Hey, everybody. Back with another chapter. Hope you like this one. It's gonna be shorter, and honestly, may be the worst chapter of the story, but I hope it's still okay.
Let's get to it.
Guest DCDGojira: Yes, Boba Fett has told Vader that Luke is his son by now. Not sure when Hall will have his next duel with Vader. Not sure if I'll have Vader remocve his helmet, as, from what I've researched, Vader's helmet has attachments in it that attach directly into his skull, and without it, he can't move his limbs. I'm going to double check that, but I may or may not have Vader show Hall his face beneath the helmet.
Peter Hong Kong: I don't know how much of the comics I'll use. I may just create a bunch of my own original material. And we will see nukes used during the war, especially during the space battle when the Empire inevitably attacks Terra.
the mysterious Mr.E: Well, the Hammer Squadron is not necessarily permanently based on Naboo. They're highly mobile and move around as need be. Plus, with the SF-15s hyperdrive, they can get places pretty quickly. And yeah, Luke probably would be considered the Empire's most wanted man. I think we kind of saw that during Episode V.
Guest: I don't think I'll be doing an Old Republic story in this universe.
Random Fan Author: I do plan on a major character dying in this. Well, I say major because they've been major in the past, but they won't show up too much in this. And, they won't die in combat. It'll be just peacefull passing away. You'll see who it is near the end of the story.
littlesky33by: I'm planning on Luke still finding out when he did in canon.
Guest: Yes, the sequel trilogy story will be a fair bit different. Although, I will spoil that the Terran Alliance won't have much of presence in the Andromeda Galaxy at the beginning. I do still plan on Luke going into exile though, but we'll see.
Guest: Don't worry, Earth won't develop into one big city like Coruscant.
Ke-Pa: The Galactic Civil War, if my current plan holds, will end in 2019.
Chapter 23- Crait
Kelly looks out of the viewport as the blue of hyperspace rushes past. Hopefully it won't be much longer before they arrive at their destination.
It's been months since the evacuation from Yavin 4. Since then, the rebel fleet has been scattered across the galaxy. Recently, and especially after the defeat at the Mako Ta Space Docks, Rebel leadership had emphasized the need to find a new base for the Rebellion.
With that in mind, the Rebellion and Terran Alliance had launched a joint effort to locate a new site for a base. One possible location was the mineral planet Crait, which had been suggested by Leia, who had heard of it from her father. Despite Mon Mothma's disbelief that it would be a good candidate, Leia reassured her it would, and she had granted them an expedition to investigate it. A small rebel team, including Luke, Leia, Han, Chewie, and Wedge Antilles, had boarded the TAS Granite Mountain, which had quickly set off for Crait.
Kelly would be part of a Terran team that would be going down with the rebels. This team included her friend Simone Biles, eight men of the US Navy's Seabees and six members of the Zulu Force. Needless to say, many of the rebels were amazed to see suits of Mandalorian armor, as Mandalorians were a rare sight ever since the Empire launched a campaign to wipe them out about a year earlier.
She hears footsteps behind her, and sees Luke approaching her. She smiles at him and says, "Hey, Luke."
"Hello, Kelly," Luke says pleasantly. The two had come to be good friends ever since the Evacuation of Yavin 4, especially since Kelly had helped with teaching Luke the ways of the Jedi. While she obviously wasn't very experienced herself compared to members of the Order such as Ahsoka, she had managed to teach Luke a number of things.
"Well, this is gonna be our first mission together. Though, I suppose it wont be too much of a test for what you've learned. This is probably gonna be rather boring," Kelly says.
"I don't think you should be wishing for more trouble, or we might just get it," Luke says, and the two share a laugh.
Suddenly, they feel the Granite Mountain start to decelerate, and moments later, the ship drops out of hyperspace. Up ahead, the planet Crait comes into view.
"Well, we'd better get down to the hangar," Kelly says. Luke nods in response, and the two start heading down towards the hangar.
It doesn't take them long to get to the hangar. When they do, they find the rest of the team already there, all waiting next to a large shuttle parked near the exit of the hangar. The shuttle, one of the Pathfinder series, is based heavily on the Space Shuttle previously used by NASA.
"Alright, everybody. Let's get moving!" Kelly says in a cheerful tone. Everyone gathers up what gear they haven't yet loaded onto the shuttle and file onto the shuttle. As they all settle into the crew area, the shuttle powers up, lifts off the floor, and flies out of the hangar. Two SF-23s follow it out.
The shuttle descends towards Crait and soon flies into the atmosphere. Within just a few minutes it touches down outside a large mine that Leia indicated was the spot that her father had indicated to her some time ago.
The shuttle sets down outside the mine, and the door opens up just behind the cockpit. Everyone on board slowly makes their way out.
As they approach the mine, they see a figure is waiting for them. Leia walks ahead of the group and says, "Trusk. It's me. Leia Organa."
Trusk smiles slightly. "Leia. Welcome to Crait. I got your message. Why don't you follow me, and I will show you around," he says.
As the rest of the group follows Leia and Trusk towards the mines, Kelly narrows her eyes as she looks at the back of Trusk's head. She's met the guy for all of 30 seconds, and she can already sense through the Force that something is up with him.
(Hours later)
Kelly looks out over the salt plains surrounding the mines where the team is working. Tursk has shown them around the mines, and Luke and Wedge have digging some trenches outside the entrance of the mine as other members of the team are exploring into the mines.
As time has gone on, Kelly's felt more uneasy. While this place could be a possible base, she just feels uneasy. Most of it centers around Trusk. The longer she's been here, the less and less Kelly trusts him.
Suddenly, Kelly's commlink comes to life, and the voice of Rear Admiral Noonan comes from it, saying, "Kelly Adams! Come in!"
"This is Kelly. What is it, Admiral?" Kelly asks into her radio.
"We just detected an Imperial shuttle dropping out of hyperspace about 15 minutes ago. We're not sure exactly where they landed, but they landed fairly close. We're sending down fighters to try and locate the shuttle, but be on the lookout!" Noonan says over the radio.
"Copy that, Admiral," Kelly says. She then shifts the settings on her commlink to go out to the rest of the team and says, "All members of the expedition team! An Imperial shuttle just touched down not too far from us! They know we're here."
Inside the mine, Leia is with Trusk and one of the members of the Zulu Force, an Israeli captain named Itai Mizrahi. As soon as the message comes through, Leia turns to Mizrahi and says, "We need to go. The Empire has found us. They sent a strike team after us."
"You're not going anywhere."
Leia looks at Trusk, who is smiling at her. He then draws his blaster, but Mizrahi quickly raises a blaster pistol at him while pointing his free fist at Trusk, ready to shoot flames from his vambrace.
"Don't even try it, a**hole," Mizrahi says angrily.
Trusk looks between Leia and Mizrahi, sizing up the situation. He then calls out, "Droids!"
Before Trusk can fully get the word out of his mouth, Mizrahi pulls the trigger, sending a blaster bolt right into Trusk's chest. Trusk stumbles back, and Mizrahi follows up with a shot to the face, killing him.
"We need to go," Mizrahi says. He grabs Leia by the hand and pulls her back the way they came so they can head back to the entrance.
Meanwhile, outside, Luke rushes up towards Kelly, along with Han and one of the other members of the Zulu Force, an American major named Kyle Lawrence. "Where are they, Kelly?" Luke asks.
Kelly scans their surroundings. Then, almost out of nowhere, a squad of seven stormtroopers appears from behind a boulder.
Kelly narrows her eyes. She recognizes the marking on their armor from a briefing she was given a little while back. SCAR Squadron. One of the Empire's elite commando squads.
"SCAR Squadron," Kelly says. She quickly draws her lightsaber and ignites it, it's green blade shining brilliantly.
One of the stormtroopers speeds up and moves ahead of the rest of the squad. He reaches down and draws a lightsaber from his belt, igniting it's green blade.
Kelly narrows her eyes a bit. She knows the name of this trooper from the briefing. Sergeant Kreel.
Kelly takes a deep breath before she sprints towards Kreel. As she reaches him, she slashes her saber at his head, but Kreel blocks it with his own lightsaber. He then slashes at her waist, but Kelly easily blocks it.
As Kelly begins a furious lightsaber duel with Kreel, she occasionally allows her eyes to flit around, and she says Major Lawrence, Han, and Luke engaging the rest of SCAR squadron. While three against 6 Imperial commandos would normally have Kelly worried, she knows Lawrence's skills, and that he really knows how to use his armor.
Kelly presses her attack against Kreel, speeding up her attacks. While Kreel is a highly trained soldier, she is a Jedi, and has been training with her lightsaber for far longer than Kreel.
Kreel quickly finds himself on the defensive, unable to keep up with the speed of Kelly's attacks. Finally, Kelly delivers a fierce strike with her saber that force's Kreel's saber aside, and she then kicks him in the chest. Before Kreel can react, Kelly slashes at his hand with her saber and destroys Kreel's saber.
Kreel reacts quickly, whipping out his two blaster pistols and firing them at Kelly while backing up to put some distance between him and Kelly. Kelly spins her lightsaber in a blur, blocking all the incoming blaster bolts.
Suddenly, she hears the sound of a jetpack overhead. She looks up and sees two more of the Zulus flying towards. Right as she looks up, one fires the rocket from his jetpack. The rocket hits among the other members of SCAR squadron, knocking them flying. The other Zulu fires his blaster at Kreel, who turns and sprints away.
Kelly glances around and sees Luke still fighting with one of the troopers, trying to deflect the trooper's blaster bolts with his lightsaber. Kelly charges towards them, lightsaber held at her side. As she reaches them, she spins around in a complete 360 and cuts down the trooper by beheading him.
The trooper's body falls to the ground. Kelly turns to Luke and says, "Come on. We need to get out of here." She turns him back towards the shuttle, and the two of them sprint towards the shuttle along with Han, with Lawrence and the other two Zulus covering their escape.
As they finally reach the shuttle, two of the Seabees hurry them aboard. Once they're on board, the shuttle takes off and climbs up several hundred feet before it stops, hovering in mid air. Seconds later, Lawrence and the two Zulus that stayed behind fly up and through the door of the shuttle which closes behind them. The shuttle then climbs up through the atmosphere and returns to the Granite Mountain.
On board the ship, Rear Admiral Noonan watches as the shuttle approaches and then disappears under the ship. Noonan continues to scan the space ahead of him, searching for any threats. Only a minute later, one of his officers says, "Admiral, the shuttle's back."
"Let's get out of here," Noonan says. The hyperdrive officer finishes setting the coordinates, then pushes the hyperspace throttles forward, and the ship makes the jump to hyperspace only moments before a pair of Imperial Star Destroyers arrive over the planet
As the ship settles in for the trip back to Naboo, down in the hangar, Kelly and Luke walk off of the shuttle. Kelly turns to Luke and says, "Well, that was an adventure."
"It sure was," Luke says, and the two exchange a laugh.
And, I'll end there. I know, far from my best, but I wanted to get this chapter out of the way so I could get to more chapters I am feeling more inspiration for. Also, I didn't have as much source material for this one.
Also, a quick PSA. So, on my Youtube channel, "Terrance Alliance Series 101", I have posted a timeline video. It covers the entire timeline from the beginning of the universe all the way to the end of "Rise of the Terran Alliance". It also covers where my timeline differs from both legends and canon, and where it melds them. So, go check it out.
Next chapter will be up soon. Until then, leave a review, go subscribe to the Youtube channel, and stay tuned!