The soldier-Jedi ran from tree to tree as the blaster cannons of the AT-ST fired their ordinance at him. The slow heavy blaster cannon kicked up dirt and vaporized plants as their shot missed its mark. The slightly more maneuverable light blaster cannon on the right side of its head followed closely behind. The pilots inside of the nearly nine meter tall walker pivoted their craft towards away from the fleeing rebel and towards the shrinking forms of the fleeing rebel troops and quickly let loose another concussion grenade. With an explosion, the pilots could barely see the bodies of the dead rebel soldiers as they were sent flying from the impact zone.
Kyle Katarn looked at the AT-ST as it turned to fire upon his retreating troops from the "safety" of a tree. In truth, the only safety that hiding behind a tree truly offered against a walker was the potential of them not seeing him. He scanned the terrain as carefully as he dared, trying to find some way to actually get on top of the walker as it continued its trek towards the fleeing rebels. It stopped and began to turn his way again. Spast! They've spotted me, he thought as he raced away from his cover. As he sprinted towards another large tree he could here the very audible crack of the tree as the twin blaster cannons hit the trunk. The sound of the top half of the tree crashing to the ground soon followed.
The AT-ST walked its way towards him, the guns of the walker slowly aiming at his hiding place. Just ten more meters, he thought as he checked his lightsaber to make sure it still hung on his belt. Just ten more meters…
Luke Skywalker hung his head down in shame as the transport he was protecting exploded just over a minute after they had broken free of Yavin 4's atmosphere. Thank the Force it was primarily cargo, he thought, yet he knew that the passengers he had been assigned to protect were probably better off dead than what would eventually happen to them. The Gallofree transport that had been forced down by the bombers a few meters off of the surface of the Rebel controlled moon would be evacuated by the no doubt numerous survivors of the crash. And those survivors that couldn't race to another transport with enough room for them would either be executed or captured. It was his first taste of real failure.
Thrawn overlooked the battle as the remaining rebel ships began to engage his entire fleet. Surely those fools have something else other than this pitiful attempt, he thought as he surveyed the holomap of the space battle. There has to be more ships waiting to "ambush" us. But where are they going to come from? Thrawn pondered this as he studied the occasionally flickering holographic images. After a few moments of thought, he pointed towards a section. "Strengthen our defenses here. This is where they're going to strike at us next."
The Ravager and one of the remaining three Victory-class Star Destroyers broke off from their easy work of attempting to destroy the transports that were making their way off of the moon. The four Star Destroyers began to slowly move towards their new target; the place that their commander had ordered them to go. The operators of the turbolasers on each ship soon reported readiness to their captains and the TIE pilots soon repeated the phrase.
The attack came from the opposite direction.
Thrawn looked on in surprisingly calm horror as two Mon Calamari cruisers reverted from hyperspace in the clear space to the Vengeance's starboard side. The Mon Cals were soon followed by what appeared to be three small and fat variations of Star Destroyers that Thrawn identified as Acclamator assault ships, a design that had seen great use during the Clone Wars before the Venator-class Star Destroyers were created. The rebels had struck exactly when the Imperial fleet was at its most vulnerable, leaving Thrawn only with his ship, three Victorys and seven Dreadnaughts to fend off one heavily modified Mon Calamari star cruiser, four "regular" Mon Cal cruisers, three ships that were essentially Star Destroyer prototypes, and two moderately damaged Corellian Corvettes. The odds weren't good and Thrawn had to do something, and it had to be done fast.
The rebel reinforcements raced towards a point in between the Imperial fleet and the escaping transports, fully intending on protecting the transports. The two fleets opened fire on each other, spreading red and green destruction throughout space. Bluish flashes emitted as the vessels shields took the brunt of the shots while starfighters from both sides raced around each other, the pilots trying their best to get a clear shot at their enemy.
The fooled Imperial ships slowly began to turn around, desperately wanting to rescue the flagship of the fleet. Whenever a turbolaser operator believed he had a free shot at a rebel ship, they opened fire. However, fate and the distance between the ships conspired, causing the gunners to miss their targets.
"Looks like Ackbar and Kenobi's plan worked," Keyan Farlander mused as he quickly checked the power remaining in the magcon field that was his only defense from the deadly cold of space. Ten minutes had passed since he had been forced to eject from his damaged starfighter, leaving the rescue shuttles that were moving around picking up the surviving pilots twenty minutes to rescue him. "ForKay, what's the situation on the rescue?"
I'VE GOT CONFIRMATION FROM SHUTTLE #1138 THAT THEIR HEADED YOUR DIRECTION. E.T.A. IS ABOUT FIVE MINUTES, THEY'VE GOT ANOTHER PILOT TO PICK UP BEFORE THEY CAN GET TO YOU, ForKay replied as "he" continued to scan the military frequencies. LOOK TO YOUR "DOWN" AND YOUR "LEFT"
"I can see the shuttle and their escorts now," Keyan replied as he struggled to maneuver in the void. "No signs of the other pilot, however."
IT IS DOUBTFUL THAT YOU'LL SEE HIM OR HER, ForKay replied. HUMANOID EYES ARE NOT MADE FOR SUCH A TASK.
"Thanks for the compliment, Forkay…"
The AT-ST continued its walk towards its target, the guns of the walker were just about in position. The gunner of the large vehicle began firing, sending the energy burst towards the ground. Run towards it…Now! The feeling hit Kyle Katarn as the walker began firing towards his hiding place. The shot landed behind him, sending up dirt and the ashes of the plants in the blast radius that weren't vaporized. Eyes trained on a fallen tree near the AT-ST, Kyle kept running towards his target. With each step he hoped that his plan to take out the AT-ST would actually work. It required some fairly competent timing combined with a precision use of the Force. One misstep would ruin the entire plan.
A simple jump brought him onto the fallen tree. As he prepared to make his second leap onto a stout branch of a tree a few meters away, he concentrated upon what he wished to do, almost seeing himself accomplish the normally impossible leap in his mind. Only a second after he had jumped towards the tree branch, his boots found it and his hand quickly moved to the trunk of the tree to prevent himself from falling. The AT-ST was now about even with the end of the branch, causing Kyle to run towards it. It was difficult to keep his balance upon the branch, but using the Force to help him, Kyle was barely able to keep running on the branch.
With a final leap, he found himself standing on the top of the walker, staring down at the no doubt sealed hatch that led to the interior of the vehicle. He removed the lightsaber from his belt and pointed it towards the hull of the walker.
"Did we get him?" the copilot of the AT-ST asked as he scanned the area for any signs of life.
"I think so," the pilot said. "Those rebels retreated to the southwest, towards our main target. I'm returning us to that heading right now."
A beam of blue light appeared from the roof of the vehicle, causing the helmeted pilots to quickly look behind them. The beam of light slowly moved around the hatch in a circular motion, quite clearly cutting it's way through the hull of the vessel.
"What the kriff is that?" the pilot asked as he turned towards the copilot.
"How am I supposed to know what it is? Open the hatch and find out!"
"I'm not going to open the hatch, you open it!"
The pilots continued arguing until the now completely cut through portion of the hull fell to the floor of the vehicle with a loud thud. Daylight quickly drowned out the artificial lighting of the vehicle as the cylindrical form of a fragmentation grenade slowly floated down towards them.
"I assume both of you know what this is," a voice on top of the walker said. "Hand me your weapons, barrel down, before I can count to ten." The grenade slowly floated back up to its wielder. "Or that grenade is coming back down, with an altogether different reaction. One…two…"
The Imperial pilots quickly scrambled to pull their blaster pistols out of their holsters before the activated grenade could fall down towards them. The copilot quickly handed the pistols to their captor, hoping that their lives would be spared.
"Lieutenant, one kilometer from target area!" Mara heard a subordinate officer report.
"Prepare our troops for deployment then," she ordered. "Is there something else?"
"Yes sir. We've gotten a transmission from the pilots of one Ravager's AT-STs. They're trapped in a tree…"
"The AT-ST is trapped in a tree?" Mara snorted.
"No, just the pilots…"
The AT-AT slowed to a stop just under two kilometers from the Rebel base, the product of several obstacles that the walker could not avoid. The 40 troops garrisoned within disembarked from the 22-meter tall walker. Darth Vader was among them. As the Dark Lord of the Sith looked in the sky, he noticed the lack of any rebel transports retreating from the base and into the waiting guns of Captain Thrawn. All of them must have retreated then, Vader thought as he walked through the undergrowth of the jungle.
"Keep alert men," Vader reported as he looked towards the trees for any sign of enemy movement. The Stormtroopers, twelve of which carried the heavy repeating T-21 Blaster rifles, raised their weapons in anticipation for the attack that would never come.
Almost as quickly as the rebel reinforcements had arrived in the system, the major space battle between Ackbar's rebel fleet and Thrawn's Imperial fleet had ended. The reinforcements had acted to shield the retreating transports as well as attempt to bring down at least one of the Imperial-class Star Destroyers. Luke Skywalker eased his X-wing next to the Millenium Falcon and slightly behind the Moldy Crow. The TIE fighters were still trying to destroy the transports, but the major combat had stopped. The Imperials had taken a heavy blow from the rebels; two Victory-class Star Destroyers, one of the Imperials, and almost half of the Dreadnaughts had been either destroyed or heavily damaged. Yet the Rebels had taken heavy damage as well. Two regular Mon Calamari cruisers were destroyed and one of the Acclamators had to be evacuated. There was no doubt that those that escaped from that ship would end up in the hands of Empire, if they didn't kill themselves to prevent themselves the agony of Imperial imprisonment first. And the worst part of the battle was that out of all the transports that had lifted off of the moon, only about 80 of them had managed to escape. About 200 lives had been lost on the transports alone.
Darth Vader stared at the bruised face of Jan Dodonna as the elderly traitor began to plead for his life. He would get no mercy, at least not until he told Vader what the Sith wanted to hear. A prosthetic foot slammed down on Dodonna's back, pinning him to the ground. "Now 'general'," Vader taunted his prisoner. "You will answer the questions I ask of you. If you answer correctly, you get to die quickly." Vader grabbed the general's shirt and lifted him off of the ground. Vader gazed into the terrified eyes of his prey, knowing that, on most people, the sight of the seemingly soulless black would intimidate them. He had seen the look in eyes of the captain of the Tantive IV before this whole mess had begun. Vader gripped Dodonna's neck, applying a slight pressure to assure his prisoner of his seriousness. "Answer me, traitor, the pilot who destroyed the Death Star and who made my landing here difficult was trained by Kenobi. Am I correct?"
"I'm not telling you anything!" Dodonna spat out, causing Vader to tighten his grip on Dodonna's neck. As his throat began to burn from the pressure and his head began to spin from lack of oxygen, he could feel Vader's grip loosen.
"I am not without a heart," Vader replied, his mechanized voice making the sentence sound horribly wrong. "Now tell me if Kenobi trained the pilot who destroyed the Death Star."
"He did," Dodonna finally relented. "Kenobi trained three of our ranks in the Jedi arts. The Jedi shall rise again, Lord Vader! Despite your attempts to wipe them out, they will bring back the Republic. Long live the Republic!"
Vader fought back against his anger, the need to snap the pathetic traitor's neck as he continued to spew his anti-Imperial catchphrases. In fact, he found it hard to remember how many people had said those exact words before or while he had killed them. Yet he needed answers. There was something about that pilot; something oddly familiar. "The Jedi Order is long dead, and any resurgence will be quickly taken care of. Now, what is his name?"
"That's classified information," Dodonna replied, hoping to protect the life of one of the Alliance's best pilots as long as he could. "I'll die before I tell you his name, or the names of the other trainees."
"That can easily be arranged," Vader replied as he moved his free hand to retrieve his lightsaber.
His courage failing, Dodonna did what he had to do to survive, or at least die quickly. "Luke," he began. "His name is Luke Skywalker!"
If Vader's arm were organic, his grip on the rebel general would have surely failed him. It was a lie. It had to be. There was no way for that pilot to be who he is. Surely it had to be another Skywalker; the surname wasn't that widespread but it was certainly possible.
Yet the boy was Force-sensitive, and far more powerful than the average Jedi. But how could it be? He had seen a holorecording of Padmé's funeral, and it was quite obvious that she had still been pregnant in her open casket. Yet there was no other way for that pilot to exist. His child had survived and was being trained in the ways of the Force by the man he claimed to hate the most. The small portion of Darth Vader that was still Anakin Skywalker felt pride at his son's accomplishments, only to be quickly drowned out by the majority of him that was Darth Vader.
There was a presence nearby, just now exiting the turbolift and heading towards the audience chamber. The Hand, he thought. If she were to know, then the Emperor would surely know. That will complicate things, Vader thought, not truly knowing what "things" that the Emperor would complicate. "Where has Kenobi gone!" Vader angrily asked Dodonna, who seemed both extremely confused and extremely frightened over the actions of his interrogator in the past minute.
"I won't tell you!" Dodonna yelled at the black mask in front of him as a redheaded female walked into the room.
"Enough, Lord Vader," she said as she walked up to the tall Sith. "Remember that all Rebel officers that we've captured are supposed to taken to Director Isard for 'conditioning.'"
Dodonna could mentally see Darth Vader smile underneath his helmet as the shame of what he had done flooded over him. He had failed to destroy the Temple while the Imperial troops had flooded into it after everyone but him had evacuated, and he had given the Empire what could be vital intelligence. He was thankful, however, for not revealing the location of the Rebel base. He could only hope that he could hold out under whatever conditioning that the Imperials had in store for him.