In Service of Chaos. (SW\B5)

[NecronLord]

Gah. Apologies for the lateness. Work this, work that. This monster doubled in size as I wrote it, too. Anyway, have a christmas Present:

Chapter Twenty

“Patriots of the fleet and the galaxy beyond. For a thousand generations, no one has seen a concentrated force as powerful and formidable as you, and the heart of this power is not in guns or ships, but in your resolve. I salute you all, every one of you is a better being than I am, believe me. We are about to take place in a single battle that will decide this war, and with it, the fate of the Galaxy. This battle will be the single largest offensive in history.

“I know you are all anxious over the resolution of this battle, I am too, but I will tell you this; here and now, the destiny of all people, humans or ‘aliens,’ republican or imperialist, will be decided. We will jump to hyperspace, and then we will liberate the Capital World of the Galactic Republic, because that is our calling, the calling of this generation, to undo the mistakes of the past, and re-found the Republic. The time of the Empire has been the greatest tragedy the galaxy has ever known. Now we bring a new day to that story, and, I know that you all hope, that this will be the greatest triumph that that same galactic history has ever recorded.

“We will apprehend the greatest criminal for the last thousand years, and restore justice to the galaxy. I will make no promises though, I will do my part, and I ask that you all do your own. Then, and only then, will we have that singular victory. It is within our power, now we must prove that our will is worthy of the opportunity we have been granted”

Anakin switched the communicator off for a moment, and relaxed into the chair on the Imperator’s flag-bridge. And exchanged a nod with the Admiral. “Admiral Thrawn,” he said, reactivating the communicator, “the fleet is yours.”

Thrawn nodded, and gave Anakin a polite thank-you for the benefit of the listeners, both in the fleet, and those who would receive coverage on the holonet once the battle was ended. “All craft, stand by for hyperspace. Task force commanders; At your discretion, execute operation!”


Kaan looked out of the octagonal window of his advanced TIE prototype, formerly the property of Darth Vader, and then General Kenobi. He steered the ship through a cloud of thousands of TIE fighters in hyperdrive rings, and ran a final in-flight check of his systems. There would be no or little chance to return to a carrier after the jump until the battle was won. Satisfied that everything, including the recently installed proton torpedo launchers was operational, he turned his own comms system on, approaching a group of T-65 X-Wings.

“All Air groups, wings, squadrons and flights, report in to fleet fighter command,” he said, and switched channel, “Rebel Alpha wing, Red Squadron, report in.”

A flash of gunmetal grey to his left heralded the first Interdictor cruiser blasting into hyperspace, and Kaan spared them a nod of good-luck as one after another component of the first two task-forces departed into hyperspace, and then turned his attention to listening to the Alliance forces, and finally nodded in satisfaction. “Figher command?” he demanded on the first channel.

“All vessels report ready commander,” came a reply, slightly distorted by static caused by the transition of thousands of ships to hyperspace. Kaan nodded, “All primary wave fighter craft, jump!” He pushed the ships’ hyperdrive activation button, and breathed in heavily as the stars vanished, turning to lines and then the familiar whirling whiteness.


Keelson Ouray sipped a high caffine drink, sitting at the only duty station of his three man observation post at the fringe of Coruscant’s star system, ‘guarding’ the Perlemain Trade Route, and monitoring it for taxation purposes. Before him was a screen displaying the near space, monitoring hyperspace activity, and an array of instruments and communications systems.

He didn’t notice at first, that the screen was beginning to change. It was normally on a black background, and at first he didn’t notice the strange red sheen that appeared on the screen. He instead focussed on the magazine he was reading from a battered data-pad, discussing the recent arrest of dissidents. Finally he glanced up at the screen.

The upper surface was a solid wall of red dots, creeping downwards, reminding him of a computer game he’d once made when he was a child, where a solitary starfighter was slowly swarmed by wave after wave of alien enemies…

He lost moments simply letting his jaw slacken, and then dived towards the communications panel, smacking it desperately, “There’s millions of ships coming down the Route! And they’re all headed straight for me!” he screamed wildly.


“Admiral Motti!” a junior officer called, watched by the Death Star over-bridge’s complement of stormtroopers. He repeated himself, “Admiral Motti!” he cried more stridently. The admiral turned to look at him, “Yes,” he glanced at the man’s rank insignia, “Lieutentant?”

“Sir! An enemy fleet is approaching!”

“What?” he demanded incredulously, “How can they imagine attacking us! This station is now the ultimate power in the universe!”

“Sir, sir,” the lieutenant stammered, flustered, “not an enemy fleet,” he gasped, “the enemy fleet!”

Motti’s eyes widened, “What, all of it?”

“Yes sir, all of it!”

The Admiral’s fingers dug into the armrests of his chair, “Recall all sector, no, over-sector ships! Issue the general recall order! Prepare the Death Star for hyperspace! Someone inform Governor Tarkin! And the Emperor! Quickly!”

He snapped to his feet, and ran over to the communications controllers, seeking to hurry them, but only harrying them as they tried to work implementing his panicked commands. His fingers grasped and pulled at his starched collar, as if he were suddenly chocking in anticipation. The forces around Coruscant were not sufficient to defend the station, he knew.

This depth of unmitigated strategic failure was worse than any he could ever have imagined.


Beyond the Death Star, the Interdictor Kaan had first watched snapped back into real space. Moments later, its compatriots joined it, even as it raised its shields to fend off the first ranging shots from the Imperial Centre defence fleet. Throttling its titanic mass-shadow-generators to full power, it caught hundreds more ships, which hit the edge of the interdiction field and returned suddenly to real-space, forming a curved wall of scores of dagger shaped warships, their prows pointed towards the spherical battle station beyond.

More ships reverted, and caught more, forming a wall tens of thousands of miles across. Their azure engines blazed brightly, and groups of vessels began parting, splitting up to enmesh the titanic battle-station in their web of unreal gravity. The interdictors and their escorts returned fire against the Coruscant ships moving to attack them, ignoring the Death Star’s guns. Another Task Force would solve that problem.

High above the surface of Coruscant, a light second from it, thousands upon thousands of aging Separatist reverted to reality with flickers of pseudomotion and ripples of disturbed space. They began to co-ordinate, Vorlon handler vessels detaching from their hulls, with one another, training their charged turbolaser cannons on the tiny sphere of the Death Star in the distance.


Gaeriel Captison watched the fleet commanders work, she wasn’t quite sure how she had ended up on the Imperator’s flag bridge, but it was a privileged view of history in the making that she knew few people would ever experience. The blue skinned admiral didn’t seem at all anxious, relaxing in his high backed command chair, a leather work of art that he’d had installed from his last ship, the Star Destroyer Vengance.

He didn’t seem to be doing anything but listening. And listen he did, he seemed to be taking in every aspect of his environment like some sort of monitoring ‘droid, absorbing every last facet of the organised chaos around him. Someone called out that there was a minute remaining until reversion, and he reacted, with a simple nod of his head, turning towards a holographic projection table, preparing to receive telemetry on the battle from the ship’s sensors.

“And so, it ends,” said a deep, filtered voice from the wide doorway behind her. Shifting in orange and gold robes. It was familiar, though she couldn’t quite place it. She’d seen something similar aboard the Silent Hunter, but that one had been purple. The starship shuddered a little as it reverted to real-space…

“Do you know how all this will end?” she demanded of the newcomer, which moved out of the way beside her.

“In fire,” it responded, looking at her and then away.


The crew of the Tanataive IV had elected to join the battle, and so Mon-Mothma was deprived of Bail Organa’s company in supervising the bridge of the Rebel Dreadnought class ship New Hope. She didn’t particularly mind though. General Dodonna and some of the other Rebel Strategists were aboard, and doing all the actual work. As with the rest of Task Force Five, the ship was busy bombarding the Coruscant fleet, shredding massive Star Destroyers, Cruisers and Battleships with torrents of fire. For now, the perimeter role was easy. The enemy had broken up to engage task force one, and left itself vulnerable to a force that outnumbered it over a hundred to one.

The clash between Task Force Five and the Couscant Home Defence fleet was over before it had even begun. By the time the Armada’s task force had completed its arrival from hyperspace, the enemy had been totally destroyed, only falling fields of debris remaining as testament to the fact that they had ever existed. The numerical advantage was insignificant next to the effective combat power advantage.

The Rebel crew felt far from insignificant. Instead they felt exultant to finally be able to stare down the guns of their sworn Imperial enemies, and watch in satisfaction as those same enemies were destroyed in direct combat.


Task Force Two had once comprised a large portion of the fighting forces of the InterGalactic Banking Clan, but now, their role was much simpler. Aboard each of the Munificent class destroyers, a droid brain counted down in synchronicity with its compatriots, monitoring the tremendous amounts of energy stored in its capacitors.

The timers marched relentlessly towards the moment that that colossal power would be unleashed twenty four thousand bolts of destruction. Microseconds ticked by, and, mostly ignored by the enemy, the Task Force commenced simultaneous final alignment burns, bringing their weapons to bear with precision upon the centre of mass of the titanic battle station, then leading to their target a little way.

The counters hit zero, and the task force unleashed its volley. Bolts streaked through the void, with green tracers burning brightly as the bolts made contact with the shield, delivering their lethal energy.

In one stroke, the great energy and particle defences of Motti’s ultimate power were overloaded, great gouts of fire blasting from the metal moonlet’s surface. Opportunistic ion-cannon shots from the fifth task force lashed into its surface, and entire sections of the surface-covering city sprawl dimmed as they lost power.


Kaan was pulled forwards in his crash webbing as the TIE was yanked against the Interdiction field. Around him, more ships appeared, hundreds of lesser TIE fighters and dozens of rebel fighters. “Red Leader,” he snapped, throttling his fighter forwards, “on my wing, Red group, form up around me.”

Over the channel, an amazed and awed voice exclaimed, “Look at the size of that thing!”

“Cut the chatter Red Two!” said the X-Wing squadron’s Leader. Kaan issued another instruction, this time to the whole fighter wing, “Accelerate to attack speed!” he said, increasing his own speed and reducing the efficacy of his inertial compensators to feel the acceleration.

“Lock your S-foils in attack position,” instructed the Red Squadron’s leader.

The Death Star loomed large ahead of the fighters, spitting death in all directions, firing wildly at the newly arrived forces, hundreds of thousands of capital starships opening fire in return. Hundreds of millions of turbolasers opened fire, filling the intervening space with lines of stuttering green, red and blue fire.

The fighters weaved their way through the forest of blasts, some falling stray to haphazard bolts that tore through them without stopping, reducing them to expanding clouds of vapour, or vaporising parts and blasting fighters into careening spirals away from the battle.


The population of Coruscant were panicking. Subjected to intermittent orbital bombardment, splattering impotently against their shields. Grand scale screens showed live footage of the tremendous naval clash, thousands of painted battleships in red and blue facing off against the Death Star that had orbited their world for days. The populous were frightened, they’d heard about the attack on Tralus, and Palpatine’s Loyalist propagandists had been careful to ensure that everyone blamed Skywalker’s forces for the atrocity.

So far the Vulture droids launched by the forces suppressing the planet and forcing its shield to remain raised had taken great pains to keep the civilian traffic into and out of the planet’s gravity well corralled away from the battle, forcing them around the planet away from the battle where possible, or out into hyperspace jump points.

The doughnut shaped Trade Federation vessels continued to pummel their enemies with precise, if weak, shots, as the battle progressed. Vulture droids, broadly catamaran shaped automated fighters that had made up the bulk of the Confederacy of Independent Systems’ fighter forces, were famed as inferior combatants, and although each was individually crafted on Charros Four, however, the programming that the long dead Trade Federation had insisted on was deliberately limited in its efficacy.

Thus, although not good enough to face the better human combatants, but their programming was more than enough to deal with the problems posed by herding civilian traffic.


The forces that Admiral Thrawn had set aside in task force one included a large wing of Procurator class Dreadnoughts, older Republican era ships that were still used by many Imperial sector fleets as command ships. Devastated by counter-battery fire from the massive battle station, several of these ships had spiralled away from the battle, either above the projected orbit, or below, to tumble helplessly into Coruscant’s shields.

The damaged ships, many with vast scars and pits in their hulls leaking gasses and liquids into space, released clouds of escape pods and small vessels, banking and pitching wildly as their engines malfunctioned and remaining crews fought valiantly to bring the vessels back under the helm control of their combat-bridge pilots.

As the minutes of the opening of the battle passed, the Procurators fell in increasing numbers, devastated by the fearsome armament of the Death Star. But they would not succeed. Their role in assaulting that titanic fastness was achieved, even with the losses of many lives among the skeleton crews that had manned them.


It seemed like a lifetime, and yet, from the chronometer mounted on the wall of the flag-bridge, Gaeriel could tell that the battle had been joined for a mere fifteen minutes. The room had become stuffy, and she wished its glowing screens replaced with the spacious windows of the Imperator’s main bridge. The views of the carnage beyond the ship were horrific, of course.

Unconsciously, the blasts and beams of battle seemed to be like a tremendous fireworks show, but she could appreciate the death toll from every massive ship that was felled. A Venator exploded into flames on one of the monitors, super dense fuel igniting and trailing from its engines in great gouts of fission, blazing with a retina-searing whiteness. She had felt another such ship to be a huge flying city a few days, or months, she couldn’t quite tell, ago. She could imagine thousands of people perishing in the blazing heat and boiling cold of space.

But what came next was unpredicted. A lance of emerald slashed through the Patriot fleet, immolating the tightly packed ships one after another, high velocity debris setting off secondary explosions. Ship captains panicked and dozens of ships attempted manoeuvres that couldn’t be managed in the scrum of battle, crossing turbolaser fire-patterns and impacting with other vessels. A single shot drove a column of chaos through the attacking fleet.

Gaeriel looked up from the display at the frowning, concentrating faces of the others in the room. They were either bent on their work, or in the case of Thrawn, calm and detached, watching the objective, the Death Star, in holographic miniature, now a blossom of fire but for the firing-disk and the northern pole.

“No, hold fire,” he said as a subordinate demanded permission to attack the firing-disk, “Order heavy ion cannons brought on it, but do not cripple it…”

The scale of the engagement in Coruscant orbit eclipsed the sun’s glow, bringing a green dawn to a quarter of the city-planet below. And even as damaged Patriot vessels beat retreats to the edges of the densely packed assault forces, the first Imperial Reinforcements, sector fleets from nearby, began arriving, fast dreadnoughts like ten mile long daggers dropping out of hyperspace above the fray.

Walking right into another trap devised by the commander of the Patriot forces. Jerked out of hyperspace by the triggering of hard-wired fail safes installed in all hyperdrives, fooled by the mass-shadows of the thousands of interdictor class vessels at work, and even the mass of the super-dense hulls and hypermatter fuels of the Patriot fleet and the Death Star itself – both of them perturbing the city planet’s orbit, temporarily, at least - they were flying directly into an exactingly prepared cross-fire of green bolts, shredding shields – slow to establish after the shock of an wrenched hyperspace transition – and thick armour cladding, the Imperials were savaged by ferocious fire from below them in the gravity well.

Imperial shields were overwhelmed one after another in quick succession, flashes of brilliant light illuminating the battle for split seconds as the shield reactors cooked off, flashing enough energy to sear continents away from the ship before flickering and dying. The punch of kinetic energy from the impacts of thousands of turbolaser bolts on the ventral plating of a single star destroyer was enough to break it into pieces even as it was almost completely melted. Others were blasted into burning frames, exterior armour comparatively intact even though the functional insides of the vessels were destroyed. These hulks drifted, burning for a short time before becoming dark and cold, in some cases, falling towards the battle-station they had come to protect like multi-billion projectiles…

But some of the Imperial ships avoided, it was almost inevitable that they would, the furious fire of their enemies, skirting the battle, and attacking their former comrades, and the blue painted vessels of the antique separatist fleet.


It was of course to part of this fleet that D204-X33-981 belonged. A long name necessary for identification among its billions of siblings, the vulture droid had never had it used by anything but another machine. It was a component of an automated fleet, and even though its precision-obsessed designers would have treated it, like all of its compatriots, as a unique work of devotional art, the vulture droid had not been produced on their world, but on a Trade Federation factory world.

Soaring through the battle, the vulture droid was unable to even count the number of fighters in the void of high orbit, despite its ultra-sophisticated target acquisition systems. Shrinking its field of awareness down rapidly, it was soon able to scan for targets effectively in the spacecraft rich environment. But with the titanic scale of ECM jamming from both sides warping its perceptions, and the sheer staggering number of targets around, it could still only scan reliably within a volume a few hundred meters across.

For a time, it could find nothing – it didn’t help that its allies and enemies used the same fighter designs, but D204-X33-981 was unable to feel that kind of dissatisfaction. It was in the open sky, diffuse micro-particles of debris and dissipate atmosphere below its wings, and its droid brain was exhilarated by this fact alone.

At last, it found a foe, an enemy TIE fighter. The enemy was forced, by the sheer density of ships around it, to duck and weave at a speed that would be unimpressive even for an atmospheric skyhopper. D204-X33-981 let itself feel a brief moment of contempt for the presumably human pilot, its head pivoting in an echo of the motions of disgust of a human – as if space was a place for organic beings! – Flying was for droids, after all.

It flipped itself end over end and burnt its solid fuel at maximum consumption for a second, killing its forward momentum and then accelerating after its foe. The vulture droid snapped its wings open, and let loose one of its missiles, a proton torpedo, the missile snapping futile steering vanes that would have been useful in an atmosphere open automatically, and blasting across the intervening space. The TIE pilot realised it was coming just long enough to begin the first moment of an evasive manoeuvre, and its killer rejoiced as it ploughed through the expanding cloud of luminescent debris. Truly, this was the meaning of its existence.


From the view of Jeris Melief, a young imperial army soldier – she’d only ever joined up to pay for higher education fees – on the concave surface of the Death Star’s prime weapon, protected by a thin space suit, it seemed to be raining. Jeris’ position, sent out with her unit to deter landings in the ‘city sprawl’ that covered the titanic battlestation, was exposed, and she was certainly ‘treated’ to a spectacular view.

The rain was made up of uncountable bolts of incandescent ion-rich beams, slamming into the ground and causing it to erupt into false-lightning arcs thousands of meters wide. She was however, not truly concentrating on the spectacle. Jeris was too busy trying to gain entry to the structure, mashing her gloved fingers against a keypad recessed next to a blast door. She knew, as did the rest of her panicked squad, that when the ion barrage, creeping across the crater-like depression in the moon’s surface, reached them, even though the key systems of the Death Star wouldn’t be harmed, they would be killed, if not (and it was phenomenally unlikely) by the electrical energy released, then by the failure of their life support equipment.

Her weapons and training long forgotten, Jeris screamed in despair as the electronic keypad – already locked – turned a deathly black from the failure of the electronic systems plotting it up. She punched the wall, and was suddenly shocked by the freezing cold in her left hand. Raising the glove to her faceplate, she could see a tear emitting a steady stream of water crystals as the atmosphere in her suit was pulled out into the void. Jeris laughed, and began to cry as she clasped one hand over the tear. What, after all, was the use? Moments later, she fell upwards from the battle station’s surface, already dead from the tissue-destroying effects of multiple capital-scale ion-strikes.


Through a narrow corridor without the fire of the Patriot fleet, hundreds of fighters fell towards the Death Star, its battered sphere filling their vision as they continued to accelerate towards the beleaguered battle-station. “Surface flak has increased by a factor of four. They’re onto us…” commented a rebel Y-wing pilot as the fighter group tore through the intervening space.

In the advanced TIE fighter, Kaan watched as icons depicting entire flights of rebels, some of them obviously rookies, disappeared under turbolaser fire. “All wings, take evasive action. Don’t just sit there,” he said, “This isn’t going to be easy, no matter what the numbers tell you. Stand by for target feed from sensor scans as we approach, take on your assigned targets, then don’t hesitate to take anyone else’s…”

He was cut off by the chime of an alert indicating fresh fighter launches from the Death Star ‘below.’ “No, it’s not going to be any kind of easy,” unfortunately, the enemy fighter commander had proven smart enough to keep enough reserves for this moment. “Enemy fighters launching,” he said, redundantly, “we’re outnumbered two to one.”

“Hah! Only TIEs” one of the rebel pilots replied. Kaan bit back the comment that he was certain he could kick any rebel pilot around the planet in a simple TIE. They were going to need all the morale boost they could get. He toggled to the command frequency, “Strike Alpha Leader to fleet command… Some more suppression fire on those fighters would be… appreciated.”


R2-D2, decorated war-hero of the now destroyed world of Naboo, trundled into the fighter launch bay of the Imperator. It had taken quite a bit of effort to ‘arrange’ a transfer – especially over the incessant complaints of his counterpart – to the star destroyer, but his acquired flair for such things, as well as the inherent enhancements bestowed by the mechanical genius of Anakin Skywalker, ensured that he’d managed to do it.

The bay was almost empty, with only two fighters remaining, one was a bent-winged imperial design, repainted in the republic’s red livery, but still with no place for an astro-droid – even one of his haughty calibre – but the other was a rebel X-wing, so far, unmanned by human or droid. Behind him, his rear sensors detected a squat black R5 droid trundling along, mere meters from entering the bay. Artoo scooted along the polished deck, and plugged into a wall socket, sealing the corridor.

It wasn’t really malice per-se, but Artoo was aware of his own skills. It was obvious that in a mission of this sort, he would be needed – he’d long ago learnt that Anakin Skywalker, and for that matter, his former master, General Kenobi, couldn’t be trusted to do anything right without his help.

As he trundled over to the snub fighter, both of them turned to look at him. Anakin shook his head for a moment, “No, can’t be,” he said, after a moment’s deliberation. Artoo bleeped his disagreement loudly, and Anakin’s attention snapped back. “Artoo?” he asked.

The little droid bobbed forwards, and Anakin’s face broke into a broad, youthful grin of a type that he’d not worn for many decades. “Better than I could have hoped for,” he said, and gestured imperiously to a deck-hand. “Plug him in,” he said, before cambering up the ladder leading to the hatch of his fighter.

The two fighters dropped from the bottom of the Imperator, and into the chaos beyond. When their pilots had last fought together over this world, some had called it the end of the ‘Age of Heroes.’ Now, they were determined to prove such pessimism wrong.


In the dimly lit chamber of the Patriot fleet’s commander, Admiral Thrawn watched the methodical pummelling of the Death Star’s defences. Numerical data that even he couldn’t parse flowed across screens and holograms, depicting the losses and victories of a hundred million starships. “Status of civilian casualties?” he inquired.

“Minimal sir, five hundred vessels approximately have been destroyed in the crossfire, estimated casualties, two hundred thousand. Coruscant shields are holding.”

“Excellent,” he said. It could have been worse, much worse.

He watched with amusement as a squadron of Star Cruisers descended into a massive crater in the primary target’s side. Neatly evading the remaining counter-fire from the surface. “Inventive. Record that unit for commendation,” he said, watching the glowing crater expand as the ships inside it dug down through the thick armour of the battle station without mercy, “but instruct them to hold off on going too far into the structure. We don’t want to disable the main weapon.”

Gaeriel glanced over at the admiral. She wanted to ask why, but was aware that her position was far from official, and that that whatever his motive was, he doubtless knew what he was doing far better than she did.


Kyle Katarn, and dozens of other members of the cream of both Rebel and Patriot assault forces, sat strapped into the uncomfortable acceleration couches of a dropship as it streaked towards the Death Star. It was strange to be back in stormtrooper armour again, but at least he wasn’t subjected to the rigours of the Imperial Military this time… Resulting in various straps on his hips carrying extra weapons and ammunition.

Regardless of all else, he thought as he tightened the stock of a stormtrooper’s E-11 blaster rifle, this would prove to be an interesting battle, provided he survived, anyway. He was too young to know precisely who the short, green alien dressed in simple robes was, and didn’t care to wonder who or what the sinister looking creature, clad in purple and gold, with a single red eye gazing with cycloptic malevolence at the disembarkation ramp, was.


Away from the scrum at the core of the battle, the Munificent class ships of task force two became the victims of opportunistic attack by Imperial ships, more of which arrived second by second. They were powerful vessels when used in the role that the Pratriots had wisely assigned them to, but when flanked by more modern, and all round capable designs like the Tector and Imperator classes, they were outmatched. They began to fall, exploding in flashes that out-shone the rest of the battle – if only for a moment – as their colossal capacitors, already partly recharged, were broken and dumped their tremendous energy reserves as radiation.

Closer to Coruscant, the cordon of ships around the battle, assigned to prevent Imperial Reinforcements assisting the Death Star, or protecting the Emperor, began to have the wheel turn against them too. The Patriot fleet was tremendous, but the Imperial fleet, was even larger. And it had been recalled en masse.

Hundreds of wedge shaped Kauti ships clashed with their counterparts, lashing out with continuous streams of brilliant green tracer bolts. In some cases, the imperial reinforcements smashed into their enemies, billions of tons of starship colliding over the veined cityscape below them, erupting into balls of flame and molten debris.


Governor Tarkin was standing on the command platform of the Death Star’s overbridge, and, much to his dismay, had discovered that he actually had very little to do with the vessel’s operation. But it was nevertheless clear to him that there was no way that the gargantuan battle-station would survive the engagement. It was already clear that if Vader’s forces wished to force a victory, they could have done so by now.

As the reinforcements began to increase in number, there was one obvious option. He looked to one of the dozens of stormtroopers on the command bridge. “Prepare my ship!” he said, urgently, trying to keep a tremor out of his voice.

“Yes sir!” the trooper snapped, and dashed off. Below, mired in the minutiae of attempting to direct the defence, Admiral Motti looked up, pausing to wipe the sweat from his eyes with the sleeve of his uniform, “You plan to evacuate, governor?” he demanded. It was obvious that Tarkin did, and to be entirely fair, he would have done the same thing, had their roles been reversed. But he was expected – and the white armoured troopers would hold him to it – to go down with his ship, or rather, battle station.

Tarkin gave no answer as he, quite literally, deserted his post. “Stop him!” Motti demanded. After all, he was already dead, “He’s attempting to flee in the face of the enemy.”

In moments, the guns of all the stormtroopers were on Tarkin, who merely smiled. “You are,” he said, “forgetting. I am a governor, not a military officer. I am not subject to such regulations. You however, Admiral, are. I would have them shoot you now, but you’re far more useful to me directing the battle.”


Aboard the Imperator, Thrawn widened his faintly-glowing red eyes, as he heard the report of a small shuttle’s call-sign being identified as that of Grand Moff Tarkin, making a break for the surface of the interdiction field. “Excellent, instruct task force five to bring it in,” he said, steepling his fingers in front of his face, and watching the holographic death star, with a grim smile growing on his lips…


Morden finally bulled his way past two of the Overbridge’s guards, “Admiral!” he demanded, “How goes the battle?”

Motti looked over at him, and sighed, bemoaning the poor state of security, but then, most of the garrison had far better things to do, be it damage control or preparing to repel the inevitable boarding. He turned, narrowing his eyes, “Badly,” he replied, walking slowly up the illuminated steps of the crew-pits, “very badly indeed, mister Morden…”

Morden frowned, and took an instinctive step back, “You’ll be glad to know that my associates say that they can bring help…” he trailed off.

“Oh yes, Mister Morden, I’m sure that they can. In fact, I’m certain they would like to do so. Unfortunately, I don’t much trust them any more…And I don’t like being used,” Motti wasn’t exactly a physically imposing man, but his angry demeanour seemed to make up for it in intimidation factor, “and especially not by some aliens who seem to think that blowing up major Imperial systems without any reason is acceptable, don’t try to deny it…” he hissed, stooping a little, adrenaline and testosterone apparently in overdrive, “Guards!”

The stormtroopers snapped to attention, bringing their weapons onto Morden.

“You’ve been using me, you and your friends, from day one. All to promote some agenda which you’ve seen fit to keep me away from.”

Morden drew himself up to his full height, he wasn’t intimidated by this show of force, he knew this admiral far too well to fall for dramatics like this. “And what if we have?” he demanded, “you can either accept our help or die. You’ll do as I tell you.”

“No,” Motti said.

“What do you mean?”

“No, I will do my duty. You might have plenty to blackmail me with, mister Morden, but I am going to die because of today regardless. Even if, and I doubt it, your ‘allies’” Motti’s hand came up, balled into a fist, then he stabbed his forefinger at the other man, “come through, I will be executed for a failure of this magnitude anyway…”

“My associates will make anything you do here cost, Motti, your homeworld, your family, whatever they have to…”

Motti exhaled between gritted teeth, “Petty threats and intimidation don’t cut it any more. Guards, attend to your orders!” he shouted, jerking his hand back into a fist instinctively.

The stormtroopers opened fire, filling the bridge with red blaster bolts.


Kaan allowed himself a half second of relaxation as the last enemy fighters disappeared from his scope, “Very good,” he said to the depleted number of fighter pilots still able to listen, “commence runs on the ground installations. We have five minutes…”

The prototype TIE spun, burning its engines brightly as its inertial compensators strove to bring it about as quickly as possible, and the damaged surface of the moon-sized station filled the cockpit windows. From high above, he could see regions the size of entire cities that had been turned into blackened craters, burning with fire where oxygen and volatiles mixed in vapour, creating fresh fireballs now and then as even the smallest laser bolt passed through them.

“There’s our target,” he said, as the fighters began to approach an armoured shuttle bay, as yet undamaged but for a fire visible inside, “All squadrons, split off and take out those guns…”

Fighters roared past, imperial and rebel designs and he could spot quite a few ‘droid fighters that seemed to have tagged along among their number, spitting green and red bolts down onto the metal desert below. He glanced down at his targeting computer, seeking a gun installation to claim for himself.


Motti had known, or at least, anticipated them, but the creatures around morden were still shocking. One had succumbed to concentrated fire from several troopers, thrashing as it became visible, and the admiral had the impression of dark limbs twitching as something heavy fell to the floor. A moment later, he could see another creature, built like a centaur-formed insect, with black armoured limbs, materialise, with one of its forelimbs inside a stormtrooper’s chest. Its wedge-shaped head turned to Motti, with what seemed to be a score of blazing red pinprick-eyes in it looking straight at him. Every nerve seemed to be aflame, as though he were being burnt alive, before he blacked out completely, and fell to the deck, at the same moment as the impaled stormtrooper

The second creature tore its arm out of its victim with a noise like a boot being wrenched from viscous mud, spiked claws dripping gore and broken pieces of plasteel armour. It jerked back as a blaster bolt hit its head, and reeled at some other, unseen assault for a moment, long enough for the remaining troopers, advancing cautiously to press their advantage of numbers, and let others from across the cavernous bridge join the fray, to destroy it.

A third was already among them though, and some stormtroopers fell from unseen injuries, while its vicious limbs seemed to move with inhuman speed, eviscerating them as if their armour were merely some industrial plastic. It looked down long enough to see a thermal detonator roll between its taloned legs, before the device detonated, immolating it and the remaining troopers nearby.


Ulkesh breezed down the ramp of the dropship as it lowered, his attention once more fully on his immediate surroundings. Sporadic blaster fire impacted on the shield of his encounter suit, and ricocheted off without damage – he had taken the time to upgrade it since his last encounter with imperial ground troops. A nearby stormtrooper, his feet sounding loud as they bounced off the polished deck was preparing to throw a grenade of some sort, pulling it from behind his back.

The Vorlon almost casually caused his grip to fail by applying a vice-like pressure to his wrist, and watched as he dropped the device to the floor. A blast from one of the suit’s many defensive systems sent the assailant flying backwards, into a fallen girder (attached to the systems malfunctioning and causing the bay’s present fire problem).

Soldiers rushed out of the dropship and its sister vessel, guns blazing as they expertly mowed down the defenders. One in particular, seemed to be quite effective in clearing a path by firing heavy explosive projectiles into the corridor attached to the bay, causing great gouts of flames to consume the defenders.


On Coruscant, the jewel-world, so far unharmed by the tragic conflagration going on high above, Miral Elester clutched his ears as he watched the display far above from the roof of a mid-standard nightclub. He couldn’t tell what the noise was, and at first, he thought that perhaps the shield generator nearby, part of the world-spanning array that protected Imperial Centre, was causing the noise, which seemed to chill the very soul – as the screaming sound reached a pitch that caused him to instinctively look for somewhere to hide - but soon, as the view of the sky was obscured by a black shape materialising as if from nowhere, it was clear what was the cause.

He barely had time to scream before a lance of purple fire reached out from the spindly shape above, tearing through the skyscrapers of the world-city before cutting into the shield generator, casually destroying him, and thousands of others.

All across the world, similar events happened, as the alien vessels that had plagued the outer rim, unnoticed by the vast majority of Coruscant’s population, materialised as if from nowhere and struck at key defensive installations, robbing the planet of its protective bubbles, and leaving it vulnerable to the debris raining from above, what had been, mere moments ago, bright flashes on the shields suddenly became mega-tonnes of falling wreckage gouging huge holes in the endless cityscape. Flashes that had been mere twinkles in the sky became almost blinding bursts of light that stunned those who looked into the sky without protection, and blinded those that observed with civilian grade electro-binoculars.


Two fighters, moving wing to wing, almost clipping each other at times, closed on the scarred surface of the death star.

When viewed from afar, they were nothing. A part of a battle that surrounded the planet in a corona of fire and death that could be seen clearly with the naked eye from the far side of the solar system. One would think that two fighters could no more alter the outcome of this incomprehensible assault than a man jumping up and down on the surface could permute the course of a planet.

But that thought would be wrong.

Obi-wan was surprised by the degree to which he had to draw on the force to fly the fighter, but thankfully (and he did indeed offer thanks to the fates of the force) the end of the journey was in sight. The divided strike-foils of his rebel fighter closed, and its astromech bleeped some technicalities obi-wan wasn’t too concerned about. As soon as he was out of the vessel, the better.

The two ships set down next to one another, and Anakin vaulted from the spheroid cockpit with ease undiminished by age, lightsaber in his hands. Obi-wan joined him, and they watched as Yoda casually, leaning on his gnarled stick, ambled over from the lead dropship.

The towering Vorlon turned to face the gathering, and listened as Anakin described his plan. Detached from obi-wan’s X-wing, Artoo connected himself to a socket in the bay’s wall, nestled in a small droid-alcove.


“Task force four reports that the planetary shield network has failed.”

Gaeriel gasped and leaned forwards, but Thrawn seemed unphased, “Inform task force three to begin acting as planetary point defence. Prevent debris impacts, order all light craft to move in as well. Any more information?”

“They report unidentified vessels appearing below the shield grid and attacking the generators sir.”

“Bring me the configuration.”

Gaeriel watched as the golden-brown alien approached the admiral’s chair, and crept over quietly to watch. The holographic death star disappeared, revealing the alien vessels she had become familiar with over the past weeks. Again she gasped, cringing inwardly at her melodrama.

“Ah,” Thrawn said, “you know these ships?” He felt somewhat justified in letting the woman remain in the command centre – her knowledge of the recent attack on Coreillia was worth keeping around.

“Shadows,” the alien said, its voice distorted by some translator system inside its armour.

“Yes,” Gaeriel said at the same moment, “they’re the ones behind the attack on Tralus.”

“Very good,” the admiral said, and Gaeriel’s brow furrowed in concentration, as the admiral pushed a button on the armrest of his chair, “Inform all commands. Contingency plan alpha is now in effect.”


Anakin and Obi-wan shot down the corridors of the Death Star, a whirlwind of blades and death, blue and green bades stabbing out at the few who reacted quickly enough to try and impede them, decapitating a few or more commonly amputating the limbs of victims with surgical precision. With them, Yoda, keeping up through sheer will, ran through doorways that seemed to open of their own accord at the approach of the jedi, and their lost son.

Blazing into a wide area, over a wide pit, they stopped, and Anakin frowned. There was only one lift tube, and that one was quiescent and inactive. Anakin punched the ‘call’ button, and tapped his foot impatiently.

Obi-wan’s weathered face broke into a grin, “Another loose wire,” he said, and Anakin turned to him.

“Honestly, I can’t believe you still think that’s funny. Those long cold desert nights must have simply flown by.”

Obi-Wan chuckled a little, “Twenty years I’ve been saving those up. I’ve got thousands.”

Anakin sighed, “What have I done to deserve this?”

“A list, you ask for?” said Yoda, shuffling his cane a little. Anakin frowned,

“Well, fair point…”

The lift door opened, and two maintenance workers, one of each gender wearing mal-fitting jumpsuits, looked out, then cringed a little. Anakin stepped out of the way, “I hope you don’t mind if we borrow your turbolift, it’s kind of important,” he said as they hurried off.

They stepped into the lift, and Yoda took up a place nearest the door. “Top floor please,” Anakin said, with a light-hearted grin, before breathing in deeply, preparing himself for the impending confrontation, drawing deeply on the force, almost loosing himself completely in its currents.


In human terms, the distance between the death star and the surface of Coruscant was beyond measure, but for a starfighter, it was merely a few moments travel. But navigating the skies of Coruscant at speed was a task for a master pilot, many Jedi would have thought twice before doing so. The outside world was obscured from Kaan’s view by the flames of atmosphere-compression as his ship tore through the upper atmosphere, but his instruments were more than good enough to tell him where the first target was, and it took only a moment’s thought to blast it apart with the furious rush of a photon torpedo from the wing of the vessel.

The disrupted civilian traffic was everywhere, and it took every ounce of his concentration and skill to avoid a catastrophic collision as he skipped up and out of the atmosphere again. One enemy down, but there were plenty more to hunt. He was in his element, he had been born for battle like this, and he would not disappoint the memories of the hundreds of brothers he’d once had, all of whom had died in battle or purge. Another alien vessel was ahead, and the finest hour of himself and of his line had arrived.


On the other side of the battle, the loyalist forces continued their attack, smashing into the roof of the battle, their assaults coming by the use of a fearsome tactic of using micro-scale hyperspace jumps to magnify their firepower – a technique that none had ever anticipated being put into practice outside of naval academy simulations. But they were matched by fire from the Patriot fleet so intense it almost seemed to be solid walls of turbolaser fire. It was common knowledge among the crews of the ‘open circle’ fleet that their objective would be achieved soon, and with this knowledge had come fresh resolve greater even than that they had arrived with.

But above the planets’ pole, beyond the circling ships of the Patriots and the few enemies in that position, a darkness began to emerge in the halo of light, growing in moments to fill a void almost a hundred kilometres across, grand enough to be seen even against the backdrop of the epic battle.

From the cloud, new ships surged, thousands of the spindly black ships, and scores of thousands of fighters and lesser craft. They seemed intent on only one thing, and tore towards the Vorlon ships skulking amidst the metal giants of the hijacked confederate fleet.


The lift’s doors slid open, and the diminutive Jedi leader stepped out onto a catwalk over a wide pit surrounding the lift shaft. On either side of the lift, imperial guards, robed in scarlet, snapped their pikes around to the intruder, filled only with aggression. Yoda waved a hand, and they were smacked backwards into the sides of the lift tube, causing them to crumple inwards reflexively before they hit the floor with heavy thumps.

“Improved, they have not,” he said, shaking his head in mock sadness.

The court of Palpatine had dwindled in recent days, down to a bare minimum of his inner circle that had been in audience with the galactic despot at the beginning of the battle. There were escape pods available, but none dared leave until the tyrant himself did so. He showed no sign of this though, instead just gazing through the windows of his tower, great circular constructs of the highest quality transparisteel. They magnified the battle raging outside, and allowed parts of the attacking fleet to be seen clearly.

From the raised dais of the Emperor, one of several ministers turned, the young, and far too arrogant, sith apprentice, formerly Executor Sedriss, glaring at the intruders, pulling a cylindrical saber hilt from his robes, and holding his thumb against the activation stud as the rest of the courtiers and minions shuffled cautiously out of the way.

Yoda took no notice, walking towards the throne across the bridge. ‘General’ Kenobi followed, weapon drawn like the youth’s, held casually in one hand. Anakin stepped out of the turbolift, and tapped a button inside it with the force, sending it deep into the battle station again.

The fight was, like all those involving such disparities of experience and skill, over quickly. Sedriss leapt the stairs in one bound, his weapon igniting with a flash, coming down towards the diminutive Jedi master like a lightning bolt.

It was blocked by the blue bar of Obi-Wan’s weapon materialising above the diminutive ‘alien’s’ head. Yoda raised a hand, drinking deeply from the force, and lifted his attacker into the air, hurling him against the stairs leading to the Emperor’s throne with the force of a speeding air-car. The lightsaber clattered through the steps, and disappeared into the darkness beyond the platform that housed the Emperor’s throne. With another wave of his hand, Yoda slid the youth’s comatose form to the side.

The courtiers fled, overpriced robes rustling as they ran down the steps. Yoda ran once more, with the same speed beyond his physical form, accompanied by Obi-Wan. The various plenipotentiaries present needed to be captured, or at least, it would prove helpful.

Anakin ignored this, walking slowly across the throne room and watching the battle rage outside. Thousands of starships could be seen, at the far side of the vast Patriot fleet, a new battle was beginning as the ships engaged something dark, malevolent even.

“Emperor Palpatine,” he said as he cleared the last step, grey robes swirling a little, “You will order your forces to stand down immediately, and abdicate your position in my favour.”

The high backed chair began to turn, revealing the wizened face of the Galactic Emperor, broken teeth visible in his mouth as he grinned, “Lord Vader,” he said at last, “I see you’re back.”

Anakin ignored him, “Give the order.”

Slowly, Palpatine rose, drawing himself up with a rustle of aged fabrics, “I will not,” he said, “And you will perish for your impudence, apprentice.” He raised his hands, unleashing a torrent of writhing lightning that filled the air with cackling tendrils of the soul shriving energy. Anakin raised a hand, and the sizzling bolts dovetailed into his palm, before being reflected away, crackling into the ceiling of the tower, where they leapt and bounced from catwalks to the black panels of the ceiling.

They seemed to remain there for an eternity, until at last, the bombardment ceased, lightning bolts flickering out one by one until none remained. “This is the last time I’ll repeat myself; Give the order,” Anakin said, taking a single step forwards.

Palpatine reached into his robes, withdrawing the electrum and ivory, a marvellous piece of work showing much of its creator’s character in its delicately fashioned white gold panelling. He hadn’t been given cause to use such a weapon for many years, but he was more than confident of his skill in doing so. Anakin’s blade too, the first of those he used, emerged from his robes, it was far more functional, with none of the ornamenting that the Emperor proffered.

In the muted light of the throne room, two blades appeared, green and scarlet, angling towards one another. Then their wielders attacked. The clashes of the blades sent crazy shadows across the throne room as they exchanged blows at an astounding rate. The blue blade of Sariss’s lightsaber shot out to remove the Emperor’s legs, but it was blocked as another blade shot from the hilt of Lord Sidious’ weapon.

The Emperor cackled, he had trained with such a double-bladed sabre in his distant youth, and had his first apprentice use one. Drawing on the force, he turned the blades horizontal, listening to the crackle of four lightsabers pressed to their limits as both opponents tried to overcome each other by strength alone.

Palpatine kicked upwards, grunting a little at the restrictive nature of his robes, his slipper-clad foot proving sufficient to, with the dark side flowing through his muscles, send Anakin sailing down the stairs before his throne, before landing on his back, using the momentum of the impact to roll over, blades scoring molten grooves in the floor.

The Emperor bounded down the stairs two at a time, cackling with glee as he bore down on his enemy. Anakin rose with another flip and advanced, the blue blade from his left hand whipping out only to be deflected by the Emperor’s weapon. Palpatine spun the hilt, the second sizzling blade impacting the back of the other weapon, batting it away.

Anakin let it go, rather than absorb the momentum of the Emperor’s strike, and turned against the force, striking at neck level, but not for his enemy’s neck. With a burst of molten droplets, the Emperor’s weapon was severed at the middle, power cell cackling as one of the blades winked out.

Anakin sidestepped as the Emperor snarled, trying to correct his grip on the halved hilt now held with the crackling bar of light at the outside of his hand, but his effort was blocked by another strike, held for a long moment, of Anakin’s blade. Palpatine stared at him for a moment, before snarling and stepping back, extending his free hand.

Sariss’ discarded blade leapt from the floor to Palpatine’s hand, and ignited, lancing forwards and almost impaling Anakin, were he a split second slower in dodging to one side. The entire chamber was lit by a burst of light from outside as an Imperial Dreadnought’s reactor overloaded, and Anakin rolled into the darkness beneath the raised dias of the Emperor’s throne.

Palpatine cackled, spinning his own blade, at the retreat, and stepped back, “The light makes you weak, my foolish apprentice,” he said, after a moment, and Anakin stepped out of the darkness, his deactivated lightsaber held to one side.

“Perhaps,” he said, and raised his free hand, unleashing a torrent of lightning at Palpatine, which the Sith Lord parried with both blades, shepherding the force assault down onto the weapons.

Anakin charged, continuing to call deeply on his hatred for moments to continue the assault, raising his lightsaber and igniting it bringing it down hard from high above. Palpatine caught the blade between his two, glaring up at the taller man in hatred, his grip on his own weapon tightening.

“Defeat me, would you?” he said, preparing to cut Anakin down, “You will pay the price for this lack of vision, Jedi…”

The Emperor’s vision was obscured by a crimson flash, and agonising pain burst from his wrists as Sedriss’s discarded weapon leapt from the concealment of Anakin’s grey robes into his free hand, followed by a smooth movement of searing heat through flesh and bone. He scrabbled to suppress the pain, and staggered back as his severed limbs fell, smoking.

Anakin brought the blades down on either side of his neck, crossing them in front of his chin, and Palpatine was reminded of the threat made weeks ago, which had rarely left his mind since.

Yoda and Obi-Wan struggled to retain control of the milling crowd of boot-lickers at the far side of the tower, most of them attempting to make for the Emperor’s escape pods. After a few moments searching, Obi-Wan found the one he was looking for, the ‘Grand Vizier’ of Palpatine. He pointed his blade at the politician, watching it crackle against a concealed personal-shield before overloading the lesser device, “You,” he said, “are needed. The same with the rest of you, out to the front.” They needed witnesses for such a ‘transfer of power’ to be effected.

The Emperor was puzzled by the delay, “Well?” he demanded, “Do it,” he hissed.

Anakin could feel the pull of the dark side, urging him to take so little a movement and fulfil his passions, allow them to control him. Drawing on that part of himself, that current of the force, had been foolish, it left a link, pushing at his consciousness. The muscles in his wrists tightened in preparation for sudden movement.

He glimpsed a brown robe in the corner of his eye, and let out a deep breath, “I’m not that merciful, Emperor,” he said, after a moment of silence.

The clemency elicited a snarl from the Emperor, “then stop wasting my time!” he snapped, “If you won’t kill me, then get out of my way…” He stepped forwards, neck almost in contact with cool blades of Anakin’s lightsabers.

“Order your forces to stand down, now,” Anakin said, his voice level.

“No,” Sidious spat.

“Then you shall have to be made to…”

The Emperor stepped back against the railings around the central-shaft of the tower, readying himself for the mental assault. He may not be able to physically oppose his enemy, but he was more than a match for him on that plane. There, experience told over all else.

The turbolift door opened, revealing the armoured form of Ulkesh, illuminated from overhead by the lift’s light, his mottled purple encounter suit glistened slightly as his head turned.

Anakin began his assault, and Palpatine hissed, waves of force-power assailing his metal defences. The Sith Lord immersed himself in the force, ready to counter. But a second force entered his perception, unrelated to the force assault, but similar in nature. He could feel his heart-rate trebling, and began to shake slowly. But with little effort to divert against the second attack thanks to the concentration needed to repel the first, he knew he would lose.


Motti looked at Morden, surrounded by white-armoured troopers, and dabbed at the blood flowing from his broken nose, “I’ll deal with him later,” he said, “repor-.”

“Sir!” one of the crewmen shouted, “Sir, the Emperor orders all forces to stand down and transmit surrender signals on all frequencies.

“What?” Motti asked, turning unsteadily.

“We are ordered to surrender, sir.”

“No,” Motti said, “disregard that order,” Motti didn’t particularly want to die, but he didn’t exactly relish the humiliation once these rebels found out what he had done, even under the inflence of the pestilent Morden. But then, he wasn’t brave enough to suffer through being shot in the belly, as one of the troopers seemed intent on doing. His lip quivered and he simply nodded to his subordinates, before falling back into his chair.


The rejoicing in the Patriot fleet was marred by the new battle erupting above Coruscant, and their ships began turning to deal with the assault of the still-expanding cloud. Those closest to it were quickly destroyed by destroyer-sized missiles which, while they lacked the firepower to overload shields, had more than enough momentum to wrench shields from their moorings and plunge through the hulls of the ships beneath. Laser bolts peppered the cloud, and while many emerged from the far side, some appeared to be impacting something solid within it, defining a broadly spherical shape that began to materialise on the tactical display of the Imperator.

Gaeriel watched, and turned to look at the Vorlon beside her. She’d seen a creature like this before, and in her mind, connections were being forged. She turned to the Vorlon, “You know something about these attackers, don’t you… This has all been about them for you, hasn’t it?”

A column of power, vaporising destroyers and cruisers, and continuing on past them again scarred the battle. The purple-green beam smashed into the surface of the planet, destroying thousands of buildings and sending out shockwaves of tremendous power causing the buildings to fall in concentric rings around the impact-site.

Admiral Thrawn watched with a slight frown as the only indicator of his emotions. “Our weapons aren’t affecting it, we read some kind of shield in there.”

“We have to do something,” someone said.

“Actually,” Thrawn said, “we don’t. Give me imperial priority channel one.

“Admiral Motti, if you would be so kind, I’m sure you know what to do with these coordinates…”


Motti burst out laughing as a point inside the cloud, where the beam terminated, accompanied the alien’s voice. The Death Star’s powerful computer banks were already computing the probable velocities of debris from the structure inside. An excellent opportunity to gain redemption in the political minds of whoever became the new power had presented itself.

“Certainly,” he said, turning to the officers controlling the superlaser, “Destroy that thing!” he snapped.

Morden yelled something, and Motti turned, “Oh yes,” he said, listening to an unseen technician warn ‘commence primary ignition.’ The battered Death Star’s lights dimmed, “put him,” the admiral pointed at Morden, “out an airlock.”

He smiled grimly as his manipulator was dragged away by two stormtroopers. Normally he would have kept Morden for interrogation, but interrogating him would lead to disclosure of things he didn’t want known, and he could always put the order down to stress, later.

The screen lit up with a view of the target as the green beam of the superlaser smashed into it. In a moment, the obscuring cloud was blasted apart, revealing a complex lattice structure surrounding a spindly sphere, or at least, what had been one moments before the superlaser had eviscerated its core, sending a pair of planar shockwaves out from the site of impact.


[Apologies for the interruption. Annoying word limit. Another post incoming.]

[NecronLord]

This time, the rejoicing at the victory was profound, and the remaining fleets around Coruscant turned their attentions onto the shadow ships, chasing them down through the debris of tens of thousands of ships. Aboard the Imperator Kosh found himself being accused of something that was worryingly close to the truth.

“You’ve set up this entire war just to destroy these enemies of yours,” Gaeriel said, “and they’re doing it because their agenda is to try and disrupt galactic civilisation as much as possible. You want to take it over, don’t you?” she demanded, “And put your puppet into power over the Galactic Empire…

“And, it’s not the first time you’ve done it, is it? I’ve often wondered about the regularity of galactic history – it’s a facet of the religion on my world, no less. Every thousand years or so, with varying degrees of success, someone starts stirring things up. Right back to the Great War a thousand generations ago…”

Kosh pointedly ignored her, watching the tactical displays, and feeling the Vorlon ships engaging their enemies. Thrawn turned to face the alien, “All ships,” he said into the communications system, “Begin disengagement, and move to geo-stationary orbit.”

“Sir,” the sensor-coordinator said, “Confederacy ships are locking onto us.”

“Ignore it,” Thrawn said, at last. “It’s time for you to take your war elsewhere you know. You won’t manage to manipulate any ruler of this galaxy for long enough to make any real difference, and in the end, you’ll find that all you’ll manage to do is cause a war so disastrous that it will result in your destruction. You clearly don’t have the resources to fight such a war, or your own ships would have played a larger part in this battle, and your enemies wouldn’t have needed to steal an Imperial weapon. If you continue this, you will be destroyed.”

Kosh turned, “You do not control the galaxy yet,” he said, voice less distorted than usual, eyepiece shrinking to a dot.

“Somehow I doubt your comrades will destroy this ship while you’re on it,” Thrawn said, “and I think you’ll find that everyone did just hear what I said. That was all sent priority one,” he smirked a little, “The entire fleet has heard everything we have said. Soon, the entire galaxy will know.

“Your choices are simple, both of you,” he added, certain that the attackers of Coruscant were listening. “You can leave, or be destroyed. In the end, the galaxy will want blood for this attack on Coruscant, and those who’ve provoked it. You may have been useful in the past, but whatever your agenda is, it’s time for you to realise that the galaxy will no longer dance to your tune.”

The Vorlon was silent, for a long moment, and the fire outside trailed off, as if it were communing with its comrades somehow. “You need guidance,” it said.

“No,” Gaeriel snapped, breathing heavily, “Maybe, at some time in the past, that was true, but no more. You were helpful in winning this war, but ultimately, you won’t control the galaxy any more. And those things, out there, will eventually be hunted down and destroyed. But not by you. By us.

“We will not be controlled by anyone but ourselves. No Emperor or hidden overlord. Look at how many people have already defected to that cause. It’s a cause that will only grow. You can either try to destroy everything, and presumably fail and be destroyed yourselves, or you can leave us now. Those are your choices, open fire, or leave.”

The Vorlon flattened the nozzles of its suit, ‘exhaling’ deeply. It turned, robes swirling, and glided over to the heavy doors of the flag-bridge. At the doorway it looked back, “The tree that stretches out without roots falls in the wind,” it said, its iris expanding again, “That which grows deep, survives the coming storm…”

The doors closed slowly as the creature left. “Confederate vessels dropping target locks sir,” the sensor coordinator said, “Shall we target them?”

Thrawn turned, “No, let them go, and clear our ‘guest’ for departure.”

“Enemy vessels are disappearing from sensors sir,” he added.

“What did he just tell us?” a lieutenant asked.

“I think he was saying that we should be careful not to become complacent,” Gaeriel answered, “good advice.”

“Indeed,” Thrawn said, “All craft, commence damage limitation options for Coruscant, we still have plenty of work to do…”


Months later, in the council chamber of the still un-repaired Jedi Temple, Obi-Wan looked out over the endless city of Coruscant. Construction ‘droids hovered in the distance, still working on repairing the damage to the great city. The battle above, despite the best efforts of everyone involved on the Republican side, and even the Imperials, had still claimed millions of innocent lives below, and caused quadrillions of credits of property damage. Subsequent attacks by other factions, though they had each been crushed, hadn’t been kind to the city either.

In the distance, the senate building, surrounded by thousands of scarlet-bordered banners, showing the heraldry of each sector of the Galactic Republic, those that had not seceded into warlordism and imperial resurgence, at any rate, could still be seen. The first day of the re-elected senate looked like it would be interesting, to say the least. Although the dictatorial powers of the Emperor had been passed from Anakin Skywalker, whose present location as a prisoner of the Republic, along with that of Palpatine, was a closely guarded secret, to an interim Dictatorial Council, the process of democracy was taking root once again.

Of course, that came with its down side. Even with a triumphant propaganda campaign and a hectic struggle to find candidates for every system, the Alliance for the Restoration of the Republic, now a purely political body – one that had great fun trying to give its former flagship back to the museum they’d stolen her from, they’d eventually persuaded the museum not to demand compensation by pointing out that they’d increased the New Hope’s historical significance greatly.

Still, counter-republican forces existed, and though the new Republic, officially known as the Second Galactic Republic, had worked to detain the most criminal of Palpatine’s lieutenants, many remained in positions of power. With transition of ruling power to the Senate once more (which had, thankfully, an Alliance majority), one could say that the Republic was truly being reborn.

Obi-Wan was, however, most interested in who would be elected to the new ‘executive’ branch of the Republic’s government. Many claimed that the insularity of the senate, and its ability to decide its own leaders had been a cause of the swiftness of Palpatine’s rise to power. Obi-Wan was unsure of this, but he felt, or rather, the force told him, assured that everything was bound to turn out well enough.

“Return here, we should not,” Yoda said at last, from his chair behind the other Jedi master. Obi-Wan agreed, the Jedi Order was not popular on Coruscant, the propaganda of the Palpatine Regime had seen to that, and a single major planetary base had proven alarmingly vulnerable to attack.

“Yes,” Obi-Wan said, “I suppose it is time for us to go,” he looked again at the construction droids. Like them, Obi-Wan and Yoda had much rebuilding work to do. “Where to?” he asked, at last.

“Tatooine,” Yoda said, ambling out of his chair, “and then, wherever the force leads us…”

[Chris OFarrell]

Wow.

Um....wow.
Seriously, that was impressive to say the least.

[NecronLord]

Wow.

Um....wow.
Seriously, that was impressive to say the least.

Thanks!

Personally, I thought the 'getting rid of the first ones' bit was forced, but I didn't want to go back and rework it, given how overdue this was.

[Crazedwraith]

*brain explodes*

Wow, a plan that actually worked for a change.

[NecronLord]

Wow, a plan that actually worked for a change.

Just wait til you see the Second Republic timeline thing I'm doing as an appendix.

Pretty much every 'crisis' the NR ever had is solved by 'Second Republic crushes $threat with overwhelming force.' EDIT: It's my reaction to the endless 'New Republic hasn't got enough ships' brainbug.

[Arrow]

Sweet. Finally a real space battle, and not the paultry excuse for a space battle at the end of the New Jedi Order series.

What happened to Leia and Mara?

[phongn]

Very nice, though I do agree, getting rid of the FOs was a bit forced.

[Spice Runner]

Wow, I've seen a lot of those alt universe fics where Vader turns back to Anakin, but this is seriously the best one out of all them.

[NecronLord]

What happened to Leia

She spent the battle with Bail aboard the Tantaive IV. I was going to include her, but she's the last person with any Jedi training, and Obi-Wan, Anakin, and Yoda aren't dumb enough to put all their eggs in one basket. Too much.

and Mara?

She becomes a galactic plutocrat by putting the bacta cartels out of business after ransacking Vorlon Prime for its medical technology. Well, okay, maybe not.

During the battle, she was probably in either a different part of the Imperator or aboard one of the Confederate ships. Most likely the former.