HES Rebecca
HES Rebecca was among the smallest of Port Block Yards' true starships for a long time, in the days before jump technology became accessible to shuttlecraft.
With a standing crew of 6, and nominally a Light Tender, Rebecca performed reconnaissance and courier duties, as well as regularly providing the spearhead of rescue missions, arriving first, to assess and co-ordinate, and moving off once the larger and more fully resourced rescue and support vessels arrived. In more complex missions, where the profile called for more independent teams, Rebecca was occasionally assigned as a support vessel to larger vessels (Armed Fleet Tenders like HES Sirius, or HES Scarborough).
The look is striking, and brings a smile to any seasoned spacer's eye, because Rebecca looks a lot like something else. Correllian Corvettes are ubiquitous across the galaxy, in roles from freight to consular transport to fire support. The Corvettes are considerably larger ships, being three decks in height to Rebecca's one only. The similarity is not a mistake, but whether it is an engineer's fancy or a piece of starship identification leger de main is open to argument.
Ship to ship recognition and range estimates aboard starships rely heavily on transponders, silhouettes and backgrounds. Without a transponder signal, and at long ranges, silhouette recognition may be the primary identifier, and this then used to calculate range. Rebecca's silhouette could easily be mistaken for a corvette, and the disparate sizes erroneously reconciled by a false assumption that Rebecca is three times further away than she is in fact.
Port Block Yard's engineers have an entirely different explanation. The ship's design specification called for 10 engines, and Port Block Yards' penchant for redundancy saw an eleventh on the 'good to have' list. There really is no more space efficient method of laying out 11 cylindrical engines than that used in the corvettes. The available second hand parts at in Port Block Yards' inventory generally tends to be modular in nature (having often been carved off something else, so the long primary corridor, flanked by docking ports, quarters and facilities elements, headed by a cockpit, was simply a natural consequence. The hammerhead was an artistic touch. The cockpit is a two man, (almost) inline affair, with the ship's commander sitting above, behind and to the right of the pilot - so it is only the same width as the primary corridor. The sensor systems Rebecca carries are classified (consistent with her reconnaissance profile), so much so that they are generally enclosed in a sensor transparent dome. In this case, the engineers simply relocated the domes from above and below the primary corridor (where they were to have been located, at the transverse docking corridor junction) to either side of the cockpit. The sloping port and starboard fairings, and undersized point defence weapons were post-specification amendments made to keep Rebecca in line with the corvette look, chiefly because the lead engineer on the project always liked the look of the Correllian ship. Or so the story goes.
In terms of specifications, beyond her high speed and manoeuvrability, and her sensitive sensors and scanner, Rebecca is a hardy little ship, but definitely not a warship. She carries no heavy weapons, and only light point defence turrets (4), capable of warding off fighters and small objects. For missions where animosity was anticipated, Rebecca was sometimes escorted by Y Wings (Port Block Yards had outfitted a small number of these venerable fighters with FTL engines for just this purpose) or Starfuries.
For those with a technical bent, the differences between HES Rebecca, and the scaled down specifications of the standard Correllian Corvette include:
- The widened hammerhead to allow space for the cockpit
- Improved upper/lower symmetry around the cockpit access corridor
- Two additional defensive twin blasters, noting that these are much less powerful than the two twin heavy blaster sets carried by the corvette
- Different equipment silhouettes on the midships hull
- Improved symmetry and size in the midships to transverse corridor flanges
- Lengthened docking corridors to permit docking with a wider range of craft
- Different sensors and works above the transverse corridor
- Minor modifications to the engine cowlings for simplicity and aesthetics
Pictured crew include (from right to left) Captain Karen Fitzpatrick, First Officer Calvin Aristakis, and Pilot Steven Anuhilana.
HES Rebecca is homeported in New Pacific, and registered in the Galactic Registry for extra-sector travel.
