Quote:I'd expect them to use water, actually. It's not as obscenely common as hydrogen, but it is still enough so to be easy to find anywhere outside the orbit of Venus, it's easier to store and handle (ie, the molecules are too big to filter through things), and most of all, it's a lot denser - so you don't need to spend near the same amount of tank material to store a given amount.
It occurs to me that there's probably not enough hydrogen aboard to get halfway across the solar system on thrusters (so skimming off gas giants is anecessary precursor) - missions out this far usually have tanker support (or in the Zentreadi's case, fold there directly).
Anyway, for the tanker thing - my thought had been that, while tanker ships were indeed a part of any long-range mission (for the Zentradi too, actually. Folds are literally instantaneous, and fighting has to be done in real space and time), the EDTO had planned ahead and installed fueling stations across the system to ease future operations. (IIRC, Luna is actually the only major moon in the solar system that isn't at least half water ice.)
The difficulty for the SDF-1 would be in actually getting to that base - I figure that they'd want to launch with as little mass aboard as possible, which'd mean that, beside having their magazines mostly empty and only those fighters and desdroids that were both present on Tinian and sealed against vacuum, by the time they folded they'd have had maybe a sip and some fumes left in the tanks - maybe enough to maneuver between moons, maybe not.
And, of course, a fueling station might well have defenses, even if it's completely automated.
Erm, that's it for now, I think.
Ja, -n
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"V, did you do something foolish?"
"Yes, and it was glorious."