyards and they’d stood a chance, at least. Though things had looked grim until an eleventh-hour reinforcement fleet arrived from Alderaan and Corellia of all places.

Alderaanian-built Thranta-class Cruisers and their War Frigate escorts are no joke, and they’d come in a support role for a type of Mon Calamari built ship that Anakin estimated to be somewhere in the Battlecruiser range. Tough and well-armed, the Alderaanians had only brought a dozen of them, but they’d made a serious impact. As had the far more hodgepodge ships that Corellia had brought to the party. Literally hundreds of Gozanti, CR-90, CR-70, and Consular-class refits. Along with more purpose-built military ships like DP20 and Vanguard-class gunships, and Purgill-class cruisers. All supporting, of all things, a half dozen ancient Centurion-class Battlecruisers and three Invincible-class Dreadnaughts. All obviously hastily upgraded as much as possible.

The totality of the firepower those very unexpected reinforcements had added to the battle had turned the tide. Not easily, and from what Anakin had seen it had been hell to try and mesh it all together on the fly. Particularly as the Corellian and Alderanian forces had arrived after the battle had started. Still, that very fact had put them into position to flank the CIS Fleet as well, and someone had clearly managed to take command well enough to make the bizarre mix of fleet elements work. Though it looked like the defenders had taken nearly as much of a pounding as the fleeing fleet…and the shipyards had taken at least some damage.

Shaking his head, Anakin made contact with a trio of regular Blades that were currently clear of the battle. He’d slot in as their fourth and they could all go hunting through the remaining Vultures. It might be shifting to a cleanup operation now, but the CIS had left behind a lot of Vultures to continue harassment and attempts to damage the shipyards. The more of them they hunted down quickly, the better it would be for everyone…