"Let my children return home to me,
May they return strong and safe.
But should they die today,
May their souls rise above the battle plains
to everlasting peace."
from - The War Prayer of Alderaan
Chapter Fourteen
"This isn't going to work," Harper announced as he struggled into the Imperial uniform they had just stolen. The boot he was trying to get on just wouldn't fit and he found himself hopping all around the back alley they were using for cover.
"Trust me," was Luke's simple reply, "I've done this sort of thing before."
"How did it work out," Beka asked.
"Not bad," Luke answered sheepishly.
Luke and Trance had elected to wear Stormtrooper armour while Beka and Harper had grabbed officer uniforms. Harper looked out of place in his borrowed Imperial Navy Lieutenants uniform but Beka wore her Imperial Intelligence uniform well.
There was nothing they could do to disguise Artoo, but droids were common enough on Imperial bases that he should go unnoticed.
"All right everyone, let's do this," Beka ordered.
The group slowly emerged from the alley with Beka and Harper leading the group and Trance and Luke following close behind. Artoo formed the rear as he struggled to keep up on the battle damaged roadways of the Kafreion capital.
They approached the base from the south side entrance and walked in through the outer fortifications without a challenge. Stormtroopers were everywhere, guarding every door and corridor as the group wandered through them.
"This is a little easy, don't you think," Beka whispered to Harper as they turned a corner.
"Yeah, that's a bit understated boss," Harper whispered back.
"We're here," Luke announced through the small transceiver placed in Beka's ear.
It was a small adjunct operations centre not far from the main Operations and Command Centre down the hall.
Beka turned away from the Stormtrooper guarding the door, pulling a datapad from her pocket and handing it Harper, she whispered to Luke.
"What now?"
"Go in," Luke whispered back.
Beka began to walk for the door once more but was challenged by on of the guards.
"Identification," he rumbled.
"You don't need to see her identification," Luke responded strangely before Beka could reply.
"Yes I do," the Guard insisted.
"No, you do not," Luke told him putting more force into his words.
"No, I do not," the guard returned with a distant sounding voice and both guards stood aside as the group entered the chamber.
Luke locked the door as they entered and Artoo rolled up to the nearest console and jacked into the system.
"Artoo should be able to interpret the entire Imperial network," Luke told them.
"He better," Beka replied or this whole party has been for nothing.
Luke smiled as she said that and turned away.
"What," Beka demanded.
"Nothing," he told her, "You just remind so much of one of my friends, he's a lot like you."
"Great," Beka respond without enthusiasm.
"Artoo," Luke said turning back to the task, "We need tactical data and general information about the Imperial fleet in this galaxy. Try to stay away from heavily encrypted files we don't want to alert anyone that we're here."
The small droid beeped his understanding and got to work.
"Handy little thing to have around isn't he," Beka commented, "But not very talkative."
"You haven't seen him with Threepio," Luke said with a smile, "Those two never shut up."
Artoo let out a loud electronic raspberry in response but continued with his work.
"That, I understood," Harper chimed.
A moment later Artoo had something.
"They haven't brought in any new ships in a couple weeks," Luke read to them, "Not since before I arrived. They are behind schedule for the arrival of over a hundred ships of all classes."
"What's the hold up," Trance asked.
"They don't know," Luke told them, "They seem to have been ordered not to contact the Imperial command except through Lord Krell himself."
"Oh, and Artoo has also confirmed the location of the Conduit between our galaxies and he has hacked into the tactical database. The Empire's next target is Ekindu."
"Ekindu," Beka breathed, "We have to get back to the Maru."
"Oh no," Luke said as he turned and gazed at the sensor station.
"What is it," Harper demanded.
"The Lusankya has just entered orbit, she has a fleet of four Star Destroyers with her."
"We leave right now," Beka ordered. This was going to be bad.
Krell was a man obsessed, not with the conquest of this galaxy, for that would come in time, but rather with the fourth DNA marker of the Magog. The first three markers were originally from the Empire's own galaxy, but the fourth marker did not conform with any know species in the galaxy. It must therefore be native to another galaxy.
"My Lord," the Lusankya's Captian approached the Dark Lord slowly, "We have received word that the Starhammer was scuttled and her crew captured. They are being held on the planet Erihs and are awaiting rescue."
"Send the escort ships to rescue Captian Meduk and her crew," Krell ordered, "We have little need of them aboard this ship."
"Yes, sir," the Captian replied and he hurriedly went off to relay the order.
As the Captian walked away Krell felt a massive rush hit him like a turbolaser blast. He shot up from his seat stalk straight and began to focus on the feeling.
It was the Force, strong and alive as he had ever felt it. He focused his feelings trying to locate this rush of power. It was difficult to focus, the energy was so overwhelming, but finally he was able to find the source.
It was coming from the planet, that was certain, but now that he had narrowed in on it, Krell could sense that it was not one locus of the force but rather two, interacting with each other in violent way.
"Captian," Krell burst out into the come systems, "Have my shuttle prepped for launch and a full squadron of TIE interceptors readied for me. I am going to the planet."
They had made it all the way to the outer courtyard before being challenged by another Imperial guard. This one however was not so easy to manipulate.
"Yes I do need to see your identification," the guard insisted for a third time as Luke tried to use the Force on him without success. The guard lifted his blaster rifle to emphasis his point. A small squad of Stormtroopers came over to see what was going on.
Beka reached into her uniform and pulled out the ID card that she found there.
"Her you go," she said with a note of annoyance in her voice as she handed him the stolen ID.
The guard scanned the ID and looked back up at Beka.
"This isn't you," he said with satisfaction.
"Your right," Beka said pulling out her own blaster and dropping the Stormtrooper to the floor.
Luke was sudden blur of movement, knowing he had to act fast to protect his new friends.
He whipped of the restrictive Stormtrooper helmet and grabbed his lightsabre from a waiting Artoo. His Jedi skills were not yet advanced enough to block the shots of half a dozen trained Stormtroopers, but in their current close quarters he was able to cut them down with ease.
"We have to get to the gate," Luke cried as he joined the others behind cover.
"No kidding," Beka replied without humour.
They were only about ten metres from the gate, but as it was they would never reach it. The courtyard was covered by anti-personal cannons and guards were taking up defensive potations around the perimeter.
Beka and Trance had abandoned their 'borrowed' blasters in favour of force lances and were trying to pick of the soldiers manning the cannons while Harper concentrated on the perimeter guards.
"Artoo," Luke called, "We need some cover,"
Artoo whistled his understanding and moved out into the courtyard. The Imperials carrying nothing for the little droid continued to fire on the infiltrators. When he arrived at what he felt was the best location Artoo began venting smoke into the courtyard obscuring everything.
"Go now," Luke demanded and the group scrambled to get to the gate.
"It's locked," Harper told them as he ran into the closed doors.
"Don't worry," Luke told them brandishing his lightsabre, "I have a lock pick."
"Well you better hurry," Trance remarked, "Its not going to take them long to figure out where we are."
Luke plunged his lightsabre into the thick gate doors and began to slice through them. The durasteel gave way slowly but soon there was a small gap in the door large enough for the entire group to escape.
Luke made Trance go out first followed by Harper. Beka went next dropping her force lance on the other side, but Luke remained behind. He couldn't leave without Artoo.
"Artoo," Luke called out, "The speeder leaving, we've got to go."
Artoo came screaming toward the exit Luke had cut, his sensors allowing him to see through the thick fog he had made.
Once out Luke and Artoo moved as fast as they could in the direction they had seen Beka and the others run in. In the near distance he could see Beka waving them on trying to get them to hurry. Luke could see that Beka was screaming into her comlink.
Only seconds later the gate exploded behind him. Beka's force lance had been reconfigured as a plasma grenade.
That gate was now closed.
They made it back to the anti-grav sled in the burned out back alley without any real problems. They abandoned their Imperial garb for their more comfortable clothes and settled in to wait.
The entire city was alerted to their presence, and right now Imperial troops were searching for them. Much of the city fringe had been burned and destroyed during the Imperial invasion, even if the entire garrison came out looking for them it would take days to search the entire area.
"We make for the Maru tomorrow," Beka told them, "From there we'll take our chances with whatever space defences the Imps have."
"I think we should leave right now Beka," Trance said, she seemed to be growing increasingly agitated, "There is something coming; something very bad."
"I sense it too," Luke admitted, "It reeks of the Dark Side. Lord Krell is coming for us, I'm sure of it."
"Okay then, lets pack are crap and get the hell out of dodge," Harper said as he jumped up from his place on the ground, trying his best not to look terrified, he was still nursing a mild burn to his leg, a near miss from a blaster shot.
"Fine, we'll go now," Beka said not sure what to make of the two creepy warnings she was given.
Lord Krell piloted his own shuttle as he descended toward the planet. He focused on the strange sense he had in the Force and redirected his shuttle toward it. It was moving south now, away from the city toward a cluster of small villages near a small lake.
"I have you now," Krell announced to himself as he changed his course.
"Harper, power up the engines," Beka ordered as they rushed aboard the Maru, "We're getting out of here and we're doing it now."
Trance took position at the sensor station bring the active and passive systems online as she scanned the area.
"Beka," she reported, "We've got trouble. TIE fighters incoming from orbit, they're heading this way."
"OK then," Beka replied wearily, "We're out here, everybody hold on to something."
The Maru rocked as it lifted off from the planets surface. The Imperial craft continued to approach as Beka angle her ship away from them and rocketed off at the best possible speed in atmosphere.
"They're catching up," Trance told Beka.
"I can see that," she responded with annoyance.
Green bolts sailed past the Maru as the Imperial fighters began to fire on the Maru, trying to force her from the sky. Beka for here part was doing quite a job of preventing that from happening.
"An Imperial shuttle is approaching," Trance warned, "Whoever is piloting that thing is either a fantastic pilot, or absolutely insane."
"Possibly both," Luke told them, "I think that Lord Krell is on that shuttle."
"What," Trance exclaimed, "How can you tell?"
"I can 'feel' him," he told her.
The Maru shook with a grazing hit from one of the Imperial fighters. Luke manned the weapons station returned fire with the point defence lasers but with little effect.
"We're almost clear of the atmosphere," Beka announced.
"Maybe, but that Super Star Destroyer is still going to be in the way," Trance told her.
"Damn," Beka said as she dropped her ship into a lower orbit trying to get out from under the dagger shaped behemoth.
The Imperial shuttle was now right on the Maru's tail and still gaining ground.
Beka threw the ship into a sudden straight drive for space, leaving the Imperial fighters behind but not the shuttle. Bursting into space Beka pumped full power into the engines before the gunners on the Lusankya had a chance to fire leaving both the battleship and the shuttle far behind.
"Everyone prepare for slipstream," Beka ordered and the Maru opened the dimensional rift and the Maru was gone.
Watching the Commonwealth vessel escape with his strange Force locus was very upsetting for Lord Krell. In his anger he demolished much of the shuttles interior throwing waves of Force into control systems and tearing apart flight components.
He did so much damage in his rage that the Lusankya had to rescue him from disaster as his shuttle began to plunge back into the atmosphere.
Back in the safety of his command ship he realized that it would not matter. Once he had found the final piece of his genetic puzzle nothing would ever stand against him again.