Hello Everyone! Sorry this chapter took as long as it did, but it's a pretty darn long one and honestly it's probably the most "eventful" one so far, so I think you'll like it.

Oh, also, the story is now up on AO3 as well if you want to read it there, it won't let me link it but just search "Star Wars: Ascendancy" and you'll find it under the same username.

"Any sign of him Brex?"

"Negative Chief. I've been monitoring the ships sensors ever since you received that frantic call. Our Jedi friend is nowhere to be found."

Ormyn let out a sigh, looking at his chrono. It was well over ten minutes since he had sealed the hanger and had everyone get into the troop transport, and Ezra was nowhere to be found.

"Dammit, and I was actually beginning to like that kid," he muttered under his breath, walking up into the cockpit. "Alright Brex, get over here. It's time to leave."

"Well sir, at least the Admiral will understand us leaving with the cargo now." Brex said as he moved away from the instrument panel, and Onym looked it over one last time. "We can always return should they still be alright, assuming it's all as bad as you made it out to be."

"Pilot, get us ready for-"

Ormyn's speaking was cut-off when he heard the sound of an unfamiliar alarm, one that sounded remarkably different from the Imperial Klaxons he was used to. He looked out the transparisteel windows, and around the hangar for the source of the alarms until his eyes stopped, fixated on the hangar bay main door.

Ormyn gulped, watching the metal doors slide across the opening into space and sealing them in like a metal tomb. Just when he thought it couldn't get worse, the main lights flickered off, their predicament now only illuminated by emergency lights.

"The hangar shields have lost power." Brex said. "That's bad, very bad. I will go investigate." The droid walked out of the cockpit, and Ornym moved over to the commboard as the stirred pilots looked on nervously and keyed on the engines to standby.
"Chief, we're stuck in here, and we can't get a signal out to the Chimera.."

Ormyn could only sigh in response, before pounding the board with his fist while his lip twisted with frustration.

"Damn it!"

BOOM!

Ezra's vision went white. Heat washed over him The walls exploded into fire, burning the ooze, and Ezra was set free. He gasped for air, his lungs desperately taking in as much oxygen as possible as he was surrounded by smoke. He looked side to side frantically, trying to figure out what was going on. The only things he could make out were bright red flashes, and the familiar sound of blaster bolts. Coughing and waving away the smoke, all of a sudden he felt a hand grab his shoulder, pulling him back. Ezra looked up through the smoke, and for the first time in his life he was actually relieved to see a Stormtrooper.

"Get up Jedi!" Ayer said, "We're leaving!"

"Ayer!? W-what are you doing here!?"

"The Admiral told me to keep you alive and I intend to do just that now get up!"

His vision cleared, and he saw that the mass of Mnggal-Mnggal was writhing and forming tendrils, reaching out at him. The body of Kalgen rose from the smoldering sludge and his shattered head cracked back up. Its dead eyes stared straight into Ezra's, and it let out a blood curdling screech.

"Neither of you will leave this ship alive!" Ezra heard the creature scream through the smoke as Ayer helped him to his feet. The ooze itself seemed to scream in rage as the walls and floors writhed and screeched. Ezra stumbled awkwardly through the massive hole Ayer had just blown through the wall while Ayer furiously blasted into the room to provide him with some semblance of cover fire as they ran straight down the corridor.

"It's coming through the wall!" Ayer said. He was right, the ooze crawled through the walls around them, reaching out into the hallway in an attempt to catch them. Ezra was coughing and sputtering, clearing his lungs of the dust particles, when he felt the iron grip of a hand grabbing his shoulder.

"Youuuuuuuu..." Kalgen's mangled shambling corpse sputtered as he grabbed him, trying to drag the Jedi back inside, his chestplate burst open as he shrieked as a mass of writhing tendrils swarmed out to swallow him. Ezra quickly force-pushed the undead stormtrooper off of him, and Ayer unloaded a few blaster bolts to try and keep him down, before they both ran away.

They only made it a few metres before running into an entire squad of shambling stormtroopers, gurgling and growling as they reached out towards them. Ayer looked around, examining the walls around him, before his eyes found their way to a ventilation shaft near the floor. The Stormtrooper Captain blasted it open and motioned to Ezra.

"Down here!" Ayer ordered.

"Are you insane!? That thing's been using the vents this whole time!"

"You have a better idea!?"

Ezra hesitated, both corridors were filled with shambling troopers, closing in on them.

Ezra jumped in first, Ayer jumping in after.

The vent lead to another corridor, and once they'd reached the bottom, they both sprinted, wary that the Mnggal-Mnggal might try to chase them through it. Ezra sprinted for his life, running faster than he thought was even possible. The mere thought of that room, covered in the vile ooze with Kalgen standing over him taunting him, the Mnggal-Mnggal filled with sadistic glee over his despair...

"Alright, I think it's lost us." Ayer said, catching his breath as he came to a stop. "The hangar should be just up ahead, once we get there-"

"KARABAST!" Ezra screamed at the top of his voice, slamming his arms into a wall.

"What the Kriff was that thing!?" He yelled, using language that probably would've gotten him a scolding from Hera back aboard the Ghost.

"It was right! I'm a murderer! All those people are dead because of me! I'm no better than Saw kriffing Gerrera!"

"Get a hold of yourself!"

"What's the point of this war!? What's the kriffing point of-"

Ezra's tirade was promptly cut short by a firm slap to his face. The sharp stinging pain was enough to snap him back to reality.

"Listen? You want to seriously ponder the ethics of killing? You can do plenty of that back on the Chimaera, but right now we are still on board a derelict ship with a nightmarish living slime hungry for blood. So please try get a hold of yourself, alright?"

"Yeah, Okay..." Ezra said, his panting slowing down as he bit his lip, then wiped the tears from his eyes.

"I'm-I'm good. Sorry... just... thanks, I needed that..."

"Don't mention it. Oh, and you dropped this" Ayer said, handing him a familiar silver cylindrical object.

Ezra grimaced, in all of the commotion and despair, he'd completely forgotten about his weapon. Losing his own lightsaber would've been bad enough, but losing this one...

"Kanan's lightsaber?" He clutched it in his fist then hugged it against his chest, relieved to have it back. "Karabast, if I had've lost this..."

"Save it for later." Ayer said, the disapproval audible in his voice, "Let's get to the hangar and get out of here."

"If they're still there. I did tell them to leave if I didn't come back after all." Ezra corrected him, before hearing his comm beep. He picked it up apprehensively and answered.

"Hello?"

"Ezra? You there?"

"Ormyn! Good to hear from you. Are you still on board the ship?"

"We were just about to leave, actually. You weren't answering your comm."

"Yeah I was..." Ezra stopped, unsure of how to describe what just happened.

"...busy. I'm with Commander Ayer now. We're all that's left.."

"Well anyways, we have another problem. The hangar doors are shut. Brex has been interfacing with the ship and from what he can gather the main reactor has lost power and the computer core is locking everything down. The ship is bleeding power from impact damage and the hangar doors have sealed shut. There's not enough power to even keep the force-field up. At this rate, Brex reckons we'll lose emergency lighting next, and then life support. Then we all suffocate and die."

"Great..." Ezra muttered. As if this day wasn't already turning out to be the worst day in his whole life. It might now be his last as well.

"Is there anything we can do?"

"I'm not exactly sure how this ship works. It's very different from the Imperial designs I usually tend to work with, but if I had to guess I'd say a reboot of the main computer power core would give us enough time to keep the system running and get the doors open again. Brex and I tried doing it from the interface in the hangar but this interface is limited to nearby systems only, it's going to need to be reset manually. Commander Ayer, I'm sending the ship layout to your visor hud now" Ayer check his heads up display, and the layout highlighting the hallway appeared with a diagram of the ship in the top right of his visor.

Ezra sighed, "Alright, I'll head down there and try to get the power back up and running. Get the transport ready for launch and I'll be up there in no time."

"Acknowledged, good luck Ezra. Ormyn out."

Ezra put away the comm, staring down the dimly lit hallway in front of him, he braced himself. That creature was still around somewhere, and any moment another tidal wave of gray ooze could spring out to grab him, but he had to do this. Getting ready to set out, he turned to Ayer.

"So, you have the map?"

"Ormyn uploaded it to my HUD remotely, yes."

"So which way is it and how do I get there?"

"How do you…" Ayer asked, before realizing what the Jedi was implying.

"You're not seriously going down there yourself, are you?"

Ezra sighed, "Look, that creature, that thing made me realize something. All of this, this mess? This is on me, all of it. I'm the one who dragged the Seventh Fleet out here. I'm the reason we're on this ship. I'm the reason all of your men are dead and we're at the mercy of that creature. I don't regret what I did, the alternative was Lothal and all of my friends dying, but now? Now I'm going to do whatever I can to get the Seventh Fleet out of this mess. I don't know why, it probably doesn't make any sense, but I guess I feel I have to. It's not logical, but to be honest I don't know what is logical anymore. I'm trusting my instincts, because quite frankly they're the only thing I can trust at this point."

There was a long pause as Ezra struggled to figure out what to say.

"I don't know, nothing makes sense anymore, and I guess I just want to try and save as many people as I can, even if they are Imperials."

"Well, regardless, you're no match for that thing." Ayer said.

"No, I'm not." Ezra replied, a sense of grim acceptance in his voice.

"Which is why you need somebody watching your back. I go back to the hangar, and it'll probably be waiting outside the entrance to ambush me anyway, and you're forgetting we all need your navigational abilities anyway. As much as I hate to say it you're crucial to the Fleet's survival. I'm going with you, whether you like it or not."

Ezra shrugged his shoulders. "Alright, sure, I guess I wouldn't mind having an extra blaster behind me."

They started off carefully. Keeping their distance from overhead vents, they descended down staircase after staircase, plunging further and further into the dark. Passing another set of dark statues carved into an archway, they came to a large door, which Ayer walked up to and opened.

"Before we go any further, there's something I want to check."

Ayer entered the room, Ezra following behind him into a large room filled with racks and railings, though mysteriously, all of them were empty.

"An armory?" Ezra asked.

"I wanted to see if whoever who built this ship had anything that could give us an advantage."

Ezra looked around, examining the empty walls, disappointed the armoury had been picked clean.

"Where did all the weapons go? Did the crew take them?"

"No, no that doesn't make any sense."

Ezra grimaced, as another possibility entered his mind, a far more troubling one.

"What if the creature took them first?"

Ayer looked back at him.

"Then that proves whatever was being stored here could hurt it."

Ayer thought about the possibility more, "Yeah, that makes more sense, there has to be something here somewhere…"

Ayer rooted around for a minute, scrounging through the room to see if the Mnggal-Mnggal had left anything behind.

"Ah!" He exclaimed in satisfaction as he pulled out a container out from under one of the shelves. He propped it up on a table, unlatched it, and opened it. Ezra peered in, and saw that the whole box was filled with rows of cylindrical black devices. The trigger on the side and the red light was similar to most Thermal Detonators.

"Detonators, could be useful. Take some, they might actually hold this thing back."

"You don't already have any?" Ezra asked.

"I had one, but I used it getting you out of that room." Ayer replied, a tinge of annoyance in his voice.

Ezra and Ayer gathered up as many of the detonators as they could carry, and then they made their way out.

Suddenly, a loud rumble emanated through the halls as the whole ship shuddered and shaked.

"What was that? Did something just hit the ship?" Ezra asked quietly.

"Sounded like a direct impact again. The shields must be fully down now. The hull will probably hold for a while.." Ayer paused.

"Wait, how long has this ship been here? A few days?"

Ezra shook his head. "I don't know, what's the matter?"

"A ship of this size, even without a full crew, the reactor should still have enough power to be running for weeks. Why has it shut down?"

They were quiet for a handful of heartbeats as they tried to think about it. "We'd better see what Ornym-"

Drip, drip, drip…

Ezra spun around, looking up at a ceiling vent and heart nearly stopping.

Gray ooze, writhing out of the vent towards them.

"Run!"

"Is there any sign of it?" Ezra asked, ducking behind a corner and frantically examining his surroundings.

"No, no I don't see it."

"We can't do this. At this rate we'll never get to the power core..." Ezra said.

He slumped downwards, resting against a wall, his hands sliding across his face as all of a sudden the gravity of his situation started to sink in.

How did he end up in this mess? Ezra thought to himself. He'd only been out here a few months, but it was already starting to feel like a lifetime. He couldn't do this, he couldn't keep this up. This thing... this creature... it was unlike anything he'd ever encountered before. No amount of Inquisitors, no amount of Sith Lords, could've prepared him for this. Send a hundred Inquisitors, send a thousand Inquisitors. Anything is preferable to that monster.

Ezra steadied himself, Ayer visibly trying to make sense of the map on his helmet. His mind continued to mull over the events in the ooze-covered lair, whatever this creature was, it viewed him as a mere insect. It knew everything, it knew about the Rebellion, it knew about the Empire, and it had dismissed all of them with a casual curiosity. A glance of amusement, how one might lift over a rock and examine the myriad of crawling insects beneath. The creature had scoffed at even the Emperor, dismissing him as a delusional fool, gloating over the inevitability of the passage of time, and giggling with glee at the relative pointlessness of the Rebellion's struggle. The entire war, everything that had transpired across countless worlds, was nothing more than an idle curiosity to it. The fact that he could be looked down on like that, the thought sickened him.

How could even a Jedi Master, let alone some orphan from a backwater planet, even hope to match it. Not even the Force was above it, how was that even possible? This "Mnggal-Mnggal" was truly unlike anything he'd ever seen.

It had him outmatched at every turn. It was smarter than him, much stronger than him, it was nigh unstoppable and it appeared to have infested every corner of the ship. Now here he was, facing this thing, hopelessly outmatched, trying to save Imperials of all people. He felt like the subject of some kind of elaborate cosmic joke. Right now, it felt like the universe itself was laughing at him. For the first time ever, it felt like even the Force itself had well and truly abandoned him to die out here.

Ezra felt alone, he felt truly and utterly alone, even more than when Kanan died. Even more so than his youth on Lothal, before he met the Spectres, back when it was just him on the streets trying to survive. He'd thought he'd felt alone during his journey on the Chimaera, but now he missed even the cold grey corridors of the Grand Admiral's flagship. The dark corridors closing in on him only reminded him of how far away from home he really was...

Beep Beep, beep beep.

His introspection was cut short by another comm call, Ezra picked up his comm and answered.

"Hello? Ezra? Are you there? Are you still alive?"

"Ormyn!" Ezra exclaimed, he never thought he'd be truly relieved to hear from an Imperial, but then he never thought he'd be lost in the Unknown Regions, his friends nowhere to be found, cornered by intelligent killer slime that liked to make him suffer for fun either. This was so much easier when it was just him vs the Empire...

"We're still moving down through the ship, but we may be here a while, we're going at a pretty slow rate."

"Yeah, and that's exactly why I called. Brex and I have been trying to splice our way into the ship's systems. We haven't made much progress, but we think we've found a faster route to the power core."

"Oh! Yes! What is it?"

"Well that's the problem, it's risky, especially with the ship's power struggling to even keep the lights on, but I think you might be able to use the turbolifts."

Ezra blinked, "The turbolifts?"

"Yeah, they go all the way down to the bottom of the ship, it'll be much faster than going through the corridors."

"Well yeah I know that, but I didn't think the ship would have enough power for us to do that." Ezra explained.

"That's what I thought to, but then I found there is a junction connected to the turbolifts, with a backup power supply. If you activate that the turbolifts will have enough power to take you right to the bottom."

Ezra blinked, unsure of this plan, "and if the power fails?"

"You both plunge to your deaths, but we've got no other option."

Ezra sighed, "Alright, let's do it. Send the junction's location to Ayer and we'll head over there."

Ayer stared blankly at nothing for a minute, presumably examining the map on his helmet, and then pointed down one of the corridors.

"This way," Ayer said, "the junction should be just-"

Thud, thud, thud…

Ezra turned to the source of the noise. Large, heavy footsteps, stomping across the ground, could be heard down one of the corridors. They were far too heavy to be a mere human. His heart nearly stopped at the noise, and Ayer silently motioned to him to move down the corridor, away from the creature and towards their objective.

The two of them made absolutely sure to stay quiet, hoping whatever was behind them wouldn't figure out where they are. All the while Ezra's mind raced as he tried to fill in the gaps. Was that one of the ships original builders? Possessed by the Mnggal-Mnggal? No, no wait, he'd heard this before. It was the creature from earlier, when they were leaving the bridge. The large, bipedal creature had needed an entire line of Stormtroopers to even get it to fall back, two people probably weren't a match for it.

Bang!

In the dark, and with Ezra's thoughts pre-occupied, he hadn't noticed the large metal object on the ground, the large metal object he'd just unintentionally kicked.

The large metal object that made a loud, audible clanging noise.

Thud... Thud... Thud... Thudthudthudthudthudthudthudthud…

The stomping was getting faster, and it was getting louder.

The creature was headed right for them.

Ayer spun around, raising his blaster and firing down the hallway. Squeals and hissing could be heard, but the creature

And there it was.

Oh dear stars there it was.

As soon as it appeared, the creature lunged at Ezra, snarling and raving as a pair of outstretched claws closed in on him from either side.

A normal human would've been dead, but Jedi reflexes are anything but normal.

With lightning speed Ezra pulled out his lightsaber, and in a swift slice he robbed the creature of both of it's arms.

The creature hissed and screeched, stumbling backwards as the stumps of it's arms bubbled and hissed. The dismembered arms fell to the floor, and with a splash they immediately melted into ooze. Ezra had seen glimpses of it before, but it was only now he was able to get a good, prolonged look.

He almost wished he hadn't.

The creature was entirely gray, and featureless. A blank, flat face was mounted on a plain head, the only discernible feature being a mouth covered in . Ezra could see himself reflected on the creature as he looked up at it's face, and it's tall spindly body and elongated limbs towered over him.

Ayer wasted no time. With the creature momentarily stunned and at point-blank range, he fired more blaster bolts into the creature. Gray ooze splashed in every direction as the armless monster lost it's footing and fell over.

"Hello again Loth-rat..."

Ezra heard a voice, a voice that sounded like a choir of a thousand different beings speaking in unison, but the creature's mouth didn't move. While the voice was unfamiliar, it didn't take a genius to figure out who he was speaking with.

"Do you like this form? I have many... but this is one of my favourites. I prefer to use flesh-creatures, have puppets do my work, but sometimes a more direct approach is needed..."

This creature, it was entirely Mnggal-Mnggal. The liquid had coalesced under it's guiding intelligence and formed into a massive hulking predator. For a brief moment Ezra wondered why a creature capable of this even needed bodies, before deciding it didn't, and merely possessed people for fun. Such a thesis fit well with the Mnggal-Mnggal's attitude thus far.

"Wonderful, isn't it? Wonderful for collecting puppets... and unlike my puppets... no pesky loved ones for you to feel guilty about..."

Ezra gritted his teeth, pointing his saber down toward the creature, his patience wearing thin. He'd had enough of this creature mocking him. "What do you care!? You clearly don't care about what happens to any of us!"

"Who the hell are you talking to?" Ayer asked in confusion.

"Simple, Loth-rat... fun..."

Ezra didn't have time to react. A sharp blade stretched out from the stump of it's arm and sliced him across the leg.

Ezra fell to his knee, yelling in pain. The slash had pierced his skin and drawn blood. The creature stood up. Ayer was frantically firing into the creature, but it didn't seem to notice.

The Mnggal-Mnggal simply looked down at Ezra, and it's teeth stretched into a sickening grin.

With all the power he could muster, Ezra let out a strong, concentrated force push, knocking the Mnggal-Mnggal back off it's feet for a second time as he struggled to stand up.

A thermal detonator flew by his head, landing on the creature's stomach. Ezra spun around and bolted in the opposite direction, Ayer sprinting behind him. A loud explosion could be heard as the creature was liquified, gray slime spilling all over the walls and floors. Had they turned around, they would've noticed it coalescing again, a blank face filled with needle-sharp teeth rising from the puddle.

Ezra ran, hearing the loud stomping coming from the darkness behind him.

Ezra gulped as they came to the end of the corridor.

A dead end, a set of turbolift doors in front of them, and the stomping getting louder.

Within a split second he'd impaled the door on his lightsaber, the blade slicing down the middle to part the doors.

Ayer turned around and started firing at the creature in a vain attempt to slow it down. It stumbled slightly, but a single blaster was nowhere near enough to stop the creature.

"You can't run forever, little Loth-rat...

Ezra ignored the voice whispering into his very mind as he cut through the door.

"I will devour you... I will devour you all..."

He gritted his teeth, paying no heed as the words clawed through his skull.

"...the entire Galaxy is my playground... my domain... such a pretty ship, the Chimaera... and soon it will be all mine..."

"Shut up! And stop calling me Loth-rat!"

The voice chuckled, "Silly little Loth-rat... so easy to play with..."

With a directed force blast in either direction, Ezra forced the doors apart, his patience wearing thin with the Mnggal-Mnggal's taunting.

"In here!" Ezra yelled as he jumped into the lift.

"But the lifts don't have any power!"

"We aren't using the lifts!" Ezra sliced open the roof above them, jumping up on top and reaching back down for Ayer. The Stormtrooper climbed up after him, and Ezra grabbed onto a railing on the wall, holding his saber out to the mechanism holding the lift in place.

Ayer didn't need any verbal instructions to figure out what he was doing, and took hold of the wall. As soon as the creature had stormed it's way into the lift, it snarled up through the opening, and stretched out it's arms to pull itself up. Ezra wasted no time, a quick slice disconnected the lift, and he held on for dear as the floor beneath him disappeared.

"Yeah! Not bad for a Loth-rat! Am I right?"

"Who the hell are you talking to?" Ayer yelled at him, confused.

Ezra looked back at him, "The Mn... the creature..."

He still wasn't entirely sure how to pronounce the thing's name.

"I heard it, I heard it speak."

Ayer sighed, "Well anyways, there's a horizontal turbolift shaft beneath us. We can go through that to reach the junction."

Ezra dropped down, grabbing onto the ledge of the shaft and pulling himself up in a display only a Jedi could pull off. Ayer dropped down after him, and the two made their way through the large rectangular tunnel in front of them.

They followed the tall rectangular pathway with the inset rails gleaming from the light from Ayers blaster. Ezra's only source of comfort was the light of his Lightsaber. He kept his eyes ahead and his Jedi senses everywhere else. The darkness was a starker contrast to the outside, and Ezra could only rely on the Force, and on Ayer's torch, to find his way. The vast void surrounding him made him nervous as they stayed on the lookout for the junction room. They kept going until Ayer stopped, and pointed to the yellow outline of an access door.

"There it is. Get up here and get it open. Remember not to touch the rails." Ezra nodded and carefully moved past him, and after removing the safety interlock, they were inside. Under the doorway were rails for damaged lifts to be brought in and repaired. Inside was a monitor with a flashing key, Ezra approached, and with an approving nod from Ayer he shrugged and pushed it. There was a chime as a display board lit up the room, showing a series of red lines steadily going yellow then green.

"I think I got it running." Ezra said, feeling himself let out a breath he'd been holding. Looking to Ayer he still wasn't sure what the man was feeling, his expression hidden by the familiar frown of a Stormtrooper.

"Can we call a lift from here? Looks like there's a tube that goes down fairly close on the map." Ayer asked.

"Uhh.." Ezra began looking at the panel. Taking note of the symbols, which he guessed must be the numbers, he punched them in the console. He assumed the yellow on the door meant maintenance, and hit the yellow key. Sure enough, to his great relief, the lift arrived in short order.

"Good work." Ayer said as the doors opened and he stepped inside. Ezra smirked, it had been a while since anyone had complimented him on anything other than trapping them here. He was quick not to dwell on the thought, as he punched a button, and the lift began to descend...

The lift brought the unlikely duo down into the underbelly of the ship. Making their way through the lower levels the two were now wary of the nightmarish Mnggal-Mnggal ambushing them once again. Strangely however, it was nowhere to be found. No undead Stormtroopers jumping out of the shadow, no ooze creeping in to surround them, there was no sign of the creature. It was as if the Mnggal-Mnggal had simply forgotten they were even on the ship.

And now here they were, faced with one of the most heavily reinforced doors Ezra had ever seen.

"Well this isn't opening any time soon." Ayer said. I don't think these detonators will do the trick either. This is some serious renforcement.

"Yeah right, this is easy." Ezra replied.

"You sure that can cut through this?" That's probably five feet of reinforced durasteel or more." Ayer said. Ezra pulled out his lightsaber, smirking as he ignited the weapon.

"I'm pretty sure. Now stand back, you're about to see just how strong these things really are."

Ayer turned away from Ezra, blaster held ready against the large corridor behind them. Ezra squinted his eyes as the blue light nearly blinded him, before driving the blade straight into the heavy door in front of them. Ayer stood at the ready, waiting for the Mnggal-Mnggal to show itself while Ezra got to work. Once again, however, the Mnggal-Mnggal refused to show itself.

"Chief Engineer, I have managed to make a breakthrough!" Brex said triumphantly, walking back into the cockpit.

"Did you get access to the power control?"

"Accessing. Stand by..." Brex responded mechanically as he began wirelessly interfacing the shuttle with the ship's computer.

Ormyn waited in anticipation, watching eagerly as Brex got to work, waiting for an answer...

"No, apologies sir. I'm afraid i've only been able to isolate as far as the ships internal security monitors. Anything above that is restricted on this level."

Ormyn sighed, frustrated at the false hope. They really were counting on Ezra to pull through.

"Wait, hang on, I believe I've found something."

Brex pressed more buttons, and before long the interface screen on the transport lit up to show a display of a room Ormyn hadn't seen before. Ormyn, however, knew ships like the back of his hand, even strange unrecognised ships like the one he was on. It didn't take him long to deduce that this was the bridge due the layout.

But what perplexed Ormyn the most, was that the bridge had people on it, and not just any people... Imperial Engineers.

"What are they doing up there?" Ormyn asked, perplexed by their presence.

"I'm going to contact them, ask them why the hell they didn't return to the hangar." He began to key the comm until Brex tapped his shoulder.

"With all due respect sir, I'm not sure that's a good idea..." Brex stopped him.

Ormyn looked at the droid inquisitively, "What do you mean?"

"Didn't the Jedi tell us not to open the door for anybody that wasn't him?" Brex reminded him.

"Yes?"

"Simply a possibility, but wouldn't that suggest whatever he was afraid of can possess the bodies of other organics?" He then pointed to the screen. "They're certainly acting atypical chief. Are you sure you want to reveal us?"

Ormyn froze, suddenly realizing what Brex was saying. The more he looked at the Engineers, the more they appeared... wrong. They stumbled and limped, moving in an oddly uniform fashion. Their actions synced together with a precision he had never seen before...

And Ormyn's heart nearly stopped when one of them jaggedly turned away from the controls and with a dark smile stared right at him.

Orymn simply returned the stare, taken aback and disgusted by the dead, lifeless eyes, and the gray ooze that was leaking from his mouth...

After a few minutes of slicing, Ezra pushed a large circular piece of metal to the floor. Taking care to avoid the white hot edges of the hole he had just created, he stepped through into the subsequent room, followed shortly after by Ayer.

The room they had just entered was utterly devoid of light. Through the darkness, Ezra could hear a faint hum, distant and dim like the dying breaths of a wounded animal. He looked around, using his saber as a source of light, before making out the shape of the room. It was rectangular, and it had an opening looking down into a collection of data banks. The large central core ran up the middle of the room below them with a pathway going horizontally across. To the left of them was a large orange machine, in the center an opening looked out into the main core and a terminal, and adorning the wall were a series of switches, fobs, and levers. Walking around to the large machine on the left Ezra recognised the similar shaping.

"I think I found the controls and the backup generator." Ezra said.

"Alright, get it switched on and let's get out of here." Ayer replied.

"I would, but the markings are in a language I've never seen before."

Ezra examined the the controls closer, holding his saber as close as he could without burning the levers. He couldn't understand the markings, but he was able to understand the green or red lights adjacent.

"OK... I think..." He muttered, before flipping the switches and trying a few buttons, until all of the lights switched to green.

"There, that should do it."

The machine hummed and the lights flooded back on almost instantly, lighting the entire room up. The silver walls and elaborate patterns that had hid in the dark now shone brightly. Ezra took another look around the room, and his eyes fixated on a peculiar object. It was a gun, an energy weapon, but it certainly wasn't a blaster. The grip was cushioned, and the deep red padding felt soft in his hand. The weapon was silver, with the slim rectangular body connected to a long cylindrical barrel. A shining gold spiral coiled around the barrel and ended at the muzzle, the side of which held an engraving of a snake bearing it's fans, it's mouth wide open and ready to attack. A dial was located on the side. Presumably it indicated the power level or setting of the device, and a large bulky magazine was connected in front of the trigger. He looked it over for a moment, before simply hooking the peculiar blaster to his hip, deciding it could be useful. Next to it was an undisturbed pile of dust. He examined the dust for a moment, before simply moving towards the door.

"Ezra!? Ezra come in!"

Ezra nearly jumped out of his skin, before realizing it was just his comm, he was half expecting that horrid creature to show itself again and had been on edge the whole time. He reached for his comm in response to the voice.

"Ormyn! We got the computer power back on, but that shouldn't have been linked to the lights.. Right?"

"You've got bigger problems than that!" He insisted.

"That creature you were afraid of? It has techs on the bridge. Not only that, but the ship already had more than enough power to keep the hangar open. The power output was turned down manually from the bridge, the creature did it!"

"What? Why-"

"Jedi! We have a problem!" Ayer yelled.

Ezra turned at the sound of Ayer's voice, only to be hit with a rising feeling of dread as a familiar grey ooze began to pour through the doorway,.

"You flesh creatures... so, so foolish..."

Ezra gulped as he witnessed Kalgen, armor scorched and burned, stepping through the hole he had cut. The ooze moved away, leaving Kalgen room to stand. More than a dozen stormtroopers marched through in lockstep after him, spreading out throughout the room as Ezra ignited his saber again and Ayer held his blaster at the ready.

"So simple minded... so easy to play with... so fun to play with..."

"What have you done!?" Ezra yelled, his dread from earlier returning.

"I haven't done anything, Jedi... but you... you've just doomed them all... the admiral... the commodore... and everyone else on that ship will all be my puppets... the Serpents fled... they screamed and they ran in terror... but one, oh one he sealed this room! He disabled the engines, he locked them down and trapped me here... and then he picked up that gun and he brought his own end... the weapon turned him to dust so that his flesh couldn't become me..."

"The engines? What do you want with-"

Ezra was cut-off mid-sentence as he was knocked back. He struggled to keep his balance as the whole room shook he could feel the engines whirring to life...

"What the.." Hammerly said as she watched the sensor readouts. "Stand By alert! Someone get me the Commodore and the Grand Admiral!"

"Commander Hammerly.. What's going on?" Faro asked, bewildered by the sudden urgency as she entered the bridge.

"I don't know how to tell you this..." Hammerly said.

"...but the ship is moving."

"The Celaphid ship?" Thrawn said as he entered the bridge behind Faro.

"Yes Admiral, its engines are online and the shields and other systems are powering back up as well."

Thrawn and Faro both watched as the ship, tattered and scraped within the asteroid field, came to life. It's sublight engines igniting, and it slowly turned, repositioning itself. It swung away from the asteroid nearest to it, and begin moving at full speed, it flew forward...

It was heading right for the Chimaera.

I'll try and get the next chapter up quicker next time, but I'd rather have them be good than fast. Don't worry, if I ever abandon this story for whatever reason I will tell you all. I'm having a blast writing this, and with no SW content I'm actually looking forward to around the corner (Seriously I just don't like how Disney are handling the franchise) this is kind of where I'm getting my fix.