"Kyp, close it up a bit. You're drifting too far out."
"As ordered, Goddess." Jaina winced slightly at the title, but said nothing in return. She had thought she would have gotten used to being called that by now, but something inside her still resented her role. The Republic is in its most desperate hour, and Jaina resented the fact that she spent most of her time weaving or training. At least they were still letting her fly.
I should be out there, on Coruscant. Looking for Jacen.
She eased her X-wing around a piece of debris that had fallen into orbit around Borleias. She saw Kyp Durron's X-wing follow her maneuver and return to his place, flanking her. If he caught on to Jaina's frustration, he was keeping silent about it. "Kyp, send Control a message: Twin Suns report no sightings of Vong activity in the area."
Kyp double clicked his comm, and Jaina heard him switch to a different frequency to hail the biotics facility on the ground. The comm clicked when he switched back to the squadron frequency. "The Vong have been rather quiet the last few weeks. They've got to be up to something."
"Probably planning something," Jaina agreed. "We brought down a couple of their ships, but they seemed to have only been scouts."
"They're gathering information," Kyp said. "They don't want to get hit by the Lusankya like that again."
Jaina was about to respond when something caught her eye. Her sensors showed the giant worldship at the edge of the Pyria system beginning a slow turn. "Control, this is Twin Suns lead. The Vong seem to be on the move."
"Affirmative, Twin Lead," a female voice returned over the comm. "General Antilles requests that you go in for a closer look, but to not engage the enemy."
"Kyp, let's go check it out. Set your sensors to record the data." Kyp double clicked the comm, and he and Jaina broke away from the Borleias atmosphere and went further into deep space. If they pull that stunt with refugees again, Vong heads will roll.
They moved into position, their weapons fired up and their s-foils in attack position. The Vong ship didn't seem to be launching any fighters, but actually recalled those that were outside the ship.
"I think they're preparing to jump into hyperspace," Kyp said. Jaina nodded to herself, and checked her sensors. The worldship was turning on its axis.
"Cappie," Jaina addressed her droid. "Once they've settled on a course, plot all the possible destination points."
Her droid bleeped off an affirmative.
Czulkang Lah sat in his command chair aboard the worldship, awaiting his son's appearance on the villip. He sat silently, fuming on the inside; his son had not contacted him personally. Rather, he had a subordinate initiate contact. And now he's making me wait for him!
The villip finally formed into something resembling Tsavong Lah's features. His father looked disapprovingly at him. "Warmaster. You grace me with your presence."
"I apologize for the wait, father." Tsavong replied, either not noticing his father's sarcasm or choosing to ignore it. "I have a new assignment for you."
Czulkang Lah leaned forward in his chair. "You are replacing me over Borleias?" He asked, straining to keep him voice even. I have lost a battle, something you yourself seem to be doing more of as this war progresses! If you replace me now, son, you will spell the doom of the Yuuzhan Vong.
"Having you at Borleias would be a waste of time. I do not wish to engage this General Antilles again until we know more," Tsavong informed him. "However, I do believe the time has come for us to conquer the area the infidels call 'The Unknown Regions'. It has come to my attention that we have seen a few of their warriors who demonstrated an extreme superiority in flying."
"I will need to know more about these infidels." Czulkang replied.
"We don't have much information, but what we do know is that one of their most prominent tacticians was of this race. My worldship's yammosk will contact yours soon with everything we know." Tsavong leaned in closer to the villip. "I have sent Domain Giil to assist you. May you bring glory to the gods."
"It will be done, Warmaster," Czulkang promised. "I must ask you: How is my special project coming?"
Tsavong looked to his right at someone Czulkang couldn't see, and asked about the status of his project. Czulkang couldn't hear the reply, but his son seemed pleased by the reply. "Your ooglith masquer is almost complete. The Domain Giil worldship will be receiving it, and it shall be passed on to you once you reach Adumar."
"Thank you, warmaster." Czulkang stroked his villip, and it inverted, ending the communication. He turned to one of his aides. "Signal the scouts to return, and prepare for a jump. The yammosk will know where momentarily."
The aid saluted and went off on her task. Czulkang leaned back in his chair as he felt the slight jerk of his ship beginning to move. He pulled on the cognition hood, and brought up the information on this race who called themselves 'the Chiss'.
"The Vong ship jumped into hyperspace approximately 2 hours ago." Jaina watched General Wedge Antilles point to the holo display of the ship rotating on its axis, and disappear into the star field. "Assuming they don't stop to change their course, the possible destinations include Adumar and Bastion. Adumar could not be reached at this time, but Bastion has been warned..."
Jaina drowned out the rest of Wedge's speech as a sick feeling came over her stomach. The pain in her stomach increased and spread to other parts of her body, and she felt a slight twinge of urgency in there too. She did her best to try to dampen its effects on her. Kyp glanced at her, and she reached out to him with the Force. She found the same feeling in him, albeit less severe. Frowning, she relaxed and let the Force guide her actions. Before she knew what she was doing, she had brought up a galactic map of the Adumar sector on her datapad. She inhaled sharply.
"Solo? You got something to contribute?" Wedge's voice brought her attention back to the meeting. Jaina became aware that everyone in the room was watching her.
She cleared her throat. "Sir, I think it's safe to assume that Adumar is captured by the Vong." At Wedge's nod, she continued, "Adumar is the closest known world to both us and the Vong to Chiss space in the Unknown Regions."
Wedge frowned at this, and brought up the galactic map on the main display. "Do we have any reason to believe that the Vong would target the Chiss?"
"It's... It's just a feeling, sir." Jaina admitted.
"You want me to make a decision based on a feeling?" Wedge asked incredulously. "Come on, Jaina, think for a second."
Jaina smiled despite the growing fear that Wedge would not agree. "I'm a Jedi, sir. We feel, not think." Wedge glared at her, and Jaina quickly swallowed. Not the best time for a joke. "Sir, if the Chiss really are in danger, we have to assist them in some way."
Wedge sighed. "Agreed, Lieutenant. We will warn them of their danger." He turned to Tycho. "Send the Lusankya to warn them."
Tycho stared at Wedge for a second before replying, "Yes, sir."
An officer Jaina didn't know spoke up. "General, I'm sorry, but I don't think we should commit the Lusankya to that. It's probably a trap, some ploy to leave Borleias undefended." Jaina held her breath. Her feeling neither confirmed nor denied the officer's suspicions, which Jaina took as a good sign.
"Hey, he's Wedge Antilles!" Wes Janson said, sitting across from Tycho on Wedge's left arm. "He can defend Borleias by himself with just a blaster and a thermal detonator."
Lando Calrissian leaned forward and rested his arms on the table. "I though that's what they say about Han Solo."
"Well, he's here too." Wes pointed out, smiling at Jaina's parents, who were trying to hide their smirks. "And we all know how Corellians feel about odds."
"Wes, I told you, you can come to the meeting if you don't say anything." Wedge shook his head at Wes' protests. He turned his attention to the officer who had spoken. "We have sufficient defenses here to hold off any attack for however long it takes us to evacuate. I'm going to hope it doesn't come to that."
Jaina sighed with relief, and once again tuned out the conversation happening around her. The Force gave her a clear warning about the Vong's destination, and Jaina had acted on it. Neither she, Kyp, nor her mother had sensed anything about the Lusankya's departure.
The meeting was adjourned, and she small group broke up into several different conversations. Kyp and Jaina tried to slip out before being pulled into one of the chats, but Wedge called them back in. "I assume you want to take your X-wings and go with the Lusankya."
Jaina nodded.
"I'm sorry, but I can't let you do that," Wedge said, and Jaina's feeling of dread returned to her. Another warning from the Force?. No, this one felt different. It had the characteristic of a vision in the way it felt, but no images were directed at her. This feeling... This is what will happen in the future if I don't go. I'm going to need to meditate on this as soon as possible.
"Sir?" She heard Kyp ask, and concentrated on the conversation at hand. She took a deep breath to relax herself.
"Jaina, I don't want to send you into unnecessary risk." Wedge looked apologetic.
Jaina forced herself to keep a straight face and not explode in anger. 'Unneccessary risk? If Jag's in danger, nothing short of Palpatine's return will keep me away from him! "As ordered, sir."
Wedge blinked in surprise. "I thought I'd have to put you under house arrest to keep you from going."
Jaina slapped a false smile on her face. "Sir, I understand that I have duties and responsibilities here."
Wedge merely nodded, but Jaina could sense suspicion forming in his mind. I guess I over-acted a bit. We're going to have to do this sooner than I'd like. Wedge excused himself, and went over to talk to Tycho. Jaina quickly pulled Kyp with her, and they left the conference room.
"I take it we're not staying on Borleias?" Kyp asked sarcastically when they were alone in the corridor.
"We leave soon, Kyp. Very soon." Jaina said, ignoring his remark. "Meet me by our ships in half an hour."
Kyp looked at her, shocked. "We're leaving tonight?"
"When did you think we were leaving?"
"Tomorrow. Very early in the morning."
Jaina grinned. "Wedge knows something's up. I don't want to give him more of a chance to stop us." She said, and broke into a run to her quarters. Kyp ran to his own.
"You could get thrown out of the military for this, you know."
"Shut up. I don't want them over-hearing this conversation." Jaina snapped. She and Kyp were not aboard a military shuttle running techs to the SSD Lusankya. They had used falsified records and Force-suggestion to get on board unnoticed, and seemed to be in the clear. That's no reason to let our guard down, though. "Besides, I'm not doing anything wrong."
"You're disobeying orders. General Antilles told you not to go."
"General Antilles told me not to take my X-wing and go," Jaina corrected him. "He said nothing about actually going with the Lusankya."
Kyp sighed. "You're disobeying a direct order. No matter how he worded it, you know what he meant. Wedge won't be too happy about this."
"I've disobeyed direct orders before." Jaina snapped. "And nothing ever came of that."
Kyp frowned at her. "Thanks to Jag's intervention. Don't get cocky, Jaina. Wedge won't let you push him around."
"Is this another lesson, Master Durron?" Jaina asked, sarcasm dripping from her voice.
Kyp ignored it. Instead, he kept his voice even. "Anything I say is a lesson."
"Sure."
Kyp glared at her. "This conversation isn't over, Jaina. Sometime soon we'll have to discuss your growing arrogance."
"Yes, master," Jaina said sweetly. "Any more wisdom to depart?"
"Plenty," Kyp growled. "But now is not the time for a lightsaber match."
Jaina grinned. "Fine. So I'll get in major trouble for doing this. But it still feels right, Kyp." She took a seat at one of the benches in the empty corridor of the shuttle. "You feel it too."
Kyp sat down beside her. "Are you sure you're not motivated by, oh, let's say, personal reasons?"
"No, I'm not sure that I'm not," Jaina replied. "But why would you have the same feeling?"
His reply was cut off by a voice coming over the ship-wide comm. "Five minutes until we dock with the Lusankya. Please have your orders ready and all your tools gathered..."
Kyp stood up. "I guess we better go with the other techs." They got their false ID's out and prepared their fake orders.
Jaina couldn't keep from remembering what Kyp had said to her. Say what you want about my arrogance, Kyp, but I am following the Force. And the will of the Force, Jaina thought to herself, is beyond contestation.
Wedge looked up from his terminal to acknowledge Han and Leia. He gestured for them to take a seat in front of his desk, and waited until they settled themselves until he spoke. "Your daughter is missing." He said bluntly.
"What?" That was Han, not bothering to hide his shock. He jumped up from his seat to glare at Wedge.
Leia remained unfazed. "I know."
"What?" Han turned his glare on his wife, and was joined by Wedge's frown.
"Did she come to you?" He asked Leia.
Leia shook her head. "Of course not. But I sensed something from her at that meeting. She felt something in the Force, something telling her to go."
"So it's safe to assume that she went with the Lusankya?"
Leia nodded, and a look of disapproval fell over Han's face. Wedge sighed and leaned back in his chair. "Han, Leia, I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to punish Jaina for this when she gets back, if not sooner."
Both Han and Leia nodded, and Wedge continued, "She's disobeyed orders before, but I can't let things slide anymore, whether she's right or wrong."
"What sort of thing do you have in mind?" Han asked, sitting back down and shifting slightly in his chair to make himself more comfortable.
"I'm not sure yet. She is too involved with everything here to simply take her off the line," Wedge replied. "I was going to hope to get some insight from you."
"I have a suggestion."
"Han?" Wedge spread out his hands in an 'I'm listening' gesture.
The next few minutes were occupied with Han told telling them his plan. Wedge listened intently, and smiled every once in a while. It should at least be amusing, if it accomplishes nothing else.
Once Han was finished, Wedge considered the total plan for a moment. "It has potential, but it depends on one thing: Jaina going along with it."
"She'll want to be where the action is, Han," Leia agreed. "She won't agree to this."
"She won't have a choice," Han reminded them. "Not if she wants to stay in the military."
"And if she doesn't?"
Han was silent for a moment, collecting his thoughts. "Do you think Jag would leave the military?"
Wedge grinned. "Not a chance."
Han's expression remained serious. "Then Jaina stays."
Jaina was on Yavin 4. Not the Yavin 4 she had grown up on, trained on, but Yavin 4 as she imagined it looked like today. The millennia old ziggurats were gone, replaced by the Vong's alien creatures that shaped the world. Jaina saw thousands, perhaps millions of the Yuuzhan Vong, working and training. She passed through them undetected.
She wasn't quite sure of where she was going, but she walked determinedly nonetheless. The Yuuzhan Vong activities seemed to slow to a crawl as Jaina passed them. She paid them no attention. She continued walking to wherever her feet were taking her.
She found herself on the edges of a field of some sort of crop. Countless slaves of every possible race were working there, knee deep in murky water, pulling out the plants by their roots. A few Yuuzhan Vong warriors walked through the rows, monitoring their progress. Jaina felt the urge to join them.
She walked straight into the water among the slaves, who continued to work at their slow rate. Jaina wondered at the back of her mind why her legs weren't soaked. She looked down to find that the water seemed to shy away from her, leaving her a dry trail to walk through.
A great wookie below brought her head up and she looked around for the source. She noticed one wookie slave straighten up and turn to look at her. It was a moment before she realized that she was looking at Chewbacca.
"Chewie?"
Chewbacca roared off a question. Jaina caught the gist of it; he was asking about her strength. Before she could ask him any questions, Chewbacca returned to his work, and his pace returned to the slow goings of the rest of the slaves. Jaina continued on.
"Are you strong enough, Jaina?"
Jaina looked for the source of the sound, and found a girl about her own age, a smile on her face, looking at her. "Anni?"
Anni Capstan, Jaina's first wingmate in Rogue Squadron, grinned broadly. Then, as if nothing had happened, she returned to her work. Jaina looked ahead and noticed some more familiar faces. Countless Jedi stood up in unison, and Jaina recognized Miko Reglia and Wurth Skidder first, before seeing the faces of all those who had died sine the Vong invasion. All the fatalities of the Myrkyr mission were there, and they spoke in unison, inquiring about her strength. Jaina just looked at them, offering no answer.
"Do you know your duty, Jaina?" Jaina closed her eyes as she heard the all too familiar voice behind her. She turned around to face her little brother. "Are you strong enough?"
"For what, Anakin?" Jaina managed to ask. Her brother looked different in his face; more mature, more troubled. He looked haunted.
"It would have been my duty," Anakin continued on, not answering Jaina's question. "Now it must be yours. Are you ready?"
"For what, Anakin?" Jaina repeated, almost pleading with her little brother.
"For whatever it takes." Anakin dropped her gaze and looked around the field. Jaina followed his line of vision and stared at the vast amount of space occupied by the slaves. The dead, Jaina realized, all these people are dead! The field was never-ending. She turned back to ask Anakin another question, but he was already gone. The rest of the slaves paid no more attention to her. Jaina walked out of the field.
She stepped back on the mainland and turned to look at the field of the dead one more time, but it was gone, replaced by a spotless white. Something grabbed Jaina's shoulder and spun her around. She came face to face with a Yuuzhan Vong warrior.
"Are you ready, Jaina?" It spoke in a perfect imitation of Jacen's voice.
Jaina's eyes fluttered open, and she gasped for air. She had gone into a deep meditation in hopes to see a vision of the future, and why she was being called to the Unknown Regions. Strong enough for what?
Anakin's voice sang out in her mind: "For whatever it takes."