A Left Turn at Albuquerque
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters that I am about to mangle around for my own amusement – sadly all Star Wars and Robotech characters remain the property of Disney, Lucasfilm Ltd and Harmony Gold respectively – I am merely borrowing them and make absolutely no profit from their use. As a result, please keep the legal attack dogs – also known as lawyers – firmly muzzled and on a leash as I have no money to give to anybody.
Chapter Eight
SDF-3 Pionee
Orbiting Hoth
An Hour Earlier
Sitting in the quiet of his ready room Admiral Rick Hunter smiled as he read the latest fleet status report from engineering. The last of the damage the fleet had sustained from first the disastrous neutron-s missile test, Imperial warships had been repaired. Once again all twenty-two ships of the SDF-3's battlegroup had been pronounced fully operational and thus ready to face the challenges and the dangers that this galaxy they'd been hurled into presented them with.
It was the first bit of truly good news that he'd been given in the last three days.
With a sigh Rick closed the file in question and opened another file this time one from the security section. Colonel Dante reported that, using the memory scanning technology they'd inherited from the vanquished Robotech Masters, they'd been carefully probing the memories of the handful of Imperial prisoners that they had in their brig. In accordance with his orders they'd been seeking not just general information about this galaxy in which they'd found themselves and more information on the seemingly quite hostile to them Galactic Empire which seemed to be the current dominant power.
The probing of most hadn't revealed much as most of their prisoners were little more than poorly trained grunts who could barely aim and fire the plasma blaster rifles they were issued with and knew nothing of the wider galaxy being conditioned to obey the orders of their superiors without thought or question. The one of the two officers they had prisoner – a Captain Brandei as the latter an Admiral Durril was still floating in a regen tank undergoing treatment for serious burns to his torso, throat and lungs – they'd probed so far had been more informative of the state of the galaxy. Opening the attached file Rick began to read first the summary then the more in-depth account of Brandei's probing.
It was not good reading.
The Galactic Empire was a harsh totalitarian regime that like most authoritarian regimes throughout history ruled the worlds under its jurisdiction with an iron fist. Almost all the rites of the people were restricted with the governments of each planet either dominated by pro-Empire politicians or replaced entirely by an Imperial appointed planetary governor. In both instances the rule of the Empire was enforced by the military which harshly clamped down upon any dissention arresting and imprisoning anyone who dared to even question the actions of the Imperial regime. And if anyone actually stood up to them they could be summarily executed.
As if that wasn't bad enough there was the protocol base delta zero which, according to Brandei's memories, involved a massive orbital bombardment of a planet if it stood up the Imperial regime and could not be captured by conventional military means. Under base delta zero a fleet of Imperial warships would move into orbit of the target planet and just start blasting away with their plasma-particle weapons. Under the protocol they would ignore all attempts to surrender by the people of the planet they were bombarding, would shoot down any ships that attempted to escape and would not stop firing until the planet was reduced to a ball of molten glass. A process that, due to the limitations of this galaxies weapons technology, could take hours or even days. Brandei knew of at least three instances in the last decade where the Empire had subjected a planet and a people to just that kind of bombardment.
Just thinking about it made Rick feel more than a little sick and brought back uncomfortable memories of the Rain of Death. Though he did console himself somewhat with the knowledge that most of the billions who died in the Rain would not have even known what was happening, their bodies being vaporised instantly by the reflex beams and particle beams raining down from Dolza's fleet. Certainly, there would be none of the sheer terror of a base delta zero bombardment given the hybrid plasma-particle bolts fired from the Imperial warships would lose considerable power and cohesion during their flight from the muzzle of the cannon firing them to the surface of the planet. As a result, there would be no cities or towns being vaporised in milliseconds as there had been during the Rain of Death but a slow levelling similar to the great air borne bombardments of cities during the Second World War and like with a few of those bombardments firestorms would likely result.
Forcing himself to read on Rick wasn't surprised to learn that there was a growing rebellion against the cruel rule of the Empire. Various rebel groups had emerged and formed together into the Rebel Alliance and publicly committed themselves to bringing down the Empire and restoring its precursor state. Something called the Republic. He wished them luck as they were going to need it.
Closing the report Rick sighed again before opening another report. This one was from astronavigation who'd completed their analysis of this system. It also wasn't the best of reports as it confirmed that not only was the planet below so cold it would make Siberia in the depths of winter seem like the Bahamas but that it was regularly hit by asteroids and meteorites. Apparently, this system asteroid belt was both unusually energetic and unstable so instead of drifting sedately along on predictable orbits – like most asteroid fields did – the rocks that made up this system asteroid field were not only fast moving but moved in erratic and completely unpredictable ways. Plus, the data from the star charts recovered from the derelict Republic vessel clearly showed that while the Hoth system was uninhabited its neighbouring system wasn't being home to a tibana gas mining colony on a gas giant planet called Bespin.
Taken together all three findings confirmed something that he'd suspected would be the case from the moment they defolded in this system and found themselves orbiting a giant snowball in space. The fleet could not stay here, the longer they stayed the greater the chances were that someone on the way to the tibana gas mine would stumble across them. They needed to check the star maps again and find somewhere else, somewhere even more remote than Hoth.
With a sigh of resignation Rick made his decision on what to do and tapped the comm unit on the desk. "Hunter to bridge," he said.
"Pren here sir," Lieutenant Pren answered immediately making Rick recall it was the young woman's turn to be the officer of the watch.
"Lieutenant start scanning the star charts we recovered three days ago. I want you to find three systems that are not only remote but uninhabited," he ordered. "Once you have the coordinates dispatch a ship from the escort squadron to each system to survey and report."
"Aye sir I'll get straight on it."
"Excellent lieutenant. Hunter out."
After signing off with the bridge Rick stood up and moved over to where the coffee machine sat invitingly on a table on the opposite side of the ready room. Lisa had made sure that it was filled up before she'd retired to their quarters where she could lay down for a while as one of the legacies of the severe injuries she'd sustained during Edwards coup was quite serious arthritis in both legs. It was one of the factors that had seen here ultimately decide to leave the military – after briefly returning to duty for the final battle with Edwards and his renegade Grey Squadron on and over the former Invid homeworld of Optera – and take up a more supporting role for the REF with the Sentinels.
After making himself a much-needed coffee he returned to his desk. He was just taking a sip of the blessed black liquid when his door hailer went off. Now what, he thought as he swallowed the mouthful of hot liquid before putting the mug down. "Come in," he called out guessing that whatever the issue was it would be a serious one as nobody would disturb him if it wasn't.
He was proven correct when the door slid open and Exedore came in with a grave look on his face.
"Yes, Exedore what is it?" Rick asked.
"Admiral my team has completed our sweep of all the ships in the fleet," Exedore replied formally.
"And is it as extensive as we suspected," Rick asked already knowing what Exedore was talking about. He cast his mind back to when Exedore had first brought the issue to his and Lisa's attention.
Rick was puzzled as, accompanied by Lisa, he returned to the lab section barely half an hour after he'd left it to walk right into the confrontation with the Imperial warships. Walking into the main lab he found Exedore right where he had expected him to be.
"You wished to see me, Exedore?" he asked.
"Ah good admiral you are here and yes I did. You remember the unknown microbes I showed you earlier?"
"The ones in the Imperial hull fragments, floating in the tibana gas and in the blood of our guests?" At the micronized Zentraedi's nod he continued. "What about them? Have you found more of them?"
"Unfortunately, yes I have but I found them in a place where they should not be… aboard this ship."
"Here! Where the hell did they come from?" Rick asked even as Lisa looked at them curiously. He took a moment to quickly explain about the microbes to Lisa.
"That I do not know though the initial microbe colonies were detected near the protoculture matrix. Initially I just thought they were attracted to its energy emissions – such things have happened before after all – but when I looked in areas away from the matrix I found more of them."
"Where are they coming from?"
"I do not know but I found them in the ventilation system and in water taken from one of the taps in the nearest restroom. I have ordered samples taken from other locations on the ship, but I have no doubt that we will find more of these microbes."
"Could they be on our other ships as well," Lisa asked just beating Rick to the punch.
"I do not know but I would not be surprised if they were."
"We need to find out and from there try to determine if these things are in some way a threat to us, especially given their low level psionic energy emissions," Rick said thoughtfully. "Exedore I want you to put together a team and begin sweeping every ship, plane and piece of equipment that we have for these microbes. Also see if you can figure out exactly where they are coming from and possibly how we could get rid of them."
"I will begin at once."
Rick shook off the memory as Exedore answered his question.
"I am afraid so admiral," Exedore admitted. "We have found the alien microbes almost everywhere on every single one of our ships."
"Almost everywhere?" Rick questioned.
"The only place we haven't found them is inside the reaction chambers of the reflex furnaces," Exedore admitted, "but then that is hardly surprising." Rick nodded knowing that there was no way anything organic, not even the hardiest of microorganisms, could survive within the reaction chambers of a reflex furnace. The sheer amount of heat created in the reaction chambers, not to mention the radiation, would instantly vaporise any organic material.
"But you've found them everywhere else," he queried.
"We have though we still have no clue as to how they are getting onboard as none of the external ports on any of our ships show the abnormally high concentrations of the microbes that would indicate the infiltration point. It's almost like they are just appearing out of nowhere.
"However, I do not believe that the microbes are any real threat to us. It would only take a recalibration of the shadow dimensional field as well as our standard electronic warfare suites to block the psionic emissions of the microbes."
"How long would that take?"
"It's impossible to say at this time. It will take far more study of the microbes to determine the correct calibration to fully block their signals. I have put a team on it."
"Efficient as always Exedore. What about getting rid of these things?"
"That might not be possible admiral. Not until we figure out just how they are getting aboard our ships in the first place."
"Understandable keep working on it Exedore."
"Of course, admiral."
"Is there anything else?"
"Not at this time admiral."
"Very well dismissed."
Exedore nodded, turned and left leaving Rick once again alone in the ready room. Taking another swig of his coffee Rick pondered what Exedore had reported to him. He had to admit that the mysterious alien microbes were presenting them with a most interesting puzzle, one he knew that Exedore and the rest of the science teams would do their level best to unravel. While he was willing to trust Exedore when he said that he did not believe the organisms to be a threat to the fleet, they certainly weren't a threat to them physically given their immune systems apparently recognised them as a threat and destroyed them, he still wasn't happy with their presence. Too often in the past alien objects and organisms had seemed harmless at first only to prove to be deadly later on, the microorganisms in the atmosphere of Garuda being a case in point – they had seemed harmless to Terran biology at first but had soon revealed themselves to have very detrimental effects on Terran neural chemistry resulting in at best an altered state of consciousness – essentially a permanent drug high – and at worst psychosis and death.
The bleep of the desk comm unit brought him out of his thoughts. Reaching out he pressed the receive button. "Yes?" he asked.
"Sir it's Lieutenant Pren. We've identified three planets that might suit our requirements," Lieutenant Pren reported from the bridge. "All three are within at most two space folds from our current location."
"Excellent work lieutenant. Are three ships prepared to leave the fleet?"
"Yes, sir the Huron, Tanganyika and Windermere report they are ready to depart the fleet on your order."
"Give the order lieutenant and wish them good luck and god speed."
"Aye sir."
As Lieutenant Pren signed off Rick finished off his coffee before leaning back in his chair with a slight smile and a mental cross of the fingers. With luck one of the three planets that the good lieutenant had identified would be the safe haven that they needed. At least till he could figure out just what it was they were going to do about the situation they found themselves in.
Moments later three Garfish-class light cruisers broke away from where the fleet of Robotech warships were sitting in orbit above the frozen world of Hoth and headed out into open space with all the speed their ion fusion sublight engines could give them. Behind them the remaining ships began changing their formation to compensate for their absence and ensure that the mighty battlefortress in the middle of the fleet – and the precious protoculture matrix aboard her – had the best protection they could provide her with.
Within minutes the three light cruisers cleared the gravity well of the planet and began aligning themselves onto different vectors for their respective space folds. Moments later fold spheres flickered into existence around the vessels and they vanished from normal space on course for their respective targets which would hopefully provide their fleet with a place of sanctuary.
The Ghost
Orbiting Dagobah
A Short Time Later
General Hera Syndulla stared in shocked amazement to the hologram images that had just been shared with them by Rebel Command on Yavin Four. She wasn't the only one as Zeb and Rex were staring in equal shocked amazement both at the images and the report from the Alliance that whoever had done such damage to a fleet of Imperial warships had done so incredibly, some would say impossibly, fast.
"Karabast who could do something like that to an entire Imperial fleet and do it so fast," Zeb asked aloud shocked, and if he was honest with himself, more than a little intimidated by the report. In all his years in the Honour Guard of Lasan and, after the massacre of his people by the Empire, he had never heard of an Imperial fleet – especially one as big as the hundred and third task force – being defeated. Let alone being defeated in just five minutes with only one badly damaged Star Destroyer surviving that battle to limp to Lothal and the aid of Grand Admiral Thrawn's fleet.
"I don't know," Hera admitted.
"I wonder," Rex mused as the speed of the Imperials defeat and destruction triggered some memories of the clone wars. While he hadn't directly been involved in the events in question as General Skywalker's clone captain he'd soon heard all about it.
"What are you thinking Rex?" Hera asked looking back the old clone who seemed to be very much lost in a mixture of thought and memory.
"It's just a thought," Rex admitted. "Something that could well explain how an Imperial task force as large and well-armed as the hundred and third could be defeated and destroyed so easily. Something similar happened to a few Republic fleets back in the Clone Wars."
"Oh?" Hera asked.
"During the first few months of the war the Separatists unleashed a huge new warship on Republic forces in the Outer Rim," Rex explained, "she was called the Malevolence and she was a monster of a warship. Three kilometres long carrying thousands of turbolasers and two massively oversized ion cannons that could disable entire fleets of our ships with a single shot, killed a lot of my brothers before she was destroyed."
"Karabast how was something like that defeated?" Zeb questioned knowing a ship like that truly was a monster of a dreadnought that even the modern Imperial Navy would fear. Force if her oversized ion cannons were as powerful as Rex was indicating that they were then not even a planetary base – protected by planetary shielding and surface to space cannons – would be safe from her.
"By a combination of General Skywalker's piloting skills, the overconfidence of the Separatists in the capabilities of the Malevolence they believed her to be invincible, sheer dumb luck and the stupidity of the clankers."
"Interesting," Hera commented making a mental note to look up the details on that battle when they got back to Rebel Command, they had records of many of the Clone Wars battles. The records the rebellion held were the largest collection of untampered with records of that war left in the galaxy – all the other known copies had been heavily edited by the Imperial propaganda ministry to remove most if not all references to the pivotal roles the Jedi had played in many of the Republic's victories in that long, bloody and tragically pointless war – but that was for later.
"Do you think that whoever the hundred and third encountered has a ship like the Malevolence Rex?" she asked.
"It's possible that they have something similar to her," Rex replied, "it would explain how and why the Imperials were defeated so quickly without inflicting any damage to whoever their assailants were."
"Possible though it doesn't explain the look of the damage on the holo," Hera pointed out directing their attention to the damage to the Oath Sworn port lateral heavy turbolaser banks, or rather the great slice in the hull where the five eight barrelled turrets would have been. "Whatever did that was no turbolaser."
"We have seen damage like that before Hera," Zeb reminded her, "granted it was on a much smaller scale but remember when Ezra used his first sabre to cut through the hull of the Sovereign over Mustafar. Or when Kanan cut through the blast doors on Phoenix Home when we stole her from the Empire over Ryloth, both times the damage left behind by their blades looked like that."
"A ship-based weapon that cuts through things in the same way a lightsabre blade does. I suppose it's possible," Hera answered making a mental note to mention the possibility of whoever had attacked the hundred and third having not only access to ship-based weapons that could do that but could have a ship with ion cannons as big as those on the long-destroyed Malevolence to Draven the next time she spoke to him. Assuming it hadn't already occurred to him as Draven probably remembered the Clone Wars just as much as Rex did having been an agent of Republic Intelligence at the time.
"I just hope whoever attacked the Imperials is on our side," Zeb commented knowing that any weapon that could slice through the dense, high quality armour of an Imperial-class Star Destroyer with such ease would be able to do the same to the few heavy capital ships that the Rebels had should they prove hostile to the Alliance as well.
Hera was about to reply when a bleep from the sensors caught her attention. She glanced at the repeater screen on the pilot's station to see that the Phantom had just emerged from Dagobah's thick, storm wracked atmosphere and was making its way back towards the Ghost. Life form readings also indicated that there were now three beings aboard the small shuttle, meaning that nothing had gone wrong with the mission – not that she'd expected it to, but it was always good to be prepared – and that Master Yoda had been safely retrieved from the swampy surface of this out of the way mudball of a planet.
"Oh, good they're coming back," Zeb commented also seeing the Phantom returning. "That didn't take as long as I feared it would."
"Master Yoda was probably waiting for Kanan and Ezra when they landed," Hera replied as the Phantom drew closer and began to manoeuvre into dock, as they closed Hera entered a command into the Ghost's navigational computer instructing it to begin calculating the fastest hyperspace route back to the current headquarters of the still young Rebel Alliance.
"If he was I am glad of it I don't like this place," Zeb admitted.
"Dagobah does seem to be something of a mudhole," Rex agreed though he had seen, and fought, in worse places during the Clone Wars than Dagobah it was still not the nicest of planets to visit. Even just sitting here in orbit it looked to be a most unpleasant place which was probably why nobody bothered with it. And which had made it the perfect hiding place for the last Jedi Grand Master.
Zeb was about to comment on that when two things happened nearly simultaneously that brought an end to that particular conversation. First a soft shudder ran through the hull of the Ghost accompanied by the faint thuds of magnetic docking clamps engaging as the Phantom slid into its birth on the aft dorsal side of the ship. The second was urgent bleeping from the sensors. Being closest to the screens Zeb turned to look and his eyes widened slightly.
"Hera sensors are picking up a gravitational disturbance forming nearby," he reported.
"Where and how big," Hera demanded to know even as a red warning light began flashing on her console as the navigational computer began indicating that the gravitational disturbance was interfering with the complex calculations necessary for the safe execution of a hyperspace jump.
"Bearing one two six by zero, zero four. Distance, karabast its only three kilometres away," Zeb replied, "the distortion is registering as a class two… no class three. We're now also picking up some phase shifts and spatial distortion. It's almost like the fabric of space is being distorted somehow."
"That's a bit too close for comfort," Hera answered already engaging the sublight engines to move the Ghost away from the gravitational/spatial disturbance. However, they had barely moved a kilometre from it when a wave of distorted gravity slammed like a giant fist into the heavily modified VCX-100 light freighter and knocked them spinning out of control. Swearing in her native language Hera fought with the navigational thrusters and main ion drives to get her beloved ship back under control.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity – but was in reality only a few dozen seconds – she succeeded. As the Ghost came back onto an even keel something became visible through the cockpit windows that had all of them stunned. A cruiser-weight ship had appeared nearby, right where the spatial distortion had been, and it was completely unlike anything they had ever seen before.
The unknown vessel had a shape vaguely reminiscent of a wine bottle laid on its side in that forward third of the strangely, almost organically curved, ship was slimmer than the rest – though it was still wider than the Ghost was long – before gently tapering out into the main body of the vessel. Slung on its underside was a boxy structure that from the doors on it appeared to be a flight bay of some type and appeared to be quite modular in design. Though what immediately grabbed attention was what was slung underneath the ships nose – a large tri-barrel turret sat there though there was something about the design of the barrels that said, at least to the experienced spacers and committed rebels, that those cannons were not turbolasers or any other kind of cannon that they were familiar with. Just over a dozen smaller turrets – that again did not look at all like turbolaser or blaster turrets – lined the hull and in the bow, they could clearly see the openings of torpedo tubes. Even more strangely the ship seemed to be shimmering slightly and oily-looking sheen flickering over the hull that made their eyes want to just slide right off it.
Zeb summed up what they were all feeling. "Oh karabast."
For another few moments nothing happened then two things once again happened almost simultaneously. First the cockpit doors opened and they all heard three people come into the room. Hera turned to look at them only for surprise to turn into concern when she saw that something seemed to be wrong with all three Force users. Kanan especially seemed to be paler than normal, was noticeably sweating and struggling to find his way forward – moving in the same kind of way he had when he'd first been blinded, before the Bendu had taught him how to use the Force to see – and was being supported by Ezra. Who honestly didn't look that well himself as his copper coloured skin seemed slightly paler than normal and there was a sheen of sweat on his forehead. As for Yoda she didn't know enough about his species to be certain but from the frown on his forehead and the way his large ears were dropped down she thought he seemed uncomfortable as well.
She was just about to open her mouth to express her instant concern both for her best friend – and if she was honest with herself love interest – and her surrogate son when the second event struck as abruptly the overhead lights began flickering. Hera looked up in surprise a moment before Chopper emitted a binary wail before being blown back from where he was plugged into the ship, the droid collapsed to the deck and began to spark as though he'd been hit by an ion blast. Even as Chopper keeled over various monitors and gages began flickering and washing with electrostatic interference.
"We're being scanned by the unknown cruiser," Rex reported as the acrid scent of overloading electronics began to fill the air.
"We're losing systems all over," Zeb added raising an arm to shield his face as his console sparked and washed with bluish energy that looked almost like lightning. "Weapons, shields, propulsion everything is going down. Karabast our main fuel cells are starting to overload if this doesn't stop soon we're going to blow up."
"Shut them down, shut everything down," Hera ordered a microsecond before all the flickering, arcing and sparking stopped as quickly as it had started.
"They've stopped scanning us," Rex reported,
"Zeb with Chopper down I need you to compile a damage report," Hera instructed the Lasat.
"On it Hera. Karabast how could a simple scan do that to us," Zeb wondered.
"The power behind it was phenomenal," Rex pointed out. "According to our monitors it was higher than the full output of a Star Destroyers main reactor."
"And at this close a range the electromagnetic flux from such a powerful scan would have easily penetrated our navigational shields and impacted our systems rapidly overloading all our EM shielding," Hera finished for him as she realized exactly what had happened. She made a mental note to recommend that the Alliance attempt to reinforce the electromagnetic flux shielding on all ships as it would help prevent incidents like this as well as reduce their vulnerability to ion weaponry.
"So, the effect on the ship and on Chopper was accidental," Rex concluded. "I don't really want to imagine what would have happened if it had been a deliberate attack."
"Dead we would be," Yoda said speaking for the first time. "If their intent aggression had been, vapours now would we be. To hurt us they did not mean, believe they are merely curious about us I do."
"I have to agree," Rex admitted before looking fully at Master Yoda and despite himself he was surprised to see just how much the centuries old Jedi had aged in the last nineteen years. The bound to be harsh environment of Dagobah and nearly two decades of sorrow over the death of the vast majority of the Jedi Order in Order 66 having clearly taken their toll on him. "General Yoda it is good to see you again."
"Captain Rex agreeable it is to meet you again," Yoda replied easily recognising Anakin's clone captain through his Force signature as despite their identical appearance every single one of Jango Fett's clones had felt unique in the Force. A sign to many Jedi that while they all wore the same face each clone had been an individual with their own minds and personalities. "Helping the rebellion you are?"
Rex nodded a moment before Zeb spoke up.
"Damage assessment complete Hera," he said.
"How bad is it Zeb?"
"Not as bad as it could have been. Almost all our main systems, including the hyperdrive, are back online and functioning normally. However, our shield generator has been fried as have our signal scrambling and masking equipment."
"Oh, those are going to be a pain to fix," Ezra commented speaking up before wincing as a high-pitched whistling – almost like radio white noise – blasted through his head for the second time in the last five minutes or so. The previous time being when they'd just disembarked the Phantom and some invisible force had shaken the Ghost like a toy. "Ugh what is that," he groaned noting out the corner of his eyes that Kanan was even more affected by the noise, leaning forward and starting to knee his temples as though to ward off a migraine. Which was kind of understandable given how Kanan used the Force to at least somewhat compensate for his blindness.
"Disruption in the Force it is," Yoda answered using his gimmer stick to balance himself against the wave of dizziness that washed over him. While he had never experienced a disruption in the Force quite like this before he was more than experienced enough to realize where it was coming from. "Coming from the alien vessel it is. Over there something creating a disturbance in the Force is."
Listening to the ancient master's words and doing his best to ignore the maddening white noise tone in his head, Ezra looked out the viewport at the alien vessel for the first time hoping to see something in the Force from it that would explain the distortion. And he froze with shock as he recognized the vessel. It was one of the ones from his visions and as he gazed upon it he once again heard the voice he'd heard at the end of the vision "your fate and the fate of the galaxy you know is now tied to the fate of the Children of Earth." It's them, he thought in a shocked moment of clarity, they are the Children of Earth. Though I still have no idea what the other part about them being the future and the past means. He was brought out of his thoughts by the sound of Hera's voice.
"All the more reason to leave here," Hera said seeing how the disturbance in the Force being created by the unknown alien warship was affecting the Jedi but especially Kanan who was immersed in the Force all the time these days, using it continuously to compensate for the loss of his natural eyesight during that disastrous mission that Master Yoda had sent him, Ezra and Ahsoka on. A mission that – now that he was here – she fully had intentions of talking to him about. Especially given how that mission's aftermath had come so close to ripping her crew apart between Kanan falling into a deep depression as a result of his injury to nearly losing Ezra to the dark side thanks to the malignant and insidious influence of the Sith holocron.
But that was for later right now they just needed to get out of here before something else happened. Thankfully that wouldn't be difficult as her readings indicated that the navigational computer was still fully functional and had finished its calculations for a hyperspace jump back to Yavin IV. So, without further ado she brought the Ghost around onto the correct vector and pushed forward the lever that engaged the hyperdrive. For a moment nothing happened, and she began to fear that there might have been some undetected damage to the hyperdrive motivator making it impossible to accelerate to FTL speeds, then there came the familiar whirring of the hyperdrive starting up and microseconds later the viewport filled with first star lines then the swirling blue tunnel of hyperspace.
The effect on the three Jedi was immediate as the discomfort that they'd been experiencing faded away. Kanan especially relaxed back in his seat his entire body posture showing exhaustion. "Kanan you should go to your cabin and rest a bit," Hera suggested gently.
"Rest we all should," Master Yoda said "very disorientating that disturbance was. In eight hundred years never felt it's like before have I. Learn how to overcome it we must."
"Do you think we will be able to Master?" Ezra asked.
"Through the Force possible anything is padawan," Yoda replied with a tired smile, the side effects of the exposure to the Force distortion leaving him feeling tired, weak and noticing every one of his eight hundred and ninety-six years of life. "Just a matter of time and patience finding the way is. But for later that is, rest and recover now we must but first something you have to tell us hmm? Something about that ship it is?"
"Ezra?" Hera said seeming to convey multiple questions with just his name, even as she stood up and went over to start attending to her faithful if extremely cantankerous and currently completely disabled droid.
"That ship I recognised it," Ezra admitted unconsciously rubbing a hand against the back of his neck. "It's one of the ones I saw in my vision. And I heard that voice again the one saying about our fate being tied to the fate of the Children of Earth whatever that means."
"Hmm far more going on here I sense there is," Yoda said thoughtfully while making a mental note to speak to Ezra later and to get the young Lothalan to meditate on the vision with him. Perhaps with his much greater experiences with such things he would be able to learn more from the vision than Ezra had, he decided then and there that he would incorporate it into the padawan's first visions lesson.
"Should we reverse course and try to speak to them," Zeb asked referring the alien ship.
"No, it's not time yet," Ezra said seemingly speaking from a long way away, the classic sign of a Jedi narrating something from the Force itself. "We will know when it is time for our path and the path of the Children of Earth to cross. Until then we must leave them be." As he finished speaking he stumbled slightly as though coming out of a trance. "Whoa what was that?"
"The Force spoke through you," Kanan replied.
"It can do that?"
"Sometimes though very rare it is," Yoda answered. "Only a handful of times heard of it have I. Listen to it we should."
"And we will do so," Hera said decisively even as she worked to bring Chopper back online. "Still we should inform Rebel Command of our encounter with that ship. I suspect that there is a connection between them and what happened to the Imperial 103rd task force."
"What happened," Kanan asked curious.
Knowing that they needed to know, and that Mon Mothma wanted Master Yoda's thoughts on the matter, Hera once again lurched into an explanation of the events that had taken place three days earlier in System M-77677.
Authors Note: Well another chapter bites the dust. I was going to do a segment at the end from the perspective of the REF cruiser that encountered the Ghost over Dagobah but ultimately decided against it as it didn't really add anything to the chapter and felt – as I tried to write it – to be unnecessary padding added to what has already been a reasonably long chapter. Once again I apologise for lack of any real action in this chapter as it was more about setting things up for future chapters and an upcoming arc involving a certain lost fleet of ships.