)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

12 miles northeast of Yermo, Upper California, NAU

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

The F-22 driver pushed his Raptor like a bat out of hell. The Mojave desert fifty feet below him passed by as a blur.

He cautiously checked for his wingman on his six. The F-18 Super Hornet was still there. There wasn't much sense radioing the other fighter or the bombers they were escorting. This close to the ETs' supply channel up the I-15 corridor almost every electronic signal was jammed out of existence by the enemy's superior tech.

The Pratt & Whitney engines pushed his aircraft past Mach 2. Speed would be his only friend if the enemy's dreaded 'H' fighters showed up.

"Where are you sons-of-bitches?" He wondered aloud.

He had never been this close to their lines without being intercepted by one of their squadrons, or worse, pounced upon from space by those six-wing bastards the ETs kept in orbit. He veered away from the ruins of Barstow, where it was known the Imps kept several batteries of far-too-effective laser flak batteries.

He waved his hand at his wingman and then pointed up. The other pilot signaled back with a thumbs up. The Raptor pilot wondered if these were his last moments. Air combat losses had been so severe and one-sided that American pilots now said their goodbyes to each other before their missions.

"Dammit, focus. Thoughts like that can make you buy the farm in a hurry against these guys." He chided himself as he pulled back on the stick.

The two fighters climbed for altitude and hopefully a greater vantage point. The blackened desert spread out below them. Their job on this mission was to act as spotters for a bomber group coming up behind them. If they located anything they were to fly over the target, pop flares and provide cover for the slower attack planes as they made their run.

His eyes spotted movement over towards Barstow to the west before he was even a mile into the air. At least one pair of H fighters flew patrol over the city. "Just mind your own business for another minute or two, you ET shit heads."

There. Something was moving along the interstate to the east of them. He pushed the stick hard to the left and banked the fighter towards the ground vehicles. The sudden turn allowed him to glimpse the seven bombers coming out of the mountains to the north. They were barreling down on him as fast as they could. If they pulled this off they would have to clear out of Dodge in a hurry.

Two looming monsters rose up out of the desert. Every pilot in the Air Force knew their alien names by now, A-T-A-Ts, but every groundpounder called them Charlie-Whiskey or camel walker. In between the two massive machines was a line of a dozen floating trucks. The soft-skin transports were slow and laden with supplies destined for the battle raging in Las Vegas.

"The hell they are." The pilot whispered as he activated his weapons. He fired his flares.

The Charlie-Whiskies noticed him and his partner much too late for it to do them any good. The big machines lurched to the side as the transports attempted to scatter. As the distance to the targets rapidly decreased he could see tiny white figures jumping from the cabs of several of the vehicles.

He opened up with his 20mm Vulcan gatling gun on the lead transport. The alien vehicle's cab shattered as the high velocity rounds tore into it, turning the engine block and its alien driver into Swiss cheese.

He was moving too fast to turn onto another target. Instead he toggled the weapons' control and dropped his aircraft's bomb load of a single GBU-39. The small munition bomb landed squarely behind the remains of the first vehicle and impacted with the second floating truck's hood. The resulting explosion vaporized the vehicle and its load of ET supplies while shredding the next two vehicles in the column with searing hot metal fragments.

An explosion near the rear of the column signified a successful run by his wingman. Knowing it was suicide to make another attack run, they hugged the ground as they raced south. The pilot swore his Raptor clipped the tops of several cacti as they went by. A few errant laser bolts shot over his plane and he wished he could put his aircraft even lower.

One mile from the target he turned east and witnessed several mushrooming clouds erupt from the freeway as the bombers made their run. The enemy column was obliterated in a heartbeat. Enemy supply drivers simply vanished from existence as the heavy ordnance rained down upon them. Surviving ETs caught fire as the asphalt of the interstate melted underneath their feet for almost three hundred yards.

The seven bombers waggled their wings in victory as they raced to join their fighter escort as they fled north again. All that was left were the two angery Charlie-Whiskeys that had failed to protect their charges. The pilot wished that the bombs had made a dent in their armor but so far he had heard nothing short of a nuke would take the bastards out.

His head swiveled to the west again and he could make out several of the H fighters sortieing out of Barstow. He wondered why there weren't more. Usually they buzzed around the supply line like flies on potato salad. Well, at least this time they had enough of a head start to get away from the ETs. He knew from experience they usually didn't pursue American fighters once they hit the mountains.

Behind him long smoke columns marked the death of the Imperial column. "I love the smell of burning ETs in the morning. It smells like victory."

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Picket Line, Subterrel Squadron Rendezvous Point, Midway between Mars and Phasma Belt

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

"Tighten up, Belly Runner and Wampa, you're flying for the Mynocks not the kriffing Howlrunners." Striker barked into his flight comm. This far from Mars communication systems had finally overcome the intense jamming the Royal Guard was emitting from their base in the capital.

He watched as the two errant fighters returned to their place in formation. Their normal carrier, the Quill, hadn't wanted to risk leaving Mars unprotected while they met up with the scattered ships of the Subterrel Squadron. Along with the Charger the damaged flagship was all that stood between Mars and the traitors serving Moff Seco around Earth. Instead the Mynocks were escorting two Lancer-class frigates, the Vahl and the Lord Hoth, on their mission to recall the remnants of the Emperor's personal squadron.

Striker still couldn't believe it. A few hours ago Imperials had blasted upon Imperials. He had even vaped a TIE Starfighter from the Insertion when the Star Destroyer had made its escape. The older model of TIEs were no match for the nimble new Interceptors and the vapefight had been a one-sided affair. "A stoopa affair, if there ever was one." Striker said.

"What was that, boss?" his new panelman, Zap, asked.

"Nothing, just counting asteroids." Striker responded. He was still getting accustomed to being in charge of an entire squadron. He missed his former panelman, Bloodstripe, Roblin had been bumped up and given an entire wing. And at the moment he was commanding the squadrons protecting Mars from the expected assault by Seco's forces.

"Vahl Task Force, this is Subterrel Battle Group." A voice cut across the highly-encrypted channel Striker was monitoring. Striker recognized the IFF code of the sender. It was coming from the bridge of the Imperial-class Star Destroyer Flood.

He peered out into the void towards the diminished asteroid belt. Ghostly gray forms slowly became identifiable shapes as they approached. The colossal warship led a column of three more battle wagons emerging from the direction of Earth 5.

"Subterrel, this is Vahl Task Force, go ahead." The Captain of the nearby Lancer responded.

"Vahl, asking for confirmation of rumors of initiation of Operation Diathim?" The Flood asked.

"Diathim initiation is confirmed. Acting commander of Mars Orbital Command has overturned orders. All orders from Theater Command are to be ignored." Vahl reported in short, channel-hopping bursts. Striker listened intently. Volumes were being said with every signal.

"Copy that, Vahl." There was a long pause as the warships approached to within close-battery range. Striker suddenly began to wonder whose side these guys were on. Had these ships been bought the same way most of the Ploo and Kuati Squadrons had? The voice that came on next was full of sorrow, "Is it true?"

Striker knew what the Flood's Captain was asking. A RescueOps signal had escaped the Royal Guard's jamming for a few minutes and confirmed the passing of Emperor Aveo Yos the 1st. It had been a devastating blow to the Mynocks, who had flown escort for the Old Man dozens of times in the past. He had been their Admiral and commander for over a decade and had led them through the 'big jump' and the crippling power outage that had occurred when they had emerged in the Sol System.

"We think so . . ." The voice on the Vahl lost its professionalism, as well, ". . .Yeah, he's gone."

Striker felt his throat close up. He was not prone to sentimentality but Emperor Yos was the Empire. If he was gone, who would lead them now? Not Seco and the kriffing back stabbers on the Insertion, he fumed.

"Vahl Task Force, permission to pass you to port." The Flood requested.

Striker thought the request was odd. Why would the Star Destroyer want to come alongside the smaller frigates? The four large warships would make bantha meat of Striker and his escorts if they meant ill. After suffering one surprise attack today the TIE pilot was on edge for another trap.

"Permission granted." The Vahl responded. The Lancer moved in line with her sister, the Lord Hoth. The two Lancers looked miniscule next to the approaching gray behemoths. The Lord Hoth flashed her running lamps twice, Attention to Port.

Suddenly all four of the crawling Star Destroyers lit up stunning search lamps from their bridges that shone on their forward hulls. Each beacon was a holograph of the emblem of the Imperial Martian Empire.

"This is Vahl, all crew man the rails." The frigate's captain accidentally broadcast his ship's command across the Task Force's channel but Striker appreciated the command none-the-less.

Every viewport aboard the Flood was open and crammed full of sailors from the mighty Star Destroyer. By the thousands they stood at their rails in their dress grays. As each ship passed the command bridges of the two Lancers the sailors raised their arms in the Imperial salute. When the last ship, the Immobile, passed by, a huge banner could be seen along several viewports in the warship's engineering section. In aurabesh it read: We are with you.

Striker reached his glove up and between his face and his helmet and wiped away a tear. It was one of the most moving moments he had ever felt in the Navy.

Did Moff Seco truly believe he would betray the Empire while men like these opposed him? Seco was a fool not to have attacked as soon as he killed the Emperor. Striker could feel it. The Empire was going to strike back.

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Labor Unit Quarantine and Processing Section, Luna Base, Luna

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

After three decades of service in the Republic and then the Imperial Navy, Admiral Neptu was used to things running efficiently and in a shipshape manner. But the excessively sterile environment of the moon base was unsettling.

Aseptic mouse droids followed incessantly in his wake, spreading an anti-viral spray after every one of his foot falls. The corpulent Admiral had already passed through three progressively invasive quarantine levels on his way from the base's landing bay to its central command center. His high-rank allowed him to keep his uniform but every personnel he passed in the migraine-inducing white halls wore a breathing mask as well as precautionary gloves and medical scrubs. No one had dared to enforce such a trifling precaution on him yet.

The Ebola Scare, as it was called when it still made the HoloNews, had come from slaves who had carried the virus through this station. The processing center's commandant hadn't wanted to take any chances since then.

Neptu had another reason for his displeasure. He had been ordered by his Lord, Seneschal Seco, to secure this base for their own purposes before they moved against Yos's loyalists on Mars. It was a task for an errand boy, not the commander of the Ploo Squadron of the Maw Defense Fleet. He should have been at Seco's right hand but instead his place had been taken by that upstart, Eritech.

Neptu seethed when he thought of the undercover agent of the hated and feared Imperial Security Bureau. Besides Seco he was the only being who knew Captain Volt's secret identity. He wondered if he shouldn't let his foe's alias slip to the right officers and sit back and watch them tear him limb to limb. A smile crept across the Admiral's jowls as he advanced upon the command center.

He reached his destination and entered. The command center sat several stories above a sprawling hangar that stretched out for almost three kilometers. Below them arriving shuttles from Earth unloaded prisoners near a large energy shield that protected the hangar from the lack of Lunar atmosphere outside. The prisoners were herded into creeping lines that led into a wide area of medical processing stations. Prisoners who passed the inspections were waiting in a holding area near the end of the hangar near a transport that would soon take them to the labor camp on Mars. Neptu could identify the ones who had passed their screening by the red utility suits they wore.

A fine mist wafted down from sprayers attached to the roof of the hangar. Within the mist was liquified sedative Hb4 spice, which subdued the prisoners as they waited for transport.

All in all the mass below was a mob of miserable looking near-humanity. They screamed and cried as their families were ripped apart by roving guard patrols. Some attacked the guards but resistance was disorganized and the evo-suited armored guards were merciless in subjugating the perpetrators.

Neptu stood waiting in the doorway. An officer turned and recognized him. "Admiral Neptu, this is a surprise. I wasn't notified that there was an inspection scheduled today." The man saluted as the rest of the officers in the command center snapped to attention.

"As you were, Commandant." said Neptu. The personnel in the station relaxed. "I am not here on inspection. I have come to take command of this base to serve at Seneschal Seco's leisure."

"I don't understand. Senes . . . Senes, what? We already fall under the command of Theater Commander Seco. We serve him as we serve the Empire." The Commandant stuttered.

"Then you have not heard of recent events on Mars. The Royal Guard has launched a coup against the Empire. Emperor Yos and Princess Phasma were both assassinated this afternoon. Moff Seco has taken the title Seneschal, or Guardian, of the Empire." Neptu reported loudly, lest anyone misunderstand his declaration. There were several gasps in the control station and to the man they all looked as if the wind had been knocked out of them at the news.

"By the Force, of course we shall follow Moff Seco's command. May he lead us through these dire times." The Commandant said. The man looked like he was going to tear up. Grief was written across his face. Several officers were in the same condition. Loyalty to the old Emperor would take some time to stamp out, Neptu thought.

"I will report your loyalty to the Seneschal. He will be glad to hear of it. Events are fluid in the capital at the moment. You are ordered to ignore any commands issued by the Royal Guard or the Star Destroyer Quill. Is that understood?" Neptu said and walked over to the viewport to gaze upon the crush of near-humanity below. He imagined that he could smell their filth even through several centimeters of transpiriteel.

"Yes, yes, of course." The Commandant said as he stood next to the Admiral.

This was too easy, Neptu thought, a job for an errand boy indeed.

"Who are these beings? And what is their disposition?" He asked the Commandant who was obviously lost in thought concerning Neptu's announcement.

"Oh, them. They are the 14th shipment of labor units from the United Protectorate. Official count is 147,352 processed in the last two days. We were going to start loading them aboard that transport down there," The officer pointed at the large container transport at the far end of the hanger, "in a few hours. They are then to be shipped to Concentration Camp 1138 on Mars for labor distribution. We even have over eleven-hundred viable candidates for Operation Stork. Those prisoners have been segregated from the rest and are being held in that area over there." He pointed to an area midway down the hangar.

Neptu thought of Eritech again. The man had risen in the ranks of their conspiracy so quickly by proving time and time again that he was a man of action. He was willing to sacrifice himself to assassinate the false Emperor and when Neptu had blocked him last month due to his own misgivings Eritech had acted alone and destroyed the off-limit target of a massive refugee camp on Earth's surface. Instead of being punished Seco had entrusted the man with even greater power. Neptu had been pushed aside but he would stand by his Moff once again. He just had to prove that he could be as ruthless as that heartless spy.

"Belay those orders. These prisoners have been deemed a liability by Seneschal Seco. The labor units only serve to benefit traitors who are working against the Empire and have thus been deemed expendable." Neptu said.

"Sir?" The Commandant looked confused.

"Commander, you have certain quarantine protocols in place, do you not?" Neptu asked.

"Of course, especially after the Ebola event. I insisted that we have methods in place to protect my men."

"Honorable. Notify all living personnel to quietly evacuate the hangar and move in more droid units to take their place. Once they have been switched out seal the hangar." Neptu ordered.

"Yes, sir." The Commandant activated the comm station in the room. He switched the signal to the channel that ran to the guard force and medical screeners' internal audicasters. "All personnel of Luna Base, a Level Besh Quarantine has been initialized in the screening center. All crew are ordered to calmly make their way to safe quarantine sectors of this base. All droid units are to report to screening center to assist in maintaining prisoners and security detail."

Neptu could hear the command as it echoed through the base's hallways behind him. The only place it wasn't broadcast openly was on the screening floor before him. Slowly but surely the medics and nurses below vacated the hangar, followed shortly by the guard force. Droid units discretely entered the hanger from side entrances that sealed behind them. Within four minutes the only living beings in the hanger were the near-human earthlings.

"Sir, the quarantine is complete. The transport crew has also sealed up and are asking for orders, sir." The officer reported.

"Have them sit in place for now."

Aye, aye. I can't maintain order in the screening center for very long with only droid units, Admiral."

Neptu got a gleam in his eye and smiled as he looked outside at the cratered lunar surface. "You won't have to. Depower the hangar's outer deflector shield generator."

"What? That's murder, sir." The Commandant gasped. The officers in the control room snapped their heads in Neptu's direction.

"What do you think was happening to these beings once they arrived on Mars? They weren't having tea with Moff Kuat. They were being worked to death in the mines. We are only hastening the inevitable end of their journey by a few weeks." Neptu said.

"I won't do it. I won't be party to this." The Commandant said with a whimper.

"Fierfek, must I do every kriffing thing myself? I should relieve you of your command for gross insubordination." Neptu shoved the officer away from the shield console and deactivated the proper controls.

Outside the viewport the shield vanished, exposing the entire length of the hangar to the sudden vacuum of space.

The beings below were suddenly sucked out of the hangar and blasted out upon the lunar surface like a flechette launcher's slug-spread. The defenestrated near-humans silently screamed in agony as they flew past the viewport, the vacuum sucking away their death rattles along with their bodies. The lower gravity outside allowed them to fall like snowflakes to the gray surface where they impacted in little puffs of lunar dust.

"Interesting. I would have thought there would be more flailing about as they asphyxiated out there." Neptu observed cheerfully. This massacre would surely assure Seco that Neptu would go to great lengths for his Seneschal.

"An ecumenopolis legend, Admiral." The Commandant spoke softly. "That's how defenestrations are always shown on the holodramas. The truth is the majority of those poor beings were killed by embolisms caused by intense pressure change, within a few seconds of exposure, followed by hypoxia and hypocapnia. The remainder probably froze to death before they ever started trying to suck air into their collapsed lungs." The officer couldn't look Neptu in the eyes. Instead he kept them trained on the massacre outside.

"Disappointing. Well, look, there is some movement out there." Neptu pointed. Several shapes were getting up and dusting themselves off.

"Just droids, sir, defenestrated with the rest. You murdered everyone else." The Commander sighed.

Neptu didn't take the comment as an accusation, instead he puffed out his barrel-shaped chest in pride. Surely Seco would reward him for this. "So shall fall all enemies of the True Empire."

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Forward Observation Station, Imperial I-class SD Wilderness, Equatorial Orbit over Mauritania, Earth

))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Moff Culter, former Imperial Governor of the Anoat Sector and chief terraformer for Emperors Palpatine and Yos, stared down at the blue and green world beneath him. Never in all his time as the premier terraformer of the Home Galaxy had he ever come across such a diverse planet.

He tried to put that unsettling business with that Kuati Admiral out of his mind. His psyche couldn't wrap itself around the idea that he had been complicit in the man's death. And not only that, but somehow he had also been associated with the assassination of the Princess and Emperor Yos.

He gazed at the ugly, black storms of toxic smoke that swirled over the main continental mass to the north. His ally, Vulnert Seco, had promised him unfettered access to the planet if he lent his military clone forces to Seco's coup attempt. Was killing the Emperor worth saving one planet, he wondered? Was murdering a thousand? Was starting a war and tearing the Empire in half?

He studied the war-torn world he wanted to save a little closer. Facts and figures raced through his mind.

Boreal forest (conifers), temperate forests (hardwoods or mixed conifers), tropical forests, deserts, an alpine zone, grassland, tundra and chaparral, sometimes called shrubland made up the primary Terran biomes. Cities, villages, croplands, rangelands, planted forests and wildlands were the principal Terran near human patterned anthromes.

Back in the Home Galaxy a planet usually had one or two anthromes and if a being hailed from a planet with more than half a dozen it was considered something of an oddity.

But here in the Sol System the old rules vanished out the viewport. If you mixed and matched your anthromes you would get the 679 eco-regions of Earth: 450 on land and 229 marine. Sadly, thirty-five percent of these had been wiped out by the inhabitants of this world before the arrival of the Empire or destroyed by the current war that threatened to choke out all life on the dying planet.

Culter checked numbers on his datapad. 34,850 known species went extinct in the century before the 'big jump'. That extinction event was, and continued to be, the sixth great mass extinction in Earth's history. And that was before the Empire unleashed a single turbolaser bolt.

No extinctions are inevitable, he sadly mused. Everything can be saved. Culter believed he was the innoculant this world needed to save it from itself.

He knew there had been a time three decades ago, in a Terran year named 2005, when the major governing body of this world announced that climate change was happening. Yet the Terrans did nothing. They wasted those precious decades. Now the Empire was here and there was nothing the Terrans could do at their level of technology to save their world while combating the late Emperor Yos's armies. At the minimum they weren't even holding steady and at the maximum they were making it worse.

Seco had promised an end to the war. Peace would give Culter his chance to save a world from extinction.

If not?

He knew what would come in the next year or so if the Empire-Earth war continued. The complete disappearance of the Arctic spring to autumn ice from their northern polar cap, irreversible permafrost and methane release and the unavoidable commitment to major sea level rise. All of the negative trends would combine in 'perfect storm' fashion, leading to a rise in average global temperatures of 5 K standard and a sea level rise of five meters. After that there would be a string of food shortages, mass riots, catastrophic death on all continents and an immense spike in the extinction rates of other species.

Culter knew ways the Terrans could turn this around if the war stopped tomorrow: self-replicating factories, fusion power, strong synthetic biology of their plants and bodies, climate modification efforts that were just barely within their reach, primitive space elevators and rudimentary sublight drives, migration to other worlds that would allow them to mine this system's readily available helium, nitrogen, rare earths, fossil fuels and access photosynthesis.

Culter was no one's fool. He knew Seco had undertaken this coup for political gain and that Culter was a mere pawn to keep the clones in line during the onrushing civil war. Blood would be spilled. Blood had already been spilled. He was part of that now.

He looked down at the blue-green world once more. For the lives of billions the price of one Emperor's life was rather cheap.

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Safe house, The Negs District, Culter City, Imperial Mars.

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

It had certainly been one of the oddest weddings Father George had ever presided over. Both the groom and the bride were Ithorians who had insisted on being baptized into the Catholic faith before their nuptials. To Father George they looked like half-man, half-hammerhead shark hybrids, but he could also tell that they were a man and woman very much in love and happy to share their love with Jesus Christ.

Father George generally liked the aliens he met. He had been a fan of science fiction as a kid and had once dreamed of making space movies as a young man. He welcomed all who came and turned no one away.

"God loves variety." George chuckled to himself.

It had been a long, strange day, the earthling thought to himself. Members of his congregation had tried to lead a peace protest along the Yos River Waterfront when an explosion high atop the Tarkin Tower had stunned the city. Martial law had been declared within minutes and not only had members of the red-armored CCG taken to the streets but so had the Home Legion. Wanting to avoid direct confrontation and possible arrest, Father George had rounded up his flock and fled to their safe house here in the Negs.

With martial law falling across the city citizens moved about with extreme caution, if at all. Father George not only had the eight original members of his congregation to care for, but also the thirty-two new members of his growing flock. The Ithorians had wished to go ahead with their wedding, realizing the security clamp-down in the city would keep them all shut in for a few days.

George took it in stride, much as he had since being rescued by pirates out in the asteroid belt and being let free in the city. When he had first arrived he had thought of nothing but making sure his missionary group was safe from being sent back to that hellish work camp on the far side of Mars.

They had lived on the streets for several days. As they had begged for food and work they spoke with many of the aliens and people here in the capital about the teachings of the messiah, Jesus Christ. He hadn't been prepared for how the citizens of the Empire would take to Christianity like a sponge to water.

The Empire was a religious vacuum, George had discovered. There was some reverence to local planetary gods that had come with the Imperials but this was limited to few species and largely ignored by other species. George and his disciples set to teaching Imperials about Jesus and how his love could offer salvation for all who came to know him.

George also came to learn about something called Force-believe, in which most people fervently believed. Supposedly there had been some kind of religion in the government before the Empire. The belief was that there was only a good or bad side and once you died you became part of this Force, which was some kind of life essence that flowed in all living creatures. George thought it was all a lot of superstition. However, when he learned that the previous Emperor had killed off all the priests, called Jedi, of this religious order some thirteen years ago, he knew he couldn't peacefully bring Christianity into the light within the Empire without there being some type of conflict.

He didn't think they were ready for that. He admired the teachings of Ghandi and Martin Luther King Jr. and their advocacy of non-violence. He felt the best way to show Christianity in a positive light was for them to fight for peace. Under the cover of student protests they had helped organize several peaceful marches and sit-ins around the Kuati Research Academy's campus in the past few weeks. While people were protesting the war they were also learning about Jesus Christ and the plan he had for each of them.

People seemed generally interested in Heaven. They had no real concept of an afterlife other than becoming one with the Force, which honestly sounded boring even to George, who didn't like a lot of excitement in his life.

He took as an example the missionary life of Francis of Assissi and sent his original congregation to the far points of the capital and the surrounding farm country. They tried to replicate as much of the Bible as they could from memory and passed out scripture written on the plastic paper Imperial citizens called flimsiplast. Soon many people were coming to their sermons and listening to the word of God.

The belief in the Force was slowly falling away. He could feel Christianity take root in the city. He had feared a Roman-style welcome for the new religion, with Christians being thrown to the Rancors or being covered in pitch and lit aflame to illuminate night time pod races. But with the Jedi gone there was no other religion to contest their rise. Now all we have to do is get Christianity established before Islam or Hinduism sneak into the Empire, he thought.

"Father George! Father George!" Several members of his congregation came through the doors, startling the wedding guests. They located the priest and made a beeline for his table. At their lead was a troubled Pastor Denis Lawson.

"George, there you are. We have something you need to see." Denis said.

"What is it, Denis? Can't you see we're celebrating?" George asked.

"Congratulations." Denis told the bride and groom before setting a device on the table before George. George recognized it as one of those holographic movie players people here used instead of digital video cameras. "We were at the big shindig in Tarkin's Square this afternoon to pass out pamphlets. The Princess was giving a rousing speech when this happened."

Denis activated the device and tiny blue figures moved around a large balcony. There was no sound. George recognized the heir to the Empire, Princess Phasma Yos. Suddenly there was an explosion. Then blaster bullets cut down many of the Princess's guards. Some lizard people attacked the young royal. Just as she looked to be about to be overrun another figure appeared with a pair of flaming swords of some sort. She cut through the attackers like a lawnmower. The hologram was shot from far away and George couldn't be sure but she reminded him of the savage attack aboard the slave freighter and the mysterious figure that had saved their life. The attackers had a leader of their own who hurled herself at the Princess's savior. They raised their hands and pushed each other repelled each other without even coming into contact. Objects moved about against their own volition.

"The Force." The bride whispered in reverent tones and made the sign of the cross.

"Miracles." Denis said as the first warrior dispatched the second and then ran away with the rescued Princess. "And she just saved the Princess." If the rumors about the Emperor are true, The Princess would be hesitant to favor any new religion that appears in the Empire except for a Force-worshiper she owed her life to.

The others' sudden reverence and awe disturbed him. If they wavered in their resolve or had a rival at this point in their church's genesis it could be like the days of the Roman Colosseum all over again, George thought.

"I see no miracles here." He said quickly to cut off any other avenues of thought before they could take hold. "Smoke and mirrors. Simple parlor tricks, is all. She's a magician who has turned the Princess into a rube."

"But the Force is real . . . the Jedi were real." The groom said. George could see the man's faith had been shaken. He needed to squash this quickly.

"These are simple magic tricks and acrobatics. The only true miracles are created by God and his son, Jesus. These people here are nothing more than . . . than . . . witches!"

"Witches?" Someone in the wedding party gasped.

"Denis, the Bible is the ultimate word of God. It is his testament of his love for his children. Us. What does the Bible say we should do about witches?" George asked never taking his eyes off his congregation.

"Thou shall not suffer a witch to live. Exodus 22:18." Denis responded. The Scot was always good with the scripture.

"And neither shall we."

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Nix, Kuiper Belt, Sol System

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Martinez made sure her safety line was secured to rock and not ice before she stood up. Several workers had to be retrieved by their supply and cargo freighter after their lines had snapped free from the ice and swept them out into orbit. Gravity here on this gray moon was only nine percent of Earths' or what the other workers out here would have referred to as Coruscant standard.

The nearest worker to her wouldn't have referred to Coruscant though. He was an astronaut from Earth, just like her. Both of them had been captured by the Empire two years ago on Mars. After their interrogation by Imperial Intelligence they had helped build a large camp on Mars' surface and then had been transferred out to the Kuiper Belt along with the rest of the 4th Mars Mission and the crew of the Space Shuttle Enterprise.

Pluto and Charon rotated around each other overhead. They were tidally locked to each other like two ends of a dumbbell, same sides always facing each other, with their center of gravity out there between them. They rotated out of the solar plane on their orbit around the sun and their days were a tad over six Earth days with their years 248 Earth years long. Martinez sighed when she realized she wouldn't live to see half of a Plutonian year. And she'd actually been there, scouting impact sites with some of Moff Culter's terraforming teams. Pluto's atmosphere was about as thick as Mars' had been before the Empire started terraforming her and had a daytime temperature of -200 degrees Fahrenheit. It wasn't exactly Martinez's idea of a perfect vacation spot yet given her natural sense of wonder and hunger for exploration she wouldn't have traded it for anything.

She stared at Pluto and Charon in awe of the vast distances she had traveled. Charon was half the size of Pluto. The next closest moon-to-planet ratio was Luna to Earth with Luna one-fourth the size of Earth. From their vantage point on Nix the comparison made her homesick.

"It's still not a planet." Major Ana Gonzalez-Martinez told her companion.

Colonel Adam Finkral chuckled over the comm. "She sure looks like one to me. It's all politics. The National Science Advisor had a big part in declassifying her back in '06, so naturally all of you go goosestepping along with the party line."

Martinez wondered what politics were like back on Earth. They had been out here for so long that little word had reached them. And what little of it there was had been thoroughly filtered through the Imperial propaganda machine. She understood that the other workers were under orders to keep the astronauts in the dark but she knew without them saying that war had broken out between the Empire and Earth. She wondered how quickly the earth had thrown in the towel.

She looked across Nix's dusty surface. The entire crew of workers, captured astronauts and even their two guards were carefully preparing the last stages of an Immobilizer 418 gravity well projector.

The device was beyond futuristic to Martinez. It was capable of creating what the Imps called an 'Interdiction Field' that could move the smallest of planetoids, like Nix, out of their orbit. They were aiming the tiny moon at her sisters, Pluto and Charon, the last two major gravity wells in the Kuiper Belt. Hydra, Pluto's other moon, had been blown to bits several months ago by a pair of Star Destroyers. With their destruction the Empire would have an unhindered hyperlane out of the system.

She only barely understood what a hyperlane was but had come to think of it as a sort of faster than light travel method employed by the Empire's starships. When she inquired about it her fellow workers, aliens and human alike, all told her she wasn't far off.

Martinez made note of every scrap of technical data she came across. One day she would return to Earth and every iota of information the astronauts gleaned from their captors would help the people of Earth throw off the tyranny of the Empire.

She knew the Earth was theoretically decades away from creating a working Orion Pusher Plate for the Space Shuttle Fleet. But since she had been out here in the outer rim of the solar system she had had access to sublight drive engines and had learned the rudimentary theory behind their use. And yet still she was like a child among the regular citizens of the Empire. Things they took for granted were light years beyond Earth's capabilities.

The thought of Light Years made her look out towards the nearest star, Proxima Centauri, only four light years away. It existed beyond human time, beyond human reach. As an Earthling, Martinez had always lived in the little bubble of warmth surrounding Sol. Outside of it lay a vastness beyond comprehension. The solar system was the one and only home of the human race. Even to reach Proxima Centauri would take a human lifetime or more. She thought "four light-years' and knew earthlings would always be fooled by those words 'four' and 'years'. People had so little grasp on how far light travels in a year. 186,282 miles a second. Then she thought of four years of seconds like that. That is what it took to get light from Proxima Centauri.

An Orion Pusher Plate would have gotten them up to two percent of that, or almost ten million miles an hour. She sighed. It still would have taken them two hundred years to reach Proxima Centauri and she didn't even have any Earth-like worlds around her. The nearest ones with planets started about ten light years away. Supposedly the Empire had reached one. Would the Earth?

With an Orion Pusher Plate it would take five million years to cross the Milky Way. It was a long way from the fantasy of Star Trek but her captors had told her that with an established hyperlane it was possible to cross the Galaxy in two to three days, a concept that sent her mind reeling.

"They've got the device all set to go. We're moving out." Their old shuttle pilot, Pete Bosko, informed them. He came bounding up and attached himself to their safety line. He always looked awkward in a space suit and the enviro-suit the Empire had given him didn't help out much. "Three days from now old Pluto, Charon and Nix here are going to have a meeting of the minds."

"Sad. What a way to end the debate." Martinez said.

"And that S-thread booster thing will clear out all the debris that's left behind?" Commander Finkral asked.

"That's what they tell me." Bosko answered. It was one more piece of technology the team was learning.

"Any idea where they're sending us next?" Martinez asked.

"Yep, the boss says we're going to support colonists on Epsilon Eradani's goldilock planet. The Empire's already landing a scout team there."

"Fourth team to Mars, first to leave the solar system." Finkral tried to joke but the humor fell flat.

Martinez put a gloved hand on her commander's arm. "Sir, what do we do with the information we've gathered?"

"We keep learning as much as we can. The guards don't watch us that closely anymore. We're just members of the work crews to them. One day we'll get our chance. Let's just hope the Earth is ready for what we've got to teach them."

Martinez nodded, trying to hold onto a glimmer of hope, but then had a dark thought when she looked up at Pluto. "Let's just hope the Earth is still there."

/

One more prologue to go. Need your guy's help getting the word about this story out there. I'd appreciate all the community adds if you guys are willing. Thank you.