The incessant ding of a transmission alert cut through the haze of sleep, in spite of Kativie Lusp’s best efforts to dismiss it. Half-blind, the small Zabrak woman rolled out of her bunk and crashed to the floor before finally shaking herself off and rising to her feet. She heard some of the other crew of the Skipray blastboat start to awaken and finally reached the comm unit, slapping off the alert. The green-eyed woman pondered what she probably looked like with her hair in a mess, tangled around her horns, for just a moment before connecting the transmission.

The blue-tinted holo that swam into appearance was neither her husband and children, nor any of the Jedi Knights.

It was Halyn Sanshir, her brother.

“Confirm security of this transmission, Katie,” Halyn said immediately.

The instruction was enough to shake the last vestiges of sleep away. She glanced over at the status lights on the comm board. “Transmission secure, encryption Aleph-Aleph-Seven-Echo-Four.”

“Confirmed.” Halyn said. “ What’s your status?”

“En route to Shelter with a crew,” she replied. “Survivors from Coruscant until we can regroup.” She squinted her eyes, trying to read her brother’s expression in the fuzzy quarter-sized hologram. “Is something wrong?”

“We are Case Black,” the other replied, his face a mask.

Kativie’s heart caught in her throat. The Yuuzhan Vong have attacked Iridonia. They’re under siege. I have to get back there now. Where are the children? Where’s my husband? “Status?” she asked, barely keeping her voice under control.

“We’ve deflected the first attack, with help from the furballs,” Halyn replied.

Wookiees, Kativie translated to herself.

“I’ve issued the recall order,” her brother continued. “We’ve been receiving confirmations from Fleet and Army units, and we’ll have a sizable force here soon. I need you to execute Operation Orange.” Halyn glanced away from the holocam for a moment. “I’m sending you all the information I have for your use, including the current tactical and strategic situation, and the information you’ll need for Orange.”

Kativie nodded grimly, half-watching the incoming data flow across a secondary flat display.

“How long until you can be here?” Halyn asked.

“I’ll need to drop this crew off at Shelter, which we’re four hours out from,” she replied. “Sixteen hours from Shelter to Iridonia with the back routes. Add in time I’ll need to refuel this blastboat, and it’ll be about a day.”

“Sooner if possible,” Halyn said shortly. “We need you here as quick as we can. It’ll do everyone here good if they see a Jedi on the front lines fighting with us here.”

Kativie couldn’t help but smile at that, stretching her arms. The Force carried the hilt of her lightsaber from its resting place under her bunk to her outstretched hand. Its weight arrived with a reassuring thump, and she brought it around to be visible in front of the holocam. “As soon as I can,” she promised. She hesitated for a long moment. “The kids and…”

Halyn nodded slightly as her words trailed off. “They’ll be safe enough until you arrive. I don’t think the Vong will make a push again before you’re here—we bloodied their noses, and Anishor thinks we nailed their commander. They’re not overly aggressive yet, but they will be soon enough.”

“Is the New Republic sending forces?”

“Doubful,” Halyn said. “After the disaster at Coruscant, they’re scattered…”

“Coruscant?!” Kativie  exclaimed. “You mean the Vong…?”

“You didn’t know?”

The Zabrak woman shut her eyes tightly for a moment. “I was retrieving a couple of Jedi who were under threat from the voxyn,” she said slowly. “I’ve been out of touch for nearly two weeks. I didn’t know.” She hesitated. “How bad?”

“The Vong killed a couple million refugees doing it,” Halyn said grimly. “Half the New Republic fleet was there, and they couldn’t hold the Vong off. The Jedi had a full wing of starfighters there and managed to kill several yammosks, but it didn’t make much of a difference. The Zabrak Defense Force fought with Wedge Antilles in Fleet Group Three, but we were largely a harassing action the entire time and lost none of our capital ships. The starfighter groups that deployed with us took a beating, but they’ve been rotated out for fresh squadrons.”

Coruscant…they took Coruscant. The idea just couldn’t quite seem to coalesce into reality in Kativie’s mind. How could they have possibly taken Coruscant? What will the New Republic do now? What about the Jedi?

“The Vong struck here less than sixty hours after taking the capital,” Halyn continued. “I think they were expecting to get a cheap shot in and take our systems without much of a fight. The ambushes we’ve discussed previously worked perfectly, but they won’t work a second time.”

Kativie nodded. “Any friends showing up?”

“A few already,” her brother replied. “More on the way, I think. Especially now that the recall is out.” He frowned thoughtfully. “I wonder if I can legally recall you from service to the Jedi Order. Do the treaties between Iridonia and Coruscant include the Jedi?”

Kativie snorted. “Like it really matters. You know I’m coming regardless, even if Master Skywalker himself told me not to come.”

“Oh, I know. Just wondering.” Halyn shook his head. “I’ll be meeting with the Council soon,” he said with just a bit of tension in his voice. “I may have overstepped a bit already.”

“Wait…” Kativie said as she put the pieces together. “You issued the recall before you talked to the Council?”

Halyn shrugged. “Only doing what I needed to do, little sister,” he said in reply. “Easier to ask forgiveness than permission.”

“And what will we do if they pull you out of the Commander-in-Chief spot?” Kat retorted. “That was a big risk, and you’re gambling all of Zabrak space on it.”

“It’d be as big a gamble to wait until the Council can get their asses together,” Halyn spat back. “Without those forces, we won’t turn aside another Yuuzhan Vong attack.”

Kat’s guts twisted. “You think you can—“

“No,” Halyn said immediately. “But some things have to be said for appearances. If I get into sloppy habits talking to you, it’ll come out at the wrong time.” He glanced aside from the holocam, then back. “I’ll see you in twenty-four hours. Don’t be late.”

“I won’t be,” Kativie promised. The transmission faded and died, and she slumped back in her chair. So much for sleep, she thought glumly.

 

 

“You wanted to see me, Master Skywalker?” Kelta Rose asked hesitantly from the door. She was cleanly-showered after her dip in the bacta tank, though she still couldn’t get the sour taste out of her mouth.

Luke Skywalker turned his head as the group he was sitting with scattered. Another meeting, Kelta had already decided. He’s probably grateful.

The blonde Jedi Master smiled at her, though weariness was in his eyes. “Yes, Kelta. Please, come sit down.”

The red-haired Jedi seated herself across the table from Skywalker. “What is it?”

Luke studied her for a moment. “What do you know about the political situation in Zabrak space?” he asked.

Kelta hesitated before answering. “Not as much as I should, I expect. I know Zabrak space has been Jedi-friendly, but not much beyond that.”

“I thought you’d know more,” the Jedi Master said offhandedly, “given your connections to some of the clans on Iridonia.”

Kelta’s poker face held. I’ll never let anything happen to my daughter…even if I have to fight you, Master Skywalker.

“When the Yuuzhan Vong declared war on the Jedi at Duro,” Luke continued, “it divided a number of worlds into pro-Jedi and anti-Jedi camps. The Zabrak worlds, as a whole, came down on the side of the Jedi and have been firm supporters. In fact, one of Iridonia’s shipping companies has been crucial in setting up elements of the Great River. Of course, it helps that the Shooting Star Shipping Company is owned by the husband of a Jedi, Kativie Lusp.

“Further, up until the battle of Reecee, Iridonia’s military was headed by a firmly pro-Jedi Zabrak, Argus Sanshir, who made a name for himself during the Galactic Civil War by heading up one of the largest and most successful underground resistance cells. When a Rebel Alliance starfighter wing broke the blockade around Iridonia, Argus’s people were on-hand to take advantage of it.”

Kelta nodded. “So how do I factor into this?”

“Aside from the fact that your daughter was inducted into the Sanshir clan?” Luke’s smile held no threat. “The problem is that Argus disappeared during the battle at Reecee—he was commanding elements of Zabrak space’s defenses there as part of the New Republic task force.”

It was all Kelta could do to keep from staring. She locked down on her emotions hard, but she had no doubt the Jedi Master could sense her turmoil. Argus…oh Argus. When Kativie finds out, it will rip her hearts apart.

“And with his disappearance, his younger brother stepped out of nowhere and has assumed the reins of power. His name is Halyn Sanshir,” Luke continued, his blue eyes studying her. “And we have no idea if his stance is pro or anti-Jedi. He led a Zabrak task force as part of Wedge Antilles’s Fleet Group  Three during the battle of Coruscant, but he returned to Iridonia with his fleet instead of joining us in taking Borleias. And in the last twenty-four hours, every Zabrak fighter squadron in the New Republic Defense Force has disappeared.”

The last statement brought surprise bubbling to the surface. “I’m not sure I understand,” Kelta said. Her mind raced as her mouth had replied automatically. Halyn…is alive? After all this time, he’s still alive?

“When the Zabrak nation joined the New Republic, it contributed all-Zabrak fighter squadrons to the Fleet. Nearly a full percent of our starfighter forces are comprised of Zabrak pilots and crew. Those forces are rotated regularly with the Zabrak home defense forces, meaning they all take their turn serving. But now, as near as Wedge and I can determine, they’re all gone.”

Kelta frowned. “How many squadrons are we talking about?”

“The fleet here had a larger percentage of Zabrak squadrons than most—two units off the Mon Mothma, and another from the Elegos A’Kla.”

“So what do you want me to do?”

Luke’s blue eyes were unreadable. “I want you to go to Iridonia, find out if this Halyn Sanshir is for or against the Jedi, and find out why the Zabrak recalled their fighter squadrons from the Fleet. If Iridonia has chosen to sign a pact with the Yuuzhan Vong, we need to know as soon as possible.”

Kelta shook her head. “Why not send Kativie?” Please, not me. I can’t deal with him again. I can’t. Kativie is the one to send—he’s her damned brother. This should be her mission, not mine. She can deal with him. She knows everything about Iridonia that I don’t.

“She disappeared the same time the fighter squadrons did,” Luke replied calmly. “That leaves you, with a connection to the Sanshir clan, as the best possible choice.”

The woman hesitated, and Luke spoke more softly. “Kelta, you’ve been with the Jedi for a long time now. You have secrets that you don’t share, and I understand that. But…” the Jedi Master uncharacteristically hesitated. “Something limits you. Your potential lies untapped because something in your past still shackles you. And the Force has indicated that you are the one who needs to do this. I believe this, Kelta Rose, is what is needed not just for the Jedi or for the New Republic, but for you personally. I have no evidence…only what the Force has led me to believe.”

Kelta stared at the Jedi Master. How does he know? Am I really that transparent? Am I weak in the Force?

“Whatever happens on Iridonia,” Luke said quietly, “is your trial to face. The Force hides your fate from me—I don’t know if you’ll become a Master, or fall to the dark side, or die there. But it is the path you need to walk.”

“There’s no one else to send?” Kelta whispered.

“You need to do this,” Luke replied.

The woman closed her eyes. May the Force be with me. Oh, fierfek, I don’t want to do this. Me, a Master? Will I fall? Will I die? I can’t leave my daughter alone in the universe.  “Will you have a transport for me?’

“The ground crews prepped a Series-4 E-wing for your use,” Luke replied, his tone more normal now. “It should take you to Iridonia and back easily, and should provide you the firepower you need should you stumble across something unexpected.”

Kelta nodded oh-so-slowly. “I understand, Master Skywalker, and I accept the assignment.”

“May the Force be with you, Kelta Rose.”

“And with you, Master Skywalker.”

 

 

The death of Commander Bykkora Kraal left Domain Kraal in disarray.

Three Yuuzhan Vong warriors had stepped up to exert supremacy. Now, the Yuuzhan Vong tactician Ret Kraal watched with disinterest as those three fought to take command of a losing battle. A crowd had gathered around the fighting circle to watch, but Ret did not believe the outcome would truly matter.

If Commander Bykkora Kraal had listened to my advice, Domain Kraal would now be in orbit over this accursed world, preparing to take it as our own. Instead, three fools battle to the death to see who will be the next to fail. Ret frowned as the three warriors exchanged rapid-fire blows from amphistaffs, each taking opportunity of another’s strikes to try to slip a decisive strike into another’s defenses. They fight each other, when their focus should be on the destruction of the infidels.

He frowned as the largest of the three was thrown off-balance by a strike to the ankle. The big warrior suffered more blows as his defenses slipped. He stumbled, but it bought him the half-breath of space he needed to lash out at his enemies. Perhaps we are the larger warrior, Ret mused. These infidels, these Zabraks, have less resources. They are not as mighty a race. Their forces are inferior to our own, but they strike precisely and off-balanced our forces. Their follow-up strike was aimed true, and it removed our head and best chance.

The big warrior lunged and his amphistaff curled around the ankle of one of his opponents. He heaved back, and the Yuuzhan Vong warrior was jerked from his feet. The third warrior, instead of striking his fallen opponent, lunged in return at the big warrior, his amphistaff straight as a spear. The blow glanced off the big warrior’s armor, but it was enough to give the downed warrior a chance to survive. These Zabraks fight with ferocity and skill, and their strategies appear more subtle than first meets the eye. Bykkora Kraal believed the infidel ambush was easily-beaten and wasn’t ready when the true strike arrived. The readers must be wrong; the Zabrak commander is not a fool, nor is he inexperienced in warfare. There is no doubt of that.

The fallen warrior did not rise to his feet—instead, he in turn lashed out with his amphistaff, the weapon becoming soft and whiplike as its serpentine head flashed at the smaller of his opponents. Its fangs found flesh, and though in an instant the victim had kicked it away, it was too late. The infidel forces arrayed against us are smaller but potent. It would be wise for us to poison them, weaken them before they can do us true harm.

The poisoned warrior staggered back from the fighting; even if he won, he had already lost. Still, he rotated his amphistaff overhead with a war cry and charged forward.

The big warrior ignored him as he recovered his own amphistaff, then sliced it down at the warrior on the floor with an overhead chop. The downed warrior, instead of avoiding it, took the blow on his vonduun crab armor unflinchingly, then seized the big warrior’s staff just below its hissing head and pulled hard.

The big warrior released the weapon rather than be thrown off-guard again. Before he act further, the poisoned warrior was all over him, raining blows down with his amphistaff. To Ret’s eye, the blows were already slowing, the strikes no longer as strong or sure. The venom works quickly. And now…

The warrior still didn’t rise from the ground. In an instant the amphistaff he’d pulled from the largest warrior hardened into a spear at an unspoken command, and he hurled it the big warrior’s armpit. The vonduun crab was pierced and the big warrior shrieked once, but he could do nothing but battle the poisoned warrior as he bled out.

The warrior who’d fallen rolled back from the fighting and climbed to his feet, his amphistaff curling around his forearm and a triumphant smile on his face. Ret paused. He allows his enemies to battle each other, dooming both. He, perhaps, has potential. Perhaps Domain Kraal is not yet Shamed.

The warrior watched as both his opponents slowly sank to their knees, still fighting with their dying breaths. He turned away before they could gasp their last. “I am the warrior Triak of Domain Kraal!” he intoned. “I will led us to victory over these infidels, by the will of the gods!”

Some of the members of the surrounding crowed cheered for the victorious warrior. Ret was surprised, however, when Triak turned and looked directly to him. “Tactician Ret of Domain Kraal, the gods have need of your services. It is time to crush these infidels and redeem our domain. We are warriors, and we will not stand by to be Shamed!”

Ret bowed his head in response. “I live to serve the gods,” he rasped. “And by their will, we shall be victorious…or die in glorious battle.”

“Indeed,” Triak said gravely. “Domain Kraal did not cross the starless voids to die shamed, as Vong, orphaned children of the gods! We are Yuuzhan Vong, the chosen people. The gods have not abandoned us here—they are testing our mettle, our skill, our devotion.

“Bring forth the priests!” he called. “Let us sacrifice to the gods, that they give us victory!”

As the crowd began to disperse, Triak stepped within earshot of Ret. “Bykkora Kraal,” he said so low that Ret strained to hear, “was a fool who believed in her own destiny, blinded by faith. The gods demand the best of us—our greatest skill and greatest strength. I need a second, one who is wiser than myself…one who can tell me what the seers miss. Is that you, Ret of Domain Kraal?”

Ret surpressed a smile. I may yet command Domain Kraal. The strength of a warrior is not the strength of a tactician, and in Triak’s fall may be my own ascension. “I live to serve,” he repeated. “I will be your second, and for the glory of the gods we will crush these infidels and redeem the name of Domain Kraal!”

 

The bridge of the Cathleen, flagship of Iridonia, was a continual hive of activity. To Halyn’s mild amusement, or occasional irritation, he found he was able to filter out almost all of it. In spite of the crewmen running to and fro, the constant updates from Kryi Rinnet, the starfighter coordinator, the incoming transmissions from other ships of the fleet, very little could penetrate the calm that seemed to surround him.

The tactical display, as always, showed the Yuuzhan Vong fleet at the edge of the system. Reinforcements had trickled in to their formation in the past forty-eight hours, but not the overwhelming forces Halyn had expected. The destroyed capital ships had both been replaced, and fresh coralskippers had replenished their ranks, but the heavy firepower Halyn expected had not materialized. Something’s different here, he concluded. I’m not sure what, but the Vong aren’t throwing the kind of forces at us I expected.

The strategic display glowed green with friendly reinforcements. Starfighter squadrons from all over the fragmented New Republic had poured in, far more than replacing Zabrak losses from the first engagement. Smaller capital ships—armed freighters, corvette, frigates, and a couple of light cruisers—had swelled the Zabrak Defense Fleet. Units from the Army were already on the ground on Iridonia, integrating seamlessly into the existing defenses.

And it won’t be enough. The forces the Zabrak had brought to bear were too fighter-heavy, with not nearly enough capital ships. Starfighters are important, even essential to modern warfare, but you don’t build your military forces around it…unless you were the Rebel Alliance, of course. Even then, without the Star Cruisers from Mon Calamari, the Alliance wouldn’t have had the forces necessary for the engagement at Endor.

Starfighter pilots had coined the phrase “Trench Run Disease” after Yavin, referring to the use of well-armed starfighters to punch way out of their weight class. Coordinated snubfighter assaults had destroyed more than a few Imperial capital ships, but it was the exception, not the norm.

Iridonia now housed thousands of starfighters with the return of the New Republic squadrons…and they wouldn’t be enough. That’s an advantage to these Vong cruisers—they don’t have a reactor to destroy. It won’t ever go supercritical and destroy the ship. There’s no power cells to neutralize. Halyn knew that it didn’t mean the Yuuzhan Vong’s capital ships didn’t have weaknesses—they certainly did—but those weaknesses were far different than the conventional starship.

And many starfighter tactics were designed around a conventional starship’s weaknesses.

Halyn was pondering the possibility of new tactics when something unusual enough happened to penetrate the peace surrounding him. He frowned, turning to locate the offending communication or officer or report.

“Unidentified cruiser, stand by,” the ensign at the communication station was saying. “Repeat, stand by.” The ensign looked around frantically, until his eyes were caught by Halyn’s.

“What is it?”

“A cruiser with no IFF codes has dropped out of hyperspace and is attempting to take up orbit around Iridonia.” The ensign looked nervous. “Sir, should we scramble fighters to intercept?”

Halyn looked at Kryi, caught her attention, and nodded. She immediately turned back to her console to dispatch starfighter squadrons.

“No IFF at all?” Halyn asked the ensign. When she shook her head, his voice dropped to a growl. “Peace Brigade.” The Brigade was an organization of traitors to the galaxy, mercenaries, pirates, and scoundrels who’d sold out secrets and intelligence to the Yuuzhan Vong. They’d been encountered in more than a few systems, acting as support for the Yuuzhan Vong. Bastards deserve nothing but death.

He looked around the bridge. “I want turbolaser solutions for that unidentified warship,” he called. “Don’t light him up yet, but paint him with lock so he’s aware we’re watching him.”

The chaos on the bridge increased as officers became aware of the unfolding conflict and began maneuvering their charges out of the hot zone.

“Give me a visual on the cruiser,” Halyn called. It took a moment before a blue-white hologram of the warship swam into view, with potential weapons emplacements highlighted in red, shield generators in green, engines in blue, and other systems labeled and highlighted in white. The vessel was twelve hundred meters long and, from first glance, at least as heavily-armed as the Cathleen. Closer inspection of the vessel’s armament revealed ion cannons and proton torpedoes, and the Zabrak realized very quickly that even the Cathleen was outgunned by the intruder.

“Frak,” he muttered. He cocked his head and realized that there was a familiar chiming, barely audible over the din of a warship preparing for combat. Abruptly his hand fell to his personal comlink. He closed his eyes, removed the comlink from his belt, and snapped it into place on his command chair to relay the signal to his headset. “Sanshir,” he said quietly, ensuring that no eavesdropped would hear it.

“There some reason you’re lighting up my ship?” a familiar voice asked in his ear. “Seriously, Lance, if this is the best greeting you can give an old friend, I’m leaving.”

That voice, the Corellian accent, my private comlink frequency… Halyn’s mouth fell open. “Ryian Coron?!”

The other man laughed. “Didn’t take you as long as I thought it’d take.”

Halyn eyed the holo of the warship with understanding. The cruiser was the Dauntless, a passenger liner from the Galactic Civil War that had been converted to a warship. The Mon Calamari Star Cruisers that had formed the backbone of the Alliance fleet had been converted from liners as well, but the Dauntless was built at Sullust. The Imperial-friendly nature of SoroSuub had prevented more of the warships from entering service, making them a rare sight in the spacelanes.

“Last I heard, you were part of the fleet defending Bilbringi,” he said cautiously. Peace Brigaders could still be trying to spring a trap on us, he warned himself.

“That was before Coruscant. We were part of Bel Iblis’s fleet there, until the retreat was ordered.”

“Where’s your IFF?”

“We took a beating at Coruscant,” Coron said grimly. “We barely made it out and missed the rendezvous with Bel Iblis’s Fleet. We’ve been trying to find a safe place to regroup and put the pieces back together. We didn’t know our IFF wasn’t transmitting.”

Halyn nodded. It made sense, but he wouldn’t be absolutely certain until…and then the idea struck him. “Stand by a second, Coron, and I’ll get you an orbital slot.” Not waiting for a confirmation, he swapped channels and sent a hail.

It took several seconds before Sandarie answered. “What is it, General?”

“Need you to confirm the ID of a ship’s captain for me,” he said. “I’m conferencing you into the signal.” A twist of the base of his comlink accomplished the task.

“Who am I identifying?” Sandarie’s puzzled voice floated across the comm.

“Sandi?” Coron asked.

“Ryian? Ryian! Where the hell have you been?”

Halyn smiled. “Stand down the turbolasers,” he called. “Rinnet, inform your squadrons that they’re on escort duty, not interception.”

His smile only widened as he listened to Sandarie and Ryian argue over his comlink. Ah, married bliss.

Bykkora Kraal was not happy.

“No,” the warmaster of the Yuuzhan Vong, the great Tsavong Lah, stated flatly. “Domain Kraal will not return to the infidel world of Borleias.”

“We must,” Bykkora returned harshly, “or all of Domain Kraal will be shamed!”

“Domain Kraal is already shamed,” the warmaster spat. “Amongst all our warriors, only Domain Kraal has seen fit to allow a world to be taken back by the infidels! We have marched from the edge of this galaxy all the way to its core, taken worlds as we saw fit, and even destroyed their pitiful attempts to defend their capital world. And now, Domain Kraal is the only domain to lose a world to the infidel fleets! No!”

Bykkora felt rage boil through her veins. Word had reached the Yuuzhan Vong armada at Coruscant only hours earlier: a New Republic task force had fallen on Borleias as a swarm of gnats, wiping away the few defenders left there and taking the world back under their control. Now, instead of moving on and contenting themselves with destroying a thousand Yuuzhan Vong warriors, they were digging in and preparing to defend the world.

The world Domain Kraal had been given stewardship; the world that Bykkora’s domain was intended to protect.

Hours after the news had arrived, Tsavong Lah had summoned Bykkora Kraal, the highest-ranked warrior of Domain Kraal, to a war room. Bykkora had expected to be reprimanded, perhaps sacrificed for her domain’s failure, but the ongoing humiliation by the warmaster was too much for any Yuuzhan Vong warrior to bear.

“Domain Cha has been tasked with purging the infidels from Borleias,” Tsavong Lah continued harshly. “Domain Kraal must prove themselves elsewhere if they intend to be greater than Shamed Ones. Perhaps they will sacrifice themselves to the gods; surely Domain Kraal must have fallen out of favor with the gods if the infidels so easily wrested a world away from them.”

Bykkora ground her teeth together at the unveiled barbs. “Domain Kraal will do whatever the gods and the warmaster see fit to regain our place of honor,” Bykkora managed.

For the first time, Tsavong Lah smiled through shredded lips. “Domain Kraal will either succeed in this task, or be utterly annihilated,” the warmaster warned. “Already great shame is upon you, and because of you, on the Yuuzhan Vong. Success will cast off the shame, but in failure the only redemption will be through sacrifice.”

Bykkora heard the warning, and could hardly believe it when her mind untwisted the truth beneath the warmaster’s words. Either Domain Kraal succeeds in this task, or we will all be sacrificed to the gods to atone for our failure. There will be no survivors.

“What task would the warmaster ask of Domain Kraal?” Bykkora asked with bowed head.

“When we first entered this galaxy,” the warmaster droned, “on the advice of our seers, our tacticians, and the priests, we avoided many of the small pockets of infidels. The gods demanded we begin cleansing this unholy galaxy by striking the head from the infidels—by making our way to the center of the galaxy and claiming Coruscant as our own.

“Now, if we are ever to inhabit this galaxy safely, we must cleanse all manner of heretics from it. Just as the Yuuzhan Vong spent lifetimes preserving our worldships in the great voyage, now we must clean pockets of infection from the galaxy before they can poison our people.”

“Where would you send us?” Bykkora repeated.

“There is a race in this galaxy called the Zabrak,” the warmaster said, his mouth twisting around the unusual name. “They call themselves warriors of a great warrior tradition, and hold sway over dozens of star systems. Their ways are like all the infidels—they are toolmakers and disdain the gods. Domain Kraal must enter their stronghold and crush them entirely.”

The warmaster flicked his hands, and blaze bugs—tiny insects with glowing abdomens used as the infidels would use a holoprojector—swarmed forward to approximate  a star system. “Iridonia,” Tsavong Lah said carelessly, “will be the place where Domain Kraal either regains the favor of the gods…or is sacrificed to appease them. There are no other options.”

Bykkora Kraal studied the blaze bugs in interest. “What sort of world is this Iridonia?”

“Harsh,” the warmaster said with satisfaction. “One fitting of true warriors. If Domain Kraal succeeds in destroying these Zabrak, it will enter into your stewardship. But like all harsh worlds, Bykkora Kraal, if your domain is unprepared, it will destroy them.”

Bykkora Kraal, for all her years of experience, her faith in the gods, her unending confidence in her abilities as a warrior—and those of her domain—felt the briefest sense of dread as she studied the blaze bugs. “Who is the leader of these infidels?” she asked, remembering the lessons of her youth.

The warmaster chuckled, a hoarse sound. “He is called Halyn of the clan Sanshir.”

“What sort of warrior is he?”

“None of consequence,” the warmaster said. As he spoke, the blaze bugs scattered and re-formed in the shape of the Zabrak leader: smaller than a Yuuzhan Vong warrior, with dark tattoos and a head filled with jagged horns instead of hair. “The readers have found only that he inherited his position as warmaster of the Zabrak. His elder brother was a true warrior who won many victories, only to be slain at Reecee by our warriors. This younger brother has no proud history of war, no stories of great victory or defeat. If Domain Kraal cannot defeat him, they will be Yuuzhan Vong no more.”

 

 

The Cathleen’s hangar bay was a hive of activity as maintenance crews refueled and rearmed starfighters. Dozens of starfighters stood at the ready, prepared to launch into battle at a moment’s notice should the Yuuzhan Vong arrive in-system. More spacecraft—fighters needing more extensive maintenance, pilot retrieval shuttles, tugs, and other utility craft stood further back in the hangar. Several of the fighters had mechanical crews swarming over them, attempting to ensure every craft would be ready for battle.

The corner of the hangar where the YT-2400 light freighter was settling on its struts, however, was relatively quiet. So busy were the maintenance crews that none of them saw the slender, blue-skinned Twi’lek decend the boarding ramp to the hangar deck. Only a single Zabrak, out of uniform, was there to greet the newcomer.

“Sandarie!” Halyn said with a smile on his face.

The Twi’lek nodded in return with a smile, then threw her arms around him in a hug. “Halyn!”

The old friends stood that way for a long moment. “It’s been a long time,” Halyn said gravely.

“Where have you been?” Sandarie demanded. “Kat was feeding me some information on your movements until, what, six or seven years ago? Then even she couldn’t find you until after Obroa-skai fell.”

Halyn nodded, his smile not faltering. “It’s a long, boring story,” he returned. “I take it you got my message?”

Sandi mock-glared at him. “If you’re not going to give me any information, why should I be helping you?” she teased. Halyn smiled indulgently, and she relented. “Of course. I found a few of them…in fact, a couple of them hitched a ride with me.”

Halyn arched an eyebrow at that and turned back to the YT-2400 to see several more people descend the ramp.

The first down the ramp was a Zabrak woman, past her prime but still a vital figure. “Nisia,” he greeted her. “It’s been a long time.”

“Jess, Jess, Jess,” she replied. “You only ever call me when you need something. You’re such a tease.”

Halyn grinned at the woman. Her sapphire eyes sparkled under the dark, delicate tattoos lining her pale face. Nisia Eisweep was one of the few friends he’d had longer than Sandarie, and one he saw less often than most. Back before he’d joined the Rebel Alliance, she had been one of his trusted lieutenants during his time running a pirate band. “You know I’m not a commitment kind of guy.”

“Suuuure,” she replied, then gestured broadly at the hangar bay. “This isn’t commitment?”

“No,” he shot back, “it’s something I got stuck with. I’m trying to unload it as quick as I can. Say, you looking for a job?”

Nisia laughed. “Do I look dumb enough to take this job?”

“No, but you were dumb enough to come here,” a distinctly male voice replied from the light freighter’s boarding ramp. “First rule of survival is to be somewhere else when the shooting starts. And according to the General here, the shooting will be starting soon.”

Halyn turned back to see the second passenger from the freighter walking towards him. “Lenn,” he said with a comfortable smile.

The other man stuck out his hand, and Halyn shook it firmly. “General,” he drawled.

The Zabrak general shook his head. “I’m never going to break you of that habit, will I?” he asked.

Lenn smiled faintly. “Never, General. The academy just drilled it way too far into my head.”

“Not my academy, clearly,” Halyn said with a smile. Lenn Kaman was a former Imperial TIE pilot. He had fought during some of the worst battles in the Galactic Civil War and survived, but after the disaster at Endor he had retired. He and Halyn had met in a bar several years later and, after spending a night in adjoining cells, had become long friends.

“Any other passengers?” Halyn asked the Twi’lek captain.

Sandi shook her head. “No, but there’s more coming when they can. Everything’s a mess out there.”

Halyn nodded grimly. “Any word from Ryian?”

The Twi’lek hesitated before answering. “The Dauntless was part of Bel Iblis’s fleet at Coruscant. There’s been no word since the fleet groups retreated. I’ve been trying to reach him by all the old channels, but everything’s in upheaval. For all I know, the Yuuzhan Vong have intercepted all the messages I’ve tried to send to him. I did let him know I was coming here, so if he had any chance, you’d probably see the Dauntless in orbit here looking for me.”

“Were you at…?”

“No,” Sandi said with a shake of her head. “I was on my way back from a purchasing trip. For you, I might add. When I dropped out of hyperspace, Coruscant was already under siege.”

“Speaking of purchasing…”

Sandi nodded. “I confirmed with Deuce that your purchases are all successfully in place. Which is good, because the hyperspace route from here to Skako is interdicted now by Yuuzhan Vong mines.” The Twi’lek suppressed a shudder, but a shiver ran through both of her lekku anyway. “They were mining the route when I came through. I barely made it past the coralskippers.”

Halyn nodded grimly. “It just keeps getting worse out there. And here,” he added as an afterthought. He shook it off and looked at the three newcomers. “With your help, and the help of others I’ve asked, I hope we can turn the Yuuzhan Vong aside here. I intend to make Iridonia a fortress that the Yuuzhan Vong can never breach.”

 

 

I hate being right, Halyn thought as he watched the contacts blizzard in across the system-wide tactical display. I really, really wish I would have been wrong.

Aboard the Cathleen in geosynchronous orbit, the general stood with arms crossed as he watched the Yuuzhan Vong fleet transit from hyperspace. It took the Vong long moments to maneuver into a battle formation, but starfighter squadrons positioned by Halyn’s starfighter coordinator, Kryi Rinnet, was not giving them time or peace to do so. Coralskippers launched haphazardly to try to neutralize the Zabrak defenders, but they were quickly chewed apart by the well-coordinated squadrons.

But it won’t last long, Halyn thought grimly. “Rinnet, start pulling your squadrons back. It won’t take the Vong long…”

“Already on it, sir,” the woman said. Halyn spared her a glance and saw her hunched over her own displays, her thin blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail that left most of her head bare and her horns clearly visible.

The squadrons—X-wings and B-wings—were already pulling back. The lone squadron of Z-95 Headhunters, slower than the rest, were caught by a coralskipper squadron now displaying the brutal precision Halyn recognized as the trademark of a yammosk. Their war coordinator is already in the game, the Zabrak thought grimly. We’re going to need to remove it as soon as possible.

 

 

Bykkora Kraal studied the blaze bugs intensely. “The infidels are cautious,” she said aloud, watching the remaining fighter squadrons retreat towards the defensive fleet orbiting Iridonia. She pointed towards a warship hanging in space much further away from the planet than any of the other defenders. The vessel was already nearly as far out from the planet as the Yuuzhan Vong fleet. “What is that vessel doing?”

A tactician spoke in hushed whispers with one of the bridge officers joined to the mighty warship, the Ponlick. “It shows no signs of movements, its hull is dark and its weapons do not fire. The yammosk can sense no power or activity from the ship. It appears to be derelict, a leftover from wars fought here previously.”

“Very well,” Bykkora said. “Keep the mataloks in close to us as we advance. Send all of our coralskippers except a small reserve forward. With the yammosk’s coordination, they can outfight our enemies and clear the way for our heavy ships. With their fighter screen neutralized, we can take their capital ships to pieces.”

Coralskippers, represented by blaze bugs, flashed away in large numbers towards the Zabrak fleet. The enemy’s fighter squadrons turned to engage them—more squadrons than the seers had estimated the infidels could field here. Bykkora could only watch as the infidel forces fought with valor against the Yuuzhan Vong warriors, holding up far better than she initially estimated was possible.

“All vessels, move in,” Bykkora finally ordered. “Keep the yammosk carrier, the Ritwynd, in the rear of the formation.”

The Yuuzhan Vong fleet began to accelerate in to crush the defenders. Bykkora allowed herself a small smile. “Target their largest vessel, before their starfighter can react,” she ordered. “We will burn it from the sky, and the rest will scatter in terror.”

 

 

“They’re beginning their move,” Allanna Saret’s voice carried from the bridge of the Cyclone. “What’s our plan?”

“Patience,” Halyn said, keeping any hint of disapproval. “Rinnet, how are our fighters holding up?”

“They’re not going to be able to break away to engage the Yuuzhan Vong fleet before they get here,” Kryi replied without hesitation. “You should have let me bring in more of the ground-based squadrons. It’s not too late—we can still salvage this.”

Halyn shook his head. “We need the ground-based squadrons where they are,” he replied.

“Sir,” Kryi said tightly, “five of those Vong cruisers are as heavily-armed as the Cathleen. Even with one of them playing shy, the other four will cut us to pieces. Without us here to anchor the line, the rest of the fleet won’t have enough firepower to keep the Vong off Iridonia. Even with us here, unless we get enough fighters in place, we can’t hold. And that’s not to mention the light cruisers and the skip carrier at the back of the formation.”

The Zabrak general smiled slightly, his eyes showing a hint of a sparkle under his dark jato. “You see, but you don’t see,” he said calmly. The Yuuzhan Vong were coming in faster now, he saw—they were already taking ranging shots at the Cathleen. He unclipped his comlink from his pocket and lifted it to his lips. “Deuce,” he said without a hint of urgency. “Spring the trap.”

 

 

The comm transmission bounced from the general’s comlink to a specifically designated relay in the Cathleen’s communications array. The transmission then transmitted to a relay satellite, which in turn redirected it to the surface of Iridonia to a small office in the capital city.

There, a red-and-grey R2 unit showing years of scuffs and dings beeped a simple reply, then changed the transmitter to a different channel and issued a much longer set of instructions in droid language. The transmission flashed back out to space at the speed of light, was captured by a relay satellite that did not officially exist, and was redirected to the hulk of a Star Destroyer in a slow orbit around the system’s star.

 

 

As her vessel began pouring more fire into the infidel defenses, Bykkora Kraal allowed herself a small triumphant smile. They are like all infidels, without inspiration or courage. They will break quickly, or they will die. They cannot stand before us long.

The Yuuzhan Vong commander stood close the blaze bugs representing the battle, and fought down the reflex to duck as more of the bioluminescent insects broke off from the battle and flashed past her face. She frowned, studying the combat more c loosely. What ship was destroyed? she asked herself.

And then the bugs hummed behind her. She turned to look, and saw tiny stars of light detaching from the infidel derelict, now well behind her fleet.

 

 

Halyn’s comlink chirped, and the Zabrak recognized the signal. “Systems-go,” he translated to himself. With a slight smile creasing his lips, he leaned forward to watch the display.

Hundreds of droid starfighters poured from the wreckage of the Star Destroyer.

The trap was one years in the making. More than once, the Iridonian government had discussed removing the wreckage of the Star Destroyer from space. Though the vessel was stripped of critical components—weapons, engines, life support, computer cores—the project of moving the hull itself just never seemed to happen. Argus and Halyn had quietly manipulated the situation for years, using misplaced credits to purchase, program, and store every old droid starfighter they could get their hands on. The old derelict was one of the biggest traps in the galaxy, just loaded with droids waiting for an activation signal.

Halyn had to give the Yuuzhan Vong credit—they were quick on the uptake. He had hoped the old Vulture droids get a crack at the yammosk carrier—most likely the vessel at the back of the formation—but many of the smaller vessels in the fleet were turning to screen it and engage the droids. The few coralskippers the Yuuzhan Vong had not thrown directly against the Zabrak defense fleet joined them, determined to keep the droid starfighters away.

He studied his tactical display acutely, biding his time.

 

 

Bykkora Kraal allowed a small triumphant smile to tug at her lips. The infidel trap—loading up the derelict vessel with hundreds of starfighters—had failed. It bothered her, a bit, that the infidel commander had accurately guessed that the yammosk vessel would be at the back of the formation. According to the seers, the Zabraks’ warmaster had inherited his position, not earned it through blood and valor. It appeared that, in spite of it, he had some small degree of tactical skill.

But it had been for naught. Her rear guard of coralskippers and mataloks was holding the infidel fighters—a type they’d never seen before—at bay. Coralskipper pilots reported they were faster and more agile than almost anything else the natives of the galaxy had thrown at them, but far more predictable.

The Yuuzhan Vong commander allowed herself a small moment of triumph. The ambush had slowed her advance, certainly, but it only delayed the inevitable.

 

Halyn allowed himself a small smile of triumph as he thumbed his comlink on again to bounce a message to his droid. “Begin phase two, Deuce.” The astromech tweetled in response, and Halyn ended the transmission. And now we really spring the trap.

 

 

“More ships reverting from darkspace!” one of the officers called in alarm to Bykkora.

The Kraal commander spun to the blaze bugs again. New contacts were flashing in golden light as they decanted from hyperspace, positioned directly between the fierce fighting between the Iridonian fleet and the Domain Kraal advance force, and the skirmish between the infidel starfighter trap and the Yuuzhan Vong rearguard.

 

 

The Wookiee berserker Anishor bared his teeth in a wordless growl of triumph. The coatrack timed our entry perfectly.

Standing aboard the bridge of the battle cruiser Kerarthorr, Anishor heard a familiar voice over his comlink: “Relaying your primary target now, furball,” Halyn’s voice came in Basic. “Eliminate it and it’ll make the Vong think twice.” As the Zabrak spoke to him, Anishor saw the new tactical data relayed to the Kerarthorr from the Iridonian fleet. One of the Vong cruisers, the one closest to the Wookiee fleet, was highlighted in red. “Judging from their fleet movements,” Halyn continued, “that’s their yammosk carrier. Nail it to the wall.”

<Brothers!> Anishor called as he relayed the data to the other two Wookiee battle cruisers, and t he squadrons of Agr starfighters. <Strike at this vessel!>

The Yuuzhan Vong tried to turn against the new arrivals, but the droid starfighters held the rearguard at bay, while the Cathleen‘s heavy guns prevented the advance group from disengaging quickly. The three Wookiee battle cruisers opened fire on the Yuuzhan Vong’s advance group, trapping them in a devastating crossfire, leaving the yammosk carrier to the starfighters.

The Agr starfighters were unique to Kashyyyk. The starfighters were a dozen meters long. Consisting of a primary hull with a pair of broad stabilizers with the pilot sitting on a secondary, offset hull, powered by three engines, and mounting a turbolaser in the primary hull, they were fast and heavily armed and armored. While not as agile as an X-wing or A-wing, the firepower they brought to bear made them flexible and deadly, particularly against an opponent that had not anticipated their arrival.

Proton torpedoes flashed from the starfighters to the yammosk carrier. Voids intercepted most of the damage, allowing the fighters’ turbolasers—weapons usually reserved for capital ships—to burn holes through the yorik coral hull.

Stunned by the ferocity of the assault, the yammosk tried to turn away from the fighters and fleet, abandoning any pretense at attack. But there was no try, nor was there do. There was only die.

And the Wookiees were happy to oblige.

 

 

Bykkora Kraal was choked by the smoke boiling through the Ponlick. The greasy scent of burnt flesh assaulted her nose, and she snarled in displeasure. The blaze bugs painted a stark picture of the situation: her primary fleet caught in crossfire between the Iridonian defenders and the new infidel assault group, her rearguard still tied up by the infidel starfighter trap.

And now the yammosk was dead. With the coralskippers no longer joined, the Yuuzhan Vong fleet was rapidly losing ground to the Iridonian defenders. “Pull back,” she called, choking on the words. “Order all survivors to pull back.”

The villip tender turned to her in shock. “Commander, we cannot…”

“Relay the order!” Bykkora shouted him down. “All vessels but the Ponlick must fall back to the edge of the system and regroup, rather than waste their lives on an assault we can no longer win.”

“What of us, Commander?” one of her officers asked.

“Rrush’hok ichnar vinim’hoks!” she called. Die well, brave warriors! “Target the infidels’ flagship, and we will fight until we join the gods!”

 

 

Halyn leaned back as he watched the Yuuzhan Vong warships begin their retreat. His expression was somewhere between triumph and depression. We’ve driven the Yuuzhan Vong off…but there’s no doubt anymore that Iridonia is a target. It’s time to start calling in favors.

“Keep the pressure up on that cruiser,” he called, tapping one of the Vong warships on the display. “Rinnet, keep the E-wings on it. Maybe they can crack the hull open. It’s too far out of position for the other cruisers to cover it.”

He heard the starfighter coordinator’s shout of acknowledgement but didn’t bother looking away from the tactical. The cruiser fell further out of formation, and abruptly, Halyn realized he misunderstood. They’re coming for us! “Rinnet!” he shouted again. “Throw more fighters at that thing, it’s coming for the Cathleen! Saret, I need the Cyclone on it, too! All turbolasers, fire fire fire!”

The Yuuzhan Vong cruiser was accelerating now, into the Zabrak defense. Turbolasers lanced into it from all angles, and its dovin basals had no chance of defending from it all. Yorik coral sloughed from its hull in great chunks as turbolaser fire lanced into it.

Coralskippers took parting shots with Zabrak starfighters, attempting to keep the squadrons too occupied to prevent the cruiser from reaching the Cathleen. Now, though, the Wookiee Agr starfighters entered the fray, concentrating on the aft of the Yuuzhan Vong cruiser. E-wings and X-wings volleyed proton torpedoes at the warship and, less than a kilometer from the Cathleen, the vessel cracked in two.

The turbolaser fire reduced the stricken vessel to molten slag. Halyn sagged in relief as he watched the rest of the Yuuzhan Vong vessels pulling back, even from the droid starfighter ambush. Fifteen minutes later, the engagement was over, and Iridonia stood untouched by the Yuuzhan Vong.

 

The bridge of the Cathleen was nearly as busy in the aftermath of the battle as it was during the engagement. Officers bustled in out, couriers delivered messages, coordinators locked down battle damage and began repairs, starfighters were brought in for repair and replenishment, and rescue shuttles were dispatched to pickup extravehicular pilots. Through it all, Halyn stood watching out the bridge windows, listening with half an ear to the bridge crew with the rest of his attention on the comm chatter.

“Sir,” the ensign at the communications post called up to him. “General, the commander of the Wookiee battle group is requesting permission to come aboard.”

“Give him clearance for the auxiliary hangar,” Halyn instructed. “The primary hangar is going to be a bit busy.” Of course Anishor would want to come see me in the flesh, the Zabrak thought to himself. “Tell him I’ll meet him there.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Also, issue the recall order.”

The words, spoken softly, brought the entire bridge to a halt. Zabraks turned from their posts to look at their commander, expressions ranging from surprise to shock to suspicion. “Sir,” the ensign choked, “I thought only the Council could issue a recall.”

“You have your orders, Ensign,” Halyn said, turning on his heel and heading towards the turbolift. He ignored the stares following him. “I’ll be meeting the Wookiee commander in the auxiliary hangar if I’m needed.”

The turbolift doors wooshed open for him. He stepped inside and turned just in time to see another Zabrak, broad-chested but close to his height, slip in before the doors could seal shut again. “Going to try to talk me out of it?” he asked the other.

Senator Ceikeh Alari shook his head. “The Council may not be happy about you issuing the order without consulting them, but no one is going to try to stop it. I just wanted to say thank you for getting me off Coruscant—I didn’t have a chance to say it before in person.”

Halyn allowed a small smile to stretch his lips. “Does that mean you’ll back me up before the Council?”

“Yes.”

Iridonia had led the coalition of Zabrak worlds and colonies in joining the New Republic decades earlier. As with nearly all worlds joining during those early days, there wasn’t a set procedure or process in place, which resulted in a variety of obscure treaties and clauses unique to each world or government’s entry into the New Republic.

Because of the devastation the Empire had wrought on the Zabraks, both at Iridonia and among the colony worlds, the Zabraks had been cautious to the point of paranoia about the defense of their worlds. Iridonia’s military history was legendary, and as such, the New Republic had expected the Zabraks to contribute a large number of pilots and soldiers to the New Republic Defense Force. In return, the Zabrak negotiators—including the first Senator, Kaysil Verwood, had insisted on a clause to allow Zabraks serving in the New Republic Defense Force to be recalled from New Republic service should Zabrak space be imperiled by an outside force.

Internally, the ability to invoke the recall was reserved for the Council—the government body consisting of a voting representative from each of the self-sustaining colonies, and a non-voting representative from colonies that had not yet reached self-sufficiency, with the president of the council—and the veto-holder—always being the representative from Iridonia. As far as the New Republic was concerned, the recall would be legitimate…but internally, if Halyn had enemies among the Council, he may have just written his own prison sentence.

Halyn turned to study the Senator. Ceikeh Alari had been a colonial Zabrak and mercenary during the Galactic Civil War, and had been among the many who had responded when then-Rebel Alliance General Halyn Lance had sent out the call for volunteers to liberate Iridonia. Alari’s tattoos resembled claw marks, much lighter than Halyn’s own designs. Combined with his broad-chested and muscular stature, he looked like a man not to be trifled with.

Ceikeh turned and caught Halyn’s eye. “Without the recall, I doubt we can stand against the Yuuzhan Vong. Even with everyone who will return, I think our chances are not good.”

“It depends,” Halyn said slowly, “on how willing the Council is to defend our worlds. Most members of the Council saw the devastation that happened under the Empire, and won’t want to see it happen again. I have no doubt they’ll be willing to fight, but I don’t know if they’ll be willing to continue fighting when Iridonia’s rivers are filled with blood.”

“The only alternative is genocide,” Ceikeh pointed out. “Ours.”

Halyn could only nod grimly as the turbolift hissed to a halt. The doors slid open, and he walked out into the Cathleen’s auxiliary hangar bay, with the New Republic senator flanking him.

The Wookiee leader’s shuttle wasn’t a shuttle at all. Anishor was visible to the two Zabraks through the battle-scarred canopy of a B-wing starfighter, which itself showed years of scrapes, dings, and scars. Halyn couldn’t help but smile at that, knowing the starfighter dated back to before the battle of Endor. Anishor never changes. Probably the only B-wing left from the initial prototypes the Verpine sent out for field testing.

The B-wing’s canopy raised silently, and the largest Wookiee either Zabrak had ever encountered pulled himself up and over, landing on the hangar’s deck with surprising agility and grace. Halyn always swore the Wookiee cheated the laws of physics to fit into the damn thing.

Anishor strode toward them, kilos of muscle rippling under his hair. War bandoleers criss-crossed his chest, and an oversized blaster hung from his hip. The bandoleers each showed empty hooks for massive Wookiee rykk blades, and though they were missing, Halyn knew his old friend and honor brother normally would carry a pair.

The big Wookiee smiled toothily. <I see you haven’t lost your touch, Coatrack. Your timing was impeccable.>

“So was yours,” Halyn said with a grin. “If you hadn’t gotten here on time, we’d be in a whole lot more trouble right now.”

Anishor chuckled, a deep booming sound that Halyn could feel in his chest. <Yes, because you’re not in any trouble at all.>

“Naw,” Halyn deadpanned. “It’s all going according to plan.”

<What is the plan?> Anishor asked. <Even with what I’ve brought from Kashyyyk’s defenses, the Yuuzhan Vong will break through.>

“I’ve already ordered the recall,” Halyn said. “In two days, we’ll have close to another thousand starfighters here, plus platoons of soldiers and a few smaller capital ships.”

<It won’t be enough.>

“It will be,” Halyn said with confidence. He caught himself, then turned slightly. “Sorry, Senator—I forget sometimes that not everyone has my connections. This is the Wookiee berserker Anishor, a warrior among the warriors of Kashyyyk. I’ve known him since the Civil War. He’s one of the few berserkers that survived the purge the Empire executed among his kind.”

Anishor accepted the billing with a nod of his head.

“Anishor, this is Senator Ceikeh Alari. He was on Coruscant during the Yuuzhan Vong invasion and barely made it off with his skin intact. Alari fought during the liberation of Iridonia after Endor, and was a mercenary before that.” Halyn smiled slightly. “He’s a bit more capable than the average politician of being helpful when the shooting war starts.”

<I think it’s already started, Coatrack,> Anishor said, then bowed before the Zabrak senator. <A pleasure, Senator Alari.>

“Likewise,” Ceikeh said in return with a bow.

“How many Wookiees did you bring me?” Halyn asked.

<The three battlecruisers plus six squadrons of Agrs,> Anishor replied. <And forty Wookiee berserkers who have been training to fight the Yuuzhan Vong.>

“But they haven’t been blooded yet?”

<Not yet. This will be their first battleground.>

Halyn accepted this with a nod. “And what about you?”

Anishor smiled. <You are honor family. I will be here until the Yuuzhan Vong are driven from your world.>

The general led them back into the Cathleen’s turbolift, setting it for the officers’ quarters. “How are the preparations at Kashyyyk?”

The Wookiee shrugged. <We have wings of Agrs ready to fly. Thirty battlecruisers are fully ready for combat. The New Republic fears what the Yuuzhan Vong shapers could do with our wildlife, how they could be turned against us all. And I have spent the last several years training every berserker I can in preparation for any attempt the Yuuzhan Vong may make to invade. But I do not believe they will move on Kashyyyk.>

“Why?” Ceikeh asked. “I’d think Kashyyyk would be a prime target for the Yuuzhan Vong. After all, they struck hard against Ithor and burned it to the ground.”

<The Yuuzhan Vong are obsessed with honor and glory of personal combat,> the Wookiee replied as dryly as Shryiiwook could convey. <They will avoid fighting warriors capable of ripping them limb from limb. And those are the normal Wookiees on Kashyyyk. My berserkers have spent two years in training with rykk blades against amphistaffs; they are more capable than any battalion of Yuuzhan Vong warriors.>

“Sounds like Kashyyyk is where we should setup the capital,” Ceikeh commented. “With Coruscant gone and the Senate in disarray, we’ll need to pick somewhere well-defended as the New Republic’s capital.”

Halyn led the way to his private, oversized quarters. The door slid open to admit the three, although Anishor had to duck to squeeze his massive frame through the portal. The tactical hologram of Iridonia space stretches throughout the room from end to end, updated with constant tactical feeds from the Cathleen, the Cyclone, and various surveillance satellites and reconnaissance craft spread throughout the system.

The glow of red showed the Yuuzhan Vong fleet huddled at the edge of the system, recovering from the brutal ambush that had eliminated a third of their force. <We’re evenly matched now,> Anishor noted. <Or we will be, when your starfighters return.>

“Not for long, though,” Halyn said. “The Yuuzhan Vong will be reinforced shortly, I’m sure.”

“And then what?” Ceikeh asked. “How long can the fleet hold?”

“It will hold as long as it can,” Halyn replied, not really answering the question. “Though if you tell anyone outside the room I’ve said this, we can’t allow the fleet to be destroyed—it would be better if Iridonia fell. The New Republic can’t afford to lose the Zabrak fleet here if they want to eventually win the war.”

<Then you will evacuate Iridonia?> Anishor asked dubiously.

“No.” Halyn’s voice was cold. “Iridonia will not capitulate to the Yuuzhan Vong. We’re going to drive the bastards out of our system.”

The Cathleen glided through hyperspace like a shark in the oceans of Mon Calamari. The ship was far too large to ever be silent, but it was relatively calm after the horrific, days-long battle at Coruscant.

Halyn’s quarters aboard the Cathleen were the largest available. It still bothered him, after all these years; he’d rather have been down crammed in a bunk, surrounded by dozens of pilots in the same condition. Looking back, his time as a fighter pilot for the Rebel Alliance had been relatively short, but it left indelible marks on him.

The Zabrak stood in the center of his quarters, surrounded by a massive hologram of the galaxy. It stretched in detail from one end of the open space to the other, filling it entirely. The stars were not their natural colors; instead of the brilliant white light, each of them carried their own tones and shades.

The New Republic stood in brilliant blue. The stars and even the space between them glimmered with the friendly color, stretching from the Outer Rim to the Core worlds. Many of these worlds, the Zabrak knew, he’d never visit, couldn’t name, had no connection for him whatsoever; yet he counted them as friends and allies.

The north-western quadrant of the galaxy gleamed golden. They were former enemies of Iridonia. The Imperial Remnant was a fraction of the power that the Galactic Empire had once represented, and politically was nothing similar to the Empire that had stood twenty years before. Even now, though, Halyn did not trust them. Too many deaths, too many battles, too much treachery would ever allow him to count them as friends and allies.

The Hapes cluster, allies of the New Republic and fellow warriors against the Yuuzhan Vong, stood as violet specks. Sixty-three worlds comprised Hapes, but far more star systems stretched between—uninhabited, but claimed and exploited by the Hapans for their wealth and resources. They, too, Halyn counted among those he trusted.

Zabrak space was represented in silver. Iridonia had spread its reach early and quickly. The harsh homeworld had inspired many a Zabrak to look to the stars, and colonies had spread quickly, to the limitations of the early hyperdrives and navigational systems. Officially, Zabrak space consisted of the home world and capital, Iridonia, with another twenty fully-established colonies. Twice that number, perhaps, were not yet self-sustaining colonies, and thus not individually counted.

But through the map cut deep streaks of crimson. The Yuuzhan Vong had entered at the northern quadrant of the galaxy, spreading along the Outer Rim. Hutt-controlled space, once a burning yellow on the galactic map, now was entirely eclipsed by the sea of red.

Then the Yuuzhan Vong had struck towards the Core systems, quickly crossing the Mid and Inner Rim, and striking through the Colonies almost unopposed. They had chosen their routes well, taking advantage of political divisions to chart their invasion corridors, always adhering to the seams of government entities.

The Yuuzhan Vong advance along the Imperial Remnant, just inside the border on the side of the New Republic, had left Zabrak space untouched. Advances from the eastern edge of the galaxy had similarly left the Zabrak nation unmolested. The Yuuzhan Vong had similarly avoided Hapan space, even though a Hapan armada had participated in the battle at Fondor.

The map finally updated, and the crimson of the Yuuzhan Vong invasion stretched all the way to Coruscant, cutting across hyperlanes and strangling trade between the stars.

In a flash of insight, Halyn understood. They left Zabrak space, the Hapans, and dozens of other small bodies alone all for the same reason. We could defend ourselves against an invasion. Sure, if they threw overwhelming forces at Iridonia, at Hapes, at the Corporate Sector, at the Remnant, they could overcome…but it would take time. Time enough for the New Republic to respond in force and fight a pitched battle that meant a conquest wasn’t certain.

                Now the galaxy is torn apart and in pieces. Their invasion corridors have bisected our hyperlanes, and with Coruscant fallen the New Republic government is in disarray. The fleets are scattered. They’ll take advantage, now, to strike everywhere against those of us who were strong enough to stand with the New Republic’s backing.

                With the New Republic is in disarray, the Vong will take advantage of it to wipe out these small pockets of independent resistance. With the Fleet scattered, a concerted effort could destroy any of us. It’ll take weeks, or months, before the New Republic government is firm enough to take up the reins of power again and direct the fleets.

                Iridonia will be attacked, and soon.

The lights rose in the room and hologram shimmered and vanished. “Maybe I’m wrong,” he pondered aloud. But I’m not. I just can’t prove it until the Yuuzhan Vong are knocking at our door.

But that doesn’t mean I just stand by and wait for that to happen.

He moved to the spacious desk that occupied a corner of the room. The terminal there flickered to life when he touched the power controls, and Halyn keyed in a request for hypercomm access. He pondered his options for a few moments. There are lots of old allies I can count on, he considered. Plenty of people who could help me secure Iridonia against an initial invasion attempt without calling on the Zabrak units reinforcing the New Republic Defense Fleet.

A small smile tugged at Halyn’s lips as he made the decision, then entered the hypercomm destination.

Kashyyyk.

 

Kelta Rose had found a quiet spot in the shadows of the Mon Mothma’s secondary hangar to meditate. She badly needed the moments to focus and find her mental shields. The remaining Jedi X-wings and blastboats occupied the berthing space; Antilles had given the entire area over to the Jedi for now.

The Force strengthened her, and slowly the roar of the emotions of the Star Destroyer’s crew began to fade from her mind. As minutes passed, the Jedi Knight found her mind was completely her own again. She breathed deeply, in and out, carefully maintaining her mental defenses.

It had been years since Kelta had begun her training in the Force. This was the second major war she had fought in, and still she was so…sensitive. It was her gift and her curse. The native of Nam Chorios had always, always been able to feel the emotions of those around her. She had learned to block those unwanted emotions out, locking them away; in times of stress, particularly battle, she couldn’t always maintain the concentration necessary to keep them away and still fight.

Now, even with her shields in place, she could feel the emotions of the crew battering away at her defenses. Raw pain was prevalent in the medical bays of the mighty warship; fighting the Yuuzhan Vong had left crew and pilots injured and maimed. The cloying scent of fatigue permeated the entire vessel, from General Antilles on the Mon Mothma’s bridge to the lowest crewman scrubbing carbon scoring off the deck of the primary hangar.

There was anger among many of the crewmembers. Anger towards the Yuuzhan Vong was understandable, though Kelta did not indulge in it. What surprised her, though, was the anger she felt directed towards the New Republic’s government. Many a member of the crew felt the government had failed them. The three fleets had fought and bled and died, not just at Coruscant but from the Rim all the way to the Core. Mismanagement of the war from the very beginning had cost them the capital of the galaxy.

Sorrow was an undercurrent to everything she sensed. Virtually everyone aboard the Destroyer had lost friends or family in the hours previously. Kelta could sense that many of the other emotions she felt sprung from that sense of loss. She suspected it would strengthen as the enormity of the disaster finally sunk in among the fleet.

And from a handful of people, she felt pure determination. It shone like a beacon among the dark and depressed emotions of the crew. She focused on that, allowing it past her defenses to strengthen her, just as she would allow the Force in for the same purpose. Her mind sharpened and cleared, and she felt a measure of resolve herself.

Finally feeling balanced, the Jedi woman opened her eyes and rose to her feet. Her knees cracked as she did so, and she winced for a moment. Kelta was no longer a young woman; years had passed since she fought against the Galactic Empire, and her daughter was now a woman and Jedi Knight in her own stead.

Kelta shied away from that line of thought. She had a mother’s worry for her daughter, Adreia. Pride, yes—few could become Jedi Knights, and it was a difficult life. Fear tried to edge into her thoughts right beside it. Adreia had been in Coruscant space as well during the fall, acting as an advisor for one of the task force commanders.

And I still haven’t heard from Adreia since the retreat. With that thought, Kelta knew she couldn’t avoid the fear she was feeling; it would eat away at her defenses far more effectively than the overwhelming noise of the crew’s emotion. It was personal, and her own defenses were no match for it.

She released the worry to the Force and closed her eyes again. The Force will bring her back to me. There’s nothing I can do about it now.

When she opened her eyes again, she saw Rigard Matl striding towards her across the Mon Mothma’s hangar deck. His sense of purpose was a beacon in the Force that Kelta grasped for a moment to maintain her focus.

The leader of the Shockers waved the various pilots and Jedi in the hangar together. Kelta was among the first to step forward to form the circle around the heavily scarred man. Rigard Matl had flown for the Empire for years before defecting to the Rebel Alliance. He had survived dozens of battles, though not without personal cost. Kelta idly wondered how many of his limbs and organs were original, and how many were mechanical replacements.

As the circle filled, Rigard started to speak. “I’ve spoken with Master Skywalker and General Antilles. We’re currently on our way to Borleias.”

There were more than a few murmurs at that. The Yuuzhan Vong invasion of Coruscant had launched from Borleias, which was itself an important navigation point for traffic to and from Coruscant. Decades prior, the Rebel Alliance had conquered it for the very same purpose.

“I don’t know what our overall strategic goals will be,” Rigard continued, “but when we arrive in-system, we’re going to crush whatever defenses the Vong have setup. General Antilles wants Borleias held firm while High Command regroups and lays out new strategic objectives. No one expected us to lose Coruscant; now that we have, all the previous strategic plans are out the window.”

“We’re hardly at fighting strength,” someone commented. Kelta couldn’t see who had made the remark.

“We’re going to reorganize. Master Skywalker will have the details, but apparently General Antilles is taking his orders to cooperate with the Jedi very seriously. If any of you who are ex-military want to join one of the regular fighter squadrons, General Antilles will accept the request immediately. His fighter coordinator, Colonel Celchu, is reorganizing most of the squadrons in the Fleet until we can get enough replacement pilots to swell the ranks out to support more squadrons.”

There were fewer murmurs this time, but the concern was greater. Kelta felt it herself. How many people did we lose at Coruscant in our attempt to keep the Yuuzhan Vong off? And…how many people did we leave behind?

                And her fear again dredged up the image of Adreia in her mind’s eye. Kelta shut her eyes, then tried to release the fear again. Adreia…oh, Adreia…

 

The Star Cruiser Cathleen reverted from hyperspace precisely as expected, smartly executing a turn to port that put it into geosynchronous orbit around Iridonia. Smaller vessels made the same reversion and maneuver—corvettes, frigates, converted freighters, and the light cruiser Cyclone. Starfighter squadrons poured from the hangars of many of the ships, and shuttles departed almost immediately for the planetary surface.

Halyn Sanshir stood on the bridge of the Cathleen, overlooking the defenses arrayed around his homeworld. It’s not enough, he told himself. It would never be enough…but it could be more. Better.

The wreckage of an old Imperial II-class Star Destroyer still hung in orbit, further out from Iridonia than the positions the Zabrak fleet had taken up. The vessel had been crippled and abandoned during the a strike by Rebel forces under Halyn’s command twenty-some years prior, a strike that had broken the Imperial blockade around the world and provided an opportunity for Iridonia’s covert resistance to rise up and throw off the Imperial shackles.

He smiled faintly at that. It’s too bad we couldn’t afford to refit it, bring it into service. It would’ve been more powerful than anything else we managed to acquire. His smile vanished. Particularly now.

The defenses of Zabrak space had been built largely by his brother, Argus. While Halyn had become an Alliance officer, Argus Sanshir had chosen to work on Iridonia, building up and leading one of the planet’s greatest resistance groups. When the Alliance starfighter wing commanded by Halyn had broken the blockade, it was Argus who had led the Iridonian Resistance to victory on the planet. It was Argus who had ensured the Imperials would never again hold power.

And when Halyn had left the armed services, it was Argus who had rebuilt the Zabrak military. Not just the defenses of Iridonia; Argus had chosen to defend all of Zabrak space.

Towards that end, the elder Sanshir brother had salvaged capital ships, purchased starfighters, arranged for flight and officer academies, refurbished orbital stations to support the fledgling Zabrak navy. When the New Republic began decommissioning old warships from the Rebellion in favor of new ships of the line, Argus had successfully acquired three Mon Calamari Star Cruisers—luxury liners retrofitted with multiple-redundancy shields and turbolasers. The Cathleen, Maria, and Yali had not begun their existence as warships, but they served the role well.

Zabrak technicians had refitted the ships yet again when they entered their new service. Turbolasers and shields were refitted, hyperdrives and sublight engines were upgraded, life support systems and entire control consoles were tuned for Zabrak standards, and the Cathleen was refitted with gravity well projectors. The curves of a Mon Calamari cruiser were well-suited to hide the tell-tale domes of the projectors, and a pocket interdictor would certainly give the Zabrak navy more options.

Halyn pressed his lips together in a firm line. The Yali had been destroyed early on in the invasion; Obroa-skai had begged for defenses, and Iridonia had responded. In the wake of the disaster, the civilians governing the Zabrak territories had become far more cautious about lending any outsiders military firepower.

As the Yuuzhan Vong began pressing into the Core worlds, Argus—the commander-in-chief of the entire Zabrak military—had led a task force consisting of nearly half the capital ships in Zabrak space to reinforce the Republic at the military base at Reecee. Aboard the Maria, Argus was confident that the Yuuzhan Vong would be stalled there long enough for the New Republic to reinforce against any incursions.

Reecee had fallen in the weeks before Coruscant. Using new organic jammers of some sort—Halyn didn’t pretend to understand the Yuuzhan Vong’s biotechnology—the defenders had never been able to call for help. Only the Errant Venture had escaped from Reecee, to the secret Jedi stronghold, to carry word of the fall of one of the routes to Coruscant.

Now Halyn stood aboard the last remaining Star Cruiser in all of Zabrak space, in Argus’s position as commander of the Zabrak navy. Perhaps a third of Iridonia’s naval strength remained from the outbreak of war several years previously. And now, if I’m right, every world, every colony in the Zabrak territory is depending on me to stop the thrust of the Yuuzhan Vong.

He turned his gaze from the drifting wreck of a Star Destroyer to the vessels sharing the Cathleen’s orbit. “Open a channel to the fleet,” he said quietly.

While he waited, Halyn wished silently. I wish Argus were here. This is his fleet, his battle. He died and left his duties to me, to the person he could trust to pick them up and fight. And this is a fight I don’t think we can win. Of our three cruisers, the weakest remains. Our best and most experienced pilots have died fighting the Yuuzhan Vong from the Rim to the Core. Our navy isn’t shattered, but it’s been reduced. Coruscant is fallen, and help is not coming from the New Republic.

                The only thing standing between the Zabrak nation and oblivion are these few people.

The Zabrak woman manning the comm station looked up at him and nodded a go-ahead.

“This is General Sanshir aboard the Cathleen,” Halyn said evenly. “And the Yuuzhan Vong are coming.

“Several years ago, these invaders entered our galaxy as warriors and conquerors. The New Republic was caught off-guard, unprepared for an invasion in force from beyond their borders. In the years since the peace treaty with the Imperial Remnant, the Republic had lost its military edge. It had become complacent.

“Zabrak blood has been spilled across a thousand worlds, from one of our squadrons aboard the Rejuvenator, to the frigate Mireth at Ithor, to the Yali and the Maria, and even defending the capital of Coruscant. Our race has fought and been blooded in trying to turn these invaders aside.

“Now, they will come here, to Iridonia! The New Republic has failed, the Jedi have proven too few, and they will come to destroy us here. Because we are a threat to them! And we are a threat to them because we are warriors! We will not let our worlds fall without a fight. We will not concede our homes, our lives, our children’s lives to satisfy their blood lust. We will fight them to the last Zabrak, be it with broken zhabokas or bare-hands.

“Prepare yourselves for what is to come. It may take hours, or days, or weeks, but they are coming. And we will not allow our world to fall.”

 

 

Kelta fed power to her X-wing’s four fusial thrust engines, following her shield trio leader out of the main hangar of the Mon Mothma. She was already deeply in tune with the Force, feeling its ebb and flow, carrying the emotions and instincts of her wingmates to her. Neither of them were sensitive to the Force, but she could feel enough for all three of them.

Ahead of her trio, Luke Skywalker blazed like a beacon in the Force. Tucked in on either side of him, dimmer presences but nonetheless powerful, were Mara Jade Skywalker and Corran Horn, Jedi as well. Kelta forced herself to focus only her wingmates, afraid that the sharper, clearer presences of her fellow Jedi would distract her.

Far ahead of them, hanging in space like a brilliant jewel, was Borleias: one of the keys to Coruscant, occupied by the Yuuzhan Vong. And we’re going to take it back.

On instinct she tucked in close to Rigard Matl, leading the trio. The third X-wing, piloted by Cheriss ke Hanadi, slid in neatly, all three starfighters overlapping defenses. Kelta hadn’t flown with Cheriss before today; while Kelta and Rigard had flown with the Shockers, Cheriss had flown with the Jedi’s Saber Squadron before the battle of Coruscant.

Now the shattered squadrons had been melded together into a new unit, Twin Suns Squadron. The formation of X-wings was looser than Kelta was used to after the intense drilling the Jedi had undergone before the battle at Talfaglio; it would take time for the pilots to become acquainted with new wingmates.

Kelta felt her wingmates’ alertness and checked her own scopes. Two coralskippers were maneuvering to intercept the X-wing squadron. “S-foils to attack position,” Master Skywalker said from the front of the formation. “First and third trios, take the leader, the rest on the wingmate. Fire at will.” Kelta’s hands functioning without conscious thought, the fighter’s stabilizers locking open as her craft slipped out just far enough around Rigard to fire without hitting him.

“They’re not engaging,” Twin Suns Eleven called. “Turning to pursue.”

Rigard led his two wingmates around to chase the trailing coralskipper down. All three X-wings opened fire, but the skip positioned a void to start drinking in the incoming damage.

“Negative, break off,” Skywalker ordered. “Do not engage. Twin Suns, turn to original course and form up on Record Time. Mon Mothma, these skips are yours.”

Rigard led the trio around. “Wish he’d make up his mind,” the former TIE pilot grumbled. The trio of X-wings moved into position over the Record Time, a medium freighter loaded with troops for the ground assault. The shield trio took the high station over the Record Time as the Skywalker’s trio took point, and the other two trios moved low to port and to starboard.

Kelta remained as quiet as Cheriss, watching her sensors as coralskipper squadrons rose from the surface of the planet to meet the attacking New Republic forces. Further out, other starfighter squadrons—X-wings, A-wings, E-wings, A-9s, even TIE fighters—formed up to cover other transports and the smaller warships in Antilles’ fleet.

Only seconds remained before they would be fully embroiled in starfighter combat. Skywalker’s voice came over the comm again: “Break and engage, cover the transport.”

“Looks ugly,” Cheriss commented from Twin Suns Six.

“At least I’ve got the best-looking wingmates in the Fleet,” Rigard joked. “You two can burn down any ugly we run into.”

Then the coralskippers were on them, and Kelta found herself hanging tightly with Rigard. Molten projectiles slammed into the combined defenses of the three X-wings but failed to penetrate, and the return laserfire was similarly swallowed by the skip’s defenses.

The starfighter combat of the war was an entirely different exercise than the X-wing vs TIE fighter battles of the Galactic Civil War. Those fights had pitted the durability and firepower of Alliance starfighters against the nimbleness and speed of Imperial TIEs.

Coralskippers could be as swift and agile as the old twin ion engine fighters, but their defenses—based around projecting miniaturized black holes, which pilots derided as “voids”—far surpassed anything the New Republic starfighters could manage. The coralskipper’s dovin basal, which was responsible for both propulsion and defense, tired out like any creature. Protracted battles tended to favor the New Republic’s X-wings, though the Yuuzhan Vong had learned in turn to force New Republic pilots to squander fuel, energy, and munitions on ineffective attacks.

“Break,” Rigard said evenly.

Kelta’s hands were again on automatic as both she and Cheriss kicked out port and starboard from Rigard, sacrificing their shared defenses to gain better firing angles. The skip managed to absorb Kelta and Rigard’s shots, but Cheriss’s fire burned clean through the coralskipper.

With the skip tumbling to pieces, Kelta slid back in to overlap her defenses with Rigard. Cheriss was slower in doing so, juking to avoid a stream of plasma fire from a Yuuzhan Vong pilot attempted to avenge his wingmate. Kelta shook her head as Cheriss fired. As the skip brought a void into place to protect itself, the Jedi fired a proton torpedo.

The blue-white projectile flashed across space. As expected, the coralskipper broke out of Cheriss’s line of fire to bring its void into place to intercept the torpedo. Kelta narrowed her eyes and reached out in the Force. In a moment she had them both in her senses—the coralskipper’s void defense, and the proton torpedo she’d fired.

She’d heard that Luke Skywalker had once used his full power in the Force to take such a void and turn it back onto the dovin basal that had projected it—using the enemy’s strength against it. Rumor had it that the technique had wearied him to the point of collapse…and she had nothing like Luke Skywalker’s strength.

Fortunately, that wasn’t her tactic.

A moment before the void could capture the torpedo, she tapped it hard with the Force, an exertion of telekinesis that took all her concentration for a moment. The torpedo, in an instant, skipped right over the projected void and smashed into the coralskipper, detonating in an argent explosion. The pair of skips following it were caught in the detonation and reduced to coral pebbles.

“You and your Jedi tricks,” Rigard Matl commented.

“It worked. Don’t knock it,” Kelta croaked in return, shaking her head as she tried to bring her concentration back to the battle.

The Record Time was far below, well inside the planet’s atmosphere. “You let us fall behind, Bucket,” Kelta commented.

“I was just making sure you could keep up with me, Red. Let’s go.”

The trio of X-wings dropped towards the planet like meteorites. Around them, New Republic starfighters clashed with Yuuzhan Vong coralskippers. Starfighters killed coralskippers, and coralskippers vaporized starfighters. The Yuuzhan Vong were clearly outmatched by the overwhelming fleet Antilles had brought to bear, and part of Kelta rebelled at the slaughter. But to another part of her, it wasn’t real. The Force carried to her clearly the pain and death and fear and triumph of the New Republic pilots, but there was absolutely nothing from the Yuuzhan Vong. In the Force, it seemed to her to be nothing but some insane simulation.

She shook her head as their fighters shook, again bringing her focus down to herself and her two wingmates. Atmosphere buffeted the X-wings as their descended rapidly towards the combat zone on the ground.

Her sensors told her the full story: the Record Time had already unloaded its troops. The freighter was still on the ground, under fire from a giant Yuuzhan Vong war-creature she’d heard nicknamed “ranges.” The shield trio led by Master Skywalker was enough now pouring fire into the giant creature, which sported its own dovin basal defenses which were soaking up everything the trio of X-wings could throw at it.

The trio, but maybe not what a half-squadron could do. Rigard slid them in neatly into formation behind Skywalker’s fighters.

“Good to see you,” Skywalker’s voice rang across the comm. “Split off and approach the base from the far side so that you reach the edge of the canopy half a second after we do. They’re only expecting three of us. Ready, break.”

Kelta hung in tightly behind Rigard as the jungle canopy flashed below them. She could feel holes in the Force, places where she knew she should be sensing life. Those holes were the Yuuzhan Vong, she knew.

It only took the X-wings a few seconds to reach position. Skywalker’s X-wings took the first pass, all three of them pouring fire into the war-beast’s flank. Voids sprung up to defend it from the attack, but it was far too slow to defend itself against the second attack. Rigard led the three X-wings full-speed past the creature, reddish laserfire burning into the creature’s flesh as the fighters screamed past.

“Break for north-south,” came Skywalker’s order. Rigard merely clicked his comm to acknowledge, and then the X-wings were strafing the rakamut again. This time the creature was prepared for the one-two punch and opened fire on both groups of X-wings with the plasma cannons it carried on its back.

Plasma fire licked Kelta’s X-wing, and her rear shields failed. “Bucket, I’m hit,” she said tensely.

“Get to ground,” Rigard advised.

“Negative, I can hold it,” the Jedi said as she followed him through a loop to setup for another pass. Her R5 astromech started bleating at her, but she ignored it. No sense listening to some piece of machinery that will only tell me what I can’t do.

“Get to ground,” Rigard ordered again. “No sense risking…”

Ahead of them, an explosion rose above the jungle canopy. Pieces of rakamut were hurled into the air, and Rigard was shouting “Break, break, break!”

Kelta broke away from Rigard, the trio of X-wings scattering. And in her senses, she could feel the other trio—Masters Skywalker, and Jedi Knight Corran Horn—doing the same thing. Her boards lit up red as systems failed, the plasma burrowing further into her fuselage.

Then an X-wing was in front of her, having broken around the explosion just like her flight. And for Kelta, there was no choice at all as she instinctively pushed her stick down.

And her X-wing hit the jungle canopy.

Another world falls, the Zabrak thought bitterly. Out the bridge windows of the mighty Mon Calamari Star Cruiser, the debacle was clear for anyone with the slightest grasp of military tactics. Or anyone with eyes.

The New Republic had assembled three fleets to defend Coruscant, under the command of three of its greatest tacticians—Garm Bel Iblis and Traest Kre’fey as an anvil, Wedge Antilles as a hammer. The plan had been for Wedge’s fleet to drive the Yuuzhan Vong forward into the mighty defensive fleets under Bel Iblis and Kre’fey, trapping them in a pincer and destroying the enemy entirely.

The Yuuzhan Vong had countered with a screen of refugee ships, dividing the New Republic’s fleet between those willing to fire on their own people to save Coruscant, and those who thought such a Republic not worth saving. The choice had been denied to the General now looking out at the devastation, at the vast fleets and the stream of refugees trying to escape the fall of the galaxy’s capital world. Not that it would’ve been a choice. I would’ve ordered our people to open fire.

When the New Republic had asked for volunteers, Zabrak space had responded. The capital on Iridonia had sent most of its remaining capital ships to join Wedge Antilles’s Fleet Group Three, along with thousands of starfighters. It imperiled the Zabrak nation, certainly, but the General had argued forcefully in favor of sending reinforcements. The fall of the New Republic may very well mean the fall of the galaxy as a whole. The last war proved the Zabraks cannot hold all its enemies at bay by themselves. Only as part of the Republic do we stand a chance.

His emerald eyes were hard as he studied the battlefield. Not that there’s much of a Republic left now. Or much of a defense for Iridonia.

When the Yuuzhan Vong had invaded the galaxy two years previously, Zabrak space had possessed a hardened, if small, military. Three Mon Calamari Star Cruisers had formed the backbone of its fleet, aided by dozens of smaller vessels—frigates, light cruisers, corvettes. Starfighters comprised a much greater part of the Zabrak military; hard-learned lessons from the Galactic Civil War had proved their effectiveness and, just as importantly, their concealability. Should the worst happen, fighters could be hidden, stored away, and launched quickly from hidden hangars across a hundred worlds when called upon.

Unfortunately, the Yuuzhan Vong war had proven to be much more about heavy firepower and mighty warships than the effectiveness of starfighter combat. Even with every fighter from Zabrak space, I don’t think we could’ve held here, the General reluctantly concluded.

“General Sanshir,” the ensign at the comm board called. “Communications from the Fleet Group commander.”

“Put it through.”

A quarter-sized hologram of General Wedge Antilles shimmered to life on the holoprojector on the Star Cruiser’s bridge. “We’re going to hold as long as we can,” Antilles said evenly. “We can’t keep the Vong off Coruscant, but we’re going to buy our people as much time as we can.”

“Understood,” Halyn Sanshir said in a calm reply. “Iridonia will stand with you until you withdraw.” And even after, he added to himself.

“Glad to hear it,” Antilles replied grimly.

Halyn turned his head away from the holo of the fleet commander. “Tactical, please.”

A much larger hologram shimmered to life around them, with the warships of both sides oversized on the scale of the map of the system. “Antilles, where’s the Jedi wing?” Halyn asked as he studied the hologram.

“There,” a feminine voice said quietly behind him.

The general caught himself before he could start. He turned his head to see where the young redhead was pointing at the tactical display.

“Thank you,” he murmured, a bit unsettled. The human girl—he could hardly think of her as a woman, given her youth—had offered to join him aboard the warship. The brown robes and the lightsaber hanging from her belt left Halyn little doubt about what she was, and her advice had twice saved the Zabrak task force from ambushed by Yuuzhan Vong counter-strikes. I’d forgotten they can sense each other, Halyn thought.

The hologram of Antilles flickered for a moment as the man turned to face someone else, then turned back. “We’ve received word from Bel Iblis and Kre’fey that they’ve completed evacuating the ships they could. The Jedi wing will be joining us shortly; they’re retrieving one of their own. Then we’ll be jumping out-system.”

“The refugees?” Halyn asked. Even as the words spilled from his lips, he could see the cold logic Antilles’ decision. As the Yuuzhan Vong armada moved deeper into Coruscant’s orbit, the refugee traffic was strangling from a torrent to a trickle.

Antilles was silent.

The ensign at the comm board spoke up again. “General Sanshir, we have a transmission coming from a ship coming off the planet. Voice-only, no holo.”

“Put it through,” Halyn ordered.

There was immediately a crackle of static for a full second before a voice carried across the comm waves. “Senator Alari to any Zabrak forces left in the system, I need extraction. Repeat, I need extraction.”

Halyn closed his eyes. Dammit. “Senator Alari, this is General Sanshir. We’re still out here. I’ll be sending you a fighter escort now,” he called. “Sensors, do you have a lock on his location?”

“Yes, sir!”

“Redirect Scythe and Blade Squadrons to escort-and-intercept.” He kept his eyes closed. A squadron of X-wings and a squadron of B-wings, he decided, should be enough to get the Senator through whatever the Vong threw in his path. “Order the Cyclone into backup position to give them some heavy punch if the Vong decide to use something bigger than skips.” That would put the only other Mon Calamari cruiser in the Zabrak forces, a smaller MC40a-class, in backup position. “Let’s get our Senator home.”

There were cheers from the bridge as the two fighter squadrons rushed headlong towards the coralskipper swarms between the friendly forces and the fleeing Zabrak senator. The Cyclone, barely maneuvered past her larger sister, opened fire with its heavy turbolasers before the starfighter squadrons could clash. The mighty fire ripped holes in the coralskipper formation, the fighters unable to deal with the damage of cruiser-grade hits. Almost unopposed, the two Zabrak starfighter squadrons took advantage of the opening to rush past without slowing to engage.

Halyn felt his guts churn. All of war’s a gamble, he decided. Saving an old friend is worth one more. Then we get out of here ourselves.

He glanced over his shoulder at the young Jedi girl. “You’ll probably want to head to the hangar,” Halyn informed her. A glance at the tactical display indicated friendly Zabrak starfighter squadrons had formed up with the Senator’s ships, and were keeping the coralskippers successfully at bay. “We’ll be leaving shortly, miss…Varo, was it?”

“Adreia,” the girl offered with a smile. “Thank you, General.”

Halyn turned back to the battle as the Jedi departed his bridge. He felt a cold hand squeeze his heart as he saw the Yuuzhan Vong matalok closing on the squadrons. “Antilles?” he hissed. But a quick look at the tactical display showed that the fleet commander’s mighty Star Destroyer, the Mon Mothma, was engaged by several Yuuzhan Vong warships itself and could spare no attention.

His eyes narrowed. “Order both squadrons to arm proton torpedoes and lock on that Vong cruiser,” he said coolly.

“Sir, only a third of our fighters have ordinance left,” protested the starfighter coordinator, a Zabrak woman named Kryi Rinnet who’d fought under him during the Galactic Civil War. “And we didn’t have time to equip them with the new decoys.”

“Don’t question,” Halyn said, his voice cooling further. “The Vong are going to have something else to worry about in a moment.” He turned his eyes to the auxiliary boards installed at the back of the bridge. “Bring the generator to full power, and throw the cone straight over our friendly and the Vong.”

Recognition lit up in the eyes of several bridge members. Halyn ignored it all. “Time till ready?”

“Twenty seconds.”

“Starboard guns,” Halyn ordered, “light up that Vong cruiser.”

At the distance separating them, the Star Cruiser’s weaponry couldn’t be able to penetrate the matalok’s void defenses. Generated by organic technology called dovin basals, the “voids” were miniaturized black holes that had proved effective at soaking up damage from the turbolasers and proton torpedoes alike.

As expected, the matalok’s defenses sprung to life in plenty of time to intercept the incoming fire, drinking it up greedily. That, too, was as the Zabrak General expected. But they’re not going to see this coming.

Halyn was fairly certain the mighty old Cathleen, veteran of the early Galactic Civil War, was the only ship of its kind retrofitted with gravity well projectors.

As the gravity well projector swept its cone across the matalok cruiser, Rinnet didn’t bother waiting for orders. “Fire, fire, fire,” she shouted into her own comm to the friendly starfighters.

Blue streaks of proton torpedoes flashed between the starfighters and the matalok. Its dovin basals, stunned by the abrupt appearance of a gravity well from a direction where the ship’s brain was certain no gravity well should be, couldn’t swing its defenses back into place before the warheads struck.

A heartbeat later, the squadrons of Zabrak starfighters and the Senator’s ship were all through the gap. “Shut down the generator,” Halyn ordered. He glanced at his tactical displays, saw the Republic fleets slowly withdrawing from the system. “Signal all our ships,” he said. “As soon as the Senator is aboard, we’re departing for Iridonia.”

 

 

Kelta Rose kept her throttle to the firewall, her X-wing tearing through space. Around her she could sense dozens of minds, coldly focused on their targets and their objectives. Far below, the Millennium Falcon raced upwards towards the friendly forces. Coralskippers were already descending towards the light freighter, and the Jedi wing was coming it an angle. Whether the Jedi would catch up in time would depend on Danni Quee.

The young woman’s voice was taut over the Jedi comm channel. “We’re ready to bring the jammer online,” she said, from an old Corellian Corvette, the Scarlet Sunrise. “Waiting for your orders, Hisser.”

Kelta gripped the fighter’s stick in one hand, her other poised over the switches for the X-wing’s s-foil actuators. Her displays showed two shadow bombs remaining from their re-arming, an hour previously, aboard the Mon Mothma. Her proton torpedo tubes were completely empty, but her lasers still had plenty of tibanna gas and her astromech was in good shape.

“On your mark, Control,” Saba Sebatyne spoke over the comm from the blastboat leading the Wild Knights.

“Do it, Sunrise,” Corran Horn immediately ordered from Jolly Man, the Jedi wing’s command and control ship.

Kelta squinted her eyes as she stared at the distant specks that were a lethal Yuuzhan Vong fighter squadron. For a long moment, nothing happened, and the Jedi Knight thought the jammer had failed. Almost anticlimactically, the coralskipper squadron lost its unity and dissolved into a confused mass.

“Lock S-foils and open fire,” Saba ordered over the comm.

The X-wing’s stabilizers were splitting open on Kelta’s ship before the first syllable had crossed the comm; Kelta had sensed the Barabel’s order before she had given it. Around her, the other X-wings of the Sabers and Wild Knights similarly locked in firing position. A half-second later, Kelta’s targeting computer lit up with the distant profile of a coralskipper still diving towards the Millennium Falcon. With the pure tone of a good lock in her ears, Kelta squeezed the trigger.

The starfighter’s cannons roared with energy, sending reddish-orange darts spearing towards the coralskipper. The targeting system, designed by Corran Horn, alternated the timing and precise angle of the shots. The first bolt drew a gravitic void to absorb it, while the other three bolts, firing a fraction of a second later, bent inward around the void to converge on the coralskipper and blast it into dust.

Kelta didn’t have time to target another skip; the rest flashed out of existence and were gone just as quickly as her own target. She smiled tightly as she saw the rising YT-1300 blaze through the now-open space, towards a distant Star Destroyer, the Jedi-friendly Errant Venture.

“Eclipse Wing,” Saba’s voice crackled, “return to the Errant Venture. It is time we take our hunt elzewere.”

Kelta dialed back to the comm channel for her personal shield trio—a surviving pilot from Kyp’s Dozen, which had been knocked out of the fight early on in the battle for Coruscant, and a fellow survivor from Shocker Squadron after the horrendous attack on the third yammosk. “Any word from Eclipse?” she asked her wingmates.

The pilot from the Dozen replied, “I just heard from Master Durron. The Vong tracked him and a half-dozen survivors back to Eclipse and found the base. The backup starfighters were enough to take down the frigate that followed them, but the Vong likely know the location of the base. Master Cilghal ordered the evacuation, and the base is pretty much abandoned now.”

The redheaded woman grimaced. Eclipse had been the Jedi stronghold, a place where the Jedi could strike from and research their enemies. Now it, like Coruscant itself, was fallen. There’s no safe haven for any of us, she thought with a touch of bitterness. Unless we can defeat the Vong—and today certainly wasn’t progress towards that—they’ll chase us and hunt us until there’s nowhere for us to escape to.

“Any idea where we’ll go from here?” the other Shocker pilot asked.

“No,” Kelta said quietly. “But I’d bet Master Skywalker will want to find someplace safe for the Jedi before we re-enter this fight.”

Across the fleet channel, a new voice spoke up. “General Antilles to the Jedi wing. Is Skywalker with you?”

The Millennium Falcon came back in reply a moment later. “Skywalker here.”

“The Third Fleet will be leaving the system shortly. Bel Iblis and Kre’fey are withdrawing  right now. Would the Jedi care to join us?”

“Do you have a destination in mind?” Skywalker’s voice asked cautiously.

“A rendezvous, and we’ll make a decision from there about our destination and objectives.”

“Then yes, the Jedi wing will join you. Hisser, please escort the Sunrise out-system; I’m heading to the Mon Mothma now. We’ll meet you at the rendezvous point.”

“Of course, Master Farmboy,” Saba replied. “Wild Knights on point, Sabers on flank.” The remaining X-wings and blastboats of the Jedi wing spread out into an escort formation around Danni Quee’s battered old vessel, prepared to fight to keep any Yuuzhan Vong aggressors at bay.

“Red,” a voice said in Kelta’s ear. She started, then saw from her comm board that it was an incoming transmission routed through her astromech.

“Go ahead,” she said in reply, recognizing the voice of the Shockers’ leader, Rigard Matl.

“You have any shadow bombs left?”

“Yes, why?” Kelta frowned. Why is this over the private channel, and not the squad?

“Seems a shame to carry that ordinance to the rendezvous. Waste of fuel and the crew’s time if they loaded up weaponry that you didn’t bother using.”

“What are you getting at, Lead?” What is he talking about? It’s not like we never bring back our unused weapons or fuel. No sense using it just to use it.

“Rotate your X-wing so your starboard s-foils are towards Coruscant, and then check your four o’clock high.”

Kelta rolled the X-wing in space and then followed Rigard’s instructions. It took a moment to spot what had grabbed Rigard’s attention.

Six freighters were trying to make a break for safety, a handful of New Republic starfighters doggedly trying to keep the Yuuzhan Vong coralskippers at bay. The fast and well-armed E-wings were holding their own against twice the number of coralskippers, but they were too tied up to see, let alone intercept, the Yuuzhan Vong corvette analog cutting across the freighters’ path.

The New Republic fleets were withdrawing, as were the Jedi. We can’t save everyone, Kelta told herself. But that doesn’t mean we can’t save them. “I see it,” she said tightly to Rigard. “Do you have a plan?”

“The Rep pilots can keep the skips off, but they’re going to need help with that bigger ship,” Rigard said quickly. “The wing is about to jump. Let them go, and we’ll swing back around to help the convoy get out. Once that’s done, we’ll rejoin the wing at the rendezvous point.”

Kelta bit her lip. Disobey orders and good sense and possibly get myself, one of a very small number of Jedi, and Rigard Matl, one of the best non-Jedi pilots I know, killed in a fight that won’t make any difference to the outcome of Coruscant…or let several hundred people die. Even as she watched, the corvette opened fire on the leading freighter, which was substantially faster than the rest and was trying to break for freedom. The scent of death wafted to her in the Force as the freighter was shattered to pieces by the Vong’s plasma weapons.

It was really no choice at all.

“Coordinates have been relayed to your astromechs,” Saba’s voice called across the channel. “Jumping in five, four, three…”

Kelta ignored the rest of the countdown. A heartbeat later, her friends and allies vanished into hyperspace, leaving herself and the X-wing of Rigard Matl still in Coruscant space. Rigard immediately swung around and accelerated back towards the freighters; Kelta fell into the pursuit position.

“Bucket, Red, what are you doing?” the voice of Corran Horn rang across the should-have-been-empty Jedi comm channel.

Kelta uncharacteristically swore. Of course. With all the battle damage our X-wings have taken, Saba would’ve ordered the least-damaged ship to stay behind to make sure everyone made the transition. And that would be Jolly Man, which we’ve kept out of combat as our coordinator.

Rigard Matl replied calmly before Kelta could speak. “Red’s having problem with her hyperdrive, Control.”

The only reply from Corran was a long-suffering sigh. “Roger, Bucket.”

Kelta swung into position behind Rigard as they closed rapidly on the five remaining freighters. The E-wings were putting up a ferocious fight, but the coralskippers were far more interested in tying up the New Republic pilots than killing them. With the E-wings unable to break way, the Vong’s corvette analog had clear and unobstructed access to destroy the freighters.

Rigard kept his s-foils locked in cruise position as they closed. Kelta followed suit, slipping directly into his aft and then nosing up just enough to see over the other pilot’s astromech. With her signature obscured in Rigard’s exhaust, she dumped her remaining shadow bombs into space. “Break,” she called.

Rigard responded immediately, swinging off to intercept the coralskippers. Kelta stayed directly behind him, her piloting on pure reflex as she concentrated on the shadow bombs closing with the corvette. With all the strength she could muster, she reached out with the Force and shoved the baradium-loaded weaponry straight into the corvette.

The Yuuzhan Vong vessel had not seen the X-wings as a threat; they had not assumed aggressive posturing, or fired a single laser or torpedo at it. As they had vectored off, the Vong had naturally believed they were attempting to aid the overmatched E-wings. And without the brilliant propellant trail of a proton torpedo, the warheads were very hard to see in the heat of battle.

The bombs detonated directly against the yorik coral hull of the corvette. In an eyeblink the vessel was reduced to so many pebbles, and the freighters were pouring on every iota of speed they could manage to escape.

The coralskippers turned their attention to destroying the freighters, but the arrival of two well-armed X-wings flown by veteran pilots had turned the battle in the E-wings’ favor. Two minutes later, it was over and the convoy was clear of the Yuuzhan Vong war fleet.

“Bucket, Red, are you ready to make your jump out?” Corran asked in a long-suffering voice.

“Roger, Control, it looks like my astromech finished patching up my hyperdrive,” Kelta replied with the tiny, undeniable smirk on her lips. “Thanks for watching my back, Bucket.”

She could imagine Rigard Matl’s return smirk in her mind’s eye. The former TIE pilot—hence his callsign—was not a man of many words, but he had disobeyed plenty of orders from superior officers in his time. Among the Jedi, Kelta figured, he didn’t even have to worry about court-martial for it. He also wouldn’t be sacrificing a promotion.

“Following you out,” came the comment from Jolly Man. Moments later, the last three Jedi ships in Coruscant space left a dying world behind them.

 

They came from beyond the Outer Rim of the galaxy, merciless invaders intent on destroying and conquering everything in their path.

At Sernpidal, Dubrillion, Agamar, Obroa-skai, Duro, they defeated and destroyed all comers. Armed with strange, biological weaponry and ships, these conquerors swept aside the forces of the New Republic like chaff in the wind. The Yuuzhan Vong seemed to be unstoppable.

Only the Jedi stood firm against them. Jedi fought and won repeatedly, but lost many of their number along the way; Miko Reglia was the first, but certainly not the last. Even Anakin Solo, the strongest of his generation of Jedi Knights, fell in combat against the Yuuzhan Vong.

The Jedi fractured under the stress: some elements became passive; others chose only to escape, to survive; still others treaded the line of the dark side by taking the fight to the invaders. Only the Jedi Master Luke Skywalker could reunite them into a single Order, and so he has—at Talfaglio, the Jedi struck a mighty blow against the Yuuzhan Vong and rescued thousands of hostages.

Even the Jedi have proven to be insufficient in the face of this menace, however. Even now, a mighty war fleet under the command of Yuuzhan Vong warmaster Tsavong Lah bears down on the galactic capital of Coruscant, with the fleets of the New Republic and the might of the Jedi insufficient to stop them…