Star Wars: New Jedi Order: Resurrection

Part One: First Contact

"Are they ready?" A mans voice asked impatiently.

"Almost, sir." A young, groveling voice answered.

"Master is most displeased with your lack of progress on Project Ismaren, Johnson, as well as our other project, as I'm sure you know. You must quicken the pace!"

"I'm doing all I can sir." Johnson whimpered.

"Do more."

Jaina Solo, Kyp Durron, Jagged Fel, Danni Quee, and Wraith Squadron gathered in the basement of Wedge Antilles's new base on Noquivzor for one of their so-called "insane speculation and planning sessions". Danni started the informal meeting, "You'll all be pleased to hear about a new weapon we've devised for you to use against the Vong. Unlike most of our innovations, this one isn't ship-ready yet, so we won't be using it for any Goddess tricks for a while. However, it will be useful for any ground missions we initiate in the future." Danni held up what looked like a standard blaster rifle with metal and yorik coral grafts on it. "This, is the Gravinometric Field Disruptor, or as the development team took to calling it, the Void. It has three settings. The first one," the young scientist pointed to a broad flat graft on top of the gun's midsection, "creates a ten meter sphere in which the gravatic anomalies created by dovin basals are negated. The second is a graviton pulse fired at either a dovin basal or one of their blacks holes. It negates the effect of the void or the void caused by the dovin basal you hit. The third is quite possibly the most amazing. It allows you to fire through the anomalies." At this audible gasps were heard from around the room. Danni continued, "Yes, I know, but it's not as special as it sounds. It's only a low-intensity burst, not suitable for actually harming Vong, just sending signals through the comm. distortions caused by voids and any other insane uses you guys can come up with." Garik "Face" Loran, Wraith Squadron's commanding officer, interrupted, a big smile on his face. "This will be perfect! We've needed to get to Duro for a while because of recent disclosures by Imperial Intelligence that Palpatine left huge munitions stockpiles, and possibly even ships, hidden underground after Duro was ruined. We couldn't go before because of reports of dovin basal mines on the surface. Who's in?" Not a person left their hand down.

"What did our informant have to say?"

"They're moving on Duro, sir"

"Excellent. What caused their decision to happen now?"

"A new gravatic weapon, one that can cancel dovin basal voids. Handheld only."

"Will that affect Ismaren?"

"No, er…maybe."

"What do you mean, maybe?"

"Well, eh, they might conceivably find a way to use it on them, but I seriously doubt it."

"I pray for your sake that you're right."

Admiral Janeway was surveying her old ship with a trace of melancholy when Captain Chakotay walked onto the bridge to greet her warmly. "How nice of you to volunteer the Voyager to take me to the Dominion homeworld for the peace negotiations."

"It's our pleasure to take you. Everyone was overjoyed to hear you'd be onboard, even if won't be very long. Perhaps you'd like to see our changes and the old crew?" Janeway brightened and responded, "Of course." The new captain led her to the turbolift and through the ship, seeing Harry Kim, Seven-of-Nine, Tom Paris, and even the Doctor as she made her rounds through her former command. Then, with no warning, it happened: one moment, the normal hum of a starship in warp, the next, a shake and abrupt stop. Chakotay reached for his combadge, but the admiral was too quick for him. "Report."

"I'm not sure, sir. We seem to have hit a wormhole, but it already disappeared. I'm not sure where we are… The computer can't find any points of reference. Wait… Long range sensors show we're near the edge of the galaxy, but… Hmm, that is illogical. The galactic barrier isn't there, there's nothing anywhere it should be." Tuvok responded.

"We're probably in another galaxy or time period. We'll be up in a moment." Chakotay, despite his growing sense that this wouldn't turn out well, couldn't help but grin wryly at how easily Janeway was falling back into her role as captain of Voyager.

The strike team for the Duro mission gathered in a hanger on Noquivzor. In a small circle was everyone from the session in which the Void had been unveiled as well as Jacen Solo, Vergere, Zekk, Tesar Sebatyne, Alema Rar, Lowbacca, and the recently crowned Queen Mother Tenel Ka. The team was tense, remembering the last time all of them had been together, and what a debacle the mission to Myrkr had been. Finally the last member of the team, Tahari Veila, dashed out of the main building, barefoot as usual. "Lets go already!" She hurried to the Trickster, a captured Yuuzhan Vong frigate, and boarded via a yorik coral ramp. The others followed and they shot up into the atmosphere and out into space. The warship launched itself into hyperspace…and immediately was pulled back out. Jaina, wearing the pilot's cognition hood, reached out both with her Force perceptions and the images supplied by and discovered they had run into a Class-2 hyperspatial anomaly: generally a wormhole or some other such trans-spatial oddity. "Where are we?" Lowbacca rumbled out a response, which Em Teedee translated as, "Master Lowbacca says we are in the vicinity of Kessel. He also reports there is a capital starship of a design we've never seen, but it most definitely not alive." The Jedi onboard reached out with their perceptions and felt for the other ship and its crew, and was quite relieved to find them normal and human. "Do they have a transponder signal?" Jaina removed the hood and walked over to their jury-rigged comm. board. Seeing that they didn't, she sent out a hail and waited.

"What is that thing?" "I'm not sure, admiral, it seems to be some kind of living spacecraft. I think that outer shell is form of coral, but I can't tell one thing from another in there," The sensor operator peered down at his station in confusion. "Send out a hail." "Yes sir… Nothing. Wait, no, they have sent a signal. It's audio only and the computer is having some trouble decoding its patterning. There, I've got it." The young officer hit a switch and Jaina Solo's voice filled the bridge, "New Republic vessel Trickster hailing ship of unknown variety. Please respond. Use this bandwidth."

"Trickster, this is Starfleet vessel Voyager, Admiral Janeway speaking. We seem to have traveled through a wormhole to get here. Are you residents of this galaxy? We don't believe this is our own." Cheers went up aboard Trickster at Janeway's voice. "And they speak Basic!" Tahari grinned from ear to ear. Jaina responded cheerily, "Hi, Voyager, this is Jaina Solo. Yes, this is our galaxy, need a tour guide? You're right in the middle of dangerous territory, so lets get out of here, then we can dock and explain everything. Follow us into hyperspace at this bearing," Jaina transmitted the set of coordinates.

The bridge crew of Voyager shot confused looks to their captain and admiral, sharing common questions. Dock? Hyperspace? What are they talking about? They collectively thought. Janeway pondered her response for a moment and finally decided on, "Trickster, we have no idea what you mean by that. What is hyperspace, and why would we dock? Don't you have transporter capabilities here?"

"Uhh… transporter? I've never heard of one. Hyperspace is the alternate space in which distances are shorter and many other such odd laws apply. It's how we get around the galaxy. But we can swap datacards later. Follow that bearing I gave you until you come straight into a star's gravity well. Stop at the second planet out. We'll be waiting there for you, assuming you don't get there first. You do have the capacity to travel a few thousand light-years, right?"

Janeway bit back a curse. A few thousand light-years, indeed! "That will take us a while… a long while. We don't have that kind of time. Do you have any other way we can-"

"Admiral. There's a wormhole forming directly in front of us. It seems momentarily stable," the sensor officer interrupted.

"Dispatch a probe."

"Understood." The probe launched and passed through, revealing it to be exactly where the friendly natives had told them to go. Too weird, Janeway received the information with awe.

"Trickster, we see a wormhole directly in our path that opens directly at your stated destination. We can get there faster that way." The Trickster acknowledged and followed them into the wormhole.

"Johnson, report."

"They've come across a foreign vessel called Voyager, sir. It's fast, several times lightspeed, but it can't enter hyperspace. It has a technology called beaming that instantaneously transports them a limited distance. They also have different weapon, shielding, and propulsion systems. They've been taken to Noquivzor."

"How? I thought they couldn't reach hyperspace."

"Well, the Project seems to be having unexpected repercussions in subspace and realspace. Wormholes are popping up all over the place, especially around points at which ships enter or exit hyperspace. Reportedly, the foreigners travel in something called a warp field, and they may also be causing wormhole formation. A wormhole appeared right in front of them and ended at Noquivzor, sir. As soon as they exited it, it collapsed."

"How did the wormhole know their destination?"

"Sir, you make it sound like it's sentient." Johnson's voice held a trace of mockery.

"Isn't it?" his superior growled angrily.

"No. I'm not sure what intention is controlling them, or even why it can control them, but I assure you, they have no will of their own." His master merely grunted.