Chapter 108

Two weeks.

That's how long it took to get to this moment - traveling in the expansive, very slow elevator up the side of the Senate Apartment Complex.

Eight days of which had been enduring the equally slow ride accompanying the kirosian and other slaves we had purchased. We remained undercover for as long as possible and only when we were back in Republic space, was the veil dropped to the rescued slaves.

There had been shock, amazement, astonishment which quickly morphed to relief, happiness and parties of celebration on board for the majority of them. That was unfortunately not the case for those who had been conditioned the longest, who refused to believe their slavery was over, that it was all just another trick or test.

We had done our best, but had to hand them off at the first friendly port which could help, which turned out to be Kashyyyk.

The wookiees had a long memory of slavery at the hands of many culprits over the millenia and consequently a near institutionally preserved knowledge of how to deprogram slaves.

We eventually left the slow bulk transport ships at Umbara, commandeering a Nu class military shuttle to greatly speed our return.

When we finally landed on Coruscant directly into the Jedi Temple Complex, it was to endure a wait for the Council to actually convene and conduct our debriefing. Most of which centered around Zygerria and our experiences there.

The moment we could leave, we got the first speeder that could carry two Jedi, a wookiee and an astromech, broke a number of air traffic regulations getting to the Federal Senate district and landed at the Senatorial skyscraper.

I gave a sideways grin towards Anakin, who was standing as still as a statue. His body language and aura gave off a feeling of indomitability and the only tick of impatience shown was when he would occasionally ride on the balls of his feet.

"What?" he asked with a frown.

I tugged a crease out of my Hapan Jedi outfit's top and settled my hands behind my back, "I'm proud of you, Skyguy. A few years ago you would've already hacked this elevator to speed it up."

He snorted in amusement, staring through the expansive transparisteel wall and the amazing view it offered of the late afternoon Senate district. "Don't think the idea hasn't occurred to me."

"If it's any consolation, I imagined throwing Stasis on quite a few of the masters of the Council who were a bit long winded, shall we say."

He chuckled at my admission. "Now that would be a sight to see, if only for the look on their faces after they free themselves."

The elevator finally came to a stop at the penthouse level, the doors swished open and we stepped into the entrance lobby of Padme's apartment.

Only to come face to face with Captain Gregar Typho, RNSF and Padme's loyal bodyguard who I sensed was like a boiling pot and ready to erupt at the first opportunity.

"Captain Typho," Anakin greeted the man with a formal bow, any trace of levity absent.

"General Skywalker, Commander Tano," Typho nodded at us stiffly. His single eye narrowed at Chewie. "Who is…?"

"Oh, apologies, this is Chewbacca, Tech Sergeant in the GAR and I am the holder of his life-debt," I explained.

Typho nodded but was clearly not in a trusting mood, "Do you vouch for him?"

"With my life, Captain."

"Very well, thank you for coming," he sighed wearily. He gestured for us to follow and we passed through the interior security doors and into the long luxurious hallway of the greater apartment. "Perhaps you will just be the final pieces needed that can unlock the mystery the senator has left us."

We stopped outside a door I had never entered, but knew to be her senatorial office space she maintained when she wanted to work at home.

Typho tapped in a code and the security system scanned him before the door slid aside with a hiss.

"I've left it as untouched as possible after my own investigation stalled," he stated.

The room beyond was a relatively small space with an elegantly molded wooden desk, imported straight from Naboo. It had a number of wall racks for datapad storage, a large group portrait of the extended Amidala family and a number of pot plants to give it the final touch of organic comfort to the otherwise sterile space. It was a space that I could imagine Padme keeping very organized but now the desk was littered with strewn datapads and the computer terminal was pushed slightly askew.

"What findings did you make?" Anakin asked with a worried frown as he opened his senses to the office.

"That the senator can now seemingly be a ghost when she wants to be," Typho said with frustration. "She received a call a few days before she began to behave strangely. It was from Duja, a former handmaiden from her time as queen. What was said in that call, I unfortunately don't know. It was marked personal, so I had no cause to screen or listen in and Senator Amidala deleted any record of it afterward from the communication system.

"Then she abruptly preflighted and left on her H-type yacht at the exact moment when I wouldn't be in any position to question or even stop her, when I was at a meeting with Alderaanian Security. She gave all the other RNSF guards busy work as distractions. She even left C-3P0 behind." Typho was now even more tightly wound and I sensed he would like nothing more than to break something.

I felt Anakin's general worry become grim. "Have you tried to restore the call record?"

"One of the RNSF staff here is a fairly good data slicer, she tried but the senator used a deletion program that did a very thorough job."

"R2, see what you can do," Anakin ordered.

The droid trilled an affirmative, rolling forward around the desk to plug himself into the terminal's logic port.

"What can you tell us about Duja, her history, anything you think might be relevant, Captain?" I asked, feeling that the path to Padme began there.

Typho's fists clenched as he watched R2 work and then his single eye met mine, "Duja, was one of the original group of handmaidens that were recruited to join Queen Amidala when she was first elected to the post. All of them were very close and she remains in touch with them. It was one of the reasons I didn't think much of the communication between Duja and the senator."

He paused at this point, collecting his thoughts and clearly debating with himself about something. "As I'm sure you're aware, Naboo handmaidens are more than just personal caretakers of the queen. They're also chosen based on other criteria, such as Sabé, who was chosen to be the queen's body double and further trained as a bodyguard. Duja could also be a body double, but she was trained in something else entirely."

Typho stopped himself again.

"What was it, captain?" Anakin frowned, we were both sensing Typho's inner conflict at this point.

"She's probably going to fire me for this, maybe even set a nice appointment with a Naboo judge but at least she'll be alive to do so," he said, his shoulders sagging somewhat. "Duja was trained in spycraft. She became Queen Amidala's hidden eyes and ears not just in Theed, but also abroad on other planets. One of the queen's security reforms was the creation of a very unofficial, off-the-books intelligence cadre. I'd hate to call it an actual agency, since that would imply a headquarters and an institution, which went against the very idea of it remaining out of sight. They're more a secret division of the RNSF if anything."

"Well, that's certainly a surprise, but it makes sense in retrospect," I folded my arms. "Let me guess, this Intel division was targeting Naboo's only enemy at the time - the Trade Federation."

"Just so," Typho confirmed. "The queen wanted early warning the next time they tried their luck. Remember, at the time, there was no GAR. For many years we felt that the Federation would come back to finish the job, regardless of what penalties the Senate heaped on them. After Queen Amidala finished her terms of office, Duja was formally recruited into the RNSF Intel division. As far as I'm aware, the spying against the Trade Federation hasn't stopped at all."

"Queen Neeyutnee probably increased their budget with the Clone Wars," Anakin theorized.

"You may deduce that if you wish," Typho shrugged evasively.

"So in essence, Duja is a spy for the RNSF Intel Division," I summarized. "She called Padme ostensibly just for a friendly chat to catch up, but then Padme goes rogue and ditches all her security to fly out into the galaxy. Clearly, their talk was about something more critical than the latest Naboo fashion or gossip from Queen Neeyutnee's court."

"Which is why I'm hoping R2 can find something. I've been trying to keep the senator's disappearance as quiet as possible. There are a lot of enemies who would see her dead or as a hostage, not just among the Separatists. That limits the amount of expertise I can call on."

"Is it just the local RNSF on Coruscant who knows?" Anakin asked.

"Yes, there's no practical way to hide that from them, but they're all my men and women, I vouch for every one of them. I've managed to placate them with the knowledge that you were coming to help. Admittedly, I could do more if I had called Theed and the rest of the RNSF on Naboo, but there would be no guarantees. At this moment, the best defense the senator has is secrecy."

I nodded, "Chewie, what would you need to trace a probable path for the senator's yacht from Coruscant?"

"A transponder number for her ship, assuming she didn't turn it off at some point or scramble it," he groaned fluently in his native tongue.

I saw Typho's frown of incomprehension, "He needs her yacht's transponder," I translated.

He pulled out his personal datapad from a pocket and walked over to Chewie.

The wookiee pulled out his own much larger pad and they tapped their respective devices together briefly, before beginning a data transfer.

"Got it, I'll see what I can do," Chewie growled, staring into the pad and typing into it rapidly.

'Masters, I've managed some partial image reconstructions of the call,' R2 trilled.

"Good work, R2, show us," Anakin said.

The droid's upper holo projector lit up and the flatscreen image of a rather beautiful woman appeared in the air.

"That's Duja," Typho confirmed.

It was uncanny and I could easily see why the woman had been picked as a possible body double for Padme at one point. There were differences naturally, especially now that both were older. However, with the amount of traditional makeup a queen of Naboo wore, it was easy to imagine at a young age that they could play deceptive games. Duja's nose and lips were subtly different now, her eyes were blue to Padme's brown and she wore her hazel brown hair much longer and in a simple braid. She was more athletic in overall body shape, which was not surprising given her more active occupation.

"Anything else, R2?"

'The audio was even more thoroughly scrambled by the deletion software. I think it's actually the primary focus of this specific program, but I'll see what I can do.'

"Do your best. Captain, did C-3P0 say or spot anything that could help?"

"I talked at length to the droid," Typho's exasperated expression could only come from long experience dealing with the insufferable protocol droid. "The senator, it seems, was particularly careful to keep him in the dark. He noticed nothing odd and she sent him to the building's droid maintenance for an oil bath just before she left."

"Where is he?"

"In the recharge socket down the hallway."

Clever Padme, I thought with a fond annoyance.

She had clearly come to the conclusion that I was using C-3P0 as a means of surveillance somehow. I had perhaps been a bit too brazen in using the droid during the Senator Clovis spying saga.

"I have the beginning of a trail for the senator," Chewie announced. "She left the Coruscant system at the Ixtlar hyper point, using the Corellian Run to go galactic southward. The Xorth waypoint station registered her ship, which confirms that direction."

"Did Corellian traffic control spot her?" I asked, imagining a galactic hyperspace map in my mind's eye.

"Checking," Chewie tapped and swiped on his datapad. "Yes, she left via the Chasin point, going down the Corellian Trade Spine… spotted in Hosnian Prime, Bestine, Moorja… She turned onto the Great Gran Run, heading galactic west. Noe'ha'on is the last place I confirm her ship being. Any system beyond that really doesn't like putting their traffic data onto the Holonet or they refuse to even have Holonet receivers on their worlds."

Typho was clearly getting annoyed at being the only one in the room unable to comprehend Shyriiwook.

"He traced her to the Western Reaches, Noe'ha'on."

He referenced the system on his own pad quickly and scoffed, "The only thing of interest there is a single world, insectoid native race, which only became space faring because off-world traders used the place as a waypoint station. There's no known Separatist activity in that region of space. Why would the senator go in that direction?"

"Logic would suggest because Duja went in that direction," I shrugged, tapping my vambrace to bring up a holomap, having reached the limit of what I could remember of the hyperspace maps of the area of the Great Gran Run was projected above my arm for everyone to see. "Could Duja have wanted a direct face to face meeting with the senator on Noe'ha'on?"

"Entirely possible," Anakin sighed with annoyance, rubbing his face. "We at least have a general direction to go in now. Snips, the Omen is still on Coruscant, isn't she?"

"Yes, still sitting in a Jedi Temple hangar. Why? You think we should use her for this trip?"

"Yes, she has firepower and speed, something I have a feeling we're going to need."

"Find the senator, please," Typho said with a single imploring eye. "I wish I could come with you, but I need to keep an eye on Representative Binks and hold up the fort here."

"Good luck."

The issue of us leaving on a journey that could last well beyond nine days, going in just one direction was thankfully solved by Obi-Wan having a brief chat with Master Yoda. Our daring rescue of so many slaves from the heart of CIS space, meant the leeway was there for us to go on this off-the-books mission of 'supporting' Senator Amidala in her duties.

So we boarded the Mandalorian Kom'rk class fighter/transport, packed with extra provisions, consumables and our respective war chests, before blasting off Coruscant with all the haste we could manage given the busy traffic conditions.

I sat back in the pilot's seat as the tunnel of hyperspace streamed past the forward view and started manipulating the holo controls hovering in front of me, bringing up a highly detailed map of the Great Gran Run.

My eyes scanned each system along the hyperspace corridor, bringing up the info on each, trying to see if anything significant would jump out at me.

After nearly three hours of trying, I pushed the holomap away from me in disgust.

There were just too many possibilities.

Especially because the Western Reaches was the literal frontier that brushed up against the Unknown Regions.

"Got anything, Snips?"

Anakin sat down in the co-pilot's chair, his tunic and pants stained with all sorts of engineering fluids. He, together with Chewie and R2 had worked on improving the Omen's hyperdrive. They hadn't managed anything before we had to jump to hyperspace, but they were confident they could tweak the ship to reach a 0.8 rating from its normal 1.0.

I shook my head, "We're not on a firm enough path. Too much potential motion in the future, too many destinations and intersections. I'm not finding the golden mean."

He nodded, "Ten days with a whole galaxy ahead of us and the Western Reaches, that is not surprising. R2 is still working on reconstructing the call. He thinks he might be able to rebuild fragments of the audio in a few days."

"Wow, he can usually work his magic in minutes."

"The deletion program used was very impressive. I've never heard R2 make so many frustrated tones in the face of a challenge like this. Makes me wonder where Padme got it from."

"One of the many questions we'll ask when we find her."

He slapped his own knee in annoyance, "Sithspit! What's worth doing all this? What's so critical that she had to go in person? Worrying us and shutting us out."

"We can only be content that the bond is still there, Skyguy. If she was truly in trouble she would open back up."

"There is that at least."

Two days later we came out of hyperspace in the Sedratis system.

The Omen had already shaved off twelve hours from our predicted arrival time thanks to R2's navigation and their collective tweaking of the hyperdrive.

"Do you have them?" Anakin asked the holo of the grungy looking man wearing a mechanic's overall and a toolbelt.

"The new ZS compressors? Sure we do. Fresh off the line from CEC."

"Good, we'll take six, how much for you to get in your ship and rendezvous with us the moment we land in Corellian space?"

Zarrer Sem, starship engineer, who also owned his own dealership in Corellia, scratched his balding head in thought. "Add 200 credits and I'll add in a complementary spare."

"Deal, we'll arrive in six hours. Transmitting coordinates and credits."

Sem looked to the side and nodded. "Received on my end. Thank you for your business and see you soon." He casually saluted with two fingers before his holo vanished.

I chuckled and smirked from the copilot seat as Anakin pushed the Omen on a high thrust burn that would see us get to the onward Corellia hyperpoint in less than thirty-two minutes.

"3200 credits for a bunch of hypermatter compressors, Skyguy?"

"It's worth it, Snips. If my calculations are correct, it'll get us to 0.75."

"Next thing you'll know, you're going to push us to 0.5," I joked.

"Snips, this ship's reactor would need to be bigger or we'd have to install a secondary to even have a hope of reaching 0.6." He chuckled and gave me a flinty stare. "You think they're going to crack .55?"

He was talking about the current rated maximum speed anyone had achieved with a hyperdrive. It was a constantly shifting balance of elements in starship design which determined its final speed; mass, the energy output of its reactor, hyperspace field geometries around the ship, the shielding against the Cronau radiation - which was what everyone looked for to determine if a ship had jumped to hyperspace.

Try to push one element of that equation, you inevitably have to make concessions in another part of it.

It was very tempting to tell Anakin that within less than a generation a certain future smuggler would routinely hit 0.5 in his old, highly modified Corellian YT 1300 light freighter.

Not sure he would believe it though.

"Anything's possible-"

My teasing was interrupted when a triumphant R2 wheeled his way into the cockpit of the Omen, screeching in Binary.

'Yes, take that you loathsome algorithm! I have bested you!'

"R2?"

The astromech spun on the spot, his Binary devolving into a rumbling chirpy tone that my montrals really didn't like.

"R2?! Relax," Anakin lightly thumped the droid on his upper dome.

'Oh! Yes, sorry Master Anakin. I've just been so frustrated with this data restoration! I just know HK is going to be ever so smug about it. That he could've done it in a day… Oh how that droid vexes my circuits.'

"How much did you manage to restore?"

'A total of eight seconds of audio synchronized video.'

"That's amazing R2, but is there anything that tells us where Padme went?"

R2 snorted in an offended tone, 'I would not be this excited if there wasn't, Master.'

His holoprojector came to life and the image of Duja appeared again, only this time she was actually moving and speaking.

"...good to see…"

"...what I've found…"

"...need to come…"

"...can't speak over active comms…"

"...dangerous…"

"...tuu, quickly…"

Anakin and I both frowned at each other, wondering what R2 had seen or heard that would let him react like this.

"Okay, R2, what did you manage to find out of that?" he asked.

'Duja mentions a location at the last snippet, you can't hear it fully, but I did a regressive visual analysis of her lips, then cross referenced the partial word, against every possible system, planet or station in the Western Reaches. I found a match… Batuu."

The droid projected a galactic map which zoomed in until the system in question was highlighted.

"That's practically on the edge of the Unknown Regions, one of the last two ports of civilization before you run smack into the Galactic Barrier," I said and could see Anakin's mind had also gone to the same place.

We both knew that the Barrier, a great cosmic string of hyperspace anomalies triggered by a controlled series of supernovae, was put there by the Celestials as a great redoubt against the various horrors that had been birthed in the western sectors of the galaxy. Bentu had given us both a bare overview of what lurked there and would teach us more in the future when we were ready for it.

The problem was, with time the Barrier had been shifting and in some parts even decaying, allowing limited travel into and out of the Unknown Regions. Many explorers and scientists, unable to resist their curiosity, braved that region of space, using painstakingly slow single system hops with hyperspace to find those gaps and routes.

Batuu was founded by such efforts and the hyper route towards it was on very thin margins of safety.

"R2, begin plotting us a course for Batuu, as quick as you can get us there," Anakin ordered.

'Yes, master.'

My eyes widened as my Prescience unfolded into a much more narrowed tapestry, with our destination properly determined.

"Snips?"

Two massive nexus points of decision were approaching, which had the potential to utterly ruin the galaxy in the near term and long term.

"I take it back, Skyguy. We are not going to have a stern talk with Padme. We are going to thank her for her initiative and being brave enough to follow in the footsteps of her old handmaiden. Her evasiveness and secrecy from us was simply to spare us the worry over something we couldn't change. She had to act on the time sensitive information and couldn't wait for us to return."

"What? What is it?"

"We are going to meet someone on this journey, someone critical and I can't tell you more because of who he is. It's bad enough that I know and it's going to be the hardest challenge of my life trying to deceive him." I gave him an imploring stare.

Eventually Anakin nodded, "I see what you're getting at. Knowledge would taint my actions and reactions, which if this person…"

I raised a hand to stop him, "Enough, Skyguy. No more speculation, it will only make things worse. I need some meditation time." My feet quickly beat a retreat from the cockpit.

This was going to be… shit.

The next four days of travel along the Corellian Trade Spine passed uneventfully, with us breezing through waypoints and systems at a satisfying pace, thanks to the Omen's augmented hyperdrive now pushed to a rating of 0.72.

It was quite heavier on the fuel reserves, increasing the ship's consumption by roughly 40% per light year traveled.

This was rather unacceptable given our final destination and while we knew that Batuu was built up and civilized enough to service starships with no issue, there was no guarantee that we would be able to avail ourselves of those services.

So we called ahead to the world of Kinyen, the crossroads system which would see us turning off the Trade Spine and onto the Great Gran Run.

Not only did we refuel, but mechanics were waiting with a secondary fuel tank, which would sit in the empty troop bay and was properly bolted down into the ship's decking. It was a rather crude patch job that Chewie, Anakin and R2 would be finishing to acceptable standards whilst we forged onward.

A day later we were passing through the Noe'ha'on system and our smooth sailing was interrupted for the first time.

I frowned in annoyance as the probability lines coalesced and nothing I tried would let us evade the half squadron of pirate fighters that had decided to pick the Omen as a target.

My hands tightened reflexively on the yoke, before I swiped through the various holographic controls hovering around me in the cockpit.

"Listen up everyone," I spoke over the PA. "Secure for battle stations. We've got pirates waiting for us at the onward Natalon hyper point. They're on an intercept that'll catch us before we can jump, twenty minutes to contact."

Barely half a minute later I found myself demoted to co-pilot, handling the rear facing laser cannons, R2 was plugged into the navicomputer and Chewie had rushed into the small engineering compartment on the lowest deck for damage control.

Anakin surveyed the sensor readouts on our opponents, "Six Uglies, looks like they combined starfighter parts of Corellian and Hoar Chall manufacture. Two cannons mounted under the cockpit, single concussion missile launcher." He grabbed the yoke and pushed hard on the throttle. The Omen surged with acceleration, reducing the intercept time. "What I don't get is why select us as a target? They can clearly see we are not just a toothless transport."

"They think they have enough firepower on their side to make it irrelevant. Another point, do you think those things have hyperdrives?" I asked grimly.

"No, so they have a larger ship to dock or even land on. Anything on sensors that fits the bill?"

"Nothing obvious that our scopes can see in the system. The largest ships are around Noe'ha'on at the moment, it's all light traffic."

He nodded, "Warming up the proton launcher."

I didn't have to tell him that we only had six torpedoes and no way to refill the magazine. It was an aftermarket modification done on any Kom'rk used by the Blades to give them the ability to punch above their weight class. The price they paid was losing the ability to engage in a long range missile duel, which was a job relegated to escorting Fang fighters.

I focused on the holo screens that were my province, throwing active sensor sweeps and readying every ECM and ECCM system, which R2 would help me manage. There was little more the droid could do with regard to our hyperspace jump. Astrophysics wasn't going to change in this situation to let us jump early, which was clearly why the pirates had picked this system as a hunting ground.

"Missile target locks!" I announced, as the range closed to under 20 000 km. "ECM active."

R2 found the hostile frequencies and immediately began jamming.

The pirates' own computers began compensating, shifting phase and frequencies to maintain the locks.

"Oh no you don't!" I gritted my teeth, as I frantically swished my fingers through the holocontrols, letting off a burst of targeted modulated EM in a forward cone.

It worked in buying time, letting R2 find the new frequency and phase.

For the next twenty seconds we played this back and forth, until R2 had enough of a reading on the enemy targeting that he could compensate as fast as their onboard computers could switch. If only CIS systems were so easy to counter.

"Good work, cannon range in five seconds, hang on."

Anakin began shifting and jinking the Omen randomly through space whilst maintaining our forward charge.

He jinked left, then right, before abruptly rolling the Omen, triggering the forward cannons whilst using thrusters to yaw and walk his cannon fire.

The pirates opened fire even as one of them died to Anakin's prescient targeting.

The Ugly burst apart into three pieces right at their weakest points before the final shot hit a fuel tank and sent a blue plasmatic explosion flaring out into space.

The Omen tanked one hit on the forward shields as the five pirates shot past us, frantically trying to yaw their fighters around to pump shots into our aft quarter.

Anakin's evasive piloting was spot on and with a viscous glee I fired a stream of deflection shots from the rear facing cannons.

The Ugly's deflectors absorbed two shots before popping under military grade power, whilst one shot slammed right into the cockpit, incinerating the pilot, and the final shot turned the fighter into an expanding field of debris.

The surviving pirates were already flipped over and fighting to shed their momentum to pursue.

It took a precious few seconds and it was clear this bunch had grown used to uncontested hunts. I could feel the shock and frustration, which quickly turned to anger. They still had their squad leader and he managed to keep them rallied and focused on the job.

They tried anew to get missile locks, sidestepping R2's constant efforts for only two seconds, not enough time for their own systems to fire and cycle.

The sensors pinged for attention, "Incoming hyper signature ahead."

"I see it," Anakin confirmed as a much larger pirate ship emerged.

At first glance, you would mistake it for a 150 meter long light freighter, with a roughly cylindrical hull and a squared aft section that housed the main engines. The twenty starfighter grade laser cannons bolted on every arc of the ship put paid to that notion. It was also a crude patchwork and definitely wasn't a job done in any shipyard worth the name.

Anakin, using dorsal and ventral thrusters, jinked the Omen with a calm purpose, even as the enemy's forward facing cannons started to fire on us.

"R2, get me a passive lock with the torpedoes on that thing. They haven't thrown any detailed scans our way, so they may just think we only have concussion missiles."

I triggered another stream of cannon fire from the rear guns as the pirates brought themselves into range again.

They tried to jink and evade, but only ended up running straight into my fire as I did the laser cannon equivalent of a boxing feint - firing in a direction only to abruptly shift my aim and target.

The Ugly's missile launcher exploded in a bright protonic white, turning the surrounding fighter into debris no bigger than my fist.

Doing this while Anakin was going crazy with maneuvering was an especially nice challenge, even with Jedi precog helping.

He triggered the forward cannons, raking fire all over the charging frigate's forward shields even as they answered with as much return fire as they could.

"Taking out another pirate would be very useful, Snips," he said with gritted teeth as our forward shields took another hit.

The pirate guns were not military grade, but they were black market, pushed to the limits and couldn't be ignored as our forward shields were battered down to half-strength.

"Trying, but someone is flying like they took some Death sticks," I said with a big grin as the Omen shuddered, the shields tanking another hit.

"Ha ha," he said, rolling his eyes.

I triggered both rear cannons, their limited traversal angle not helping matters, but managed to walk my fire into another Ugly.

"R2, stand by on hyperdrive," Anakin ordered.

I looked up and my eyes widened as the Omen was now barreling straight towards the pirate frigate at maximum acceleration.

Oh great, he's going for one of those maneuvers.

My hands slewed on the holocontrols, switching fire modes, as I basically dumped the rear cannon's full capacitor, delivering a rapid fire stream of blue cannon bolts behind the Omen.

The remaining fighters on our tail died in brief explosions as Anakin pulled out every maneuver that was physically possible.

I felt his thanks at my efforts and he switched our shields into Double-Front mode without pause.

It shored up our forward shield damage and added more on top.

We were closing so fast on the enemy frigate now that I doubted we'd have more than three seconds to actually deliver torpedoes.

"Any time now, Skyguy!" I winced, there was also definite butt puckering going on.

Anakin triggered a stream of fire from the forward cannons to pepper the frigate shields further, before slewing the yoke over hard, his finger triggering a torpedo.

The Omen had barely three kilometers of separation at that moment, its starboard thrusters firing at just the right time to avert the ship plowing straight through the enemy.

Instead, it skimmed away to port, whilst Anakin yawed to keep our nose facing the passing frigate, where more of our cannon shots scythed down its length.

In that moment, our torpedo detonated on the frigate's forward shields.

The bright flash heralded a hammer of protons that popped it easily, with enough bleedthrough to tear great gaping holes in the poorly armored hull.

Something gave up the ghost inside the frigate and all the shields went down…

Anakin pumped every cannon shot he could into the enemy's engines, before yawing the Omen around in line with our momentum and resuming our burn towards the jump point.

My scan showed the pirate frigate had been turned into a coffin for the crew. One that was leaking air, debris and spewing flame which was quickly smothered by the vacuum of space.

We hit the invisible point in space and Anakin pushed forward the holocontrol of the hyperdrive motivator.

Omen's form blurred and leaped forward into hyperspace.

He folded his arms and grinned at me, "Nice shooting, Snips."

I rolled my eyes in exasperation, "Nice flying. Got your adrenaline rush?"

"Give me a break, you know how long it's been since I've done any proper combat flying."

That made me pause in thought, "I suppose you have a point. Don't worry, Skyguy, with any luck we'll get back to the Resolute just in time to run into the CIS ghost fleet."

"Still can't believe they haven't found them," he sighed. "Though it makes perfect sense from an enemy perspective. Ties up yet more resources and ships as we try to hunt them, while we have yet another frontline battlespace to worry about."

He pushed his seat back and got up. "Let's go R2, see what repairs are needed. I want this bucket in top shape for what's coming."

We powered through the Gran Trade Run, which ended in the Cerea system, before turning onto the Spar Trade Route to take us further west.

Another day's travel had us reaching Annaj and the Moddell sector.

A place notable only to me because we were only a few hours of travel away from the Endor system.

The hyperspace routes here were now truly turning into a dense clustered net, some of the systems didn't even have proper names yet, still only designated by their discovery numbers. We now had to turn north for a full day on a hyperspace route named Houche's Run.

A few hours beyond that we emerged into the Rattatak system and Anakin indulged his inner fighter jock some more as we blasted our way through a small Weequay pirate patrol that launched from the planet.

Then, at last, ten hours of hyperspace later, we emerged in the Batuu system.

The emergence point was just a few light seconds from the planet itself and we beheld the rare sight of a garden world sitting in the very narrow habitable zone that surrounded a trinary star cluster.

The place was beautiful from orbit; streaks of expansive continent sized forests, mountain ranges and oceans, overlaid with carpets of clouds being birthed and dying in a never-ending march of weather around the planet.

It was home to a cauldron of 200 000 people representing many species of the galaxy and had been settled for close to a century by now with five cities springing up to house them. It only had a modest local industry and agriculture to support the population, but was just enough for their needs. The locals technically flew the banner of the Republic, but it was lip service at best and their taxes barely represented a rounding error in the grand scheme of things.

This was the absolute frontier and the troubles of the rest of the galaxy and Core Worlds was a very distant thing. The most people had to worry about here was piracy from Rattatak.

"All right, putting us in a high orbit, anything on scanners, Snips?"

"Only two cities are in range, Skirl and Surabat. The yacht transponder is not registering there, nor am I detecting the unique signature of Naboo plasma." It was very handy that Nubian starships had power systems that made direct use of the substance. It made them stand out from the crowd, not only in terms of their near artistic aesthetic design.

I felt him reach out with the Force and it didn't take long for the verdict. He closed his eyes and I could feel his struggle to master his frustrated anger, "She's not down there."

My own senses pushed out and I could only agree. "Yes, but let's be thorough with our scan for her ship."

Anakin frowned at me for a moment, "You think she left it behind for some reason?"

"It's too unique and recognizable. If she ran into trouble, especially if it involves the CIS…" I trailed off.

"Then she'd procure other transport, a local ship that wouldn't be recognized."

"Or they are using Duja's ship, which would definitely not be a Nubian model."

"All right, let's keep scanning, if we can find Padme's ship, between myself and R2 we can definitely open it. Hopefully, it can tell us where she went or find nearby witnesses."

I could tell he was now in a battle with himself to accept the minor hope of the path forward being revealed.

The next two cities we orbited over also had no Nubian ship signature in them and Anakin altered the Omen's course abruptly to power directly to the final city.

"Got it," I smiled with relief. "There's a Nubian power signature landed on the outskirts of Black Spire Outpost." Before Anakin could even begin a descent, the computer chimed a warning. "We're being scanned," I announced.

"Source?"

"A ship, slightly larger than we are, 13 000 clicks and closing on a very leisurely intercept course."

I grabbed the holoscreen displaying the data and chucked it forward to enlarge.

"Don't recognize that design," he frowned, studying the distinctly asymmetric ship.

It had a centralized flat hull, with a thick left nacelle that jutted from the port side, which tapered to a thin point towards the front. The nacelle coming from starboard was much smaller, but also tapered. The hull was a bone white color that stood in stark contrast to the blackness of space behind it.

"You're not alone, the ship database has zero potential matches. Not even partial percentages… I think we're looking at something completely 'alien', Skyguy." The computer chimed again. "Their scans are ramping up, it might be a prelude to a target lock."

"How sure are you of that?"

"Not 100%, these scans are not like any scan system I'm familiar with. Which only leads credence to the fact, we might be dealing with an entirely new race."

Anakin nodded, "We are on the borders to the Unknown Regions, it's always been rumored that there are spacefaring species within that mess."

"Should we actively scan them in turn?"

Now he was really frustrated, on the one hand, Padme, but then there was our duty as representatives of the Republic in a potential First Contact.

It was not an entirely unknown situation to the Republic but was becoming increasingly rare as the millennia marched on and the star charts grew ever larger. All Jedi had a minimum of training by the Explorer Corps in the Academy on the do's and don'ts.

One of the biggest don'ts was to ignore it, unless you were busy fighting for your life.

He hit a fist against his own knee in frustration as he made the decision. "Return the favor, Snips."

"Scanning… Hull is composed of an unknown element. Particle shielding seems similar to systems that were in common use two centuries ago and I'm reading nothing indicative of a shield system as we know it."

"So we have the upper hand if it comes to a fight."

"Maybe," I gave him a mild warning glare. "Their hull might shrug off a proton torpedo for all we know. Minimal weaponry, which looks like a plasma projector in nature. The hyperdrive signature is about the only thing we can evaluate with certainty. Finally, I'm reading two unknown life signs within the craft… and they've cut off their scans."

"Shut down ours as well."

I did so and began shunting all the data we were gathering into a stealth buoy, just in case everything went to shit.

"Incoming transmission on broadband frequencies."

"Let's hear it."

What came through was a language neither of us recognized, spoken by a male voice that radiated a calm confidence.

I shook my head, "Computer is working on a translation, but it's not a dedicated protocol droid. It estimates it'll take at least an hour to even guess."

Anakin closed his eyes, taking in the sounds from the alien voice, reaching out with the Force and applying his own polyglot brain to the language.

If there was one bit of slight envy that I would always have towards Anakin, then it would be his talent for languages. If I only counted languages from my current incarnation, I was fluent in Basic, Togrutan and Mando'a. In a pinch, I could get by with Huttese. To learn more I would have to do it the hard way, though I could turbo charge the learning with the Force.

He pushed the transmit button and spoke, "Unidentified ship, this is General Anakin Skywalker of the Galactic Republic. You are now in Republic sovereign space, state your intentions. Kmä kany blokïb nyeny ral…" He now turned to a completely different language and I could hear him shift to two other languages in turn. Only through the Force could I infer that it was just a repetition of what he had said in Basic.

He lifted his hand off the transmit button finally and there was silence for a brief moment over the link. Then the same alien voice returned, only speaking an entirely different language. Anakin absorbed it like a sponge, nodding his head. "Okay, at least I got that across, they're cycling languages that they also know."

"You realize the chances of us having an overlap are very, very small, unless…" I trailed off and wanted to slap myself. "Of course, their comlink. Our encoding shouldn't even be compatible. Yet they're clearly transmitting in a way that our computer can interpret." I consulted the readouts. "It's old, but they're using the Ceno-31 standard."

Anakin smiled, "Good catch. This is clearly not a true First Contact as such. Whoever this race is, they've had dealings with unaffiliated races in the Outer Rim or they've been observing enough to get some idea of how communication is handled by the greater galaxy. It's a pity that old codec can't handle modern holographics, otherwise we could've at least had body language helping things along."

"Assuming they're bipedal humanoids-"

"Wait," he held up a finger to interrupt, then played with the holocontrols, rewinding a section of the transmission and listening carefully. "We're in luck, Snips. They know the Meese Caulf trade language."

Meese Caulf was one of three trade languages that was used in the Outer Rim. They were languages developed organically over eons to overcome the problem of communication between species who had widely divergent speech and speech organs.

Anakin tapped the comlink again and began babbling in said language.

All I heard was something that sounded like, "Saa yer la lu ngar hifo saa shak ngar…"

Again there was silence… before Meese Caulf was returned in full.

Anakin frowned as he listened and I felt his emotions turn from eager fascination at the challenge of new languages, to worry as he began to interpret the speech from the alien ship.

The moment was approaching and my stomach was starting to twist itself into nervous knots.

"What did he say?"

Anakin frowned and looked at me with dead serious eyes, "He basically introduced himself, 'I am Commander Mitth'raw'nuruodo, senior scout officer of the Chiss Expansionary Defense Fleet.'"

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