Chapter 49: Chapter 49

A Young Girl’s War Between the Stars

Alaris, 39 BBY/961 GSC. Approaching blockade.

I looked at the fishbowl display, studying the positions of the enemy blockade fleet, their orbital path and speed, and our own approach and velocity. On the hologram, three CECConsular-class light corvettesand a single modified CEC CR90 corvette flew in a heavy right formation relative to the planet—keeping three ships on the outside of the orbital path and one on the inside. Following the lines drawn on the map, with points marked with timestamps, I saw where our flight path would intersect theirs and we would slip in behind them, joining their formation from the rear. We were a little less than half an hour out from being in the perfect position to attack.

The frigate lit up as it broadcast to us. “Flight path confirmed ROI. Just slide into the rear of the formation. Leave the docking and formation maneuvering to us, and we’ll rotate out as needed, one at a time.”

“Roger that, Serpent. We look forward to your patronage,” the lieutenant answered. “ROI out.”

As soon as the transmit light was off, Lt. Taris looked to the communications officer. “Sound general quarters.”

“Aye, sir.” The familiar tone calling for attention sounded across the ship, followed by a short alarm. “This is not a drill. This is not a drill. General quarters. General quarters. All hands, man your battle stations. Set condition ‘Zeta’ throughout the ship. Attack on enemy forces will commence in approximately T-20 minutes.”

I tapped at the controls on my chair, adjusting the fishbowl to focus on the moon we were fighting over. “Comms. officer, page Cid to the bridge.”

Waiting for the cantankerous old man to show up, I studied what we could pick up with the passive sensors. There were a few hot spots on the surface, where I thought our forces were gathered. Passive signal detection showed what might be the droid facility as well. I couldn’t be certain on either of those without an active scan—and doing that would clue the enemy in that we weren’t who we appeared to be.

Focus on what’s right in front of us. With that thought, I shifted the display to bring up the four ships.

The Consular-class had been around for nearly a thousand years—since just after the Ruusan Reformation, in fact. They were ubiquitous as the go-to ship for corvettes. Everyone from the Republic Navy, to planetary authorities, shipping companies, and pirates employed them. Even the Jedi had several in service. The crew requirements were minimal. They were modular and could be outfitted with a wide range of weaponry. Brand new, they were fairly cheap but lightly used you could get one for less than a million credits. Honestly, if I hadn’t acquired my corsair, I was considering buying one outright for myself at some point in the future.

These particular Consulars were outfitted with at least six twin turbolaser turrets each. I doubted they also had missiles, but it was possible. We wouldn’t be able to tell without a deep scan, and doing one would surely convince them to launch said missiles.

The CR90, on the other hand, was relatively new but exceedingly popular. That model had come into service around 950 GSC and Corellian Engineering Corp. could barely make enough to satisfy demand as it quickly began to replace the Consular-class as the workhorse of the Republic Navy. Everyone wanted one, and I couldn’t really blame them. This particular one had been modified, but I couldn’t quite tell how—just that it looked different from a standard model.

They were relatively well-armed for their size, but were modular like the Consular-class, so they could be easily up-armed to the point of outgunning nearly anything in its weight class. Their power plant was excellent and their shields were decent. As far as escorts, gunships, and system patrol craft went, they filled the roles rather well while also being somewhat cheaper than the nearest competitors—if I recalled correctly, they went for between two and a half to three and a half million credits, with the next best in class being about four million.

My only qualm was that the CR90 was ugly as sin. I didn’t like the hammerhead design and the mass of drives on the ass end of it was just unsightly. If all you cared about was function and price and you could completely disregard form, it was a decent choice. However, if you cared at all about how it looked, you were better off paying a bit more for something that both looked appealing and had the features you wanted.

In fact, when I was still looking into a career in the Republic Navy, it was the new CR90 that I looked to as what I would most likely end up commanding. An ugly but functional ship I could learn the ins and outs of and put to good use, earning my salary. That was before I learned just how corrupt they were, and how likely war was to break out soon. Before Master Dooku gave me another option.

There was a chime from the elevator and the platform descended. A moment later, it came back up and our weapons engineer stepped onto the bridge. The old man wore his normal clothes, but I could see the edge of a vac suit poking out of his collar, and a collapsible helmet at his hip. Looking around, Cid whistled quietly before stepping into the fishbowl hologram. “Damn. Cindy said she was inspired, but this is nice.”

“It is,” I agreed from my chair, before tapping at the controls and highlighting the enemy formation, then bringing up the specs and technical diagrams we had for those models off to the side of the display showing our current respective courses and the countdown to intercept—when we would have to either commit, or jump to lightspeed before we got close enough for their sensors to penetrate our disguise.

The Consular-class was so old that nothing about it had been secret for a long, long time. The CR90, on the other hand, was new enough that we really only had the ‘public release’ diagrams for civilian models. There wouldn’t be much difference between those and the ones sold to military interests, or the Republic Navy. “What do you think?”

“Well, that depends on what your goal here is, girly.”

I nodded. “We want to capture as many of them as possible, but I’m not opposed to destroying one or two to cow the others. We’re going to be getting in very close. I want to know your opinion on turning the big gun on that CR90 if we need to.”

Cid snorted. “Oh, she’ll do the job alright. If I were you,” he moved over to the hologram and tapped the right ‘hammerhead’ protrusion, “I’d put a shot through her right here. Do it from the right angle and that’ll take out the bridge crew without completely destroying the bridge.”

Turning a questioning look on Lt. Taris, I raised an eyebrow. “Think we can?”

“Excuse me.” He grabbed the panel on the side of my chair and detached it to use as a tablet. After a moment of fiddling with it for a moment, he projected a simulated engagement. On it, our ship moved in from the rear and then angled to attack as suggested. “We come in close, then at the last minute,” red lines traced out from the holographic ship to the others, “we roll to port to expose our guns for a better shot and open fire.” The model of our ship rolled leftward, allowing the guns on the bottom to point fully downwards from our position while keeping the railgun in the nose aimed at the main target. “We can potentially take out or cripple three targets at the same time. The main gun hits the CR90 as suggested. We line the port guns up on this Consular and the starboard on this other one. Open fire with a volley of ion cannon fire, targeting their main deflector shield projectors. Once those are down, switch to turbolasers and give them a few shots, before sending the order to surrender. We may not have to even engage the last one, but regardless, we should launch fighters as soon as we fire the first shot.”

Considering for a moment, I nodded. “Very well.”

“I do have one question, captain,” the lieutenant began, and I motioned for him to continue. “How are we handling prisoners, or are we…handling them?”

“Mm.” Humming quietly to myself, I gave it a second of thought before voicing those thoughts aloud as I slowly paced the deck. “Demanding surrender and then executing prisoners is a crime in civilized space. Moreover, these are enemy regulars, not pirates. In this case, the difference is paper thin, but it is there. And while we are privateers and acting in a piratical manner ourselves, we are still bound by the letter of most of the conventional laws of warfare. Should our actions ever come under scrutiny and any records or witness testimony of untoward conduct arise, we would be subject to the law as though we ourselves were pirates.

“So then… We will offer them the opportunity to surrender. Then, we will send marine teams to board their vessels and secure them—I’ll be joining one of those teams myself. If they put up any resistance, the marines are cleared to deal with anyone who does anything unwise. Once they are secure, we will modify the life pods to direct them to land on Alaris Prime and activate their distress beacons on a timer to give us enough time to get the captured ships away—if we can capture them. We send the prisoners down on their life pods. The SOS draws in the enemy. The enemy wastes time and resources dealing with those stranded below. We have a target rich environment to play in and potentially more prize ships.” ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ novel[f]ire.net

Taking my seat, I grinned. “Of course, if one of them refuses to surrender, we’ll have to blow them up to make an example of them to the others. Unless it’s the CR90. That one, I’ll deal with myself if I have to, but I want that ship. It is worth a lot of money and I’d like to make this little venture as profitable as possible for all of us.”

“Mind if I stay up here and watch? I want to see how my baby does, firsthand,” the old man asked.

Lt. Taris glanced at me and I nodded. “It’s fine.”

Watching the display, I waited as we closed the distance. Given the distances involved, it was rather quick, but it felt like things dragged on and on, and as the tension across the ship grew, I reached out and pushed back, doing what I could to calm everyone.

For a few moments, I briefly considered projecting myself ahead and just… handling it myself. I could vent the CR90 to space, for instance. Or have it fire on the other ships. Or just put their bridge crews to sleep. The possibilities afforded to me with Force Projection were quite frankly terrifying given the potential for someone to use it against me. It was also insanely tempting to use, even now. It was like having my own little cheat code. An instant ‘I win’ button.

But while that would potentially win us the day, it would cripple my people in the long run. They wouldn’t be tested. They would come to rely on me when they should instead be relying on their own skills and experience. Especially since I was eventually going to leave to go on other missions and I needed them to be able to operate independently and continue making money, or responding when and if I called for backup.

The long term gain was simply too great to sacrifice in exchange for the short term advantage. So, as much as it pained me to give up the opportunity, I sat back in my chair and waited.

And then there’s the other issue, I mused. I didn’t know of any other Jedi in the current era who could use Force Projection to the degree that I could. And while Revan assured me that it was actually much more common in his time, especially among the Sith, that didn’t particularly help in the here and now.

If ships started venting themselves or firing on their allies any time I showed up in the general area, people would begin to suspect my involvement. And with a Sith, potentially two, active it wouldn’t be long until they sussed out what I was doing and began either coming up with a defense or trap, or doing it themselves—or all of the above.

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I wouldn’t be giving the enemy ideas if I could help it. That meant it needed to stay in reserve for now. Used sparingly and mostly for scouting and communication, as I had been.

Finally, the time came. Our ship slipped into an area of space highlighted by proximity with the enemy ships as the red zone—too close to back out now. We were in range of their guns, and they were in range of ours.

Lt. Taris made his way over to the comms officer’s station and took her headset, before keying up. “All hands, this is your XO. Make final preparations for combat.”

He handed back the headset and pulled the helmet off his hip, securing it over his head before clicking his heels to engage his mag boots as the other bridge crew did likewise. I grabbed my own armored helmet from the floor and pulled it on, making sure it read as sealed. Turning to me, Lt. Taris said, “Your orders, captain?”

I grinned. “Begin the assault.”

“Aye, captain!” Turning, the lieutenant turned around, tucking his hands behind his back. “Helm, rotate the ship ninety degrees along the Z axis, then pitch up fifteen, bringing the nose in line with the front of the CR90. Do it nice and slow. Make it look like we’re just drifting a bit as we match with them. Make sure our optical camouflage stays true to its previous orientation—if they happen to look outside, I don’t want them realizing we’re turning. Main gun, target the starboard front section of the CR90 and begin charging now. Port battery, switch to ion cannons and target the second Consular, starboard battery the same for the third. Concentrate ion cannon fire on their deflector array. As soon as it’s down, switch to turbolasers and hit each with a broadside—shake them up but try not to break anything too important. As soon as the shooting starts, start jamming their comms—we don’t want them squawking home for backup. Once the shooting starts, scramble fighters. All stations report when ready.”

I watched as the display showed everything being done while, through the transparisteel ‘windows’ of the bridge, our position relative to the other ships and the moon changed, putting the moon above us instead of on our left. After only a few seconds, people began reporting in with simple calls of, “Ready!”

“On your order, captain,” the lieutenant said.

“Fire!” Lt. Taris roared.

The ship shuddered slightly even with the inertial dampeners as the main gun fired, then a staccato beat pounded up through our feet as the ion cannons began firing. Outside, there was a flash of shields from the CR90, then a very brief flash of fire and a mist of air and debris as the front right hammerhead section of the CR90 evaporated into shrapnel. I watched as bodies and chunks of bodies were evacuated from the CR90’s bridge and out into space.

“Hot damn,” Cid murmured directly behind me. “She actually works. She fucking works.”

“At point blank range, with the element of surprise,” I added the caveat, and felt the man’s annoyance as I put a damper on his joy. “The real test comes later, when their reinforcements arrive.”

With a grunt, the man grudgingly conceded, “Yeah. You’re right.”

“Charge the main gun and prepare to fire again,” the lieutenant ordered.

Through the view ports, I watched as our batteries switched over from the blue of ion cannons to the red of plasma and small explosions dotted the hulls of the two Consulars we’d targeted. Lt. Taris nodded, before giving the order, “Comms, hail the enemy. Put me on.”

“You’re transmitting, sir.”

“Trandoshan blockade vessels, heave to. Cut your engines, lower your shields, and prepare to be boarded. If you surrender, you will be spared. We want your ships, not your lives, but we’re willing to take both if you force our hand. If you attempt to flee or fire upon us, you will be destroyed. You have thirty seconds to comply and respond with your formal surrender. Your time starts now.”

It was a tense twenty seconds before the sensor operator announced, “The first Consular is powering drives.”

“Fighters?” Lt. Taris asked.

“Engaging, sir. But it looks like they’re going to be able to engage their hyperdrive before the fighters can get their shields down.”

“Fine. Have the fighters clear out. Helm, bring us about and line us up with that Consular. Target their ship with the main gun,” came the lieutenant’s order. “Fire when we have a solution.”

The ship dipped and lined up as the fighters scattered from the Consular starting to pull away. Almost as soon as the ship came into view properly, it evaporated in a flare of shields and a silent fireball. Our shield flashed in places as debris pinged off of it like rain.

“Confirm reactor hit. Enemy ship destroyed!” the weapons officer reported. “Charging main gun again.”

Looking to the comms station, Lt. Taris waited a moment for the officer to nod, before saying, “We warned you. Cut your engines and prepare to be boarded immediately, or you will be destroyed.”

“Sir, registering thruster shutdown from the two Consulars. They’re signaling their surrender. I don’t think the CR90 can hear us, though,” the sensor officer reported.

“That’s fine,” he nodded. “Bring us close and prepare boarding parties. Captain, if you’re going to join the others, you’ll want to hurry. They’re about to launch.”

Nodding, I stood. “XO, you have the bridge. I’ll be back shortly.”

I made my way to the elevator, where Cid joined me on the way down. As we descended, I said, “Your weapon did well, even if the test didn’t show off its full potential. It’s still quite impressive so far. I look forward to seeing what else it can do.”

I felt a bit of pride off of the man as he nodded. “Don’t worry. She’s got plenty more where that came from.”

“Good. We’ll be needing it soon.”

I left the old engineer at a run as I hurried down the corridor to the flight deck. I was only briefly distracted by the open ceiling and the view

Spotting the boarding craft, I hurried inside and joined the contingent of Mandalorian marines already inside. As soon as I made it in, someone hit a switch to close the rear hatch/ramp and called, “Cap’s on board! Go, go, go!”

The inertial dampeners must have been dialed down, or simply unable to compensate, as the drop ship rocketed up and out of the hangar. Then, I was nearly thrown on my ass as it leapt forward, rapidly accelerating to catch up to the CR90.

“Hard dock in thirty seconds! Hatch is over there, captain,” the (first) sergeant in charge of this group of Mandos directed my attention to a circular hatch on the floor. I nodded and moved into position. “You should let one of us go first, ma’am.”

“Negative, sergeant,” I shook my head, pulling my lightsaber and getting ready. “As soon as we board, I’m going straight to the engine room to make sure no one tries to scuttle the ship. You and your men secure the rest of the ship. There should be a backup bridge near the center of the ship. As soon as you have it, get us slowed down and radio Lt. Taris.”

He hesitated and I could feel the man’s consternation. After a moment, he said, “How about I send an escort with you—”

“They’ll just slow me down,” I shook my head. “Trust me, I’ll be fine.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he capitulated, very reluctantly.

A few seconds later, the ship jolted with an impact as we came to an abrupt stop. A panel flashed on the side of the hatch, going from red, to blinking yellow, then finally to solid green. Grabbing the latch lever, I pulled it up and open, revealing a second hatch below. Forcing that one open, I dropped down through the hole, igniting my lightsaber as I fell.

It was chaos below as men and women scrambled to assess damage, everyone I could feel who wasn’t one of the Mandos I’d brought with me radiating worry, concern, fear, and/or panic in varying degrees. Yellow alarm lights flashed and dim amber emergency lighting lit the area, while the overhead lights had apparently failed.

“BOARDERS! We’ve got boarders!” someone yelled in Basic. An instant later, an alarm began blaring and the yellow flashing lights going off were joined by red.

A moment later, my danger sense flared and I swung, smacking a blaster bolt back the way it had come and stepping forward to clear the hatch as the enemy began firing. Looking around the cargo bay we’d found ourselves in, I grabbed several metal crates with the Force and dragged them over, piling them up to make some improvised cover for my people. The Mandos quickly piled in behind me and began returning fire as they dug in.

“You have this, sergeant?” I asked, and the man nodded.

With that, I spun up a detection formula and pinged the ship. Orienting myself on the engine room, I took off at a run, shutting off my lightsaber and activating an optical camouflage formula before I left cover. Rushing across the deck, I made it to the hatch leading deeper into the ship and dove through, hurrying down towards engineering. Someone shut off the irritating intruder alarm, but the red flashing lights remained.

Eventually, I came to a locked hatch, feeling several people behind it—all of them radiating panic, but also a sort of grim determination that told me I needed to move. I dropped the camo formula and tried the hatch, finding it locked. Reaching out with the Force, I grabbed it and pulled, durasteel groaning under the force as I slowly bent the locking mechanism out. Finally, the lock gave way and the door flew open with a loud boom of metal on metal that echoed in the sudden silence.

A group of nine men and women, mostly Trandoshans but some other races, stood in the dim hallway lit only by the slow, alternating red and yellow strobe lights. I stepped slowly through the hatch and their tension increased, panic very quickly starting to give way to anger.

“Let me through. Let me stop whoever that is on the other side of those doors from scuttling the ship. No one has to die today. Surrender, and you will be allowed to board the escape pods and leave. But if you make me go through you to get to that engine room, there will be—”

“FIRE!” someone in the back screamed, and the group opened fire.

Red plasma bolts streaked down the corridor towards me, only to slow, then stop entirely as they hung in midair. The frantic shooting stopped as the enemy stared—the fires of anger suddenly snuffed under a tsunami of fear.

White-silver lit the gloom as I pulled my second lightsaber and ignited both. The plasma bolts abruptly reversed course, causing the people in the hall to scatter, taking cover from their own returned shots, before some of the braver—or perhaps more stupid—poked their weapons back out and fired desperately. Not that they had a chance in hell of hitting me.

I flew down the corridor, juking around anything that came close to hitting as I spun through the air, blades seeking targets as I rushed down the hall—a whirlwind of flashing blades and trailing cloak as people fell in my wake. Reaching the end I flipped end over end, landing feet first on the far side hatch—blasting it out of its housing and into the room beyond, knocking down two people mustering on the other side to ambush me.

I flung both blades out and drew my pistol. One blade speared a very tall, very hairy alienholding a rifle on my left through the chest while the other spun, whipping through the area a pair of trandoshans’ heads had occupied a moment before. The blaster flashed once and the trandoshan messing with the console collapsed forward against it, before sliding off and falling to the floor, leaving the room clear.

Quickly recovering and stowing my weapons, I hurried over to the console to check the damage. A quiet sigh escaped me as I saw that while the self-destruct sequence had been input, it hadn’t been confirmed. I quickly canceled it and locked out the panel to make sure no one else could use it without the new code I’d just input.

Tapping the side of my helmet, I keyed up on the radio. “This is the captain. Sergeant, how are things looking on your end?”

“Things are proceeding apace, ma’am. We’ve secured the backup bridge and I’ve got my men searching the ship to secure the rest of the crew.”

“Understood. Send a pair of men back to engineering to relieve me and I’ll join the search. That will be much faster than searching blindly.”

It was less than two minutes later when two armored Mandos hurried into the engine room. “Ma’am,” they saluted and I quickly returned it.

“Hold down the fort, gentlemen. I’ll send someone to relieve you as soon as I can,” I told them, before hurrying back down the corridor to help finish the sweep.

Once I met up with the Mandos, we swept the ship from stem to stern, quickly rounding up the rest of the crew and hauling them to the cargo area. Once they were secured, and a couple of our men started working on those escape pods, I made my way to the secondary bridge. A check of the CR90’s sensors showed that the ships that remained had come back together in formation.

Active scans showed no other ships in the zone and my ship was still jamming comms, so it seemed like backup wasn’t coming any time soon. I allowed myself a small smile at seeing our success so far, before making my way back to the cargo bay.

“Sergeant, as soon as you can get these prisoners into those pods and off this ship, I want you to return to our ship. We’ll be sending backup down to the planet as soon as we can, then pulling out to prepare for the next phase of the operation. Also, I poked my head into their docking bay and found out what looked off about this particular CR90 variant—they’ve expanded the docking bay. It’s effectively a carrier, but all of that extra space was wasted holding one ship—a CR25 troop carrier. I think their intent was to send their own people down to try to run off the Wookiees. Either way, I want it. We’ll be taking that for our personal use. She’s a bit too big to put in the docking bay, but she’s got a hyperdrive and can be flown with minimal crew. For now, we’ll send it to the surface with our people we’re sending to back up Master Qui-Gon—that way, we don’t have to deploy the VAAT.”

The man nodded. “Yes, captain. You’re not sticking around?”

I shook my head. “I’ll be going ahead.”

“Understood. I’ll wrap this up as fast as I can.”

With that, I made my way to an airlock and out into the black. It was a quick trip back to the ship via flight formula and I soon flew through the shield over the hangar bay and set down inside. Heading straight to the bridge, I pulled my helmet off and stuck it to the magnetic plate on my hip as I took the elevator up.

This time, thankfully no one announced my presence. Lt. Taris did turn from where he was hovering over the sensor station and meet me at the captain’s seat, however. “Captain, how did it go?”

“A few dead. They were very close to scuttling the ship when I arrived. Another few seconds and we’d have been atoms,” I admitted quietly. “Other than that, the ship’s secure and nearly ready for transport. They’ll be sending off the life pods soon. I found a nice little prize for ourselves while I was there, too—a CR25 we can use for larger troop deployments and the like. She won’t fit, but she can dock in transit and transfer troops and supplies back and forth as needed. I’m think I’ll have Cindy give it a few upgrades and add some hologram and signature spoofing to make it look like a light freighter. We can have it automated to follow along with us or follow programmed flight paths when we’re not actively using it.”

Lt. Taris chuckled, nodding. “If you say so, captain.”

“The other two ships?” I asked, looking out the view ports towards the two Consulars.

“Secured and ready to send their escape pods when we give the signal. We’ve already sent droids and the minimum crew needed to transport them to the rendezvous point, and a shuttle so they can get back when they’re done.”

“Good work. If you’ll take it from here, I need to make a trip down to the planet’s surface. I won’t be long. I need to get into contact with Master Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan, and I can’t trust the message to a transmission.” And while I could use a Force Projection, I didn’t want to risk Palpatine or the other Sith somehow detecting and overhearing it, minimal as I felt the risk was.

Besides… There was something to be said for visiting in person.

“Understood. We’ll contact you if we spot anything on long range sensors.”

With that, I left the bridge and hurried back to the hangar. Pulling my helmet on, I waved to Arthree and the droid hurried over, slotting himself in as I climbed into the Dagger.

Keying up on my radio, I made sure to let our CIC know I was leaving before easing her up and out, then turning for the green moon. Get down, let Master Qui-Gon know about Palpatine, then head back up. I’m not here to get stuck in on this little moon. I’ll let the marines handle that. As soon as I’m back, we’ll go set up nearby and prepare our ambush. Then, it’s time for a harassment campaign. If they want to drag their heels in the senate while they try to strong-arm things on Alaris Prime, then we’ll just have to make them bleed for it. With the Trade Federation bankrolling it, their pockets are too deep to bleed them dry, but that just means more money for us.

The question was, how long did I want to stick around and farm the Trandoshan government, and thus the Trade Federation for credits? Eventually, they would wise up and figure out there was someone out here picking off their ships, and they’d send a larger force. We needed to strike a balance somewhere between doing enough damage to them, and earning enough credits for ourselves, and not risking our asses against a pacification fleet.

We’ll have to see how they respond to this one first. No point getting ahead of ourselves.

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