When the flagship Battle Dragon of the Hapan Royal Navy dropped into realspace right above the Myrkr worldship, Chazdrul Harn had allowed himself the comforting belief that Lukhan's pirates would swiftly scatter and either flee or get wiped out by the superior Hapan force.
Unfortunately, it wasn't the route he'd hoped for.
The Hapans surprised him by deploying mass pulse mines, which promptly erected interdiction fields that prevented the mercenary fleet from jumping to hyper-space. He could only guess that was because the Hapans wanted to capture the mercenaries or force them to surrender; unfortunately for them, they were dealing with Narl Lukhan, one of the most exception-ally prideful and stubborn humans Harn had encount-ered on his many travels. Unfortunately for Wayward Soldier, Lukhan knew he couldn't fight a Battle Dragon head-on, so he decided instead to pull his ships back to the worldship and rely on his superior fighter wing to run interference against the Hapan Miy'tils, a job which, for the moment anyway, they were proving disturbingly competent at.
As a result, the Wayward Soldier found herself surrounded by two corvettes, a gunship, and an escort carrier, all hostile.
And the worst part was that Lukhan still kept that damned jamming field up, so there was no way to contact either Praelyx on the surface or the captain of that Hapan ship and ask them what the devil was doing on.
So, left to his own devices, Chazdrul Harn had to figure out what to do himself.
The Baragwin reacted quickly. They had nowhere to run and the best defense was offense. He ordered helm to charge the engines and race toward the escort carrier. Emptied of snubfighters, it was a very tempting target. Lukhan knew that, of course, and he countered by keeping his Corellian gunship close by. Wayward Soldier was a faster, stronger, newer model, but the DP20 was still formidable enough. Its laser turrets and missile launchers immediately tracked the Soldier's approach and opened fire.
The command deck shook as the shields absorbed the first volley. Harn commanded, "Swing us around the other side of the carrier. Use it as a shield."
Helm responded swiftly, pivoting Soldier so its starboard cannons had a full field of fire, first on the gunship, and then on the carrier. The boxy vessel still had defensive cannons that spewed more energy against Soldier's shields, but the gunship's target lock was temporarily blocked.
"Crack open that carrier," Harn ordered. "Leave 'em no place to roost."
"Gladly," growled the Trandoshan gunner.
He looked to the Duro at the tactical station. "Give our friend a call. Tell him he's free to fly."
"Yes, sir."
The Corellian gunship was coming around to catch them but Wayward Soldier kept pace so that it could use the carrier for continual cover, even as it began to pound the ship's shields with missiles and laserfire. By Harn's bet those shields wouldn't last long; the question was whether Lukhan's two corvettes could catch up them them before he could break either capital ship.
"We could really use some fighter cover right now," he heard the Duro mutter.
"The Hapans are still tangled up," Harn grunted, once more wishing he could comm that battle dragon. "So we use what we can."
The Duro glanced at his console. "Mandala's away."
"Good. Helm, slow down. Give that gunship a tempting shot. Rear shields to maximum."
He glanced at the tactical display as the gunship swung around on their aft and opened fire. Just as it died so, Revli Vjarna's little Corellian freighter arced over the carrier's back and swung down on the gunship, emptying every missile in its tubes. They cut through the gunship's rear shields and tore apart one engine cluster. Soldier pivoted so its entire starboard side could unleash hell on the gunship's forward compart-ment. They broke through the shields easily, vaporing the bridge and sending shrapnel tumbling through space. Cheers rippled across Soldier's bridge but Harn called, "Kill the carrier! Kill it! Kill it!"
The gunship emptied it own missile payloads into the carrier's aft. Its shields crumpled and the engines burst. Lights inside began to die and the carrier started to drift, helplessly pulled in by the worldship's gravity.
"Boss!" the comm officer called, "Jamming's down!"
"Good. We must have killed the source." Harn lurched over to the communications station. "Hail the Hapans. Time to put together a real battle plan."
The officer's face immediately fell. "Getting hailed by Edge Runner."
Harn considered ignoring it, but the old mercenary just might want to surrender. "All right, put him on."
The human's voice immediately came over the speaker. "Damn you, Chazdrul. Damn you, damn you, damn you!"
The comm officer smirked in amusement but Harn said, "Does this have a point, Lukhan?"
"Enjoy your little victory while it lasts, you ugly karker."
The comm line abruptly shut off. Harn immediately looked to the tactical station. "What's happening?"
"Both corvettes, coming right for us," the Duro said. "And he's pulling back some of his fighters."
It was what Harn had expected. "Helm, get us to that Battle Dragon as fast as you can. And comm, now get me the Hapans."
-{}-
The holo-image that materialized on Dragon Queen's bridge wasn't what Tenel Ka had been expecting. The sloop-shouldered, thick-necked, small-eyed Baragwin face seemed very alien, and she saw Admiral Baas restrain a shudder.
"Is this the captain of the Wayward Soldier?" Baas asked with all her Hapan prissiness.
The Baragwin's head swung back and forth. "First officer, Chazdrul Harn. Captain Praelyx is on the worldship with your agents and the Jedi."
"Jedi?" Tenel Ka interjected. "Which Jedi?"
"Two of 'em, humans. Little blond girl with scars on her head and a big tall guy with black hair. Calls himself Zekk."
Tenel Ka's jaw dropped. Jaina had mentioned that she'd passed news of the Yuuzhan Vong bioweapon on to Tahiri, so it wasn't a total surprise that Jacen's apprentice had found her way here. She'd halfway suspected it was her when Trista had mentioned a Jedi working with their clients.
But Zekk was different. She'd resigned herself over the past few weeks to his death in the Transitory Mists, one more casualty of that awful battle.
But he'd ended up here, just like Tahiri, just like Tenel Ka. A shudder ran through her as she wondered whether the Force itself hadn't drawn them all back to this place where everything had changed, where they'd lost things they couldn't imagine, where they'd made promises they could never keep.
"Are they all right?" she asked the Baragwin.
"Last I heard. Their ship went down after a dust-up with the Imps but they found themselves another. We're trying to hail them now. Listen, Lady-"
"You're addressing the Queen of the Hapes Consortium" Baas snapped.
"Okay, okay," Harn waved a clawed hand. "But if you haven't noticed, we're heading your way with two corvettes on our butts and a lot of fighters messing with us. We need some help."
"You'll have it," Tenel Ka promised.
The Baragwin nodded and promptly killed the signal. Tenel Ka turned on Admiral Baas and said, "Do everything you can to keep that ship alive. Do you understand?"
"Of course."
"Good. And prepare a shuttle. I may have to go down to that worldship."
"You? Your Majesty, I must protest-"
Before she could finish, Dragon Queen's captain called, "Madams, you need to see this!"
She was pointing not to the tactical holo but out the viewport. At first Tenel Ka just saw flashes of night against the backdrop of Myrkr and the worldship. Then she spotted the round body of the crippled escort carrier as it slammed into the drifting gunship. Both vessels scraped and sparked against each other without exploding, and both seemed to be falling away, pulled in by gravity's reel.
"Will those ships impact on the worldship?" asked Tenel Ka.
The captain nodded. "Within five minutes, Your Majesty."
"The odds of them hitting the same place as our agents is tiny," Admiral Baas said.
"That's true," the captain nodded, "But we've been running projections. The worldship already has a decaying orbit around Myrkr. The impact of those ships will nudge it even further into the planet's gravity well. Our first readout said it would take another decade for the worldship to fall into the planet-"
"But now?" asked Tenel Ka, dread rising.
The captain swallowed. "It has only a few hours left, Your Majesty."