Chapter 1
To ODST Ezra B, thanks for the suggestions.
Year: 2560
Ship: UNSC Infinity
Location: Unknown
Captain's Log: Captain Thomas Lasky, UNSC Captain of the UNSC Infinity, service number 98604-72690-TL. We have discovered an Anomaly and Central Command has ordered the Infinity to investigate. However, when we arrived, our Jump drive malfunctioned and we managed a blind jump into unknown space. Engineers are working around the clock to restore long range communications to Central Command. We have to be extremely careful... We don't know what could be out here.
"Sir, we've picked up some sort of communication, but it doesn't sound like anybody we'd know," a communications Lieutenant reported.
Captain Tom Lasky stared at the Lt. in confusion. "What do you mean?"
"I can't explain it, sir. You need to hear this."
The Lt. raised the volume and this is what they heard:
"This Rebellion has to be stopped and soon. Otherwise we could have all out war on our hands and that's something we really don't need..."
The Lt. shut off the transmission, "Should we attempt to make contact?"
Laskey pondered the situation carefully before coming to a conclusion.
"Let's see what everything's like here first. We should stay under the radar until we know what's here."
"Yes sir!"
Lasky turned to the Navigation officers, "Any idea where we are?"
"We have the coordinates, sir, but they're not within our galaxy," an ensign reported.
"Not within the Milky Way? Then where are we?" Lasky asked.
"I don't know exactly, sir."
"Can we establish communications to Command?"
"If we want Live communications, I'm afraid that's not possible. However we can record a message and send it to Command. Should take about a month at most for the message to reach back home," the ensign replied.
Tom thought a moment, "What's the minimum?"
"A week or two. Don't know the exact time," a lieutenant replied.
"I suppose that will have to work. Get a message to Command immediately!" Lasky ordered.
"On it, sir!"
"I need some ODST units to scout some of the inhabited planets with communications. See what they can find out about the government here," Lasky ordered.
"Yes sir!"
"Come on! Let's get out of here!" Ezra yelled to Sabine. She was painting her violet Starbird on another TIE fighter.
"One second, I'm almost done," she said.
"You said that two TIEs ago," Ezra complained.
"Hey, you can't rush art," she shot back, smiling.
Ezra looked around the wing of the TIE and saw a patrol of Stormtroopers headed their way, though they weren't alerted to their presence.
He turned back to Sabine who was placing the final touches on her purple bird.
"Those stormtroopers will be here any second now," he hissed.
"Alright, I'm done," Sabine said, packing up her paint applicator.
"About time," Ezra said. "This way."
They ran over to the other TIE fighters so they could get to the exit without being detected. Pretty soon, both Ezra and Sabine made it out of the Imperial TIE base and back to the Phantom II.
When they returned to the Ghost, Hera already had another mission for them.
"While you two were gone, one of our experimental cloaked scanners picked up something strange. Do you think you two are up for a little investigating?"
"Sure, why not," Sabine said.
"But we just got back from the TIE airfield!" Ezra protested.
"If you're saying you're tired, then you can sleep on the way there," Sabine said.
"It's not comfortable enough to even doze off in that thing!" Ezra exclaimed.
"Well you have me don't you? I can be your pillow," Sabine said with a wink as she walked back over to the Phantom II.
Ezra was frozen in place, his face a bright red. Hera stood behind him, her arms crossed.
"What did she mean by that?" she asked.
"I-I don't know..." Ezra said.
"Well, I trust you two won't to anything crazy," Hera said as she walked back to the Ghost's cockpit. Ezra's face turned a darker red, but Sabine's voice cut him out of his thoughts.
"Ezra, you coming or what?" she called.
"I-I... I'm coming!" he called back, running to the Phantom's access hatch.
A few hours later...
"Sir, some of our ODSTs have returned," the ensign reported.
"Good," Lasky said. "Bring the squad leaders up here, I need the information they found."
"What about the other ODSTs?" the Lt. asked.
"How many squads are missing?" Lasky asked.
"One squad. All others are making their way up here as ordered," the ensign replied.
"Should we break radio silence?" the Lt. comm officer asked.
"Negative. Not until we know what's here."
"Yes sir!" the bridge crew replied.
"Grand Admiral," a bridge officer saluted the admiral on the Imperial Star Destroyer. "There's been reports of some heavily armed rebels in the Kamino system, but there's something different with these ones."
"Different? How so?" Admiral Thrawn asked.
"Our garrison on the planet can't seem to hurt them, even when their shots hit," the officer reported.
"Fascinating. Are you able to get me in contact with the garrison Commander?" Thrawn asked, calmly.
"I'm trying to contact him now..." the officer said. There was a small beep heard from the console, "Channel open, sir."
A blue image of the garrison's commander appears, and he looked terrified.
"Grand Admiral! It is a relief to see you have picked up our distress call," he said.
"I am aware there are rebels at your base. Can you describe them to me?"
"They're bigger than most people here, only shorter than the Kaminoans themselves! They're using ballistic weaponry, but we can't kill them!" the commander reported.
"You must be hallucinating, "Thrawn said coldly. "Ballistic weapons haven't been seen in millenia, not including our missiles and some torpedoes."
"Don't get me wrong, Grand Admiral. They seem to be trying to avoid a fight, which is also strange," the commander said.
"I'm on my way. I will provide you some more ground units to capture these rebels," Thrawn said. He closed the channel and ordered a course be set for Kamino.
"Who are these guys?" an ODST called out. Him and his unit have been caught snooping around the data complex by what they currently understand as Imperial Stormtroopers. They were able to collect almost all the information about the galaxy, its government, its citizens, everything.
"I don't know, but they have terrible aim!" another replied as he popped up over his cover and shot another trooper. He fell off the bridge and into the raging waters below.
"That had to hurt," the ODST medic said.
"Hey, cut the chatter! We still have to get out of here before we kill more of these guys! They could be the good guys, remember?" the squad leader called.
"Then again they might not be the good guys, but I'm not arguing with you," the medic said.
They called for their ride to pick them up and pretty soon, much to the Imperial's surprise, a Pelican appeared from the clouds and landed on one of the pads. All the ODSTs boarded the Pelican, keeping the Imperials off of it as it took off. They managed to get to a Strident-class heavy frigate just as an Imperial Star Destroyer appeared from Hyperspace.
"All hands, prepare to jump!" the captain of the Strident class ordered.
"Grand Admiral, there is a ship just a few klicks ahead of us of... unknown origin," an officer reported.
"Contact that vessel immediately. I wish to speak to the captain," Thrawn said.
Before a channel could be opened, a blue portal-like thing appeared in front of the vessel.
"Do not let them escape!" Thrawn ordered.
Just as he turned back to the viewport the ship was already gone.
"Grand Admiral, they jumped out... what it was, I don't know, but we can't track it's trajectory," an officer reported.
Thrawn placed his hand up to his chin, pondering what just happened. "Interesting."
"Grand Admiral?"
"Commander, I believe those aren't rebels. They are something completely different. Who they are and where they came from, I intend to find out," Thrawn said.
"Ezra, are you awake?" Sabine said, shaking his shoulder.
"Mmmm..." he groaned. "I am now. Where are we?"
"I was just about to bring the ship out of hyperspace. I needed you to keep an eye on the scanners for me," Sabine answered.
"Whatever you say," he said with a grin, making Sabine smile.
Sabine dropped the ship out of hyperspace and the very first thing they saw took their breath away. Ahead of them there was a massive ship, along with a few other smaller vessels.
"Kriff," Sabine said.
"Sabine, what's the length of a Star Destroyer again?" Ezra asked.
"I believe they're 1,600 meters to be exact..." Sabine said, her mouth still agape at the sight of this massive ship in front of them.
A voice came over their comms, "Unidentified vessel, this is Captain Thomas Lasky of the UNSC Infinity. You have entered restricted space. Identify yourselves!"
"I'm sorry for intruding, but..." Sabine started, but was interrupted.
"How did you find us?" the man asked.
"We didn't expect to find anything here... We were sent here to investigate an anomaly detected from one of our long range scanners," Sabine said.
Lasky waited for the captain of that small ship to answer. What he heard made him relax only a little bit.
"We didn't expect to find anything here... We were sent here to investigate an anomaly detected from one of our long range scanners," the female voice replied.
(In case you were wondering how the Infinity was able to contact them on their radio frequency, one of the returned ODSTs from earlier helped with that)
"Bring them aboard, but do not let security loosen up until we know who they are," Lasky ordered.
A marine saluted him, "Yes sir!"
The marine and his squad left for the hangars to await their guest's arrival.
"Unidentified vessel, how many people do you have on board and what kind of cargo are you carrying?" Lasky asked.
(I honestly don't know if they have scanners for this sort of thing and I can't find anything on the internet about it)
The female voice answered with a confused tone, "It's just me and one male... and we don't have any cargo on board. Don't you guys have scanners?"
"That's classified. I am allowing you to board the Infinity. I would like to speak to you and your friend in person. You seem friendly enough, and I can answer any questions you may have under one condition," Lasky said.
"What would that be?" the female voice answered.
"If you tell us everything about where we are," Lasky said.
A few strange looking starfighters escorted the Phantom to one of Infinity's hangars. As soon as they docked, however, they saw armed soldiers waiting for them. They looked similar to some of the Rebel soldiers in their forest gear, but these guys seemed to have more armor and some sort of gun Sabine has never seen before.
"Command wants you to turn in any weapons you may have on you. You aren't under arrest, just standard precaution," a soldier said.
"Woah woah woah... I'm not surrendering my weapons to people I barely know!" Sabine said.
"Sabine, now's not the time to start a fight," Ezra said.
"You should know Mandalorians never leave their weapons behind much less surrender them," Sabine said.
"I'm sorry, but we can't take any chances here. We won't do anything to hurt you," the soldier said.
Ezra pulled out his blaster and lightsaber, and handed them to the soldier who stared at the weapons.
"What, you've never seen a blaster and a lightsaber before?" Ezra asked.
"Blaster is understandable... just never one of this design. Now as for a lightsaber I've never heard of it," the soldier said.
"You should be able to just clip it to your belt. Here, let me help," Ezra said, taking his lightsaber and clipping it to the soldier's belt. He looked up to see a few soldiers had their weapons trained on him.
"Woah hey I wasn't going to do anything!" he exclaimed, raising his hands in surrender.
The soldiers lowered their weapons as their squad leader looked to Sabine. "Now yours."
"Sorry not happening," Sabine said.
"Sabine, we don't want trouble with these guys. I mean, this ship is massive for crying out loud! I mean it's bigger than two of our MC80s combined!" Ezra said.
"How do you know this is bigger than two MC80s?" Sabine asked.
"I've seen two of them lined up before, and this still looks a lot bigger!" Ezra explained.
"I'll make you a deal... uh Sabine, right?" the soldier said.
"That's right. And this is Ezra," she said.
"Alright, Sabine, I'll make you a deal: I'll let you keep your weapons IF you promise not to use them in any way as long as you're on this ship," the soldier said.
"How can I trust you?" Sabine asked.
"In return, we will take you to our captain as friends, not as an armed escort," the soldier said.
"That the best you can offer?" Sabine asked then.
"I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I will be breaking enough orders by letting you keep your weapons. If not, you can follow your friend's lead..." the soldier began but Sabine interrupted him.
"Fine, I agree to your terms!" Sabine said.
"Good. Now if you will please, follow me." The soldier began leading Ezra and Sabine to a lift to the bridge.
Lasky turned around when he heard his Marines return from the hangar with their two guests.
"Their names are Sabine and Ezra, though they never gave their last names. These are the boy's weapons, but the girl insisted on keeping hers. Something about 'Mandalorian honor' or something like that," the soldier said, handing Lasky the DL-44 and the lightsaber.
"Only as long as she doesn't use them in here," Lasky said and the soldier nodded, confirming there was a deal made.
"Ezra and Sabine... Am I right?" Lasky began, looking to the two teens.
"Yes sir! My full name is Ezra Bridger. This is Sabine Wren, from..." Ezra began but Sabine interrupted him.
"Sabine Wren, from House Vizsla, Clan Wren," she said.
"I understand the... Mandalorians, never surrender their weapons?" Lasky asked.
"It would bring dishonor to my family," she said bitterly.
"I will respect your wishes, then. I do not wish to create enemies while we are here... though I hear one of my squads got caught up in a firefight with... whatever those white-armored guys are," Lasky said.
"Stormtroopers? Are you guys against the Empire?" Ezra asked.
"Right now I need confirmation on our current location and who the good guys are," Lasky said.
"Tell us who you are first, then we'll talk," Sabine said.
"As you wish. I am Captain Thomas Laskey of the UNSC Infinity. My crew and I were investigating an anomaly when our slipspace drive malfunctioned, bringing us here. All we know is we're in the wrong galaxy," Lasky said.
"You guys aren't from here? At all?" Sabine asked, now starting to relax a bit.
"No. Now what about you two?" Lasky asked.
"I'm from the planet Krownest in Mandalorian space. Ezra is from a planet called Lothal, which is under Imperial rule. How much data do you guys have of this place?" Sabine said.
"Almost none at all. We're still awaiting the arrival of my..." Lasky started to explain, but was interrupted when a Strident-class heavy frigate came out of slipspace.
"Captain, I'm picking up a slipspace rupture just off our starboard side!" an ensign reported.
"Good they're finally here!"
The Strident-class frigate docked with the Infinity and the ODST soldiers immediately went up to the bridge to turn in what they have found.
"Captain, sir!" the ODSTs all said, giving him a crisp salute. Ezra's and Sabine's eyes grew wide at the sheer height of these men, and the armor they were wearing.
"What do you have for me?" Lasky asked.
"We managed to gather enough information about our current position, the government, the military... literally almost everything, all from that stormy ocean planet," the ODST leader said.
"You mean Kamino?" Sabine asked.
The ODST turned to look at her. "Who is she?"
"This is Sabine Wren and her friend Ezra Bridger. They appeared out of nowhere just off our Starboard side, apparently investigating an anomaly... which I believe was us coming in here," Lasky said.
Ezra stood up and held out a hand, "It's nice to meet you."
The soldier just stared at Ezra, but he was kind enough to shake Ezra's hand. "I suppose I can say the same. Let me just say, those... Stormtroopers do not seem friendly."
"They're not. The Empire isn't a good thing around here. It's a full galactic tyranny. You see, Sabine and I are Rebels; A group of people trying to combat the Empire... and right now things aren't looking good for us," Ezra explained.
"How bad is this... Empire?" Lasky asked.
"The info you have wouldn't show you the truth, but they have committed genocide against innocent races, driven innocent people from their homes, all because they said no to them... I lost my parents that way," Ezra explained, only this time he had a sad tone in his voice when he mentioned his rested her hand on his arm, to comfort him.
"I'm sorry to hear that," Lasky said.
"It sounds a lot like the Covenant, sir," the ODST guy said.
"What's the Covenant?" Ezra asked.
"They are an empire of alien races, who attacked all of humanity's colonized planets in the Milky Way galaxy, where we're from, in a genocidal campaign, to put it plainly," Lasky said, but there was a hint of sadness in his voice. Ezra couldn't feel any connection to him, meaning there was no Force with him or anybody in the ship. But even then, he recognized that tone.
"You lost people you cared about during that time, didn't you?" Sabine asked, also catching his sad tone.
"As a matter of fact I have. But it's something I don't talk about," Lasky said.
"I understand that completely," Ezra said.
After hours of explaining and all sorts of briefing, like where they came from, where exactly they were, etc, they finally came to a conclusion.
"Alright. I suppose this Empire should be brought down, but I'm afraid that's up to my superiors back home," Lasky said.
"By the way, captain," Sabine started. "I love this ship. It's... It's huge!"
Ezra grinned, "You just now say that?"
His wrist comm went off, and Hera's voice was heard through it.
"Ezra, Sabine, where in the galaxy are you two?" she asked, obviously furious.
"Sorry Hera," Ezra started. "We were just talking with some new friends."
"New friends?" Hera asked, her anger melting. "Who are they?"
"Well... how do I put this... They aren't exactly from here," Sabine said.
"What do you mean not from here?" Hera asked.
"They're not from this galaxy. Have you ever heard of the Milky Way?" Ezra said.
Pretty soon, there was a massive 5,694 meter starship in orbit around Yavin 4. Hera was allowed to board the Infinity with a small group of Rebel marines as a guard.
"I presume you are the famous Captain Syndulla?" Lasky asked.
"Captain and General, yes. And you must be Captain Thomas Lasky," she replied.
"It's a pleasure to meet with you, but I know you are not the full Rebel leadership... granted we are unknown to you," Lasky said.
"I can say the same to you. Impressive ship you have here," Hera said, looking around the bridge.
"Thank you. I must say, for a small group you really seem to know how to hit the Empire," Lasky complemented. He has read the data and reports about the Phoenix Squadron's successful missions.
"Now, about why I'm here," Hera said.
"Right. So as you know already, we are not from here at all," Lasky started, bringing up a star chart.
"Is that...?" Hera started.
"Yes, this is the Milky Way. I'm sure if you use your space telescopes you will see it," Lasky said.
"I wouldn't doubt civilizations before space travel would have done that, but by now those records no longer exist," Hera said.
Ezra turned to the ODST marine standing next to him and saw the patch on his armor.
"What's ODST?" Ezra asked.
"Orbital Drop Shock Trooper," the marine said. "We're the Special Operations of the UNSC Marine Corp. We better than the normal marines, but we aren't the most elite. That title belongs to the Spartans."
"Spartans?" Ezra asked.
"You don't know what Spar-," the marine caught himself. "Sorry I forgot we're in the wrong galaxy."
"Spartans are basically the Elite of the Elite," the ODST explained. "You see, the difference between us ODST and a Spartan, for one thing, Spartans are a lot bigger. The Master Chief is like, 6 foot 10. And Spartans are genetically enhanced, so they can really take a hit and keep moving. However, they like to steal our kills. They're good, but us ODSTs don't really like them very much."
"Who was he?" Ezra asked.
"He was the best Spartan of us all. It was said that you should never underestimate a Spartan... but the one you really did not want to mess with was the Chief. He's taken down a Covenant assault carrier alone. Let me tell you those suckers are as huge as Infinity. Taking one down is no easy feat," the ODST said.
"But you're a Spartan?" Sabine asked.
"No. They also have their own separate military branch. The ODST don't have as good of armor as them. We work with the Marine Corp, but the actual Spartan branch work wherever they're needed. You get what I mean?"
"Sort of," Ezra said.
"Captain Lasky said something about a... what is it, Slipstream drive?" Sabine asked.
"Slipspace. It's our form of space travel. It's a drive that opens something like a portal to almost another dimension of space. The ones we have are not as good as the Covenant's... and theirs isn't even close to as good as the Forerunner," the ODST said.
"Forerunners?" Sabine asked.
"It's... hard to explain. If it weren't for the Master Chief, every bit of humanity would be dead in our galaxy," an ensign said.
"I'm probably saying too much already," the ODST said. "How do you guys go places?"
"We have Hyperdrives. It propels the ship into another dimension of space called hyperspace," Sabine said.
"Is it fast?" the ensign asked.
"It depends on what class hyperdrive you have. Anything with a 1.0-class hyperdrive is pretty fast, but 0.1 almost anything could outrun it," Sabine answered.
"Interesting," the ODST said.
A few hours later
"We should probably leave this system and fast. Who knows what the Empire is picking up from our very presence," Lasky said.
"Are you going to help us fight?" Ezra asked.
"I'm afraid I can't. Humanity isn't ready for another galactic conflict... the Covenant made sure of that back home," he said.
"That and it's just one ship, Ezra," Hera said.
"Yes, but we have 10 Strident-class heavy frigates docked. The Infinity can deploy a small battlefleet of ships if the need comes, but looking over the Star Destroyer data we received, our cruisers could be obliterated by one of those SDs," Lasky said.
"Then there's the matter of a fleet of SDs," the ODST commander said.
"Indeed. I don't think Infinity could last too long against a fleet like that," Lasky agreed.
"So... you won't fight," Ezra said.
"Not unless we are fired upon. We've lived by that code for centuries, and we're not dropping it," Lasky said.
"So unless the Empire attacks you first, then you won't fight?" Hera asked, only to clear it up.
"I'm afraid so. Unless that happens, we can only watch and gather as much data as I can. We need to find a way home," Lasky said.
"I understand. Do what you will," Hera said. "It was a pleasure to meet you."
"Likewise," Lasky said.
A little while later, Ezra, Sabine, Hera, and their group of rebel officers undocked from the Infinity. Not long after they were clear of the ship, they saw the Slipspace drive in action, which really impressed everyone.
"When a ship jumps to slipspace, we call it a 'slipspace rupture.' We are able to detect it easily, and apparently with the right equipment, you could too."
That's what the ODST explained to Ezra and Sabine after they asked about the Slipspace drive, or as they call it they Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Drive, FTL drive, and occasionally calls the slipspace itself the slipstream. They use many terms for their jump technology, it was hard for even Sabine to register all of them.