Beyond the Rim

Book 1

Chapter 7: Tale of Two Empires

The humming of ion engines filled the empty soundscape of the grasslands. The beige grass below soon turned shades darker as a large triangular shadow overcasted the sun.

"Status report!" barked an officer.

One of the lower ranked technicians glanced at his screen and back at the officer. "This planet has a rich biosphere, oxygen is breathable to the common species, including us. It looks like there is no signs of intelligent life yet, but this is a relatively good area to allow the start a foothold camp."

The officer looked out the viewport of the Star Destroyer. "Very well, alert all personnel that will disembark to the planet surface to gather in the hanger."

The technician nodded and began to speak over the Star Destroyers intercom.

Stormtroopers, officers, and droids were dashing down the halls. The Klaxon blared all around, two of the individuals caught in the sudden traffic were Minister Maketh Tua, and Agent Kallus.

Tua's eyes glanced across multiple data pads in both of her hands. "Are you sure all my effects are accounted for?"

Agent Kallus rolled his eyes. "Yes Minister, I assure you there won't be a single crate left onboard when we depart."

"And the cadets?" she asked.

Kallus turned his eyes towards the Minister. "They should be gathering their personal belongings now. But Minister, you still haven't reveled to us why you thought it would be a good idea to bring these children on such an expedition?"

Tua gave a single chuckle. "As I told you before, it is classified by the Emperor himself."

Kallus raised his brow and spoke cautiously. "The Emperor, trusted you with an assignment that can't be shared with anyone, not even your second in command."

Tua grunted. "You know, if you want to worry so much about the cadets, why don't you go make sure they're ready."

Kallus just shrugged and turned down the corridor towards the barracks.

When he reached the rooms set aside for the cadets, he looked on in displeasure and shock, never before in his career as an agent for the Empire, has he seen such a mess inside Imperial Barracks.

One of the Cadets, trying to close his portable locker turned and saw a bewildered Agent Kallus standing in the doorway, he quickly turned around and put his hands at his sides and squeaked "Attention!"

The other cadets all turned their attention towards the doorway, and quickly scrambled to their respected positions, stepping over laundry, sheets, and personal items approved to carry in Imperial service.

Kallus eyeballed every Cadet in the room. "What is going on in here, who is the senior cadet here?"

"I am." Called out a quiet yet respectful voice.

Kallus looked, he saw a young girl, she had an almost blue hair like the young rebel of the Ghost Crew, she looked at Kallus straight in the eye, with a kind smile on her face. "Cadet Reann Tomvig, sir."

Kallus walked up to Reann, her eyes trying to adjust to the height of the approaching Agent as he towered over her. Kallus tilted his head over the young girl. "What is the meaning of this disorder?"

Reann stuttered a little. "Th-This is most our first transfer; we haven't gotten use to packing and unpacking yet."

Kallus stared looking at the other cadets, some of them quickly turning their heads to face forward. Reann continued in a soft voice. "I'll make sure we are ready within the next few minutes, sir."

Agent Kallus turned around and looked at all the other cadets. "Get started then."

The room was suddenly alive with movement as the cadets reached for their belongings and tried to shove them into their bags. Kallus looked around and nodded his head, as he began to walk towards the door he asked; "Cadet Reann, Is this your first time as Senior Cadet?"

Reann looked up for her case and addressed Kallus. "Y-Yes, it is, sir."

Kallus twisted his body around and smiled. "I remember when I was a Senior Cadet long ago, you'll get use it."

He walked out the automatic door, when they closed, Reann took a sigh of relief, and then returned to packing her belongings.

The Destroyer Captain looked on as the final group of troopers lined up in front of him in the hanger. He turned to Minister Tua, who simply nodded. He approached the front of a makeshift stage and began to speak. "Brave men and women of the Empire, you have been selected for this special mission in uncharted space, to bring glory to the name of the Emperor. There are one thousand here today, Stormtroopers, engineers, scientists, and cadets. My orders were to escort you here and see to it that you were escorted safely to the planet's surface, unfortunately my duties will lie elsewhere in the galaxy, and you will be without the support of my ship. The next vessel to come with bring additional men and supplies, it will take another month to get here. I cannot guarantee your success, but I have full confidence and a belief in the Emperor's wishes that you will become legends in the archives of history."

All the personnel in front of the podium gave a salute, cheers broke out, "Glory to the Empire!" one shouted.

Minister Tua took the stage, and commanded; "To the landing craft!"

The shuttles soon departed from the lower hanger of the Star Destroyer and made their way to the grassy surface below. The shuttles lowered their gear, and touched the soil, the front ramps open, Minister Tua gave specific instructions she and the Cadets were to be the first ones off the shuttle. Agent Kallus leaned his head down to get a glimpse of what was happening, and he noticed something, an Imperial Cam Droid from the Ministry of Information.

He continued to look on as the Cadets started to plant a small Imperial flag on the grasslands, once the red light on the droid turned off, Tua turned to the shuttles and shouted. "Alright, you may all come out now and get to work!"

Stormtroopers carrying spades, crates, and other supplies off the shuttle, bobbing themselves out of the way of Agent Kallus as he slowly walked towards Minister Tua who was reviewing the footage with the droid.

I take it your secret is that this Jedi hunt has become a colonization and a publicity stunt?

Tua acknowledged Agent Kallus without moving her eyes off the footage. "It was the Holonet News' idea, they want to put out a new advertisement for the next semesters. They really wanted to show how good the Academy programs can be."

Agent Kallus turned to find the cadets, his eyes locked onto them, they were digging the foundations for one the barracks they were going to build in the area.

He turned back to Minister Tua. "If you do not mind my opinion, it's not wise to bring a group of children on a mission to capture a Jedi."

Tua chuckled and turned to Kallus. "It's better to be dealing with a Jedi hunt with children then facing worse punishment back on Lothal, besides, this view looks just like home."

Kallus smirked and began to walk to assist in the unloading of the shuttles. Suddenly, he felt something catch his boot, he sharply stopped and looked down at what could have tripped him. Through the tall grass, he saw a medium size white cage, he took one sniff and realized there was a rotting smell.

Kallus shouted; "I need an anthropologist over here!"

The ribcage was under a portable scanner, the group of scientists, were looking at the data pads and results were feeding in. The cadets gathered around under the temporary shelter.

"What do you think that creature was?" whispered one Cadet

One of them shrugged. "I bet you it like one of those Loth-Cats"

"It can't be, loth-cats are small, look at the size of that rib cage." One of them blurted out.

Suddenly one of the scientists turned to Kallus, the cadets began to shush each other as the scientist read the results. "Agent Kallus, This appears to be from a large herbivore creature, about the size of a Nerf, no larger than a Bantha, but what the machine caught are these bite marks left on the bones, they are clean penetration, from what could be a fast moving projectile. We are picking up traces of an unknown alloy combination left behind on the marks, but we are still uncertain. We'll need more time to examine everything."

Kallus peaked over his shoulders at the ease dropping cadets, he turned back to the scientists. "Perhaps you can put the cadets to work."

The cadet's eyes widen as they began to stand at attention. Reann stood in front of the small formation. The scientist approaches the cadets and knelt down in front of Reann. "There is a source of water nearby, if you and the others can get scans of the water, sediment, and any possible lifeforms there it will help our work move along faster."

Reann gave a sharp salute and turned to the others to break down the plan of action.

The cadets marched down to the river, with a small trooper escort. They began to stick small probes into the soil and water, taking samples of the fauna, and trying their best to make light of their predicament. Splashing water on each other, or trying to spook some the younger Cadets and they traversed the small grove of trees. Reann tried her best to make sure the others were behaving. "Cadet Alton, stop using the foliage as a weapon!" she demanded.

The cadet dropped a stick in his hand and just crossed his eyes at Reann before trotting to the riverbank. Reann followed behind, where she was in horror to see some of the cadets in just their undergarments, jumping into the water. "At least here we can have aquatic activities." Laughed one cadet.

Reann fumed red and shouted. "Will you all get your act together, we are members of the empire, and we have to be on our best behave—Aiiee!"

Her statement turned to panic as she felt four hands shove her from behind, as she fell face forward into the cold water, still in full uniform. She surfaced a few seconds after she fell in, shivering and looking at all the other cadets who were snickering and laughing.

The Stormtroopers soon caught up to the group of cadets. "Alright play time is over cadets, back to work."

The complied with the older men, they began to wade out of the water and back onto shore, Reann moved at her own pace, her clothes and hair dripping water. She turned to see if all the Cadets had gotten out, but something in the corner of her eyes caught her attention, smoke in the distance, before she could chose a course of action, the stormtrooper barked again. "Cadet, let's get moving."

Agent Kallus was looking over the sample rods that were collected and looked up to Reann, still wet from her fall. "And would you like to explain your appearance, Senior Cadet?"

Reann spoke up. "The others seem to be a little rowdy with following my orders, two of them pushed me into the river."

Agent Kallus sighed. "I see, if you can point them out, I'll have them pealing tubers for the next few rotations."

Reann lifter her head. "That is thoughtful sir, but I don't feel it is necessary."

Kallus nodded and looked down at his data pad. "Anything else you wish to report?"

Reann recalled what she saw and leaned forward. "I did see smoke in the distance."

Kallus looked up from his data pad and looked out to the horizon. He then reached for his commlink. "TK-448, get the troop transports filled up."

He began to make is way towards the vehicle depot where speeder bikes and a few transports were waiting for them, soon the small convoy disembarked from the small but growing base, further into the grasslands.

The trip passed by in a matter of minutes, they reached the source of the smoke, it was to all defiance of early reconnaissance and intelligence gathered, a small house made from whole logs of trees.

Kallus looked at the structure and the small railing of wooden fence. "Set your weapons for stun and follow my lead." Kallus reached for his bo-rifle and took the lead to the cabin.

A stormtrooper began to inspect the door, with one knock, the door began to creak open, they pushed the remainder of it open into the interior space. Furniture was on its sides, scratch marks covered the wall, the men observed the scratches, when one of them came across a knife with a red ribbon and me message, pinned to the wall.

"Agent Kallus." One of the stormtroopers alerted.

Kallus walked right over and observed the piece of paper, the language written on it was unknown to him. "We'll have to get the interpreter droid."

As the small band of imperials marched out two troopers who went to investigate the fire approached. "Agent Kallus, sir. We found the source of the fire; we took scans of what appeared to be a corpse of a large creature in the fire."

Agent Kallus snatched the data pad from the stormtrooper and began to look over the image. He then perked his head up. "Back to camp." He shouted.

Reann was marshaling the other cadets who were doing their evening exercise routines. The cam droid followed suit and filmed the entire session. Once the red light turned off on the droid the cadet's broke formation. "Alright to the mess hall then." Ordered Reann.

That was probably the only order the cadets seemed to follow. As they made their way towards the shelter where the rations were being prepared, the smell of seasoned nerf steak and fresh baked polystarch bread was a scent rare to anyone, as usually these were regulated into portions and packed into dehydrated rations. The cadets began to have their trays be filled with the sources of the aroma and began to gather into their groups while they ate.

Reann was looking for a place to sit, the moment she attempted to approach a table with an empty seat or two the other cadets would try to deny her the seat by placing their helmets on them. She continued to try to look for a seat, when she saw Minister Tua began to sit down at a table, also alone.

Reann made her way towards the table and politely asked. "Permission to sit down, Minister?"

Minister Tua giggled a bit. "Sit down dear." Reann smiled as she sat down and began to cut her steak.

Tua looked at Reann. "Is everything alright, Cadet Reann, is it?"

The young cadet began to open up to the minister. "I never thought being a senior cadet can be this hard, the others don't think I have the right views to be in the Empire, or even as their commander."

Tua leaned in. "Such as?"

Reann looked at the minister and spoke softly. "I don't like hurting people or any innocent lifeforms, yet in the academy, they basically told us to be rude, rash, and violent, especially towards each other."

Tua tried to be reassuring, putting her arm around the cadet. "I understand, I though the empire was supposed to be what it wanted to project itself long ago, but I've seen things that made me question that as well. But we are here in the service of our emperor, and if those around us would not improve the world, we will do it ourselves."

"Am I interrupting something?" the voice caught the two girls off guard, they turned to see Agent Kallus standing behind them.

Reann almost stood up to saluted him, but Kallus stopped her. "Please, I've had a busy day running around the plains trying to figure out what's been happening here."

He sat down with his meal and took a good chunk of the steak into his mouth. Once he swallowed, he began to disclose his discovery. "We found a primitive home over by that fire you reported to us Cadet, the cause of the fire looked to be set off by what we presume in an intelligent lifeform."

Tua looked at agent Kallus evermore confused. "Intelligent lifeforms?"

Agent Kallus began to slice up more meat from his tray as he spoke. "The only thing we know is that they can build simple structures, start fire, and have a writing system, but further evidence also puts on that they are skilled with metalworks, we found a well forged knife at the scene."

Tua looked back to her food and put a spoonful of the polystarch bread in her mouth. Reann took a moment to think, "Do you think these lifeforms can be a threat?"

Kallus shook his head is disagreement. "Whatever forged this weapon is up for debate, the creature's ribcage we found earlier, we found another, it was the item being burnt that cause the smoke you saw. It is a large predator from what we were able to analyze. And seeing how we found two separate corpses in less than a few clicks apart, this could be their domain."

Tua swallowed the bread still in her mouth. "Then, is it safe to still be here?"

Kallus reassured the Minister. "I've had motion sensors set up a click out from the base camp, if anything crosses past them, it will sound an alarm." He then turned to Reann. "If those alarms do go off, take the cadets to the central building, it's just been put up and its walls are reinforced, nothing on this planet should be able to penetrate it."

Minister Tua smiled at Reann and put a small holdout blaster on the table. "Don't worry, its only setting is stun, the most it can do is give someone a headache and a refreshing nap."

Reann giggled as she took the small blaster and placed it in one of her pockets on the sleeves. "Thanks minister, that's really thoughtful of you."

The three continued to enjoy their dinner as night fell.

The camp only had a few more minutes before curfew. Some of the cadets were still outside, playing with smooth rocks and a few drawn rings in the dirt. Reann walked up to them, one of the cadets grunted. "Listen, we're in the Empire now, we don't need you to tell us our bedtime."

Reann then surprised the other cadets with her reply. "I was actually going to ask if I can play with you guys two."

The other cadets began to look at each other as if she were joking, but quietly he handed her a rock and began to explain how to play.

Agent Kallus and Minister Tua looked on as she was being accepted into the group. Tua smiled and spoke indirectly to Kallus, "She's just like us, but younger, more innocent."

Kallus nodded. "I know there have been questions on the Empire after the Phoenix Squadron' victory against Grand Moff Tarkin." The Empire tried to suppress these thoughts from its citizens and inside its ranks…

Tua interrupted and looked him in the eye. "Then I hope you, being part of the ISB, will make sure nothing bad happens to her."

Kallus just smiled and shook his head. He began to walk towards the officer's barracks when the night ambiance was interrupted with a low distance mash of a howl and a growl. The sound caught everyone off guard. Tua turned to Kallus. "That sounded quite far?"

Kallus began to look around to see if he could see the source of the sound. "I don't know, but I think we should be alright…"

Suddenly, a loud clash comparable to a quick flash of lightning rang out, followed by another one. The two adults ran to the perimeter, two stormtroopers looked out with their macro binoculars. "There!" one of them shouted.

Kallus was handed one of the pairs, he began to see bright and short flashes in the tall grass, he saw the silhouette of humans between the flashes. "There are people out there. Turn on the floodlights!"

Before a stormtrooper could throw the switch, a bright light filled the valley overhead, they all looked up, covering, and squinting their eyes as they saw a flare illuminating everything.

They then heard from the area of all the commotion. "Over there! Fall back."

The group of figures began to run towards the encampment. As the figures got closer, the stormtroopers began to aim their weapons. "Hold!" one of them shouted.

The group stopped feet in front of the Imperials. Kallus and Tua looked the men up and down, the strangers were wearing red tunics with black cloth webbing, white trousers with a black stripe down the side, they wore a short cylinder style hat with a brim at the front, and the number twenty four on the front, and they had fear in their eyes.

"Here they come!" One of them in the back shouted. Kallus looked out from behind the group and saw the shine in what eyes were prowling in the grass. He pulled out his bo-rifle and began firing between the gaps between the men as they dropped to the floor to get out of the line of fire.

One of the creatures dropped dead while the others charged at full speed, showing their teeth as they jumped at the Imperials. One of the strange men stretched out his weapon, that had a long knife at the end and impaled on of the creatures at it attempted to pounce on him.

The other landed on a stormtrooper and began to chew on its armor. Minister Tua took of her hat and tossed it at the creature, the simple fashionwear just bounced off the creature, but it stopped gnawing on the stormtrooper and fixed its sights on Minister Tua, she began to back up slowly into the camp, and began to dash as the creature snarled. She ran as fast as she could towards the central building, only to find herself and the other cadets banging at the door. "They didn't wire the doors yet!" one of the cadets shouted.

The turned as looked at the creature right in the eyes, it began eyeballing its targets, to see which one could give it a satisfying snack. "Leave them alone!" They all turned to see Reann run up with the holdout blaster, and began to fire stun shots at the creature, she kept firing, landing hit after hit, till the creature fell down.

She slowly began to catch her breath, the cadets looked on in total awe, "Let us hear it for Reann! The bravest of us all!"

The cadets cheered and hoisted her up on her shoulders, Tua smiled as she saw Reann being embraced by the others.

Agent Kallus and the small group of men walked towards the unconscious creature. "Looks like you guys got it really good, Captain Dillon Bryson, His Imperial Majesty's twenty fourth home division, you?"

Agent Kallus looked at them, still trying to process all that had just happen. "Agent Kallus of the Imperial Security Bureau."

Bryson looked at his other men and back at Kallus. "I don't think I've heard there was a 'Security Bureau' set up?"

Agent Kallus firmly replied, "I don't think I've heard of the Twenty Forth Home Division either."

Bryson began to look around the camp, seeing the stormtroopers in their white armor, their odd-looking weapons, and the clothing style of the cadets and Minister. He looked back at Kallus. "Where are you from?" he asked intently?

Kallus pointed up at the sky. "We're from a planet, called Lothal, our Galactic Empire is here to conduct a special mission."

Bryson could not believe what he was hearing but tried to explain his purpose also. "Our Emperor, Augustus, sent us on an expedition to deal with these feral grass banshees wreaking havoc out here. If you do not mind, if my men could remain here till morning and well try to sort this all out and try to understand more about each other."

Before Kallus could decide on the best course of action, Minister Tua butted in. "I'm in charge of our delegation here, I'll see to it that your men are looked after and meet all your needs."

Bryson smiled and put his hand out to the minister, to which Tua went to shake.

The other cadets watched from a distance, once of them nudged Reann. "You see that? That is history in the making, and we'll all get credit for it."

Reann just laughed. "They'll remember me for saving all of you." The other cadets laughed and went to their barracks to rest form the exigent they experienced and prepared for what adventure tomorrow could bring.