Lucky Strike (A Star Wars SI)

Chapter 35

The dragon had been gone for a couple of weeks now, which had given us enough time to strip the other two Interdictors of everything that was useful. Of the two, one had been a standard Republic variant, and the other had been among those used by Revan. The Republic variant had sustained some serious battle damage, but its internal power and infrastructure was easier to work with than whatever had been done to the one used by Revan's forces, so we'd mostly stripped parts from the Republic variant and used them to repair the damage done to the Horizon.

Thankfully, when it was all said and done, the Horizon was back up to full strength, if not a little better than before. We'd pulled the backup power generators from the 'spare' ship and wired them into our systems as well. If we turned them on, we could temporarily boost power to our shields or engines, but we'd burn them out through prolonged use.

As for the Reven Interdictor. We ripped the starfighters out of its hangar and left it alone after that. While at first, several of my crew had wanted to board and take it for ourselves, the sheer feeling of something being wrong had quickly changed that idea. It was a good thing that the cargo holds and hangar were adjacent to eachother, because it allowed us to quickly take whatever we thought we might need and leave.

While most of us were working on repairing the Horizon, a small group of people led by Aliya had done sruveys of the two other ships we were confident we could use to help fend off the dragon if necessary. She reported that while she'd have liked to use the Centurion battlecruiser, it was going to be hard to get it working to a satisfactory degree. Instead, her and her team had chosen the Sith Harrower.

Of course, it was while her team and the droids we were planning on using to help crew the other ship were busy that the Dragon returned.

"Sir, sensors are picking up the creature! It just dropped out of hyperspace on the edge of the system and is moving towards us."

"Just bring our power levels down to what we need to monitor the situation," I replied, moving to behind the sensors officer and looking over his shoulder along with the people beside him as the dragon dragged what looked an afwul lot like a whale behind it. "Looks like it went hunting," I felt nervous. "Did we ever get anywhere on the communications possibility?"
"The protocol droids kept glitching out and having to get reset when we tried getting a translation suite together," Vane shook his head. "To be honest, we're mostly just hoping that it ignores us if we attempt to leave."

"I really don't want to fight it," There was something intensely terrifying about the thought of facing a dragon the size of a Venator. Sure, there was still that masculine urge to fight the dragon, but that was being tempered by the thought of the men and women that were under my command.

So, we watched the dragon move through the system over the next few hours until it ignored us and the fleet of derelicts entirely. Instead, it moved through the planet's atmosphere, smoke trailing off the flesh of the space whale as if cooking it on the way down.

"Get me a line to the Harrower," I glanced at the comms officer. "We need to know her ETA. If this thing has to take its time to eat, we should be able to escape via jumping to hyperspace."

"Chief Engineer Aliya Alitas here," her voice graced the headset I'd been handed.

"How long before you and the ship are ready to jump to hyperspace?" I asked.

"Five, six hours," I could hear her shrug. "The systems on this ship are weird, and we've been completely locked out of the bridge. We're running things form the secondary control center. We should be able to leave once we restore power to the hyperdrives. But we're going to need you to feed us the coordinates."

"Alright," I replied. "Shrink that time as much as possible. We've got a window of opportunity here, and I don't want to waste it."

"I'll see what I can do," She sighed. "We'll contact you once we've reestablished power to the hyperdrive. Alitas, out."

–
–


Three hours later…

"I've got power to the secondary systems!" Aliya slapped the panel she was working on, grinning as it finally stopped glitching and flared to life. "Just needed a little percussive maintenance."

"Bridge is still on lockdown. But we've got power to the engines," Conor Jalatian the other lead engineer reported. "Say what you will about the B-1 battle droids, but the engineer variants are pretty good at this."

"I'm just glad that we've got enough to make the skeleton crew requirements work here," Aliya replied. "Keep working on the reactor and those power couplings. We need the backup hyperdrive up and running at a minimum."

"I've got a group working on that," Conor said. "I've got a team working on the bridge lockout. I can reassign them assist with working on the hyperdrive if you want."

"No, keep them working on restoring access to the bridge," Aliya shook her head before remembering that he couldn't see her. "We're going to need that access if we're going to gain full control of this ship."

"Aye, ma'am. We'll keep on it."

"Now that power's restored to the secondary command center, I should be able to help with narrowing down some of the problems from here."

The engineer droids around Aliya were already tapping into the systems and beginning to feed data to the teams working throughout the ship. Aliya herself was patching the ship into the battlenet that the Horizon used. Changing the frequencies and comms channels necessary to give the other ship a good IFF reading. Friendly fire wasn't, and she wasn't going to set things up for her or the other engineers to accidentally be killed if and when it came to an engagement with the creature that controlled this system.

–
–
Twelve hours later…

"Why won't the stupid bridge doors open?!" Aliya felt like slamming her fist into the console again, but instead simply hit the side of her thigh. "Please tell me that the rest of you have good news?"

"Primary and backup hyperdrives are finally online and staying that way," Conor reported. "I don't know why we had such massive power fluctuations earlier, but we seem to have fixed whatever was up with the reactors."

"Prepare to receive the hyperdrive coordinates from the Horizon," Aliya stopped trying to get the bridge door open. "I think we're still in that window of opportunity."

"Roger Roger," the B-1 manning the comms replied, it seemed that no matter what tweaks they made, they still wouldn't say anything else. "Sending confirmation of hyperdrive to the Horizon, standing by to receive coordinates."

A few seconds later, they had the coordinates and were ready to jump out of the system.

"Triumphant, we're preparing to jump, confirm reception of coordinates and sync up with us."

"Triumphant here, coordinates received, we're ready to jump when you are."

A few short moments later, the two ships left the system behind. The Dragon's Hoard had not kept its hold on them.

---

The Drake shifted in his sleep and cracked open a lone eye. Something had changed. It was as if a fog had been lifted from its mind, and now it could see clearly.

Moving away from his mate, he nudged her awake and bade her to look after the Creche while he explored their home. Flying through the atmosphere and reaching planetary orbit, he paused. Reaching through the system with his senses, he searched for something out of place, eventually, finding what was wrong.

Someone had stolen from his treasures. Two of them were gone, and a third had been scarred moreso than it had during his taking of it. Roaring his displeasure, he made to leave the system and give chase when there was a tug on the bond he shared with his mate.

The clutch of eggs had begun to hatch, he could not leave the system and abandon his mate and their young during this time. So, even as he sensed the treasures get further away, he turned and headed back to the planet. He would reclaim his treasures. He had all of the time in the universe to do so.

Chapter 36

"Alright, we're clear of the immediate danger," I looked around at the assembled senior officers. "What's the status on the Triumphant?"

"We've got access to most of the systems," Aliya replied. "Only thing that prevents us from taking full control is that the bridge is completely locked down. We can't even get in from breaching the viewports. Whoever owned the ship before us replaced them with armored panels and sensors."

"We do have some other options there," Conor, the other lead engineer said. "But most of them involve not being able to close the doors there anymore."

"Let's leave that option for last if possible," I tried to hide my smirk, knowing that they were thinking about using explosives to breach the bulkhead doors. "Are we going to need access to the bridge to keep the ship moving with us?"

"No," Aliya shook her head. "We can do pretty much everything we need to from the secondary control center. The only issue we might run into is that we don't have access to the ship's databanks. Those are going to be locked away on the bridge."

"Then let's leave the bridge for another day," I said, stroking my short beard. "Now that we have time, I want a full inventory of the Triumphant. We've got our ARC-170s repaired, but I want a full squadron out there for recon if possible. There's a safety in numbers. Especially out here in uncharted space."

"Given we're going to be operating at efficiency below what our maximum is, we're authorizing the activation and use of reprogrammed droids to fill out crew roles," Lieutenant Crix Vane said, the holoprojector showing a handful of droids that were sitting deactivate on the Triumphant. "We're aware that this would have been a Sith Empire vessel, but several of our droid experts believe that they have a method to reset the combat and engineer droids and make use of them. Now, they're going to be testing their method first. But if we see results, we should see an increase in our crew complement."

"That's part of the reason we're going to be conducting a full inventory," I interjected. "We already pulled everything off the other Interdictor that we thought might be useful before we left. So, we've got half a full complement of Starfighters, even if they are dated, and a smattering of spare parts that should be somewhat useful for both ships. But we don't know what's in the stores for the Triumphant."

"There aren't any bodies," Aliya said quietly after that. "There were bodies on the other Interdictor. But there aren't any on the Triumphant. That's part of why I want access to the bridge. All of the lifeboats and escape pods are still present, there isn't any visible damage to the interior of the ship beyond the degredation of time."

"If you can find a way to get onto the bridge that doesn't involve removing the bulkhead doors, then I'll approve getting in," I replied. "Until then, we're going to proceed as planned. Now, moving onto navigation. The Astromechs and astronavigators are confident that they've found a relative location for our position. By best estimates, it's likely to take three months to return to known space. In all probability, it's going to take six months to a year if we're wrong about things."

I waited for the news to settle in before continuing.

"Thankfully, we were fully resupplied when we left the Core," I tapped a control and our list of food and water rations appeared. "We should be good for the return journey. But, we're going to be keeping an eye out for habitable planets. Fresh water and food are the sort of things that will keep morale high. We're also going to be moving to shift pattern Aurek. With how much work there is, I don't want anyone burning out or making critical mistakes. That goes doubly so for our engineers and other technicians. Make sure you're fully rested before doing any work on either of our ships or before we execute a jump. The last thing we want or need is for a critical mistake to cause us to get stuck out here for longer. Now, are there any questions?"

"Just one, sir," one of the last few starfighter pilots raised his hand. "There are only three pilots still present. Sure, we can probably use the rear gunners from our 170s to make up a gap or two. But I'm not sure that's a good idea out here in the Unknown Regions."

"You're right," I sighed, "It's not a good idea. Which is why we're going to be pulling some gunship pilots to fill in the gaps," I nodded at the clone that was in charge of our groundpounders. "It's not my favorite option, but it's all that's left to us. We'll have the two 170s, and four of the Aurek-Class running escorts. We need comprehensive scans of the systems that we're going to be jumping into."

"We're going to need to work out a rotation schedule for our deployments," the pilot replied. "We'll be spending a lot of time in the cockpit. There's going to be some issues if we don't get the proper breaks in-between."

"No better time to do that than now," Lieutenant Vane said. "We can sort that and the engineering schedules now. Get things sorted so we don't run into issues in the future."

---

Location: Eriadu

It had been weeks and there had still been no sign of the Horizon. If Lieutenant Hull or his people had deserted, there would have been a sign of them already. Instead, there had been no communications or sightings of the vessel whatsoever. Which meant that the vessel was another victim of the perils that came with utilizing Hyperspace.

Forcing the lost ship and crew far from his mind, Commodore Teskit instead considered the holographic map in front of him. Those systems that were aligned with the Republic were vastly outnumberd by the blue systems that surrounded them. Sullust was among them, the shipyards there produced ships for the Confederacy in great numbers. Well, it was time that the Republic moved to block such a vital resource here on the Outer Rim.

"Commodore Teskit," A smooth female voice interrupted his considerations.

"Maarisa," Teskit smiled as his old friend entered the room. "It's been a while."

"I see that you've finally managed to earn a promotion," the tanned woman smirked. "I was worried that you would be doomed to be a junior officer fro the rest of eternity."

"Competence always shines through," Teskit shrugged. "Now, how can I assist you, admiral?"

"The Republic won't be willing to contribute extra ships to assist you with taking Sullust," She replied, studying the Commodore's face for a reaction.

"I'm well aware of HIGHCOM's reluctance," Teskit replied, gesturing to the holographic map. "The CIS has been agressive and hit hard of late. I understand why they have pulled back to defend and rebuild lost forces. Clones and our personnel are not as easily replaced as the Confederacy's droids. But if we do no strike at one of the major worlds, then we will be ceding the initiative to the enemy. General Grievous is many things, unintelligent and unwilling to take advantage of weakness is not among them. If we sit back, he will strike as he did before, and we have no means to devise which fleet he will be with as of yet."

Admiral Zsinj considered Teskit's statement for a few short seconds before responding.

"All of that is accurate," She looked at the holomap and the systems it was focused on. "But the ORSF is not the Republic. If you can persuade me that with our assistance that your assault will be successful, then I will personally see to it that you receive the ships and assistance required to break through the Sullustian lines."

"We will use my battleship and destroyer as a spearhead," Teskit took control of the map and triigered a simulation. The ships of his fleet appearing and the known enemies in the system appearing as well. "Our job will be to focus on the enemy Providence and Lucrehulk-Class vessels that are in the system. The rest of the fleet will split according to our objectives. With wolfpacks of combined Arquitens and Acclamators hunting and destroying any stragglers. While I would like to capture the Sullustian shipyards intact, if we cannot, then we will need to deny them to the enemy. In the event that we are likely to fail, I will instruct my fleet to skuttle the shipyards. If the Horizon were with us, I would interdict the system. But alas, she is not, and so we will not be able to prevent the enemy from escaping or from contacting the greater Confederacy for Reinforcements."

"You still haven't told me where my fleet comes in," Zsinj crossed her arms. "Why do you need extra ships?"

"Because while we have the firepower to take out the majority of the enemy firepower," Teskit waved for the simulation to proceed. "We do not possess adequate anti-starfighter assets to keep my fleet alive. If the estimates are accurate, then we will win against every ship that comes against us. But we will still fail," the simulation showed all of the ships being swarmed by fighters, bombers, and boarding craft. The battleship and destroyer the last of the Republic vessels to be destroyed. "The ORSF has significant assest that can assist."

"Run through a few more simulations with me, first," Maarisa leaned over the table. "Let's see what othe tactics may work. I'd rather not spend my entire fleet on a gamble."

---

The lights that lined the Triumphant's corridors were dimmer than the lights on the Horizon. Instead of the harsh white that seemed to illuminate the Republic's vessels, they were a darker, more comfortable yellow-white in color.

I didn't even really want to be here. But Aliya had insisted that she'd found a way to get the bridge open, and as the acting CO of two ships, I needed to be present to help deal with whatever was on the other side. (And if I didn't come, then she'd open up the doors anyway but without sufficient backup. It was as if she was being compelled to open the doors)

Fortunately, I hadn't come alone. I'd brought two squads of Commandos, a handful of the old War droids we'd found on the spare parts Interdictor. I'd also put on the Republic Mod armor that I'd acquired, and made sure that all of my weapons were ready. I wasn't taking any chances on what might be on the other side…

Chapter 37

"It'll take me about five minutes to get the doors open," Aliya informed us. "After that, we should have full access to the bridge and the systems we've been locked out of."

"Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to stand clear when the doors open," a clone commando with the callsign Nightmare had grabbed my shoulder. "We don't know what's on the other side, and we're not willing to take any of those kinds of risks."

I sighed and moved to where he wanted me to. I wanted to be at the front leading them in, but I knew that if there were a Sith or anything else waiting for us on the other side, that being in the front was probably going to end up with me dead.

It felt like an enternity before Aliya finally looked at the commandos and signaled that the door was about to open.

Tapping one final control, the bridge doors slid open, the clones and droids stepping inside and clearing the interior before sending someone to collect both Aliya and myself.

"I think we found where all of the bodies went," I muttered, looking at the lifeless and mummified corpses of what had once been sentients of the Sith Empire before they settled on the figure in the center of the bridge.

"He's dead as far as we can tell, sir," one of the Commandos commented. "But he doesn't look like the rest of the bodies here."

"Start having droids bag and space these bodies," I ordered. "It's possible that he's still alive, and I don't want to take any chances."

"Yes, sir," The clones saluted while the security droids began moving the first of the bodies.

"Aliya," I turned around to see the engineer stuck with he mouth open at the sight of the bridge. "What do you need us to do after we get the bodies moved out of the way?"

"Aliya," I shook her shoulder and she snapped out of her stunned state and doubled over instead, emptying her stomach's contents out onto the nearby floor.

"Just get it all out," I patted her back as she retched all over the floor. "Nightmare, have someone take her to the medical bay."

"Yes, sir," Nightmare gestured towards another clone, saying something that I figured was on their private comms channel. "Checklist here will ensure she gets there."

The other clone stepped forward and gently grabbed the engineer by the arm before leading her out of the bridge. "Right this way, ma'am. Doc'll get you taken care of."

"Why aren't you affected, sir?" Nightmare asked. "I didn't think you'd served in frontline combat."

"Undercity was worse," I sighed, crouching down. "There's some seriously dark shit down in the underbelly of Coruscant. Things that haven't seen the light of day in millennia. These people don't even have an odor," I reached out and acquired the lightsaber that was attached to a nearby belt. "Then again, anything smells better than the refuge of a trillion sentients and the discarded remains of the dead for thousands upon thousands of years."

"War's a bit different," I continued, gesturing for a droid to pick up the body. "But death, death's the same everywhere. Whether it's here on a ship, or underneath the surface of a world-sized city. Now, help me get the rest of these bodies out of here."

I wasn't quite sure how whatever technique the Sith had used to drain the bodies of life worked, but I was sure that there wasn't enough bodies for this to be the entirety of the crew on the bridge.

If I were completely honest, I was hoping that if there was a Sith Ghost, that it was going to be bound to the body we'd found. In the event I was wrong, we were going to have a situation on our hands.

–
–

I'd spent a few hours helping out on the Triumphant before returning to the Horizon. Despite the fact there'd been no sign of Sith Ghosts doing anything, I still had some deepseated concerns about it.

It was a large part of the reason why I'd grabbed one of his probable acolyte's lightsabers. Even if the original user was dead, it was likely that it'd be useful against any shade or ghost that tried anything.

In the meantime, we were going to be waiting on the return of the 170s and A-Wings that we'd sent as escorts. Our next few hyperspace jumps would set the pace for the rest of our trip.

---

Location: Eriadu

Teskit woke up slowly for once. The warm figure curled up beside him stirring as the comlink on his desk went off.

"That for you or for me?" the brunette asked.

"Me," the officer groaned. "But we're still on leave," Teskit muted the comlink and snuggled back down beside her. "Whatever it is, it can wait."

As the two of them were about to drift off to sleep again though, the comlink chirped again.

Opening his eyes and sitting up, the Commodore grabbed the comlink and opened it.

"Commodore, I'm sorry to interrupt your leave, but this is urgent," Janine Franz's hologram said. "We've just received intel from Republic Intelligence. that a massive fleet just left Sullust and is en route to Eriadu."

"Krif," Teskit swore and nudged his partner. "Get up, we've got work to do."

"Seppies making a move?" she asked, stretching and lazily walking to where she'd left her bag.

"Heading right for us," Teskit replied. "It's likely that they're trying to preempt our strike."

"It's what I'd have done in their position," the woman pulled on a fresh tunic and then the rest of her kit, finishing it off with her issued blaster going into her holster.

"Let me know where you want my fleet positioned," Teskit slipped his comlink into his belt. "We'll be ready for the Separatists when they get here."

"We better be," Maarisa pulled her hair up into a bun. "Because after we deal with this fleet, we're taking the fight directly to them. I'm tired of playing defense."

"Ceding the initiative was never going to be the way that we won this war," Teskit agreed.

"A shame that they picked now to do so though," Zsinj smirked. "I was so looking forward to the rest of the weekend."

"We can continue this once the war has been won," Teskit replied, fixing his uniform cap onto his head. "Now, we have a battle to plan for."

–
–

"What's the status of the fleet?" Teskit asked as he stepped onto the bridge of the Defender.

"Moving into the positions you ordered, sir," Commander "Task" CT-1972 replied from the comms terminal. "The ORSF auxileries are taking positions to assist, and the handful of defensive stations have gone on standby. When they come, we'll be ready for them."

The next few days were a flurry of organization and movement until a massive Separatist fleet dropped out of hyperspace at the edge of the system.

"Commodore, enemy unencrypted Comms seems to indicate that this fleet has multiple Jedi forces among it. We may be seeing some of Dooku's acolytes among the fleet," Jedi-Commander Kalyna briefed him. Her fleet section was placed closer to Eriadu than most of the others as she'd proven herself better at defense than at pushing the enemy.

"If you detect them, then inform us immediately," Teskit ordered. "We'll deal with them before they become a greater problem. As for the rest of us. We will stick to the plan. It's through competence and steadfastedness that today will be won. Both of which we possess. So, let them fall upon us. We will endure."

---

The Shadow was displeased. After so much time and energy spent to try and achieve immortality through the possession of such a beautiful creature of darkness as the Drake was, it had been thwarted by mere mortals. Mortals who he could no longer even steal the lifeforce from as he desired.

With his body long since abandoned; he was left to struggle and influence the minds of those weak enough to potentially betray their fellows. But there seemed to be few who would be so easily influenced. He had first desired to take over the Commander's body. While not as capable as his previous form, it would have been sufficient. However, said commander's body had completely rejected his influence, there were no gaps that he could push through.

He would bide his time though. Now that his body had been disposed of, he had all the time in the galaxy to find a new form. Then he could search out a new method. The Drake would still be his final immortal form, it would merely take longer to achieve.

Chapter 38

I opened my eyes to the feeling of something being off. There was something strange about my house, and given this wasn't the first time we'd had it broken into, I knew what my usual procedures were.

Sitting up as quietly as I could, I moved the covers off me and stood up. Thankfully my desk chair was out of the way enough that I could access the small safe I kept by my desktop. A short combination later and I had my handgun in my hand and the spare magazine in my pocket.

It might sound crazy to want to clear my house on what seemed like a whim. But I didn't take chances with my kids.

The power was out. Because the usual dull glow of my alarm clock and that of the hallway light was gone. Music quietly streaming from underneath my kid's bedroom door told me that it hadn't been out for long enough for that battery to die yet, either.

I pointed the weapon at the hallway and towards the front and back doors, flipping the weapon light on and illuminating the living room, only to find nothing. Moving forward, I checked the corners and any possible hiding spots before heading back to my kid's room and opening the door there.

There was nothing, both kids quietly snoring underneath their blankets. The heavy sleepers unaware that there might be anything wrong.

After checking the garage for anything that might have gotten in there, I moved to the back door, unlocked it, and stepped outside. With the power out, the back porch light wasn't there to stop me from seeing the stars.

Turning the weaponlight off, I stared up at the sky for a moment before turning around to open the back door, only for it to not be there.

In its place was a sliding door and a control panel. Then I looked up, and the stars were gone as well. Replaced by a ceiling that looked impossibly high up. A few lights illuminated what looked like a street surrounded by concrete.

But this wasn't the clean streets, plants, and greenery I was used to seeing where I lived. No, this was dull, dark and gray, with nothing but filth lining the walls and surfaces of everything.

A distant light flickered and a shadow moved in my field of vision. There was a chill that ran down my spine, and I smelled something akin to ozone in the air.

My handgun was still in my hand though, and the spare magazine I'd grabbed was in my pocket. So, I backed up toward the door and hit the keypad, My heart pounded in my chest, and I felt a deep sense of dread come over me as I continued hitting the controls, desperately hoping that it would work and let me into what I was hoping was a way back home. I needed to be home with my kids.

It didn't work, and my heart sank. The dread leaving me with something ice cold in its place. I had no other options now that my back was to a wall.

I settled into a long-practiced shooting stance and flipped the weapon light on for a brief second, just long enough to catch a glimpse of the attacker before lining up my sights and squeezing the trigger.

The shot was impossibly loud in whatever underground I had found myself in, and I had to ignore the beginnings of my tinnitus flaring up again as I watched the creature fall back, a small hole in it.

Unfortunately, it was trying to get back up and lunge at me, so I squeezed the trigger two more times and watched it go still. Pained gasps having ceased altogether with the 9mm to the brain.

Checking my magazine, I nodded. I still had eighteen rounds left plus the magazine in my pocket.

"I really hope these are the new batteries," I muttered, turning on my only source of light in the dark ridden space.

---

I woke up in a start and a cold sweat. It had been a long time since I'd dreamed about the first night in the Undercity. The nightmares having mostly stopped once I'd felt safe in the prison on Coruscant.

"It's probably just the stress of being responsible for everyone," I muttered, trying to convince myself that it wasn't anything more.

Still, I didn't have time to dwell on nightmares or dreams about the past. Hell, the dream hadn't even gotten that encounter right. I touched a scar on my left hip. I'd only barely survived that creature, and I certainly hadn't had that much ammo left afterwards.

Pulling on my olive drab uniform, I straighted it and pulled on the officer cap before glancing in the mirror that was in my quarters. I didn't looke like I felt, but given a few more days or weeks, the dark bags would make a reappearance like they once had.

Even though I was tired, I should be able to push through my shift and get some solid sleep 'tonight'. Whenever that was.

So, with a nod to the 'me' that was in the mirror, I did one last look around my quarters before sliding my blaster and handgun into their respective holsters.

Weapons might as well be a part of my religion nowadays…

–
–

The reports from the starfighters we'd sent ahead as scouts hadn't done the next system we jumped into justice in the slightest. If anything, they had undersold the system.

Most systems without habitable worlds had lifeless rocks orbiting a star. Usually, there might be a gas giant in orbit, but even those were smaller and less common in explored space.

There were four gas giants in orbit around this binary star system. Each with a set of rings that glistened when the red and blue suns light struck them. Looking out of the viewport, it was almost as if this system was made out of diamonds from afar. The massive rings would make any single one of the gas gianst a tourist destination for many to see. To have four together in this lone world out here in the Unknown Regions felt almost like God had taken a lone jewel out of creation and hidden it away just for us to find.

Dozens, if not hundreds of moons surrounded the giants, and if we'd the time, I'd love to see if there were any habitable worlds around them. But for now, we simply documented the system and moved on. Marking its location in our navicomputer and logs for a potential return someday.

"This would be a place to retire to," Lieutenant Vane said after a comfortable silence filled the rest of the bridge. "The amount of resources that are probably here, and this view." He shook his head. "You always hear spacers talk about seeing systems like this. But no one ever really believes those rumors."

"Well, we'll be adding to the rumor mill when we get back," I laughed. "Still, we've got some time to kill while we rotate our pilots out and have them scout the next system. Let's run some scans and see what we can find while we're here. Specifically, water or food sources."

While we weren't low on fuel, food, or anything else yet. (We had the reserves for three years of travel). It would be for the best if we were able to obtain some fresh water or food from a local planet.

Morale's a helluva thing to keep high… Especially when your people are living off survival rations and the equivalent of MREs.

---

At the first glance, it appeared to Teskit that nearly all of the Confederacy forces in the sector had gathered here to remove Eriadu and the ORSF from the war effort. After all, Eriadu and a handful of nearby systems were the key to ensuring the Republic's hold on this part of the Outer Rim.

Hundreds of IFFS from ships from both enemy and friendly began to fill up the holotable. The red daggers of the Republic mirroring the blue dots of enemy ships as individual fleet sections were ordered into differing positions.

But there was a problem. All of the Republic elements were acting independently of each other. Moving into their own fleet formations and interfering with, or disrupting the other Republic forces. The lone exception being the ORSF forces led by Zsinj. They were falling into complementary formations with his fleet, her two Venators moving their dagger-shaped hulls into an escorting position for his Defender and the Shards of Elysium. The two massive wedge-shaped ships dwarfed even the large Venators and held many times their firepower over.


Teskit theoretically had the authority to assume command of the other fleet elements in the system. But in practice, he was just as likely to be ignored.

Still, if he did nothing, then the Republic would likely lose this battle, and Eriadu along with it.

So, tapping a control, he began to broadcast across FLEETCOM.

"This is Commodore Condev Teskit of Battlegroup Huntress. I am assuming command of all Republic ships in the system, please respond to the handshake procedures and tie your ships into our command structure. I repeat…"

Chapter 39

Location: Unknown Regions

We'd known that the seeming peace of our return to the Republic wouldn't, couldn't last. Something that was proven when we moved to the next explored system. One that had been clear according to our starfighter scouts when they'd returned a day or so ago. A quiet star system with a sole star and two 'dead' planets in orbit around it.

The problem was, it wasn't such a quiet and 'dead' system when we arrived. Instead, we found ourselves spectators of a skirmish between four ships.

Two of them seemed eerily similar to that of Mon-Calamari star cruisers, in that they were circular and bristiling with various bumps that likely indicated weapons. One of those two was drifitng though, its engines sputtering along while the other one guarded it. They were being attacked by what looked like a pair of coral reefs in space, the two organic vessels intent on destroying the nonorganic ones.

"Sir, we're being hailed," The comms officer reported, Lieutenant Vale leaning over her shoulder to look at her screen.

I walked over and accepted the headset I was offered, listening to the static-filled device before an unfamiliar accent filled my ears.

"This is Captain Plikh'os'ianico of the Chiss Expansionary Defense Force to the unkown ships in the system," it crackled. "We are requesting aid against the Far-Outsiders, they have crippled one of our heavy cruisers and seek to exterminate us."

Everything now clicked and I knew exactly where the bioogranic ships had come from. My first instinct was to begin opening fire, but I needed to justify it to the rest of the people under my command.

"Sir, we should help these people," Lieutenant Vane said. "If nothing else, they can help us navigate our way out of here."

"Right," I accepted the out that Vane had just handed me. "Power up weapons and shields. Designate the ships from Captain Phlik," I butchered the name, but just accepted and moved on. "As friendlies and begin opening fire on the other two."

As soon as I gave the order, our two wedge-shaped ships began to fill the void between us with the green and blue of heavy and medium turbolaser batteries.

"Sir, they're absorbing all of our fire," the sensors officer reported. "But in the process, they've completely slowed down. There's no movement outside of their momentum. It's like all of their propulsion vanished when we began firing."

"Sir, the Triumphant is preparing to launch proton torpedoes and concussion missiles," Vane reported.

"Have them target somewhere that we're not firing," I orderd. "Let's see if we can bypass their defenses. Meanwhile, have us start firing on an arc, across their aft."

I watched as the enemy ships stopped firing at what I now knew to be Chiss vessels, instead, turning to focus on my pair of antiquated vessels. Despite having read so much about them in high school, the Vong still took me by surprise, their plasma projectiles melted through the deflectors, only barley slowing down to impact and threaten our hull.

"Armor damage in sections Shen-seven and Orenth-Four," Vane said from the console that he'd sat down in. "I'm evacuating those decks and assigning damage control teams."

"Keep up the fire," I ordered. "And keep us on the move. I'm pretty sure that was just a recon hit. They wanted to know how much we could take. I expect we'll see far more firepower coming after us now."

If the system had had more than the two worlds that were a distance away, I'd have been trying to use asteroids or anything possible to put between us and the enemy. As it was, with the system being mostly barren, we were locked into a slugfest with little to do but maneuver around the enemy vong ships. If we were firing, they couldn't move. But their return fire was both accurate and painful. As my previous words were proven right. The second Vong ship finally rounded the 'corner' behind the one we were focused on and began to return fire. I couldn't remember the name of their plasma cannons, but it didn't matter. They caused a lot of damage when they impacted all the same.

Even evasive maneuvers weren't enough to keep all of the damage away, and we had to choose between putting more power into our weapons or our deflectors and engines.

Still, we maintained our focused fire on the first Vong ship. It was 'down' from us and as such was in the perfect cone of fire for most of our turbolasers. The massive weapons causing damage even through the singularity generators, if only bits at a time. However, we weren't restricted to that kind of damage. After all, the Triumphant's proton torpedoes and concussion missiles of the Triumphant were about to make an impact. Our focus on one area had kept their singularity generators busy while the missiles broke through the organic armor and began ripping it to pieces. The initial explosions seemed to cause minimal damage before one of their plasma cannons overheated and exploded, ripping part of their ship apart and exposing it to the explosive decompression of the void. Which did the rest of the work for us.

"First enemy ship is down, sir," Vane reported as the Horizon shook under the plasma fire of the remaining Vong ship.

A few of their starfighters had attempted to get close, only to get vaporized by accurate fire from our point defenses, the quad lasers doing more than enough to overwhelm whatever they were using as shields.

One specific hit nearly threw me to the ground, even as Vane began to direct damage control teams to deal with the immediate damage.

Thankfully, this is when the Triumphant and the operational Chiss vessel stepped in.

With the Triumphant focusing fire on the enemy ship, the Chiss Heavy cruiser was able to launch some sort of missile into the breach, a cloud of something eating away at the Vong ship until it suddenly moved away from the fire, taking a few turbolaser hits even as it continued to lose armor.

It was trying to run, only Aliya seemed a bit bloodthirsty for once, because a concussion missile and pair of torpedoes saw to it that the Vong vessel was crippled, limping along until the Chiss put it out of its misery.

"Get the rest of the damage under control," I ordered. "And get ready to receive visitors. We're going to be here a while."

---

Four hours later…

We'd spent the better part of the next few hours conducting emergency repairs on the Horizon and the Triumphant. The Horizon had taken more damage, but both ships still needed us to take care of things and seal off several decks.

We'd also managed to help the Chiss with the evacuation of their ship the Aggressor. It seemed that one of the 'Far Outsider' hits had caused their reactor to hit near critical levels. They'd been able to stabilize it, but only barely; it was expected to explode as soon as we left the system, if not sooner.

However, with half of their ship's crew ending up on the Horizon, we were now going to be having a meeting with the remaining Captain. We had some things to sort out.

"The Chiss Expansionary Defence Fleet thanks you for your assistance in this matter," the blue-skinned woman in her black uniform gave me a brief nod. "As I communicated previously, I am Captain Plikh'os'ianico of the Guardian. However, you may call me by my core name. Khosia."

"I'm Lieutenant Hull of the Grand Navy of the Republic," I reached out and shook her hand, studying her red eyes for a moment.

"I wish it were under different circumstances that we had met," She nodded, looking around the hangar of the Horizon. "Unfortunately, given the nature of the Far Outsiders and your rescue of us. I will have to ask that you slave your computer systems to mine for a hyperdrive jump so that you may be debriefed."

She raised an eyebrow as a pair of B-1 crewmembers began to manhandle a piece of the deck away to repair a conduit underneath while in view.

"We will also see to it that your ships are repaired," She smirked. "As repayment for the assistance you have offered."

"None of my crew will be harmed?" I asked.

"We are in your debt," Khosia frowned at me. "The Agressor's crew is on your ship. I would not sacrifice them for petty circumstances as that."

"Then we'll take you up on that offer," I sighed. "As long as it comes with a map out of here too."

"That remains to be seen," the Chiss captain replied. "But I will see what I can do."

---

Location: Eriadu

Kalyna was very much aware that she was out of her depth as anything more than a small ship captain or a Starfighter. It's why she had argued with Commodore Teskit when he'd first assigned her to be in charge of a Section of Battlegroup Huntress.

Taking charge of a trio of Acclamator assault ships and their escorts was no easy ask. But the Republic was under attack, and she knew her duty.

Standing in the middle of the bridge, the Jedi reached out into the Force and expelled her worries and frustrations into it. Battling the Dark Side even as it began to close in from the Separatist fleet.

There were more than one Dark Jedi among the enemy fleet. While she didn't know them by name, Kalyna was more than aware that several of those Dark Jedi were people who she had likely been friends or acquaintances at some point in time.

Opening her eyes, Jedi-Commander Kalyna Durald was calm once again, and now knew exactly where two of the enemy Dark Jedi were. One was on a Providence-Class destroyer hidden behind much of the Separatist fleet. The other had a fleet section and was headed directly for her own small section.

"Open a channel to the Defender," Kalyna orderd.

"Yes, ma'am," the clone replied, his hands dancing across the controls before he tossed the headset to her.

"Commodore, I've got a lock on one of the enemy Dark Jedi," She informed him. "They're coming after my fleet section, what are your orders?"

"I'm sending a group over to assist," the Commodore's voice was calm even though half othe Republic Fleet had elected to ignore him in favor of following a different Commodore's orders. "Hold your position for now, we can't afford to offer the enemy any exposed sections across our lines."

With that, the transmission cut off, and Kalyna observed as the Shards of Elysium began to shift. The Acclamator destroyer was faster than almost any other capital ship in the system, and it showed with how it had begun to outpace its escorts before slowing its own acceleration.

Thankfully, as the enemy began to close into weapons range, Kalyna identified a weakness in the enemy. They were just as disjointed and disunited as the Republic fleet was, if not moreso. The Republic fleet was split between Teskit and another Commodore, meanwhile the Confederacy had four different points of command, each pulling in a different direction.

After she'd dealt with this group of enemies and the Dark Jedi within, Kalyna would relay this information to Teskit. Dividing the enemy would mean they could push them out and move to secure this Sector of the Galaxy again.

Feeling the bloodlust of her crew, Kalyna reached out into the Force to steady herself once again. Aggression was needed in war. But losing herself in it would be the end. Soresu was her practiced Form for a reason. She'd always been drawn to aggressive actions first, but with enough time and discipline had overcome that part of her personality.
So, with a sharp inhale, Kalyna turned and began giving instructions. The enemy was here, and the important fight was outside as much as it was within.

WIth one last glance in place to ensure her armor was secured, Kalyna moved to the viewport, she wanted to see the men and women she was going to be consigning to their death even as she gave the orders…