Chapter
1
NEW REPUBLIC CRUISER:BRIGHT STAR; THYFERRA
10 ABY:
Alarms blared across the command deck, and the red flash of battle alert warning lights strobed along the sides above viewport height.
Captain Salorin reacted with lightning speed. She whirled around to face her aide and demanded an explanation at once. Needless to say, with the experience and record of the young man, the explanation came swiftly.
While looking down at the sheet of flimsiplast in his left hand, the young man said; "There's an Imperial fleet dropping out of hyperspace, ma'am." He looked up at her to gauge her reaction, and then back down at the flimsi as some new information flashed across it. "And it's led by the Lusankya," he added.
"Fierfek!" Salorin hissed. "Isard!"
The aide swallowed and awaited orders dutifully. "Doesn't look like we have much time to do what we came here to do then, does it?" She asked no one in particular. "Battle stations, everyone. Get the word out to the fleet, and deploy all capital ships to the rear flank nearer to the planet."
The aide nodded and scurried over to the holocomm station on the port side of the deck.
Since Admiral Ackbar had returned to Coruscant in Home One to retrieve the specialist team needed to slice into the databases of the Imperial outpost on the surface of Thyferra, Captain Salorin had temporary command of the fleet stationed there.
The whole operation had been organised as a rescue mission, she understood. The children of Han Solo and Princess Leia had been kidnapped only a month ago by an as yet unidentified Imperial agent, and the parents, and Jedi Luke Skywalker, had all pleaded with the Senate to at least attempt to rescue them.
Only after a whole month of investigating every lead, every scrap of information, was the NRI able to determine that the children were being held here on Thyferra.
Salorin could only assume that the Solo children had been rescued already; the legendary Millennium Falcon had left the system some several hours ago. She'd been told that the reason they planned to slice into the planet-side base's databanks was to determine the whereabouts and the identity of the Imperial or Imperials that were behind the infants' kidnapping.
The base, evidently, had been built specifically without interface ports for droids—probably as a countermeasure to a foreseen capture by the New Republic.
It made sense that the military would want to arrest those people responsible in order to prevent them from attempting it again either with the Solos or another family.
That was fine by Salorin.
However, it seemed as though the person behind the kidnappings was keen on remaining both hidden and anonymous. The encroaching Imperial fleet stated that fact as obvious as a Hutt stating that it was grossly overweight. The presence of the Lusankya and its less-than-ordinary commander, Ysanne Isard, was further evidence that whoever had been responsible for the kidnapping of the infant Solos, they were obviously very well connected within certain Imperial circles.
Salorin glared across space at the massive, arrowhead-shaped bulk of the Lusankya, which by far eclipsed the ship she commanded.
The Bright Star was an MC80-B class Mon Calamari designed heavy cruiser. She was more than a match for the standard Imperial- and Imperial II-class Star Destroyers, employed at large by the dismantled Galactic Empire and now by the Imperial Remnant. She would have decimated the Victory- and lesser-class ships within minutes. But for all of that impressive strength, all of that destructive firepower, there wasn't much that could be done against the might of an Executor-class dreadnought.
Though the fact served to sober any commander of the instinctual thrill of battle, it wasn't enough to deter Salorin from hitting the monstrosity head on with everything she had at her disposal.
"The fleet is deploying as per your instructions, ma'am." Salorin's aide was by her side once more, the sheet of flimsi in his hand again.
"Good, good," she replied with an absent nod. Her hand went to her chin as she stood there, gazing out at the Imperial flagship and trying to guess what Isard would do. "Any word of Home One?"
"They should be on their way back from Coruscant now," her aide replied thoughtfully. "But no; there's been no word as yet."
"Alright, it looks like we might have to go this one on our own then." She sighed and glanced over to the lieutenant sitting in front of holocomm station two. "Lieutenant, see if you can open a channel to that monstrosity. I want to speak to her commander."
"Aye, Captain," the woman replied before setting about her task. Salorin waited a moment, until the lieutenant called out; "Channel open."
"Imperial fleet, this is the commander of the New Republic third fleet. Identify your intentions at once, or leave the system equally so."
There wasn't a response at first. Salorin hadn't actually expected one. It wasn't really part of the Imperial agenda to rock up with an invasion fleet and just announce their intent before opening fire. But after a few moments of silence in which she patiently waited, a disturbingly sinister drawl came over the speakers routed through the holocomm station.
"Good afternoon, Bright Star," Ysanne Isard said. Her voice was almost snakelike, and Salorin visibly shivered at the chills it sent up her spine. "You're in Imperial territory. Withdraw your fleet at once, or prepare to lose it."
Salorin frowned. "Thyferra is an unaligned system, Isard," she pointed out. "You have no jurisdictional claims to force us out."
"You have no jurisdictional bounds to be rifling through our outpost," Isard countered.
Stang, Salorin thought to herself. They were in a standoff now. Thyferra housed both a Republic outpost and an Imperial one, and those outposts were, ostensibly, to be used only for the refining and dispatching of bacta to their respective governmental home worlds—Coruscant for the Republic, Bastion for the Remnant.
The Republic had been using their outpost for exactly that reason, hoping that it would foster enough good faith with the Imperial Remnant that they wouldn't try anything sneaky either.
But now, the Republic had been caught vandalising an Imperial installation, and it didn't matter that the Imperials weren't using it for the reasons they were supposed to. If Isard, or whomever she was here on behalf of, could convince the Remnant's leaders that the Republic had done wrong, it could quickly lead to a political incident the likes hadn't been seen in centuries.
It wasn't even exactly like the Remnant and the Republic were allies, per se. But since the failed campaign to topple the Republic by Grand Admiral Thrawn a year ago, the Remnant had been quiet and withdrawn, no doubt biding its time until it could strike again more successfully.
So therefore, avoiding such a diplomatic incident hinged on the result of the battle that was so increasingly unavoidable.
"Your outpost, Madame Isard, was operating outside its boundaries. The residents of Thyferra agreed to let the Imperial Remnant put an outpost there for bacta dispersal purposes only, not so that it could be used to house hostages."
"The use of our facilities is of no concern to your Republic. Withdraw your fleet at once or we will destroy it, your base on the surface, and every last inhabitant of that stinking green rock!"
"Then I'm afraid I'm going to have to put you in that position," Salorin said with a bored sigh, more to mock Isard than to express any genuinely felt boredom. "The Imperial Remnant has committed an inexcusable transgression. If you're willing to leave, we're willing to overlook it. If not, you're going to have to force us out."
She nodded to the lieutenant at the holocomm and the channel was cut off before Isard could mount a biting reply.
Without pause, Salorin looked over to the banks of weapons stations to the starboard side of the command deck. "Charge all weapons and load all missile bays. Prepare to lock onto any hostile targets that break through the forward ranks and try to make a run for the planet."
Though none of the officers bothered to reply to her command, she knew that all of them would be doing exactly as she'd ordered. As such, she didn't need to wait for a response, and she turned to the next bank of stations.
"I want the shields up above normal capacity. Divert power from the hyperdrive if you have to, it's not like we'll be using it."
Salorin continued to issue orders to the respective sections until she felt confident that the Bright Star was ready to survive, briefly, a direct encounter with the Imperial flagship.
Her aide, it seemed, picked up on that. "You're not thinking of taking on the Lusankya, are you?" he asked, worried.
"Maybe," Salorin said thoughtfully. "Isard has been a painful thorn in the Republic's side for a while now. If we can take her out, then the Imperial fleet here might lose its willingness to fight and simply retreat. And we'll have dealt a blow the Remnant, as well as doing them a favour removing an unstable element in their ranks."
"You think doing them a favour is a smart thing?"
Salorin smiled and nodded. "A gesture of good will for potential peace," she offered. When the young man didn't return her smile, she sighed. "Maybe not. But the Lusankya is as yet the single most powerful ship at the Remnant's disposal. If we can destroy her, it will serve to set back any plans the Remnant has of launching another campaign against the Republic for years."
"What makes you think they're planning any such event?"
"To my knowledge, the current commander-in-chief of the Remnant is … Gilad Pallaeon, I believe." She'd almost forgotten, actually. When her aide nodded to confirm her guess, she continued. "He was Thrawn's right-hand man when the Remnant came for us a year ago. He might not be quite to par with Thrawn's genius, but I'm betting he learned a thing or two; enough to guarantee him leadership of the Remnant as well as posing a significant threat."
"If he's that much a threat, destroying the Lusankya might not do anything more than sting the Empire," the aide pointed out.
"He's a threat as long as he has power to muster. Without a fleet, he's little more than a gnat."
The man nodded and returned his gaze to the forward viewport.
Salorin hadn't shifted her gaze from the viewport the entire time she'd had that conversation. So she'd been witness to the deployment of the Imperial fleet, far ahead of the forward lines of the fleet at her own disposal, and approaching the forward lines at a slow, cautious pace. She also had noticed the tiny mobile pinpricks that were the tell-tale signs of fighters being deployed ahead of their own lines.
"We've got incoming waves of bombers and interceptors," someone from the sensor stations reported. Salorin nodded, waited a few seconds, and then turned to the comm. stations.
"Tell the support ships at the front to open up with a suppressive barrage. I want them to blanket every last inch of space along those trajectories with laser fire," she said. "All currently deployed fighter squadrons are to set up picket lines just behind those forward support ships and pick off any fighters and bombers that get through."
"Yes, ma'am," one of the officers replied, more to let his comrades at adjacent comm. stations know that he was on the task.
Seconds later, she saw the corvettes at the front of the fleet moving into positions that offered the best coverage, and then begin to open fire with all available laser cannons in the direction of the approaching fighters.
Small explosions in the distance ahead of the support ships alerted her to the hits and detonations of the incoming Imperial fighters. The explosions continued to come in waves, each of them creeping closer and closer to the support ships until, finally, some explosions were either right on top of them or behind the line.
Salorin could see the tiny efflux trails of Republic fighters zipping back and forth behind the support ship lines, the red and green flashes of laser cannon fire as the Imperial and Republic ships engaged in good old fashioned dog fighting.
Her support ships continued to fire.
Smaller combat cruisers were weaving amongst her lines now, moving closer to the support ships at higher positions to offer covering fire for the bombers that were hammering the support ships' shields with proton bombs as they passed overhead.
And still, the Imperial ships came.
At the current angle of approach, they looked no more than flat, white wedges with a blocky command module atop.
The Lusankya was the most misrepresented from that angle. She was such a long, gracefully thin ship when seen from above. But from this angle, she looked short and fat. If Salorin had been seeing it for the first time, she mightn't have believed that such a vessel was capable of such utter destruction.
But she had seen it before, and she did believe it.
Within minutes, the support ships and cruisers at the front of the Imperial lines came into range and opened up with rapid fire bursts from their laser cannons and turbolaser batteries.
"Destroyer and frigate groups three and seven change position and come at them from planet side," Salorin ordered. "Send the Righteous Justice over with them, and have the Sentry and the Blazing Fury lead groups five and six out to the other side."
"You plan to pen them in, Captain?" her aide questioned.
"Precisely. If we flank them from both sides with the heavier ships straight down the middle, we might just catch them in enough of a crossfire to make them think twice about pushing the attack."
"You're betting on the fact that Isard will see your plan and back off. Not to sound disrespectful, Captain, but Madame Isard isn't well known for her …" He hesitated, and fidgeted with the corner of his report flimsi while he considered. "How best to say it."
"Her sanity?"
"Precisely."
"She might be a Palpatine-toting Imperial fanatic, and currently hold the majority sway of the Remnant's fleet," Salorin started quietly, "but how long do you think that will last if she orders the fleet she's assembled here on a suicide run, knowing it's a suicide run? She'd have to resort to shooting down her own ships when her commanders decide their crews' lives are more important than her agenda. That'll turn the Remnant leadership against her and the threat she's posed for a while now will have been nullified."
"Risky manoeuvring, if I may say so," her aide said before leaving her side again.
Salorin nodded and then got back to the business at hand.
"All ships are to open fire at will the second they have a target lock. Let's make the Imperials rue the day they decided to cross the Third!"
An hour later, and things were not going the way Salorin had hoped they would.
A third of the fleet was damaged or destroyed. The Blazing Fury took a long range turbolaser hit straight in the command and control bridge from theLusankya, effectively taking her out of the fight. The Righteous Justice had been hulled in a dozen places, and lay spinning on her axis at the edge of the battle, venting mists of atmosphere, debris, bodies.
But the Bright Star was still almost at full strength, and Salorin had ordered her crew to broadside the Lusankya's port flank, where the Imperial flagship's shields were weakest.
Turbolaser and missile and laser cannon fired in any which direction out there in the space surrounding Thyferra. Most found purchase on hull or shield, while the rest fizzled out or detonated in empty space or the planet's atmosphere.
So when a lone Imperial ship, at least three decades out of date, hyper jumped into the middle of the battlefield, none of the Republic commanders paid it much mind.
All of them assumed that such a ridiculously out-dated ship would stand no chance against the modern weapon strength employed in the turbolaser cannons, or the detonation power in the missiles. After minutes, the Republic was forced to reassess that assumption.
A Mon Cal MC80 cruiser took the initiative of opening fire on the relic, only to have her weapons fizzle against the newcomer's shields and deal no damage to the ship at all.
More Republic commanders opened up on the Venator-class Star Destroyer, firing with all the weapons they had.
It wasn't enough.
The ship punched a hole right through the Republic's fleet lines and continued on straight for the planet. It didn't stop, and it didn't slow.
It continued on, and on, until finally, a massive blue and white fireball lit up a section of the planet's surface, wiping out everything within its deadly plasma radius, burning flesh and melting steel and disintegrating plants.
Nothing survived.
And as the Imperial fleet began to pull out, one ship at a time, the Republic commanders knew that they had lost.