Chapter 38: Chapter 38

A Young Girl’s War Between the Stars

Serenno, 39 BBY/961 GSC.

The Serenno sun beat down on the open-air docking bay and turned the sheet-metal floor into a low-grade griddle that shimmered with heat haze. The air stank faintly of scorched durasteel, engine lubricant, and ozone discharge from the nearby traffic lanes. Work droids wheeled past in sluggish routines, and somewhere back, repulsor-lifts thrummed as they carried starships between levels.

“Alright, it’s done, boss!” chirped the mechanic walking beside me, earning a side eye from me.

The mechanic, Cindy, looked like the kind of woman you’d find on a pin-up poster lounging half-naked on a swoop bike: a busty blonde in oil-smudged booty shorts and mustard-yellow leather jacket crop top, topped off with a much abused and faded red cap. Neither hid the long strings of the salmon pink bikini she wore underneath. The weather was indeed hot, but showing this much skin was too much. Her entire slim midrift was showing for Force’s sake!

“Though why you’d want to hide that beautiful silver hull is beyond me.” She ran a gloved hand across the new finish of my ship.

My eye twitched as I wondered if the workshop sent me a booth babe instead of an actual mechanic because of how much I'm a big spender. Completely understandable from a business’ perspective, but as someone who was familiar with a marketing department’s playbook, it didn’t fill me with confidence with the quality of their services rendered.

I'd better make sure…

“I chose the refit, because I don’t want to be seen.” I looked over the list of modifications made to the Delta-6 and nodded. “Walk me through the modifications.”

“Yeah, yeah, I hear ya,” the blonde beamed down at me. “So, check it—canopy’s been swapped out for a double-shaded transparisteel number. Dark on the outside, crystal clear from inside. You’ll blend in just fine without spoiling your field of view.”

I stepped closer, hand trailing along the smooth matte finish.

Her finger tapped the tablet for the next item. “The transponder flips off with a switch, right on your dash. Same with the running lights. You wanna disappear, you disappear.”

I raised an eyebrow, impressed.

“Anchors top and bottom,” she went on, tapping the tablet again. “Mag clamps tuned for low-grav insertions, hull-conformal design so they don’t snag on a hard break. I personally handled the penetrators—bites into composite plating like a Serenno spine-wolf on a piece o’ meat. The rest of the ship’ll fall apart before the anchors give.”

“Perfect.” I peered under the hull, nodding at the subtle housing mounts and microthruster ports nestled in the seams in the platings.

“Port’s also hotter for your astromech,” she added. “We upgraded the socket to sync better with your tin can’s neural core. With that kind of connection, you take a hit hard enough to knock you out, and your droid can fly you home on half a nav array—assuming the sublight motivators aren’t in pieces.”

“Nice work,” I muttered, circling the nose cone. “Real nice.”

Finally, I signed my name on the bottom to confirm receipt and handed the pad to her. “Excellent work. I look forward to seeing this quality on my other ship.”

“Heh. Thanks, boss,” Cindy smiled brilliantly.

Glancing over at the Rusted Silver, I continued, “This isn’t a slight against your work, nor do I believe you to be untrustworthy. However, I need to use my astromech and I don’t feel comfortable leaving the ship open where anyone can walk in without someone to watch it. I will be gone most of the day, so I need to know if that’s feasible.”

The blonde woman nodded, reaching up and scratching at her cheek, leaving behind a black grease streak. “We’re done with the interior work for now. Have to go back to it eventually, but for today, we can focus on exterior stuff.”

“Thank you. I appreciate your understanding,” I sent her a smile.

Cindy nodded awkwardly and we made our way over to the Rusted Silver—her to recall her droids from inside, me to get my vac suit and armor on, arm up, and collect Arthree. When I stepped back outside, the mechanic whistled, looking me up and down with a grin.

“Damn. You mean business, huh? Who’s gonna have a bad day?”

“Pirates,” I answered simply, hurrying for the Delta-6, Arthree humming along beside me as he rolled across the concrete floor. Climbing in, I settled into the pilot’s chair and adjusted things to my liking, looking around and taking in the amenities, since I’d been wondering how these things were supposed to be used for long missions—especially given that the Delta-6 was one of the go-to ships the Jedi temple used.

The chair was comfortable enough and there was enough room to recline it for sleep. A set of controls on the armrest allowed a panel to open below the pilot to take care of the biological necessities a long flight would incur, including a small sonic scrubber for handling hygiene. There was a small chilled storage compartment that could hold food and a bin just above it that would warm it, while on the other side was a fresh water reservoir equipped with a retractable straw for drinking.

Arthree locked into the ship’s astromech slot and connected to its systems as I powered on and registered him as its assigned astromech. With that done, I went through the preflight sequence. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust my mechanic’s work—Cindy seemed to know what she was doing—but I preferred to be certain of these things when dealing with a machine that would be moving at Mach fuck, could kill me with a single moment of inattention or carelessness, and which would be going into space.

Everything checked out as far as the ship’s sensors and Arthree could tell, and a check with the Force showed no apparent danger to me in using it. I closed the hatch and pressure tested it before moving on to the last thing required before I could launch.

Staring at the ship name input, I hummed as I considered what to call it. The old computers had been yanked out and replaced, and the new ones had been scrubbed clean, so there was no preset name I could fly it under. Not that I would necessarily want to.

Well, what am I going to use it for? I mused, before chuckling. The answer to that question was obvious. This little ship was going to be a knife in the dark. Something I could use to get in very close to my intended target, then cut their throat.

I entered the name: Dagger.

The engine purred as I fired it up, and even that had a lower decibel range than other starships of its tonnage. I keyed in my flight plan, and traffic control pinged with a friendly ack as I waited for clearance. I didn’t have to wait long. As if on cue, the mechanic’s voice came in over the comms, filtered through the hangar’s civilian channel.

“Alright, boss, you’re cleared with traff-con.” There was a pause, then she added with a wink I could hear in her voice, “Come back anytime though!”

I keyed my mic. “Keep the grease warm for me.”

“Sure thing, boss!” Her laugh filtered through the comms. “Kick butt out there!”

Keeping it civil until I was clear of the hangar, I followed the speed cap like a good citizen. But the moment the city skyline dipped behind me, I pushed the throttle forward and felt the ship respond like it was scoffing at the challenge: the new thrusters kicked in—smooth, fast and mean. Even with the inertial dampener at full, between the planet’s gravity and the ship’s sudden acceleration, I found myself shoved back into my seat. It was impressive, I had to admit. Cindy had done a fine job tuning it up and getting it ready. However, as tempting as it was to look into poaching her for myself, I didn’t really have a need for a personal mechanic in my employ yet. One day perhaps, but no time soon.

Soon enough, blue skies thinned away to black vacuum of space. Stars began to cut through the glare of the upper atmosphere. Then, with a final shove from the suborbital engines, we broke free.

The silence of space settled and Arthree filled it with the beeping of the sensor suite flickering to life, overlaying a grid of orbital traffic—civilian ships, system patrol craft, and a few flagged vessels keeping their distance. A soft chime sounded as the droid highlighted one in particular: Ranger.

I leaned forward, tapped the console, and pinged them with a tight-beam ID burst. Mine, and the ship’s. A second later, the comms crackled to life—audio only. Another tap and I accepted the hail.

“Identification received, Dagger. How can the Ranger be of assistance?”

I raised an eyebrow as I realized that this comms officer was much more polite. Either it was a different shift, or the other guy had found himself rotated to some other duty. As far as disciplinary actions went, that was fair in my eyes, since no harm was done in the end and I well understood the stresses of being stuck in a hurry up and wait situation.

“Good morning, Ranger. Just calling in to let you know I’ll be going dark shortly. Please give Capt. Borgin my regards.”

There was a moment of silence, before the man answered, “Alright, we’ll let the other ships in orbit know. Cap says ‘good hunting, Dagger.’”

“Let’s hope so. Dagger out, Ranger.”

Signing off, I flipped off the transponder and running lights, then tapped the button on the panel to speak to Arthree. “Arthree, shut off your active sensors. We’re going to be running passive only so no one sees us broadcasting our position as we’re looking for them. Then bring up the hyperspace lane map, the local space map, and put up the locations and type of every ship that’s been hit so far. When and where they dropped out of hyperspace, the course they took, and where they were hit. I’m going to need that map played forward from the first attacks to today.”

The droid chirped as I put us on a course to the nearer of the planet’s two moons. While Arthree worked, I closed my eyes and reached out with the Force. I had picked up some new sensory techniques from Tython and some improvements to the ones I already had and this was as good a time as any to try them out.

Opening myself up to the Force and my empathic sense, I tuned out the planet behind me and focused outwards, sensing for anything out of the ordinary, dangerous, or malicious. Unfortunately, space was big and while my senses were good, this would probably take a while.

A couple of hours later, Arthree beeped—a loud, sharp note that yanked me out of half-sleep. The cockpit was dim, save for the soft glow of the navscreen flickering to life as the droid cued up the system map. I blinked against the light and sat up, rubbing the grit from my eyes.

“Let’s see it,” I muttered, voice still gravely.

The gridded system map unfolded in a slow rotation—inner planets, the twin asteroid belts, the orbital lanes, and the usual shipping corridors etched in pale blue. A moment later, yellow dots began popping onto the screen one by one, and blinking in sequence. Ship after ship came, each of them tagged with vector data and IFF codes. All of them—every one—had exited hyperspace just outside the asteroid belt.

“Further than I expected. Arthree, pull up the most recent Serenno regs on inbound hyperspace reversions.”

The droid warbled a response before putting the requested data on screen.

[NOTICE: System Traffic Control Alert. Serenno Orbital Authority recommends a minimum hyperspace reversion distance of 0.012 parsecs for vessels exceeding Class 3 tonnage due to high density transit lanes and increased collision risk. First time violators will be penalized with a fine according to their…]

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My eyes glossed over the complex matrix of fines and jail time.

Most planetary governments discouraged ships from dropping too close to orbit—especially the big ones. Too much mass exiting hyperspace at short range made traffic controllers and fellow pilots nervous. Nobody wanted to turn a routine approach into an orbital debris field because some freighter vented its entire cargo after a bad decel—especially the big ones, who typically carried volatile cargo. Even mid-sized freighters braked earlier than needed.

I leaned forward as more ship vectors populated—gray for civilian, yellow for monitored traffic, and the red ones… those were the ones that hadn’t made it. All hit en route, and all of them hit after exiting hyperspace.

But not one was hit outbound from Serenno.

That also made sense: outbound jumps were a different story after all. A ship leaving the planet could spool up and jump to hyperspace within minutes of leaving low orbit. Hell, if your nav was clear and your drive was hot, you could be gone by the time you cleared the upper atmosphere. Even for souped up pirate ships, it was a tight window for an ambush.

But inbound traffic with that kind of mass? Forced to drop early and drift for a few minutes at sublight while your systems oriented? It was practically written in every pilot textbook across the galaxy that if there was a time to get ambushed, it was right after hyperspace reversion.

I zoomed in on the transit paths.

They were all arching—climbing up and over the belt instead of going through it. The safer route with less chance of scraping the paint on a rogue rock.

“Every damn one of them,” I muttered. “They’re not even trying the direct route.”

The hits lined up across the upper arc of the belt’s outer edge. A few hundred klicks variance, but the same general kill zone. They weren’t directly on the plotted approach, but just off to the sides. So the pirates weren’t dumb. They knew not to sit directly on top of where the approach vector ran, because they knew patrols would sweep those spots first.

But if you sat beside it, just far enough to catch them when they coasted past… And you had passive sensors or droids parked out in front to ping for targets… And you powered down fast enough if you caught a navy sweep coming in… You had the perfect little pirate nest where you only had to wait for your prey to come within grabbing distance.

But even droids have blind spots.

They’re looking up—watching that overpass arc, but nobody watches below.

I dragged the map, adjusting the projection.

There it was. A sliver of vector space that wouldn’t ping their watchers until it was already past them—beneath their field of view.

I smiled. “Got you, you bastards.”

Deciding that was how I’d make my approach, I marked the optimum route from the hyperspace lane exit to Serenno on the map, then set out to the south of it, toward the asteroid field.

“Keep an eye out, Arthree. And remember—no active scanners.”

Arthree warbled an affirmative. And once we were close enough, I moved beneath the edge of the field, letting the titanic asteroids drift just above the hull as we eased along its perimeter. I kept my hands on the controls while Arthree listened passively, and I opened myself to the Force once more. As I felt for our quarry, my mind wandered back to the last couple of days since I’d arrived on Serenno and the situation I had arrived to.

It hadn’t been good. But it hadn’t been catastrophic either.

“Serenno should not rejoin the Republic,” Master Dooku had asserted, walking sedately with Lady Jenza through the halls of her abode on Serenno. “It mustn’t, not after what you and I have personally borne witness to.”

Jenza had stood at the window, her arms crossed, the light from the towers painting her silhouette in gold. “I am inclined to agree. We’ve been paying nearly half our planetary revenue in taxes,” she had said, “and receiving next to nothing in return.”

“The justification,” I had quoted the deal, “is that those funds support shared defense, logistical assistance, emergency relief…”

“Yes,” Jenza had said with a soft sigh, “Services which, by their own record, have either never arrived or arrived too late to matter. That is not governance but extraction. A vassal state’s burden. From the pirate activity in the outer settlements to the attempted coup three years ago, we filed every report and followed every formal protocol the Republic had imposed. Yet they never came, and we were forbidden from establishing our own defense fleet because of ‘overlap with Republic jurisdiction.’”

“They will defend a planetary regime—if it is compliant,” Dooku had said. “But not the citizens beneath it. For the people of Serenno were never the Republic’s concern, only this sector’s stability is. Serenno’s prosperity has only ever been a side effect of that policy.”

“So much for the Senate’s mission statement of protecting the rights of all Republic citizens,” I had said, fighting an eye roll at the time.

“Indeed,” Dooku’s gaze had fixed on mine. “Fine words, but in practice, it buries their petitions in committee.”

My master hadn’t been wrong. I had reviewed the records myself. Centuries of documentation showed the same pattern like some tapestry of typical government waste: laws passed, compliance enforced, pleas ignored. Socialization of cost and privatization of benefits. But still…

“A messy internal conflict is more wasteful than peaceful reform,” I muttered.

“Ah,” Jenza had said with a sad smile, “so you acknowledge that Serenno has nothing to gain by remaining under the Republic’s thumb. It is only the method by which we… correct this mistake that is left to be debated?”

“I never denied it,” I had shrugged. “Only counseling exploring all options before committing to a messy one.”

“But the decision is already made,” Master Dooku had informed me.

“We’ve already begun procurement,” Jenza had said, “The first shipments are on their way. The trade disruption hurts, yes, but not as much as paying for the privilege of being abandoned. Without those taxes draining our economy, we now possess the resources to defend ourselves.”

“Twelve Keldabe-class battleships,” Dooku had specified. “Constructed by Mandal Hypernautics. Three per month, scheduled over the next quarter. Four Quasar Fire-class cruiser-carriers from SoroSuub. Ninety-six fighter berths apiece. And each Keldabe has thirty-six, plus two for shuttles or light freighters. As well as torpedoes, munitions, power cores, fuel—procured not only from Mandalore, but from allied systems and independent manufacturers. All en route.”

“That’s…” I had lost my words at the scale at which things were moving.

“The Republic will not collapse tomorrow—but it will collapse.” Jenza glanced out the window to the skyline of the capital city, “And Serenno will not fall with it.”

And that military buildup was another issue entirely…

I had spoken with Master Dooku and Jenza several times since arriving on Serenno, but the tone of the conversations changed once the others joined in. I’d sat in on several long-range holocomms between Serenno and Mandalore, watching blue flickers of Duchess Satine Kryze and Mandalore Jaster Mereel.

Heads of State, of entire planets, speaking from opposite ends of the galaxy and connected by a single thread: Mutual Survival.

The concern had been clear from the start. Serenno’s independence was no longer a quiet conversation in drawing rooms or council chambers. It had been declared, officially and publicly. Mandalore hadn’t followed yet, but Satine had made it clear she would soon. Both systems had already ceased paying taxes to the Republic, and Mandalore wasn’t just building ships for itself—it was building them for us.

Even with the glacial reaction speed of the Senate, they were bound to notice soon and arrange a violent response.

“It is a loud message,” Master Dooku had said during the most recent call, his voice smooth but iron-edged. “Two prominent systems… Both militarizing, and both rejecting Republic oversight. They will see it as a coordinated act of hostility.”

“Good. They should be worried,” Jaster had said, arms folded over his chest, the harsh lighting of the Mandalorian war room casting shadows over his features. “Even if we’re not planning an attack on them. A little fear means that they respect us. Respect Mandalore.”

“We’re not stockpiling weapons for a spectacle,” Jenza had said, her voice clipped and steady. “We’re doing it because the pirates are growing more aggressive every month. The Hutts have begun moving assets into our outer orbitals. The scant few Republic patrols have withdrawn. They’ve left a vacuum.”

“And we are left to fill it ourselves,” Satine had added. “Or see our people bled dry by raiders and syndicates.”

Dooku inclined his head slightly. “But the Senate will not acknowledge that reality. They will interpret military capability as intent. They are terrified of dissent—because they fear what it might inspire. When a corrupt institution begins losing its tributaries, it does not tighten its grip on principle. It tightens it on the throat.”

Satine’s expression remained composed, but I saw it in her eyes—she had heard that tightening already.

Jaster had leaned forward. “The Jedi Council knows what’s coming. You think they’ll just let this go?”

“I suspect they will attempt diplomacy first,” I had said. “One of their own. A negotiation, but more of a subtle warning.”

“I believe my pupil is correct,” Dooku had said, voice darkening slightly. “Moreover, they will send someone who believes the Republic must survive, and that we are traitors for stepping away. Someone who will find it far easier to leap at the wrong conclusion.”

“Typical, and when they find it’s definitely our fault?” Jaster had asked.

“They’ll escalate,” Jenza had said. “Fleet action under the guise of peacekeeping.”

“Which is why we need each other,” Satine had said. “We can claim our intent is peaceful all we like, but peace unsupported is just a polite form of surrender. The Republic will not respect our sovereignty unless we demonstrate the means to defend it.”

“Then we are in agreement,” Dooku had said. “Let it be formalized. A mutual defense pact between Serenno and Mandalore. If either system is attacked by the Republic or its proxies, the other will respond in kind.”

“I accept,” Satine had immediately said, her voice steady, “We’ve walked this path before. Mandalore cannot afford to walk it alone again. In the holobooks yet to be, let it not be written that Mandalore was the victim to another… humiliation. Never again.”

“And I’ll hold you to that, Duchess,” Jaster had said, with a slight smile that didn’t reach his eyes. He had looked over to Jenza, “Because if they come, they’ll come for both of us. And we’ll need every ship, every fighter, every soul who knows how to hold a line.”

“Then we must ensure it is a shield they fear breaking,” Jenza had simply replied.

There had been silence after that. A quiet, determined consensus between allies in a do-or-die situation. Everyone in that comms had understood the same truth: the Republic had been looking for an excuse, and we were about to give it one.

They would come. And when they did, we would have to be ready.

From there, once everyone was on the same page on that holobook’s prelude to war, the conversation took a predictable martial turn.

Jaster, never one to back down, had leaned forward, resting both forearms on the edge of the holotable. “Look, we’re not the only ones pulling out,” he’d said. “Half the Mid Rim is teetering, and the Outer Rim’s already halfway gone. I know it, you all know it, we’ve seen the traffic data.”

“We have,” Jenza had replied, sliding a report across the holo-channel feed. “Eight systems in the past two months. Quiet declarations, but official.”

“Then we ought to stop thinking like isolated planets,” Jaster had said. “If they strike one of us, they will conquer us piecemeal. But if they strike one and find themselves up against an alliance—a big chunk of the galactic map all looking in their direction—suddenly even those bloated Senators will hesitate.”

Dooku had exhaled quietly. “An organized coalition of aligned sovereign systems in a mutual defense pact.”

“Call it whatever you like.” Jaster had said, with the faintest hint of satisfaction. “But it’s time to stop thinking in planetary borders and start thinking like a galactic counterweight.”

There had been a brief silence on the call as the weight of the idea settled across the group.

Then Satine had spoken. “And who will speak for us? If we are to form an alliance, someone must negotiate on our behalf. Someone the other worlds will trust.”

Jaster had looked at Dooku, unblinking. “You know the Senate. You know the Jedi. You’ve been both inside the machine and outside it. I vote for the Count.”

“I second that,” Jenza had said without hesitation. “No one else has the stature or the strategic mind.”

Dooku had gone still for a moment. His hands, always so deliberate, had paused in motion. “I did not propose this initiative to lead it,” he had said.

“And yet, here you are,” Jenza had noted.

“That’s how it works.” Jaster had also agreed with a faint smirk.

I had watched Master Dooku closely at that moment, watched as his eyes went to Satine to Jaster then to Jenza. He exhaled, “I accept the responsibility. But I will not lie to you—if this grows, it will draw fire. From Coruscant and the Jedi Council, it will ripple to all corners of the Republic. Seditionists will likely be the tamest word they’ll use to paint us.”

“Then let them paint,” Satine had said. “Truth won’t be determined by their holonet headlines.”

Master Dooku took the mantle without ceremony, immediately launching efforts to coordinate with sympathetic systems. By the next day, the Council Hall on Serenno had been repurposed into a nerve center, with entire wings cleared out and converted into diplomatic suites. Holotransceivers, encrypted relay stations, and dedicated diplomatic attaches had flooded in within days.

But even that wasn’t the end of it, the internal work had begun immediately. Serenno could not be a capital of independence while it still bore the fingerprints of Ramil’s regime. The rot ran deeper than any single nameplate on an office door.

“This is not a gentle transition,” Dooku had warned one evening, his tone clipped with that rare, simmering frustration that only surfaced when his patience had been strained. “Decay has been allowed to spread to the roots of this world, and it has left me no choice but to enact not a reshuffling, but a purgation.” Follow current novels on novel⚑fire.net

I had never seen him work like that before.

Jenza had drawn up the initial structure for the internal oversight department within hours of that first meeting. She and Dooku had agreed on its name and its charter had been ratified by the planetary council in less than a day.

Authority was granted, access codes issued, and the mandate was simple and unambiguous: no loyalty but to Serenno itself.

They had requisitioned a secured wing of the capital’s central archives, cleared out half the floor, and filled it with terminal clusters and review stations. A dedicated force of investigators—many of them hand-picked by Jenza—had been brought in from outside the existing government entirely. Retired military logisticians. Legal and financial analysts. Independent auditors. Even a few droids, heavily modified, with slicing permissions and behavioral heuristics designed to flag inconsistencies in appointment data.

The review process was brutal. Reaching every department, and every post from supervisors to data clerks.

“I want a full record of each appointee’s qualifications,” Jenza had instructed the army of droids during the first daily briefing. “Educational background, public service record, financial disclosures, and chain of appointment. If anything was pushed through irregularly, I want it flagged.”

And when files proved inconsistent—or incomplete—interviews followed. In person and with no exceptions.

For certain key posts, Jenza had personally reviewed the replacements. Thumbing through profiles by hand. Meanwhile, her aides had borne the bulk of the fieldwork and toured each department in person, meeting staff directly by walking unannounced into facilities with a slate in hand and ordering them into the spacious main halls where curtained cubicles were prepared to interview them by the dozens. No one was safe from review, and no one was expected to be.

I’d sat in on a few. And it was surreal to be back to my original occupation… two lifetimes ago. But the usefulness of a living lie detector couldn’t be ignored.

“State your name and department,” the investigator would begin as soon as the interviewee sat in a tiny chair. The question had almost echoed as dozens of others were conducting the same interview with the same questionnaire in the same hall.

“Martan Vell. Office of Interstellar Customs.”

“And how were you appointed to your position?”

“I… my uncle served as under-director. He recommended me… oh and I passed the qualifying test!”

“Do you possess a degree or formal training in trade regulation, logistics, or Republic import law?”

“No, but I’ve worked in ports since I was nineteen—”

“And yet we have no record of your prior service. Can you explain this discrepancy?”

Many couldn’t, or worse—they could but their explanations only confirmed that they’d been placed as favors, paid in influence or coin. Those who couldn’t justify their position were removed immediately.