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All content is strictly non-canon

Chapter 6: Pirates

Darth Kolbre stood on the balcony of the shrine. The leader of the One Sith looked out over the barren wasteland that was Korriban. The tall man called up a hologram from his datapad. It showed a large fleet of strange-looking craft, with an army of much smaller spacecraft darting to and fro. It was his secret fleet. The reason the One Sith had been mostly inactive the past few years was because they were pooling their resources to build said fleet. It suited the Jedi just fine while they had their hands full with the Lost Tribe.

Kolbre knew the fleet was nearing completion. A few more weeks and the last set of ships would be finished. Then the One Sith would wait for the perfect opportunity to strike, preferably when the Jedi and the Lost Tribe had locked horns, then they would deploy their fleet, consisting of large frigates and cruisers, each containing several Annihilator-II class fighters, and wipe both the Jedi and the Lost Tribe from the galaxy, and that would be that.

Darth Kolbre turned from the balcony and went back to his room. No need to worry about this for now. Time was the one thing they had on their side.

*aboard Amidala, in orbit over Coruscant*

On the other side of the galaxy, a small shuttle was just depositing three young Jedi Knights in the hangar of a large frigate. Wordlessly, the trio made their way to their own quarters, which happened to be just next to each other, before going up to the bridge. The Grey Knight had already left to deal with his own "business".

Jedi Master Pong Fel was already waiting for them. Turning at the sound of the turbolift, he smiled warmly and greeted the three young Jedi.

"Jedi Hybergo and Ashkander, welcome back. Jedi Kanghar, welcome to the Amidala, this time not as a prisoner, but as a Jedi." Fel said.

Itoryo was amazed by the ship. The previous time she had only had a brief glimpse at the frigate's insides, but now she was standing at the bridge, and the nearby planet of Coruscant, glowing brightly with all its lights, filled the front viewport, surrounded by hordes of miniscule ships darting back and forth.

The bridge itself was also a thing to behold. The young woman was bedazzled by all the shining control boards and the massive tactical display.

Master Fel chuckled at the new Jedi's wonder. Calling the dynamic trio to attention, he explained their mission to them. "We are being assigned to the Perlemia system, a major stop in the Perlemian trade route. The frequency of pirate raids have increased, and this has put a heavy toll on the defense fighters stationed there. Seeing as the Lost Tribe has recently suffered a major defeat, and the One Sith have been strangely inactive, the Grand Master has assigned us there to escort the freighters passing through the Perlemia system. This is but a routine mission until the Sith decide to attack or the Jedi come up with a target for us to attack."

Teimos grunted. "Well, it's better than sitting around in the Jedi Temple rearranging the records."

Loriole and Itoryo both found it hard to disagree with the hulking Jedi, even though the latter had only done the library job twice.

Fel nodded, satisfied that the Jedi Knights were agreed on this matter. Sending them back to their quarters, he instructed the 3 pilots to commence the exit from orbit around Coruscant and prepare for the jump.

*in hyperspace, unknown position*

Far from any trade routes, a little starfighter blasted through hyperspace. At first glance, one might mistake it for a top-secret prototype model not seen before, since it was a small wedge-shaped craft with an odd-looking ring of thrusters surrounding it. But upon closer inspection, one would realise it was nothing more than a typical Jedi fighter equipped with a hyperspace ring, enabling the small craft to make jumps across the galaxy.

But this was no ordinary Jedi fighter. This Jedi fighter was painted gold, and had the symbol of the Jedi Order splayed all over its sides and was labelled "01". This starfighter belonged to the Grand Master of the Jedi Order himself, Jagnord Skywalker.

The Jedi narrowed his eyes as he approached his destination, the end of his jump. The grey-haired man had been cramped in the tiny compartment for hours on end, despite travelling at the speed of light, so remote the destination was.

At long last, the starfighter dropped out of hyperspace with a light bump. Jagnord was presented with the view of the densely forested jungle planet Dagobah. His steel-grey eyes filled with determination and resolve, he disengaged his fighter from the hyperspace ring and swung it towards the far side of the planet.

*Perlemian system*

Itoryo loved the speed and handling of the X-wing, but the Jedi fighter she was in now absolutely thrilled her. It was just so nimble, and Gold Squadron's top-notch X-wings could barely keep up as she barrel rolled and did flips. The veteran clone pilots were aware that this was Itoryo's first time in a Jedi fighter, and recalling the excitement of stepping into an X-wing for the first time, they indulged her stunts with wistful smiles on their faces.

Eventually, Itoryo calmed down, and they were able to commence their escort mission. Most freighters dropped out of hyperspace a short distance away from the system's core planet. Some would head directly to the planet, both for refuelling and resupplying as well as for the crew to take a much needed break in one of the many cantinas on the surface.

For the first few days, the escort missions were uneventful, and although they were boring, Itoryo knew it was probably for the best. As she took her turn to patrol the area with Gold Squadron's X-wings, she could feel a strange sense of unease, but it was not her own.

Activating her comm, she asked CT-4208 a question. "What's the matter Weedy? Why are you so worried?"

The veteran clone in question seemed unruffled by the question. After all, he had been working with Jedi for a long time, and was used to them sensing his feelings. "I'm just worried about that large nebula over there, ma'am." Weedy turned his head to look out his cockpit at the large yellow cloud of particles floating nearby. The clone explained through his comm. "A while back, when I was still a shiny, we were doing escort runs in this system that had a big nebula. It was all going fine until our mother frigate picked up some anomalous signals from inside the nebula. Nebulae tend to mess up your sensor signals, so we thought it was just a glitch. That was when a massive swarm of pirate ships came out of from inside the nebula. I lost a couple of brothers, and we fought long and hard until we chased the pirates away. Fifty-eight clone pilots were killed in the skirmish."

Itoryo was silent. She looked at the nebula with a newfound sense of worry. Several other veteran clone pilots' voices came in over the comm, sharing their own encounters with nebulae and pirates.

Itoryo spared another glance towards the large cloud of yellow particles. She could only hope that such an ambush would not happen, even as she turned her Jedi fighter to escort a YT-2300 Corellian freighter that had just dropped out of hyperspace.

*a few days later*

Loriole stepped out of her Jedi fighter, jumping down lightly onto the durasteel floor of the Amidala's hangar. Shaking her sweat-matted hair free of her helmet, she pulled at the zipper of the form-fitting jumpsuit, loosening it at the neck and allowing herself to breathe.

Loriole watched as Teimos led Uber Squadron's X-wings and Y-wings out for their shift. She couldn't help noticing that quite a few clone pilots from Red Squadron, who were dismounting from their crafts, were eyeing her greedily. She sighed. Boys would be boys.

Loriole headed to the refresher to get changed into something more comfortable before going to the bridge for her debrief.

Loriole stepped onto the bridge of the Amidala. Itoryo and Master Fel were already waiting for her, the former leaning back in her chair with her boots propped up on the table, and the latter standing erect in front of the tactical display, going over the latest sensor readings from the nebula.

Itoryo leapt to her feet as soon as Loriole entered, and they hugged each other tightly. It had become a ritual as of late, and in the back of her mind Loriole reflected that sometimes girls could be weird too.

Loriole detached herself from the hug and went over to Master Fel. He smiled at her as she approached. "Great piloting out there, Jedi Hybergo."

The bearded Jedi Master was intently studying a close up of the nebula on the tactical display with an overlay of a series of red dots. "We started picking up some strange signals inside the nebula. This is the scan from 20 minutes ago. The neweset scan should be in soon." Fel made fists with both his hands and rotated the three-dimensional holographic cloud.

Something about the image on the tactical display bothered Loriole for some reason. Then it hit her. The nebula was quite far away, and there was no way even the Amidala's top-of-the-range sensors could produce such a detailed image of all sides of the nebula, let alone its interior.

Turning to question Master Fel, he answered her before she could even ask her question. "While we were on Coruscant, we received a bit of an equipment upgrade. This ship is now carrying an experimental sensor prototype that utilizes midichlorians and their Force abilities to produce high-resolution images of long-distance subjects, but it's just a prototype so it needs a cooldown period between scans. Our scientists managed to extract living midichlorians and preserve them a few years back, so it was just a matter of calibrating some new sensor technology to be more sensitive to the Force."

Loriole was awed, as was Itoryo. Loriole could understand why this was kept under wraps for so long, this kind of technology, once proven in the field, improved, and mass produced, could win them the war.

Before she could ask Master Fel for more details, a nearby clone sitting at a console waved to the Jedi Master. "General, the latest scans are in. Refreshing the hologram overlay now."

The display changed to show an even larger multitude of red dots congregated in the nebula. Fel rotated the hologram to show the other side of the nebula. Near the far side, several triangles were shown approaching. Itoryo asked Fel, "What are those triangles?"

Fel replied, "The triangles represent signals that the sensor has recognized as ships. The red dots are only due to the fact the nebula messes up the sensor signals."

Fel gestured to a nearby clone. "Bring up real-time radar scans." The clone nodded and typed into his console. The 3D hologram changed into a 2D image on the screen, much closer up than before, and this time, the red dots could be seen to be moving frantically inside the nebula. Occasionally one of the red dots would transform into a triangle briefly and back to a red dot.

Master Fel frowned at the display. Turning to Loriole and Itoryo, he said to them, "I'm sorry girls, you'll have to suit up again and standby to launch at a moment's notice. One squadron of fighters simply isn't enough, and the pirate ships are too scattered for our turbolasers to be effective."

Loriole and Itoryo nodded, although inwardly Loriole sighed at having to get back into that stuffy and tight jumpsuit and the equally stuffy cockpit so soon. After they had left, a senior clone commander walked up to Master Fel. This clone had served alongside Fel for many years, and despite the clone being of a much lower rank, the two were close friends, almost like family. Master Fel sensed his approach, and turned to greet him with a warm smile. "What is the matter Hardy?"

CT-7349, or Hardy, acknowledged the greeting with a nod. Tapping a holographic keyboard at the side of the tactical display, the nebula vanished and was replaced by a schematic of a large, circular device. Turning to Fel, he asked a simple question. "Will we have to use this? It could be necessary." Fel contemplated the circular device, before nodding, and replying, "Have it prepped and ready to fire. Standby to activate it on my command."

Hardy saluted sharply, and retreated to his post to send the orders. Fel turned to face the nebula once again, reflecting that the prototype sensors were not the only equipment upgrades the Amidala had received during its 3-month stop on Coruscant.

*aboard Pillager, pirate ship*

Jahvel Fett sat in the command seat of the Pillager, his father's ship, looking out the front viewport, even though there was nothing to see besides a cloud of yellow cosmic dust. He turned to face the screen next to him, a screen that showed a live video feed from a surveillance drone that Jahvel had sent to the outskirts of the nebula to act as his eyes, especially since the Pillager's sensors were dead thanks to the nebula.

In front of Jahvel, gathered around the tactical display, were his lieutenants, the people responsible for ensuring the smooth day-to-day running of his pirate and smuggling enterprise. Each one of them owned a ship, and they each had several ships working under them, staffed by their own crew. Jahvel didn't really care how they got the ships or what they did in their free time, as long as they remained loyal to him and gave him a share of the spoils, usually from ships that he had ordered them to attack.

Right now, one of Jahvel's lieutenants, Rang Thye, was debating with the others whether or not they should wait any longer to attack the Jedi frigate stationed just near the Perlemian system core planet. Rang Thye had been the one who had noticed the Jedi frigate's presence and had hastily called off the planned raid and called for a meeting.

"They have fighters patrolling the area, and no doubt they have many more inside the ship! If we wait any longer they could attack us and wipe us out! The only advantage we have is the element of surprise!" Rang shouted.

A grizzled old pirate standing opposite Rang shook his head and rubbed his temples with the base of his hand. Kurtum Jhu was one of Jahvel's favourites, known for his levelheadedness and ability to stay calm in the face of the fiercest turbolaser barrage. Right now his famous patience was being tested. He growled at Rang, "What's to say they don't already know we're here. For all we know, they could be planning a counterattack and shred us with their turbolasers the minute we come out of the nebula. I say we have two options, run and live to pirate another day, or fight and most likely be wiped out."

Several of the older pirates, veterans who had tangled with the Jedi before and barely made it out, murmured assent to Kurtum's comments. Rang, however would not be put off so easily. Young and hotheaded, he regarded the Perlemian system as his territory, and would not tolerate the Jedi's presence here anymore. Ignoring the older pirates' advice to leave the Perlemian system alone for the time being and target another trade route, he felt that it was up to him to defend the "sovereignty" of "his" system, even though Perlemia was technically allied to the Jedi Republic.

Jahvel closed his eyes, a nanometre away from losing it. Rang was seriously getting on his nerves. This meeting should not even have been called. Jahvel knew that it was protocol that if they came up against a force they knew they had no chance of overcoming, they were to retreat and report directly to him. This was a rule that Jahvel's father had set from the start, a rule that was constantly reiterated to anyone who just joined the Fett pirate band.

Raising his hand for silence, Jahvel decided that enough was enough. Rang's insubordination was too much. Jahvel opened his mouth to speak. "Rang Thye, you may take your crew and engage the Jedi frigate. I will lend you a squadron of droid fighters to aid in your fight. No one else is to intervene in this battle. If he wishes to defend what he regards as his own system, let him be." Rang's eyes visibly lit up at what he thought was the big boss siding with him, although he deflated slightly when he realised there would be no backup, and he shrunk even more upon the realisation that this was a suicide mission. Starting to regret having so vehemently insisting on attacking the Jedi frigate, he started to speak, but was silenced by Jahvel.

"You will begin the assault tomorrow at 0700 hours standard time. Everyone else is to vacate the area by then. The droid fighters should arrive sometime before the attack begins, and even if they do not, you MUST commence." Jahvel said to Rang, before dismissing him to return to his own ship.

Waiting until Rang was safely out of earshot, Kurtum turned to Jahvel. "Is it really wise to let him do this?"

Jahvel buried his head in his hands. "Of course not. But that idiot was pissing me off. The droid fighters will never arrive, and he will be left to fend for himself. We move out in two hours."

Jahvel motioned to the droid pilot, one of hundreds of thousands of Clone War-era droids he had liberated from an ancient Geonosian shipyard, and the Pillager deftly manoeuvred through the nebula, swinging back towards the other ships.

*aboard Amidala*

Itoryo walked onto the bridge, rubbing her eyes from the sudden waking from her sleep. Loriole and Teimos were already there, looking equally dishevelled. Loriole had a bad case of bed hair, and her robes were crooked and crumpled. Teimos' chin was covered in rough stubble, and his eyes were bloodshot.

It did not comfort Itoryo that Master Fel also had not had a good night's sleep. Right now the three sleep-deprived Jedi were gathered around the tactical display, so the young woman made her way over.

The first thing Itoryo noticed was that the number of red dots inside the nebula had been significantly reduced. The next thing as that the few red dots that remained seemed to be organizing themselves into an attack formation.

Itoryo turned to question Master Fel, but he silenced her unasked query with a raised hand. It was clear that something they did not yet understand was at hand, but what was clear enough was that a majority of the pirates had left, and whatever or whoever remained was going to attack.

Wordlessly, the three Jedi Knights made their way back to their quarters to get changed into their flight suits.

*near Korriban*

A desert planet hung in space. Seemingly desolate and devoid of life, it had many secrets. One of which was currently exiting orbit. Darth Kolbre watched as his One Fleet launched from the underground hangars the fleet had been constructed in. His disciples would be in charge of the frigates, and he would personally command the largest one, the flagship. Little did he know, he was not the only one watching the fleet that day.

Near one of Korriban's seven moons, a small sphere slipped out of hyperspace with barely a whisper. Inside, a figure dressed in armoured grey robes narrowed his black eyes behind a reflective silver visor at the image he saw through the front viewport of his meditation sphere.

*aboard Amidala*

The battle had been short. The pirate ships were completely outmatched and outclassed by the newer X-wings and Y-wings. Next to the high-tech next-gen fighters, the pirate skiffs seemed comparatively ancient.

Itoryo hopped out of her Jedi fighter, docked next to Loriole's. The X-wings and Y-wings were just returning to the hangar. Some had been damaged in the skirmish, although not too seriously. One such damaged fighter was entering the hangar now, sparks spewing from a damaged ion drive. The pilot deftly manoeuvred the craft, angling the flaming exhaust away from the other ships.

After getting changed, Loriole and Itoryo made their way up to the bridge once again, all the while gossiping about that one Jedi knight that most of the female Padawans back on Coruscant were clamouring over.

Laughing at the antics of teenaged girls, the two ladies stepped onto the bridge. Teimos was already there and had received his debrief.

Master Fel smiled at the two women and congratulated them on a battle well fought. Then he moved on to more serious matters, his smile melting away like butter. "We have a new mission. The Grand Master has ordered us to report to the Graveyard of Alderaan. He wishes to unveil a new weapon there and wants us to join him."

The three young Jedi looked at each other gravely. A new weapon to be unveiled at the Graveyard of Alderaan? The implications of this were too fearsome to be voiced, and the terror at what this weapon might be was all too evident in their Force auras. Master Fel could feel their fear, and for once, he too wondered if this could spell the end for them all.

A/N hey all, finally managed to get this chapter up, the past week was seriously more busy for me than I ever expected. you might be disappointed that there wasn't much action here but I really didn't want to make this chapter any more draggy.

as always, feel free to leave a review commenting on my writing etc. and don't forget to enjoy the story!

stay awesome guys

peace, Darkrai the Slayer