Chapter 4: Dueling The Emperor

Q was wrong, the battle had not ended as he had thought it would. Instead of retreating when notified of Vaders death a few hundred more Star Destroyers suddenly decloaked and surrounded the wounded allied fleet. The only thing Picard could think to do was to send a strike team to kill the Emperor and end this once and for all. With no Emperor there would be no Empire and the command structure would be in total chaos. So, Picard used his only option and sent down Q, Luke, Yoda, Lieutenant Reed (NX-01), Worf and Kirk down to the Emperors palace to take him out. Reed, Worf and Kirk would distract the guards in order to let the Jedi and Q slip in to the palace and end the Emperor once and for all. Picard just hoped that they could end this once and for all.

They were outnumbered ninety to one but that didn't matter to Reed, Worf and Kirk. They had a job to do and they were going to see to it that they helped Q, Yoda and Luke end this once and for all. The storm troopers fired volley after volley of phaser and laser fire at them to no avail, they all had horrible aim as far as Reid could tell and he took full advantage of that. Reid jumped out into the open and threw a few plasma grenades into the crowd of troopers, killing almost half of them by himself. With a grin, Reid jumped back behind their cover and shrugged at Kirk and Worf, "Whoever trained them either didn't do a good job or forgot to mention that it's imperative to stay spread out to avoid a grenade attack like that."

Kirk shook his head and kept firing back at the troopers, "That works to our advantage then. Worf, lets use all of our grenades and end this right now."

"With pleasure, sir." the Klingon said, not bothering to hide that he was pleased to end the lives of these troopers. Kirk shook his head at the Klingon and grabbed a few to get ready to send these troopers to kingdom come. Worf grabbed a few and ran out into the open. "Today is a good day to die!" he yelled as he cast the first few grenades.

Deep within the palace Q, Luke and Yoda were hunting for the Emperor to no avail. They had taken out a few of his most trusted guards but he was nowhere to be found. But, as Q and Yoda noted, if his elite guards were here he was definitely still in the palace. Q kept at the front of the group of Jedi and kept his eyes fixated towards the ceiling at all times. If and when the Emperor attacked it would be from above, that was his favorite way to attack his enemies. When Q last fought the Emperor he had failed just as Yoda had. Q almost won, if it wasn't for the fact that Vader jumped in at the last second and tipped the scale he would have slain the Emperor, regained his powers and turned Vader into a pile of dog feces. Qs thoughts wandered but on guard he remained, once the Emperor jumped out of the shadows he was ready. His blade met the Emperors, they locked eyes and the clash began. Yoda spun around to the Emperors side and Luke went to his backside to corner him to no avail. Yoda was much slower than when he last fought the Emperor while the Emperor showed no signs of such, this was going to be a hard task even for three Jedi. Q spun around and cut the top of the Emperors shoulder and grinned as the Emperor yelled in pain, but was soon defending himself from the frenzied blows of the Emperors lightsabre. Before Q could react another red lightsabre came from out of nowhere and stabbed him through the chest. Yoda and Luke both froze as the Emperor cackled at the sight of Q being skewered. Q's vision was blurring but he looked up to see Vaders mask. "How... How the hell did you live."

Vader looked down at Q and said with satisfaction, "You underestimate the powers of the dark side." Vader pulled out his sabre and beheaded Q while the Emperor cackled and turned towards Yoda and Luke. Vader pointed his sabre at Luke, "Join us my son, and Master Yoda will be allowed to live in exile until he expires from old age. If not, you both die here." Before his son could say anything he, Yoda and Q's body were transported away from the palace and back onboard the Enterprise-E. Vader turned away and began to walk for his ship, "I'll finish them once we cripple their ships master, they won't go far."

Picard ordered the fleet to retreat, jump into hyperspace and head back towards the wormhole where reinforcements were waiting to help with repairs and to engage the enemy. He didn't take his decision lightly, but once he found out that Q had been killed he had to order the fleet to retreat back towards Federation space and hoped that another Q could bring Q back from the grave to assist them in their endeavor to defeat the Empire. Picard sat in his chair and stared at the screen until something seemed off, the stars were no longer there and the screen was nothing but a bright blue. "Report." Picard said as he got out of his chair and looked at the screen.

Before Worf could give him a report on what was going on another voice spoke up, "You are in a cross galactic time warp, or as you would call it, a temporal vortex."

Picard and his crew turned to the direction of the voice to see a man standing in a weird black looking jumpsuit with blue eyes and short brown hair. Picard walked towards the man and finally understood what was going on after he inspected the man, "You're Daniels aren't you? Captain Archer has told us much about you, why are you here?"

Daniels sighed and shook his head, "Q, Q is why I'm here." Daniels walked around the room and addressed the bridge crew, "Q was not supposed to die, and because of his death the entire timeline has been thrown into turmoil and the temporal cold war that was ended with the defeat of the Suliban by Captain Archer in his own timeline has been reignited because of this." Daniels paused, looked towards Picard and continued, "The only way we can repair this mess is to break Starfleet protocol and change the history of the Empire and the Republic. Captain Picard, I'm sending your ship and Archers to the past to make sure that Anakin Skywalker never becomes Darth Vader and that the Emperor is defeated before he has a chance to murder all of the Jedi. I'm sure you've read up on what happened so I have confidence that you and Captain Archer can bring an end to this dire situation."

Luke, who was listening to this man in awe spoke up, "So, does that mean my life will change and that I'll never exist as I am now?"

Daniels shook his head, "No, you will exist as you are forever since you are here on this ship and on this mission. You are vital to this mission, your DNA is going to match Anakins and show that you are in fact his son from the future. That is the key to gaining the trust of the Jedi council."

Picard shook his head at Daniels, "I can't do it, I cannot ignore the prime directive. I was sworn to obey it and I will not take part in this."

Daniels sighed and took on a strict tone, "I figured you would say that, but I am the rank of Admiral so I order you to do this Captain, the future of the Federation is at stake. If you do not do this there will be no prime directive to protect, do you understand Captain?

Picard folded his arms, pondered for a bit and finally conceded, "Alright, we will take on this mission but this will be my first and last time helping you in this temporal cold war, do you understand Mr. Daniels? I'm only doing this for the Federation and to prevent Q's death."

Daniels nodded, "Very well, you have a deal Captain. I have already talked to Captain Archer and his bridge crew so they know what's happening right now as well. I am leaving you in orbit of Coruscant, tell them you want to speak to the Jedi council and invite them to your ship. Let them know that there is a secret order that the chancellor, Darth Sidious has called Order sixty-six that states that all the Jedi must be massacred by the clone army. Good luck." At the end of his little speech Daniels disappeared and in front of them was the large image of Coruscant. It looked the same with the exception of huge spacial cannons that surrounded the planet to protect it from separatist bombardment.

"Captain, we're being hailed." Worf announced from tactical.

Picard nodded, "Put it through on our securest channel Mr. Worf."

The screen blinked to life and showed a tall, lean and bald dark skinned man with an extremely serious look on his face, "I'm Jedi Master Mace Windu of the Jedi council, state your reason for being in our system."

Picard paced closer to the screen and straightened his command shirt, "I'm here to speak to you and the other Jedi, I was sent here from the distant future and another galaxy to give you information that will save the Republic and the Jedi council itself, I have proof and will provide you with such but will do so only on my ship where the information I am going to relay to you isn't intercepted by a third party."

Windu shook his head, "Very well, I will bring a few Jedi with me so if this is a trap I am warning you that we will be armed and ready."

Picard nodded, "Of course, rest assured that our intention is to save the Republic, and I will give you the proof that you need."

Mace nodded, "We'll be there in an hours time, Mace out."