On a distant planet, far from the eyes of the New Republic and most of the scattered remnants of the Galactic Empire, Qi'ra sat in the chair of her flagship and mobile command centre: the 290 meter tall Kalevalan star yacht called The First Light.
Qi'ra was the leader of the powerful and ruthless crime syndicate known as "Crimson Dawn." But one wouldn't think so when they first looked at her. Qi'ra did not look like a crime boss, or even a common thug. She was not a big or rough-looking man. Rather, she was a beautiful human woman with smooth, light skin, long, sleek, brown hair, full lips, bright green eyes, and a lithe, slim, curvy body. She wore a silver necklace and a sleek, elegant black grown that really highlighted her well-developed figure. But her beauty hid a most dangerously ruthless, cunning and devious mind that few other criminal masterminds dared to trifle with.
Qi'ra hadn't always been a crime boss. As a child, she had been abandoned by her parents on the streets of the distant planet of Corellia. As a result, she had grown up as a common thief. One day, she became a member of the criminal gang known as The White Worms, led by the ruthless, worm-like Grindalid Lady Proxima.
During that time, Qi'ra had met the young human male Han Solo. At first, they had been rivals, but overtime they became friends and then lovers. Desiring a better life, Qi'ra and Han had attempted to escape Corellia. Through a clever trick pulled off by Han, they had managed to get away from Proxima's hideout and flee to the Coronet Spaceport. For one glorious moment, it had looked like the new life for them both was only a step away. But then, Proxima's minions had caught up with them. Han had gotten away safely, while Qi'ra had been captured and taken back to Proxima.
As punishment for her escape attempt, Qi'ra was sold intoslaveryby Proxima to the slave dealerSarkin Enneb, who eventually sold her toDryden Vos: the previous leader of Crimson Dawn. Qi'ra had of course tried to escape, and although she had killed many of Vos's guards in the attempt, he himself had stopped her. But instead of executing her, Dryden Vos had been impressed by Qi'ra, and allowed her to join his syndicate.
From there, Qi'Ra had worked her way up through the ranks of Crimson Dawn until she became Dryden Vos's second-in-command. To gain such a high position, she had done many awful things; told lies, cheated at games, betrayed and murdered people, made sacrifices, buried bodies. Some of those things she regretted and felt guilty about to this day, even though she knew she could never take them back.
Qi'ra's heart ached as she remembered her long-ago reunion with Han, on this very ship. She had been so happy to see him again, and yet so afraid of what he would think of her when he learned that she was the second-in-command of Crimson Dawn, and of the awful things she had done to obtain her new position. In the end, she had saved Han from being killed by Dryden Vos, and made sure he was out of harm's way. But still, Qi'ra had chosen her own ambitions over her love for Han. She had gone to the secret lair of Crimson Dawn's true leader: the former Sith Lord Maul, and became his closest servant. For several years she had trained under him, learning new skills and secrets, and making plans to bring down the tyrannical Galactic Empire, which both she and Maul despised. Qi'ra despised it because it made life difficult for her. Maul despised it for more sentimental reasons: the Emperor was in fact an evil Sith Lord who had taken him from his beloved mother when he was just a child, and then had her murdered when he was an adult. The Emperor had sought to wipe out Crimson Dawn too, and his minions had destroyed a number of their ships and members over the years. But still, the Empire had many other enemies that wanted them gone, and thus the Empire focused more on them. Thus, many of Crimson Dawn's members and most importantly its leaders; Maul and Qi'ra, had survived. And so they conspired and plotted their revenge.
But then one day, Maul, while on a journey into the far Outer Rim to unlock an ancient Sith secret, had mysteriously disappeared. In his absence, Qi'ra had taken control of Crimson Dawn. Now, she was a Crime Boss. She had her own ships, her own money, her own clothes, her own food, and her own army… a small army, but still it was an army. She was one of the richest and fiercest women in the galaxy.
And yet, she wasn't happy, and she didn't understand why. Somehow, having power and control was not enough for her. From time to time, Qi'ra wondered what might have been had she chosen Han over her ambitions. She wondered that again now, and yet again, she pushed the thought away. She told herself that it would never have worked out: She and Han had both changed too much. She had done things Han could never understand, or forgive. She had chosen her ambitions over him, and she could never take that choice back.
Besides, Qi'ra had learned not so long ago that Han had moved on from her: he had fallen in love with and married Leia Organa; the crown princess of Alderaan and one of the leaders of the Rebel Alliance that had toppled the Galactic Empire. Qi'ra thought it was ironic that Han had married royalty, when his first love had been her; a common thief. However, she had to admit that she was both impressed and amused by Leia, whom she had only met in person once, when they had been searching for Han after he had been captured by the infamous bounty hunter, Boba Fett. Leia's beauty, cunning, courage and determination rivaled her own. In fact, not unlike Qi'ra, Leia had briefly been a slave, and unlike Qi'ra, she had escaped. And the one who had enslaved Leia was none other than the infamous Jabba the Hutt. Qi'ra had heard about Jabba's fetish for beautiful, scantily-clad humanoid women, but she had only met Jabba once via hologram, to discuss an uneasy agreement about their respective syndicates avoiding each other. During that holographic meeting Qi'ra had been most unnerved and disgusted by the lecherous way Jabba had looked at her, and by the way he had stroked his Twi'lek slave girl, Oola, as if she was a pet cat. From what Qi'ra had heard about Jabba, she could very well guess the lustful, perverted thoughts that had been going through his mind. She had no doubt that if she had met Jabba in person, the Hutt would have enslaved her.
Leia, however, had not been so fortunate. She had been caught by Jabba while trying to rescue Han, who had been held captive for a long-failed debt to Jabba, from him. Like all the beautiful women Jabba had enslaved in his long life, Leia had been forced to endure the shame and humiliation of wearing a skimpy dancing girl costume that left very little of her body unexposed to view. She had also been forced to wear a collar around her neck. That collar had been attached to a metal leash, which Jabba held onto at all times because he had made Leia his personal slave. Qi'ra knew about all this because she had seen the famous, widespread recording of Leia, clad in that humiliating outfit, using the very chain that bound her to Jabba to strangle the notorious Hutt to death. The deed had earned Leia the famous title "Huttslayer," though the proud princess's humiliating enslavement at the hands of Jabba had left an embarrassing stain on her fierce reputation.
Qi'ra couldn't help but feel a slight twinge of sympathy for Leia's ordeal, though she was also grateful to her for slaying Jabba, who had been the leader of the Hutt Clan and one of the biggest rivals of Crimson Dawn. With Jabba gone, the Hutt Clan had been taken over by his Twin cousins, who, while powerful and devious, were nowhere near as clever, feared or inflectional as he had been. The Hutt Clan's power and influence, which had been maintained in the Outer Rim for thousands of years, was slowly but surely diminishing. And that was a good thing for Crimson Dawn.
But the fact remained that few days went by when Qi'ra did not think about Han. And her life as the leader of Crimson Dawn was far from easy. Most of her followers were loyal to her, but few of them actually liked her. She trusted few of them. And stealing, smuggling, swindling and criminalizing were not easy either. There were rival crime syndicates, apart from the Hutt Clan, to worry about, and now there was the New Republic, which had taken the place of the Galactic Empire as the dominant civilization of the galaxy. The New Republic was currently focused on consolidating their own power and dealing with the scattered loyalists of the Empire, but Qi'ra knew it was only a matter of time before they turned their attention to crime syndicates like Crimson Dawn. Not only that, but a few scattered Imperial officers had gathered enough resources and followers to become warlords, plundering hyperspace lanes, which made smuggling difficult. There other threats too, ones more mysterious than others.
It was mainly because of all these threats that Qi'ra continued to use The First Light as her command centre. Since it was a ship, it could be moved easily. From it, she could send out transmissions and give orders to her minions from afar. She never stayed in one place too long, but mostly she kept to the Outer Rim territories, where the presence of the New Republic was thin, and the scattered, unorganized, greedy Imperials generally focused on targets that couldn't fight back; people that were weaker than Qi'ra and her followers. Right now, The First Light was parked on a cliff side overlooking a vast ocean.
Qi'ra settled more comfortably in her chair. Her thoughts whirled with plans now that her regrets had been reburied. Her main goal in life was to stay alive. But she still longed for more power. In her cynical mind, being powerful was the best way to stay alive. And she had come to believe the best way to become more powerful was to become the most powerful. The New Republic and the Imperial remnants were in disarray, and Crimson Dawn grew stronger every day. Maybe, just maybe, if she played her cards right, she could get rid of the New Republic and the Imperial remnants. And then she could remake Crimson Dawn into "The Crimson Empire." Under her rule, the galaxy would know true order, peace and freedom.
Empress Qi'ra, she thought. That does sound nice.
Qi'ra shook the thought away as she heard the sound of another ship landing outside. Her dreams and grand plans could wait. Right now, she had other, more pressing matters to deal with.
The door of the bridge slid open and Qi'ra's top lieutenant: a tall, lanky, grey-skinned, black-eyed Hylobon male named Inu, walked into the room. "Milady, he's here," he announced with a short bow.
"Who and what has he brought?" Qi'ra asked.
"A Light Cruiser and a battalion of storm troopers, just as you predicted milady," Inu replied.
"I see. Is everything ready?"
"Yes, milady," Inu nodded.
"Good, show him in," Qi'ra ordered.
Inu beckoned their visitor into the room.
In strode Moff Isdain: one of the few remaining Imperial governors that hadn't been captured or killed by the rebels. He was flanked by five stormtroopers, all dressed from head to toe in identical white armor and armed with black blaster rifles.
Moff Isdain was a tall, stocky, middle-aged man with short, graying blonde hair and wrinkled skin. He wore a nicely polished Imperial navy suit with several golden medals on it. He stood before Qi'ra and looked at her with cold, deeply arrogant eyes. As he took in her appearance, however, Qi'ra saw something else flash in his eyes. That something flashed in the eyes of so many males… and some females, when they looked at her. It was a look of lust.
Isdain shook his head, clearly trying to clear his head of the desire he had so instantly developed for Qi'ra. He addressed her imperiously, "Qi'ra, head of Crimson Dawn?"
"Yes?" said Qi'ra quietly.
"I have come to demand that you surrender the control of Crimson Dawn to me and all of your resources to my forces," Isdain said.
Qi'ra stared at him. Then, she smiled. "And why would I do that?" she asked.
"Because I am Moff Isdain of the Galactic Empire," Isdain said arrogantly.
"The Empire is gone," Qi'ra pointed out calmly.
"The Empire will never be gone, not as long as people remain loyal to it!" Isdain snapped, very angrily. "There are citizens loyal to the Empire on every planet in this galaxy. They're already getting sick of the rules and regulations of the New Republic that stole the galaxy from us, especially since they've turned a blind eye to you and your crimes. If we give our loyalists a show of strength, they will rally behind us. I know you and your underlings fear us, Qi'ra. I have powerful friends, including ones in the underworld. I don't think you'd like that, would you, Qi'ra? Wouldn't it be bad for your kind of business?"
For a long moment, Qi'ra looked at Isdain, and then at the stormtroopers flanking him. Then, she smiled and stood up slowly. As she did, she saw his eyes widen as he took in her remarkable figure, very well highlighted by her black gown. As she stood, Qi'ra made a hand signal at Inu, as small as she could possibly make it. Back.
Inu nodded, and he eased out of view.
"You are absolutely right, Isdain," Qi'ra said, slowly approaching the old Imperial, swaying her curvy hips gracefully from side to side. "That would be very bad for my business."
"It would, wouldn't it?" said Isdain with a slight stammer in his voice. He was finding it hard to focus with Qi'ra showing off her graceful body.
"And I'm sure you can find a much better use for my resources?" Qi'ra cooed, puffing her busty chest out.
"Of course I can," Isdain said, not taking his eyes off Qi'ra's chest, which looked so enticing even concealed beneath her gown.
Qi'ra gracefully walked up to Isdain until she was only a foot away from him. "You obviously have a great vision for the future, Isdain. Maybe we could do it together?"
Isdain's arrogance and lust had overridden his common sense. He had lowered his guard. So he did not see Qi'ra finger with something inside her gown. "Yes, my dear," he droned. "We can definitely…"
Isdain never finished his sentence. At that very moment, Qi'ra made her move. With lightning speed she produced a small tube from her gown and sprayed a torrent of sleeping gas into the face of Isdain and his stormtroopers. A moment later, Isdain fell to the floor, unconscious.
The stormtroopers, on the other hand, remained standing, for the filters in their helmets protected them from the effects of the gas. Nevertheless, the cloud of gas obscured their vision, and that moment was enough for the lightning fast Qi'ra to pull out her pistol and shoot them all dead, her sharp memory having memorized their locations to do so.
Qi'ra smiled with smug satisfaction at her handiwork and hoisted her pistol. She herself had been unaffected by the sleeping gas because she had taken a drug that made her immune to it. "Men are so gullible," she scoffed, remembering with a mixture of amusement and guilt how easily Han had fallen for her lie that she would leave Crimson Dawn to be with him again.
Qi'ra then remembered a very important detail; Isdain and his fellow Imperials had come in a 230 meter long Light Cruiser that was armed with several Turbolasers and contained several TIE fighters. So she pressed a button on her com-link; a signal.
Outside, there were the sounds of blaster shots as Qi'ra's other henchmen ambushed and took out the remaining stormtroopers, and thus took control of their ships.
A few moments later, Inu stepped out of hiding. "Good work, milady," he complimented.
"Thank you, Inu," Qi'ra acknowledged the compliment. "Take these men out of my sight and throw them in the ocean," she ordered.
"Yes, milady," Inu nodded obediently. "And what should we do with their ships?"
"We'll keep them of course," Qi'ra said. "We need every ship we need. But make sure the ships' tracking beacons are removed and destroyed as soon as possible."
"Yes, milady," Inu nodded respectfully. He called several red-garbed Hylodon bodyguards and together they dragged the unconscious Isdain and his dead stormtroopers away, to be thrown into the ocean, where they would be forgotten.
Qi'ra sat back down in her chair and smiled more broadly. Once again, she had used her sharp wit and her feminine charms to outsmart an arrogant, cruel, stupid, evil man who had underestimated her. She spent several minutes relaxing in her chair, savoring her victory.
Just then, Qi'ra's console beeped…