To die with honour is good.
To live in honour is better.
Wookiee Proverb
Chapter Eighteen
Untold thousands of swarmships existed the slipstream into the Conduit system, far more then Rev Bem could have ever known. Magog from across the known worlds had gathered for this battle to take their revenge on the Empire and to prevent the Commonwealth from gaining their technology.
This was not their only motivation, the Spirit of the Abyss was bending all the might of his will upon this battle. History was in motion, and nothing that had occurred should be allowed to fall. All depended on the outcome of this battle.
The Harbingers of the Abyss, the Magog as the beings in these galaxy's called them, would not fail in their mission. It had already happened, they could not fail.
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Picking herself up from the deck, Captian Meduk automatically began to review her situation. The shuttle seemed fine, the monitor showing her former crew showed that they were also all right. A quick examination of her pilot showed that he was not.
"Skywalker," she said nudging the young Rebel, "Are you conscious?"
Given that Skywalker did not reply she realized the answer was no.
The droid rolled over to its master and started beeping and hooting in concern.
"I don't know," she said to the little droid, "He must have hit his head on the bulkhead or something."
The droid continued it's incessant hooting as it tried to get her to do something.
"Just be quiet," she ordered the droid, "let me think."
Meduk was herself a decent pilot who had logged hundreds of flight hours on shuttles such as this, she could pilot the craft herself. With the modifications Skywalker and that annoying little engineer made the shuttle should be able to outrun any ship in the battle zone.
Then she could bring Skywalker to Darth Vader himself, she could be in command of a Star Destroyer again within a month.
Sadly she had no time for such thoughts now.
"This is the Prosperity to Captian Hunt," she called into the comm-system.
"Meduk, what are you still doing here," Dylan's voice came back through the speakers.
"We were just about to leave when all hell broke lose, do you require assistance," she asked.
"No, get out of here Tealera. The Magog have arrived, you need to get to the conduit before it's to late," he told her, "Permission to depart granted, now get out of here. Hunt out."
"Not exactly what we planned for," Tealera said to the little droid, "Plug back in, we'll have to take care of your master when we get to the other side."
Captain Meduk activated the repulsorlifts and launched the shuttle out into the battle.
"There are nearly seven thousand swarmships in the system," Rev Bem reported, "Far more than I ever expected.
"Yes and far more than we could possible fight," Dylan responded.
"They're attacking everyone," Tyr commented, "No strategy, just violence and death."
"They have seven thousand swarmships," Harper quipped, "They don't need strategy."
"Yes, but we do," Dylan replied, "And this one isn't working."
All over the system the Magog were striking out at every ship they saw. The Commonwealth and its allies were being pounded by the regular swarmships while the Imperials were being struck by point-singularity bombs, which ripped straight through there shields like they didn't exist.
"Rev," Dylan began, "Send a message to all Commonwealth ships. All ships full retreat, fall back to rendezvous point "Charlie One."
"And see to it the Drago-Kazov and the Than get the message as well."
"We aren't just going to leave our we," Rommie asked.
Dylan looked at her with sad eyes, "Not us Rommie, we're staying right here."
The Commonwealth forces began to pull back immediately and over the next few minutes, those ships that could leave did. The Dragans and the Than followed suit not long after as the Andromeda pulled further away from the main battle lines.
"What exactly are you planning, Dylan," Tyr asked with a slight stammer fearing the answer.
"The only option we have left Tyr," Dylan replied, "The final option. Our only opportunity to stop both the Empire and the Magog.
"Initiating Nova deployment sequence."
The stunned crew looked at the Captian suddenly understanding his words. Andromeda carried two Nova Bombs built by Harper in secret over the past two years, they would now deploy those weapons to save the universe.
Dylan looked into the eyes of his old crew, his friends. They all remained silent for a moment, even Trance who had demonstrated a genuine disgust for the weapons.
"First officer Rebecca Valentine, Nova deployment authorized. Code zero-zero-stike-red-zero."
"Acting Arms Master, Trance Gemini, Nova deployment authorized. Retro-nine-stike-blue-nine-five."
"Fire Control Officer Tyr Anasazi, arming Nova weapons one and two. Execution code nine-five-over-seven-blue-five, arm."
"Ready for you final order," Rev told the Captian.
"This is Captian Dylan Hunt, Commanding Officer. Nova deployment authorization, Ten-break-alpha, strike-strike-strike."
"They're ready," Tyr reported.
"Wait," Harper yelled, "The slipstream drive is off-line, we wont be able to get away."
"Then fix it mister Harper," Dylan ordered sending Harper scrambling off Command for the slipstream core.
"Tyr, deploy Nova bombs."
Two plumes rocketed away from the Andromeda heading toward the systems star.
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Krell watched the Magog attack his ships in utter fascination as they fired a singularity into one of his Star Destroyers. The small bomb, with greater mass then a planet, tore through the ships shields without effort and left a gapping hole in the midsection of that ship. All around his Star Destroyer the Magog swarmed as they tried to drive their ships through his shields. For some reason they did not use their singularity weapons on the Lusankya, perhaps they wanted this meal unspoiled.
These Magog were a nearly perfect species, absolutely alive in the Force. Their hunger filled him, their desires smothered him, Krell wanted to be a part of this great horde. If not for an abnormal decay rate for their DNA, he would have been able to create them on his own.
Krell doubt anyone on his ship would agree with his assessment of these incredible creatures. He looked around at the bridge of the might warship, at the faces of the crew members that had come to realize that against such weapons they would certainly die.
The native fleets were already pulling out of the battle in the face of these magnificent terrors. Most of the Commonwealth fleet had already escaped while the Drago-Kazov were still fleeing. The bug-like Than were just starting to break off their attack.
The Magog drove their ships heedlessly into the minefields that surrounded the Imperial forces, showing such reckless abandon for their own lives. No Imperial solider would ever be so callous with his own life.
Krell looked back to the Andromeda, now the only ship remaining of the native fleets. He felt the fear melt away aboard that High Guard warship and grow inside himself.
Two streaks, clearly visible on the sensor screen shot out of the Andromeda toward the systems star.
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Meduk may not be a TIE fighter pilot but she was not bad either. Weaving her way through the various Imperial, Commonwealth and Magog craft proved easier then she had expected in this over modified shuttle craft.
It helped that no side was paying much attention to them as she continued to dodge stray weapons fire.
The droid began to frantically whistle in the background causing Meduk to look at her sensor screens. The Commonwealth was pulling out, the Magog threat was too large for them to handle and the were going to abandon the Empire to its fate.
"It figures," Meduk said to no one in particular.
It didn't take long for her to realize that Andromeda was not fleeing with the others. A fact she was unable to give enough attention to as she sideslipped past a Magog ship and managed to evade some heavy turbolaser fire.
She did however notice Andromeda fire two missiles into the star before she plunged the ship into the conduit. The ride through was more rough then she had remembered and when she burst through to the other side she immediately dropped the ship into hyperspace taking the co-ordinates that Artoo had already pumped into the nav-comp.
"Where are we going," she asked the droid.
Nal Hutta, was the reply that showed up on her vidscreen.
Satisfied, but unsure why she didn't just go straight to Vader's flagship, Tealera turned her attention to Skywalker's injures.
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On the other side of the Universe a star, catalogued as T-12D-32147-C, exploded in spectacular fashion.
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Krell stood in absolute horror of the event he had just witnessed. The star had gone Nova, all his plans would come to nothing, he was ruined. So much had gone into his planning, and now he would not have his chance to destroy Vader, and rule the universe as overlord.
"Set course for the conduit," Krell ordered, unwilling to give it all away.
"We will never make it, my lord," his Captian told him.
"Do as I say, or die now," Krell yelled, sending arcs of force lightning into his subordinate.
The Command Ship began to move toward the conduit at its best speed, and all available power was shunted to the shields.
"We, will not survive this," the Captian whimpered at his new place, laying on the deck.
Krell's response was simple, "That remains to be seen."
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"Four point six minutes till the blast wave reaches our position," Rev reported.
"Hurry Harper," Dylan whispered.
In the Slipstream Core Harper was frantically running all over the place, trying to race the clock and repair the slipstream drive. In his rush he nearly knocked one of the other engineers off the platform to a gruesome death below, in the process he dropped the 'spanner he needed to realign the last slipstream lens.
"Oh, crap," Harper cried, "We're screwed."
About to resign himself to his impending death he noticed that the 'spanner had not fallen down into the core but was balanced precariously on the framework below.
"Man I wish Luke was here," he complained as he tried to reach the tool that was unfortunately just out of his reach.
Stretching out one more time, Harper closed his eyes as he strained for the tool. Inexplicably the 'spanner ended up in his hand and Harper rushed to the access tube where he could realign the faulty lens.
On Command, Rev began to receive the preliminary results of the damage the Nova had caused.
"It seems the entire Magog fleet will be caught in the blast wave," Rev reported, "The Imperials are making for the conduit but most will not make it in time.
"The conduit will be enveloped in the blast wave in twelve seconds."
"What about the Lusankya," Dylan asked.
"She is twenty seconds from the conduit and closing," Rev told him.
They all watched as the conduit was surrounded in fire and the Lusankya had been completely enveloped.
A whirling sound filled the Command Deck as primary systems began to come back on-line, including the slipstream drive.
"The little professor did it," Tyr triumphed.
"Beka, slipstream, now," Dylan ordered, as Beka was already getting the system ready. Andromeda's slip runners opened the portal into slipstream and Andromeda was gone.