Chp-5: Deal Time Babyyyyy

Chp-5: Deal Time Babyyyyy

I once again was standing in my office, overlooking the city from one of the windows of my office. It's not even a particularly large office, so I don't get those same window walls that Palpatine got when he was Chancellor. The lighting is nice though. And the chair. Very comfortable.

Accordia wasn't a particularly large city, all things considered. The capitol building was the largest there, standing at around 5 stories. Just above my office was a security corridor that led to the rooftop, where there were 2 landing pads, one directly on the rooftop and one attached to the side with supports. Also on the roof were 2 quad barreled AA laser repeaters for anti-fighter screening. Aside from the TIE fighters and some assorted AA repulsorlift weapons platforms, they were the only AA defenses the city had.

The city itself was fairly low standing, with the tallest building aside from the capitol being the central comms tower a block down the street. Standing at 4 stories, it worked as a data processing center, comms tower/relay, and air/space traffic control.

The rest of the city didn't breach 3 stories, and was mostly a combination of small office buildings/apartments, with the ground level being leased out to businesses. The material type of buildings actually changed outward in roughly concentric circles. In the center was the capitol building made of Ferrocrete with durasteel plating. Around the capitol building were other government buildings also made of Ferrocrete, including the comms tower, the downtown barracks, the military spaceport, etc… Going away from there are the business districts filled with office buildings and the like, mostly made of steel and concrete. Another ring away from them is where you get into pre-fab pourstone buildings. After that is where you get more locally made wooden buildings, though pourstone is still fairly common considering its durability and ease of use.

I turned from the window to go mope at my desk. It was a nice, if simple, steel desk with a terminal sitting at an angle on one side, and an intercom built into the desk on the other. 2 chairs sat opposite my own for guests. The rest of the office was a fairly small space, longer than it was wide. On both sides leading up to the door were fitted with filing cabinets, installed at my order. Within those cabinets were official, physicalized reports of materials, military strength, and other important statistics. While I miss the nice drawers and monitors that were there, these cabinets are better, and allow me to secure important documents like contracts in a place that can't be hacked.

Unfortunately, that means I now have paperwork. And not just the messages on my terminal, but physicalized paperwork.

God truly is dead.

Regardless of my existential musings, I sat down at my terminal and began my day's work with a cup of some local milk and pastries. The pastries were kinda like a poptart if they were made of fluffier bread and filled with a lemon like custard of sorts. Pretty good. The milk was bitter though. Going to have to ask Darna to source a different drink.

Flicking through the day's messages, I ruminated on the progress made so far.

Already, a third of the asteroid belt had been rented out to a variety of small mining companies, and with the refinery on Minda 0-A-5(dwarf-planet asteroid) almost complete(Takshun works fastwhen they don't have to fight for space) they would be paying me-sorry, the Empire, to have their resources refined to sell, or just selling to us directly.

Aside from that, the Imperial mining groups that had been approved were already setting up shop, mining on Minda 0-A-3 and prospecting other areas of the belt. This meant more ore for the refinery, which upon competition would start loading up the Gozantis and the Acclamator with refined ore to be sold to factories in neighboring systems.

Speaking of the Acclamator, it was…functional. The reactor and other vital systems had remained undamaged, and it stayed in a low power mode. This was nice, as it kept the internals breathable and the stored goods usable. Bad because now I had to fill its fuel cells. Expensive.

Within its hull was a number of goodies. This included a full complement of 80 LAAT's(66 gunships, 14 transport), 5 of which were handed over to KhaganMotors so they could more easily deliver their products planet-wide. Aside from those, there were a smattering of speeder-bikes that were given to Commander Grant to distribute as she saw fit. If she happened to take a joyride or two, I was willing to look the other way. So long as she wasn't out to kill, I was happy.

The last things in the hull were some crates of military equipment and some starfighters. The guns were outdated, to say the least. DC-15 A's were nice, with long range, and plenty of ammo, but suffered from weight and sustained fire problems, making them unwieldy in smaller spaces and short-medium ranged conflicts. They would also be handed over to Kaela, because despite what I can only assume is insanity, she is scarily competent and would know how to use them well. The starfighters, on the other hand, were odd. 10 or so V wings, the Clone interceptor, and 15 or so ARC-170's, the Clone heavy fighters. All of these would be sent to the small starfighter emplacement here, to be trained in their use. While the V-Wings lacked life support, TIEs are similar, so we already have flight suits.

The biggest thing was a single starfighter. A Delta-7 Aethersprite-class light interceptor. A Jedi Starfighter. On one hand, having a pilot fly this thing well would be a massive boon to our air/space defense, as these things are incredibly agile. On the other hand, their internals are massively stripped of pilot assistance tools because its made specifically for Jedi to navigate with the help of the Force, meaning unless I risked the attention of the Inquisition and harbored a Jedi or other Force sensitive, I was gonna have to get rid of this ship.

Best way to do that? Sell it. Cause profit. And the best person to sell it to? Grakkus Jahibakti Tingi. A Hutt, crime lord of Nar Shaddaa, and prolific collector of Jedi artifacts, from lightsabers to holocrons to, in this case, starfighters. If I could sell to him, I could make a killing. Better yet, if I could sell this thing at auction on Nar Shaddaa that he's attending, I could make even more! Some other Hutt's might try to one-up him out of spite or whatever, but considering he has a vault dedicated to Jedi memorabilia, he'll for sure out bid them. And even if he fails, I still get paid! Absolute victory!

Now I just have to figure out how to do that… Ah I'll just send a message to Darna and see if she can turn up anything useful.

Moving on, I got to the worst part of my day. Spending money. And not on nice things, but on …public safety. Fuck(frak now, right?), I just want a space yacht and a sexy space wife and more money than I can conceive of, but instead I gotta worry about the public!?

I sighed. "Just 2 years. Just gotta do this shit decent for two years, then you can fake your death as the Empire collapses and jet away to some resort for the rest of your life." My self-assurance complete, I returned to work.

On the list today were patrol craft. What with all the increasing industry, that meant that there was an increased chance at piracy. Those pesky profit takers have yet to make an appearance, so it's best to have some deterrents in place sooner rather than later. The entrepreneurs of violence will show up eventually, but if I have a decent defense, that'll ensure that only the stupid(or crazy) show up, therefore passively reducing pirate numbers. They're opportunists after all. Most smaller pirate crew's won't bother in more defended systems, because they're too afraid. Only the ones with big ships and bigger ego's will try something, and get fucking blasted out of orbit. But I digress.

There were many ships that I could purchase. The problem was three-fold. Acquisition, Cost, and Labor. Not all the ships I was thinking about were accessible, either because they weren't sold, weren't finished, or haven't been conceived of yet. On top of that, while I was solidly in the black now that those contracts and ore hauling had started to pay off, I wasn't swimming in credits. And finally, even with an influx of new businesses and the gears of economy chugging away, I still lacked all that many people. The population of Minda 3 had only gone up by some 3,000 people(excluding births, that is).

Then I came upon a solid choice. I needed something powerful enough to scare pirates, fast enough to respond to emergencies, small enough to man it, and cheap enough to buy them. What I found, was the CR92a Assasin-class Corvette. Standing at 139 meters in length, it was stronger in both armament and armor than its CR90 cousin. It boasted 6 dual turbolaser batteries, 2 quad laser cannons, a proton torpedo launcher, and a tractor beam projector. Put in groups with the ARC-170's and V-Wing's that were found in the Acclamator, and there was a solid anti-piracy squad.

The CR92a would act as a powerful center-line, raining turbolaser fire on enemies, while 2 ARC-170's could both engage the enemy and keep fire off the CR92a with their rear mounted turret.. The V-Wings would utilize their mobility to flank and harass the enemy. Pirate's wouldn't have a chance, and the profit margins would stay healthy!

With all that done, I sent out the orders for 4 CR92a's, costing me a heft 10 million credits, leaving only 5 mil for emergencies of the state(If/When I need to cut my losses and take off).

Now that I had finished all the gruelingwork, I decided to lean back and doze off for a minute.

Just as I was about to fall asleep, the whirring of my door jolted me away.

Clearing my eyes, I blinked them open just in time to see Darna walk through the door lookin mighty nervous.

"You alright there? Look like you saw a ghost?"

"...no sir. Just met with some…old friends. Told them you were more of an enterprising type, and that they might get something out of dealing with you."

She shuffled around, and I now understood what was happening with perfect clarity.

She's embarrassed! She was chatting with some friends and had a few too many and accidentally promised she would introduce them to her boss! Of course, I won't say anything, so as to not embarrass her any further. Instead I just nodded.

"I understand. When would they be willing to meet?"

Her eyes seemed to shine.

"I can have them here in 15 minutes sir!"

I could feel my eyebrows shoot up into my hat. That's fast, what are they doing, camping across the street?

"Ok then, I'll trust you on this."

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Sidheth T'vor

Minda 3, Accordia

As Sidheth waited anxiously for the elevator to climb, she thought back to how this whole debacle began.

She and the leader of Phyto Cell, Vilil, had been working on establishing a base/outpost somewhere in the outer rim. Dubrillion, the richest world in the sector wasn't to far, bringing with it plenty of targets of opportunity.

Minda had seemed like the perfect system. Near-empty, plenty of places to hide, etc…

Then she remembered something. An old friend of hers who had left Phyto Cell some years ago had taken up a job in the Capital of Minda 3, Accordia, as a secretary. So, when Phyto Cell came looking for spots, she and Vilil decided to go meet up with Darna, see how she was doing, and ask if she had any decent intel, considering she had been there longer than them.

It was to their surprise when she revealed that she was the secretary for the Imperial Governor of Minda. Apparently he was a cut above the rest of the Imps in regards to public policy and the like, and actually improved the state of the system he ruled.

She had scoffed at the idea, but here she was, a week later, in an elevator on the way to meet him as a potential "business partner". Darna had said that he was more profit driven, and that they could probably hide their rebel business by just disguising it as legitimate and approaching him as if they were looking to buy land.

Walking into the office, she paused when she noticed the space. Or lack thereof. The office was fairly bland, the walls lined with cabinets, and a simple desk decorating the end of the room, situated near some windows.

Behind the desk sat a somewhat lean, pale skinned and brown haired man in his early twenties, though the bag's under his eyes seemed to age him a whole decade.

"Ah, hello, hello, please, take a seat. Talia Fortath, correct?"

"That would be me." She replied. Her cover story was as such. She was an entrepreneur that had contacted her old friend Darna to see about buying a license for development of orbital facilities in the asteroid ring. While these facilities would exist(thanks to the generous financial donations of some unnamed sympathetic senator), they would exist almost solely to disguise the fact that within would be rebel activity. The facility would conduct regular business, and if a package or data chip slipped or was forgotten every now and again, no one would take notice. And if there were some hangars that were never open to customers, that happens occasionally.

"So, you want a license to build a station here in the belt. From the forms submitted here, I can see that it would be an R&R general station. Light refit capabilities, some repairs, refuel, etc… While all that seems in order, I have you here for two reasons. The first is that you're Darna's friend, so doing this over terminal might be a bit rude considering the effort she went through to get you here. The second is that I have a proposal for you."

Sidheth went still as soon as she heard him say he had her, loosened up as he continued, and stiffened again at the end. A proposal? Was this the part where StormTroopers march in as he laughs maniacally and says "I propose you die, rebel scum!!! HAHAHAHAHAHA". So she was pleasantly confused when he continued.

"You see, not too long ago I contracted a company by the name of Takshun Orbital from Ord Mantell to build the refinery complex out on the belt, and to draw up plans for an orbital station around Minda-3. This, when completed, would make your R&R station more or less obsolete. Instead, I wanted to talk to you about creating a refit station. You see, while the new station will have a great many facilities, it won't have any way of refitting/repairing ships larger than light freighters. I'd like to instead create a joint project with you. I would provide a portion of the funding and control some docks of the yard for Imperial use only, while the other docks would be yours to do with, though we would still be taxing the whole operation. What do you say?"

Overwhelmed. That was an appropriate word. The governor had talked, and talked, and talked, and by the end of it she was actually fairly convinced. While the original station was definitely more hidden and secretive, it lacked the facilities to support any larger rebel activity in the area. With a scrap/refit/repair yard, they would be able to scrap ships for parts, then send those parts to cells who need them, right under the Imperial's noses.

Sure they would be in a fairly precarious position, but this had the potential to help the rebellion in way's Phyto Cell had never before been able to. The scale, which was something the rebellion lacked, was great.

"I would have to speak with my team on this, but it is certainly promising."

A smile bloomed onto his face. It seemed to glow like a golden credit chit.

"That's wonderful. I hope to see you very soon!"

With that slightly ominous message, Sidheth left, sparing only a glance at Darna, who was busy on the comms, before heading to the elevator, and returning to base.

There was a lot of work to be done.

—-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hell yeah! While she didn't confirm anything, the potential for a mixed scrap/repair/refit yard would be huge!

Sure, it wouldn't pull numbers like planet side scrap yards, but it would allow me to scrap those wreck Clone Wars ships in system instead of selling them, along with any future pirate vessels. It would let miners refit new equipment onto their ships, or repair damage from asteroids. It would let me upgrade/repair the ships in my slowly growing defense force. And the money! Fuck Yeah! I would for sure be charging people extra for repairs in an Imperial yard if the others were full!

Not to mention the taxes! Taxing the sales, the services, shuttle rides to the surface or the other station when built, the fucking snacks bought by people waiting for their repairs to be finished, Never in my life did I ever think I was gonna love taxes, yet here I am, the TaxMan himself.

However, I still had a problem. Population. There was a decent solution to this, however. Clones. And not new ones. I ain't got the money for that. What I do have though, is a trade fleet of an Acclamator and 5 Gozantis flying about the galaxy selling ore. All it takes is a message, and they can start putting up posters and shit advertising a place for clones after they were displaced from the empire.

And they would still be in decent shape as well, as the only accelerated growth occurred during the initial stages. And by now, the chips in their heads either don't work, were removed, or simply have no reason to be activated. This means that I get a solid population willing and eager to work, with prior military experience, and a solid loyalty if earned.

Honestly, it's so hard not to win at this life thing.

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Hi there folks. Famous last words up there, huh?

Anyways, here to say thanks for reading, and to answer some questions/concerns.

I am doing a mix of canon and legends/eu. This is because I like parts of both of them, and feel like while legends has more stuff to pull from, canon has some cool ideas that can be better utilized if mixed with legends.For QQ readers, I put this story under NSFW for two reasons, those being that the SFW page is dryer than your girlfriend(imaginary) and that this fic will contain gore, viscera, and some depictions of sexual slavery.I think this must have been lost in translation somewhere, but I keep seeing people say that Las has an older brother in Imperial Intelligence. He doesn't. He has 3 older sisters; an ISD captain, an ace TIE pilot, and a II agent. For a group of super nerds on a decades old forum, you'd think you get this right.

Aside from allat, as you guys know, I love your comments. They make my day, especially the theorycrafting about ships, tactics, diplomacy, and where the story will go, so rock on with that shit.