Star Wars: Operations/Chapter 3

Star Wars: Operations

Chapter 3

RESIDENTIAL ZONE 88-IB, SUERTH BIOCHEMICALS WAREHOUSE 7184-C CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

Thirty minutes after the conclusion of the Chief-of-State, Colonel Burseg reflected that the odds were rather lopsided. The intermingled wreckage of decimated GAG landers and droid liftships had been cleared from the top floor of the apartment complex, but beneath the landing pad, the warehouse was still a tangle of blaster bolts and felled organics and droids.

After hundreds of GAG specialists and guards had fallen under the fusillade of proton grenades beneath, a GAG officer had been able to snap something along the lines of “under attack” off to Burseg, who had been coordinating the perimeter on the landing pad, when several liftships had fell upon the GAG forces on the rooftop. A slender spike of ceramic had driven itself into the base of his neck, rendering his unconscious while hundreds of GAG soldiers fell before a semi-intelligent GAG officer called in the Army for air and ground support.

Strafing scramjets had eliminated most of the liftships, and further DD-45 Deterrent-class landers from the Army were assisting the tattered GAG Field Ops remnants in securing the warehouse. A medic had found Burseg laying facedown on the pad, and revived him, bringing him back from the comforting embrace of unconsciousness into the ragged hell that was the TAC situation.

He stood by one of the communications posts established on the landing pad, listening to the tactical chatter as the Army officers directed their subordinates. A futile cause. Perhaps three hundred fifty droids had been destroyed in total, at the expenses of far upwards of seven hundred Galactic Alliance lives. It was just that these HK-model Mandalorian war droids were far superiorly armed and armored: grenade launchers for long-range, suppressive, and cleaning-out fire, and blasters for close quarters combat.

The CP was rather like a flower, with himself the stigma. The outwardly radiating computer panels and COM transceivers were like pedals, with a mess of feeds plugged into the tactical headset he’d donned. “Green Six sweeping the far corridor of the second floor...all clear. Seven, Eight, Nine, let’s move.”

Next followed a panicky cry for reinforcements from Red Two, and then a static-drenched directive from one of the GAG tactical coordinators to give fire support for the ailing Army group. A repeating melody of inharmonious blaster rifle chatterings, off-tone sounds from missed blasts, screams, melding together in a stream...

“Roger that, Control Two. Flushing out with EMP grenades...priming, setting...get clear!”

Muffled detonations, flurries of heated fire. “Repeat, the cross-junction of corridors B and 6 on the second floor is secure, along with the surrounding rooms.” A series of indicators on one of the displays morphed light green. “Most of the hostiles in our quadrant have been cleared out. Over and out.”

Burseg gave the traditional thumbs-up accolade to the nearby lieutenant that had coordinated the assault, and then donned a light flak jacket and hefted a blaster rifle. The lieutenant’s eyebrows quirked, and then he lowered the mike, depressed a tab, and asked, “Sir?”

“Like that Army doughboy said, it’s pretty clear down there. Inform Blue Lead that I’m coming down to meet him at his position. They’d better not shoot me.”

Control Two frowned, the motion greatly amplified by the combat stress and looking rather comical for all intents and purposes. “With all due respect, Colonel, we’ve just gotten a foothold on the second floor and have most of it to go as well as the first floor...”

Colonel Burseg waved him away, and turned to the black-suited GAG commando standing uneasily nearby, on guard duty for the lander offloading zone. “Sergeant, reform your team on me. We’re going in.”

The trooper merely nodded, for he was a GAG Special Tactical Assault Reconnaissance (STAR) trooper - the rather innocent acronym betrayed their true dual brutality and finesse in combat. The STAR Force was delegated for the most extreme of enemy encounters. Heavily armed, armored, yet agile and tactical despite their bulk, each 5-man STAR team was rumored to be able to assault and defeat a full dozen enemy soldiers. Rumor, no. It was fact. Burseg had seen it with his own eyes, and would once again.

The STAR Sergeant waved to his subordinates, the hand signals blatantly clear enough to his compatriots to relay the Colonel’s command. They sealed the last of their suit pressure seals (temporarily left disengaged to drain out the heat while not under active combat conditions), and without bravado-charged shouts of military affirmatives, followed Burseg down the descending stairwell.

MILITARY COMMAND CENTER “SITE-H” CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

The Kuat ambassador to the Galactic Alliance was a stoic male human, clad in a nondescript business formal suit. Traditional red/blue striped tie, alternating shades of gray suit and pants, the works. Within the Situation Room of Site-H were the Chief-of-State, the Secretary of State, and a dozen armed troopers of Homeland Security and assigned to defend high-ranking GA government officials. Omas and Taraan fit that profile rather well.

The ambassador gave an unnecessary bow. “Sire Chief, Mister Secretary, an honor.”

Cal contemptuously refused to reciprocate that gesture, not even offering the man a seat. “Well, Mr., ah, Calving, perhaps you’d like to explain why you’ve held four Jedi Knights hostage aboard a Corellian starship?”

Ambassador Calving remained unfazed even before the most influential and titanic man of the Galaxy, so resolute in his cause and faith. “With all due respect, Sire Chief, we were compelled to arrest them when they were found conducting acts of espionage against the Kuat government. Furthermore, they are not hostages. They are being treated with all proper respect in accordance to the relevant sections of the Corellian Accords, and we of Kuat are fully ready to return them back to the Galactic Alliance.”

Taraan was the one that raised the blood pressure next, leaning forward and saying icily, “Well, then, with all due respect, Mr. Ambassador, you’d understand that the Galactic Alliance would be compelled to rescue its Jedi Knights.”

Calving stiffened, beginning to relinquish the pretense of formality and respect. “We’re ready to give them back, Mister Secretary. Make no mistake about what we’re doing. It’s just-”

Cal Omas held up a hand, sidling from side to side in his Sullustian leather-backed chair and twirling a crystal tumbler in his right hand. “The mistake’s not on our side, Calving. The public knows you’ve taken Jedi hostage. We’ll give you a chance to save face and get yourself outta that place.”

The ambassador shook his head. “They’re not hostages, sire. They’re-”

Another interruption from Taraan. “Kuat is ready to conditionally return those Jedi, not just without any strings attached. You’ll return them at a time and place of our choosing by nightfall, or you’re looking at a Declaration of War from the Senate, Ambassador.”

The air chilled as the ambassador readjusted his gold-framed glasses and his demeanor darkened like a falling star upon its child planet. Calving drummed his fingers on the edge of the table before him. “If that is the will of the Senate, then it is. However, be warned that Kuat will defend herself from any aggressive...”

Cal Omas snapped this avenue as a bountiful opportunity, raging with false fury, “You wanna play hardball, Mr. Ambassador? Huh? It’s a game for two, you know.”

Calving internally frowned, noticing the gracefulness of that power play. It was actually the Chief-of-State’s lackey that had begun the aggressive moves. Ah, the number of mindless automatons that Omas has.

His calmness was utterly shattered as Cal Omas made a motion to his guards. “Take Mr. Calving under arrest under suspicions of...treason against the High State.”

The educated bureaucrat was physically incapable, for his duty wasn’t a weightlifter, for an elegant dueler in the realm of slick words, unvoiced opinions, but all that intellectual talent went down the drain as a guard cuffed him across the face, and then a second found his wrists.

The guard captain snarled, spittle flying for intimidating effect, “Take him to Interrogation Two and prep it for a Level V session!”

As the retinue of GAG soldiers escorted the ambassador from the room, leaving Omas, Taraan, and the captain behind, Taraan said, amused, “I though you agreed with me to use him to stall.”

Omas shrugged. “Changed my mind”, he said, and then turned to the captain. “Nice work, Captain. Get whatever you can, and then some more. Whatever you have, pass it on to Intel ASAP.”

The bald-shaven Bonadan native attentively saluted. “Yes sir!”

GALACTIC ALLIANCE COMMUNICATIONS INTERCEPT, LIMA-BRAVO-6184 RESTRICTED CLEARANCE

Galactic Alliance Counterintelligence Directorate Section IV

START TRANSMISSION: //

TO: Unsecured HoloNet transceiver, Coruscant FROM: Unidentified HoloNet COMSAT, Bothanwui orbit

SENDER: “I’ve secured the final monetary codes for you. Three billion credits - a third paid a week in advance, a third a day before, and the last third right afterwards.”

RECIEVER: “All very good, but I need...confirmation that the funds are in place first.”

SENDER: “Fair enough. Log onto any HFRC news stream low-level terminal as user 718.8192.351, hold the CTRL button for three seconds, and then you’ll hear a steady beeping. On the fifth beep, enter the phrase ‘ROYALE’, and then you’ll see the funds we’ve authorized for a timed payment from our intermediate friend.”



RECEIVER: “It’s all there. I must say I’m surprised.”

SENDER: “Just do your job, and we’ll keep up our part of the bargain.”

RECEIVER: “You hired me precisely because of my track record. I haven’t come all this way to make a blunder for any...trusted client.”

SENDER: “Be sure to purge the server cache of the terminal you’re using.”

END TRANSMISSION: //

IMPERIAL-CLASS STAR DESTROYER MON MOTHMA 63 LIGHT-YEARS FROM KUAT SYSTEM, DEEP SPACE

The unnerving tingle of blaster bolts striking the Star Destroyer’s ray shields had become rather pestering, declared Commodore Darklighter as he strode from the primary bridge turbolift to his standard command chair in the center of the Mon Mothma’s command deck.

Officers snapped off precise salutes, but Gavin merely amiably nodded, and said, “At ease”, from which his crew gathered that his little mood was over.

After half an hour of intensive running warfare between Taskforce Green Three and the Harakeen group, the Galactic Alliance strategy was now blatantly obvious. When a Star Destroyer’s shields were coming close to being downed, it would maneuver behind the two other Star Destroyers, which would shield it. This triangular formation had been like the clone trooper Geonosis Square in the fateful first battle of the Clone Wars - unbreachable, and maximizing both offensive and defensive assets.

The Laryn Kre’fey and the Peacemaker had sustained light to moderate damage across their durasteel hulls, and because of that, recently, the triangle had to be inverted so that the Mon Mothma solely took point, and that maneuver had given the enemy nice firing shots for several minutes, bleeding the Mon Mothma’s shields even further.

However, the enemy had its own advantage. While there was only the Harakeen and four Tartan-class patrol cruisers remaining, they took advantage of the hanging, gutted hull of the former Interdictor Cruiser Rapacious, using it as a temporary bastion to recharge their shields.

Gavin Darklighter turned once again to his Starfighter Coordinator Officer. “You’re sure that those patrol cruisers can’t take on our E-wings and XJ3-wings?”

The Verpine emphatically nodded and buzzed, his translator vocalizing the Basic translation: “Yes, Commodore. Those Tartan cannons are essentially four decades old and our starfighters are up-to-date!”

The commodore waved at the Verpine Lieutenant. “Very well. Since the Lancer frigates have been just cleared, you have permission to launch the fighter squadrons. Hold the lighter birds pretty far out, but they are under no circumstances to launch an attack. Keep the bombers with us at home.”

“Yes sir!”

216 - 18 starfighter squadrons - of Series IV E-wings, XJ3-wings, and K-wings began streaming off of their resident Star Destroyers in the orderly lockstep that pilots went to great pains to perfect (carrier takeoffs were the second highest noncombat source of casualties for pilots, that is, besides carrier landings).

The Harakeen shifted behind the Rapacious, taking potshots with its turbolasers at the launching starfighters. The three Galactic Alliance Star Destroyers returned the heavy salvo, and as turbolaser and ion cannon bolts withered the unshielded hull of that Kuati Star Destroyer, its interceptor screen reformed, firming up that damaged hull section. The Harakeen was suspended there for a moment, scattering a last handful of energy bolts to discourage any of the launching starfighters from pursuing it, and then doggedly taking cover behind the Rapacious again, along with its interceptor screen.

Commodore Darklighter was conducive for giving the Harakeen its sheltered enclave for now, for it decelerated the battle, making it more a duel of elegance and tactics rather than brute force, one that the former Rogue Squadron commander was assured that he would prevail in. If it had been a brute force battle all long, the statistics said that the Galactic Alliance would win - but at the expense of two of the Star Destroyers.

The COM Officer almost offhandedly, “Transmission from the Pax Galactica.”

Gavin tapped the communications control on the arm of his leather-soled command chair. “Commodore Darklighter here, Admiral.”

Nek Bwu’atu glanced at something off-screen disapprovingly: probably the TAC display of Taskforce Green Three’s battle. “Taking a bit long there to sweep up, Commodore. Just end it. We’ve received a priority command from FLEETCOM on Coruscant. All ships of Battle Group Green are to rendezvous with Blue at our station. Do you copy?”

The commodore wistfully examined the aligning rows of leading E-wing interceptors moving to begin their elegant dance of metal, fire, and death with the Kuat starships lurking behind the Rapacious, and then turned to Bwu’atu. “Yes, sir, but the enemy is entrenched behind the Interdictor’s remains and it will take time to clear the-”

Nek’s eyebrows showed a slight tick as he waved, “Commodore, call off the Laryn Kre’fey and the Peacemaker and order them to the rendezvous point immediately. Recall all starfighters.”

This verged on tactical insanity. The commodore feared not the Fleet Admiral’s diatribe if one of his Star Destroyer commanders refused a direct order, and for the sake of the lives of his crew, protested, “Sir, with only the Mon Mothma versus five Kuati ships, even with exceptionally superior tactics, at best, the Mon Mothma will escape critically damaged...”

Bwu’atu scoffed, and snarled, “Tactical Officer?”

The lieutenant halted in his conversation with one of the starfighter squadron commanders, and turned. “Sir!”

The Bothan Admiral turned his gaze around to the commodore. “Darklighter, unless you carry out those orders, you’ll find yourself in the brig facing charges of military disobedience and your Tactical Officer in your chair. Do it.”

Gavin took a sharp intake of breath, and allowing it to slip by his teeth as he exhaled the carbon dioxide, clenching the arms of his command chair with his fingernails like a predator extorting a prey for blood and wringing a rag for water.

Bwu’atu did not relent. “Commodore, this tactical withdrawal will happen whether you want it or not. Would you think that a Galactic Alliance Fleet Admiral wants to maul one of his best Star Destroyers?”

The overture to Gavin’s ego was rather blatant, but he succumbed to Bwu’atu, for the man who defeated the Thrawn simulator every time could never be proved wrong in the realm of starship tactics. “Yes sir.”

He turned to his subordinates. “Do as the Admiral commands.”

RESIDENTIAL ZONE 88-IB, SUERTH BIOCHEMICALS WAREHOUSE 7184-C CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

The light tap of metal boots swiftly running across metal sounded as Colonel Burseg and his STAR team advanced towards Blue Lead’s unit’s position. The Army lieutenant there had been preparing a joyous sight to greet his commanding officer. “Sir! Captain Oshan, Army, Blue Leader. Pleased to meet you, sir.”

Burseg nodded slightly, acknowledging the E-WEB turrets set up to cover all avenues of approach and the cluster of Army soldiers. “Very good, Captain. What’s the status of the teams you’ve dispatched?”

The Zabrak paused for a moment, a chill setting upon him as he observed the five armored STAR troopers, and then replied, “They’re encountering heavy resistance. I also have confirmation that Red Company’s been able to gain a small foothold on the first floor, and are clearing that out. Blue and Green are still duking it out for this floor. Homeland Security has also graciously loaned us some scramjets for the top cover, I’ve heard.”

“Correct. Now, let’s move out. What’s your farthest team?”

Oshan waved at a corridor. “Down this way, sir. I’ll send squads ahead of us to make the location at least marginally secure.”

IMPERIAL-CLASS STAR DESTROYER MON MOTHMA 63 LIGHT-YEARS FROM KUAT SYSTEM, DEEP SPACE

For a moment, the Laryn Kre’fey and the Peacemaker appeared to be suspended in nullifying abeyance, but then they leapt with such velocity away from the eye that the rangefinder immediately peaked: the two Star Destroyers were in the embrace of hyperspace, and their previous stillness was merely an optical illusion caused by the transdimensional properties of hyperspace jumps.

As the last of the Mon Mothma’s XJ3-wings and E-wings tucked themselves into the grand primary hangar bay of the Star Destroyer, the five remaining Kuat ships drew even closer to each other, suspecting a ruse of some sort, for two Galactic Alliance Star Destroyers would never call off the chase in a battle they were winning without being implicated in some more insidious scheme.

After Bwu’atu glanced at a datapad, the HoloNet transmission from both of the recently departed Star Destroyers that they were both outbound and would arrive within the next two hours at the rendezvous point, he looked up again at Commodore Darklighter. “Are you still holding the interdiction field?”

Gavin replied, “Yes sir”, his skeletal muscles rigid in their consistency from ordering away both of his flagship’s escorts. Logic or not, his intuition rebelled against his decision to listen to the Bothan.

The Fleet Admiral mused for a moment, and then commanded, “Cut the power to the gravity well generators by sixty percent, Commodore, but still maintain the interdiction field at two-fifths power.”

Gavin relayed the commands to the System Operations Lieutenant, who gave verbal confirmation as the deed was done. The OPS Officer, however, felt inclined to warn, “Field radius decrease by twenty-nine percent, Commodore.”

Nek Bwu’atu ran a series of abbreviated mental calculations and guesswork in his head, and snarled, “Decrease power appropriately so that field radius is at seven percent.”

The commodore nodded at the OPS Officer, and after a heartbeat, turned expectedly towards the flickering 3D hologram of the Fleet Admiral, with some perverted internal desire to learn of the tactics master’s ploy. “Done, Admiral.”

Now, Bwu’atu gave that toothy smile that was the penchant of the Bothan race. “Reverse the polarity of the graviton coils of the gravity well generators at the current power level feeding the coils.”

The bridge had then silenced sufficiently for the OPS Lieutenant to hear the words himself, at which he began consulting with his technical staff regarding the mechanics of such a stratagem. This atmosphere, however, was also conducive for Bwu’atu to hear the light chatter as well, when which he demanded, “Such an operation is rudimentary. Positive polarity means gravitons which interdicts. Flip the switch: negative polarity means antigravitons which doesn’t interdict but repulses.”

Obviously, things were grossly simplified, as this could not be done by “flipping a switch”, but such a stimuli drove the OPS Officer into action, and he immediately assumed an air of authority, barking for lackeys to carry out his bidding.

Fifty seconds and a brief call to Engineering downstairs later, the OPS Officer called, “Admiral, Commodore, depolarization is on standby”, and without asking for further confirmation, declared, “Commence depolarization.”

Static electricity rustled across the electronics like phantasms, and hair fibers rose into the air, kept there by the invisible hand controlling them, as a high-pitched whine grew from the midsection of the ship like the rising chorus of a defibrillator...except there was no climatic word like “Clear!” to signify the event.

A tidal wave of repulsive energy from the antigraviton tides propogated outwards from the Mon Mothma at the speed of light - three hundred million kilometers per second, lifting the unpowered, charred remnants of the Rapacious without hesitation and then flinging it backwards into the tight phalanx of ships behind it... Detonations flared against the night, and shields, metal, and flesh crumpled and exploded. Several threat indicators were still reading positive, but those ships were either moderately or severely damaged. As the Mon Mothma lurched to intercept the last of the Kuati ships and the OPS Officer swore something about gravity coil replacements, Commodore Darklighter turned appraisingly towards the Fleet Admiral.

“Touché, sir.”

A curt nod with a repressed slightly smug smile, and then a command: “When you’re done, Commodore, rejoin us at Battle Group Blue’s position. We will be expecting you. Bwu’atu out.”

RESIDENTIAL ZONE 88-IB, SUERTH BIOCHEMICALS WAREHOUSE 7184-C CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

Sandwiched between lines of Army troopers and STAR operatives, the blaster bolts striking armor unmercifully and burning down file after file of Galactic Alliance soldiers, Colonel Burseg ran through his mind that leading the assault might have been a fatal misstep. As he squeezed off shots with his blaster, the bolts one of hundreds that similarly hit Mandalorian war droid armor, and a Galactic Alliance Army soldier folded to his knees before the Colonel, lanced from a hard chest shot, another series of volleys rang out.

The entrance of elements of the 2nd Homeland STAR Regiment were heralded by the steady electrical thrumming of rotary chainguns. Incandescent blaster bolts scythed through the rising smoke of diversionary smoke grenades, droids fell, explosions sounded.

To the credit of the Army grunts, there was little room to maneuver, and their expertise dealt in standard non-urban combat, not this gore, with explosive surprises behind every corner. As the last of the Army squad before him toppled like puppets with severed strings, the blaster bolts sending superheated sprays of blood and other less recognizable fluids into the air, the fresh perfume of battle, Burseg and his STAR team advanced.

Fortunately, the droid resistance had been mostly broken at the point, and for that matter, throughout 7184-C. It was of sheer luck that the last droid standing triggered a flurry of blaster bolts that severely wounded a STAR medical corpsman, flash-vaporizing the epithelial layers and gnawing at the sternum, and that was the last as the rest of the GA troops vengefully fell on the war droid.

Yet, the battle was not done. Could not be done. As an Army field paramedic navigated his way to the fallen STAR trooper and a second STAR trooper attended to his comrade, more of the black-suited and helmeted commandoes dispersed into the nearby rooms alongside Army troopers. The engagement would not be officially finished until each room was double-swept for droids or explosive devices.

As a steady continuity of “clear” reports came through OPCOM, the top-side operations COM controller overlaid over the reports, “I believe that all teams have sounded that the area is secure. We’ll bring in Demolitions for the explosives sweep, but we need to pull out the wounded. The medical landers are already topside and field surgical units have been set up. Meanwhile, all operational commands sound off.”

As the Army captains: Red, Blue, and Green Leaders, affirmed their alive status, Burseg wearily intoned, swaying for his balance like an unweighted pendulum and crashing against the wall, “Colonel Burseg here, Control.”

“Copy that, sir. Are you wounded?”

His senses dulled for a moment as he detached momentarily from reality, the horrors of combat: withered limbs, shredded bodies, filled his senses, and then he contemplated how Control could even think he was wounded compared to those honored ones that had fallen in combat. Was it just the standard after-mission question to your C.O. to kiss-ass?

Then he observed PERSBIO and his biosigns. Blood pressure and core body temperature elevated from high epinephrine and other catchecolamines. Standard adrenal post-mission cocktail as you see the dead ones around you and feel gratitude to your god for blessing you with another day of life, to breathe...

“Sir?”

His temples felt like lead and the salty sweat over his hair crystallizing and suppressing his elegantly done hair in the rigors of his helmet. “I’m fine, Control. Any news from Command?”

“Negative, sir. Control out.”

As his knees folded upon themselves and world peacefully blurred as his exhaustion overtook his combat stamina, a COM report from a STAR trooper. “Colonel? We have something...someone you might want to see.”



The storage room had the tempo of unrest and timber of apprehension as Colonel Burseg and a light escort swept in. The GAG colonel arrived in time to see a paramedic apply cation conductive solution over the two metal plates of a battlefield-sized defibrillator.

His interest was only aroused when he saw the uniform of the man that lay sprawled on the floor. The ID tag read: COLONEL JACEN SOLO, and alongside was the golden eagle signifying a Galactic Alliance colonel. The energy from his limbs was sapped from his first life-fire field action in just under a year, and his muscles felt unnervated as they trembled slightly. Yet, how did he forget about where Colonel Solo was? Was that revered Jedi supposed to be his first person MIA to look for after the conclusion of the shootout? How had amnesia overcome his brain?

However, in times of crisis, one did not falter, but turn resolute. “Medics, what’s his status? What’d he get hit by?”

The soldier tautly replied as his partner placed a conduction plate over a blood and shrapnel-splattered chest, “Looks like an explosive charge from close range, sir.”

The AED’s green LED winked on: the cardiac arrhythmia had a chance to be corrected by the defibrillator’s successive electrical jolts. However, as Burseg leaned to observe the EKG he found only a plain line with a loud, disquieting tone...asystole: cardiac arrest. If the colonel had been like this for over forty minutes...even the colonel knew the prognosis would be grim. Damn it!

“Charging...” A mechanical beep sounded. “Clear!” There was a sickly sound as volts thundered across the conductive paste, diffused through the chest, and impacted the forked cardiac muscle.

The second medic almost didn’t have to look at the EKG built into the side of the AED. It was out of pure formality that he did. “Negative, sir. Raise the voltage.”

“Charging...clear!”

The rest of the two-word phrases melded into an unblissful haze for Colonel Burseg, who was already mentally composing the after-action KIA report.

MILITARY COMMAND CENTER “SITE-H” CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

Three hours later

Admiral Veers of Fleet Intelligence, nephew of the renowned General Maximilian Veers that had grieved so many Rebel wives during the Galactic Civil War, stormed, “With all due respect to my informed colleague, sire, our network picked up the Demagogue and the Mediator III, but they were under the command of this Commodore Klynn Rath. He’s a nobody, a no-one. Didn’t trigger any alert flags when he set sail for Chandrila. We just tagged him with a robotic spy drone to ensure he didn’t do anything rash with his two diplomatic corvettes, and that’s it. If there’s an error, it definitely wasn’t on Fleet Intel’s side, sire.”

Cal Omas, temper frayed, stormed, “There definitely is an error, Admiral, but no one is telling me anything even marginally useful! While Fleet Intel continues to bitch around with Intel as normal, we have a galactic crisis, people! Think! Our enemies have four Jedi hostages, and after we interrogated and then murdered their ambassador, they’re going to-”

Secretary of State Taraan gently counseled, “The Kuati don’t know that yet, sire.”

Omas scoffed, raising his arms in disgust. “Who’re you trying to fool, Taraan? Their ambassador is missing for over three hours after paying a trip to a Galactic Alliance military installation and they’re wondering where he is?”

The Mon Calamari continued, “It was...a necessary step, however, sire. It was a just decision, considering that they hold four of our Jedi hostage, so we take the lives of one of their ambassadors. Vengefully justified, sire.”

That salved his ego. “Well, then, but that’s something else. However, I want a plan to retrieve these four Jedi! I want it by nightfall, and want it executed in the next couple of days! The only reason we haven’t razed Kuat to the ground is because of those four hostages. I swore to Skywalker to retrieve them, and if the people knew that a GA attack led to the murder of four Jedi, we’ll never hear the end of it.”

“Well, then.”

A pointed gaze was directed at General Rieekan of Intelligence, Admiral Veers of Fleet Intelligence, General Kopf of the GAG, and the Secretary of Defense. He waved irritatedly at the officers and their no-body-do-nothing staffers. “You’re dismissed.”

They courteously nodded, gathered their papers, and left, ready to excise each other outside the doors of the Situation Room. As they departed, already bickering, Omas turned to the Secretary of State and Supreme Commander Gilad Pellaeon of the entire Defense Force. “Well, Supreme Commander, what do you think of a rescue attempt?”

The aging warmaster shrugged, unprofessionally toying with the end of a whitened moustache as he said, “A possibility, but we’ll need the Jedi. Intel and Fleet Intel will get along with each other for this.”

Omas turned to Taraan, who responded to the unspoken question, “Sire, I also believe that there’s a chance. However, as the Admiral and Generals have said, data on Kuat is getting extremely scarce, with their contacts mostly shutting themselves off from the GA. Grand Master Skywalker also noted earlier that perhaps they’re using Force-deadening drugs so that the Jedi can’t be detected through the Force. However, there should be a solution. There is always a solution, even though it’s sometimes pricey.”

Once again, the Chief-of-State shifted his gaze, and with that, Pellaeon concurred, “What he’s saying is true. However, there’s one thing: this has to work. The GA can’t be bullied by a bun-”

Cal raised a hand. “I’ve already gone through the political ramifications of this, Supreme Commander. You just stick to the blowing stuff up aspect, and Taraan and I will handle the actual tricky parts, eh?”

Few the Chief-of-State spoke to had such an informal relationship with the great man. “Yes sir. I’ll coordinate with Fleet and the Intel agencies to get this to work.”

ADMINISTRATION OF DEFENSE “Q BUILDING”, LIBERATION CITY KUAT, KUAT SYSTEM

Six hours later

It was with much fanfare from the assembled hundreds of Kuati military officers that Commodore Klynn Rath was accepted on the stage of the Provocation Assembly hall of the Administration of Defense’s Q Building. The naval officer was clean-shaven in the traditional closely-cut dress uniform: fire-retardant black. Fireproof yes, stylish no. It was no matter, however, for the single bronze star affixed to his breast was sufficient enough to cow any fashion critics in the crowd, and the expected promotion was elevate him ever higher.

As the eldest son of a Minor Family of the Kuat Drive Yards administration (not exactly on the fringe, but in the ruling halls of the KDY, about mid-level), his life could be plaintively summarized as luxurious. A mid-level administrator was sufficiently high enough to wield power like a vibropike, shearing through those that disobeyed and subjugating them into disgrace and eventual poverty. His family’s standing would ascend, for their eldest son was now being paraded as Hero of Kuat. He had averted a terrible attack by the Galactic Alliance by taking the four Jedi hostage, yes. The lumbering reincarnation of the Empire would not even dare to launch a strike on Kuat while four of their immeasurably precious little Jedi were under Kuat captivity. A GA commando strike would come in several hours, undoubtedly, but that was another concern to be dealt with at another time.

Not only was his upbringing enviously pampered, he had started well from his mother’s womb. Mildly attractive with a shaven figure, slightly above average intelligence, high enough EQ to play the games of politics and come out at least living, which was enough.

He’d taken full convenience from his family’s standing to go to El College for his 4-year university: Steiln University, the most highly regarded university of Kuat and the surrounding systems. Only two classes of people went there: near-geniuses and geniuses and also people whose families had considerable political clout. Klynn was automatically accepted the moment his last name was saw on that application form and verified by private investigators, scraped by with a string of low Ds (actually more like 30s and 40s that were curved to be marginally passing), got his bachelor’s degree in Engineering and also an attractive wife. Then, his family asked him to join the military after it became blatantly clear that a traditional job route won’t work for him. No company would accept someone that was 1.3 points away from a failing grade, not even from Steiln.

Klynn Rath had started as ensign of the Kuat Home Fleet, but presto, and in two weeks, found himself captain of an Imperial-class Star Destroyer, the Hierophant. His father had opted for him to become the captain of some nondescript vessel that never saw any action whatsoever, but Klynn was drawn to glory as a moth to the flame that kills it. Well, not exactly kills, but close enough.

In the last year of the Yuuzhan Vong War, while on a border patrol on the far rim of the Kuat System, the Hierophant was ambushed by the xenocides, and caught without escorts. A synthetic forearm replacement was necessary, as well as full bacta tank submergement for eight consecutive days. After that, he’d been raised to commodore (in fitting with the wounds he sustained, the public outrage that the Yuuzhan Vong had wounded him, and his family’s prestige once again), and delegated to an extraordinarily-low risk station: commander of two CR90 Corellian Corvettes on atmospheric patrol in Kuat, the Demagogue and the Mediator III. After that fateful year had ended and the birth of two twin boys, the Corellian Corvettes had been tasked with diplomatic duties, bargaining for trade deals, the whole nine yards. Klynn overlooked the operation and security of the corvette pair while the negotiators gouged deals out of unwilling businessmen and diplomats. He’d carried out that duty without major incident for four years...that is, until now: the capturing of the StealthXs and the hostage-taking of the Jedi.

Yet, something at the auspices of his mind cried out to him in silent chorus. As the holorecorders played out rays, capturing his image and projecting it across Kuat and other potential member worlds, urging, Yes, join our cause! There is hope!, there was...well, something. Nondescript yet his instincts branding it potentially ramificating. What, then, my mind?

Even as the three silver stars of a Vice Admiral were affixed to him besides his minor aggregation campaign ribbons, he felt a slight tremor of uneasiness for not remembering doing the act that now had exalted him…

GALACTIC ALLIANCE ARMY COMPLEX “ECLIPSE BASE” CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

The air of the morgue was chilling, and the fact that a Jedi had been slain even further distressing to Han Solo, that weathered gun-‘n-runner. However, first and foremost was the fact that two of his three children had been killed in action, defending the Galactic Alliance…to gain what? Jacen had died just to destroy a pair of war droids? The seemingly senseless of this wanton carnage drove further into the ex-smuggler’s mind that the galaxy’s Scales of Justice were misweighted, and punishment came upon even those that did not wrong others.

The locks of the door that barricaded the room whirred, and with a pneumatic hiss, two more individuals entered: Luke and Mara Jade Skywalker, their eyes inclined towards the floor in reverence for the dead, motions slight.

Han tried to conjure a typically joyful greeting, but found none, just rasping into the air. Luke initiated the brief conversation. “I’m...sorry about everything.”

Han Solo had been searching for hours to find something to vent his fury, that his second son had fallen, but in accordance with Leia’s wishes of solitude, had restrained himself, until now, for his seemingly hollow words ignited anger within him. “Yeah, what’re you sorry about?”

Leia, clothed in the ragged flight jumpsuit she’d donned on countless situations over the years that might expose her to combat, moved to hand to forestall the shouting to come, but Luke gave a slight shake of the head, refusing to stop it, instead replying contritely, “About everything. Authorizing Anakin to go to Myr-”

That fenestrated the walls of the reserve of patience that the Corellian had. “Yeah? Myrkr? That’s all, you think?”

Irascibly tossing aside Leia’s arm, he advanced forward almost menacingly, the death of Jacen fueling him with a fierce temper now. “No, it’s that both of our sons died for the Galactic Alliance! One to the Yuuzhan Vong and another to...”

A quiet whisper, strained with undertones of quieted pain. “Dad, please.”

Han Solo whirled, finger upraised like his trusty DL-44 blaster pistol, and then found Jaina, her downy brown eyes almost pleading, in their innocence heartbreaking. After a moment, that fury within him was pacified by the oasis of silence that was Jaina, her eyes welling with tears, perhaps, her hair tossed into disarray.

His resolve to bash the Grand Master of the Jedi’s skull into the ground faded as he gently moved to enfold his daughter in his arms paternally. “Jaina, Jaina...” His words were similarly soft as well, and he recompartmentalized his anger, now a naked soul without that shield of fury and left alone to experience the heartbreak...

As the two held each other in their embrace, perhaps silently sobbing tears over the dear baby boy they both held high within their hearts, Mara and Luke sidled up with Leia. Mara whispered, eyes transfixed on the figure shrouded in white surgical cloth, “Jacen...”

Luke pursed his lips and fingers together, mind drawn to a single point: the sorrow of losing Jacen Solo. It had been a GAG operation, not a Jedi one. I should have been swifter to read the Force, and more carefully, found the threads of threat in the op he was embarking on. Just a moment faster, just a fraction more precise. All that was needed.

Meanwhile, as Mara gently folded Leia’s starkly chilled hands into her own, she whispered, “How? We just got here from FLEETCOM, and didn’t read the reports.”

As Luke paced away, scrutinizing the antiseptic white wall as a single thought rebounded in his mind, and his head gracefully dipped forward further in disgrace, knowing he had failed his nephew for the last and penultimate time, Leia replied hoarsely, “Self-destruct charge. A war droid at close range exploded and took Jacen with it.”

Mara was betaken by that fact, soundlessly rocked back on the soles of her boots, a nexus of Force threads drawing together: a thousand animations how the deed could have been done, how the charge had detonated, the intensity and shape of the blast...as Luke gently brought his forehead to the wall, allowing the cold to permeate into him, Mara closed her eyes. “Good fate...”

Leia turned away, hands on hips, unwilling to bear this any further, stalking out through the doors in search of a spiritual calmness from which the shock of the incident could be absorbed and dissipated. A moment later, Jaina disengaged her arms from around her father, the tear-streaks visible across the smuggler’s rumpled vest and eyes reddened as she followed her mother’s footsteps, irregularly pausing, contemplating the promethean scale of the matter and its ramifications...

The doors swung themselves open, and then were brought shut again, allowing the Jedi and Han Solo to convene in a conversation without words, for the only word resonating was grief, or more precisely, the emotion of grief.

As Luke turned from the bland wall to observe the corpse, the world became distant, his senses went numb, his fingers and face contorted, for the sheets that serenely enshrouded the corpse brought the full sheer terribleness of the deed onto his soul. He had killed another of his sister’s sons. Slain them. The emotions came forth vengefully, ceasing to consume the Grand Master in a torrent of grief, and so they did as he silently collapsed on the corpse, crying silent tears that would never be heard or seen.

However, in the Force, his presence blossomed out, its typical trim edges succumbing to this sorrow, this empathy for his sister that was hard-wired within him. Experiencing the deaths of millions had shielded his heart, turning it barren and unyielding to death, but this surmounted those, and that profound grief radiated into the Force, flooding over other presences.

Therefore, it was only a stone in the path of a monsoon when a choking voice croaked, “Uncle?”

GALACTIC ALLIANCE HOLONET ENCRYPTED CHANNEL, GAG-OPCOM-825/A3 BRAVO SECRET CLASSIFIED

Galactic Alliance Guard General Operations Directorate Encryption Keyword: ......... . Point-to-Point Transmission, Source/Sender unknown

START TRANSMISSION: //

Sin-Viola-Octet

END TRANSMISSION: //

ADMINISTRATION OF DEFENSE “Q BUILDING”, LIBERATION CITY KUAT, KUAT SYSTEM

The overflight of a dozen Home Fleet TIE Interceptors was necessary to deter potential assailants, postulated the Special Defense Bureau of Kuat Homeworld Security. The S.D.B. was tasked with defending major administrators and officers of the Kuat government, and Klynn, now a Vice Admiral, fell within their jurisdiction.

A slight under-preparation for his security, however, as only now two minutes ago had be been confirmed by the Kuat Senate as Vice Admiral, Home Fleet.

The S.D.B. officer in command of the forces protecting Klynn Rath was a Colonel, and went by the name of Darr. He had arranged for there only to be one major procession hovercar, as the Public Relations officer from State had mandated that Klynn be given as much exposure to the public as possible to reap the morale high that the public was cresting right now. So instead of one “real” hovercar and two decoys, there was solely one. The security complement had been kept to minimums as well for the same reason. The TIE Interceptor overwatch squadron was the primary defense unit, able to detect and react to any threats within three seconds, or so assured the squadron commander.

Anyways, there were two smaller hovercars of S.D.B. agents slightly lagging behind the processional hovercars, and unadorned with flags to mark their difference from the hovercar which that State liaison wanted to emphasize so emphatically. A dozen military-grade hoverbikes seated by Kuati Special Forces commandoes in light, aesthetic body armor suits were in a quick-response formation around the three hovercars: a rakish, offensive formation, but not overtly so to the hundreds of onlooking holocams and thousands of eyes massed onto the streets.



There was a figure on the rooftops, yes, dressed in the formfitting armor of a standard-clad S.D.B. sniper. The person grasped a standard-issue S.D.B. sniper, appearing to the TIE pilots crisscrossing in elegant formations above (for the pleasure of the crowd) as an innocuous backup sniper posted on the roofs under the jurisdiction of the S.D.B. and Colonel Darr.

Except she wasn’t. She sighted the primary hovercar with the electronic scope on the girth of the camouflaged PR996C high-powered sniper rifle, flicked a toggle, viewed the broad magnetic street through the grainy world of infrared, replete with the ghastly outlines of the crying aliens and humans that heralded their savior, the dear Vice Admiral.

The computer acknowledged a preset command, automatically fazed out the hovercar gravitic boost drives and holocams - the two primary sources of heat and interference on her scope, instead just analyzing the figures seated in the three hovercars. In the lead one, there was a figure stretching out the window on the opposite side of the street that the assassin was perched on. The other figures in the hovercar gave the waving figure a wide berth. The vice admiral. Except the shot would be difficult. The wanted kill was by a single, perfectly executed shot through the heat and the vaporization of the cranium and brain matter.

Unfortunate, she muttered with her silky, toying voice. War yielded bad chance, and she had surmounted enough of that vile fruit of the garden of Life to take the bite without ascerbicness. She depressed a control on a slender datapad that was set alongside the barrel of her PR996C, and it broadcast from a secure, undetectable local COM node an alert code: a threat to the Vice Admiral’s life had been spotted. The three hovercars broke as if that code had been transmitted instantaneously, which it was, and they began juking evasively, the windows rolling down and the S.D.B. agents donning body armor and loading heavier weapons within their vehicles, away from the public, which were breaking like a mass of Mon Calamari faced with an evaporative bomb that would dessicate them. The flood had a single, fiery mind, to escape, and so they did, uneven ranks of bodies spilling across the barriers and towards the surrounding buildings.

A second control, and the code updated new information: the threat was a sniper, on the right side of the street, the far side from the villainess. As the snipers that laid on the rooftops on that side began dismounting tripods, bringing sniper rifles to bear on closer-ranged targets, perhaps one of their own brethren besides them, the assassin ignored them and the amplification of COM traffic as S.D.B. officers demanded clarification of this ambiguous threat. As she saw the TIE Interceptors overhead angle their acuminous solar panel wings as they swiveled to bombard the area with active scan beams and their laser cannons warmed to full battle readiness, the primary hovercar lurched left spastically, bringing the Vice Admiral away from the perceived threat and towards her sniper rifle.

A difficult shot, with a swerving hovercar, a raised laser-dispersive window. She paused for a moment, allowing the dozens of sniper kills in her past permeate her mind, inflame her with bloodlust and confidence. A single shot, that was all it took. The streak of muted scarlet burst forth from her sniper rifle’s aperture, and impacted the window. Apparently, the S.D.B. had not ordered the highest-quality protective window, as it fragmented into crack-littered irregular jagged slabs. However, the trailing edge of the shot still was undampened, and entered Klynn’s head through the area above the right ear and bisecting almost perfectly through to the corresponding site over the left ear.

The deed is done, she remarked, and with a practiced hand, set a miniature charge besides her discarded sniper rifle, Tibanna gas ammunition case, and falsifying datapad. Then, she slipped into darkness within the pure light of the day, a specter never seen.

MILITARY COMMAND CENTER “SITE-H” CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

Covened, the heads of the military were, at the Kuati wide-band broadcasting of a streaming video: a spaceborne satellite’s recording of the death of Vice Admiral Klynn Rath, the newest savant of Kuat and its savior. The slender assassin was shown prone on a rooftop, and then the bolt that ended his life… Dozens of other videos played out the same atrocity from different angles: holocams, civilian recorders in the crowd…a tainted blessing for the Galactic Alliance. Because the man that had staged the elaborate dance that’d taken the Jedi hostages had been killed, it led to the inevitable conclusion that Kuat’s thinktank would be severely hindered without this genius on their staff.

In the light that everyone in the GA and the galaxy definitively knew that an GA Intelligence agency had murdered Klynn Rath, but that Kuat’s tactical staff was blunted, it was with slight trepidation that Cal Omas pointlessly asked, “So you’ve all seen the news?”

Curt nods, a lull, but Rieekan was the first to announce, “Galactic Alliance Intelligence didn’t order the assassination, sire. It must have been some other agency.”

A perplexed pause as the thought “Why is the General not claiming credit in this even if he didn’t order it?” percolated throughout the minds of the assembled officers and administrators. Yes, there were ethics and the compulsion to say truth, yet this was a most unusual situation. Not claiming credit for killing someone that just kidnapped four Jedi?

Cal Omas was of sufficiently high authority to vocalize a question regarding this situation. “So, General, your agency did not authorize this operation? Why not? Or perhaps the appropriate question would be to ask who did?”

Taraan’s and his eyes surveilled the line of military intelligence officers, who all demurred credit for the act. The air grew tangibly unnerving as Cal Omas demanded, “Damn it, who did? I am not here to play guessing games, Generals, Admirals! Let the officer who authorized the assassination of Klynn Rath step forward!”

Another pause as each officer shaded his or her own eyes, and then the Chief-of-State’s diatribe lengthened. “I don’t care what resources it took or what you had to trade to authorize it! Hell, I’ll be the one giving you a medal, whoever did!”

Taraan noted the immaturity of the Chief-of-State and his raging demands, the undertones of lucid anger substratal. Perhaps he was ill from his own assassination attempt, or he seethed to exact revenge on the Kuati assassin that nearly murdered him...besides apprehending, torturing, and beheading that Kuati agent with the cyanide dartgun, but with his own assassin, murdering a Kuati high official. Such poetic justice. An assassin retributing against another assassin’s work.

Not the most impeccable logic, but sufficient enough.

Yet, the question was still hanging. Which GA Intelligence agency director had ordered the assassination, and what conceivable reason was him or her covering up such an act of fame?

RESIDENTIAL ZONE 80-JE, RESIDENTIAL COMPLEX “GOLDEN SUNRISE” CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

The smog-laced air bore the ominous quantum flutters of GAG assault ships, and was the conduction media of a hundred transmissions on GAG frequencies: firing authorizations, weapons checks, unit assignments. Such was the scene that Colonel Burseg came upon as his CC-118 Corsair low-profile assault gunboat settled at a recessed loading dock at the base of the Golden Sunrise residential complex.

Major Wharton, the preliminary GAG officer that had arrived with the first gunboat wave, greeted him, with the lack of the usual compliment command aides lagging in lockstep behind him - this was a free-fire potentially hostile zone. No asides were necessary here: only blasters, skill, and blood.

Just six minutes ago, the local GAG HQ - Katana Base - had intercepted a brief point-to-point encrypted transmission with the word “radiologicals” and “stealth” within. A SAT scan had revealed a fluctuating radiological spike at one of the apartments at the Golden Sunrise high-rise apartment complex: a relatively exuberant housing section for multiple species. The spike’s particle ratios revealed a nuclear weapon of unknown size.

Nearby GAG teams had rushed to inconspicuously cordoned off the area, and rapid-response STAR groups had seized control of the building, arresting the owners under trumped-up charges of harboring terrorists. When one had refused to relinquish the universal lock override to the apartments, he was charged with a blaster bolt through the chest. No handcuffs needed.

Now, a full STAR combat platoon had been rallied within the building, covering every avenue of approach towards the radioactive apartment module and using explosive traps to cover avenues of exit.

Hundreds of undercover standard GAG agents had circumvented the girth of the building, and inconspicuous repulsor roadblocks had been set up. Furthermore, Fleet was advising all nearby airborne ships to land: the EMP from a nuclear device would be able to down nearby aircraft.

Burseg tersely smiled and nodded, and then started, “Major, show me our positions.”

A real-time satellite wireframe of the locale, overlaid by troop tactical symbols, appeared. The apartment was outlined in winking red, and STAR teams had been posted on the floor above, below, and to all the adjacent apartments and passageways. At a cursory glance, all possible vectors had been not only covered, but intersected by diagonals.

He nodded approvingly, and then asked, “Which STAR platoon is this?”

“Daleth Platoon, sir. The commander is a Major Golonz, a Noghri.”

Daleth Platoon was the third-best local STAR platoon. They’d handled the crisis three months ago on Coruscant when the staff to the Adumar Embassy had been kidnapped by feuding Adumar Army renegades. The platoon commander had been killed in the action, but the new commander, a Noghri, seemed capable enough, as all Noghri were automatically gifted commanders and battlers.

“Excellent. Are all the TACVID feeds linked to the central hub and Katana HQ?”

“Yes, Colonel. Equipment and position triple checks are complete.”

“What about Pyrotechnics?”

“Yes, sir. The Bomb Squads are ready to go, just beyond the STAR teams.”

“Show me.”

Major Wharton gestured, and the two walked towards the mobile command vehicle, a grav-truck with civilian markings. The innards were claustrophobic - monitors, communications equipment, satellite uplinks, colored wires, all compacted into that space. As he stepped in, the two GAG soldiers that were the informal guard attentively rose to attention and saluted.

He returned their salute as a courtesy, muttering “At ease”, and then observed the far side of the trailer: an 8x5 matrix of video displays, each broadcasting from the mission recorder of a STAR commando in Daleth Platoon. A lull, and Fate deemed the time for the assault to begin, seizing his heart with bravado and releasing the apprehension that the hundreds of GAG agents would be incinerated by the nuclear weapon. “Daleth Platoon, this is Colonel Burseg. Begin the operation.”

IMPERIAL-CLASS STAR DESTROYER MON MOTHMA 2 LIGHT-YEARS FROM KUAT SYSTEM, DEEP SPACE

Battle Groups Red, Blue, and Green of the Galactic Alliance Fifth Defense Fleet were aggregated in a single voluminous sphere formation two light-years out from Kuat. This coagulated cluster of warships was over one hundred starships in number, an explanation for why whatever Kuati taskforces were remaining were giving it a several light-year berth. A precaution, to say the least.

The battle groups had all been withdrawn to the fallback rendezvous position precisely because of the hostage-taking of the Jedi. The flyby of the dozen Star Destroyers and Mon Calamari Star Cruisers across the face of Kuat had been cancelled after the political advisors had deemed that such aggressive posturing would not be beneficial to the political climate.

However, as Commodore Darklighter entered the twelve alphanumeric character password to log onto the local intership HoloNet network, it became clear from the number of political staffers and military officers of other commands that Admiral Bwu’atu clearly had something in mind more than a standard stand-‘n-wait.

RESIDENTIAL ZONE 80-JE, RESIDENTIAL COMPLEX “GOLDEN SUNRISE” CORUSCANT, CORUSCANT SYSTEM

The orbital satellites had registered twelve heat signatures inside Apartment 13-107 that were organics: living beings. Therefore, each STAR commando HUD had a small tick-down box that had the number “12”. Each successive kill would reduce the sum by one, therefore giving a more realistic threat assessment of the situation for the STAR troopers.

Upon the command of Colonel Burseg, the three opulent doors were utterly destroyed by the force of three full-power proton charges. Slivers of metal lanced outwards from the spherical detonations, impaling and eviscerating nearby terrorists. The number of heat signatures dipped to nine as the first 5-man STAR teams made their dramatic entrances, a thundering of heavy repeating blasters and the synthetic whining of support weapons of the flanks.

Combat controllers monitoring TACVID took snapshots from helmet-mounted optical recorders in the first milliseconds, registering the crumpled hostile bodies and what they were jacketed in: jet-black ribbed flak jackets, and in their hands, heavy blaster pistols or contraband blaster rifles. Clearly hostiles.

Upon a command from the Noghri major, fragmentation grenades were hurled, and they too released their brilliance from within their casings, flinging hostiles into the air with such force that their bodies and armor were shredded. Five further contacts: three severely wounded, two in minimal fighting shape.

No calls for surrenders. As the three wounded terrorists crumpled onto the ground, reminiscent of their fallen comrades, shrapnel lining their flak jackets and drawing copious blood from their skins, the two others went into crouching stances, scattering several shots into the haze of advancing black-armored commandoes and chips of metal excised from the walls.

A blaster bolt managed to impact a STAR trooper, but the shock was negated by the fibers in the armor plating. That commando’s repeating blaster’s reciprocating fire unleashed a torrent of flickering bolts that lifted up and annihilated the last terrorist, punching decimeter-sized holes in his chest.

The last hostile unleashed a wavering war cry, but there was the dulled thump of a grenade against metal, and the ensuing blast neutralized the terrorist and the downed ones as well.

The major radioed, “Mission accomplished. All hostiles neutralized. Pyrotechnics, we have uncovered the nuclear device. The timer reads five minutes to the second.”

Burseg acknowledged from the command vehicle, “Copy that. Pyrotechnics, go, go.”



Captain Nad’halu, Galactic Alliance Guard, Pyrotechnics Division, a Bothan that was a craft master of the game for twenty-one years. Often, Pyrotechnics technicians did not survive extremely long: the job consisted of exorbitantly brief moments of paralyzing terror, and prolonged periods of torpor.

Flanking him as a Twi’lek lieutenant and six field technicians. As the Pyrotechnics team entered the apartment, the usual connotation for a GAG raid on a building would be “bombed out”, and this aptly fitted the description. Wallpaper shredded, metal pitted and discolored, the whole works.

The entrance teams were in the process of securing the corpses and sounding off.

“Apex Team reporting.” “Blackvine Team reporting.” “Copperleaf Team reporting.”

The affirmatives smeared into the mirage of military commands and reciprocatings, and Nad’halu’s eyes fell upon the bomb: a metal object with a bottom cylindrical section and a top conical section. The electronic timer was bolted into the base and the nuclear warhead stuffed into the cone, according to radiation counters.

He motioned at the technicians. “Open it.”

One applied a fusioncutter, a brilliant orb of coalescing, electrifying cyan and amethyst fire as the metal covering sparked, glowing a dull, slate red as it heated, and then, with a violent jolt, the Devaronian technician dislodged the base from the cone, laid bare the cylindrical base and its timer, replete with wires that linke dit to the nuclear warhead. The apprehension that had struck him, immobilized him if he’d “cut the wrong wire” and the surrounding square kilometers were immolated into a nuclear flame, now drifted away with the speed of a gazelle.

Two wires: one red, one yellow. The red wire linked the timer to the warhead. The yellow one, from the almost rudimental setup of the bomb, wired the backup timer to the detonation core.

A technician produced a pair of razor scissors with the graveness of a nurse handing a surgeon forceps, and with the Noghri STAR major hanging at his side, observing the proceedings, Nad’halu incised both wires with utmost purity of spirit, not a single mote of guilt.

The timer winked, flickered off.

It was almost anticlimactic how the tactical nuclear device was defused, just two concise motions with a pair of scissors.

The major turned, looked him in the eye, and the Bothan captain nodded curtly, his step invigorated with utter exuberance at his deed. Promotion to major, colonel? What would it be…was the only line permeating his mind. No, in this tale, his promotion would be to passenger to the grave, as when the recovery teams handled the nuclear warhead in its conical casing, all the hell broke loose.



The masonry impacted the command vehicle with such brutish velocity that the lights immediately shorted out. The irregular boulder of cobblestone, interlaced with granite pebbles for aesthetic effect, penetrated the dorsal armor plating, bashing against the central computer nodes. Sparks rushed outwards in a violent conflagration from the center of the truck, propelling the GAG officers and guards against the walls with such speed that several fell lifeless. Fire burst from the central pillar, and further slivers of stone thrust through the ragged opening on the top of the vehicle as the GAG personnel within her entombed…

IMPERIAL-CLASS STAR DESTROYER MON MOTHMA VENDAXA, VENDAXA SYSTEM

Three days later…

The elongated streak of viridian fire that was a turbolaser bolt connected with the trailing edge of the KDY-design bulk freighter. The Kuati starship was jolted erratically as its engines fluctuated in integrity as it skimmed below the exosphere of Vendaxa. The atmospheric disturbances further weakened the integrity of the freighter Yonder Galleon, and its circuitry began to overheat, shoving down that KDY starship several meters further into the atmosphere, the internal pressures spiking just because of that slight altitude depression…and then a primary plasma conduit gave, unable to withstand the torque applied on it. Fire coalesced within the engine room of the Yonder Galleon like an aggregating sphere of ball lightning, discharged, lancing adjacent engine components with that energy.

The Sensor Officer of the Mon Mothma curtly reported, “Commodore, the Yonder Galleon is losing power. Infrareds show malfunctions in their reactor. The freighter is going down…extrapolating course…the hulk will land seventeen kilometers from an abandoned ground installation.”

Not a coincidence, mused Commodore Gavin Darklighter. The Mon Mothma had been too sluggish to react to Fleet Intel’s revised tracking charts and perfectly intercept the bulk freighter the moment it entered hyperspace. No, a gunnery error had allowed the Yonder Galleon to skirt close to the planet and possibly even make a crash landing…and its location near that “abandoned” installation was not chance.

Therefore, when a ravenous swarm of elderly TIE Interceptors arose from the opening hangar bays on the roof of the installation, a dozen of them, it was not a wholehearted surprise.

“Firing Control, eliminate enemy starships. Navigations, bring us closer to the planet. Is immobilization by tractor beam viable yet?”

“Negative, sir. The freighter is going down too fast, and atmospheric abberances are making its trajectory only a sixth-degree approximation.”

“Very well, then. Open up those batteries.”

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3